What Are You Reading Now?

[mariab]

You mean, cuz of Brainstorm? (Which I haven't seen.)

He won an Oscar for "The Deer Hunter!"

Well-earned, if you ask me.

How did we move from books to movies? ;-)

[DVV]

He knows what happened to Nathalie Woods.

[kensei]

Hey, me too. Seriously like this guy. Liked him even in that silly Bond movie (A view to a kill). Maybe his best was The deer hunter. And his scene in Annie Hall is hilarious.

He won an Oscar for "The Deer Hunter!" Some other movies of his that came from books include Stephen King's "The Dead Zone," Frederick Forsyth's "The Dogs of War," and Whitley Strieber's "Communion."

[mariab]

I'm a big Christopher Walken fan and was collecting his movies for a while. Oh my god, was he ever bizarre and creepy in "The Comfort of Strangers." Yikes.

Hey, me too. Seriously like this guy. Liked him even in that silly Bond movie (A view to a kill). Maybe his best was The deer hunter. And his scene in Annie Hall is hilarious.

[kensei]

I've seen the movies for both The cement garden (by Andrew Birkin, starring his niece Charlotte Gainsbourg) and for The comfort of strangers (playing in Venice, with Christopher Walken and Natasha Richardson).

I'm a big Christopher Walken fan and was collecting his movies for a while. Oh my god, was he ever bizarre and creepy in "The Comfort of Strangers." Yikes.

[mariab]

I've seen the movies for both The cement garden (by Andrew Birkin, starring his niece Charlotte Gainsbourg) and for The comfort of strangers (playing in Venice, with Christopher Walken and Natasha Richardson).

[robhouse]

I have been reading Ian McEwan: The Cement Garden, Black Dogs and I just finished Atonement. Next will be The Comfort of Strangers or perhaps short stories of Edith Wharton.

RH

[Adam Went]

Gone very old school at the moment and am perusing Dickens' "The Uncommercial Traveller" collection of stories....very fascinating stuff, though a little hard to take in at times if you haven't been to or seen the places he's talking about as they were 150 odd years ago.

Frederick Forsyth got me hooked on "ODESSA File" so "Day Of The Jackal" is waiting in the wings too....chewing through the classics at the moment...

Cheers,
Adam.

[The Grave Maurice]

What Alice Knew

There was an unexpected lull in the pre-Christmas activities around here, so last night and this afternoon I read Paula Marantz Cohen's What Alice Knew: A Most Curious Tale of Henry James & Jack the Ripper. I didn't hold out much hope for this one. I read a Henry James novel (The Ambassadors, I think) many years ago and just about died of boredom.

Anyway, this is much better than I anticipated. Marantz Cohen writes engagingly and her work has some keen insights. There were a couple of small problems with her knowledge of JtR, but nothing that can't be attributed to artistic license. It's an interesting, well-crafted novel. For a while, I thought she was leading her readers down a well-worn path, but she has a nice little detour at the end that leads to a very satisfying denouement.

If you're looking for a way to spend a pleasant afternoon or two over the next couple of weeks, you might want to pick this up.

[Scorpio]

I am reading Cormac McCarthy's blood meridian.
If i read enough times then i might understand it.

[c.d.]

I just recently finished "The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks" a non-fiction book on the development of the He-La cell line. Very good.

Also "Unbroken" by Laura Hillenbrand who wrote "Seabiscuit." It is a true story of survival in World War II. Very good.

I just recently ordered "1861:The Civil War Awakening" by Adam Goodheart. It has gotten excellent reviews by hard core civil war buffs who say that it provides a unique perspective on the causes of the war and why everybody was so pissed.

c.d.

[mariab]

Same here David, and one doesn't even need to read them constantly to be "carrying them around" in onesself.
I sure hope I'm not getting old though, at least not for a couple decades yet. ;-) (If I live that long, that is.)

[DVV]

Hi Maria & Maurice, all

there are many authors I re-read regularly. Some for all their works, some for one book.
It sure means I'm getting old, as Maurice suggested, but that's a good part of it.

I believe there is a need for re-reading certain authors and be somewhat in constant touch with them, and I believe this need is normal.

[The Grave Maurice]

I've just started re-reading all the Sherlock Holmes stories. I try to do that every few years, and I always find something new in them. Another author I try to re-read every decade or so is Proust. Fortunately I've got a couple of years before I have to tackle his work again. I seem to be doing a lot of re-reading lately.

[mariab]

Currently re-reading "Die Wolfshaut" by (genius) Austrian novelist Hans Lebert (1919-93), published 1960. {...} said to have influenced prominent Austrian writers (Jelinek, Ramsmayr, Haslinger, etc).

I find Elfriede Jelinek very entertaining, David. ;-) And loved the movie with Isabelle Huppert. Priceless.
When I end up re-reading one of my favorite classics, it'll be either something by the sisters Bronte, or some Dickens, or maybe a play by Tennessee Williams. My Dostoievsky I don't have it here (it's at my mom's) and all my Shakespeare is packed in a box. Non classic favorites would be either travel reports/memoirs or some obscure books about my favorite sports and bios of my favorite athletes. Oh, and I love re-reading my favorite childrens' books, but here at my place I only have Hector Malot's En famille and M.K. Rawlings' The Yearling, which I adore as books. When I get at my parents' house in Athens, there's tons of cool stuff to re-read, from Dostoievsky to childrens' books to obscure pulp fiction (which my dad used to collect). I hardly ever sleep at night when I'm at my mom's, LOL.

Ripperology-wise I'm (re)reading stuff about the WVC, and workwise I'm about to start “reading“ all Rossini scores/materials for my second book, which is still not completely structured.