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Wildtortilla posted:I started Blood Meridian just today, and holy poo poo it's amazing. Only if you don't call them science-fiction!
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Aug 2, 2011 02:45
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Was wondering if any of the history buffs here could reccomend a book about the New World and the transition from England to USA, along with life in the first years after coming over. Mostly focusing on the Mayflower expedition and Plymouth. I'm looking for something that tells it like it was and doesn't romanticize it. Thanks! e; I'd read a fiction recounting also. Methodis fucked around with this message at 17:06 on Aug 2, 2011 |
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Aug 2, 2011 17:02
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Methodis posted:Was wondering if any of the history buffs here could reccomend a book about the New World and the transition from England to USA, along with life in the first years after coming over. Mostly focusing on the Mayflower expedition and Plymouth. I'm looking for something that tells it like it was and doesn't romanticize it. Thanks! I actually have a stack of history books that's almost as tall as I am that I need to work my way through. Educating yourself can be a very time-consuming process! If only I had taken an interest in history when I was in school and reading 500 pages a day 
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Aug 2, 2011 17:53
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I'll check out that book thanks. I was looking at some Mayflower book (titled that) and it seemed okay, but it supposedly took a turn to focus onto the War 50 years after they settled. I picked up Peoples History of United States in the meantime and will check this book out.
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Aug 2, 2011 22:44
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PureRok posted:Does anyone know any good books about Abrahamic angels and demons? Basically books talking about/listing them all and going into detail about them. I find that stuff really interesting and I would love to have a collection of books on the subject. I really liked To Reign In Hell. It's a novel about the fall of Satan. If you're religious, it might offend you somewhat because Satan is a pretty sympathetic character. I enjoyed it a lot, though.
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Aug 2, 2011 23:01
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I've been looking for a certain kind of book for a while now, with no luck. I'm basically looking for a book about assholes/unlikable and unsympathetic main characters. Curb Your Enthusiasm, but in book form. Catcher in the Rye, but less of a downer. It's gotta have humor too, like sarcastic, sardonic, anti-humor type humor. In short, books about horrible people.
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Aug 3, 2011 19:24
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Opium Jellyfish posted:I've been looking for a certain kind of book for a while now, with no luck. I'm basically looking for a book about assholes/unlikable and unsympathetic main characters. Curb Your Enthusiasm, but in book form. Catcher in the Rye, but less of a downer. It's gotta have humor too, like sarcastic, sardonic, anti-humor type humor. In short, books about horrible people.
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Aug 3, 2011 19:36
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Opium Jellyfish posted:I've been looking for a certain kind of book for a while now, with no luck. I'm basically looking for a book about assholes/unlikable and unsympathetic main characters. Curb Your Enthusiasm, but in book form. Catcher in the Rye, but less of a downer. It's gotta have humor too, like sarcastic, sardonic, anti-humor type humor. In short, books about horrible people. Apathy and Other Small Victories by Paul Neilan.
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Aug 4, 2011 01:09
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Opium Jellyfish posted:I've been looking for a certain kind of book for a while now, with no luck. I'm basically looking for a book about assholes/unlikable and unsympathetic main characters. Curb Your Enthusiasm, but in book form. Catcher in the Rye, but less of a downer. It's gotta have humor too, like sarcastic, sardonic, anti-humor type humor. In short, books about horrible people. Vanity Fair: A Novel Without a Hero by William Thackeray.
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Aug 4, 2011 01:52
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While I'm waiting for the rest of The Geralt Saga (the Witcher books) to get translated, I'm looking for something similar. With this I mean mature, intelligent, dark-but-not-grimdark fantasy, that still retain a sense of humor. ...sorry, that sounds incredibly pretentious, but it's hard to explain what sets them apart from the generic fantasy sludge. So basically books like Blood of Elves. Thoughtless fucked around with this message at 20:37 on Aug 4, 2011 |
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Aug 4, 2011 20:32
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At the moment, I'm pretty much completely ignorant about politics and economics, and I want to change that. Does anyone know any good books to read to become a bit more knowledgable and informed about these subjects? I'm mainly looking for books to become more informed about political idealogies, etc. I do know a bit of basic micro and macroeconomics but not enough to really apply it to current events. I was thinking of picking up freakonomics to start off, what's the general consensus on it? I'm aware that I'm looking at reading a lot of books here, but that's cool with me 'cause I need to read more anyways. If getting properly informed on these subjects requires reading up on history I don't mind that at all too.  edit: removed 'philosophy' since I found some recommendations in the thread Coritani fucked around with this message at 00:56 on Aug 5, 2011 |
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Aug 5, 2011 00:44
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Coritani posted:At the moment, I'm pretty much completely ignorant about politics, economics and philosphy and I want to change that. Does anyone know any good books to read to become a bit more knowledgable and informed about these subjects? I'm mainly looking for books to become more informed about political idealogies, philosophy, etc. I do know a bit of basic micro and macroeconomics but not enough to really apply it to current events. Carl Sagan's The Demon Haunted World is a great book about the philosophy of science. I can't recommend it enough. Not exactly the same as what you're looking for, but it's very enlightening and easy to read. Carl is probably the biggest influence on my personal philosophies. Edit: I really liked Freakanomics, but I've seen things that call some of their stuff into question. Never looked into it more than that, so you should read up on the controversy if you read the book. Day Man fucked around with this message at 00:52 on Aug 5, 2011 |
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Aug 5, 2011 00:50
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Opium Jellyfish posted:I've been looking for a certain kind of book for a while now, with no luck. I'm basically looking for a book about assholes/unlikable and unsympathetic main characters. Curb Your Enthusiasm, but in book form. Catcher in the Rye, but less of a downer. It's gotta have humor too, like sarcastic, sardonic, anti-humor type humor. In short, books about horrible people. A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole The Ginger Man by JP Donleavy Saturday Night and Sunday Morning by Alan Sillitoe
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Aug 5, 2011 01:43
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Coritani posted:At the moment, I'm pretty much completely ignorant about politics and economics, and I want to change that. Does anyone know any good books to read to become a bit more knowledgable and informed about these subjects? I'm mainly looking for books to become more informed about political idealogies, etc. I do know a bit of basic micro and macroeconomics but not enough to really apply it to current events. Nixonland is long (750 pages) but it's pretty applicable to politics now and how certain stances developed in the 1960s. That reminds me. When visiting home, I found a copy of All the President's Men. I need to start on that.
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Aug 5, 2011 03:01
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DrGonzo90 posted:A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole The Ginger Man was cool, but man, was Sebastian an rear end in a top hat.
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Aug 5, 2011 03:45
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Day Man posted:Edit: I really liked Freakanomics, but I've seen things that call some of their stuff into question. Never looked into it more than that, so you should read up on the controversy if you read the book. Freakonomics is basically well-written BS. The authors claim they won't pull any punches or worry about being politically correct, but what this translates to is questionable hypotheses based on heresy presented with unsubstantiated data and treated as fact. For example, they argue that abortion lowered crime rates in the 90's. Why? According to them, poor people are most likely to get abortions and live in lovely crime-filled neighborhoods. When Roe v. Wade was decided, now, because everyone could get abortions, children that would have been growing up in poor neighborhoods were not being born. Because they didn't exist, they couldn't grow up to be criminals, so crime decreased. The data to support this is that some cities that allowed abortion earlier had crime fall earlier. Barely (if at all, I can't perfectly recall, TBQH) discussed is the idea that correlation != causation. Additionally (and far dumber), in SuperFreakonomics, the final chapter deals with global warming. Luckily, the authors have some solutions. 1) Fill the ocean off the coast of Africa with inner tubes wearing plastic "skirts". This (supposedly) will cause warm water to fall down and allow cold water to come to the surface, thereby reducing the ocean's temperature. 2) Pump the skies full of a reflecting agent, using long thin tubes that reach into the highest parts of the atmosphere. Due to the reflection of the sun's light, the earth will cool. (How these tubes are to be built is not discussed beyond "they would be made of a light material", and "there would be a big motor at the bottom pumping the reflecting chemical") Their source for both these ideas is one "research lab", headed by one "scientist". They mention that other scientists have expressed doubts (to put it mildly) about these solutions, but that's obviously because they don't want to look for a creative answer. In short, both books are fun to read, but you should take any ideas they express with about a pound of salt. Some chapters aren't so bad (the one on how income and race factors affect baby names was fun), but any semi-serious or controversial claims are probably bunk. The main problem is that they often choose only one or two sources per chapter, and present any opinions expressed by these sources as gospel truth, giving no time to opposing points of view. The authors also lack any scientific grounding outside their fields, so they fall into the same sort of trap Malcolm Gladwell does, where some crazy idea or misunderstanding is presented unambiguously as fact. Anyway, if you're looking for political books, I'd recommend A People's History of the United States by Howard Zinn. It's more historical than political, but it really does reveal a lot about the state of politics in the US today. For philosophy, it's harder to say unless there's a specific issue you're interested in (epistemology, mind-body, ethics, etc), but Plato is a good place to start if you want to understand the context of later developments, and is surprisingly decently readable. You can pretty much try whatever you want, everything should be available as a free ebook, so even if you don't have an ereader, you can try out a couple and see what you like. If I had to name one, I guess the Republic would be a good place to start.
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Aug 5, 2011 04:30
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Coritani posted:I was thinking of picking up freakonomics to start off, what's the general consensus on it? the pop economics genre is full of terrible writing, terrible logic, and terrible people. Freakonomics is the poster boy (although it is well written): the skin-deep analysis, failure to consider alternative explanations, and undue confidence in the conclusions presented -- the field is full of this kind of stuff. The best book I've read in the genre is Tom Slee's No One Makes You Shop at Wal-Mart, ostensibly about the failure of neoliberal belief in the power of choice to provide optimal solutions, but actually a pretty good introduction to micro economics and game theory and the way economists think about these things.
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Aug 5, 2011 15:46
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Opium Jellyfish posted:I've been looking for a certain kind of book for a while now, with no luck. I'm basically looking for a book about assholes/unlikable and unsympathetic main characters. Curb Your Enthusiasm, but in book form. Catcher in the Rye, but less of a downer. It's gotta have humor too, like sarcastic, sardonic, anti-humor type humor. In short, books about horrible people. Seconding American Psycho and adding his other books, Less Than Zero, The Informers, and Rules of Attraction. Glamorama is also great but doesn't fit your description as much, Lunar Park was mediocre, and I haven't read his new one, Imperial Bedrooms. Also, Ham on Rye by Bukowsky is really good and fits your description.
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Aug 5, 2011 16:28
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Jigsaw posted:Anyway, if you're looking for political books, I'd recommend A People's History of the United States by Howard Zinn. It's more historical than political, but it really does reveal a lot about the state of politics in the US today. For philosophy, it's harder to say unless there's a specific issue you're interested in (epistemology, mind-body, ethics, etc), but Plato is a good place to start if you want to understand the context of later developments, and is surprisingly decently readable. You can pretty much try whatever you want, everything should be available as a free ebook, so even if you don't have an ereader, you can try out a couple and see what you like. If I had to name one, I guess the Republic would be a good place to start. A People's History is a chronology of labor strife through a very rigid and narrowminded lens. I wouldn't recommend it even to progressive readers -- it's a polemic, not a textbook. Here's a critique from the left that points out the many shortcomings. I'm not sure what I'd recommend, but you could do a lot worse then picking up the bits of the Oxford History of the United States that you can find.
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Aug 5, 2011 16:32
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Copernic posted:A People's History is a chronology of labor strife through a very rigid and narrowminded lens. I wouldn't recommend it even to progressive readers -- it's a polemic, not a textbook. Here's a critique from the left that points out the many shortcomings.
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Aug 5, 2011 17:51
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Thanks alot for the suggestions. I've written them all down so I'm going to go down to my local library to find some, and I'll probably look around some cheapo bookstores as well. Especially the Demon Haunted World - I would've never thought of it and it looks fascinating. But with regards to reading up on politics, I was looking for something a little more introductory - something that covers what the most common idealogies (e.g centre-right, social democrat, etc) are, their beliefs, maybe their history too, etc. Does such a thing exist? Would I be better off printing out a whole bunch of wikipedia pages instead (augh)? If it was in the context of New Zealand that'd be even better. The info on freakonomics is interesting too, I'll definitely keep it all in mind when I pick it up. Are there any easy to read books on macroeconomic theory, or should I just grab a textbook? Thanks again!
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Aug 5, 2011 22:23
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Thoughtless posted:While I'm waiting for the rest of The Geralt Saga (the Witcher books) to get translated, I'm looking for something similar. With this I mean mature, intelligent, dark-but-not-grimdark fantasy, that still retain a sense of humor. Repeating this post as I'm also interested!  How god-drat long will it take for these books to be translated? They're awesome! I've read the only 2 ones that are translated.
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Aug 6, 2011 14:39
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Can anyone recommend some entertaining (ie. not textbook) books about European history? More of an overview than focusing on any specific period (like, the history of Joan of Arc is not exactly what I'm looking for, I'm looking more for something like England between 1200 and 1600). Ideally English or French, but honestly anything like that would be good. The kicker is that I'd really like for there to be a Kindle version of it. Thanks.
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Aug 6, 2011 19:06
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Coritani posted:Thanks alot for the suggestions. I've written them all down so I'm going to go down to my local library to find some, and I'll probably look around some cheapo bookstores as well. Especially the Demon Haunted World - I would've never thought of it and it looks fascinating. I found Thomas Sowell's Basic Economics to be quite readable. The writing is pretty good and the examples he uses are interesting enough to make the book fun to read. DrGonzo90 fucked around with this message at 19:20 on Aug 6, 2011 |
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Aug 6, 2011 19:15
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Proteus4994 posted:Can anyone recommend some entertaining (ie. not textbook) books about European history? More of an overview than focusing on any specific period (like, the history of Joan of Arc is not exactly what I'm looking for, I'm looking more for something like England between 1200 and 1600). Ideally English or French, but honestly anything like that would be good. The kicker is that I'd really like for there to be a Kindle version of it. You could try Millenium by Tom Holland, it's an overview of Europe around the turn of the millenium. Holland writes in a narrative style that's very engaging for the casual reader. There's plenty about England and France (the period covers 1066 after all) and there's a lot about the relationship between church and state if thats something you're intersted in. If you want to go back as far as classical europe his books Rubicon (about the Roman republic) and Persian Fire (Persian invasion of Greece) are also very good.
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Aug 6, 2011 20:09
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Thanks for the recommendations, I just started American Psycho--it had been on my list for a while. Coincidentally, someone had lent me A Confederacy of Dunces so I'll probably start either that or The Ginger Man next.
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Aug 6, 2011 23:10
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Pining away for the days of yore, when I was involved in show jumping, I've been reading a lot of books about horse racing (Nack's Secretariat, Hillenbrand's Seabiscuit, bios on Man O' War and Affirmed, etc, etc). Does anyone have an recommendations for more books, either non-fiction or fiction? In the way of fiction, I've read Sara Gruen's Flying Lessons and Fern Michaels' Kentucky Series. I read almost every young adult horse book I could get my hands on when I was younger. After my non-fiction splurge, I'm more in the mood for fiction. I'll take science fiction, romance, general fiction, whatever. Any ideas?
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Aug 7, 2011 03:50
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If you liked Nack's book on Secretariat, he's also written a good book on Ruffian.
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Aug 7, 2011 04:48
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Opium Jellyfish posted:Thanks for the recommendations, I just started American Psycho--it had been on my list for a while. Coincidentally, someone had lent me A Confederacy of Dunces so I'll probably start either that or The Ginger Man next. If you're up for a bit of the old ultra-violence, there's also A Clockwork Orange.
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Aug 7, 2011 10:56
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Proteus4994 posted:Can anyone recommend some entertaining (ie. not textbook) books about European history? More of an overview than focusing on any specific period (like, the history of Joan of Arc is not exactly what I'm looking for, I'm looking more for something like England between 1200 and 1600). Ideally English or French, but honestly anything like that would be good. The kicker is that I'd really like for there to be a Kindle version of it. Terry Jones' Medieval Lives might interest you, or maybe A World Lit Only By Fire, for contrasting views of the Medieval era.
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Aug 7, 2011 13:41
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Proteus4994 posted:Can anyone recommend some entertaining (ie. not textbook) books about European history? More of an overview than focusing on any specific period (like, the history of Joan of Arc is not exactly what I'm looking for, I'm looking more for something like England between 1200 and 1600). Ideally English or French, but honestly anything like that would be good. The kicker is that I'd really like for there to be a Kindle version of it. Norman Davies' Europe: A History is pretty great, although it covers the entire continent and from prehistoric times to the EU.
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Aug 7, 2011 15:16
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Opium Jellyfish posted:Thanks for the recommendations, I just started American Psycho--it had been on my list for a while. Just a fair warning - this book is extremely graphic and disturbing.
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Aug 7, 2011 16:25
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Are The Witcher books worth reading? I played the game, and it seems like an interesting world, but the game doesn't really fill you in on the history of the world. I rarely read fiction. I'm finishing up World War Z, and I really didn't like it. I understand I'm in the minority here. Genre fiction especially seems like it has much lower standards, which is my fear here. Thanks. Va fail.
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Aug 9, 2011 03:19
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Opium Jellyfish posted:Thanks for the recommendations, I just started American Psycho--it had been on my list for a while. Coincidentally, someone had lent me A Confederacy of Dunces so I'll probably start either that or The Ginger Man next. There is also Lolita
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Aug 9, 2011 03:56
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bobkatt013 posted:There is also Lolita Lolita's a really good book though, erryone should read it.
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Aug 9, 2011 04:09
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Internet Cliche posted:Are The Witcher books worth reading? I played the game, and it seems like an interesting world, but the game doesn't really fill you in on the history of the world. Absolutely. They're very unlike the usual fantasy pulp, intelligently written and with a healthy fistful of dry humor. Really, Sapkowski doesn't let himself get restricted by the default conventions of the genre, so there's bound to be at least some entertainment to be had. Of course, it's still all fiction, even if not strictly genre-bound, but as long as you can get over that I'd recommend them. Give The Last Wish a shot and see if you like the style, it's a collection of short stories, so it's not a big investment of time.
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Aug 9, 2011 16:20
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I've been itching for some Nazi-era German fiction lately. I recently read The Book Thief and I feel like I need more to feed my brain. Any suggestions?
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Aug 12, 2011 00:56
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That drat Satyr posted:I've been itching for some Nazi-era German fiction lately. I recently read The Book Thief and I feel like I need more to feed my brain. Any suggestions?
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Aug 13, 2011 02:29
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xcheopis posted:Have you read Mr. Elie Wiesel or are you looking for something written by someone less personally involved? So you are saying Night is fiction?
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Aug 13, 2011 02:35
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That drat Satyr posted:I've been itching for some Nazi-era German fiction lately. I recently read The Book Thief and I feel like I need more to feed my brain. Any suggestions? I take it you mean fiction set in Nazi-era Germany, yes? If so, it's not an easy read, but Gunter Grass' The Tin Drum is pretty incredible. bobkatt013 posted:So you are saying Night is fiction? Here's hoping he misread something and is not a Holocaust denier...
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Aug 13, 2011 03:01
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