What are you currently reading?

[Bogey]

On to the fourth book in this quietly amazing series.

[Ken B]

On to the fourth book in this quietly amazing series.

One of the best series ever.

[Bogey]

One of the best series ever.

It's the grind of the first three that draw me in.  The pacing is absolutely brilliant and make you feel as if you are along with the characters.

[Ken B]

It's the grind of the first three that draw me in.  The pacing is absolutely brilliant and make you feel as if you are along with the characters.

Reading some of the threads here makes feel as if I were right along with Kvant and Kvastmo ...

[Moonfish]

Yeah, except for that they would not rant in English!

[The new erato]

This:



Brilliant, entertaining and educating as usual from Bill.

[Bogey]

This:



Brilliant, entertaining and educating as usual from Bill.

Wow. That looks cool.

[Ken B]

This:



Brilliant, entertaining and educating as usual from Bill.

A fun book as ever from BB.
Recommended for all Double Indemnity fans! The sash-weight murder ...

[The new erato]

A fun book as ever from BB.
Recommended for all Double Indemnity fans! The sash-weight murder ...

I love that movie and found that part of the book very interesting. Also some nuggets on Barbara Stamwyck's backgroud (she wasn't always named that).

[Mookalafalas]

I haven't been reading much the last couple of years, but just had a little binge:
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   A fine memoir.

  I was sick all day (again), and read a Rex Stout, which was fun but whet my appetite for the real thing--some Dashiell Hammett.  Been a long time since I read two novels in one day.  I should do it more often

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[Henk]

Eckermann - Conversations with Goethe

[Ken B]

I haven't been reading much the last couple of years, but just had a little binge:
[asin]B003K16P4G[/asin]

   A fine memoir.

  I was sick all day (again), and read a Rex Stout, which was fun but whet my appetite for the real thing--some Dashiell Hammett.  Been a long time since I read two novels in one day.  I should do it more often

[asin]B00413QACE[/asin]

[asin]B00IXQE2WU[/asin]

First time I read RH I thought it a lot weaker than the Glass Key. Second time I read it I thought it was a masterpiece. Still think so after a third reading. 
Might be time to rerereread some more Hammett. Only Dain is weak.

[Daverz]

On to the fourth book in this quietly amazing series.

They must of run out of umlauts for the cover.

[Mookalafalas]

First time I read RH I thought it a lot weaker than the Glass Key. Second time I read it I thought it was a masterpiece. Still think so after a third reading. 
Might be time to rerereread some more Hammett. Only Dain is weak.

  I like Dain a lot, although it is even more over-the-top than the others. Re-read "The Thin Man" today. I didn't remember anything from it, except the one "secret" you aren't supposed to find out til the end.   I hadn't read it in 25 years.  Read Raymond Chandler's "Killer in the Rain" last night--which turned out to be an early version of "The Big Sleep".  Still fun to read.  It's too bad those guys have so few novels between them.   Hammett's books are so crammed with people and events that if I wait enough years, I really don't remember much of what happened and can get a really enjoyable re-read.  I doubt that will be the case with Chandler--but I don't think I've re-read any of his yet.  I'll have to give one a go and see what happens. I've really got the hard-boiled detective bug these days.

[Ken B]

  I like Dain a lot, although it is even more over-the-top than the others. Re-read "The Thin Man" today. I didn't remember anything from it, except the one "secret" you aren't supposed to find out til the end.   I hadn't read it in 25 years.  Read Raymond Chandler's "Killer in the Rain" last night--which turned out to be an early version of "The Big Sleep".  Still fun to read.  It's too bad those guys have so few novels between them.   Hammett's books are so crammed with people and events that if I wait enough years, I really don't remember much of what happened and can get a really enjoyable re-read.  I doubt that will be the case with Chandler--but I don't think I've re-read any of his yet.  I'll have to give one a go and see what happens. I've really got the hard-boiled detective bug these days.

When I reread Chandler I was pleasantly surprised how they held up. He's due for a third reading.

[Ken B]

Interspersed amongst Proust and Bloom is Baudelaire's The Flowers of Evil.

No Ken, no. Some jokes are just too easy. Let this one go.

[Florestan]

Novalis - Europe, or Christendom

Online here: http://germanhistorydocs.ghi-dc.org/pdf/eng/13_Class.Romanticism_Doc.3_English.pdf

I was particularly impressed with this paragraph which, although written in 1799, looks almost like a commentary on some events which have recently disturbed the tranquil community of GMG...

By downright preference the common people were enlightened and educated to that cultivated enthusiasm, and in this way there arose a new European guild: the Lovers of Mankind and Enlighteners. What a pity that Nature remained so wondrous and incomprehensible, so poetic and infinite, in defiance of all the efforts to modernize her. If somewhere an old superstition about a higher world and the like turned up, a hue and cry was straightway raised on all sides and wherever possible the dangerous spark was quenched into ashes by "philosophy" and wit. And yet Tolerance was the watchword of the cultured, and particularly in France was reckoned synonymous with "philosophy."

[Henk]

Interesting.

[Mookalafalas]

When I reread Chandler I was pleasantly surprised how they held up. He's due for a third reading.

I just went back and read Lady in the Lake, Playback, and The High Window.  I'm sure I read Lady in the Lake and the High Window before, but I didn't remember anything from either, like they had been wiped from my memory. Unfortunately, I also just re-read the Thin Man, which uses the same plot-twist as Lady in the Lake, so I could see most of the story coming...still, it's a fun ride.  Just started "Trouble is My Business"--some Chandler short stories. 

[Ken B]

I'll be reading some of the works of Alexander Pope (thanks to Bloom's prompting).

True wit is nature to advantage dressed:
What oft was thought but ne'er so well expressed.
-- Al Pope

I am reading several books at once as ever, but concentrating on Thank You, Jeeves and The Battle of Bretton Woods.