What are you currently reading?

[Gurn Blanston]

Steig Larsson, The Girl with the Dragon Tatoo.

A decidedly low-brow thriller/crime novel.  Well done and entertaining, though.

That's funny, I was coming over here to write this post, now all I have to do is quote it. I got book 2 of the trilogy also, but since I just started book 1, it'll be a while. Sometimes, low-brow is good.

[SonicMan46]

Cahokia (2009) by Timothy R. Pauketat - about the Mississippian 'city mound complex' that spanned the Mississippi River on both the Illinois & Missouri sides in the St. Louis area.  Taking a short vacation to St. Louis next month to meet our son who will be driving from Indianapolis - Cahokia State Park is on the Illinois side, so planning a visit.  America's first 'great' city flourishing from about 1050 into the early 13th century - the history and archeology are still shrouded in mystery!  This book is a short but somewhat dull read hampered largely by a lack of illustrations (of any type!) - think that it was part of a 'cheap' series, so just not much funding - this author is well known and has apparently written better books on the subject in the past. 

[jlaurson]

Geek-me.


Fanfare, 33:5

Is it good? Hmmm... well, it's Fanfare. You take the good along with the bad and the ugly.

[MN Dave]

A decidedly low-brow thriller/crime novel.  Well done and entertaining, though.

Decidedly? List some high-brow thriller/crime novels, please.

[Scarpia]

Decidedly? List some high-brow thriller/crime novels, please.

Crime and Punishment, Fyodor Dostoyevsky.
Sanctuary, William Faulkner

[MN Dave]

Crime and Punishment, Fyodor Dostoyevsky.
Sanctuary, William Faulkner

Crime maybe.

[DavidW]

Steig Larsson, The Girl with the Dragon Tatoo.

A decidedly low-brow thriller/crime novel.  Well done and entertaining, though.

Next time I go to the library I'll check it out!

[Todd]

A rather fine book, though one sure to rile up economic and environmental doomsayers.  Just how could one say that life is better now than 100, 1,000, or 10,000 years ago, and how could one not foresee environmental catastrophe in the future?  The dude is crazy, right?  His passages on environmental issues are a bit less thorough than I would have liked, and he doesn't explore the benefits of imperialism to those lucky imperial powers quite enough, and there are some other minor weaknesses, but overall this is a fine swat at the not exactly rare End is Near thinking and publishing.  (And one gets the feeling Mr Ridley doesn't particularly care for Paul Ehrlich - and with good reason in that instance.) 

[lisa needs braces]

Decidedly? List some high-brow thriller/crime novels, please.

[oabmarcus]

The Big Short by Michael Lewis

[MN Dave]

Nice.

[MN Dave]

Nice.

[greg]

Nice.

Nice.

Nice.

Nice.

[MN Dave]

Nice.
Nice.

Nice.

[karlhenning]

Nice must be one of the adjectives which cannot really be applied to Silence of the Lambs ; )

Stars My Destination I remember being good fun.

[MN Dave]

Nice must be one of the adjectives which cannot really be applied to Silence of the Lambs ; )

Stars My Destination I remember being good fun.

Nice human-skin suit!

[karlhenning]

Thread duty: Mistress of Modernism: The Life of Peggy Guggenheim

Nearly done reading this, and very interesting.  Well written, too . . . the author is a bit gossipy, but without, I think, crossing the line into vulgarity (a line which IMO Philip Norman crossed in his bio of Lennon).

[CD]

Nice.
Nice.

Nice.

Erm, anyway, thread duty:

Arno Schmidt - Nobodaddy's Children

Really ni... I mean, excellent so far (a third of the way through).

[Lethevich]

A neat little thing - words only rather than notated examples (always a plus for people like me who can only read notation with considerable effort), and quite extensive.

[SonicMan46]

Cahokia - Mirror of the Cosmos (2002) by Sally Chappell - just returned from a visit to this Illinois State Park (Cahokia Mounds) just across the Mississippi River from St. Louis.

Cahokia was a LARGE (for its time) population center for the Mississippian Amerindian culture; in 1250 A.D. the statement is made that its population was larger than that of London!  The second picture below shows the remains of Monk's Mound, the highest platform pyramid in the place - from the top (about 100 ft) the city of St. Louis and the Arch are clearly seen.  This is the largest 'earthen' (i.e. no stone) pyramid in the Americas built by pre-Columbian native Americans - would strongly encourage a visit if ever in the vicinity!