What are you currently reading?

[North Star]

Fetched from the post today, in a package that was large enough for half a dozen volumes.
[asin]0091940176[/asin]

[kishnevi]

Michael Psellus - Chronographia

My version of that....


TD
Bruce Catton
A Stillness at Appomattox
More prep for my little trip next month to Virginia.

[kishnevi]

If you want a great read (and excellent history), find Douglas Southall Freeman's Lee's Lieutenants: A Study in Command (3 Volumes).  Best book on the Civil War, IMO.  Most libraries have it.  Shelby Foote's 3-vol. narrative history is also very good.

They are the classics.
But this is for a focused purpose.  I will be B"H with a tour group for four days, literally going over the ground from Petersburg to Appomattox that saw the final week of the Army of Northern Virginia's existence.
Last year I went with the same group to visit the sites of the Battles of the Wilderness and Spotsylvania Courthouse. We were there literally 150 years to the day after the fighting at Spotsylvania.  If you want, you can see the pictures I took then on my Flickr stream. (Hit the globe under my avatar.)

[Jubal Slate]

 

[Karl Henning]

There's a bulletin:

"It is no secret that popular media have a real struggle communicating complexity," Camosy wrote.

What do Americans really think about abortion? The answer may surprise you.

[Ken B]

This remarkably good blog post.
http://slatestarcodex.com/2015/04/22/growth-mindset-3-a-pox-on-growth-your-houses/

[Moonfish]

Just started on this one. Very interesting...   

[asin] 0312427719[/asin]

[Bogey]

Reads like a spy novel. 

[aligreto]

[NikF]

A biography of Billy Strayhorn.

[Drasko]

[aligreto]

Just started The Rainbow by DH Lawrence....

[Mookalafalas]

I finished the first volume a bit ago, and am nearing the end of vol. 2. 
[asin]0393307069[/asin]

[Wakefield]

I finished the first volume a bit ago, and am nearing the end of vol. 2. 
[asin]0393307069[/asin]

What an eccentric character was Patrick O'Brian! And what a sharp intellect. I love this quote where he expresses his dislike for the inquisitiveness of strangers: "Question and answer is not a civilised form of conversation."

No doubt, he didn't enjoy interviews. 

[Mookalafalas]

What an eccentric character was Patrick O'Brian! And what a sharp intellect. I love this quote where he expresses his dislike for the inquisitiveness of strangers: "Question and answer is not a civilised form of conversation."

No doubt, he didn't enjoy interviews. 

  I'm sorry to say that I had never heard of him, or this whole series until just recently.   I have some criticisms, but find the books (so far) hard to put down.  The jump in quality between books 1 and 2 is surprisingly large.  I suppose I will end up reading these for some time to come. 

[Ken B]

  I'm sorry to say that I had never heard of him, or this whole series until just recently.   I have some criticisms, but find the books (so far) hard to put down.  The jump in quality between books 1 and 2 is surprisingly large.  I suppose I will end up reading these for some time to come.

I bet not.

[Artem]

Another Bernhard for me. Pretty much in his usually style, but good.

[Mookalafalas]

I bet not.

   ?  Why's that? Do you feel they pall pretty quickly?
    A few years ago I re-read the whole C.S. Forster "Hornblower" series, which this one seems to be modeled after.  O'Brian brings in a lot more of the politics of the times, and larger social issues, which is sometimes interesting and sometimes not.   However, he has technical problems with scenes, in my opinion, especially complicated ones with action or multiple characters.  It is often not clear who pronouns refer to, or the physical relations between the participants.  That's extremely unusual in work of this stature.

[Ken B]

   ?  Why's that? Do you feel they pall pretty quickly?
    A few years ago I re-read the whole C.S. Forster "Hornblower" series, which this one seems to be modeled after.  O'Brian brings in a lot more of the politics of the times, and larger social issues, which is sometimes interesting and sometimes not.   However, he has technical problems with scenes, in my opinion, especially complicated ones with action or multiple characters.  It is often not clear who pronouns refer to, or the physical relations between the participants.  That's extremely unusual in work of this stature.

They do. And they get diffuse. A friend said that in the end he couldn't figure out why O'Brian wrote them. Seems a good summary. The one I liked best was about chasing a 74, but I forget which it was. Nutmeg perhaps or Mauritius.

[Wakefield]

  I'm sorry to say that I had never heard of him, or this whole series until just recently.   I have some criticisms, but find the books (so far) hard to put down.  The jump in quality between books 1 and 2 is surprisingly large.  I suppose I will end up reading these for some time to come.

Actually, I have read very few historical novels in my life (most of them when I was a boy), but O'Brian interested me as an eccentric character, specially after I did read some years ago this article written by his son:

http://www.theguardian.com/books/2003/nov/28/fiction.film

Apparently, his life was quite enigmatic.