Reading any good books lately?

A brilliant new novel — deeply humane and entirely convincing — from Lori Lansens, author of two previous bestsellers and a writer who can be counted on to deliver an amazing story and characters to fall in love with.

In Lori Lansens’ Leaford, Ontario — home of Rose and Ruby Darlen, the sorrowing parents of Larry Merkel, and not far from Rusholme where Addy Shadd once looked after an abandoned child — love and grief combine to awaken an obese woman from her loneliness. When her husband doesn’t come home on the eve of their 25th wedding anniversary, Mary Gooch, who has never learned to be self-sufficient, sets out on a truly remarkable journey of self-discovery that takes her first to the big city and then to another country.

Quote: Originally Posted by FiveParadox

It’s campy British science fiction.

Quote: Originally Posted by Lou Garu

Is that what the tv series by the name is based on,FiveParadox?

Quote: Originally Posted by jambo101

I usually read just sci-fi
Dan Simmons Illium and the sequel Olympos is some of the best Sci-fi i've read in a long time..

Quote: Originally Posted by FiveParadox

Yup. It’s a series about the adventures (and misadventures) of the last members of the Torchwood Institute, an organisation that seeks to capture extraterrestrial technology for the use of the British Empire. (Or, at least, that was the original mission statement — as you discover during the course of the series, not everything went quite as planned.) It takes place in the “Doctor Whoniverse”.

Quote: Originally Posted by AnnaG

I'm reading an interesting novel called "The Wife's Tale" by Lori Lansens. It was talked about on CBC radio today or yesterday.
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It portrays the subtle changes in the girl after her hubby disappears and she begins to lose her obesity and stuff.
Sorry, guys, it's a girly book.

Quote: Originally Posted by FiveParadox

If you weren’t a fan of the series, I’d steer clear.

Quote: Originally Posted by Lou Garu

Weeeeelll, since it's about guuurrrllllls,.............seriously,there's a Canadian authour(ress?)named Kelly Armstrong,and she's doing a series based on the premise
that magic and demonry has gone underground (so to speak) and evolved a shadow society that has to co-exist with "mundanes". They're not heavy reading ,they're classed as romance (a mistake I think) and yet I look for the next of the story line.........

Quote: Originally Posted by AnnaG

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Those also sound interesting.

Quote: Originally Posted by Lou Garu

Just Wiki'd Illium, I'll be looking for that,not familiar with Dan Simmons tho

Quote: Originally Posted by jambo101

He also has a 4 book series called Hyperion, great stuff , another writer i've discovered in the past couple of years is David Weber,if you like military Sci-Fi he's where its at,if you like hundreds of battleships fighting it out in space you'll love his Honor Harrington series but after reading his Starfire series you are left with a sense of amazement , and after reading the final payback in the Shiva option its just WOW.
Insurrection (November 1990) ISBN 0-671-72024-4
Crusade (March 1992) ISBN 0-671-72111-9
In Death Ground (May 1997) ISBN 0-671-87779-8 ...

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Quote: Originally Posted by Dexter Sinister

Been in a non-fiction phase lately. I've been reading Bart Ehrman, a biblical scholar of some renown apparently, the James A. Gray Distinguished Professor of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina. I'd bet that the group "Renowned biblical scholars" is pretty small and insular for the most part, but this guy's gone public with the fruits of his scholarship, about the origins of the biblical texts, how they've come down to us, what they originally said and meant (lot of additions and editorial changes in the days of hand-copying), stuff like that. Pretty interesting material, if you're curious about such things. He says in one of his books that this is the stuff they teach seminary students that you never hear about from the pulpit.
I had an English teacher in High School who used to say that those who are ignorant of the Bible are ignorant of English literature. It was 30 years before I understood what she meant, but I can see now that she was right. Funny what sticks in the mind; wish I could find her and tell her how important that lesson turned out to be. Titles I've got through so far: Misquoting Jesus, Lost Christianities, Lost Scriptures, and God's Problem. That last one is particularly interesting to me, it's much more personal than the others, and deals with how the Bible answers the question of why an omnipotent benevolent deity allows humans to suffer so. His answer surprised me.

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Quote: Originally Posted by AnnaG

I've only read ALL of Shakespeare's known works...

Quote: Originally Posted by Walter

Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand.

Quote: Originally Posted by Dexter Sinister

That's part of the point. Biblical narratives and symbols and mythologies are deeply embedded in all western cultures. Shakespeare's works are full of biblical references you won't get unless you're familiar with the Bible. So is most other well known English literature of the last 500 years, and if you don't get them, you'll miss a major dimension of the works. You'll never make sense of William Blake, for instance, without knowledge of both the Bible and John Milton's works, and you can't make sense of the latter without the former either. Literature is created in a cultural context, and the Bible's been a large part of that context for centuries. It's only recently become relatively less important.

Quote: Originally Posted by Walter

Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand.