Shock, Horror, I'm reading neither a Potter book or a Christie book I've recently discovered the "Inkheart" trilogy by Cornelia Funke, and at the moment reading "Inkspell", the second in the series. I am very impressed by it.

I am reading Tennysons Gift by Lynn Truss at the moment. I was given a gift pack of her books for christmas and this is the second one. The first one I read of hers was With One Lousy Free Packet of Seed. It was one of the funniest books I have read and I heartily recommend it, particularly if you like a good farce. The current one is good but not as funny. It does have Alfred Tennyson and Charles Dodgson in it. It's not great literature but it is good fun. One day I'll read her bestseller Eats, Shoots and Leaves - about punctuation, of all things!

With nothing to read, I knew by the feel that one of my birthday parcels contained a book, so at midnight , I opened it and what a wonderful thing it was!
The Letters of Noel Coward ,edited by Barry Day. I was so delighted I started to read and at 3 am was still deeply engrossed. I recommend it to anyone. The letters are funny, sad and fascinating and the man was a genius. A lovely lovely gift indeed.

I have just finished The Mastership Game by Scott McBain. A very thought provoking book about the abuse of power. I am sorry I did not read it long ago.

I got my hands on a whole slew of "new" antique and vintage books, as well as a couple that just sounded like something I'd enjoy. A few of them were sent to me by good friends who know just how to brighten my week after a car accident, a snowstorm and the flu. (It was a bad start to February in my house!)

I just finished a darling little "romance" called Passion Flower by Marjorie Bowen, printed in 1932, and oddly enough not listed in Wikipedia's works for the author. I love romance novels from before the bodice-ripper days. They are rarely less passionate, but certainly less vulgar and, I think, a great deal more realistic. I mean, no one loves a good fantasy more than me, but I'll take wizards over impossibly perfect men every time (viggo as Aragorn excluded, of course). Old romances don't portray every woman as beautiful and brave and damsel-in-distress all rolled into one, and they don't portray all men as either gorgeous scoundrels or gorgeous heroes or both. They're maybe a little more simple, but they look at the romance of real life, like you could imagine just such a romance actually taking place even though you know the characters are made up, and there's always a little bit of bittersweet rolled into the story, just like real life, and it doesn't have to be real movie-drama tragedy and sacrifice followed by ridiculously overblown lust like in the newer genre counterparts. I don't know if I'm talking sense or not, but anyway, I guess Marjorie Bowen was a prolific author in England in the early half of the century, and I can see why. The book was sort of sad and sweet with an edge of riches to rags that I think EVERYone likes sometimes as a respite from the more overdone rags to riches. If I can find more books by Bowen, I'll read them for sure.

I'm almost finished with a book by Christopher Morley called Kitty Foyle. I guess this book was made into a Ginger Rogers flick, greatly sanitized for the American movie market in 1940. The book was something of a sensation when it was released in 1939, and I have to say it's an interesting peek into society of the time, for me at any rate. There are certain issues which the moral majority of America now would like us to believe never existed before the women's lib movement of the 60's, and they expound greatly about how much simpler and more wholesome life was back when such things just weren't done. I think I sort of grew up believing that when I never believed a whole lot else that segment of the population ever tried to sell me. In the last year I've gotten a great deal of education from older works of fiction, from the 30's through the 70's, both movies and books. I think fiction has a way of treating social commentary that sort of puts it in the place of real life the way that non-fiction never can. I don't know why that is. Anyway, I never saw the movie Kitty Foyle, but the book is one I've really enjoyed, even though I haven't finished it yet.

Just finished the new Stephen King - "Duma Key". I thought it was very good - I like King anyway, but not all of his books have impressed me. He's the kind of writer who needs a good editor, as he tends to go overboard.

This one was the work of a mature man, and explored some things that King knows about - the nature of creativity, starting over, paying the price. He's still not above going for the cheap gross out, though.

Anyway, I found some of it very moving - maybe for personal reasons. I'm reinventing myself, somewhat, and there was a lot of resonance.

Ooh, I havn't got a chance to read that yet. I really must.

I have finally got the last Dark Tower book, and I'm partway through it. So far it's just as good as every other book in the series.

I'm well into 'The Player of Games', by Iain M Banks.

It's one of his 'Culture' novels, and the first one of his offerings I've ever read. It's about *surprisingly* a player of games, who goes on a long mission to take part in an amazingly complex alien game, in a society very different from his own. I'm really, really enjoying it - I hope his other books are this good!

I've just begun reading James Patterson's "Women's Murder Club" series, having watched the (short-lived) television adaptation this fall.
I finished the first book, 1st to Die, and loved it!

I just started reading Bryce Courtenay's "The Power of One" and it really is an excellent novel. We're about to start reading "The Known World" in English class, which I'm looking forward to since both my parents read it recently and enjoyed it immensely. On the other hand, books circulate in our family & circle of friends, and I need to track The Known World Down by tomorrow afternoon...

I've tried really really hard to get through "The Historian", and I think that in GENERAL it's a good book. It's just not what I'd call a "page turner". Right now I'm taking a break from it.

Although it did get pleasantly intense when the two main characters first encountered the creepy librarian at the church.

Has anyone else had trouble with it?

Just finished 'To kill a mockingbird'

What a Book!

Just finished Grisham's latest 'The Appeal'. It is a good book, not as good as his previous ones but worth reading.

Now waiting to get my hands on Jeffrey Archer's latest 'Prisoner of Birth', anyone read this?

I have just started reading Camelot's Sword, an Arthurian romance.
It's set in the Tristan & Isolde Era, and thats about all I know so far.

I have just begun number 4 in the series, and have really enjoyed each of the others so far!

About to read "The Heroin Diaries".... a book by Nikki Six's life....

I'm about halfway through Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson. I think it'd be hard for a lot of people to read it. The plot skips backward and forward every few pages between WWII era and the late 1990's (or in other words, contemporary with when the book was published), and it goes off on frequent tangents about math, cryptology and information theory and how they are related. But it's been a great read for me so far. Sadly, the book had water spilled on it repeatedly in the last two days, and I'm not sure if I shouldn't just toss it and buy a second copy, but I'm slogging through it as is for now.

hi all
i usually am reading some reference book/science book or a science-fiction novel
or a robert b. parker spenser book
or a western by zane grey or louis l'amour.

i read the science-fiction for ideas about possible futures,
read the parker spenser books for the usual (snappy dialogue, short chapters, wit, interesting plots and the sheer fun of reading them--good quick half day read)
and the westerns from either author, quick ok to good plot, lots of action, has definite hero and is a blast from my 6 year old self--another quick half-day read especially good for going to the va hospital and waiting and waiting.

I am currently reading The Sum of All Men by David Farland and The Mists of Avalon by Marion Zimmer-Bradley.

I have only just started both, but they are excellently written.
When I finish them I am planning to read A Breath of Snow and Ashes by Diana Gabaldon. Mostly because I love the series and am re-reading it, party to annoy mum slightly because she knows that it isn't suitable for me. Unfortunately, she found that out too late - eg. after I'd read the first, second and third books.
Her best friend told her they'd be suitable for me, but she has a different idea of suitable.

I've just finished "A Killing Frost" by R. D. WIngfield, who sadly died last year. People will probably know D. I. Jack Frost from the wonderful David Jason and "Touch of Frost" television series. Very good book.

I've just finished 'A Thousand Splendid Suns' by Khaled Hosseini and I wholeheartedly recommend it to all those who enjoyed 'The Kite Runner' - and anyone else besides! It's a totally absorbing story of two women and how their lives became entwined during the years of the Taliban in Afghanistan. The regime was appalling in their treatment of women, and the book gives a detailed account of the injustices endured by the two women, Mariam and Laila. It reduced me to tears. It was simply superb.

Thanks Maggie, I am waiting for a friend to finish that one. I might just go and buy it!

I just finished reading most all the "Little House On The Prairie" books out there.
Looking to find other stuff similar to that time period. Any good suggestions?

Is it the time period you are after, or the setting? Because you might enjoy L M Montgomery's books - "Anne of Green Gables" and the "Avonlea" books. They are not set in the West, but I've always felt that they had something of the same flavour.