I just finished Amy Tam's 'The Hundred Secret Senses'. I liked it much better than her others.Very absorbing, and some wonderful description. It is also funny. Now I am on 'The Big Blowdown'by George Pelecanos.It's a crime story,but much more. To quote 'it has drive, savagery and elegance'. He is an awesomely good writer, and I need to get his earlier books next.

------------------

I had a boring office job—I cleaned the windows in the envelopes. —Rita Rudner

Yay!Finally got my hands on Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire after my kids really took their time with it. Also really into Elizabeth Peters'Amelia Peabody mysteries, about a feminist Victorian Egyptologist (!) who has great adventures while unravelling strange mysteries.... very amusing, and they move fast...these are made especially interesting cos I'm currently based in Egypt, and it's funny to see how times haven't changed...LOL!

Can't concentrate on anything too serious right now, too much on my plate, but these are FUN...then I'm planning to re-re-read To Kill A Mockingbird and some old Agatha Christies...adore her from my teenage years...good times lie ahead!

I have decided to give Stephen King another shot. I am now reading "Hearts In Atlantis". So far so good. I am finding in this book that he is not repeating himself over and over again, which is why I gave up on him in the first place. Maybe he is out of his writers block finally!

------------------
Sandalwood's Cosmic Creations: Working with the magic of love....

opening the lotus -by sandy boucher

if on a winter's night a traveller -by italo calvino

the garden of the prophet -by kahlil gibran

a woman speaks -by anais nin

------------------
"i was so much older then, im younger than that now"
-bob dylan

currently i'm in middle of the Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordan for the second time...I'm in mid of #3- The Dragon Reborn..
It's feels weird not to be in middle of at least five books- that's usual for me .

I can't believe I've actually found other freaks like me! Every always asks me how I can read more than one book at a time. I hardly ever am in less than three. Right now, I am (slowly) making my way through the Bible, reding HP 4(for the umpteenth time), and The Slave Dancer. I read have a book I read at night, one at read in my free time (like I have any), and a book I carry everywhere with me. I just finished rereading The Time Quartet books (A Wrinkle in Time, Wind in the Door, Many Waters, A Swiftly Tilting Planet), and the Harry Potter books, while i was bed-ridden this weekend. I also just finshed the Elliminst Chronicals.

------------------
"I used to hate math because it had to many numbers. Now I hate math because it has to many letters." ~Me, in Algebra.

I am reading "Cloudsplitter" by Russell Banks. It si a very interesting book.

Hey, sand !Are you into Garrison Keillor ? I like his books. I finished Wobegon Boy before starting Cloudsplitter (by Russell Banks). I have read several of his other books. I enjoy his writing style. I am also re-reading Look Homeward, Angel by Thomas Wolfe which is my favorite novel !!!

Hi malizma! I do enjoy Garrison Keillor, but I like his radio programs on NPR better than his writing, and I like his short stories much better than the novel I tried to read ("Lake Wobegon Days"). He has a great sense of humor.

I am reading I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou.

Hey sand !! I love that book !! It's nice to talk with people who actually read !!! Still reading Cloudsplitter here and loving it. I have to finish it by next week, it has to go back to the library.

I think xterminal and I must have been separated at birth. I've also got a very long queue and several books being read at once. I don't know if it's bibliophilia, overenthusiasm, or the attention span of a two year old. Anyway, I'm currently reading "David Copperfield", "Gawain and Lady Green" by Anne Eliot Crompton, "Encyclopedia of World Mythology", and "A Pocket History of Ireland" (a very short history, indeed).

------------------

I just finished a couple of nice English murder novels, by Reginald Hill. BBC/PBS/A&E watchers may be familiar with Pascoe and Dalziel. The books are some of the most interesting, psychologically speaking, police procedurals I have ever read.

I'm currently reading Paul Durcan's "The Berlin Wall Cafe" which is some of the best poetry written in the last 30 years. I'm also perusing Brian Greene's "The Elegant Universe" (a 'simple' explanation of superstring theory) and rereading "Huckleberry Finn" by Mark Twain. I'm still giving the fisheye to Heaney's "Beowulf", but I'll start that soon enough. Finish one Irish poet, move on to the next...

------------------
What do we all care about? Clear skin, clear skin, clear skin!
--Jennifer Love Hewitt

Um, besides romance novels and my psychology book?

Kidding.

I've just started reading "Monkey King" a book by a new author (can't remember her name), re-reading "Heart of Darkness" by Joseph Conrad, and reading Henry IV by Shakespeare.

------------------
Beware of the turtles!

Uhhh... hmm I wish my list of books was as impressive as some I've looked through here! I've just finished rereading (again!) the Outlander series by Diana Gabaldon, and I've moved on to:

Amo, Amas, Amat and More: How to Use Latin to Your Own Advantage and to the Astonishment of Others by Eugene Ehrlich

Twice-Told Tales: The Psychological Use of Fairy Tales by Hans Dieckmann

Twilight Eyes by Dean Koontz (rereading)

The Bad Place by Dean Koontz (rereading)

...and I'm trying to get hold of the Lord of the Rings books by J.R.R. Tolkein, but they never seem to be in the library!!!

Have fun reading everyone

------------------
Ubi solitudinem faciunt pacem appellant

I'm currently reading about 4 or 5 different books...

-Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
-Salinger's Raise High the Roofbeam, Carpenters
-Evolution of a Creationist
-The Tragedy of American Compassion, by Marvin Olasky
-Tom Brokaw's The Greatest Generation

There are so many books on my to-read list I can't even think of them all. I don't think I have enough time to read everything I want to read.

I'm reading
The Last Time I Wore A Dress by Daphne Scholinski
and
The Fifth Son by Elie Weisel

Tragedy and Hope, by Carroll Quigley. 1400 pages. That Jared Diamond book was boring, but I liked his thoughts, although dubious - he seems to promote Imperialism.

The new star wars book was interesting, with ole' Darth Maul's history of gruesome killings of severl Jedi Masters.

and Lastly, Dungeon, Fire, and Swords...by jj Johnson is a fascinating account on the Knights of Templar.

I think Star Wars seems to work because they have taken so much from Greek and world mythology..I can see different stories- re-written by these various authors...also, Mr. Campbell the Myth-freak was rather a good friend of Spielberg's and quite influential...

Tragedy and Hope, by Carroll Quigley. 1400 pages. That Jared Diamond book was boring, but I liked his thoughts, although dubious - he seems to promote Imperialism.

The new star wars book was interesting, with ole' Darth Maul's history of gruesome killings of several Jedi Masters.

and Lastly, Dungeon, Fire, and Swords...by jj Johnson is a fascinating account on the Knights of Templar.

I think Star Wars seems to work because they have taken so much from Greek and world mythology..I can see different stories- re-written by these various authors...also, Mr. Campbell the Myth-freak was rather a good friend of Spielberg's and quite influential...

how does one delete a double- submission?

Don't think you can without help from the Forum Gods and Goddesses themselves!!

As to what I'm reading - "Angela's Ashes" ;

And have just finished "The Chalice" by Phil Rickman . Phil Rickman's style is great - lots of research depth in all his work. This one is on Glastonbury where the Grail is supposed to have been buried.

I'm just about done with Plutarch's "Lives" (the abridged version, hrm). I'm midway through "Teachings from the American Earth" (American Indian philosophy). And as soon I finish Plutarch's seemingly exhaustive discussion of Mark Antony I'll start "Pagan Meditations: Artemis, Hestia and Aphrodite" (a feminist book, sounds good!).

------------------
"You can't claim supreme executive power just because some watery tart threw a sword at you!" ---Monty Python and the Holy Grail

[This message has been edited by TrueBlueGolde (edited 03-21-2001).]

feminist, germaine greer's "the female eunuch".

beleive me, i really, really need to read it...

------------------
"the advantage of emotions is that they lead us astray." -oscar wilde

I've started re-reading, for like the 80th time, a hippie philosophy book written by my great-uncle, called "The Velvet Monkeywrench." Some of you west coast hippies (I'm looking in JoJo's direction) may have heard of "How to Keep Your Volkswagen Alive" by John Muir. That's the same guy.

Surprise! I'm related to a somewhat famous hippie weirdo.

------------------
"In Italy for 30 years under the Borgias they had warfare, terror, murder, bloodshed--they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and the Renaissance. In Switzerland they had brotherly love, 500 years of democracy and peace, and what did they produce? The cuckoo clock."
--Harry Lime (Orson Welles) in The Third Man

I just started reading THE SILMARILLION by J.R.R. Tolkien. I've never read any of his work before, but the The Lord of the Rings movie coming out sparked my curiosity. This book seemed like the best choice to read first, it's about the myths and pasts from which his other works branch off.

------------------
"I'm nobody's Tonto."

I'm delighted to find other people like xterminal and mycroft who have huge piles of books to be read and re-read! And lots of people who read more than one book at a time!

At the moment I'm reading:
Sophocles' 'Antigone' (for my Open University course)
Terry Pratchett's 'The Colour of Magic' (am intending re-reading the whole series)
Carrie Fishers' 'Postcards from the Edge'
Marcus Berkmann's 'Brain Men' (very funny book about pub and TV quizzes - highly recommended if you're into them)
plus I've just got another two library books I've not started yet.