What are you reading?

[sandragonfly]

well..what do you (everybody) recommend?

I think the last book was Woman Murders I took off my mother's shelves ages ago and still need to finish 99/100 of the pages..

[Karen]

Originally posted by K9soul
I'm rereading a favorite at the moment (Byzantium by Stephen Lawhead). I can read a fiction and a nonfiction at the same time but not two fiction novels at the same time. I get too deeply immersed in the characters and story and I would find it too distracting and disorienting to switch gears mid story. I generally read at least a couple hours a day and tend to go through a novel a week on average. Barnes & Noble loves me

I have what my mom always called "a garbage head" in that we keep all sorts of useless knowledge up there. So I can read several books at a time, and instantly pop back in to the story. I keep book seperate physically - The King in the Window is my kitchen or taking-with-me-in-case-there's-a-wait book, the Splintered Icon (due out in September 2005) is my computer desk book, and the Karin Slaughter book is my nightstand book!

I recently finished these:

No Place Like Home by Mary Higgins Clark - good, but not her best. Standard MHK, suspense, some romance, a real fast read. I didn't like how quickly everything tied up at the end, and how neatly it did, with no grey areas between good guys and bad guys, but it's a good simple story.

Their Magician and Other Stories by Gloria Kurian Broder - due out in July 2005. A really good set of short stories, many with Russian flavor, but definitely American stories, and set here. Thoughtful, interesting stories, each different from the next, not all happy endings, but each story is a solid entity unto itself, with believable, normal, flawed human beings at their center.

and I'll go the other one in a minute. I could describe the cover (royal blue and black, silver lettering) but cannot recall the title off the top of my head.

[micki76]

I'm jsut finishing up Karen Robards' "Bait" .

Next up is "Forty Words for Sorrow" By Giles Blunt.

[RICHARD]

Nelson De Mille....and anything that Gutenberg has done...

[sandragonfly]

posted by gina's ark inc.

Woman Murders

Woman Murderers

I only took that one out because it has pictures in it ...lol. I've never liked to read. I'm trying to love it since everyone is!

[Karen]

Okay, the other two I just finished over the weekend:

Killing Her Softly by Beverly Barton - Really good suspense/mystery. The ending was pretty much a surprise, I grew to care about various characters, hoping which one was or was not the villian. The main characters were pretty well fleshed out, fair amount of thought and depth to them. Again, kind of stayed away from the cartooney stereotypes, even though several of the main characters are lawyers.

City of Towers by Keith Baker - Excellent Fantasy/Science Fiction. Many mythycal characters like orges, a Phoenix, goblins, elves and halflings, hippogriffs, etc. make up the ordinary population of this world and city. Set on another world, "magic" and various "powers" pretty believably done, well-described imagery, and good characters, it's the first in a series, and I'm looking forward to reading more!

[elizabethann]

A Walk Across America.

[prechrswife]

I just finished The Cat Who Went Up the Creek by Lillian Jackson Braun. I haven't picked out my next book yet because I just finished that one last night.

As for reading multiple books at a time, I don't usually do that, but my husband does. I tend to just read one at a time, but very quickly.

[JenBKR]

Something by Sandra Brown...can't remember the name offhand. Not one of her better books. I usually like suspense & mystery...James Patterson, Tami Hoag, Mary Higgins Clark, etc.

[katienoonan]

I am reading the Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown. I just bought Angels and Demons yesterday so I am going to read that one next.

[MariaM]

Order of the Phoenix!

[Lacey]

I think next up on my reading list will be "All the Weyrs of Pern." I read it before a few years back, so maybe this go around I'll be prepared for a certain event in it and won't end up bawling my eyes out.

There's an amazing used book store two minutes from where I work, so whenever I start to run low I collect books that I've already read and trade them in for store credit. My list of "books that I hope to find at McKays" keeps growing whenever I try out a new series there. My only gripe with McKays is that they price the Redwall books only slightly cheaper than what you could find them for at Waldenbooks.

If anyone's looking for some good reading, I highly recommend:

Anything by Neil Gaiman. "Coraline," "Good Omens" (co-written with Terry Pratchett of "Discworld" fame), "Neverwhere," and "American Gods" feature high on this list. I found "Stardust" to be so-so, with the characters seeming a little stiff, but that's not stopping me from eagerly awaiting "Anansi Boys" to come out.

McCaffrey's Pern series is also extremely fascinating. The whole series takes place over a span of 2500 years, and it's just absolutely amazing to see the culture she manages to create. My advice is not to read the books in chronological order, but to start instead with the Harper Hall Trilogy and follow it up with the Dragonriders of Pern part of the series. Because if you start with "Dragonsdawn," you're going to get a lot of names thrown at you and have no clue what their significance is.

Glen Cooks' Garrett, P.I. series is another fun read. You can start with pretty much any book in the series and you're given just enough backstory to (1) whet your whistle for more of the books and (2) keep you from being confused about who's who. They're just the right mix of funny and sarcastic. Though from Petty Pewter Gods on down the line they start to lose something.

Spider Robinson - highly recommend. Sci-fi with the empath's touch to it. The Callahan's series is an excellent place to start, though the early books can be tough to find. The main theme behind the series is that "shared pain is lessened; shared joy increased." There are tall tales and awful puns and people overcoming problems together. PT's Thursdays always seem to have a similar feel to these books. And, if you're not easily offended, the two Lady Sally's books are also very good reads, and really, the fact that they take place in a "house of ill-repute" isn't that big a deal.

[furrykidsmother]

I love anything that Danielle Steele writes. I am currently reading "The Wedding". I think I have every book that she has written. I am also a Stephen King fan, although I haven't kept up with his novels as frequently these past few years, but I do not believe that he has retired. I am reading only 1 book at the moment, but I have been known to have 2 or 3 going at the same time.

[Suki Wingy]

Originally posted by kimboe
I'm just starting to read "Spanish Holiday" by KATE CANN so far it's not to bad!

I've read that before, it takes a change 1/2 way through

[Suki Wingy]

Originally posted by prechrswife
[B]I just finished The Cat Who Went Up the Creek by Lillian Jackson Braun./B]

that one took me for ever just to read the first chapter, then I put it down never to pick it up again