Sleuth Home - Message Boards - The Gumshoe Lounge

Jul-27-2006 03:15

I know we already have the Sleuths Bookshelf, but people there talk about their general tastes, what books they liked in childhood etc. I'd like all of us to share with others what we are reading now, do we like it or not and to recommend the books we like. Possibly we could have a similar thread for movies.

Nov-1-2006 18:29

I'm reading the last book in the Lemony Snicket "Series of Unfortunate Events."

Nov-1-2006 19:36

This message board....

*waits for the dumb joke bi**h slap that should come from someone anytime now*

Nov-2-2006 00:56

*pimpslaps biggie with extra knucklage*

The ingredients label on a bag of plain potatoes.

Nov-2-2006 03:13

I'm re-reading for the umpteeth time, ' Harry and the Stone' (as I like to call it). And trying to re-read "The Boring Code" or as others like to call it, "The Da Vinci Code." Seriously, what a piece of crap.

Dan Brown is a very sucky writer. He takes a very cool idea that could have been fantastic and adds a script that reads like a first draft, flat characters with forced foribles and would create more bloody suspense if he added SUDDENLY, like a eight year might.

NOT a good author at all. Who was this guys editor? Should be shot.
I've read all of Dan's books and they're all as bad as each other, the only one, I sort of enjoyed was "Deception Point" except his goes a little over the top as usual. Shame really, as the ideas behind his books are good.

I just finished reading Jasper Fforde's "The Big Over Easy" .

I've raved about this author before on the Sleuth Bookshelf page.
He'd write Dan Brown off any day.

He's very witty, clever and funny.
Here's what a critic had to say, "It is great not just because it's very FUNNY [ see, I told you ] but also because it works properly as a whodunnit. Comic Genius."

Yeah, that's right, a GENIUS, just like Leonardo Da Vinci :) and it's a detective story.

Nov-2-2006 03:17

Foribles actually means foibles :) I got that word from Jas. All I got from Brown was Narcolesy.

Nov-2-2006 06:12

I am indeed in desperate times.... I am not reading anything right now. Which is a first for me. I usually read a book a week. (depending on how big it is.) I read a variety of things. From classic lit to mystery to comedy. Just as long it gets my attention in the first chapter. The only book I forced myself through was EMMA by Jane Austin. after halfway through I finally got interested in it. - which was weird for me because Pride and Prejudice is one of my favorite books.

Nov-2-2006 10:52

Almost done with The Deadly Curse of Toco-Rey. Just two more chapters...

Nov-2-2006 19:07

Just finished "A Confederacy of Dunces" and it was excellent. I was afraid it was one of those books that many people touted as great simply because of the tragic personal story of the author, but it really is a good read.

Nov-2-2006 23:43

Just finished re-reading "Thinks" by David Lodge and I'm thinking about reading "A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius" by Dave Eggers again. That was the last book I really liked reading, and I kinda think most of the time, the ones you like, you'll like even more next time around.

Update: After a THIRD run at "Everything is Illuminated" I pretty much quit the book with thirty pages to go. It's not a bad story at all, but the thing is, the way the author keeps experimenting with different techniques (read: showing off what he can do) start to become more prominent than the story itself. It's a shame, really because sometimes what he writes is just indescribably beautiful.

Jul-11-2007 10:37

I've just finished reading The Poisonwood Bible for the first time and reread The Bean Trees and Prodigal Summer by Barbra Kingsolver.
She is definately one of my favourite authors.

The words bittersweet are way over used in book reviews, but her work is very honest and very real leaving you with a slight regret and yet hope, not only for her characters but the world that they (we) are in.

The Poisonwood Bible is narrated by five different females, the wife and daughters of an American Missionary sent to the Congo. The women aree all struggling to find a place int he world and each of them eventually find in their own way. The Father is more of a representation character, he too has a defined character that you first dislike before coming to pity.

The Prodigal Summer also has a split narrative with two old feuding neighbours, an older women disillusioned with humans who finds solace in nature and a much young man who whom is also a hunter and a young widow who has just lost her husband and is struggling to fit in.

The Bean Trees is my favourite, it's so beautiful, full of heartbreaking loss yet full of hope too. About a young woman who "finds" a baby and ends at somewhere in Arizona.

I really recommend checking out her writing soon if you can. :)