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Post by bjd on Jun 28, 2019 8:55:41 GMT
In "The Master and Margarita" an editor called Mikhail Alexandrovich Berlioz is run over and beheaded by a tram in 1920s Moscow.
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Post by bjd on Jun 28, 2019 14:43:35 GMT
According to a note by the translator, Berlioz is chosen as a reference to the Berlioz opera "The Damnation of Faust".
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Post by whatagain on Jun 28, 2019 17:58:56 GMT
I slept at hotel Vivienne. Rue Vivienne. Close to the galerie. Nice area awful hotel.
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Post by kerouac2 on Jun 29, 2019 16:53:06 GMT
I took a university course where The Master and Margarita was one of the required books. Even though I passed the course, the book has been completely erased from my mind.
I tried to pick up a book that I had abandoned (8 by Tristan Garcia), but it makes absolutely no sense to me, so I will abandon it again. I will select another book from my multitude of shelves of forgotten books.
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Post by bjd on Jul 9, 2019 5:55:12 GMT
At the library the other day I spotted a book by a writer mentioned by Whatagain recently -- Zygmunt Miloszewski. I don't usually read thrillers, but this one is pretty good. The Polish title translates as Priceless but I can't find the name in English. About recovering stolen works of art.
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Post by cheerypeabrain on Jul 9, 2019 12:01:07 GMT
After finding the Carl Sagan book interesting I got myself another astronomy one. Our Universe, An Astronomer's Guide written by Jo Dunkley. I'm enjoying this book even more than the Carl Sagan one. For the first time I can understand explanations about what scientists think dark matter may consist of. So well written, a little dry at times (necessarily so) but full of information. Really fascinating stuff.
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Post by Kimby on Jul 9, 2019 13:46:34 GMT
Digging deep into older titles I haven’t gotten around to reading before.
Like Annie Dillard’s Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, which was highly regarded but I actually boycotted when it first came out in the 70’s because she wasn’t Edward Abbey or Aldo Leopold, my preferred nature writers. Like Thoreau, her inspiration, it’s a little thick with words. but she makes some interesting points. I keep it in the nightstand at the lake cottage, and will read -and digest - a chapter at a time.
I’ve also found a copy of Autumn of the Patriarch by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, a book I somehow haven’t read yet. But after enjoying Love in the Time of Cholera while in Florida, Autumn is sitting in my pile for the next trip.
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Post by kerouac2 on Jul 10, 2019 15:58:39 GMT
I rarely read old stuff, but I just read a French translation of Hemingway's short story One Trip Across which was later consolidated with a second short story into the novel To Have and Have Not. Now I am intrigued. I feel a need to see the movie and see how Hollywood made a total travesty of the story. In the short story, "Harry" gets swindled by an American tourist who had hired his boat but then he swindles Chinese immigrants trying to get from Cuba to Key West. Cuba went out the window when the film was made because Cuba benefited from the 'good neighbour' policy and bad things could not happen there. So the movie takes place in Martinique under the control of the Vichy regime. No Chinese but French resistants to be transported to safety, so no swindling either. And then there is Lauren Bacall. WTF? There is not a single woman in the short story.
If I were Hemingway, I would have committed suicide. Oh, that right -- that's what he did.
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Post by bjd on Jul 27, 2019 8:51:11 GMT
I just finished a book by Henning Mankell, the Swedish writer mostly known for his books about a policeman called Kurt Wallender. This book is a series of short chapters started from when Mankell was diagnosed with cancer in January 2014. He recalls various things he did as a youth or adult, interspersed with a few chapters about his chemiotherapy treatment. A recurring theme is the environment, especially nuclear waste and how to warm future generations about what we are hiding underground now. It's quite good and not depressing at all. The English title is Quicksand.
I just took it back to the library and discovered that they have a little section in the back where they put books they are giving away. Some of these were library books, some obviously donations. I found a bunch of books in English, probably read on vacation and given away because they are in good condition, some in hardcover. I took a few, mostly detective stories, which I will eventually put in a book box in Bayonne.
One of the first things I did when we moved here permanently in April was to sign up at the library. It's quite small (as is the town!) but they are building a new library (a "médiathèque" in fact, which means they will have music and movies too).
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Post by bixaorellana on Jul 31, 2019 16:51:08 GMT
Thanks for that review, Bjd. Because of the description I probably would have given the book a pass, but your review makes me want to read it. Such good news about your library and that you're in a town that really cares about it. Last night I started a novel called The Silent Duchess and was immediately pulled into it. It got rave reviews and I'm including its Amazon page, which for once doesn't give the whole plot away: www.amazon.com/Silent-Duchess-FP-Classics/dp/155861222X/ref=sr_1_1 The protagonist and narrator is from an aristocratic family in early 18th century Sicily, and the voice and pace are compelling from the very beginning.
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Post by bjd on Aug 8, 2019 18:16:31 GMT
In the pile of books I mentioned above, I found one called The Dinner by a Dutch writer, Herman Koch. Looking for the author's name, I see they made a movie out of it. It's well written enough (a translation but good) but it made me feel uneasy and I didn't feel any sympathy for anyone in the book.
I also got Solo by William Boyd. Now, I like Boyd's books usually, but this one is a James Bond book and it's really crappy. And why do these authors feel they have to describe everything in detail, as though they are writing a movie script. I gave up halfway and will get rid of it.
And went back to my library book, Le Tour du Monde du Roi Zibeline by Jean-Christophe Rufin. A re-imagined life story of a real adventurer of Hungarian/Polish/Slovakian origin, deported to Siberia in the 1770s, who escaped with other prisoners and sailed to Japan and around to France, eventually becoming a self-declared king of Madagascar. Rufin's books often describe adventurers.
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Post by bjd on Aug 14, 2019 16:23:43 GMT
Continuing my going through my pile of library discards, I read Stella Rimington's ("Former head of MI5) novel The Geneva Trap. Meh. The heroine of course works for the British secret services, all the men in charge are pretentious snobs. It's a mix of French anarchists, Russian spies and North Korean spies. I did finish it, unlike the previously mentioned William Boyd book, which is now sitting in a book box in Bayonne. I think this Rimington book will join it next time I go there.
I'm now reading a Maigret book by Simenon (or Yesbutno as Whatagain calls him). I found a pile of them at the local junk shop, including some I hadn't read. The very early ones, written in 1930 or so, show just how much things have changed in France.
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Post by bixaorellana on Aug 14, 2019 17:29:14 GMT
In #1838 I commented that I was reading The Silent Duchess by Dacia Maraini. I was drawn into the book from the very first sentence and after a chapter or two, ordered it for my mother. She was as enthralled as I and whipped through it, then pressed it on one of my sisters. I read the Kindle version, but since Mama had the physical book she noticed that it was from the Feminist Press and urged me to be sure to read all the afterwords, which give an excellent literary biography of the writer. I of course read it in English, but it's so well done that it's impossible to tell that it's a translation. This is a thoroughly engrossing and enjoyable read which I highly recommend. Right now I am re-reading Shike, Time of the Dragons, which I last read over 35 years ago. I am loving it just as much this time! Yesterday I got a used copy of Wolf Hall. I had completely rejected Hilary Mantel after attempting The Giant, O'Brien, the dense, even claustrophobic prose of which defeated me. I had, however, quite enjoyed the televised series of Wolf Hall, so took a look into the book. The writing is so different from the Giant that I am really looking forward to reading it. Stay tuned!
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Post by bjd on Aug 14, 2019 18:38:42 GMT
I actually ordered Wolf Hall second hand on Amazon. It was okay but a bit too long. In the library discard pile there was a copy of Bring Up the Bodies (sequel to Wolf Hall) but I didn't bother taking it.
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Post by bixaorellana on Aug 15, 2019 1:54:12 GMT
Oh, good catch, Huckle! The Silent Duchess is the only thing I've ever read by Maraini. The book takes place in the early 18th century, and comes across as being all about the protagonist in that time, so I didn't feel the author interjected herself. Did you get that unfortunate sense of Maraini from her non-fiction writings? Considering that if you go back far enough, the way any aristocratic family became aristocrats is not usually a particularly noble story. And the sheer number of aristocrats in Maraini's blueblood group is almost laughable. Speaking of laughable, this is a scion of the House of Savoy. I know one is not supposed to laugh at how people look, but really -- his face fairly announces he's not at the top of the class. (For further laughter, consider the fact that I follow that website. What can I say? I like jewelry. ) www.thecourtjeweller.com/2019/08/savoy-jewels-stolen-in-paris.htmlI've looked up en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bagheria online, and would love to go back to Sicily and visit there.
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Post by bjd on Aug 16, 2019 13:02:05 GMT
I just finished a very good book, Detroit by Charlie Le Duff, a reporter who returned to Detroit in 2007 and talks about the city, its collapse, corruption, etc.
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Post by kerouac2 on Aug 16, 2019 14:40:43 GMT
I became frustrated with wasting my money on bad new novels, so I have been picking things off my shelves concerning which I have no memory at all. Some of them are readable and others not (I am making a pile for the nearest book exchange box). I am reading an annoying epistolary novel at the moment (Did the French invent that genre with Dangerous Liaisons? I have no idea.). Even though it annoys me, it is still interesting enough to keep me going so far. However, I encountered an old movie ticket stuck between the pages, so now I am wondering if it was my bookmark and I never finished it. The ticket has the name of a cinema which still exists, but the name changed in 1996. The novel dates from 1985, so that at least gives me the decade when I was reading it.
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Post by bixaorellana on Aug 16, 2019 17:58:25 GMT
If you don't want to use ebooks and you don't want to risk more money on new novels, why don't you use the library?
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Post by kerouac2 on Aug 16, 2019 18:25:08 GMT
Choice of the latest books is extremely limited, and I find time constraints unbearable. I read some books in 48 hours and others in 4 months.
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Post by bixaorellana on Aug 16, 2019 20:37:12 GMT
I can understand that. But really, you might want to put one (1) ebook on your phone or tablet, just to see if you'd really hate reading that way. I know I sort of harp on this subject, but ever since I started with the 24-hour deep discount books I have a sense of great riches which are mine, all mine and tidily stored in the Amazon cloud. And on that note, I have to mention that The Silent Duchess is available today for $2.99, if huckle, or anyone else is interested. I'm not sure, but I think people in other countries can click on the Kobo button in the email offers and get the price in US dollars with an option to click on their country of residence to see what books are available. In personal reading news I peeked into Wolf Hall just to get more of a sense of it and was inexorably pulled in. I do love the pace, the excellent sense of place and time, and the characterizations. My only complaint so far is that sometimes it's difficult to figure out who is speaking because of the way Mantel writes dialogue. Wolf Hall is now my downstairs book. (the upstairs book, Shike, is on my phone) One of the reasons it's the downstairs book is because I have it set up on a sturdy wooden book rest, making it easier to read. Not that anyone asked, but my bathroom book is The Seashell on the Mountaintop. It's been lying around my house for ages and, judging by a bookmark in it, I had read quite a ways into it at one time. I did pull out the bookmark and start over and am really into it this time around.
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Post by bixaorellana on Aug 16, 2019 22:04:45 GMT
Yikes! I can't imagine it working as an audio book unless distinctive voices were brought in for the various characters, which would turn it into a sort of old-time radio show.
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Post by bixaorellana on Aug 17, 2019 19:45:28 GMT
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Post by whatagain on Aug 19, 2019 18:14:14 GMT
I finished origine by dan brown. Utterly boring. Full of digressions full of names no plot no suspense no nothing. I left the book at the nice airport maybe someone wants to read it but I don t want to add it to the overflowing shelves at home. Picked a book by Dennis Lehane - a drink before the war. No idea what I bought. Some if you read from him ?
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Post by bixaorellana on Aug 19, 2019 19:56:38 GMT
Dan Brown is garbage. You were nice to leave the book at the airport, though. Books are expensive & some people like that crap.
I too would like to hear from someone about Dennis LeHane, who is supposed to be a good writer (I think). For whatever reason, I've never read a book by him, probably because none of the plots of his best sellers have grabbed me.
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Post by bjd on Aug 20, 2019 11:24:36 GMT
I have seen books by Lehane at the library but the blurbs on the back of the books never tempt me either. Yes, Dan Brown is crap.
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Post by rikita on Aug 25, 2019 20:14:56 GMT
i listen to audio books more often than i read (or that is, i need a long time to finish books i am reading, so it takes a few months between starting one book to the next) ...
currently reading: "dorés bibel" by torgny lindgren. just started listening to (as an audiobook): "the science of discworld", after recently finishing "hände weg von mississippi" by cornelia funke.
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Post by Kimby on Sept 5, 2019 15:41:55 GMT
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Post by bjd on Sept 5, 2019 15:54:05 GMT
I have read many of Margaret Atwood's books since the earliest ones. The one I liked least was The Handmaid's Tale. In the review of the sequel that Kilby links to makes me realize that TV has to be more extreme in showing people, whereas literature allows the reader to come to a slower and deeper understanding of what is going on. I wonder too whether Atwood would have written a sequel if the first book hadn't been made into a TV show.
Meanwhile, I quit not even halfway through another book by Robert Goddard that I got from the library. What a crappy writer. And I have nearly finishedThe Wonder Boys by Michael Chabon, which my daughter found in a book box. Some odd moments but not bad.
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Post by bixaorellana on Sept 5, 2019 18:08:01 GMT
My problem with Margaret Atwood is that I greatly admire her and eagerly snatch up any book she writes. But that means that I am sometimes disappointed because the book does not entertain me in the way I wish to be entertained -- obviously my problem, not Atwood's. If I didn't have so much other stuff I need/want to read, I'd be tempted to go back and re-read some of her work which I read when I was much younger & less discerning and less informed. I think the way in which her books "disappoint" me entertainment-wise is because so many of them are more in service of an idea(s) than of sheer narrative force, although of course she can be quite good at that, too. I see that Francine Prose has the same thought about Atwood although, unsurprisingly, she phrases it better than I: “Atwood has always had much in common with those writers of the last century who were engaged less by the subtle minutiae of human interaction than by the chance to use fiction as a means of exploring and dramatizing ideas.” That quote is from a long and interesting article about Atwood: www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/04/17/margaret-atwood-the-prophet-of-dystopia
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Post by bjd on Sept 5, 2019 18:15:49 GMT
Atwood has always been a dual kind of writer : the novels, often about women, many of which take place in Canada and Toronto: The Edible Woman, Surfacing, The Blind Assassin, Alias Grace and many others.
She also writes science-fictiony distopian novels which I like less but still tend to read them when I get a chance. They are more difficult to enjoy, for sure.
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