What books are you reading right now?

Talk about a book getting off to a slow start; even when things finally get interesting they're not that interesting. I sure hope that the second half The Robots of Dawn is much better than the first half.

 

I'm 4.5% into The Bourne Identity on audio book via OverDrive. I ran out of Jack Reacher, Michael Bennett, Alex Cross, and Alex Delaware novels. *sigh* #firstworldproblems

 

Just started War of the Whales

"Two men face off against an all-powerful navy -- and the fate of the ocean's most majestic creatures hangs in the balance."

 

I'm 2/3 into Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller. Some how I've never read the play, saw it performed or on film.

 

Finished it. Excellent, and thoroughly depressing. It was an odd choice for Xmas reading, but it fit right into what's happening this year.

 

GREAT play! Miller was totally brilliant. I still like The Crucible better, but Death of a Salesman is an amazing piece of work.

 

I'm going to try to find Death of a Salesman on film (DVD), and hope to see the play some day.

I need to finish Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? by Edward Albee. He taught some creative writing courses at UH while I was there, but I didn't sign up for any. Chances were pretty good I wouldn't gotten in.


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I'm now reading Born Standing Up by Steve Martin, his autobiography that covers his years doing stand-up comedy. I'm usually disappointed by the masturbatory nature of many celebrity ABs, but so far this is pretty good. I never knew that Martin had a long history of having his writing in some prestigious magazines.

 

Patton was quite a character. His military tactics have been praised and damned.

 

I thought WAVW was a great play for actors-- I did a scene from it once when I was an undergrad, and it was very challenging. But when I saw the play as an audience member, I found it a little boring-- it felt a little two-dimensional. Maybe I just didn't see a great production, I dunno. But I feel like what made his dialogue so challenging as an actor-- it's spartan minimalism-- just didn't make for great reading or watching. I think Miller was better, though different; and better but similar was Eugene O'Neill.

 

I think that WAOVW? reaches a point early on where the audience starts thinking 'Yes, they hate each other, we get it, there's no need to keep beating it into our heads.' It's not an easy read, esp. since I have very little experince reading plays.

 

My issue with WAOVW is I've been stuck at peoples house when they've started railing on each other and seriously watching people tear each others souls out really isn't my favorite kind of spectator sport.
There certainly is the watching one of those self destructing art machines aspect to it but after a while even that gets tedious.
Good actors bring a vibrancy to the parts and can make it watchable but I really don't enjoy it.

 

For comparison, another play with fairly minimalist dialogue that showcases a lot of destructive behavior, but which, IMO, is much more compelling than WAOVW is Lanford Wilson's Burn This. I once saw a production of that so gripping I literally could not look away. I had to pee the whole back quarter of the play, and couldn't make myself get up and leave to go, it was so riveting.

 

I'm near the end of Billy Bathgate by E.L. Doctorow. The story is pretty good, but Doc's writing style takes some getting used to, namely his fondness of run-on sentences and imagery (if that's the right word) that borders on being poetic. I haven't done this much 'scan' reading since I read Ayn Rand.

 

Have you read Ragtime?
Beautiful book that you can almost fall into but like said it takes a bit to get used to his style of writing.

 

Ragtime has got my attention, but I haven't yet read it. I'm on the fence regarding Doctorow. He writes very compelling stories, but I seriously dislike run-on sentences (and paragraphs), & have never been a fan of poetry.

 

I'm currently reading Failure Is Not An Option by Gene Krantz. So far I'm enjoying it, am pleased that Krantz isn't using a lot of technojargon.

 

I found Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn for $1.99 at Goodwill. I've heard & read all the hype, and hope that the book lives up to it.