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  • 2 weeks later...

I've just finished the Motley Fool's "Stocks 2005."

 

Also just finished reading "Yakuza" by Kaplan and Dubro. Very interesting history of Japan and the Pacific rim.

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Currently: Salman Rushdie "Satanic Verses" Intellectual, religious, controversial, can't put it down, etc.

 

Most recent: Haruki Murukami "Hard Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World." Funny, technical, sci-fi, mystery, sherlock holmes, crazy monsters, crazy people, all mixed into Tokyo!

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  • 1 month later...

Finished up reading Ryoma(Sakamoto) by Whitning (spelling) on the plane. Fascinating read.

 

rereading A Wild Sheep Chase by Murakami right now

 

Seperated at Birth (about Korea) written by my Uncle...just got my copy from my pops taday. Pretty timely piece I think with N. Korea building nukes and the US looking at new policy measures.

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I'm reading "Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith by Anne Lamott", sent to me by a family member who thought I should read it. It is making for an interesting read (when I'm in a serious mood).

 

Here's what Amazon says:

 

With the trademark wisdom, humor, and honesty that made Anne Lamott's book on faith, Traveling Mercies, a runaway bestseller, Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith is a spiritual antidote to anxiety and despair in increasingly fraught times.

 

The world is a more dangerous place than it was when Lamott's Traveling Mercies was published five years ago. Terrorism and war have become the new normal; environmental devastation looms even closer. And there are personal demands on Lamott's faith as well: turning fifty; her mother's Alzheimer's; her son's adolescence; and the passing of friends and time.

 

Fortunately for those of us who are anxious and scared about the state of the world, whose parents are also aging and dying, whose children are growing harder to recognize as they become teenagers, Plan B offers hope in the midst of despair. It shares with us Lamott's ability to comfort, and to make us laugh despite the grim realities.

 

Anne Lamott is one of our most beloved writers, and Plan B is a book more necessary now than ever. It will prove to be further evidence that, as The Christian Science Monitor has written, "Everybody loves Anne Lamott."

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I really liked Satanic Verses, I read it early on when it was first available. I wouldn't mind giving that another read.

 

I've just started "The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century"

by Thomas L. Friedman

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... endless reams of crap to sort out a dicky graphics card. I hate those so-called 'Support' download sites!!

 

Almost got it sorted, though.

 

On a brighter note: I like biographies by famous historical figures - have read the life of Captain Cook, Ernest Shackleton (Polar explorer), and Sir Edmund Hilary. Fascinating people indeed.

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  • 2 weeks later...

"Brainwashing" by Kathleen Turner, fantastic book - if you're interested in psychology at all check it out. No academic pretension here, very accessible.

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"British Isles: A Natural History" by Alan Titmarsh (BBC Books). Don't be put off with the name attached to the book. It's a really good insight into the geography of the BI. It may seem like a candidate for "coffee table design accessory", but it's more than that. Some great photography and info and new light on places that aren't normally covered in this kind of book.

 

It was a nice present from a friend in the UK.

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  • 2 weeks later...

An odd little book called "I Hated Hated Hated This Movie". As a blurb on it says "ofteh the films you most want to read about are the ones you'd least like to watch".

 

"Some of the worst films in this book are so jaw-droppingly bad they achieve a kind of grandeur"

 

lol.gif

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I just finished "Reagan & Gorbachev - How the Cold War Ended" by Jack Matlock who was intimately involved in the negotiations between the two presidents. Having grown up while all that was going on, it was very interesting to read a first-hand account of it. Some of the problems with Gorbachev that were hidden at the time by his lionisation in the media are revealed.

 

Matlock condemns the post-Cold War triumphalism of some sectors in the US, and quietly portrays Reagan as a person of far greater stature than both Bushes. He also mourns the death of diplomacy.

 

I was hesitant to read something so clearly likely to be biased, but was impressed at how light the bias actually was.

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