Hiromi_X

check out Seven Types of Ambiguity" by Elliot Perlman.. it's a novel.. good stuff.

I've been reading several books by Daniel Goleman, Emotional Intelligence was the one that got me started. He's also worked with the Dali Lama on some books. They delve into many aspects of the human mind and how it works.

Let me know how you like The God Delusion Personally, i loved it. For all the book has some flaws, i think Dawkins is fuckin' brilliant.

Oh, is Dawkins the guy who was on South Park the other night banging Ms. Garrison's monkey hole?

Two writers I love are Anne Lamott and Mary Kerr. Lamott's fiction is sort of almost perfect in a quiet way. She wrote one book about the sixties in California, as seen through the eyes of an eleven year old girl. Another begins, "I returned to the town in which I grew up with a dull sense of torment for which the germans surely have a word." Kerr writes about her childhood in east Texas, in refinery town, "too ugly not to love."

Have you read "The Poisonwood Bible" ? Or Umberto Eco's "Foucault's Pendulum"? Those're still favorites for big-loose-yourself-in-em novels. I'm also reading "Trainspotting," the novel, which I love, and had never read before. And from the public library well, I checked out "Outwitting the Gestapo," by Lucie Aubrac, a French Resistance fighter with a young family.

I know from posts you've done in the past, that you sometimes like science-y books. Two of my favorites (and quick reads, too), are "Longitude: The True Story of the Lone Genius Who Solved the Greatest Scientific Problem of His Time," by Dava Sobel, and "The Arcanum: The Extraordinary True History," by Janet Gleeson. "The Arcanum," is kind of cool, because its about a German prince who locks up an alchemist who tried to swindle him. He tells the alchemist he'll set him free when he turns some lead into gold, which, obviously, the alchemist can't do, but he does eventually figure out how to make porcelian, or Dresden China.

Hope that wasn't too long a list. I'm not a word-nerd or anything...

Yeah Ray, but Dawkins makes a lot more sense when he's not a cartoon. Not as funny that way though.

Out of Egypt: A Memoir by Andre Aciman. It hits your requirements (memoir, general fiction). I picked it up in Abq and just recently re-read it. Other than that, I've been on an erotica kick.

OMG, this triggered a memory of my dream from several nights ago. I was in a library that still had the card catalog Dewey Decimal system. Nowadays everything is on computer. But there it was .. this extensive card catalog of little paper cards all in perfect order in little drawers in a massive cabinet. I discovered that if I swapped out two drawers, that the entire system would reorganize itself. It was like a magical, Rubiks cube. I was being challenged by something or someone unseen in my dream, to figure out how to reorganize the entire system backwards from the last to first by swapping out drawers. The dream seem to last forever and I could never solve it. I kept swapping drawers to get the cards in perfect reverse order...I kept trying and trying and it never would work for me.

This is my fixation on perfectionism. Everything has to be perfect for me or I freak out. This time it just happened to be the Dewey Decimal system. Thanks for reminding me of this dream!

Hiromi: our tastes differ somewhat -- I enjoy certain graphic novels and, though I'm picky about it, science fiction -- but we agree on everything else, sounds like. I'd recommend "A Traveller's Guide to Mars" by William K. Hartman. He's a member of the JPL team that photographed Mars on several early missions. Hartman has an easygoing prose style mixed with scientific detail, and a boatload of amazing Martian photos you won't see anywhere else. My favorite is of a string of dust devils wandering slowly across the Martian dunes, leaving long, thin lines behind them. It's as though someone had grabbed a pencil and doodled on another world.
"The Secret Life of Dust" by Hannah Holmes is about exactly what it sounds like, but manages to squeeze a lot of fascinating details out of this topic as well as drawing some thought-provoking conclusions.

"Letter to a Christian Nation" and "The End of Faith" by Sam Harris. I read letter in about an hour at BnB and it is a response to all the letters he received since publishing "The End of Faith."

"Imperial America" by Gore Vidal. Read this over last semester and found it to be a well written.

"The Art of Happiness" by the Dalia Lama. Read this about a year ago and found it helpful. I read portions from time to time.

"Greatest Story Ever Sold: The Decline and Fall of the Truth from 9/11 to Katrina by Frank Rich.

"The Lighthouse" by P.D. James, which I just finished reading last night is quite a good british detective series.

I'm just beginning the latest V.I. Warshawski novel and are usually good.

B

I just read and liked Emergency Sex, about 3 people on UN peacekeeper missions. First person raw emotion experiences in Bosnia, Somolia, Cambodia, Liberia, and Haiti.

Jhumpa Lahiri novel "the namesake" is good but not as good as her short stories "the interpreter of maladies" Really like her style of writing.

Of all the sociology books I read, I liked "Stigma," by Erving Goffman the best. It was more narrative than textbookish.

Stiffed, by Susan Faludi

Of course as a librarian I'm thrilled to hear when someone re-discovers libraries. (They're a great equalizer! Same information/entertainment is available to all whether you have money or not.) I don't bother renting movies, I just borrow 'em for free! I buy very few books now because most I'll want to read only once and don't need to own them. Anyway, do you like historical fiction at all? I really enjoyed Tracy Chevalier's books. ("Girl with a Pearl Earring" is the most famous, but I liked "Falling Angels" even better.) Otherwise, I read a heck of a lot of teen and children's books since that's my area of work.... So I'm not usually great at reader's advisory for adults. :-)

Yay, libraries! :-) I am in the middle of "In the Hand of Dante" by Nick Tosches, and I am enjoying it very much. It's the first book that I've read in quite some time that actually uses words that i don't know. That's fun. My only beef with it is how he jumps from voice to voice between chapters, but it's a good story, so far.

Ever since your first post, I've been scanning my bookshelves for a few more titles in different categories (just in case you aren't in the mood for science that day). One of my favorites is "Boggs: A Comedy of Values" by Lawrence Weschler. It's about the artist / accused forger who draws currency by hand, then asks to trade it to store owners -- as "art" -- for their merchandise. At first, I thought little about him, but his book explains how he came to do this as well as the message behind it, and explains both very well. He also includes numerous color plates of his more creative bills, with Maya Angelou and other deserving people replacing the dead presidents.
In a more biographical vein, I'd recommend "Archibald Cox: Conscience of a Nation" by Ken Gormley. It details not only Cox's life, but places him in context. Best of all, the book takes an honest approach to its subject, who cooperated fully with it. The result paints Cox as a sincere, dedicated man sometimes paralyzed by his desperate determination to consider every point of view and weigh every need before taking action. Gormley neither canonizes nor demonizes, a welcome change from the usual approach.

Hiromi, here are some books I like:

Jared Diamond: Collapse
Amory Lovins: Natural Capitalism
Jonathan Kozol:
>> Amazing Grace
>> Ordinary Resurrections

Books that the little boy in me wants to recommend to you. All of them are by Richard Bach.
>> Jonathan Livingston Seagull
>> Illusions
>> The Bridge Across Forever

I love Noam Chomsky’s political books. I just love to watch his mind work.

Howard Zinn. What an affable character. I just love to read him, listen to him and watch him.
>> A People's History of the United States
>> His memoir: You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train: A Personal History of Our Times

Studs Terkel. My remarks about Dr. Zinn apply equally to Studs. This man is the greatest radio interviewer I have heard (Anybody I consider better than Terry Gross has got to be great; she is great, too.). Studs breaks all the rules and still is the best.
>> The Good War
>> Working: What People do all Day and How They Feel About What They Do
>> I am going to read more Terkel soon.

Red Barber.
>> Rhubarb in the Catbird Seat. This is his memoir.
>> Bob Edwards of NPR Morning Edition fame wrote a book. Fridays with Red: A Radio Friendship

You gotta love guys like Noam, Howard, Red and Studs. Cute old guys, amazing experiences, amazing minds, amazing stories, amazing energy. These guys are my heroes and mentors.

Hope that helps.

I'd second the Goffman. Actually all of his books are great.

For "light" science reading, I enjoyed "Circles : Fifty Roundtrips Through History Technology Science Culture" by James Burke. I've also read his most famous book - "The Day the Universe Changed".

I always enjoy a good mystery novel. My favorites are PD James (mentioned above - she's only written about 5 with my favorite character, Dagliesh) and Agatha Christie (I enjoy the Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple series). If you want to start with a good Agatha Christie, read "The Murder of Roger Acroyd". It was the first book with Hercule Poirot.

Oops. That's more than one book!

For Austin public libraries it isn't really necessary to go to multiple branches; simply go to the website and have books sent to the most convenient location.

As far as a suggestion, I've been reading a lot of Murakami lately and my favorite so far is Sputnik Sweetheart. Also Wild Sheep Chase is great (I'm almost done) but I have the only copy checked out ;).