OT: good books

[Lise]

How is it that none of us has mentioned To Kill A Mockingbird? Harper Lee is the author. It's an American classic. I've reread that one more times than I remember.

Two more, and then I'll give it a rest (for today...):

Stigmata, by Phyllis Alesia Perry. A young woman inherits a quilt from her grandmother, and begins to experience the life of her enslaved ancestor who made the quilt. Is she crazy? Is she re-incarnated? Fascinating little book.

Lying Awake, by Mark Salzman. The story of a nun who is a poet and a visionary, and then learns that both the poetry and the visions may come from a brain disorder. She struggles with the nature of faith and her willingness to be "cured". A beautiful, spare book. I'm astonished that a man could write so well of this woman's experience.

[Susan126]

Some of my favorite books are:

I love the Harry Potter Series . . . can't wait for the final book (estimated June/July 2007) too long!

LOTR! Read it twice. The second time just before the first movie came out.

The Da Vinci Code - Looking forward to the movie this May. Love comparing movies to the books.

Angels and Demons

Memoirs of a Geisha

Snow Falling On Cedars

Down the Common: A Year In the Life of a Medieval Woman (excellent historical fiction!)

The Molly Murphy Mystery Series

I JUST LOVE THIS SERIES: Big Stone Gap by Adriana Trigiani
Big Cherry Holler
Milk Glass Moon
and coming the fall of 2006 . . . Return to the Big Stone Gap! I can't wait!

And my all time favorite: To Kill a Mockingbird

Those are just my top favorites. Besides cycling I love to read!

[Yubagirl]

notice you live near me, are you a road cyclist or just mb?looking for a good road ride thats in your area but not too steep. have any ideas? i ve done the 'greg lemond loop' have any fav. loops you could suggest??

[Trekhawk]

notice you live near me, are you a road cyclist or just mb?looking for a good road ride thats in your area but not too steep. have any ideas? i ve done the 'greg lemond loop' have any fav. loops you could suggest??

Im a newbie to road (started riding Jun 05) and super newbie to Mountain.

The Allison Ranch Ride is a nice one (you can pick up a map for this and others at Tour of Nevada city bike shop).

I normally make up my own routes depending on how much time I have and how much climbing I feel like doing.

If you would like any more info or if you would like me to grab a few of the maps from the LBS and post them down to you just let me know you can PM me with your postal address.

If you are ever looking for someone to ride with up this way let me know. I am a newbie though and pretty slow so if you are a racing demon you might blow me away. Still we could always meet up after for some yummy food.

[Yubagirl]

Thanks for the info. Ive ridden allsion ranch rd..i think that one is the one that turns gravel for 100 yds or so. do you belong to the cycling club and if so how is it, as you see i started riding when you did. dont want to embarass myself with the club if theyre a bunch of speed demons!. thanks for the map offer, i can grab one there. if i ever plan on a ride your way ill write ya a few days in advance. i hardly ever get a full wknd off though. a ride thats nice in the spring is the ride to donner park, it parallels hwy 80.. goes by the rainbow inn, cant think of the exit you take right now. anyway its a rolling ride and goes along the river. talk to ya later-Yubagirl

[Trekhawk]

Thanks for the info. Ive ridden allsion ranch rd..i think that one is the one that turns gravel for 100 yds or so. do you belong to the cycling club and if so how is it, as you see i started riding when you did. dont want to embarass myself with the club if theyre a bunch of speed demons!. thanks for the map offer, i can grab one there. if i ever plan on a ride your way ill write ya a few days in advance. i hardly ever get a full wknd off though. a ride thats nice in the spring is the ride to donner park, it parallels hwy 80.. goes by the rainbow inn, cant think of the exit you take right now. anyway its a rolling ride and goes along the river. talk to ya later-Yubagirl

Thanks for the tip on the ride to Donner Park I will check it out in spring. No Im not in the bike club. I enquired when I first started riding and it was a little speedy for me. Cant remember exactly what the speed was now so if your interested it would be worth giving them a call. As I said Im pretty slow so Im not the best gauge to go by. Im pretty happy riding solo now. I have three kids and a husband with a job that requires him to go away a lot so I have to get a ride in when I can. I doubt even if I had the speed that I could get to many club rides anyway.

Happy riding
Trekhawk

[bikerz]

Yellow - oh BOOKS! a topic close to my heart!

The Pullman books are great - completely absorbing, and meaty enough to think about even when you're not reading them.

I agree with SK - anything by Barbara Kingsolver - Prodigal Summer was great, Poisonwood Bible (recommended by Karen as well) was (I think) the book she was put on earth to write. If you're looking for non-fiction, she has a terrific book of essays called High Tide in Tucson. The first book of hers I ever read was Bean Trees, and is still one of my favorites.

I'm a big fan of several British authors, all of more or less the same generation - different in style, but all with similarly witty, erudite, beautiful prose - these authors are Penelope Lively, Margaret Drabble, Penelope Fitzgerald, Iris Murdoch, A.S. Byatt, Barbara Pym, Fay Weldon, and Anita Brookner - I think you could hardly go wrong with anything any of them have written - but a few stand out in my opinion (and they're all pretty short, so no big investment of time if you don't get into them): Penelope Fitzgerald's Offshore, Penelope Lively's Passing On (5 stars for this one!), and really, anything by Barbara Pym. People either seem to love or hate Iris Murdoch (I'm firmly in the "love" camp), and I'd recommend The Green Knightas a good starter. I often find an author I like, then go out and read all their books, then find out who they inspired, or who inspired them, and read all THEIR books, and so on. That's how I found this crowd of writers.

There are also some really wonderful books being written by Indian authors - Rohinton Mistry is great - A Fine Balance and Family Matters - A Fine Balance is long, and sad, but really great. I also loved A Suitable Boy by Vikram Seth - I think it is one of the longest books in the English language. Any of these books will really give you a great sense of life in India in the 60s and on. I also really like Salman Rushdie - I think Midnight's Children and Satanic Verses were 2 of the best books I ever read - very inventive and exciting use of English.

Also - Zadie Smith White Teeth was remarkable - I'm dying to read her new book On Beauty.

I agree with Lise on Hundred Years Of Solitude- that is on my all time top 10 list of books, and has been for 20 years. His short stories are wonderful too. (Look for translations by Gregory Rabassa)

Since you're such a "westerner", have you read anything by Wallace Stegner? I loved Angle of Repose and Big Rock Candy Mountain.

Non-fiction - Joan Didon - anything she has written - what a prose genius. Politics, the "west", water use, it almost doesn't matter - she makes the topics so interesting and relevant.

There are so many extraordinary books and writers out there, and you're right - a bunch of duds too - I'd better calm down - what you have read recently and liked? (I keep jumping up and running into my "book room" to scan the shelves!)

Oh - something fun - I just read Wicked by Gregory Maquire - kind of a re-telling of the "Oz" story - very fun and engaging. Apparently he has refurbished several other fairy tales like this - I have Confessions of a Wicked Stepsister, but I haven't read it yet.

(OK - off to bed - I think this is my longest post yet! My book club hasn't met in months - can you tell I'm suffering from withdrawal?)

[Try-Chick]

Skinny Dip by Carl Hiaasen
Mystery
Recommended by a friend.
Couldn't put it down.

Anne of Green Gables is a good one

Pride and Prejudice is a good romance by Jane Austen. Acutally anthing by Jane Austen or Emily and Charlotte Bronte, their classics are good romance reads Wutering Heights Jane Eyre, etc.

All of the Harry Potter Books. We had to buy two sets because my husband and I and the kids were all trying to read them at the same time!

Fantasy: Anything by Marion Zimmer Bradley or David Eddings (Belgariad series) or Ann McCaffery's Dragon Rider series, Amber series by Roger Zelazny. Also anything by Piers Anthony, Barbar Hambly, Philip Jose Farmer, Christopher Stasheff, Clifford D. Simak, Julian May.

If you like current thrillers try Tom Clancy and Michael Crichton. Everything I've read of theirs is great too.

A lot of them I read in college and with 2 small kids, it's hard to find time to read except when they're in bed and by then I'm just exhausted and want to veg these days.

[nuthatch]

This is great! I'm writing all these down.

I'm just crazy about Patrick O'Brien (Master & Commander, et. al.) Twenty books in the series, or "canon" as the devout would say!

[jobob]

Great thread !
(OK, I'll fess up, at one point I was grumbling about OT posts. I'll stop grumbling )

Lee & I are heading off to the used bookstores in Mountain View - that's our idea of a big night out - and I'm bringing a list !

Here are a few of my faves that haven't been mentioned yet:

Rosamunde Pilcher - I especially enjoy Coming Home, that's a big favorite of mine, one of those books that I pull out & re-read at least once a year. I love her characters. The Shell Seekers is really good too. Her most recent book (the name of which I've forgotten) was a big disappointment, but, she's getting on in years.

Tracy Chevalier - she wrote The Girl with the Pearl Earring (I never saw the movie) and I also enjoyed Falling Angels and The Lady and the Unicorn

I think one of my all-time favorite books is Welcome to the World, Baby Girl by Fannie Flagg, who also wrote Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistlestop Cafe.

[Trekhawk]

This is great! I'm writing all these down.

I'm just crazy about Patrick O'Brien (Master & Commander, et. al.) Twenty books in the series, or "canon" as the devout would say!

Got to love Jack and Stephen. Many a night have I spent with these two wonderful men.

[RoadRaven]

If you like current thrillers try Tom Clancy and Michael Crichton. Everything I've read of theirs is great too.

Yes, Michael Crichton is a good read... though at times I find him dry. However, his research into getting details accurate is impressive

[tatormc]

*title - Riding With The Blue Moth
*author - Bill Hancock
*fiction or non-fiction? - Non
*short summary - Bill rides his bike cross country after the death of his son
*why you liked the book - It's about riding a bike
*how you ended up reading it in the first place - It was mentioned on the news and sounded interesting