doubleplay

Just started "Mistress of the Art of Death" by Ariana Franklin. So far, love it. It's a medieval murder mystery.

cangel

Mistress of the Art - liked that book, although it broke down a bit toward the end. I'm a pathologist, so I had to like it.

whatever4

Great thread! I liked "The Kite Runner" but LOVED "A Thousand Splendid Suns." Someone earlier mentioned "A Prayer for Owen Meany," which is one of my all-time favorite books. Other "WOW!" books that I have loved but have not seen mentioned in this thread include: "Gilead" by Marilynne Robinson; ""Peace Like a River" by Leif Enger; "Prodigal Summer" by Barbara Kingsolver, and "The Hours" by Michael Cunningham.

garland

Just finished a wonderful novel, "Strange as this Weather Has Been," by Ann Pancake. Really gorgeous writing, takes place among the people who live in mountain removal mining areas of W. VA. I learned a lot--it's something I've read about, but it made it the destruction and fear much more real. Great characters, too.

epistrophy

Lately I've been dipping into - with great pleasure - Clive James' Cultural Amnesia: Necessary Memories from History and the Arts. Whoever came up with this title didn't do James any favor, as it's both vague and ponderous - qualities you won't find in the book itself.

James is a cultural critic (or at least that's one of his many hats) who's better known in England than he is here (which is not to say that his reputation here is insubstantial). This book is a collection of essays, organized alphabetically, about 20th Century figures (with a few earlier ringers thrown in) that have intrigued James over the years. He's thought hard about these people and, in each of the essays I've read so far, has some very fresh and stimulating things to say about them (in a brisk, lively style).

What a dinner party you'd have with the folks assembled here: why, there's Duke Ellington over in the corner chatting with Franz Kafka, and over there Marcel Proust is huddled with Miles Davis, and that must be Dick Cavett (!) sharing a joke with Charles de Gaulle , and . . . and . . . and . . . .

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/08/bo...=1&oref=slogin

http://www.amazon.com/Cultural-Amnes...1891662&sr=1-1

momfirst

It seems that with the tv writers' strike I've been flying through books. i'm heading to Borders tonight...think I'll be there for awhile with all these suggestions! I have to agree with all of The Kite Runner & Thousand Spendid Suns recommendations. They were both beautifully woven stories that made me look at people differently. I gave them both to my Ds to, again, help them understand what priviledged lives we live here.

SouthJerseyChessMom

Charlie Wilson's War- (not the movie) the book---enlightening, and very pertinent to these political times

Onward

I just read what I thought was a really good book. A Thread of Grace by Mary Doria Russell. Excellent. It's about people in Italy right after Italy surrendered to the allies in WWII. The Nazis, however, are still trying to control the area with devastating consequences for the people of the area and the Jewish refugees. I really found this book hard to put down. Her other book, The Sparrow is also excellent but a very different concept. I am now starting to read her book, Children of God.

epistrophy

This last post called to mind for me Primo Levi, an Italian Jew and chemist who during WW II survived incarceration at Auschwitz. Levi's best known work, The Periodic Table, is (I assure you) unlike any other book you have ever read - a series of linked stories, many of them autobiographical, each titled after an element that then serves as the story's central metaphor. Saul Bellow's cover blurb remains one of the more compelling I have ever encountered: ""We are always looking for a book that is necessary to read next. There is nothing superfluous here, everything this book contains is essential."

Amazon.com: The Periodic Table: Books: Primo Levi

PackMom

Just finished Ken Follet's The Pillars of the Earth. Loved it. It's a not a new book but was recently an Oprah's Book Club selection so is prominately displayed in local bookstores. Eighteen years after it's publication, the sequel, World Without End was released in Oct. '07. That's next on my list.

kathiep

I've just finished a non-fiction book entitled, "Boys adrift, The five factors driving the growing epidemic of unmotivated boys and underachieving young men." Very interesting book that talks about a myriad of things that resonated with me including how kindergarten is like first grade and why young boys aren't ready for that, video games vs. real life experiences, single sex education and medicating boys for ADD and ADHD. I would recommend this to any parent that has a boy.

dbwes

For anyone who likes mysteries, I've been reading Benjamin Black's "Christine Falls." Pen name for Booker prize winner Jonathan Banville. Beautifully written, set in the 1950s in Dublin and Boston, with sibling rivalry, lost loves, orphanages, and nuns! Very engrossing.
And an alert -- the new Tess Monaghan by Laura Lippman is due at the end of the month! If you haven't read Lippman, do so immediately. (LOL)

Felix12

For the Middlesex fans, Eugenides has a new book of short love stories, "My Mistresses Sparrow is Dead"

His video Suicide Virgins is quite good.

Cannery Row, Steinbeck

TimeCruncher

I recommend Walter Mosley's mystery trilogy Fearless Jones (2001), Fear Itself (2003), and Fear of the Dark (2006). I have just finished reading all three. They are terrific.

Brief backstory: Like many Americans of his generation, young native rural Louisianan Paris Minton moves to post-WWII California to seek his fortune. Reading is Paris' passion, so he uses his hard-earned money to open a used books store in South Central Los Angeles. Mild-mannered Paris contentedly spends his days collecting used books, reading books, and discussing books with his customers. His peaceful life is invariably disturbed when Trouble--in the form of a stranger, friend, or relative who doesn't intend to impose but ends up doing so--knocks on Paris' door requesting a small favor. The small favor quickly mushrooms into a life-threatening obligation, requiring Paris to call upon his best friend, WWII veteran Tristan "Fearless" Jones, for help. Together, brainy Paris and brawny Fearless dodge killers, chase clues, and seek justice, South Central-style.

Each of these novels is a humorous and suspenseful read, with fast-paced day-by-day action, snappy dialogue, believable plot twists, and a supporting cast of memorable oddballs. The first book of the trilogy is somewhat less light-hearted than its sequels, but all three books provide can't-put-it-down, page-turning pleasure.

I recommend that you have all three books on hand, and read them in sequence, one right after the other. I also recommend that you keep a detailed Los Angeles street map handy, because Mosley refers to real locations. As you travel the streets of 1950s South Central with Paris and Fearless, you'll get to know and appreciate the neighborhood, and you'll feel at home there.

I discovered Walter Mosley several years ago. I'm a fan. I've read most of his books, and I plan to read them all. I recommend anything (both fiction and nonfiction) by Mosley to everyone who enjoys well-written books. If you like well-written mysteries, then Mosley's mysteries are for you. (If you like Raymond Chandler, then I'm 99% sure that you'll also like Walter Mosley.)

One more thing: The Fearless books were written to entertain, but Mosley uses them to communicate an important message: Reading is cool. Through Paris, Mosley recommends dozens of classics. Young, inexperienced, and/or unenthusiastic readers who seek out the Fearless books just because they are by Mosley, or just because they are mysteries, are subtly persuaded to explore classic works by Camus, Plato, Shakespeare, Tolstoy, and other esteemed authors for the first time, because, "If Paris Minton reads them, they must be good."

Read and enjoy!

epistrophy

I've also read and enjoyed some of Walter Mosley's books over the years. I started with the first Easy Rawlins mystery, Devil in a Blue Dress, and went on from there.

I agree with virtually everything said in the last (very thoughtful) post about Mosley's work. At least from the books of his that I've read, I'd say that he's not as strong on plot as some of his fellow mystery writers. But he's terrific with character, period, and setting. And when you're reading one of his books, you're hearing a very distinctive, very lively voice. His books breathe.

A few odds and ends:

--Some folks may recall the Denzel Washington movie made from his first book. (I haven't seen it.)

--His career got a huge boost in the early 90's when then President Clinton (famously characterized as our "first black President') called him one of his favorite writers.

--On a side note, I happened to get to know him a bit back in the early 70s, when both of us were young. He was a very good friend of a college friend of mine - they'd gone to school together in Los Angeles. Did he seem destined for greatness then? Nah.