H P Lovecraft. I love his weird fiction. I am part way through “At the Mountains of Madness.”
Love lovecraft. Not many writers can get away with the use of the word undescribable horror so often.
He rarely describes anything directly. Like all good horror it’s the implication. What you can imagine is far worse than anything he can plainly describe. That’s what I hate about modern horror, it’s all too obvious.
Aside from my stable diet of Japanese mangas, my current books are The Diary of a Nobody (penguin classics) and The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman (penguin classics).
Am studying the political/ethnic crisis in Sri Lanka these days…
Labels of all my snuff boxes/tins/bottles
I’ve recently started to revisit George Orwell. Holy Cow, how that man could write! I think one of the greatest books I’ve ever read is “Down and Out in London and Paris.” I’ve just started reading “Coming Up for Air.”
I just purchased the first three volumes of the Forgotten realms series: “The Legend of Drizzt” by R. A. Salvatore. I will crack open the first volume tonight and if past experiences serve me right, I won’t be putting it down until I discover that I have reached the last page.
Reading to myself: Atlas Shrugged…for the third time. Ullyses by James Joyce…for the umpteeth time…I love Molly Bloom’s soliloquy at the end. The Violent Bear it Away by Flannery O’Connor. On the Road by Jack Kerouac. Reading out loud to some friends: To Kill a Mockingbird. My next book to read will be Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell; with no other books until I finish it.
Right now I’m reading Tom Robbins’ novel “Skinny legs and all.” Just finished Christopher Moore’s “Coyote Blue” on Thursday. You know, I love this thread, but I just saw an article on MSN today that said something like 58% of non-college grads and something like 42% of college grads haven’t read a book since high school or college, respectively. I think that is pretty sad.
I’m currently reading: Fiction: Good Omens by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman (a farcical comedy about armageddon) Non-fiction: A Polite and Commercial People (the New Oxford History of England volume covering the period from 1727 to 1783) Just Finished: The Dark Tower: The Long Road Home (graphic novel based on the Stephen King series) About to start: The Emergence of the Catholic Tradition 100-600 AD by Jaroslav Pelikan (volume one in a history of the development of Christian theology)
tybalt , I see you are a history buff too~~ snuffegnugen , I think that article you read has some truth in it. TV and the internet have a lot to do with the decline of reading.
@itsuke: Yes, I’m a bit of a history buff. At one time I had contemplated going into academics, and had even gone so far as completing an M.A. in history before I realized that the job prospects in academics left something to be desired. Although I’m in a different line of work now, I still enjoy reading history in my spare time (mostly English history prior to the 20th century). Although I enjoy reading fiction as well, I’ve often found that, to paraphrase the cliche, truth is often stranger (and more entertaining) than fiction.
Reading Gravity’s Rainbow, by Thomas Pynchon. Only about a hundred pages into it, so I’m not sure what to make of it. At this point, it’s rather confusing, but I’m thinking there may be some sort of resolution much later that will warrant a second read. Have The Blood of Elves, by Andrzej Sapkowski next in my queue, along with The Histories of Herodotus. Being a student, I find that I actually get much more reading done when I’m away from university. About Dostoevsky, I have I a love/hate relationship. He spent the majority of Crime and Punishment creating a very accurate depiction of humanity, and then I felt that Raskolnikov’s last few moves were just a total 180 on all of his previous traits and actions. I really felt as if Dostoevsky sold himself short to sneak in a little word about the saving power of Jesus. Anyone else get that?
tybalt , aahh, I am an M.A. student reading history. I also hope to teach history in a college setting someday. What you said about job prospects…I know it all to well. But to be honest, I can’t imagine myself doing anything else, guess I am screwed.
Itsuke: I was thinking about switching my major from bio to history, but I simply cannot stand kids, and the only jobs I could get around here would be as high school history teachers, or maybe a university professor. Still, I hardly have patience enough to deal with 20 year-olds, I doubt I could put up with high school kids every day.
@snuffegnugen Have you read any other books by Tom Robbins? I have read them just about all of them and I love his books. I got turned on to him when my college roommate had to read Another Roadside Attraction and write a paper on it. She did not get the book at all. So, I read it and wrote her paper. Yes, I know that is a bad thing to do. I might just have to pull out that book and read it again. 
Have just finished reading ‘The Autobiography of Malcolm X’ for the nth time. Currently reading ‘Necropolis - London and it’s Dead’ by Catherine Arnold. Macabre and fascinating.
I’m reading An Introduction to Visual C++
Just finished Mircea Eliade’s ‘The Sacred & The Profane.’ Currently working on ‘She’ (H. Rider Haggard), ‘The Pagan Religions of the Ancient British Isles’ (Hutton), ‘When They Severed Earth From Sky’ (Elizabeth and Paul Barber), ‘The Great Plague’ (Stephen Porter), ‘Synchronicity’ (Allan Combs and Mark Holland), and ‘In Defense of Women’ (Mencken). All are rereads except for Haggard and Mencken. I keep a pile going on my little porch-nook, and begin an evening with the more scholarly volumes, working my way down to the simpler ones as the night progresses and my mind becomes more tired and/or inebriated.