Alias Reader's comments (member since Oct 28, 2008)

Alias Reader's comments from the Readers and Reading group.

That's a great list, Sandi. Thanks ! It's a terrific way to find new authors. I'm going to pass it on to some friends.

I think for this GR experience to work, we need posters who are committed towards that goal. If GR is not your thing, and you prefer other venues, that's cool. But for those who do use and like GR and want to see it continue we need more people to take an active interest. It is all about give and take. There are a lot of people who just read the board. Some only lurk, others just read the board by digest. When this becomes the vast majority, and only a handful of people are putting in any effort to make the board work on a consistent basis, that is a problem. It takes a village to make a board successful. So if the GR message boards are a valuable experience to you, and you don't want to see them fade away, we all need to make an effort to participate in a meaningful way in the coming new year.

It sounds like something I would enjoy. I like English TV shows.

Thanks, JoAnn !

Deb, I don't know if you get the GR monthly newsletter, if not, I wanted to let you know there was an interview with Greg Mortenson in it.

Here is a link.
http://www.goodreads.com/interviews/show...

Deborah, FYI
On C-Span Book TV

Insightful author interviews
Saturday 10 PM, Sunday 9 PM and
Monday 12 AM & 3 AM ET

Greg Mortenson, Stones into Schools

Greg Mortenson, co-founder of the Central Asia Institute and author of Three Cups of Tea, talks about his latest book. The book follows Mortenson and his colleagues as they work to set up remote schools for girls in Pakistan and Afghanistan.
Mr. Mortenson discusses his book with Rep. Mary Bono Mack (R-CA), an early champion of Mortenson's work. Congresswoman Bono Mack has represented California's 45th district since 1998.

You can also view the program on
BookTV.org

I would stick with Three Cups of Tea, Deborah. It's an inspiring read and well worth your time.

I thought some might be interested in a special on the History channel. The excerpts I saw looked very interesting. (Zinn is on Bill Moyers this weekend )


It premiers Sunday December 13th at 8pm on The History Channel

The People Speak

Democracy is not a spectator sport. Using dramatic and musical performances of the letters, diaries and speeches of everyday Americans, THE PEOPLE SPEAK gives voice to those who spoke up for social change throughout U.S. history, forging a nation from the bottom up with their insistence on equality and justice. Narrated by Howard Zinn and based on his best-selling books, A People's History of the United States and Voices of a People's History of the United States, THE PEOPLE SPEAK illustrates the relevance of these passionate historical moments to our society today and reminds us never to take liberty for granted.

http://www.history.com/content/people-sp...

This was posted on another board, and I thought you might enjoy it.

It is the 100 Best Last Lines from Novels

They have my personal favorite #8 from A Tale of Two Cities. :)

I am printing it out as I think some of these last lines are so good, I want to read the book !


http://americanbookreview.org/PDF/100_Be...

You're welcome, Libyrinths. :)

I am on my library's list for The Teaching Co. course for the Italian Renaissance.

I, too, like The Teaching Co. And all their courses go on sale at least once a year. A great investment, imo.

The 10 Best Books of 2009
By THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW

http://www.nytimes.com/gift-guide/holida...

100 Notable Books of 2009
By THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW

http://www.nytimes.com/gift-guide/holida...

From the list I read and can highly recommend 'Columbine' By DAVE CULLEN

Nancy- I did finish Lacuna- the last third is very good!
-----------------------

Nancy, I am happy you were rewarded for you diligence.

Maybe I'll give the book another shot in the future.

Five great memoirs, according to author Ben Yagoda

By Bob Minzesheimer, USA TODAY
"We live in an age of memoir," says Ben Yagoda, who traces their development in his new book, Memoir: A History. Yagoda names "the five greatest memoirs you've probably never heard of."

•Roughing It by Mark Twain (1872). "His account of six years in Nevada, San Francisco and the Sandwich Islands is among his least-known books, but it is a comic gem."

•Memoirs by John Addington Symonds (written 1889-1893, published 1986). "Symonds, an English scholar, was gay and sexually active, and his no-holds-barred memoir could not be published in his lifetime. It's fascinating to chart the change in his attitude: from a rueful sense of himself as a deviant to a sort of defiant pride."

•I'll Cry Tomorrow by Lillian Roth (1954). "Roth, a former Ziegfeld showgirl and early-talkies actress (she was in the Marx Brothers' Animal Crackers), created a sensation because of the frankness with which it depicted her alcoholism and abuse by husbands and lovers. In some ways, it created the template for the contemporary memoir, with its emphasis on trauma and recovery."

•Growing Up by Russell Baker (1982) and An American Childhood by Annie Dillard (1987). "They're luminous and could easily trade titles, though Baker spends more time on the public realm and Dillard on the private."

From USA Today

Speaking of making reasoned arguments, and to bring this back around to books, I would highly recommend:

Nonsense by Robert J. Gula

Cont.

16. When your opponent puts forth a proposition, find it inconsistent with his or her other statements, beliefs, actions or lack of action.
Example: Should your opponent defend suicide, you may at once exclaim, "Why don't you hang yourself?" Should the opponent maintain that his city is an unpleasant place to live, you may say, "Why don't you leave on the first plane?"

17. If your opponent presses you with a counter-proof, you will often be able to save yourself by advancing some subtle distinction. Try to find a second meaning or an ambiguous sense for your opponent's idea.

18. If your opponent has taken up a line of argument that will end in your defeat, you must not allow him to carry it to its conclusion. Interrupt the dispute, break it off altogether, or lead the opponent to a different subject.

19. Should your opponent expressly challenge you to produce any objection to some definite point in his argument, and you have nothing to say, try to make the argument less specific.
Example: If you are asked why a particular hypothesis cannot be accepted, you may speak of the fallibility of human knowledge, and give various illustrations of it.

20. If your opponent has admitted to all or most of your premises, do not ask him or her directly to accept your conclusion. Rather, draw the conclusion yourself as if it too had been admitted.

21. When your opponent uses an argument that is superficial and you see the falsehood, you can refute it by setting forth its superficial character. But it is better to meet the opponent with a counter-argument that is just as superficial, and so dispose of him. For it is with victory that you are concerned, not with truth.
Example: If the opponent appeals to prejudice or emotion, or attacks you personally, return the attack in the same manner.

22. If your opponent asks you to admit something from which the point in dispute will immediately follow, you must refuse to do so, declaring that it begs the question.

23. Contradiction and contention irritate a person into exaggerating his statements. By contradicting your opponent you may drive him into extending the statement beyond its natural limit. When you then contradict the exaggerated form of it, you look as though you had refuted the original statement. Contrarily, if your opponent tries to extend your own statement further than you intended, redefine your statement's limits and say, "That is what I said, no more."

24. State a false syllogism. Your opponent makes a proposition, and by false inference and distortion of his ideas you force from the proposition other propositions that are not intended and that appear absurd. It then appears that your opponent's proposition gave rise to these inconsistencies, and so it appears to be indirectly refuted.

25. If your opponent is making a generalization, find an instance to the contrary. Only one valid contradiction is needed to overthrow the opponent's proposition.
Example: "All ruminants are horned," is a generalization that may be upset by the single instance of the camel.

26. A brilliant move is to turn the tables and use your opponent's arguments against himself.
Example: Your opponent declares, "So and so is a child, you must make an allowance for him." You retort, "Just because he is a child, I must correct him; otherwise he will persist in his bad habits."

27. Should your opponent surprise you by becoming particularly angry at an argument, you must urge it with all the more zeal. No only will this make your opponent angry, but it will appear that you have put your finger on the weak side of his case, and your opponent is more open to attack on this point than you expected.

28. When the audience consists of individuals (or a person) who are not experts on a subject, you make an invalid objection to your opponent who seems to be defeated in the eyes of the audience. This strategy is particularly effective if your objection makes your opponent look ridiculous or if the audience laughs. If your opponent must make a long, winded and complicated explanation to correct you, the audience will not be disposed to listen to him.

29. If you find that you are being beaten, you can create a diversion-that is, you can suddenly begin to talk of something else, as though it had a bearing on the matter in dispute. This may be done without presumption that the diversion has some general bearing on the matter.

30. Make an appeal to authority rather than reason. If your opponent respects an authority or an expert, quote that authority to further your case. If needed, quote what the authority said in some other sense or circumstance. Authorities that your opponent fails to understand are those which he generally admires the most. You may also, should it be necessary, not only twist your authorities, but actually falsify them, or quote something that you have entirely invented yourself.

31. If you know that you have no reply to the arguments that your opponent advances, you by a fine stroke of irony declare yourself to be an incompetent judge.
Example: "What you say passes my poor powers of comprehension; it may well be all very true, but I can't understand it, and I refrain from any expression of opinion on it." In this way you insinuate to the audience, with whom you are in good repute, that what your opponent says is nonsense. This technique may be used only when you are quite sure that the audience thinks much better of you than your opponent.

32. A quick way of getting rid of an opponent's assertion, or of throwing suspicion on it, is by putting it into some odious category.
Example: You can say, "That is fascism" or "atheism" or "superstition." In making an objection of this kind you take for granted:
1. That the assertion or question is identical with, or at least contained in, the category cited; and
2. The system referred to has been entirely refuted.

33. You admit your opponent's premises but deny the conclusion.
Example: "That's all very well in theory, but it won't work in practice."

34. When you state a question or an argument, and your opponent gives you no direct answer, or evades it with a counter-question, or tries to change the subject, it is sure sign you have touched a weak spot, sometimes without intending to do so. You have, as it were, reduced your opponent to silence. You must, therefore, urge the point all the more, and not let your opponent evade it, even when you do not know where the weakness that you have hit upon really lies.

35. Instead of working on an opponent's intellect or the rigor of his arguments, work on his motive. If you succeed in making your opponent's opinion-should it prove true-seem distinctly prejudicial to his own interest, he will drop it immediately.
Example: A clergyman is defending some philosophical dogma. You show him that his proposition contradicts a fundamental doctrine of his church. He will abandon the argument.

36. You may also puzzle and bewilder your opponent by mere bombast. If your opponent is weak or does not wish to appear as if he has no idea what you are talking about, you can easily impose upon him some argument that sounds very deep or learned, or that sounds indisputable.

37. Should your opponent be in the right but, luckily for you, choose a faulty proof, you can easily refute it and then claim that you have refuted the whole position. This is the way in which bad advocates lose good cases. If no accurate proof occurs to your opponent, you have won the day.

38. Become personal, insulting and rude as soon as you perceive that your opponent has the upper hand. In becoming personal you leave the subject altogether, and turn your attack on the person by remarks of an offensive and spiteful character. This is a very popular technique, because it takes so little skill to put it into effect.

Sharon, I was browsing the Teaching Co. Web site and they have an offering on 38 Ways to Win an Argument from Arthur Schopenhauer's The Art of Controversy.
Seems as if a lot of people have taken this to heart. :(


1. Carry your opponent's proposition beyond its natural limits; exaggerate it. The more general your opponent's statement becomes, the more objections you can find against it. The more restricted and narrow your own propositions remain, the easier they are to defend.

2. Use different meanings of your opponent's words to refute his argument.
Example: Person A says, "You do not understand the mysteries of Kant's philosophy." Person B replies, "Oh, if it's mysteries you're talking about, I'll have nothing to do with them."

3. Ignore your opponent's proposition, which was intended to refer to some particular thing. Rather, understand it in some quite different sense, and then refute it. Attack something different than what was asserted.

4. Hide your conclusion from your opponent until the end. Mingle your premises here and there in your talk. Get your opponent to agree to them in no definite order. By this circuitous route you conceal your goal until you have reached all the admissions necessary to reach your goal.

5. Use your opponent's beliefs against him. If your opponent refuses to accept your premises, use his own premises to your advantage.
Example: If the opponent is a member of an organization or a religious sect to which you do not belong, you may employ the declared opinions of this group against the opponent.

6. Confuse the issue by changing your opponent's words or what he or she seeks to prove.
Example: Call something by a different name: "good repute" instead of "honor," "virtue" instead of "virginity," "red-blooded" instead of "vertebrates."

7. State your proposition and show the truth of it by asking the opponent many questions. By asking many wide-reaching questions at once, you may hide what you want to get admitted. Then you quickly propound the argument resulting from the opponent's admissions.

8. Make your opponent angry. An angry person is less capable of using judgment or perceiving where his or her advantage lies.

9. Use your opponent's answers to your questions to reach different or even opposite conclusions.

10. If your opponent answers all your questions negatively and refuses to grant you any points, ask him or her to concede the opposite of your premises. This may confuse the opponent as to which point you actually seek him to concede.

11. If the opponent grants you the truth of some of your premises, refrain from asking him or her to agree to your conclusion. Later, introduce your conclusion as a settled and admitted fact. Your opponent and others in attendance may come to believe that your conclusion was admitted.

12. If the argument turns upon general ideas with no particular names, you must use language or a metaphor that is favorable to your proposition.
Example: What an impartial person would call "public worship" or a "system of religion" is described by an adherent as "piety" or "godliness" and by an opponent as "bigotry" or "superstition." In other words, inset what you intend to prove into the definition of the idea.

13. To make your opponent accept a proposition, you must give him an opposite, counter-proposition as well. If the contrast is glaring, the opponent will accept your proposition to avoid being paradoxical.
Example: If you want him to admit that a boy must do everything that his father tells him to do, ask him, "whether in all things we must obey or disobey our parents." Or, if a thing is said to occur "often," ask whether you are to understand "often" to mean few or many times, the opponent will say "many." It is as though you were to put gray next to black and call it white, or gray next to white and call it black.

14. Try to bluff your opponent. If he or she has answered several of your questions without the answers turning out in favor of your conclusion, advance your conclusion triumphantly, even if it does not follow. If your opponent is shy or stupid, and you yourself possess a great deal of impudence and a good voice, the technique may succeed.

15. If you wish to advance a proposition that is difficult to prove, put it aside for the moment. Instead, submit for your opponent's acceptance or rejection some true proposition, as though you wished to draw your proof from it. Should the opponent reject it because he suspects a trick, you can obtain your triumph by showing how absurd the opponent is to reject an obviously true proposition. Should the opponent accept it, you now have reason on your side for the moment. You can either try to prove your original proposition, as in #14, or maintain that your original proposition is proved by what your opponent accepted. For this an extreme degree of impudence is required, but experience shows cases of it succeeding.

I got this USA Today.

12 books of Christmas to give your true love and others


By Bob Minzesheimer, Korina Lopez, Deirdre Donahue, Carol Memmott, Craig Wilson and Jocelyn McClurg, USA TODAY

What began with Charles Dickens and A Christmas Carol has become a holiday publishing tradition. This year's Christmas-themed books – many in an appealing stocking-stuffer size – include big names from Wally Lamb to Kate Jacobs to Garrison Keillor. Here are 12 that capture the spirit of the season.

1.Wishin' and Hopin'
By Wally Lamb
Harper, 288 pp., $19.99
Genre: Comic novel
Setting: New London, Conn., 1964
What it's about:
Narrator Felix Funicello (third cousin of Annette, the former Mouseketeer turned beach-movie star) is the second smartest fifth-grader in a blue-collar Catholic school governed by ruler-slapping nuns. A new student from Russia (a Communist?) changes everything, including an unforgettable Christmas program.
Holiday cheer level: Lamb, a two-time Oprah Book Club pick, proves he can be short, sweet and funny, with a soundtrack by Dusty Springfield.
–Bob Minzesheimer

2.A Christmas Blizzard
By Garrison Keillor
Viking, 180 pp., $21.95
Genre: Gentle satire/fable
Setting: Contemporary Chicago and Looseleaf, N.D.
What it's about:
An obsessively insecure tycoon, haunted by his grim childhood, dreads Christmas, which he likes to spend in Hawaii. But a call from his hometown about a dying uncle summons him to North Dakota in the midst of a blizzard. In a fishing shack on the ice of Lake Winnesissebigosh, he finds new meaning in the mysteries of life.
Holiday cheer level:
A Christmas Carol meets Trains, Planes and Automobiles– with a dash of A Christmas Story. A perfect gift for fans of Keillor's storytelling on A Prairie Home Companion.
– Bob Minzesheimer

3.The Gift
By Cecelia Ahern
Harper, 320 pp., $19.99
Genre: Fiction
Setting: Christmas season in Dublin
What it's about:
Business exec Lou Suffern is an insufferable go-getter who brushes aside his wife and kids to jockey for a promotion at work. He often wishes he could be in two places at once so he can keep up with his demanding schedule at home and work. He forms an unlikely friendship with a mysterious homeless man, Gabe, who grants him his wish. But is that what he really wants?
Holiday cheer level:
This modern-day Scrooge tale is a delightful read with plenty of fun twists and turns.
–Korina Lopez

4.The Christmas List
By Richard Paul Evans
Simon & Schuster, 368 pp., $19.99
Genre: Fiction
Setting: Salt Lake City
What it's about:
After ruthless real-estate mogul James Kier is wrongly declared dead in a car accident, he reads the gloating comments posted online under his obit, some by colleagues. He tries to make amends to five people he hurt but finds that saying sorry isn't enough.
Holiday cheer level:
Grinches might find Evans' modern variation on Dickens' A Christmas Carol a tad manipulative, but nobody irrigates tear ducts more effectively than the author of The Christmas Box. If only real life worked this way!
–Deirdre Donahue

5.Knit the Season: A Friday Night Knitting Club Novel
By Kate Jacobs
Putnam, 260 pp., $24.95
Genre: Women's fiction
Setting: Manhattan and rural Scotland
What it's about:
Seasonal festivities infuse the ongoing stories of Dakota Walker and the other women who meet weekly at the Walker & Daughter yarn shop in Manhattan in this best-selling series.
Holiday cheer level:
The spirit of the season permeates every page as the women knit their way through the family trials and tribulations of Thanksgiving, Hanukkah, Christmas, New Year's and an unforgettable wedding.
– Carol Memmott

6.You Better Not Cry: Stories for Christmas
By Augusten Burroughs
St. Martin's Press, 206 pp., $21.99
Genre: Autobiographical essays
Setting: From Burroughs' bizarre childhood Christmases in western Massachusetts to a New York City apartment he shared with his partner who had AIDS.
What it's about:
As a child he confuses Jesus and Santa. As an alcoholic adult, he ends up in bed with Santa. Burroughs, famous for his memoir Running With Scissors, is back with his trademark quirky wit.
Holiday cheer level:
This for those who enjoy Burroughs' take on the world, aren't in need of an always happy holiday, and believe that Santa, at times, can be a dirty old man.
– Craig Wilson

7.The Christmas Secret
By Donna VanLiere
St. Martin's Press,
291 pp., $14.99
Genre: Women's fiction
Setting: Main Street USA
What it's about:
Burdened with two small kids and a vile ex-husband, a waitress fights to keep her job and her sanity. Meanwhile, an arrogant young accountant – downsized before Christmas – is reduced to working at his grandfather's department store. A random act of kindness connects them.
Holiday cheer level:
Tired of sugar plums and impossibly perfect families? Consider this stark tale with its appealing heroine who struggles against losing faith in herselfand in God.
– Deirdre Donahue

8.A Christmas Promise,
By Anne Perry
Ballantine, 193 pp., $18
Genre: Victorian mystery
Setting: The freezing slums of Dickensian London
What it's about:
Gracie Phipps, a plucky 13-year-old, helps 8-year-old Minnie Maude Mudway after Minnie's beloved Uncle Alf, "a rag and bones man," is murdered and left on the street, his cart and donkey missing. Can Gracie and Minnie solve the crime and find donkey Charlie before Christmas?
Holiday cheer level:
With Perry, you're guaranteed evil will be mixed with good. Let's just say a Nativity scene at the end will give you faith that all's right with the world – for a brief shining moment.
–Jocelyn McClurg

9. The Christmas Cookie Club: A Novel
By Ann Pearlman
Atria, 272 pp., $24.99
Genre: Women's fiction
Setting: A snowy December evening in Ann Arbor, Mich.
What it's about:

Every year, 12 women – aka the Cookie Bitches – gather to share heartfelt stories and recipes, taking a break from the bitter realities of divorce, loss and foreclosure to celebrate their longtime friendship. At the center of this loyal circle is Marnie, who anxiously awaits news about her unborn grandchild.
Holiday cheer level:
Best read with a glass of milk, this novel will satisfy anyone with a sweet tooth. Bonus: each chapter includes cookie recipes.
–Korina Lopez

10.The Dreaded Feast: Writers on Enduring the Holiday
Edited by Michele Clarke and Taylor Plimpton; introduction by P.J. O'Rourke
Abrams Image, 208 pp., $15.95
Genre: Essays
Setting: Everywhere from Christmas Eve services to the aisles of FAO Schwarz
What it's about:
You name it, as 30 humor writers take on the holidays. Calvin Trillin espouses his fruitcake theory, Mark Twain shares daughter Susie's letter from Santa, George Plimpton guides us through gift giving, and Dave Barry offers up his survivor's guide to shopping.
Holiday cheer level:
A wonderfully irreverent look at the holidays. A must for the Christmas cynics on your list.
– Craig Wilson

11.Tinsel: A Search for America's Christmas Present
By Hank Stuever
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 331 pp., $24
Genre: Non-fiction
Setting: Frisco, Texas, a suburb of Dallas
What it's about:
Stuever, a Washington Postfeature writer, checks out Christmas in 21st-century America as he follows three families through three holidays in suburbia, touching on everything from decorating McMansions to mayhem at the mall. All that glitters is not gold here.
Holiday cheer level:
This isn't a Norman Rockwell view of Christmas. It's both laugh-out-loud funny and oddly depressing. Stuever's keen eye misses very little.
– Craig Wilson

12.A Rumpole Christmas
By John Mortimer
Viking, 161 pp., $21.95
Genre: Short stories
Setting: London and environs
What it's about:
Horace Rumpole, the beloved and curmudgeonly barrister, sips yak's milk on a Christmas season visit to a health farm, investigates a steam-room murder at a country hotel and inspires honesty in a not-so-on-the level Santa Claus.
Holiday cheer level:
One can't help but smile as the churlish Rumpole and his bossy Mrs. (She Who Must Be Obeyed) spread seasonal cheer while wending their way through their holiday misadventures. Mortimer's death earlier this year adds a nostalgia factor.
–Carol Memmott

Bunny, I am surprised you didn't pick up the new Stephen King. It is a 1000 page book, Under The Dome. Some are comparing it to his great novel, The Stand.

I plan on reading it in January. I am on the list at my library.

http://www.amazon.com/Under-Dome-Novel-S...

Nancy, I couldn't get into Lacuna at all. I gave up fairly quickly and I almost never do that. And I like this authors books. The book started off slow and a bit confusing. Not what I expect from this author at all. :( I thought it may have been me, just not the right time for me to read the book, but your post seems to make me think I was correct to drop it.

Here is what I read in Nov.



An Empty Spoon- Sunny Decker - Non Fiction GR rating 3/5
I was given this book by my neighbor, who purchased the book back in 1970.
Sunny Decker is a first year teacher who goes to teach in an inner city school.
It's touching and quite sad. Her story comes across and quite genuine.
Sorry to see this book is no longer in print. However, you can buy it used at Amazon.


Wit by Margaret Edson - Play- fiction - GR rating 4/5
I read this one for the GoodReads Book Nook Cafe Board.
This is a very moving account of a women who is faced with late stage ovarian cancer.


The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barberry Fiction GR Rating 4/5
I really enjoyed this poignant novel. It the story of a Renee, and middle aged, unattractive, and very intelligent women who is a concierge in a posh Paris apartment building. The novel is alternately funny and touchingly sad. It's a book to be savored slowly with a nice cup of tea as the author explores philosophy, love, life and friendship. A gem of a book.


The Ladies Auxiliary Tova Mirvis Fiction GR rating 2/5
The story of a newly widowed women and her small child who move to a tight knit Orthodox Jewish community in Memphis, TN. I found the story slow moving and tedious at times. And I came to dislike many of the characters. I was hoping to learn more about the Orthodox Jewish religion but the book had little depth.


<Up the Down Staircase </b> by Bel Kaufman Fiction GR rating 3/5
The story of a first year teacher at an inner city school. The story is told in epistolary fashion.
story. At turns funny and sad.

I am still working on In Cheap We Trust and Les Miserables. I'm enjoying them both.