What have you just read? Opinions, recommendations & reviews Showing 601-650 of 12,687

[Leslie]

Amber wrote: "I enjoyed the enchanted castle. It was a very whimsical story."

I'm glad to hear that you enjoyed this, Amber :)

[Amber]

I tried reading carrie when I first got into his books but couldn't get into that book or it. I enjoy some of his books . Maybe I'll try again in a few years. the movie with Sissy spacek was great though.

[Sigourney]

All this talk about Carrie is really making me want to read it...probably going to get it for my kindle soon. I've never seen the film but I find the plot behind it interesting.

[Alannah]

Sigourney wrote: "All this talk about Carrie is really making me want to read it...probably going to get it for my kindle soon. I've never seen the film but I find the plot behind it interesting."

I strongly recommend it, it's quite short and didn't take me long to finish it.

[Sigourney]

I started reading it :) so far so good! I really didn't think I'd like reading it as much as I am.

[Amber]

Thanks leslie. It was a pretty whimsical story. :-)

[Bionic Jean]

I've just finished reading In Defence of Dogs by John Bradshaw. It was quite a solid read, so took me a long time. Lots of interesting facts about how dogs evolved and their behaviour, but Bradshaw has a rather dry style. Here is my review

[Pamela]

I just finished reading The Blue Jar by Marta Pelrine-Bacon. I would recommend it. I couldn't put it down!

[Amber]

I'm almost done with The Extra-Ordinary Princess by Carolyn Q. Ebbitt and it is a pretty good read. I'd definitely reccomend it to others. I'll review it when I finish. Ten chapters to go ( on page 200-something of 324 pages). It's a whimsical fairytale. I'm enjoying it!

[Book Ninja]

I just finished The Fault in Our StarsIt was beautiful novel. Everyone should read it!

[dely]

I have read yesterday Die Physiker by Friedrich Dürrenmatt (English edition The Physicists) and it is a short play in two acts. I have read it because I will go next week to the theater to watch it and so I wanted already to know the story and the plot.
The story is set in a madhouse where we have three fools who think to be Newton, Einstein and Möbius and there is also more than one homicide; the first part is roughly funny. The second act is deeper and more serious and we have the message of Dürrenmatt: responsability of science. Must science be kept in the hands of scientists to protect human kind or must science be free but dangerous because it could go in the hands of politicians who have interests?
It was written during the Cold War and so Dürrenmatt was scared by nuclear weapons who could have destroyed everything.

I don't know if I recommend it. It is always a pleasure to read Dürrenmatt but the theme of the play isn't anymore so actual nowadays.

[LauraT]

dely wrote: "I have read yesterday Die Physiker by Friedrich Dürrenmatt (English edition The Physicists) and it is a short play in two acts. I have read it because I will go next week to the theater to watch it..."

I'll have to read Richard III for the same reason soon!!!

[LauraT]

Glad you like it Mariana. I've not heard about it

[LauraT]

Thanks! I'll see if it can be found here in this italian provincial town; maybe next year ...

[LauraT]

I haven't got a Kindle; if it's on paper I'll look to it

[Leslie]

dely wrote: "I have read yesterday Die Physiker by Friedrich Dürrenmatt (English edition The Physicists) and it is a short play in two acts. I have read it because I will go next week to the theater to watch it..."

Sounds very interesting to me! And I think the theme is still relevant - it has just moved from physics to biochemistry. Who should decide if (for example) medical research into disease should be done with stem cells - politicians, religious groups, or scientists?

[dely]

Leslie wrote: "dely wrote: "I have read yesterday Die Physiker by Friedrich Dürrenmatt (English edition The Physicists) and it is a short play in two acts. I have read it because I will go next week to the theate..."

Good point! I didn't think about these actual themes.

Give it a try, it is really very short so, also if you won't like it, you haven't wasted your time. I would have liked Dürrenmatt would have been deeper in his points of view. It could have been much better in my opinion.

[Joy]

I've just read The Snow Child which I mostly loved. It's set in 1920s Alaska. A couple trying to recover from the stillbirth of their baby attempt to create a smallholding in the wilderness. The setting and characters are convincing and compelling. I felt the very last few chapters didn't quite work - but still worth reading.

[Shirley]

Joy wrote: "I've just read The Snow Child which I mostly loved. It's set in 1920s Alaska. A couple trying to recover from the stillbirth of their baby attempt to create a smallholding in the wilderness. The se..."

Joy, I had a similar experience to you when I read this last year. I enjoyed it over much, but found the ending was rather weak. A good read, though.

[Leslie]

I have finished The Dead of Jericho, the 5th Inspector Morse mystery. I would recommend it to mystery fans as a solid police procedural, but not one to tempt someone who isn't a mystery/crime book fan already.

And I have (finally!) finished Moby-Dick; or, The Whale. Will comment on this on the readalong thread...

[Kristi]

MaddAddam is complete! I didn't think I'd be so sad to finish it. These characters were so real to me! I didn't like this book quite as much as I did the first two--there were entire sentences made of buzzwords--but I'm still impressed.

[Dhanaraj]

Finished reading Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions. A must read for the maths and physics students. Of course, it is also a book for the lover of the literature.

[Charbel]

Dhanaraj wrote: "Finished reading Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions. A must read for the maths and physics students. Of course, it is also a book for the lover of the literature."

Being a physics and maths lover, I am adding this!

[Dhanaraj]

Charbel, you will have no regrets at all...In fact, you will be happy to have read it......

P.S. New profile picture is quite philosophical....Lol..

[Leslie]

I just finished Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? which I would recommend heartily! A post-apocalyptic sci fi book, it is a good story with lots of layers of meaning...

[Nicole]

Narrative of Sojourner Truth 3 stars. This one started out really strong for me. I was really interested in her youth and her family. Her story was very inspirational. However, the writing was archaic and somewhat difficult to follow. Then as the book followed her in her travels, it became less interesting to me. Overall, it left me a bit disappointed.

Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret by Judy Blume 2 stars. While this was cute and had me chuckling a few times, overall I didn't care too much for it. I think I may have enjoyed it more had I read it when I was younger. That said, I wouldn't recommend to kids simply because I thought the content was somewhat inappropriate, particularly for pre-teens or younger. But that is simply my opinion. Many probably would consider this pretty mild.

[sonny (no longer in use)]

generation x and yes especially if you're in your twenties.

[Meran]

I just finished the Mangel series by Charlie Williams. The books in order are: Deadfolk, Booze and Burns, King of the Road, One Dead Hen, and Made of Stone. I just put up the rest of my reviews. It may not be for you; read my reviews and see why.

I loved them (and hated most of the situations), but it was like watching a train wreck... you can't stop watching and cringing and speculating. I very much enjoyed them.

And they're very different from the usual novel. In fact, I'm not sure if there's anything quite like them!

[Robert]

I finished a James Dean biography. My full review can be found here -

http://manofyesterday.wordpress.com/2...

But basically I thought the author spent far too much time idolising James Dean. Also, bizarrely, he spent some time using anagrams to somehow prove that James Dean's life was cosmically ordained. Very odd.

[Charbel]

Robert wrote: "I finished a James Dean biography. My full review can be found here -

http://manofyesterday.wordpress.com/2...

But basically I thought the..."

Wow that anagram thing sounds weird!

[Leslie]

@Robert - I agree that the anagram stuff sounds very odd!

I just finished The Valley of Fear, the 4th and last Sherlock Holmes full-length novel. Sadly, I can not recommend it. It felt as if Doyle had a non-Holmes short story which he turned into a Holmes novel to appease the demands of his publisher (and/or his public); the novel is in two parts and the second part is all backstory set in America.

[Robert]

It was strange, I don't know if you read my review or not, but at one point while writing about East of Eden he says, "and Dean is one letter away from being an anagram of Eden," which is just bizarre really considering it's one letter away from being similar to a lot of other words.

[Charbel]

Robert wrote: "It was strange, I don't know if you read my review or not, but at one point while writing about East of Eden he says, "and Dean is one letter away from being an anagram of Eden," which is just biza..."

It seems like the author is obsessed with James Dean. Doesn't that affect his objectivity? Make him less credible?

[Leslie]

Robert wrote: "It was strange, I don't know if you read my review or not, but at one point while writing about East of Eden he says, "and Dean is one letter away from being an anagram of Eden," which is just biza..."

LOL! yes, let's see how many:
deal
dale Dane
sand sane
band bane
land lane
wand wane
need
lend bend send tend wend

I am sure there are more...

[Charbel]

Leslie wrote: "Robert wrote: "It was strange, I don't know if you read my review or not, but at one point while writing about East of Eden he says, "and Dean is one letter away from being an anagram of Eden," whi..."

Mend, bean, mean, head , read, sead, bead, dear... and what else? Oh yeah, Eden! Lol

[Robert]

Charbel wrote: "Robert wrote: "It was strange, I don't know if you read my review or not, but at one point while writing about East of Eden he says, "and Dean is one letter away from being an anagram of Eden," whi..."

It just harmed the book in my opinion, what I like about biographies is the way they are able to strip away the myth and the legends and present the icon as a person. It's what Peter Guralnick did with his Elvis biographies and they are amazing. Here it was just a lot of building up of James Dean as a mythic figure so it wasn't a very intimate portrayal.

[Amber]

I've read a few autobiographies that were pretty good and were done by the person themselves. I've read Always Looking Up: The Adventures of an Incurable Optimistby Michael J. Fox, I'd Like to Apologize to Every Teacher I Ever Had: My Year as a Rookie Teacher at Northeast Highby Tony Danza, Hollywood Monster: A Walk Down Elm Street with the Man of Your Dreamsby Robert Englund, Heartbreak & Triumph: The Shawn Michaels Storyby Shawn Michaels, and Comfort from a Country Quiltby Reba Mcentire. These were all autobiographies that I read and enjoyed.

[Charbel]

I don't go much for biographies/autobiographies, I think I've only ever read four. When it comes to non-fiction I usually go for science books.

[Scott]

I just finished Divergent and have to say it was a fun read.

[LauraT]

But I see it's the first of a series. I'm starting to "resent" books that not finish ...

[Scott]

Laura...I hear ya...it's sort of Hunger Games..ish. But fast reads

[LauraT]

See what you mean, even if I've still to read Hunger games!!!

[Jenny]

I've just finished Bitter Like Orange Peel and was really pleasantly surprised, as after chapter one I had already kind of convinced myself that this wasn't my kind of book at all. Instead I discovered a very well written book about the power of absences. So yes, that a 'I'd recommend'.

[Dhanaraj]

Finished reading an interesting book Água Viva. Highly recommended if you are a student of philosophy.
About the book: This is the link to my review (if you are interested) https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

[Emma]

Just completed Men-ipulation by Monica Sarli and Denise Domning.

Would definitely recommend it to anyone who likes a gritty memoir about the darker things in life.

3/5 stars

[Charbel]

I just finished The Epic of Gilgamesh. I found it confusing and misleading. Since it's the first written piece ever, I didn't think it was fair to judge the writing style, not to mention that translation plays a factor. My review was based purely on the story, which was best described as misleading.

[Kristi]

I have finished The Aftermath. It was a quick read. For reasons that I can't seem to explain, I didn't love it. It was OK, but I expected more from it. I didn't really like the lead female character, and I think the reader is meant to. Perhaps it was too short. I felt like it ended just as things were getting interesting.

[sonny (no longer in use)]

the cellar by Richard laymon. it was not a comfortable read, read only if you can handle transgressive fiction.

[Dhanaraj]

Finished Stefan Zweig's Chess Story. A five star read. A fantastic allegory of the Nazi regime......

P.S. If you are a lover of the game of chess, you also will find many interesting reflections on the game of chess itself.

[Jenny]

I've just finished Youth Without God which I started this morning and then couldn't stop reading. I would whole-heartedly recommend it. I'm too tired to repeat myself so forgive me for doing the review-link thing: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...