What's Our Next Group Read?

[Jen LD]

Funny you should mention that. DS has to participate in a "trial" of the New Deal as an opposing member. I got him "The Politically Incorrect Guide to American History" to help him with his researches...

[Erin]

I love that title! Politically incorrect is probably the best type of history to read. I've never had a very god attention span for most history books (I think the best I've ever done was finishing Testament of Youth for one of our VBC discussions a few years ago), but all of my friends read Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States: 1492 to Present for AP history in high school and said it was the best history book they'd ever read. Really eye opening.

I keep meaning to pick that up....but again, have like zero attention span for history books.

[Steve]

Erin wrote: "...all of my friends read Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States 1492 to Present "

Don't bother. That book doesn't even pretend to be unbiased about the USA. It reads like it was written in Moscow by Soviet propagandists during the Cold War. Zinn is a noted far left-wing radical who considers the US an unmitigated evil.

Pail Johnson's A History of the American People, while written by an unabashed British Ameriphile, is both a far better read and much less biased. He covers both the good stuff and the warts.

[Jen LD]

The Politically Incorrect Guide series is notorious for being an equal-opportunity offender of every side! What I like about it is the information is taken from documents of the time. It's not about a writer looking back offering his opinions. But the results are without doubt, surprising...
Jen

[Barbara C]

I'm new to Goodreads and to this group. Where does one find the book to be read each month? I'm totally confused. If books are not uploaded to Goodreads, does one buy them, for instance, on Amazon, and then read them? What am I missing? Not wanting to clutter the list with nonsense, I suggest that kind, generous people can reach me backchannel at barbjohnson74@gmail.com.

[Erin]

Hey Barbara! The book we're reading each month is posted on the group home page here: http://www.goodreads.com/group/show/6...

The book that we'll be reading for the month will (usually) be posted before the month starts so you have time to go find it wherever you usually find books (bookstore, library, amazon, etc, etc) and then you can read it and join in chatting on the discussion thread that will be started up here in the group pages.

Goodreads doesn't offer books for sale; it's more like a reference site where you can keep track of books you've read or want to read, and find our more information about new books or authors you might hear about.

[MaryL]

Erin wrote: "Hey Barbara! The book we're reading each month is posted on the group home page here: http://www.goodreads.com/group/show/6...

The book that we'll be reading for ..."

So any ideas about May's read? May 1 is Tuesday.. I'll suggest "Thirteenth Night" by Alan Gordon-first in the Fool's Guild series and recommended in the VBG last year. Excellant writing, good characters and story.

[Sabrina]

"Thirteenth Night" looks pretty interesting. Weren't we thinking of reading "Gods of Gotham" at some point too?

[Margaret]

I loved "Thirteenth Night" but so far it's in print only. I want to "read" the rest of the series. I have written to the publishers begging them to make audio versions available.
"The Gods of Gotham" is high on my TBR list and I can get it reasonably from Audible.com

[Vicki]

Is everyone ready for our May pick--Lady Almina and the Real Downton Abbey: The Lost Legacy of Highclere Castle?! I'm downloading the audiobook to my phone even as I type. Wheeee!

Looks like we already have a few nominations for upcoming picks--we should probably choose selections least through August. September will likely be an LRK-recommended pick to lead us into the October discussion of GARM.

So, it looks like we have The Gods of Gotham as well as Thirteenth Night. As noted, there are availability issues with the latter--it's actually not even in print anymore, and not on kindle or audible, either. Meh to the publisher on that count! :( But we can put it in the hopper in order to get the title in front of VBC eyeballs again.

What other titles? We can come up with a list and put it in a poll to let the gang vote.

[Vicki]

Oh, good--I'm glad you were able to get it quickly! I'm starting Lady Almina right after I'm done with one of my weekly podcasts--probably after dinner.

I hate to admit it, but I may be the last person in the Anglophone world who hasn't watched Dowton Abbey. I started the first episode with DD, but she didn't like it, so we switched to another show. So I've only seen about 30 minutes of the whole series.

[Lenore]

Vicki wrote: "I hate to admit it, but I may be the last person in the Anglophone world who hasn't watched Dowton Abbey...."

If you have streaming Netflix, Season 1 is available.

[Jen LD]

I thought I was the last person to get into DA but it caught me and I fell hard! Esp. the 2nd season at the end. I will not spoil, I will not spoil but I loved it!
Jen

[Vicki]

I do have Netflix, and I'll probably start watching DA as soon as I've read Lady Almina. I tend to stay behind the curve on TV. I'm just now on the third season of Big Bang Theory, and I <3 <3 <3 it!!

[Sabrina]

Vicki wrote: "I do have Netflix, and I'll probably start watching DA as soon as I've read Lady Almina. I tend to stay behind the curve on TV. I'm just now on the third season of Big Bang Theory, and I <3 <3 <3..."

Yay for Big Bang Theory! Have you seen IT Crowd, Vicki? It's a BBC show.

Also, I read in the Lady Almina book description that there is a lot of pictures. Do the pictures appear in the ebook version?

[Jessica C.]

Just requested both print and ebook copies from the library of Lady Almina and the Real Downton Abbey: The Lost Legacy of Highclere Castle.

As for future books, I would suggest Fremont Jones if it were easy to find, but I doubt that is the case. :(

[Lenore]

Arghh! Library doesn't yet have the audio version!!

[Vicki]

Sorry! I wish audible had a lending program like kindle and nook, so I could lend you my copy when I'm done. The reader is very good.

[Jen LD]

Alls I can say about BBT is my husband is a physicist, I hung out with physicists and the ones on tv have a much more active "social" life than any physicist I have ever known!

[Vicki]

They do seem to be rather sociable introverts! But then, Einstein could be very sociable--at times. And Richard Feynman was a positive extrovert, but that seems to be pretty unusual in that field. I just listened to a collection of his autobiographical essays--Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!, which I enjoyed immensely.

I just watched the BBT episode about the Ring and literally hollered laughing.

[Barbara C]

Jen,
What is BBT?

[John]

Big Bang Theory, Barbara; a show that routinely cracks me up!

John.

[Jen LD]

Guys,
I think I was too delicate. My physicist friends were social, interesting and entertaining, full of fun and surprises but the guys on BBT seem to have an "Open All Night" sign above their bedroom doors (well, not Sheldon maybe...).

Jen

[Barbara C]

John,
I've been loving in Costa Rica. Is BBT on a network? Which one? We see network shows down here. On which day is it run?

[Erin]

Jessica C. wrote: "As for future books, I would suggest Fremont Jones if it were easy to find, but I doubt that is the case. :( "

It doesn't seem too horrible to get hold of. It's still in print and my library has it (which is saying something because it's a pretty small library). It's available in audio too. Just not digitally. =\

I'd be up for reading Fremont Jones, though. We should definitely add it to the poll.

[Vicki]

Okay--we'll add FJ to the poll.

BBT is on CBS, but I watch it on Amazon streaming, as I don't have cable. Several of the characters do tend to have some Aspie tendencies--some more than others. Leonard seems more emotionally aware than the rest of the group. Strangely, he's the one DD can't stand--she says he's too whiny.

[Barbara C]

Thanks. We get CBS here.
As for streaming, I have no idea how that works.
There are expats here, but I've never gotten around to ask them. My neighbors are Brahmin cows. They only moo.

[Vicki]

Would love to see some pictures from around there! Re: streaming--basically, you just go to Amazon or whatever streaming site you want to use, and click on the show you want to watch. If you have enough bandwidth, and there aren't international restrictions on the content, you can watch it there on your computer--or on a tv, through an internet device hooked up to it (we use a roku device, but I usually just watch on my laptop).

Some streaming sites charge an annual or monthly fee, and some charge per season or episode. Some are even free. It's pretty easy to manage.

[John]

Thursday evening, Barbara!

[Vicki]

Raj is probably the least annoying, at least as far as I've seen. But then, there are women in the scenes enough to where he probably only talks about 60% of the screen-time. Maybe he'd be more annoying if he could talk around women.

[John]

But Raj is by far the creepiest of the guys, too weird for words!

John.

[Vicki]

I dunno--Howard is a serious contender for the creepy prize, at least partway into the third season. But I hear he gets a serious romance and settles down somewhat. Which is good--both for him and the entire female gender, methinks :)

[John]

Howard and Bernadette make an interesting pair, but it is really s threesome as long as Howard's mom is around :-). All four of the guys are over-the-top stereotypes of their particular personalities/foibles/idiosyncrasies, which is why I find them humorous instead of just sad. An awfully well written series, imho.

John.

[Vicki]

The writing really is wonderful.

I can't recall Raj having an actual girlfriend, but I'm only part way through season 3.

[John]

Since Raj has to be somewhat intoxicated to even talk to a woman it has been hard for the writers to give him a steady girlfriend. He has had a couple for an episode or two at a time but always manages to mess up the budding relationship somehow. However, hope springs eternal :-).

[Barbara C]

Thanks everyone.
Looks like I have some learning to do.

Vicki, sorry that I cannot supply pictures. I have no camera, neither film nor digital.

I do have photos of the house I'm renting. Looks palatial, but there were some and still are drawbacks. Like low water pressure in one bathroom, tree roots blocking the waste pipe in another, not enough electric plugs, and lights don't work where the wiring has rotted out, water goes to two houses rather than only the one I live in, and until recently, there were no screens between the open walls and the ceiling -- a condition which encouraged rabid bats, hungry horrid-looking opossums, and assorted rodents to visit regularly. The occasional birds who visit are beautiful, particularly the mot mots.

Costa Rica is beautiful but has baffling infrastructure: water service has to stop when the underground pipes break when there are landslides with the heavy rains. Electrical storms sound like an A-bomb in the sky and often cause brown-outs. The dry or sunny season is not only from November to May. It's shortened on both ends. That is, rain commonly begins in early April and ends in late November, making it essentially 8 months rain, 4 months dry. The mornings, even in the rainy season, are, however, dry. The rain is always refreshing, and is why everything grows rapidly and almost always green. There are 27 climactic conditions in Costa Rica, which is about the size of West Virginia.

The people are wonderful, but very passive. The national music is like a Gregorian chant in feeling and robs listeners of energy.

An interesting country. Funny things. Just the other day, I learned that cows can be male, and that oxen are castrated bulls.

[Jen LD]

Is the music meant to rob listeners of energy? We are doing Gregorian chant at church and I didn't have that reaction but I am just learning. I tend to be excited when I am learning something new.
Jen

[Lenore]

I can't speak for Costa Rican music (about which I know absolutely nothing), but speaking as someone who loves Gregorian chant (despite being a nice Jewish girl to whose culture it is totally foreign), I think Gregorian chant is intended, like some Indian music, to intensify concentration and focus the spirit.

[Barbara C]

Gregorian chants are fine to listen to, to learn, to study, and . . . as you write, Lenore, to "intensify concentration and focus the spirit."

But, frankly, I have difficulty listening to them for hours. Because of where my house is located, I hear the goings on in the central park and the church almost every weekend. Those goings inevitably include music, which to me is Gregorian chant-like.

I then do many things:
--- play a Brazilian disk
--- listen to Topol in Fiddler on the Roof (Lenore, think of how Hava Na Gila (spelling?) incites an entire audience to stand up and join in)
--- listen to Greek music -- which is, for me, the all-time high in the world of music to which you can dance and about which you can drum up dreams.

The list of energizing music is quite long, but it, in no way, includes Gregorian chants.

My 2 cents.

[Cateline]

Lenore wrote: "Vicki wrote: "I hate to admit it, but I may be the last person in the Anglophone world who hasn't watched Dowton Abbey...."

If you have streaming Netflix, Season 1 is available."
Actually, if you have Amazon Prime, the first season is free to watch. We watched not too long ago, and then bought the second season from them to stream. At least with the first being free, we were able to acertain our liking for it.

Soap Opera, yes, in a way certainly. But in an Upstairs Downstairs manner. There are a great many similarities, especially in the first season.

[Amy]

Also, as an aside, if you haven't seenthe recent update of Upstairs. Downstairs by the BBC then you really should. IMHO it far outshines Downton...

[Cateline]

Amy wrote: "Also, as an aside, if you haven't seenthe recent update of Upstairs. Downstairs by the BBC then you really should. IMHO it far outshines Downton..."

Thanks for that, I've wondered. :)

[Erin]

Amy wrote: "Also, as an aside, if you haven't seenthe recent update of Upstairs. Downstairs by the BBC then you really should. IMHO it far outshines Downton..."

I tried to watch the old Upstairs Downstairs (it was on Netflix so I thought I'd give it a go), but it just didn't grab me. The screenplay struck me as very theatrical...which I don't think really came across all that well on tv.

I'm curious about the new one, though. I'll have to wait until I can find it streaming somewhere.

[Pat]

John wrote: "Big Bang Theory, Barbara; a show that routinely cracks me up!

John."

We moved here (Talllahassee) 25 years ago so husband could continue his degree in physics...so BBT is like revisiting that era...I think I could contribute an episode or two.

Gave hubby DVD's for birthday...so we can pause and he can tell me what's on the grease boards...each show it's a new physics joke...he chuckles, I roll my eyes. Sigh.

[Jen LD]

Erin wrote:
I tried to watch the old Upstairs D..."
Erin,
The old Upstairs/Downstairs is in the tradition of so many of the great Masterpiece Theater dramas. I got hooked on it when I was pregnant with my 2nd. It came on everyday on the public tv channel where we lived. I fell in love with the characters and the attention to detail of the period. Today we are so used to someone somewhere in the drama violating the rules of the society and the old U/D presented a much more formal world where if things were breached, it didn't bode well. Now we get a medal if we cross a convention and it's so normal, it's expected. So I loved seeing what the Brits of the 1970's thought the world of Edwardian England was like. It's all grist for the mill. The new Upstairs/Downstairs struck me as throwing almost every stereotype about the time out the window and that didn't strike the right note to me. I wish I could have lived in all these period dramas, the actual time. I don't trust any one view anymore....
Jen

[Cateline]

Erin wrote: I tried to watch the old Upstairs Downstairs (it was on Netflix so I thought I'd give it a go), but it just didn't grab me. The screenplay struck me as very theatrical...which I don't think really came across all that well on tv.
..."

That is exactly part of what I enjoyed about it. Funny, different stroks. :)

I think it makes a difference too, the age one is at watching. I was in my 20's at the time, and was fascinated with that time frame because my maternal grandparents had not left England yet, and lived through some of that, plus my grmother was a nurse/and matron at the front lines in France, very much against her parents wishes. So it was sort of as though I could peek into her life experiences a bit.

[Pat]

I loved U/D when it was first aired...but trying to recapture that feeling today, I find the whole production below my current expectations both in writing and physical production...not to mention the problems with blurred and mis-colored videotapes and the perpetual difficulty with British sound when translated on this side of the pond. Either my expectations have increased with the advances of technology, or the writing has just gotten better.

Speaking of technology, I tried to purchase the Blu-Ray version of DT which on HD TV is unbelievable (the costumes and hall itself) only to find they were not Blu Ray...very disappointing...returned them

After the second season I will watch it for the costumes alone having felt the second season had become wearisome....when Maggie Smith leaves--so will this viewer.

[Lenore]

Next season, not only will Maggie Smith be back, but also she will have Shirley MacLaine as a foil (Cora's mother). I think that will be vastly entertaining!

[Jen LD]

As long as whoever writes Shirley MacLaine's part, doesn't succumb to the temptation of writing her in an over-the-top kind of "which ole dame is gonna out do the other." I realize that is exactly the reason she was hired but to me, that's at least jumping the goldfish...

[Pat]

Last thing I read Maggie had not signed on for season 4.