[quote="GoldenRhino"]Reading:
[img]http://i.imgur.com/5gWQ0tH.png[/img]
On my nightstand:
[img]http://i.imgur.com/y0Bm0W8.png[/img]
Just read:
[img]http://i.imgur.com/INpMXZg.png[/img]
Just read:
[img]http://i.imgur.com/QYLMxJ7.png[/img]

I...sorta got into jazz, a lot, this year. [/quote]

[quote="yaro"]Yeah--I'll agree with you that some of the conversations can get tiring...I guess they're there to be somewhat amusing and to illustrate the inanity of the characters, or something. For me it was OK, because I don't really need or enjoy action anyway (when I was a child I complained about how every book had some problem in it that had to get solved, and why couldn't they just make a book where people were hanging out and everything was normal?), but I will concede that the dialogues get long in this one.You could probably gloss over them and still be OK.[/quote]

Maybe I'll get back to it... I don't generally mind long conversations if they're interesting or advance the plot, but yeah so far a lot of it seemed pretty inane. I was fine with the bits on the cat.

I gave up for now and read [i]Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother[/i]. Another short and easy read. It's an autobiographical account of an American Chinese woman raising her kids the strict 'Chinese' way. I thought she was somewhat over the top, but really not as bad as people made her out to be (yay for taking things out of context). It was somewhat superficial though, I wish she had done a little analysis about different philosophies on how to teach children. Now just starting [i]At Home: A Short History of Private Life[/i].

Currently a couple hundred pages deep in the book Last Night in Twisted River by John Irving; great so far! Anyone who likes in depth character descriptions and humor, here and there, would possible enjoy it. So far, it's a timeline book of a boys life, starting from the 1940s, of becoming a writing. Compelling read!

[quote="terra"][quote="yaro"] Now just starting [i]At Home: A Short History of Private Life[/i].[/quote][/quote]

I loved that book--it was the first book I read by Bill Bryson. For some reason, I had thought he was just a run of the mill sort of writer (maybe because he's so popular ) but I really found that I love his stuff. It's something that I really admire and try to do myself--making the seemingly mundane extremely interesting, because it really [i]is[/i] extremely interesting when you look at it hard enough.

Right now I'm working on
[url=https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/64617.Mr_Bloomfield_s_Orchard?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book][img]https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1347581089l/64617.jpg[/img][/url]
[url=https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/64617.Mr_Bloomfield_s_Orchard?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book]Mr. Bloomfield's Orchard: The Mysterious World of Mushrooms, Molds, and Mycologists by Nicholas P. Money[/url]
Another fungus book by the same author as the fungal epidemic book. Actually, I would not rate this one very high--I think the fellow's an expert in the realm of fungi, but I realize that not every expert can write about their subject beautifully and clearly. I'll give him an A for effort, but I haven't been impressed--try as I might, I'm still finding it difficult to penetrate the world of fungi with his books. I'm going to try someone/something else.

and

[url=https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/30227683-grafts?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book][img]https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1463619893l/30227683.jpg[/img][/url]
[url=https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/30227683-grafts?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book]Grafts by Michael Marder[/url]

Interesting and philosophical essays about plants and so-called plant intelligence. Ashinow--I think you might like this one.

To Kill a Mockingbird. Like many high school canon texts, it's a lot better than I remembered.

Coin Locker Babies.
Finished it, loved it.
Some pretty damn good parts in it. Better than expected: surprisingly more depth that I had expected.

“TV sounds are all the same; there's no difference between the sound of the wind in Northern Ireland and the wind on a Polynesian island.”

Very Fight Club-esque... or should I say.. Fight Club probably got some inspiration from Coin Locker Babies.

An excerpt:
http://documents.mx/documents/coin-lock ... 074ce.html

DATURA!

[url=https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17465709-braiding-sweetgrass?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book][img]https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1366775928l/17465709.jpg[/img][/url]
[url=https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17465709-braiding-sweetgrass?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book]Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants by Robin Wall Kimmerer[/url]

This book is fantastic--partly poetic, partly scientific, and partly historical. It offers perspectives about plants that Western culture doesn't usually consider, which I would hope more people might adopt.

[url=https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/10959.Sophie_s_World?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book][img]https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1343459906l/10959.jpg[/img][/url]
[url=https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/10959.Sophie_s_World?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book]Sophie's World by Jostein Gaarder[/url]

Nice! When my friend was trying to describe this book to me, I couldn't understand what he meant about it being a history of philosophy as well as a novel at the same time. Now that I'm reading it, I find that it's a really nice idea, especially for introductions into subjects. I think the history is probably, by necessity, a bit cursory at times, but it's great that it is informative while providing a fascinating fictional story as well.

Lovely books Nicole.
I had quite some time on my hands to read some books, so I did.

[b]Some P.G. Wodehouse (Ring for Jeeves, Uneasy Money). [/b]
Wodehouse is always a light read with lots of British humour. The Jeeves/Bertie Wooster series are phenomenal, I've read them all.

[b]The Elementary Particles - Michel Houellebecq[/b]
"Bruno and Michel are half-brothers abandoned by their mother, an unabashed devotee of the drugged-out free-love world of the sixties."
The initial set-up is very much alike 'Coinlocker Babies' as you can see. But the elementary particles draws more from the past (sixties liberation area) and draws the line to present modernity... while 'Coinlocker Babies' was planted firmly in the (post-) modern era. Part social commentary, part plot, I liked the book a lot.
[b]
Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow - Yuval Noah Harari[/b]
It is a non-fiction book about the most recent history of human kind (starting from enlightenment era/industrial revolution)... and then plots a possible itinerary of the future. Subjects covered are humanism, free will, artificial intelligence and biological engineering. It is not a hard read. The theme fits neatly that of 'The Elementary Particles'. Good read.

[b]Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry into Values - Robert M. Pirsig[/b]
I found it a delightful read. Part a travel report and a part philosophical treatise. It is like Sophie's World.. but it does not cover as many philosophers. It is about the split between Romanticism and Classicism... and how to synergize the two. (a little bit more of this, however overgeneralized, here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5QmJofRAB9M)

[b]The Secret Diary of Hendrik Groen, 83 ¼ Years Old - Hendrik Groen[/b]
What a fun, yet heartfelt and a deep book, about life, old age, a shrinking world, death, loneliness and illness. It is a Dutch book originally. The gentleman talks about his little daily adventures in a nursing home and his thoughts about it. It made me a lot more emphatic to old people, and especially my grandmother (mother of my father), who has been here on the earth for 99 years now. But she is still very healthy, mentally and physically! What a joy and wonder

[b]The Lost Valley + The Last Border - Anthony van Kampen[/b]
1) Dutch again. Tells the tale, based on true stories, about a Dutchman who went and lived with a Papua tribe for ten years.
2) Non-fiction report about travel and stay with a tribe in the North-West Amazon.

The fun thing about this list, is that all books listed are actually owned by my dad. We have a small library here at home .

Working through, bit by bit, as particular moods strike...

The Collected Stories of Raymond Carver
The Collected Stories of John Cheever
The Wapshot Chronicle by Cheever
Men Without Women by Haruki Murakami
Sexual Personae by Camille Paglia

[color=#0040FF]About Cambodia:[/color]
[b]Sideshow: Kissinger, Nixon and the Destruction of Cambodia - William Shawcross[/b]
My goodness... Cambodia and Laos had a lot to suffer from the Vietnam war spilling over. Detailed history from 1969 to 1975.
[b]Hun Sen's Cambodia - Sebastian Strangio[/b]
Political history of Cambodia after Killing Fields and Vietnamese Government. Very well written.
[b]Anthropology and community in Cambodia - Edited by John Marston[/b]

My plan is to move to Cambodia to live and work there for a few years, learn the language etc. Maybe after that, I will move up to Laos, then to Myanmar (Burma) and then end up in Bhutan as a Buddhist monk, haha.

[color=#0040FF]About the Philippines:[/color]
[b]Mass - F. Sionil José[/b]
The narrative of Mass pictured the Philippines during the years prior to and after the imposition of Martial Law in 1972. It narrated about a movement advocating reform, the resulting struggle for human rights, students’ rights, tenants’ rights, and women’s rights, and mass protests that were manipulated by "fraudulent leaders". The uprising failed. One of the characters went back to Central Luzon to discover his origins in order to rebuild his life.

Very familiar to me as I have worked with grass-roots movements in the Philippines. The struggle is still ongoing and present.

[color=#0040FF]Fiction, Science-Fiction:[/color]
[b]The Tin Drum - Günter Grass
[/b]The first verse of 'I want to be Sullivan':
I was playing a tin drum
I remembered my childhood
No matter how much time passes, I can't change
I can never move from this place

is a direct reference to the movie (I think Sawao watched the movie), which is based on this book. I think it is an 'okay' book.
[b]H.G. Wells: The War of the Worlds + Selected Short Stories [/b]
I liked the 'Time Machine' a lot. Also: The Door in the Wall, The Country of the Blind, Aepyornis Island, The Purple Pileus.

[color=#0040FF]Religion, Philosophy, Spirituality:[/color]
[b]The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge - Carlos Castaneda[/b]
Interesting and relatable. Prefer my own adventures though, haha.
[b]Tao, Teilhard and Western Thought - Allerd Stikker[/b]
It is in Dutch actually. Nice insightful book.
[b]The Tibetan Book of the Dead: The Great Liberation by Hearing in the Intermediate States - Padmasambhava[/b]
Interesting.

~yaro's 2018 books-read mega post~
Mostly written up for my own benefit so as to revisit what I've read, but perhaps someone will pass through this forum once more and see it. Starting from the beginning of the year:

[i]The Wayfarer[/i] by Natsume Soseki
[i]Brick: A World History[/i] by James W.P. Campell
Nice oversized book of photos of brick architecture and fascinating brick history. I was in a brick mood and I got my fix.
[i]The Story of Spanish[/i] by James Benoit Nadeau etc
Not super great but somewhat informative. However some reviewers have said there are inaccuracies so I am suspicious of this book.
[i]Mon/The Gate[/i] by Natsume Soseki
[i]A Hut of One's Own[/i] by Anne Cline
Too theoretical. I just wanted to read about huts, real huts. This book would be good if you want to ponder the deeper meaning of huts as art but not if you just want to read about HUTS.
[i]Muhammed[/i] by Karen Armstrong
Just a book about prophet Mohammed (peace be upon him)
[i]Angelic Music: The story of Benjamin Franklin's Glass Armonica[/i] by Corey Mead
A handsomely printed book with an accessible history of the Glass Armonica. I learned more about this instrument, and indeed learned that one can purchase one today if willing to shell out the cash.
[i]Glass[/i] by William S. Ellis
I got this book at a used bookshop and I didn't think that a book about glass could be outdated but this one is, although 1998 doesn't seem that far into the past. I would recommend finding a more recent book about glass.
[i]Cactus[/i] by Dan Torre
Super attractively bound book with examinations of cactus in culture. Not a guide for growing at all, more a light ethnobotany.
[i]The Crossword Century[/i] by Alan Connor
Just a book about crosswords, from a British perspective (but American crosswords also get fair treatment here)
[i]Becoming Native to this Place[/i] by Wes Jackson
Wes Jackson runs the land institute and writes about nature
[i]How the World is Housed[/i] by Frank G Carpenter
An old-time children's book that I found at a used book sale. Aside from period racism, I found this book to be shockingly interesting and informative about shelters around the world (apparently the author got rich and travelled the globe until he died in China from disease) and industry from an earlier era. I think this book was published around 1915 or something, but I would recommend it, actually.
[i]Men as Women, Women as Men: Changing Genders in Native American Cultures[/i] by Sabine Lang
Really scholarly and sometimes super dry reading of nonbinary gender roles in Native American cultures of North America
[i]Life and Times of Frederick Douglass[/i]
I had never read this until now but it was highly fascinating and readable.
[i]The Land of Little Rain[/i] by Mary Austin
Nature writing of the American Southwest
[i]Peyote Dreams[/i] by Charles Duits
Some interesting insights
[i]The Language Insinct[/i] by Steven Pinker
[i]Words and Rules[/i] by Steven Pinker
[i]the Stuff of Thought[/i] by Steven Pinker
I read the three above books and all were interesting but I also don't really know what to comment about
[i]Cacti: Biology and Uses[/i] by Park Nobel
Collection of scholarly articles on cactus plants. I had to skip the CO2 uptake chapter because it got too technical for my untrained brain. Others are readable to the layperson, I guess, but not necessarily fun to read
[i]Gathering the Desert[/i] by Gary Paul Nabhan
Nice ethnobotany book for American Southwest. Divided by different plants.
[i]Wisdom of the Elders: Sacred Native Stories of Nature[/i] by David Suzuki and Peter S Knudson
Really nice collection of worldwide indigenous beliefs regarding nature juxtaposed with current scientific thought which can often jibe though we usually think of them as being at odds
[i]Ecopsychology[/i] compiled by Theodore Roszak
A bunch of essays related to Ecopsychology. Perhaps a bit outdated by now, but interesting. Someone might take or leave some ideas.
[i]Dream Boy[/i] by Jim Grimsley
Absolutely jarring and dismal novel of two boys in love that is the same time really grabbing -- but it would be nice to have some uplifting lgbt novels too. I suppose it might be a reflection of the time it was written or set in.
[i]Death in Midsummer[/i] by Yukio Mishima
Short stories by Mishima. I enjoyed these more than I enjoyed his novels.
[i]Seeds, Sex and Civilization[/i] by Peter Thompson
All about Seeds and plant breeding, both natural and human directed. Nice color plates in each chapter of seeds and plants.
[i]Owning the Earth[/i] by Andro Linklater
This book must have been a massive undertaking to write. All about the economics and social impact of owning land.
[i]Indians in Minnesota (1972 booklet)[/i] by Minnesota league of women voters
I found this book in my grandparents' things when they moved out. It is informative but outdated, however it gives a glimpse to us of how the native life looked in the 50s and 60s -- this book was written just as the American Indian Movement formed in Minneapolis, and as such that organization only receives a small blurb of mention.
[i]Urban Forests[/i] by Jill Johns
An accessible foray into the world of urban forestry in the United States. Histories of several North American city trees and their maladies.
[i]River Horse[/i] by William Least Heat Moon
Heat Moon travels the United States east to west largely by water and writes splendidly about it.
[i]In Winter's Kitchen[/i] by Beth Dooley
Talking about midwestern foods, such as apples, cranberries, wild rice, etc.
[i]Secrets of the Cat[/i] by Barbara Holland
Nonscientific treatment of the housecat. Interesting and enterataining.
[i]Night Flying Woman[/i] by Ignatia Broker
Ojibwe woman narrative, based on the author's great grandmother's life.
[i]The Sybil[/i] by Par Lagerkvist
Creepy parable-like novel of divine vs. human love
[i]Leaves in Myth, Magic, and Medicine[/i] by Alice Thoms Vitale
Many trees' leaves receive an entry and short blurbs about their various uses in history
[i]Our Land was a Forest: an Ainu memoir[/i] by Shigeru Kayano
Interesting and readable memoir of an Ainu activist
[i]Arabic Verbs & Essentials of Grammar[/i] by Mahmoud Gaafar and Jane Wightwick
just a grammar book
[i]The Early Homosexual Rights Movement (1864-1935)[/i] by John Lauritson and David Thorstad
Slim book about the early homosexual rights movement in Europe, mostly, which was basically arrested with the coming of the great war
[i]Crossworld[/i] by Marc Romano
Another book about crosswords but the author seems a little cynical and so, while informative, it doesn't seem very fun, which a book about crosswords ought to be.

Still currently working on:
[i]Los rios profundos[/i] Jose Maria Arguedas - novel of indigenous boy's experience in Peru
[i]White Birch, Red Hawthorne[/i] by Nora Murphy - white woman writes a kind of memoir but with American Indians in mind and trees as a theme. Cheesy title but quite nice actually.

That truly is an amazing list yaro, with bunch of interesting reading materials! We share a lot of interests in common! Thanks for sharing!

I'm currently reading [b]'First They Killed My Father: A Daughter of Cambodia Remembers' by Loung Ung.[/b] About the Khmer Rouge era... have seen the film already before moving to Cambodia, now I am here and a traveller gave it to me. Now a lot of it is recognizable, about the culture, the landscape and everything. Interesting read.
[b]
'The Woman in the Dunes' by Kobo Abe.[/b] This is another book the gentleman gave to me. I finished it last week. Great read. It's about sand, and conformism and being trapped and enslavement and an entomologist.

I continuously re-read the poems of [b]'Edge of Wonder' by Victoria Erickson.[/b] They're about wildness, sensitivity, the elements, nature, travel and road trips, wonder and amazement and all of that. Love it, gives me inspiration.

I bought [b]'Lolita'[/b] at the airport, before going to the Philippines, and then Cambodia. It's a favourite book of a friend of mine. I have more sympathy for paedophiles now. Especially as many, if not most, of them are born that way.

What else?
Not that much else since I posted my last post. I'm kinda deprived of books here. In the future I'm planning to read books about local/complementary/alternative currency as I am considering to start one myself. Anyway, I will have more time to read books, starting from next month. I will go through your list once more yaro. What would you recommend that relates to permaculture? I would like to learn more about it, practical stuff, mostly. Perhaps[b] Wes Jackson's "Becoming Native to this Place"?[/b]

[b]'How the World is Housed' by Frank G. Carpenter[/b] also sounds interesting!
My parents will be visiting me in Cambodia at the end of March, so I can send them a list of books they can bring for me to read.
[b]
'Peyote Dreams' [/b]sounds interesting too!! Especially, since I have direct experience with this magical plant and Master teacher. I still have some seeds with me that I am planning to plant in my future permaculture garden or at someone else's.

[quote][b]Leaves in Myth, Magic, and Medicine by Alice Thoms Vitale[/b]
Many trees' leaves receive an entry and short blurbs about their various uses in history
[b]Our Land was a Forest: an Ainu memoir by Shigeru Kayano[/b]
Interesting and readable memoir of an Ainu activist[/quote]
Cool!

You've read so much yaro! I have some catching up to do, haha.

Indeed I think we do share more than a few interests. As for Becoming Native to this Place -- I think that book seemed kind of theoretical, but perhaps the same author has other books or writings that might pertain to permaculture. A book I finished a while back that you might like is [b]Worms Eat My Garbage[/b] by Mary Appelhof. It is an accessible classic to home vermicomposting. Also the illustrations are cute. I've been meaning to start a worm bin myself but haven't been able to order any worms where I am at the moment.

I am also working slowly through a big book about Cycads, the ancient family of trees. I've gotten through all the overview chapters and now I'm just slowly browsing through the different genera and selected species. One bit of information that I found interesting was how, although all cycads contain toxins fatal to humans, there are various cultures that have methods of preparation of some parts of the tree that make them edible. However, there is some hypothesizing about whether cycad product consumption and the high incidence of degenerative neurological disorders in Guam are related. Who knows though! (Well maybe someone does now as the book I have is 20 years old and I haven't searched the literature)

Also now I have begun [b]Fire: A Brief History [/b]by Stephen Pyne. Apparently, this is like the Cliffs Notes version of all his other books about fire -- it is super dense in information. I have never thought about fire as much as I have begun to. I mean -- the control of fire is one of those things that makes us human. We (and the rest of the living world) adapt to fire, but fire does not adapt to us because fire cannot adapt. The book is somewhat philosophical in its style. Would recommend.

I finally read Slaughterhouse-Five recently. It wasn't bad. I think having the experience of going through the military made it more accessible to me, because the last time I read it (in high school,) I couldn't get into it at all.

Philip Roth, Murakami rereads, Hiromi Kawakami, Etgar Keret