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sighfyfan Report | 08/12/2011 3:43 pm

Great Expectations was the only book I didn't finish in high school. I will not let it defeat me. And 'A Tale of Two Cities' cannot be any worse than Moby d**k. I am on page 600 and nothing has happened yet...just endless descriptions of whales and the internal workings of whales.
Norman Mailer should be an interesting change.

sighfyfan Report | 08/11/2011 5:48 pm

I googled 'Castle in the Forest' and it looks like my kind of book. There's a whole lot of classics I never got around to reading (hence the 'Moby d**k'...which I am not enjoying in the least), but I think I'll put Mailer's up ahead of 'Tale of Two Cities' and 'Great Expectations' for next-to-read.

sighfyfan Report | 08/11/2011 4:46 pm

Sad to say...I don't think I've ever read any Mailer, and I'm sure it would be something you'd remember reading. I will have to add 'Harlot's Ghost' to my 'To Read' list, unless you can recommend another of his (that might possibly be shorter).
And I'm going to recommend 'Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell' by Susanna Clarke if you haven't read it. It's an alternative history set during the Napoleonic Wars, and written in the style of the times (including the spelling). Neil Gaiman proclaims it "the finest English novel of the fantastic written in the last seventy years." It's a little over a thousand pages, and magnificent from beginning to end. (I'm predicting, I have 100 pages to go.)

sighfyfan Report | 08/11/2011 3:59 pm

Do you ever feel like there's too much to read and not enough time? I've started 'The Portable Athiest' and 'god is not Great' is waiting for me on the shelf. I'm half-way into Sagan's 'Broca's Brain' and 100 pages shy of finishing 'Moby d**k'. I also have about 100 pages left in 'Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell' and am half way through a Discworld novel. If life would just slow down, I could get some reading done. (Who am I fooling? I need to stay off Gaia.)

sighfyfan Report | 08/11/2011 3:26 pm

i enjoyed 'Demon-Haunted World' as well. The reason I like Sagan better, is because he isn't as angry as Dawkins, his compassion for the human spirit overrides everything. In the opening remarks of 'Varieties', Anne Druyan quotes his work in Cosmos. I love this quote...."Every one of us is, in the cosmic perspective, precious. If a human disagrees with you, let him live. In a hundred billion galaxies you will not find another." What an amazing human being he was.

sighfyfan Report | 08/10/2011 5:34 pm

I highly approve of the books that changed your life. While Dawkins did significantly affect mine, it was Carl Sagan's 'Varieties of Scientific Experience' that provided my epiphany.

MzKimmyy Report | 08/04/2010 3:57 pm

thanks for buying!

lush-uz fyre Report | 06/30/2010 6:53 pm

Nice avatar! Mine's under construction. xp

chaosthingy Report | 05/11/2010 3:23 am

Hi! I haven't talked to you for a long time. How are you? Please feel free to read my journal. It's about Milan Kundera: http://www.gaiaonline.com/journal/?mode=view&post_id=31486683

Butterfly_Raindancer Report | 05/05/2010 6:35 pm

As I am 28 this September, and one of the few older Gaians here, I feel we must be friends. smile
Well, that and I think your avatar is cool, dear god, what have I become?