Book recommendations

[Alpinfox]

recommended

 

Me Talk Pretty One Day - David Sedaris (laugh out loud funny, )

The Island Within - Richard Nelson (brilliant ecopoetic prose)

Desert Solitaire - Edward Abbey (better than Monkey Wrench Gang )

Into the Wild - Krakhauer

Ishmael - Daniel Quinn (the most poorly written good book ever)

The Only Dance There Is - Ram Dass (Oh, I've said too much)

The Human Zoo or The Naked Ape - Desmond Morris (Sociology)

Catch22 - Joseph Heller (brilliant "pointlessness of war"-type book)

The Family of Man - Time Life photography collection (very cool)

Bugaboo Rock - Green & Benson (Faster Summer! Faster!)

None of Chomsky's political books really stand out as being better than all the rest, but I have some you can borrow if you wish (Prosperous few and the restless many, Media Control: The spectacular achievements of propaganda, 911, maybe some others...)

Anything by Ayn Rand, Franz Kafka, John Muir, or Jack Kerouac that you haven't read already

 

And Squid! Maybe it's time to re-read the Iliad

 

 

SHIT! I totally forgot about Tom Stoppard! Thanks Dru. I got a really cheap copy of the Bugs guide, but I'll look for that other one too.

 

Arcadia - Tom Stoppard (my favorite play of all time)

Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead - Tom Stoppard (also rent the movie! )

 

 

For the sake of brevity, my top two rec's are:

Island Within

Arcadia

 

 

This was my 911th post and I recommended a book titled "911"

Edited March 26, 2004 by Alpinfox

[Dru]

hey throw that benson/green bugs guide away and get the real deal by atkinson and piche! more peaks, more routes, better topos etc

[Dru]

oh yeah all you alexandre dumas readers should check out the khaavren books by steven brust. brust is the only moden author i have ever read who writes anything like dumas (by way of tom stoppard...)

[Squid]

No more guide book recommendations! They're all I've read for too long- time to get out and remember what life is like in the subalpine.

 

BTW- AlpineFox- I just picked up The Island Within and enjoying it so far.

[Alpinfox]

 

Cool! I'll be interested to hear your impressions.

 

BTW: You are welcome to borrow any of the books I listed above.

 

 

 

Here's a little something to bring back some fond (?) memories Iliad

[Squid]

Thanks, old bean. Don't know what I'd do without those fond memories of transcribing amphoras.

[Bronco]

Last of the Mohicans is a good read.

 

"The track of the cat" by Walter Van Tilburg Clark is pretty good reading.

 

A very good read is "The climb up to Hell" by Jack Olsen.

 

I'm still looking for a copy of "Death on the Ice" by Cassie Brown. I hear it's a good read, indeed.

 

Anyone read the "Sovereign American's Handbook"?

[foraker]

Dru, I have an old hardbound edition of "Le Comte de Monte Cristo" in French if you want to dare to slog through it. I'm still afraid to because I think I'll be going a page a week...

[Dru]

i have already read comte de monte cristo, three musketeerrs, vicomte de bragelonne, vingt ans apres and the "chicot the jester" serries of dumas but not in french - that'd be too much. i can read vertical mag. cause it has nice pictures but i haven't read french novels since high school

[foraker]

don't think i've read the vicome de bragelonne or chioct the jester. any good?

[Dru]

viscomte de bragelonne is part of the man in the iron mask/ 20 years after sequels to 3 musketeers but it is the full meal deal not the abridged 1-bbok volume most people read.

 

chicot the jester is a 2 volume series about one of the henri's jesters. i thought it was pretty good. musketeer type swordplay and so on.

[rbw1966]

Hey squid and alpinfox: you boys went to reed too? I was there from 90-92.

[Alpinfox]

 

 

Cool! I graduated in 97, I think Squid graduated in 96.

 

Small world!

 

It sure has changed a lot since I graduated...

[lummox]

graduating from school is overrated.

[icegirl]

"The antelope wife"

 

If you like native american folklore it's quite delightful.

[Fejas]

Celectine Prophecy; The Tenth Insight (sequil) by James Redfield or 2150 by Thea Alexander (oldy, but a goody)... for a little bit of fictional philosophy....

[lancegranite]

Latatudes and attitudes

[snugtop]

I am reading The Bird Artist, by Howard Norman. Excellent novel. It begins:

 

My name is Fabian Vas. I live in Witless Bay, Newfoundland. You would not have heard of me. Obscurity is not necessarily failure, though; I am a bird artist, and have more or less made a living at it. Yet I murdered the lighthouse keeper, Botho August, and that is an equal part of how I think of myself.

[snoboy]

Witless Bay, NF is a real place. I have been there. (In case you wondered.)

[Bronco]

Tools of the Trade, The art and craft of Carpentry by Jeff Taylor

 

Must read if you've spent much time on Jobsites.

[snugtop]

I was wondering that, actually. Now I'll have to go there!

[thrutch]

Undaunted Courage

Stephen Ambose

 

Great book on the travels of Lewis & Clark.

[snugtop]

who knew Spray could be so....literate?

[Thinker]

West With the Night, by Beryl Markham

 

a good short read about growing up, flying, elephant hunting, and horse training in British East Africa in the 1920s and 1930s. One gets the impression that Beryl was a remarkable woman who lived a life free of regrets.

[kurthicks]

A River Lost by Blaine Harden.

It's all about the effects, positive and negative, of damming the Columbia and Snake Rivers. Gives you something to think about as you drive down the gorge.