***OFFICIAL*** Milwookiee Lounge II

if you like biographies. I would recomend Aint-it-cool by harry knowels . It is defenelt something that could be read in one sitting. also the kid stays in the picture by Robert Evans is a great book about the famous hollywood producer

 

Ain't-It-Crap? I'm sorry, but I'm afraid I don't share your opinion of Mr. Knowles. No offense.

Here are my book recommendations:

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert Pirsig
The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis
Breakfast of Champions by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
The Silmarillion by J.R.R. Tolkien
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight by J.R.R. Tolkien
The Adventures of Tom Bombadil by J.R.R. Tolkien
Smith of Wootton Major and Farmer Giles of Ham by J.R.R. Tolkien

Socialized health care? Sounds great! Let's all move to Canada and be Commies!

jedihexer: Hells yeah, let's get stinko!

 

Books a much happier topic!

If you like Asimov try reading "Naked Sun" yes, it's a detective novel but it's very interesting in it's delivery and the social ramifications are interesting to say the least. Also, if you haven't read the Foundation Trilogy it's good.

Frank Herbert's Dune is a great story sort of like a Russian Novel in space only interesting.

Two decent Fantasy series which I like (not oodles of romance...sorry it's just not my bag) that sometimes get over looked are Raymond E. Feists "Riftwar Saga" and David Eddings "Belgariad" both good with cool characters. Oh yeah and the Dark Elf Trilogy by RA Salvatore. Also for pure mindslush goofiness do the Robert L. Aspirin's Myth stuff. It's total mind candy but in an amusing sort of way.

Sci-Fi: Larry Niven's Ringworld books are good. I'm also a fan of some of Greg Bear's work. The Martian Chronicles are a must read just because it's brilliant for its time.

And of course, I have add my two personal favorites: I know you're a WW something buff so All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Remarque. I have a copy or 7 of those (We were cleaning out the basement and I had no idea I had that many copies..so yeah, it's a favorite) and To Kill a Mockingbird which should be read outside the context of the classroom because it's probably IMHO one of the greatest American Novels ever written.

And I'll stop now because I could go on forever. Hope it helps.


M

 

Edit:

If you like war novels, I'd recommend Midnight Clear. It's about a World War II unit comprised of the smartest squad the army could put together. It's an interesting story and very well told. I believe the author's name is William Wharton. If you're interested, I can let you borrow it, then let you borrow the movie.

Dwayne

 

Other than LOTR, I haven't read any good adult books recetently...well, I've read some decent books, but nothing extrodinary. Finished "Dreamcatcher" by Stephen King a few months back and it was decent, but I think the movie coming out this year will be excellent as they've nailed the casting and the feel of the book from what I can tell from the trailers.

Children's books on the other hand, I'm starting to become an expert in, since I get to read & reread & reread book over and over again for my 2-yr-old. "How Does a Dinosaur Say Goodnight?" is fantastic, particularly the illustrations...I'd even go so far as to say it's become my favorite children's book over my Seussical memories. Spike Lee & his wife have written a pretty simple children's book "Please Baby Please" or something similar to that. My wife says kids like the reptitive text, but this is another book with fantastic illustrations.

Star Wars: I only bother buying the "Art of ..." books. Info into the development and concepts of the movies are much more interesting to me than EU.

 

anything by neal stephenson is good. i recommend snowcrash or diamond age. very cool stuff.

 

Alright. I'll concede and talk about books.

I recommend Darkness At Noon by Arthur Koestler. It's a Russian prison camp novel I had the pleasure (I sincerely mean that) of reading in high school. It sounds boring, but it's really very compelling with some wonderful passages. A great line from the book: "How long must the footsteps of freedom be gravestones?" Very good book. And if you're into the Russian prison camp thing, there's also A Day In The Life Of Ivan Denisovitch. I can't recall who the author is, but it's a short novel. But worth the two or three hours for the read.

But a very moving and inspiring book is Night by Elie Weisel. It's his personal account of time spent in a concentration camp in WWII. Hard to read at times, but absolutely one of the most moving pieces of literature I've ever read. I highly recommend it. And have a copy, if you're so inclined.

And then there's The Lorax. My favorite Dr. Seuss book. Take your pick.

 

ANY of Viggo Mortensen's poetry. I just bought "Recent Forgeries" and I love it. It even comes with a CD of Viggo speaking and singing his poetry, some of which is in Spanish. (There's nothing hotter than Viggo speaking Spanish right in your ear, let me tell you!)

If you don't like our President, there's an interesting book out there called: "The Bush Dyslexicon: Observations on a National Disorder" by Mark Crispin Miller. It's basically what Bush has said and comments on it. I'm not political at all, but I loved it.

Another good one is "What Dreams May Come" by Richard Matheson. It was a very uplifting book and much better than the Robin Williams Cuba Gooding Jr. movie of the same name.

 

Some of my favorite books:

Science Fiction:
All Honor Harrington scifi by David Webber
Edgar Rice Burroughs scifi (ie Princess of Mars etc - only his first 3 Tarzan books are good)
The MagForce 7 series by Margaret Weiss and
Tracy Hickman
Dune etc by Herbert
Starship Troopers by Heinlein
Thrawn Trilogy
Most of Jules Verne and HG Wells

Fantasy:
Most JRR Tolkien
The original Dragonlance trilogy of Dragons of Summer etc by Margaret Weiss & Tracy Hickman

Other Fiction, inc Horror:
Hunt for Red October, Red Storm Rising, Clear and Present Danger by Tom Clancy
Club Dumas
Picture of Dorian Grey by Oscar Wilde
Edgar Allen Poe
HP Lovecraft

NonFiction:
Holy Blood Holy Grail
God's Heretics: The Albigensian Crusade
Massacre at Mont Segur
Stalag Wisconsin (about the WWII POW camps in Wisconsin - I grew up in Hartford where there was one at the old ballroom grounds)
Silent Warriors: The Alamo Scouts of WWII

These are only the ones that come right to mind.

 

Yep, I'm definitely the freak here, with romance novels being my mainstay (although I only read certain authors).

When I'm not reading romance, I'm usually delving into history. Anything by Alison Weir I usually chomp into, Rene Guerdan's "Byzantium" is very good. I also like Robert Graves' historical novels, and usually anything that'll boost my knowledge of western history.

As for socialized medicine, I think you brought up alot of good points to consider, in terms of medical care and technology here and abroad, Marcy. And it's true, you want to have cardiac surgery here rather than in Canada. And yes, we do have Badger Care to help in Wisconsin. I guess I just feel so bad for the average person in the US when it comes to health care, and I know so many who can't afford health insurance, that I get hot about the whole thing. But it's good to hear opposing commentary on the subject, and it keeps the subject focused.

 

Dwayne-Do you know if there was a movie made of Midnight Clear? Maybe 8 or 10 years ago, I clicked onto a really good movie on TV, and I think that was the name.

Just checked the IMDB, indeed it is. It'd be interesting to see how the movie stands up to the book.

Life and Death in Shanghai is an autobiography by Nien Cheng. She was imprisoned during the Cultural Revolution in China for being a spy (she was upperclass wife of a Shell executive) for 6 years. I read it in high school, and thought it was good then. I've noticed that books i liked 15 years ago aren't as good when I read them as an adult. From the reviews, I suspect it is still an intriguing read.

 

I agree with Marcy on Robert Aspirin--I found his "Myth" series hilarious at times.

I would recommend "Song of Solomon" by Toni Morrison. Try to ignore that Oprah gushes over Morrison--this is a good read. Two good ficitonal crime books are "The Alienist" and "The Angel of Darkness" by Caleb Carr, both of which take place in late 1800's-era New York.

As far as SW-EU goes, I read it all, but I agree that the Thrawn trilogy is some of the best-written and most entertaining.

I'm partial to World War 2 history, and one of the best books I've read is "Flags of Our Fathers" by James Bradley. It's just excellent.

For poetry, I'd have to go with William Wordsworth--I fell in love with his vision of the pastoral English countryside while reading his and Coleridge's work in one of my many English classes. He's definitely an underrated romantic poet.

Ahh, sweet literature!

 

I like Robert Ludlum books. They are slow to start, but once they get up to speed, there's no stopping. His books are suspense/spy types and have lots of twists and turns in them. He wrote the Bourne Identity and the rest of the Bourne books, as well as many others.

Douglas Adams is always fun to read. I love his sense of humor.

 

I really liked the Alienist too. I haven't had a chance to read Carr's other books.

 

Besides, I don't want the government getting their grimy mitts all over it. They're screwing up enough, lets not give them something else to ruin.

 

...Outlander_ will now be "disappeared" by the guys in black suits.

 

Some other good books to read are

Harry Potter books by JK Rowling

The handmaids tale by Margret Atwood

The hobbit by tolkein

The time machine by H G Wells

The Giver

Diary of Anne Frank

 

A while ago I picked up Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk and High Fidelity by Nick Hornby after seeing both films. Great books to read, and they inspired me to go out and pick up more works by the authors. I've got Choke by Palahniuk to read yet, and I read About A Boy by Hornby before the movie came out (which actually was a decent book). Might be a little something to read.

I can't stress enough anything written by Philip K. Dick; it is a must read for anyone that enjoys sci-fi. Some great movies were based off of his works: Blade Runner, Total Recall and Minority Report. Recommendations of his would be Do Androids Dream of Electric Sleep? and A Scanner Darkly.

For fantasy, I'd recommend Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series. There's currently 10 books, and each one is at least 700 pages. The amount of detail and characterization that he puts into them is amazing.

 

Well, I've been watching a bit of Sundance and IFC as of late in an attempt to get a bit more culture in my life with independant and alternative films. I must say that I've been impressed with the films thus far. Here's what I've thought about two of them.

Scotland, PA: A retelling of MacBeth placed in the 70's. MacBeth is an employee at a fast food joint run by Mr. Duncan. MacBeth's ideas for growth are shunted by Duncan, and after some persuading by Mrs. MacBeth, they go ahead with a plan to rob the joint. It goes awry and they accidentally kill Duncan by burning/drowning him in the deep-fryer. Christopher Walken plays Sgt. MacDuff, who is investigating the case. Overall, it's an interesting retelling of the story, but not worth it unless you're either truly bored, a Christopher Walken fanatic, or really really love MacBeth.

Killing Zoe: Cool film starring Eric Stoltz and Julie Delpy. It's about a botched bank robbery, and the safe cracker doesn't know that the job has been botched. It reminded me of Reservoir Dogs, and after seeing the beginning of it a second time I realized why. Tarantino dabbled with this film in some way, shape or form and has his name in the credits.

One movie I'd like to see on there, or probably rent one night is Donnie Darko. I hear it's deliciously twisted.

 

On the socialized medicine topic: It'll never happen. Doctors and pharmacy companies are too much into the profits now to ever change. Plus, with socialized medicine, you pay more in taxes to pay for it. If you think health care is costly now, think of the high rates of taxes countries with socialized medicine pay, regardless if you use the health care system or not. Yes, in the US (and our area in particular) health insurance isn't cheap, and health costs are expensive. But if you don't need the services, you don't have to pay for them. What we need is disclosure on rates for tests, doctor's vists, etc. so we can pick and choose our doctors and where we go for tests and such. Medicine would be more competative and easier on the consumer if that were the case. That may be the way healthcare is going in the US. Watch the Journal Sentinel for articles on this.

On the topic of books: Neil Stephensen is awesome. The first of his I read was Snowcrash and I was immedately in love with his work. The most abitious read of his is Cryptonomicon. It's quite lengthy but well worth the read. I don't think anyone has mentioned the Incarnations of Immortality series by Piers Anthony. It starts with On a Pale Horse and runs for a total of 7 books. A very good series!
JMHO.

 

hey maybe when i get my book done you can read it. that might take a while but i'm gonna finish it. assuming i get the premise to work. i keep having problems with the frame of the story.

 

Off the subject of books and politics, I have one desk left to sell. It is an "L" shaped desk that has a grey counter and black legs. I am selling it really cheap and it is in very good condition. If you are interested, please pm me. I am moving soon and I have no room for this desk.

 

This Just In:
The new T.V. Guide: Mr.Reeve has been asked to be a consultant on the next Superman film

 

Thanks for all the suggestions - I shall be making a trip to the book store soon!

BTW - Check this out - screenshots from an Asian bootleg TTT DVD with English subtitles - the last one on this page is especially funny.

 

OH yeah!! That was indeed the funniest of them all!!!