What are we reading?

[GDS_Starfury]

There are billions killed every time she swallows.

[Greybriar]

Here is a great visual for how absolutely ruthless George R.R.Martin is. Every bookmark is a death in his series....

Even what I thought were Martin's lead characters aren't spared in his books. After spending a lot of time developing characters that won their way into the hearts of the readers, Martin would kill them off.

[Martok]

Here is a great visual for how absolutely ruthless George R.R.Martin is. Every bookmark is a death in his series....

Even what I thought were Martin's lead characters aren't spared in his books. After spending a lot of time developing characters that won their way into the hearts of the readers, Martin would kill them off.

David Weber is somewhat guilty of this as well, albeit to a lesser extent.  At least he only kills off characters now & then -- infrequently enough that you feel the impact of their deaths.  With Martin, the deaths come so thick and fast you start to become numb to them. 

[MetalDog]

I was sooooooooo disappointed with A Dance With Dragons.

[Bison]

I was sooooooooo disappointed with A Dance With Dragons.

Yeah it is not the best book in the series.  I have hopes that it's primary job was to set up a lot of background and plot lines for the next book. 

[MetalDog]

I figured that's what it was trying to do.  My probem is that he didn't seem to tell it all too well.  Slow pacing, almost fanatical (for him) devotion to three characters storyline and making Tyrion into a pig racer.  WTF?!?!??!  His LiveJournal blog constantly referred to the, 'Myreneese knot.'  After reading the book, I see that he was trying to bring major players together, I just think it was poorly told.

[Gusington]

Started reading "1913: In Search of the World Before the Great War" by Charles Emmerson. 50 pages in and its an awesome read. Think "The Proud Tower" by Tuchmann.

[GDS_Starfury]

NEW YORK (AFP) - The first book written in what is today the United States of America fetched $14.2 million in New York, becoming the world's most expensive printed book sold at auction.


The translation of Biblical psalms "The Bay Psalm Book" was printed by Puritan settlers in Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1640 and sold at a one-lot auction in just minutes by Sotheby's Tuesday.


Bidding opened at $6 million and closed swiftly at a hammer price of $12.5 million, rising to $14.165 million once the buyer's premium was incorporated.


The book, with its browning pages and gilt edges, was displayed in a glass case behind the auctioneer to a relatively small crowd which attended the less than five-minute auction in person.


The settlers, who came to America to seek religious freedom, had set about making their own preferred translation from the Hebrew original of the Old Testament book after arriving from Europe.


Sotheby's named the buyer as David Rubenstein, the billionaire American financier and philanthropist. He was in Australia and his bid was conducted by telephone.

[BanzaiCat]

From something that old, you could get Psalmonella poisoning.

[GDS_Starfury]

well played sir.

well played.

[JasonPratt]

I actually own a 3rd edition of a book originally published in the early 1700s by one of Oliver Cromwell's chaplains; the reprint was about the time of the American Revolution, and some soldier on one side or other may have had it with him because there are old blood stains on the pages. I bought the pages from an antique dealer in North Carolina, and had it sent to a rebinding specialist in Oklahoma (who has done work for clients all over the world, up to and including the Vatican); they rebound it in a cover and design of a type similar to how it would have been bound in during the late 1700s.

I sure didn't pay 14million for it (more like $140 total), but I like to show it to people sometimes. :) A soldier may have died with that book in his ruck or in a pocket of his jacket, reading it at night (or maybe bugging his fellows by reading it to them. ;D It's about God saving all sinners from sin someday, not only some. Not exactly a precept of Cromwell. ;) The guy who wrote it must have had stones the density of neutron stars...)

[Mr. Bigglesworth]

I got the Everyman's Library edition of Clausewitz On War. That is the Paret version with extra stuff. 8)

It should help me develop my strategy game idea.

[Greybriar]

I am currently reading Citizen Soldiers by Stephen E. Ambrose.

[eyebiter]

.

[BanzaiCat]

I finally got back to a little Ender's Game, to the part where Bonzo gets into the fight with Ender in the bathroom. Then I thought, "WTF," since I've already seen the movie. He was paralyzed in the film, but in the book he was dead. Why would they make a change like that? Certainly to not NOT offend or frighten children - for crying out loud, my son's English class already read it this semester.