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Book club 📖 What are we reading right now? (Planning related or not)

Walkable City

I am not usually a fan of the preachy, New Urbanist, "planners should do better" kind of works (cough <<Kunstler>> cough) but I have been enjoying "Walkable City" by Jeff Speck. He knows that most planners know this stuff, and provides lots of good data and a light, enjoyable writing style that is refreshingly unpretentious. Basically, he argues that walkability is not just good for how a city looks, or the environment, but is quantifiably good for the city's economy.

He also acknowledges how hard it is to make change, particularly in smaller cities and places off the coasts. A good read (at least, so far.)

http://www.amazon.com/Walkable-City-Downtown-Save-America/dp/0865477728
 
The Modern Man by Anthony Flint, about Le Corbusier. A decent read but it jumps around a bit. Sure doesn't make me like Le Corbusier or his concepts any more than I did before.
 
I'm reading The Book Thief by Markus Zusak. I started it probably a year ago and put it down. My sister convinced me to start it again and now I'm really into it. Must have been a slow start, I suppose.
 
Zoning Goddess said:
Books read count for 2014: 218
Up from 2013's 202

Clearly, i have no life... :r:
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:) You have a fantastic life. I'm trying to read more this year and watch TV less. Accordingly, my kids gave me a copy of "As I Lay Dying" for Christmas. Started it the other night. Typical Faulkner, and I love it so far.
 
Started "Daughter of the God-King" by Anne Cleeland yesterday. Like it so much I've already put another book of hers on my library list.
 
Maister said:
Reading "Unbroken"
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Great book!! I read it when it came out and gave it to RJ but I think he thought it was too depressing, plus he only reads books by the pool in the summer, so not much action there. Then I got the author's book about Seabiscuit and loved that, too.
 
I'm trying something very different for me and picked up one of my wife's books "The Heist" by Janet Evanovich and Lee Goldberg. It's the closest I've come to reading a romance novel. So far It's fluff pure and simple, but it's not un-enjoyable in a guilty pleasure kinda way.
 
Maister said:
I'm trying something very different for me and picked up one of my wife's books "The Heist" by Janet Evanovich and Lee Goldberg. It's the closest I've come to reading a romance novel. So far It's fluff pure and simple, but it's not un-enjoyable in a guilty pleasure kinda way.
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Just say it, Maister: you are reading "chick lit". Bwahahahaha...
 
Maister said:
I'm trying something very different for me and picked up one of my wife's books "The Heist" by Janet Evanovich and Lee Goldberg. It's the closest I've come to reading a romance novel. So far It's fluff pure and simple, but it's not un-enjoyable in a guilty pleasure kinda way.
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Zoning Goddess said:
Just say it, Maister: you are reading "chick lit". Bwahahahaha...
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Next step is joining a book club and sitting around drinking wine with the girls. Not necessarily a bad thing.:D
 
Gift from my Secret Santa - Kinky Friedman's Guide to Texas Etiquette

Next up - from office Christmas gift exchange - Unbroken by Laura Hillembrand
 
Gone To Texas, by Forrest Carter, which is the book that the movie "The Outlaw Josey Wales" is based on. The writing is very good and fast-paced. The movie follows the story pretty close and borrows a lot of the best lines from the book.
 
"Clouds of Glory: the Life and Legend of Robert E. Lee"

I'm finished with the 'chick lit' phase of my life. That's over with. I enjoyed sharing a box o' Chardonnay with the gals while we talked about 50 Shades, Oprah, and The View, but that chapter is now behind me.
 
I always feel so bad when I read this thread. It looks like everyone (but Maister) is reading some quality stuff. I tend to read fluff sci-fi or fantasy. Right now I'm reading some classics from Pierce Anthony, A Spell for A Chameleon and on occasion I pick up my ABZs of Planning book and read a little. I guess as long as I'm not reading the chick-lit like Maister and my wife. She reads that stuff too, but she has better taste and rejected 50 Shades and sometimes reads WEB Griffin. So yeah, she's more manly the Maister. Should I be scared?
 
dvdneal said:
I always feel so bad when I read this thread. It looks like everyone (but Maister) is reading some quality stuff. I tend to read fluff sci-fi or fantasy.
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I have an unofficial rule of reading something "quality" and then reading something I just will enjoy. Sure Buddenbrooks was a classic but, man, it was long and quite a chore at times. I needed to cleanse the literary palate after that one with some Max Brand. I am thinking now that I finished Gone To Texas, I am going to read a Star Trek novel.

Reading a book takes a lot of time. Unless you are a reading powerhouse like Zoning Goddess. Read what you want.

The other day I was watching a Bonanza episode and it was one where the writers did a version of Of Mice and Men. Which got me thinking that I had never read it. I've seen countless versions or variations of the story in film and TV, but never read the source. I went online and checked out our local library and was surpised our library did not have a copy of it, in fact they hadn't had the print version since 2006.
 
I find I read the fun books - slowly, not like ZG - and on occasion I'll find something like Mice and Men that I just decide I need to read that. It's a good book by the way. The author writes smoothly so it flows well. Not like Hawthorne or some of the older writers that tend to be a little more descriptive and jarring to read. I do tend to avoid the chick lit though. I haven't read Pride and Prejudice (my wife's favorite - hint for someone's reading), but I might read Pride and Prejudice and Zombies or Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters. They sound interesting.
 
dvdneal said:
I always feel so bad when I read this thread. It looks like everyone (but Maister) is reading some quality stuff. I tend to read fluff sci-fi or fantasy. Right now I'm reading some classics from Pierce Anthony, A Spell for A Chameleon and on occasion I pick up my ABZs of Planning book and read a little. I guess as long as I'm not reading the chick-lit like Maister and my wife. She reads that stuff too, but she has better taste and rejected 50 Shades and sometimes reads WEB Griffin. So yeah, she's more manly the Maister. Should I be scared?
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Hey, I'm sure many of us read sci-fi/fantasy. I read every thing Piers Anthony wrote decades ago, I have A Spell for a Chameleon probably first edition paperback. I am reading Lev Grossman's The Magician series, Deborah Harkness's All Soul's Trilogy, and Magnus Flyte, So you are not alone!
 
Checked out How We Got to Now: Six Innovations That Made the Modern World by Steven Johnson this weekend. So far very interesting and has little facts/stories about famous inventions.
 
For something different, I'm reading Starship Troopers. Remember the bad movie about marines killing bugs. Forget that. The book is mostly about the importance of doing your civic duty and why a hard volunteer military service (or other service) should be a basis for citizenship and voting. There just happens to be a bug war going on at the same time.
 
I am getting the impression some of you think I read junk; well, I do but I read a lot of good stuff, too. Being unemployed, which I'd rather not be, and having only so many opportunities to clean the white tile floors, I have to do something...
 
Zoning Goddess said:
I am getting the impression some of you think I read junk; well, I do but I read a lot of good stuff, too. Being unemployed, which I'd rather not be, and having only so many opportunities to clean the white tile floors, I have to do something...
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Read the junk, hell I'm reading about space marines killing space roaches. If that's not junk I don't know what is.
 
Zoning Goddess said:
I am getting the impression some of you think I read junk; well, I do but I read a lot of good stuff, too. Being unemployed, which I'd rather not be, and having only so many opportunities to clean the white tile floors, I have to do something...
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dvdneal said:
Read the junk, hell I'm reading about space marines killing space roaches. If that's not junk I don't know what is.
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I am reading Star Trek and Philosophy: The Wrath of Kant . So, a combination of junk and "good stuff". A win-win. :p
 
ursus said:
:) You have a fantastic life. I'm trying to read more this year and watch TV less. Accordingly, my kids gave me a copy of "As I Lay Dying" for Christmas. Started it the other night. Typical Faulkner, and I love it so far.
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Good for you. I have some kind of phobia about reading "classic literature". I would rather die. Must have to do with required classes way back when.
 
Okay, done with the Starship Troopers book, it's more about the philosophy of civic duty than killing bugs, but not bad. I've picked up A Brave New World, mostly because it was on the list of books to read, but also because Ursus mentioned reading it sometime.
 
Just finished "Trust No One" by Jayne Ann Krentz. Pretty good, just not one of her best.

About to start "Murder In Thrall" by Anne Cleeland.
 
otterpop said:
I am reading Star Trek and Philosophy: The Wrath of Kant . So, a combination of junk and "good stuff". A win-win. :p
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Interesting, I'm doing something quite similar as I'm currently reading The Psychology of Joss Whedon: An Unauthorized Exploration of Buffy, Angel, and Firefly.

This morning I started the chapter about determinism and the illusion of free will.
 
Gail Carriger's Changeless, book 2 in a series of 5. Have the next one on order at the library, and the remaining 2 bookmarked. I love her alternate version of Victorian England - just off enough to be weird, but hinting at things to come in man's timeline (dirigibles, other inventions, supernatural beings).
 
Yeah.....

As I've said before, I have my books read to me:science::brofist:

Impact by Douglas Preston right now.....
 
Reading some series by David Eddings. I think the one I'm on is called The Queen of Prophecy. Usual epic tale about boy who saves the world from an evil god.
 
dvdneal said:
Reading some series by David Eddings. I think the one I'm on is called The Queen of Prophecy. Usual epic tale about boy who saves the world from an evil god.
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The Belgariad and the follow-up series The Mallorean. Excellent choices in the Sword and Horse fantasy genre! I have both series and reread them every few years. Eddings has another series with jewels in the titles that is also good, but his Elder Gods series is a snoozer.
 
Salmissra said:
The Belgariad and the follow-up series The Mallorean. Excellent choices in the Sword and Horse fantasy genre! I have both series and reread them every few years. Eddings has another series with jewels in the titles that is also good, but his Elder Gods series is a snoozer.
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Not bad, it's no Lord of the Rings or Dragonlance, but it works for me.
 
Finished The Empty Throne, which is really good if you like the Saxon Tales by Bernard Cornwell. I started This Band Could Be Your Life, which covers the post punk/hard core/alternative movement from 1981-1991.
 
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