billnuke1 

I'm 1/2, 3/4 of the way through, "JUST RIDE" by Grant Petersen. Debunking, questioning, biking's accepted knowns, norms, and what people perceive, again, accept as facts! Anyhow, Interesting read!

ecnewell 

I had to read it in high school, and unfortunately at that time I had disdain for anything that was forced upon me. Since then I've reread a lot of those classics and loved them. I'd like to give it a fair chance.

Most recently I read Jared Diamond's "Collapse," which only took me, oh... 3 years to finish.

Chicago Al 

Wolf Hall, by Hilary Mantel. A historical novel that takes the viewpoint of Thomas Cromwell, who was a runaway blacksmith's son, an Italian mercenary, a trader and man of business, a protege of Cardinal Wolsey, and eventually Henry Tudor's counselor and 'fixer', the man who managed the break from Rome and allowed Henry to annul his marriage to Catherine of Aragon and marry Anne Boleyn. Heads will roll, literally.

Mantel adopts an odd stylistic choice of having everything through Cromwell's eyes, and using 'he said' and 'he thought' without reminding you that it's Cromwell. But you get used to it, and he's so compelling a character, and the drama so high yet underplayed, that you (or I at least) can't help getting caught up in it. It's like 'Game of Thrones' without the hocus-pocus.

I was approaching the end, thinking, 'but Wolf Hall is the seat of the Seymours, and we just finally got to the Boleyn marriage!' when I found this is the first volume of a trilogy! And the second volume is about to be published. It got this rave review in the New Yorker. I usually use our public library but this book I'm ordering. From our LBS, Local Book Store.


^ cool choices above. I'm also partial to Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey/Maturin series, they are indeed like comfort food which I have returned to over and over. Back in the early 90s I even went on a tall ship cruise, up Lake Michigan, on the 'HMS Rose,' a replica of a Royal navy frigate, which was later bought and used in the 'Master and Commander' movie.

^^There may not be many Dutch novels in English translation, but Harry Mulisch's 'The Assault,' which I picked up in an Amsterdam bookshop, is very powerful. Especially if you've just been to Amsterdam's Resistance Museum. It seems to explain a lot about the postwar generation. I need to find 'The Discovery of Heaven.'

^^^ Re: the Forrestal fire. I read some years back that hotshot Navy pilots sometimes fired up their engines briefly while on the deck, kind of a 'f you' gag to the guy next in line, and that this may have been the cause of the fire on the Forrestal. (edit: DD addresses this below, and there's also a thorough page at wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1967_USS_Forrestal_fire)

^^^^The Marine's secret is safe with us.

Ciufalon

I'm almost through "Currency Wars" by James Rickards. I have enjoyed it thoroughly, think is a very good book, and would recommend it to others.

southpawboston

Current book? The Third Policeman by Brian O'Nolan.

Rocket-Sauce 

I started cycling just before Greg Lemond won everything and Hinault was king. Great stuff.

Rocket-Sauce 

^^Before that I read this:

Rocket-Sauce 

^^Before those, I re-read the Hobbit, all three Hunger Games, and complete Sherlock Holmes -all free on my Kindle.



I definitely prefer real books, but the kindle is great for TONS of free classics*, has some decent free selections if you have Prims, and it is great for travel.

*In addition to Amazon, there is Project Gutenberg. Very cool.

Drillium Dude 

Great read, that one

Thanks, CV-6!

DD

Drillium Dude 

Actually, it was a procedural shortcut, designed to speed up the rack/stack/launch sequence on station in the Gulf of Tonkin. An unauthorized one at that, and one that one or two squadrons were using to arm the rocket launchers on deck. The procedural shortcut allowed stray voltage to fire a Zuni rocket across the deck from an F-4 Phantom on the starboard side into John McCain's A-4 Skyhawk on the port side.

The resulting fire was not the real issue, however. The fact that the bombs on the planes for that morning's sortie came from a Phillipines ammo dump - bombs that were old WW2 composition B - had a very short cook-off time was the main issue for the large loss of life and massive damage. Some of the bombs delivered the night before were actually leaking pure nitro.

Once the bombs began going off on deck, it was touch-and-go whether the ship would be saved. The fact that the crew - and nearby destroyer ******* - were able to contain it was nothing short of heroic.

DD

ciocc_cat

I recently completed all three books of the Hunger Games series by Suzanne Collins - easy reads but very well-written IMHO. I've been trying to get into Game of Thrones by George R. Martin. I loved his earlier SF short story Sand Kings, but find the novel Game of Thrones not as captivating as the HBO adaptation.

RobbieTunes

It took a long time for some of the pictures to come out, and many never will. Sailors literally walked into magnesium fire to save the ship, did they not?

02Pilot

I read a lot both for work and pleasure. Of the recent titles I've read, Eliot Cohen's Conquered into Liberty stood out as a very well constructed and readable account of some of the lesser-known but critically important battles in early American history. I'm working through William H. McNeill's Venice right now; few historians are capable of providing such consistently insightful and concise prose, both descriptive and analytic.

leftthread

At first glance at the cover, I thought it was the Franklin.

Flying Merkel

3/4 of the way through Carl Van Doren's biography of Benjamin Franklin. He was an amazing man who had more influence on U.S. history than generally given credit for. He sailed on an American ship to France during the Revolution to secure French aid. Had the British intercepted the ship, he would have been arrested as a traitor to the Crown. Punishment would have been being hanged, drawn, and quartered- as in being pulled apart by four horses. Franklin's property would have been forfeit to the Crown, and his family turned out. He knew this. He also knew that the British were actively seeking American ships. Ben was 70. That is true courage.

Finished a book about the history of the bicycle. Wish I remembered the name & author. Took a while for all the technology in place for the bicycle as we know it to become practical.

BluesDaddy

wikipedia:

CMC SanDiego

I've recently read a couple of Cycling books. One the Story of Greg Lemond by Samuel Abt, and the other Lance Armstrong's (autobiography with a co-writer) "Its not about the Bike". I enjoyed both of them. It looks like the 7-11 book shown above was co-written by "Och" who was mentioned frequently in Armstrong's book. It may be worthwhile getting.

I've also recently read Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged", which was fascinating. A book called "Enders Game" which is supposedly used to teach tactics at some military schools (and which was nothing like I expected) I would recommend to anyone because the characters were very real. John Grisham's "The Broker" which was fair as a typical Grisham thriller.

I love to read, and don't restrict myself to any one type of book. If something comes highly rated by someone I trust, I'll read it.

I've also got the Kindle reader, which I enjoy less than holding a real book in my hands, but find very convenient to use while traveling because I can carry dozens of books in a pretty slim case. I recently loaned it to my mother-in-law, so it's on a trip to Germany right now.

Drillium Dude 

I believe you may be referencing the magnesium flare locker fire aboard the USS Oriskany; that did a fair amount of damage and killed a number of the crew just a little while before the Forrestal incident.

The story about how that fire began was stupidity and very, very bad luck of the highest order. Out at sea, however, it's Murphy's Law that rules - that's why we train, train and train until it becomes as routine as brushing one's teeth.

DD

RosyRambler

After having acquired a couple of bikes from the '70s and '80s, I'm re-reading "Glenn's Complete Bicycle Manual" (1973), and Eugene A. Sloane's "Bicycle Maintenance Manual" (1981). I need to refresh my memory on the repair/maintenance techniques I started teaching myself back in the early '80s after having spent nearly the past 20 yrs. working on my mountain bikes with index shifting and suspension.

Harold Glenn's book has a lot of photos, but Sloane's book feels more like he's having a private conversation with the reader. It's one of my favorite bike maintenance books, out of my entire collection of bike 'tool' books.

Drillium Dude 

I couldn't agree more. Eugene Sloane was my Sheldon Brown when I was growing up.

DD

pakman

I have the Nook color e-reader and while it doesn't compare to a book as the feel of holding the book and turning the pages, the ease of carrying it while traveling sure is nice. I am reading the book "The 47th Samurai" by Stephen Hunter and is good light summer reading. Also I've been reading "The Dancing Chain" by Frank Berto and it is an excellent book for the history and technical development of the derailleur from a person who did a lot of the technical reports for bicycling magazines for many years.

RobbieTunes

Thanks for the update. One good reason, as a Marine on board, you either help as told or get out of the way.

rhm

I was recently given a copy of The Long Ships by Franz Bengtsson. It is one volume containing what amounts to four novels, each of which could have made one volume of the Aubrey/Maturin or Hornblower series. But it is set in the years 985-1010 or so. Originally written in Swedish, and brilliantly translated by Michael Meyer.

Usually when I finish a book I put it down and go on to find the next thing to read. This one I just went right back to page 1 and started reading it again. When I finished it the second time, I left it on my side table and now I read a chapter or so at random every night before going to bed. It's that good.

silvercreek

"The Custom Bicycle" by Michael J. Kolin and Denise M. de la Rosa. Most of it is over my head so far but I'm slowly understanding better as I read.

cb400bill

I recently finished the Stevie Ray Vaughan biography "Caught in the Crossfire". Good book.

A while back I read Rush drummer Neil Peart's book "Ghost Rider: Travels on the Healing Road". Great book.