The Cycle of Cosmic Catastrophes:
Flood, Fire, and Famine
in the History of Civilization
by Richard Firestone,
Allen West, and
Simon Warwick-Smith
Posted on 12/24/2007 6:21:46 AM PST by randita
Merry Christmas, all!
I already have in my possession gift cards to bookstores given to me by students of mine. After tomorrow, others will no doubt have bookstore giftcards burning holes in their pockets, as well.
I thought this might be a good time and reason to solicit advice as to what good books you have read this year.
Please post books you would recommend.
Thanks!
My Correct Views On Everything by Leszek Kolakowski. My nominee for the best title of the year. Kolakowski, for those who haven't run into his work yet, is a Polish academic philosopher, anti-Marxist and pro-religion social critic who acts as a witness for one of the main axes the 20th century revolved around.
The End Of Commitment by Paul Hollander. Why do intellectuals turn from a lifelong belief in Marxism? Hollander interviews some, including Eugene Genovese, Doris Lessing, Christopher Hitchens, and David Horowitz, and explores the lives of a host of others.
Postmodernism by Christoher Butler, and Foucault by Gary Gutting, both part of the "Very Short Introduction" series. These describe part of the reason the academy is the way it is these days in the liberal arts. It's helpful if you read a few of the references in the field first, but these are fine compendia.
Happy New Year, everyone!
Good list, AKA airplane cr@p. I added Jan Burke and Phil Rickman to my list which in the past was dominated by Dean Koonz, P.J. Tracy and Aaron Elkins.
I think I have a Jan Burke in the queue. I’ll have to go look at my reading stack, LOL!
OK, McGee, pony up.
I’ve read some very good reviews of “The Kite Runner”. Why do you recommend it?
blindside.
great football book by the guy who wrote “moneyball”
I couldn’t list them all. I read about 10 books a week, all genres except true crime. I spent 5 years in records at a PD/SO, I don’t do true crime anymore. :-)
My latest one was David Weber - On Armageddon's Reef.
To Set The Record Straight: How Swift Boat Veterans, POWs and the New Media Defeated John Kerry.
“City of Falling Angels” (nonfiction, about burning and rebuilding of an opera house in Venice) Very good, written by the same guy who wrote “Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil”
“Manhunt” (the hunt for John Wilkes Booth)—very good!
“The Worst Hard Time” (history of the 1930’s dustbowl, EXCELLENT, but very, very sad)
“Book of the Dead” by Patricia Cornwall (not her best effort, but better than most “airplane books”)
“The Great Mortality” (history of the Black Death in Europe—really good)
“Ghost Soldiers” by Hampton Sides REALLY REALLY good!!
“The Most Famous Man in America” by Debbie Applegate (won 2006 biography Pulitzer)—Just outstanding!
William Bennett’s “America: The Last Best Hope” part 2—Very good. This and part 1 should be used instead of the garbage texts used in most high schools.
:’) Wow, that’s a lot of books. In the second half of the year I wound up finishing up a few I’d dallied with, plus reading some new acquisitions in entire. If it weren’t for spending way too much time on FR...
The Cycle of Cosmic Catastrophes:
Flood, Fire, and Famine
in the History of Civilization
by Richard Firestone,
Allen West, and
Simon Warwick-Smith
KITE RUNNER.
THE HISTORIAN.
Both were excellent.
Also read NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN. Kind of bleak. Might see the movie, though.
No one mentioned “An Inconvenient Truth” ... I wonder why?
“America Alone” by Mark Steyn.
ping
“Fatal Revenant” by Stephen R Donaldson.
Second book in the Final Chronicles of Thomas Covenant.
For those that have not read the others, start with “Lord Fouls Bane”
If you enjoy stories the like the Ring Series from Tolkien, but with a harsher edge, this is for you.
Wow, nmh is feeling a little cranky, rude today.
Anyway, VA_Gentleman you may like We the Living by Rand (see post 53).
And Happy New Year!
Your immature repsonse is typical of Ayn Rand fans.
Ayn Rand has the morals of an alley cat in heat.
Her god is MONEY.
Some of us have matured and realize there is more to life than money. Ayn Rand’s atheism is her problem and perhaps yours?
It’s too bad that truth is “rude” and “cranky” to you.
I do NOT apologize for my statments of FACT.
I am extremely tough on crime issues, and the only reason I ever even hesitate on the issue of the death penalty is because I honestly don't think it is issued fairly. If you are a rich defendant, you have a better chance of avoiding it. If I was queen of the world, I would dole out the death penalty probably far more liberally, but I would not let rich people get away with murder. I also think if you are sentenced to life in prison, that should mean a hard life, no TV, no lifting weights, no education, etc. But this story did make me think.
It is good. I do recommend it.
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