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  #61  
Old 06-26-2020, 08:45 AM
reeve21 reeve21 is offline
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I recently read 2 novels by Upton Sinclair. The exact names escape me right now but they are the first 2 in his Lanny Budd series. I followed Lanny from just before WWI to the beginning of WWII. Very entertaining if you like historical fiction.

Then I read 2 much shorter books about talent by Dan Coyle. The Talent Code and The Little Book of Talent. Highly recommend if your are on the quest to improve, especially if you think you didn't win the guitar talent lottery. The first book explains what happens neurologically while learning, and the second gives a lot of short tips on how to accelerate the process. Basically-- practice intensely on things just beyond your current stabilizes, practice slowly, and do a lot of reps (duh!). Treat mistakes as opportunities for correction, not blunders, and fix them before moving on. Lots of examples from music, sports, business. Inspirational.
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Old 06-26-2020, 11:10 PM
Glennwillow Glennwillow is offline
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I am reading "Grant" by Ron Chernow.

I have learned a great deal about the post Civil War period that I never, ever learned from any American History course I took in high school or college. It's very well written but a ridiculously thick book. I am on about page 900 right now. Really!

Also, my wife and I are taking turns reading Doris Kearns Goodwin's "Team of Rivals" out loud to each other. I read this book when it came out -- I think 2006 -- but it's fascinating to be reading it again. It reminds me what a great man Lincoln was.

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  #63  
Old 06-27-2020, 09:17 AM
Inyo Inyo is offline
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I just re-read my book In Search of Vanished Ages--Field Trips To Fossil Localities in California, Nevada, And Utah.

It's a downloadable print book (pdf) version of my paleontology and geology-related cyber-field trips.

The book contains 115,034 words--equivalent to an above-average-sized hard cover work of standard nonfiction. Runs to 301 printed pages, with 32 chapters and 35 individual field trips to places of paleontological interest; also includes 70 color photographs--representative on-site images and associated pictures of fossil specimens from each locality visited.

In total, including images, the book is equivalent to about 418 pages in standard nonfiction 6 by 9 inch hard cover format, with an average 300 words per page.
  #64  
Old 06-27-2020, 10:11 AM
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"The suicide run" by William Styron.Excellent compilation of short stories by one of America's underrated authors.
  #65  
Old 06-29-2020, 02:17 AM
Don Lampson Don Lampson is offline
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Just finished "Tombstone", by Tom Clavin.

Don
  #66  
Old 06-29-2020, 05:48 AM
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Currently reading 'Barkskins' by Annie Proulx.
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  #67  
Old 06-29-2020, 06:41 AM
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I'm reading "Rodham" by Curtis Sittenfeld.

It's a fictional auto-biography of Hillary Rodham that takes a counterfactual look at what her life might have been if she had NOT agreed to marry Bill Clinton. He evidently asked her three times in real life, she turned him down the first two and finally agreed to marry him, knowing he wasn't nothin' but a hound dog. Well, he was more than that, but he surely was that.

Kind of bizarre because the first quarter of it or so really feels like you're reading an actual auto-biography. A bit more than I need about their sex life, but otherwise, it tracks actual events quite closely. But then in about 1974, after she's well aware of his ways and being sure he'll never change, she decides not to take the simplicity bargain she's being offered, and drives away from Arkansas and settles elsewhere. At that point it starts to get interesting because he marries someone else and has just (at my point in the book now) announced he's running for president. She's a law professor (and activist for children's issues in Chicago at Northwestern and is just starting to consider a run for Senate in the wake of the Clarence Thomas hearings. At first I was kind of thinking, 'OK, let's get past this part we all know and get to the counterfactual part'. Now that I'm into the hypothetical part of the book, it's really holding my attention and is a pretty interesting thought experiment.

A really interesting look at one of the more fascinating "power couples" of the baby boom generation if things had turned out differently for them.
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  #68  
Old 09-02-2020, 10:54 AM
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Just in. Louise Penny is one of my favorite fiction writers. I just received the latest installment of one of the best series out there — Chief Inspector Gamache.

  #69  
Old 09-02-2020, 11:12 AM
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I Am Pilgrim- Terry Hayes
  #70  
Old 09-02-2020, 04:52 PM
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Just finished My Losing Season - Pat Conroy

I found the author online and realized mid-listen (audiobook) that this is the autobiography upon which he based his novel/excellent movie, The Great Santini. I'm not even a basketball fan and I enjoyed the book a lot.
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Old 09-02-2020, 04:53 PM
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Just finished the Border Trilogy by Cormac McCarthy.
And just started "The only good indians"
  #72  
Old 09-02-2020, 05:04 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Riverwolf View Post
Just finished the Border Trilogy by Cormac McCarthy.
And just started "The only good indians"
I enjoyed those books. Great writer, great stories.
  #73  
Old 09-02-2020, 05:31 PM
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I'm rereading the story of Joseph Rutherford Walker. A true American explorer. A friend with to Indians and explored allot of western American before it became part of the U.S.

I'm rereading Linthead Stomp. The story of how the Piedmont area cotton mills employees where the people who were the flame bearers of American folk and old time country music as it became country music.

I just finished "Rural Roots of Bluegrass" songs, stories and history.
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  #74  
Old 09-02-2020, 06:00 PM
Ryler Ryler is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by tinnitus View Post
Just finished My Losing Season - Pat Conroy

I found the author online and realized mid-listen (audiobook) that this is the autobiography upon which he based his novel/excellent movie, The Great Santini. I'm not even a basketball fan and I enjoyed the book a lot.
A favorite author of mine. I'll have to check this one out.
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  #75  
Old 09-02-2020, 07:11 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by guitargabor View Post
"The suicide run" by William Styron.Excellent compilation of short stories by one of America's underrated authors.
I saw him read “Tidewater Morning” back when I was teaching at JMU. Brought tears to my eyes.
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