What are we all reading at the moment?

[roundtowngirl]

I never noticed this thread before. After reading from the beginning I have added several great reads to my reading list. One can never have too many books! (Okay, my husband disagrees, especially when he is the one who has to move all of my books.) Who says that stacks of books don't make great bedside tables and side tables?!

I read the book "Preppy" by Curtis Sittenfeld on the plane to and from Paris. It was pretty good. I still prefer "I Am Charlotte Simmons" by Tom Wolfe.

I am currently about halfway through "The Gravedigger's Daughter" by Joyce Carol Oates. I absolutely love her writing and the narrative in this one is disturbing yet insightful. It takes place in America but is based on the lives of an immigrant family who leaves Nazi Germany.

I just read a review of "Two Lives" by Janet Malcolm in Newsweek. It is a look at the lives of Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas. It sounds interesting. I don't know a lot about them, so perhaps I will check it out. Has anyone read "The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas" by Stein?

Gitte - I own a copy of "A Moveable Feast" but have never read it. Your snippet on Hemingway reminded me of it. I think that I am having PPD and perhaps need to pull it out and read it next.

[cigalechanta]

Right now, "My French Life"by Vicki Archer. Just released here.
Finished RE-reading, a favorite, The Debt to Pleasure.

[trechic]

Gitte! I am running out to get "A Moveable Feast" at Border's right this minute!! Are you in sales, my chance, in your REAL life??? You should be!! LOL!

[rssilverandlight]

Right now, when I am not working on my book, I am reading
an adventure novel by Clive Cussler. Probably his best known book
is "Raise the Titanic"

[geordy]

I know many of you have read it already...I started My Life In Paris by Julia Child and nephew at lunch today. Only 30 pages in and I am loving it! As she describes places I feel like I'm in Paris with her and the photos are great too! Really getting me in the mood for upcoming trip! (Like it takes a lot! :

[Becky (Berkeleytravelers)]

Thanks to Ian's recommendation, I just finished "Englishman in Paris" by Michael Sadler - very funny, I really enjoyed it (although I don't think I could ever get that adventurous about eating, even if I lived there for years!) Not sure what to start next - big, big pile of books on the shelf of the nighstand by my bed (not to mention the equally big pile on my husband's side!). Oh well - having "too many" books is a problem I certainly can live with!

[iank9]

Thanks for the reminder Becky, will have to read a couple of those chapters again: The colonel in the car from Dieppe to Paris ;D Unloading the luggage ;D, and trying those recipes with his new friends

At the moment I am reading "Three Sheets to the Wind" by Pete Brown. A quest for the meaning of beer- takes a global trip looking for small independant breweries and rails against the giant brewing corporations- supporters of Anheuser-Busch take cover!

Have just ordered from Amazon:

Between Meals: An Appetite for Paris, A. J. Liebling, which looks really interesting and just up my street- a young man's look at the cuisine and customs of Paris during the 20s.

www.amazon.co.uk/Between-Meals-Appetite-J-Liebling/dp/086547236X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1196150337&sr=8-1

[Darcy]

Ian, you might enjoy McCarthy's Bar by Pete McCarthy

"Although Pete McCarthy was raised in England, his mother hails from West Cork, and, despite never having lived there, he can't shake the strange feeling that Ireland is more home than home. A return pilgrimage reveals immediately why he (or anyone, for that matter) feels "involved and engaged" in Ireland. On arriving at the airport in Cork he's greeted by a guy in a giant rubber Celtic cross getup who's telling jokes with a latter-day St. Patrick . Later, when McCarthy happens to mention that his surname matches that of the pub he's in (ever faithful to his Eighth Rule of Travel: "Never Pass a Bar That Has Your Name on It"), the owner buys him a Guinness, invites him to her raucous all-night birthday party, then insists he move to Ireland because, well, obviously he belongs. McCarthy's Second Rule of Travel states: "The More Bright Primary Colours and Ancient Celtic Symbols Outside the Pub, the More Phoney the Interior." While the island is turning into a haven for upmarket tourists--and McCarthy offers outstanding examples of bumbleheaded tourists in action--he still finds plenty of pubs where you can buy a bicycle and which still exist primarily as venues for conversation and Irish music sessions."

I found it very entertaining.

[hkpuipui99]

I'm reading (well listening... it's an audiobook)
Stephen Colbert - I Am America (And So Can You)

[Becky (Berkeleytravelers)]

I've been reading "Brother to the Sun King," a biography of Philippe, Duke of Orleans. I've become interested in that period, and this is a fascinating perspective. (Recently finished "Lincoln's Dreams," an interesting sort-of sci fi about a young woman who finds herself dreaming thoughts/dreams from a hundred years earlier.)

[Happygoin]

I just finished The Lost Mother by Mary McGarry Morris this past weekend. It's not a particularly new book, maybe a couple of years old, but it's wonderful. Morris has been compared to Steinbeck in a couple of reviews, and I can see why. A really good read, although I think any tender-hearted person would be haunted by the story. It's hard to let it go.

[sistereurope]

I'm reading "A Paris Moment" by Gordon Cope. It's about the year he spent living with his wife in the Marais (they're Canadian)
I thought it would make me excited for my trip (it has), but it's kind of a rip-off of Peter Mayle. Still, it's always great to read about someone experiencing life in Paris.

[sistereurope]

OK, I FINALLY got Julia Child's book "My Life in France" out of the library last night. Oh my, I LOVE it!! She is so great!! I really relate to her descriptions of the smells, sights and sounds of Paris and of course the food...sigh. I am going to savor reading this book.

I just love Julia. And I think that I fell in love with my husband when he told me (in an email) early in our relationship that Julia Child was his hero ;D

[Happygoin]

SE, you reminded me to post this: I visited Shakespeare and Co when I was in Paris and bought way too many books. One of them is really wonderful. It's called Sarah's Key. It's two stories in one about an American journalist, married to a twit of a Frenchman, who writes a story about a little-known roundup and deportation of Parisian Jews by the French police in July of 1942, the Vel d'Hiver.

Has anyone heard of this Vel d'Hiver? I haven't gotten too far into the story but it has made me curious about this dreadful part of WWII history that I'd never heard of before.

[muffya]

I've started Suite Francaise by Irene Nemirovsky. It takes place as th Nazis occupy France. It was written in the 1940's, but was published recently when her daughter found it. Irene was sent to Auschwitz and died there. So far its excellent. Wish I had more time to read!!

[geordy]

Muffya,
I'm starting that when I finish My Life In Paris! I was reading on my lunch hours but lately I've been rushing home..20 min race walk there, 20 mins there, 20 mins back..for the exercise..adds a mile walk to my day! But my reading has suffered.

Once winter is done..when the wheather is nice I can sit outside and read again!

Plus I got "We'll Always Have Paris" by John Baxter for Christmas.
Sub title..Sex and Love in the City of Light!

[Anne]

Yes, the "rafle du Vel' d'Hiv" was the biggest arrest of Jews in France during WW2 . Actually, nazis had planned a huge raid on Jews throughout Europe, and so for Paris the Vichy government accepted to lend the French police to do the job that the Germans wanted done . This is not the most glorious part of our history as you can imagine it, and it is much talked about and studied here . It is named after the Vélodrome d'Hiver (in the 15th arr), where many of the Jews were kept prisoners before being sent to the camps .

[Shoesy]

Speaking of the Jews during WWII, I heard that the diary of a French girl, Helene Berr, was just published this month in France. They're calling her a French Anne Frank as she too perished in Bergen-Belsen.

[cybee]

Yes, Shoesy, I also recently read (with interest) the new book re Helene Berr! If I recall correctly, it is newly released in France and has yet to be released in the States (not sure about release date in Isreal!).

I finished reading not too long ago "Alexis de Tocqueville" (by Hugh Brogan) (and recommended by Ray!) which was not only interesting about the man's life, but I learned a lot about that time period in France!

"Shakespeare and Co" by Sylvia Beach is an interesting read as is "Time was Soft There" by Jeremy Mercer (re his time staying at Shakespeare and Co.). The actual book I bought at Shakespeare and Co. was "Gem Squash-Tokolshe" by Rachel Zadok (new author) which was a charming read whilst esconsed on a bench in the Luxembourg Gardens...but I was rather disappointed in the latter part of the book.

[rssilverandlight]

Cara Black's Murder in Bellview.