So, watcha' reading?

[typhooforme]

Biography of E.A. Bowles of Myddelton House (British horticulturalist)

INFLUENZA 1918 (worst epidemic in history)

SALAMANDER (story of the forger Mark Hoffman and the Mormon murders of 1985)

ART OF THE VINEYARD (by Gary Conway, who was the TEENAGE FRANKENSTEIN!)

[ChattyLMS]

I'm reading a biography of Eleanor Roosevelt. 

[BaronLatos35]

Anzio: Italy and the Battle of Rome 1944

Lloyd Clark

[Bogey]

I'm reading a biography of Eleanor Roosevelt. 

Which one?  Is it by chance No Ordinary Time: Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt by Doris Kearns Goodwin?  If not, run, do not walk, to the store to buy this one!

[michblk]

I'm currently reading Tales to Astonish which is a Bio on Jack Kirby and also am reading  Hawaii 2009.

BK

[Bogey]

Here is an excerpt from the Hammett book I posted on the last page from one of his short stories.  Absolutely classic!:

The Montgomery Hotel's regular detective had taken his last week's rake-off from the hotel bootlegger in merchandise instead of cash, had drunk it down, had fallen asleep in the lobby, and had been fired. I happened to be the only idle operative in the Continental Detective Agency's San Francisco branch at the time, and thus it came about that I had three days of hotel-coppering while a man was being found to take the job permanently.

The Montgomery is a quiet hotel of the better sort, and so I had a very restful time of it -- until the third and last day. Then things changed.

I came down into the lobby that afternoon to find Stacey, the assistant manager, hunting for me.

"One of the maids just phoned that there's something wrong up in 906," he said.

We went up to that room together. The door was open. In the centre of the floor stood a maid, staring goggle-eyed at the closed door of the clothes-press. From under it, extending perhaps a foot across the floor toward us, was a snake-shaped ribbon of blood.

I stepped past the maid and tried the door. It was unlocked. I opened it. Slowly, rigidly, a man pitched out into my arms -- pitched out backward -- and there was a six-inch slit down the back of his coat, and the coat was wet and sticky.

That wasn't altogether a surprise: the blood on the floor had prepared me for something of the sort. But when another followed him -- facing me, this one, with a dark, distorted face -- I dropped the one I had caught and jumped back.

And as I jumped a third man came tumbling out after the others.

From behind me came a scream and a thud as the maid fainted. I wasn't feeling any too steady myself. I'm no sensitive plant, and I've looked at a lot of unlovely sights in my time, but for weeks afterward I could see those three dead men coming out of that clothespress to pile up at my feet: coming out slowly -- almost deliberately -- in a ghastly game of 'follow your leader.'

[Bogey]

I usually have several books going at once. Mostly short story anthologies, but here's what I'm currently plowing through:

The Bible


Mike

I have been hitting the Book of Romans pretty deeply over the past few weeks, Mike.

[Scary Terry]

I'm finally getting around to reading "Carter Beats the Devil" by Glen David Gold -- half way through and loving it.  Next up -- a bio of Charles Addams.

[michblk]

I'm finally getting around to reading "Carter Beats the Devil" by Glen David Gold -- half way through and loving it.  Next up -- a bio of Charles Addams.

Terry, what's the name of the Bio on Addams? 

BK

[Illoman]

I have been hitting the Book of Romans pretty deeply over the past few weeks, Mike.

You can spend several weeks in that great book! It's deep! Enjoy!

Mike

[Wicked Lester]

Working on several things. Showcase Presents Jonah Hex #1. On the last 100 pages.
E.C Reprints of War Against Crime , I'm on issue 7. Tim Lebbon - Berserk. Haven't read him before but he gets high praise from the likes of Ramsey Campbell , Fangoria , Rue Morgue and Cemetery Dance. 200 pages into it with 90 in the last couple. Pretty good stuff. Also reading a Dan Turner Detective Pulp reprint. FUN stuff.

[Ynnad]

I'm in the middle of 3 books, as I usually am
'Hunger' by Knut Hamsun, 'the Sound of Waves' by Yukio Mishima, & X-Men: the Dark Phoenix Saga..
All pretty great so far!

[typhooforme]

Hamsun and Mishima!  Ynnad, you have admirably interesting choices in reading material. 

[coughcool]

I just finished Jim Butcher's "Turn Coat" Great Book 

[Illoman]

Terry, what's the name of the Bio on Addams? 

BK

There's this one:

http://www.amazon.com/Charles-Addams-Cartoonists-Linda-Davis/dp/0679463259/ref=sr_1_8?ie=UTF8&qid=1249489288&sr=8-8

I just found out about it myself and started reading it. It came out in 2006.

Mike