Books ARGH Us!

I am currently reading The Arabian Nightmare, which could be historical fiction, historical fantasy, or literature. I'm at the halfway point in the book and wonder which genre it will turn out to be. The story is intriguing and follows half a dozen characters around for a few weeks in Cairo, Egypt around 1450 A.D. The main character contracts some weird condition which seems to be linked to a dysfunctional dream state, and he spends a lot of time staggering around in this state, bleeding from the nose frequently and feeling God-awful. No one will help him, and he is defintely heading for death.

The author is Robert Irwin, a scholar of the Medieval Middle East. The book is well written and fun to absorb, and I look forward to finishing it.

Neo, be sure to give what you believe the moral of the story is. I love a good moral. I think that's why me and Game of Thrones doesn't get along. There's not much to learn from it other than ruthless pragmatism.

Worked on my old book idea today titled Torch. It's science fiction, dystopian with a heavy dose of religion in it. I need to go to the library and print out the new outline again so I can mark it up with a pen. It's so much easer to work by pen than on a word processor. Trying to find a way to better incorporate religion and a new ethical code into it.

Well, I'm giving up on the audiobook SEVENEVES. It has a Hugo award even, but it's more science than story. It's more of a book explaining how we would survive if the moon exploding, it's so technical with such little heart. I don't know what my next book will be. It might be Mistborn, Stormlight Archive, or American Gods. Those are my options. Anyone here read any of those?

Just out of curiosity have you ever read anything by ra Salvatore or terry goodkind? I liked both of those series.

No I haven't heard of him until now. I see he wrote a book for the star wars series A New Jedi Order, which runs along the lines of the current saga. I wonder if it's any good... Was Terry Goodkind's Sword of truth any good? That guy seems like a polymath. Impressive!

I've been listening to Brandon Sanderson's Mistborn series. It's starting off really slow... Only two hours into it so far. Ill keep trying. It's epic fantasy.

I liked sword of truth, they actually made that into a tv miniseries that wasn't as good as the book.

What was your favorite book by him? Ill give it a try after mistborne.

You have to start with sword of truth it's like part 1 of 13 or so......

Hoooooollly snikes! A 13 book commitment? Where do writers get all of this creativity from? Man, I hate writing my outline so far. It's so boring compared to writing the actual story. I miss my old book writing format. 75% philosophy 24% Myth/Epic story with vinnettes

Im not sure if i can finish this book by seneca. This last chapter has been just him rambling about his mother. Its boring. I have maybe 20 more pages to go and ima try but its just dragging and dragging.

Newtus. i give books 60 pages. If they don't grab me by that then i have no problem putting them down for good. You can always skim though. Lord know i skimmed a lot in college.

I just ordered La Morte de Arthur. By Thomas Mallory The Norton Critical Edition. Ill never get around to it though. I started Mistborn and its been growing on me and its a 4 book series. But in Mallory's book there is a segment on true love and friendship which I'm interested in learning.

So what's everybody's three favorite books and why?

Goethe's Faust: I read this constantly when I was under psychosis to deal with not giving up, to keep striving, that certain emotions are worthless and that there is mystery in the world.

Homer's Odyssey: If the Iliad was about going to war, then the Odyssey is about returning home, the struggle of returning to your center, to where you belong. Where Odysseus is defeating monster after monster, Penelope, Odysseus wife, is facing a war of her home as suitor after suitor try to wed her. Odysseus becomes trapped by a goddess and she offers to make him immortal and he turns his back on that as he accepts to be human because of his loving wife waiting patiently for his arrival.

Ender's Game: Ender's greatest flaw is his greatest strength, compassion. Because of his intelligence he is isolated and turned into a war pawn to lead armies into space to defeat an alien race that haunts humanity. I find Ender to be psychologically interesting and his childhood was similar to my own.

Well the reasons are the same for all, the stories make me happy and engaged. Fraid I'm not that deep.

You know Name of the Wind.

Also enjoyed the dragonlance novels and the early books about Drizzt Do'urden from RA Salvatore....excellent fight descriptions.

I follow Patrick Rothfuss on Twitter, Author of the name o the wind. He has a card deck coming out with all the characters to the name of the wind. Have you thought about reading his offshoot of the king killer stories, the strange silent of things or whatever with the main character as Aurie? I cant remember her spelling.

The Name of the Wind holds a special place in my heart too. Smoething about young love, genius, and struggle makes my heart beat! Rothfuss said on twitter that he is having a really hard time writing the novel. He said he thought he could just write three in a row but that's proving difficult. It's been YEARS... I want to know more about the Chandrian already!!! sigh

When I finish Mistborne, ill give your book suggestions a try. What I like about the main character in Mistborne is that he's been stripped of everything but his power and his ability to see laugh as a comedy instead of a tragedy.

No I heard the book about aurie kind of was a let down because you really just want to know more about the main plot of the earlier books and you won't be getting any of that....

Mistborne sounds incredibly familiar to me though I don't think I've read that one

The other series I like is by Paul S Kemp---title is something about shadows....its been a long time since I read any of these though.

I liked reading Shakespeare. I should reread Macbeth. I had a huge collected works at one time, but who knows what became of it.

I'm currently reading Assassin's Quest by Robin Hobbs. It's the third in her first trilogy based in the realm of the Elderlings.

It's fantasy in case you were wondering and I love the series. Enough to make me explore all her other books in the same series.

I did that in high school. I think a lot of people do. I remember doing A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Tempest, Romeo and Juliet, Macbeth and Othello.

What I enjoyed most of all was the film Romeo+Juliet with Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes which I first watched in class after reading the play...

Oh how I love Shake-my-speare!

I love how intellectual the Tempest was for it being the last play written. It was a good farewell if he meant it to be. Helen Mirren plays a good Prospero. I recently read Hamlet again for the 2nd time. I use to fall asleep to the black and white movie. My favorite line in Macbeth is:

40****Canst thou not minister to a mind diseased,
*41****Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow,
42.*Raze out: erase. written troubles of the brain: troubles written on the brain. 43.*oblivious: causing forgetfulness.
*42****Raze out the written troubles of the brain
*43****And with some sweet oblivious antidote
*44****Cleanse the stuff'd bosom of that perilous stuff
*45****Which weighs upon the heart?

*******Doctor
***************************************************Therein the patient
*46****Must minister to himself.

What do you think "Can'st not thou minister toa mind diseased?" means, ladies and gents? It's so deep.

I received my Le Morte De Arthur in the mail. These Norton Critical Editions are so great. They are meant for scholars and most of the time have stephanos numbers. They always have papers and notes in the back ground, and foot notes. I looooooooove footnotes. I hate end notes. Who's got time to shuffle back to end notes, right? Such an annoyance.

I just wish these editions were hardcover. Damnit they should be. I'd pay an extra $15 for a hardcover.

my favorite mini quote from hamlet...

Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them?

I have those one memorized! I thought of that quote repeatedly during my psychosis. Reading the classics is how I partly coped with my psychosis.

When MacBeth asks, "Can'st thou not minister to a mind diseased" to the doctor I had to pause. The mind is a mental arena, not physical and what we have here is her grief over killing a baby. How could the doctor help her conscience? Of course now we know that SSRI's can, at least for me, can turn one into a sociopath basically with no fear, guilt, or really anything. That's what it was like for me, but still, The root of the problem was moral and the doctor can't work within the moral realm, only the physical one.