What are you reading now?
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Part "travelogue", part spiritual quest for the meaning of life, part mystery, it is the story of a US guy who disappears while hiking in northern India. Quite interesting, and is actually quite a good read. It is a beautiful, yet somewhat isolated area.
In August 2016, an experienced American trekker named Justin Alexander Shetler ascended to a high Himalayan lake on a pilgrimage in the Parvati Valley of northern India, never to be heard from again. He carried a walking stick that he’d partially fashioned into a flute, a woolen wrap and not much else, having shed most of his earthly possessions.
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It’s excellent. Living the reich in ‘real time’ through his diary, but also getting a glimpse of what the life of a foreign correspondent in the 30s and 49s was like. Remember he was one of the original ‘Morrow’s boys”.
I re-read Rise and Fall about every ten years. It’s excellent.
Last year I read his The Collapse of the Third Repubic. I loved it but you kind of have to be into French history not just the war.
@jon-nyc said in What are you reading now?:
I re-read Rise and Fall about every ten years. It’s excellent.
Jon, I just started The Third Reich Trilogy
According to Ian Kershaw, it is "the most comprehensive history in any language of the disastrous epoch of the Third Reich".[5] It has been hailed as a "masterpiece of historical scholarship".[6]
There are three volumes:
The Coming of the Third Reich
The Third Reich in Power
The Third Reich at WarI just started the first volume. A bit difficult for me, not really knowing much about European history (talking about Bismarck, etc. and how that set the basis for Nazi's), but I will continue with it for the time being. Mr. Evans, in his "preface" says that he tried to write it not too academic, but not too simplistic.
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@jon-nyc said in What are you reading now?:
Finally.
I finished this yesterday. I kept thinking that there’s so much good detail in there that probably had to be left out of the miniseries. I’ll watch it soon.
Only non-witches get due process.
- Cotton Mather, Salem Massachusetts, 1692
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@jon-nyc said in What are you reading now?:
Finally.
I finished this yesterday. I kept thinking that there’s so much good detail in there that probably had to be left out of the miniseries. I’ll watch it soon.
@jon-nyc said in What are you reading now?:
@jon-nyc said in What are you reading now?:
Finally.
I finished this yesterday. I kept thinking that there’s so much good detail in there that probably had to be left out of the miniseries. I’ll watch it soon.
Band of Brothers and Saving Private Ryan may be the two best Hollywood productions concerning WW2. I was very disappointed in The Pacific, which would have been much better if they hadn't tried to meld two books into one story.
I have not seen Masters of the Air..
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@jon-nyc said in What are you reading now?:
@jon-nyc said in What are you reading now?:
Finally.
I finished this yesterday. I kept thinking that there’s so much good detail in there that probably had to be left out of the miniseries. I’ll watch it soon.
Band of Brothers and Saving Private Ryan may be the two best Hollywood productions concerning WW2. I was very disappointed in The Pacific, which would have been much better if they hadn't tried to meld two books into one story.
I have not seen Masters of the Air..
@Jolly said in What are you reading now?:
@jon-nyc said in What are you reading now?:
@jon-nyc said in What are you reading now?:
Finally.
I was very disappointed in The Pacific, which would have been much better if they hadn't tried to meld two books into one story.
You'd really not like Masters.
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@Jolly said in What are you reading now?:
@jon-nyc said in What are you reading now?:
@jon-nyc said in What are you reading now?:
Finally.
I was very disappointed in The Pacific, which would have been much better if they hadn't tried to meld two books into one story.
You'd really not like Masters.
@Aqua-Letifer said in What are you reading now?:
You'd really not like Masters.
It was OK - it just didn't have the cohesive feel that Band of Brothers did. I couldn't relate to the characters until halfway through. The fact that they tried to shoehorn so much real history into a relatable tale made it feel that way.
BoB, however, follows ONE set of guys, each of whom is relatable from the outset.
I thing "The Pacific" had the same flaw, though I don't remember much of it.
"Now look here, you Baltic gas passer... " - Mik, 6/14/08
The saying, "Lite is just one damn thing after another," is a gross understatement. The damn things overlap.
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@jon-nyc said in What are you reading now?:
Finally.
I finished this yesterday. I kept thinking that there’s so much good detail in there that probably had to be left out of the miniseries. I’ll watch it soon.
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@Aqua-Letifer said in What are you reading now?:
You'd really not like Masters.
It was OK - it just didn't have the cohesive feel that Band of Brothers did. I couldn't relate to the characters until halfway through. The fact that they tried to shoehorn so much real history into a relatable tale made it feel that way.
BoB, however, follows ONE set of guys, each of whom is relatable from the outset.
I thing "The Pacific" had the same flaw, though I don't remember much of it.
@George-K said in What are you reading now?:
@Aqua-Letifer said in What are you reading now?:
You'd really not like Masters.
It was OK - it just didn't have the cohesive feel that Band of Brothers did. I couldn't relate to the characters until halfway through. The fact that they tried to shoehorn so much real history into a relatable tale made it feel that way.
BoB, however, follows ONE set of guys, each of whom is relatable from the outset.
That's how it happened, though. It's harder to write a cohesive story about the 8th Air Force because it's harder to find the exact same group of guys who stayed together all throughout the war.
I thing "The Pacific" had the same flaw, though I don't remember much of it.
I didn't think that was a flaw. Sledge and Leckie had very different perspectives about the same experiences. I think they didn't go hard enough with portraying that. To reject one over the other would have been a disservice.
Please love yourself.
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@George-K said in What are you reading now?:
@Aqua-Letifer said in What are you reading now?:
You'd really not like Masters.
It was OK - it just didn't have the cohesive feel that Band of Brothers did. I couldn't relate to the characters until halfway through. The fact that they tried to shoehorn so much real history into a relatable tale made it feel that way.
BoB, however, follows ONE set of guys, each of whom is relatable from the outset.
That's how it happened, though. It's harder to write a cohesive story about the 8th Air Force because it's harder to find the exact same group of guys who stayed together all throughout the war.
I thing "The Pacific" had the same flaw, though I don't remember much of it.
I didn't think that was a flaw. Sledge and Leckie had very different perspectives about the same experiences. I think they didn't go hard enough with portraying that. To reject one over the other would have been a disservice.
@Aqua-Letifer said in What are you reading now?:
That's how it happened, though. It's harder to write a cohesive story about the 8th Air Force because it's harder to find the exact same group of guys who stayed together all throughout the war.
Exactly my point. Much, much harder, especially when you consider the mortality of these kids.
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@Aqua-Letifer said in What are you reading now?:
That's how it happened, though. It's harder to write a cohesive story about the 8th Air Force because it's harder to find the exact same group of guys who stayed together all throughout the war.
Exactly my point. Much, much harder, especially when you consider the mortality of these kids.
@George-K said in What are you reading now?:
@Aqua-Letifer said in What are you reading now?:
That's how it happened, though. It's harder to write a cohesive story about the 8th Air Force because it's harder to find the exact same group of guys who stayed together all throughout the war.
Exactly my point. Much, much harder, especially when you consider the mortality of these kids.
Then how is it a flaw to stay true to that?
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@George-K said in What are you reading now?:
@Aqua-Letifer said in What are you reading now?:
That's how it happened, though. It's harder to write a cohesive story about the 8th Air Force because it's harder to find the exact same group of guys who stayed together all throughout the war.
Exactly my point. Much, much harder, especially when you consider the mortality of these kids.
Then how is it a flaw to stay true to that?
@Aqua-Letifer said in What are you reading now?:
Then how is it a flaw to stay true to that?
Perhaps "flaw" is the wrong word. My point is that the characters were just not as relatable as Winters, Nixon, etc - because they were scattered all over the place, and didn't have as much "screen time."
Staying true to the story is not a flaw, but it makes the story (like the characters) disjointed. If you were to write a book, fiction, of course, you wouldn't do that.
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@Aqua-Letifer said in What are you reading now?:
Then how is it a flaw to stay true to that?
Perhaps "flaw" is the wrong word. My point is that the characters were just not as relatable as Winters, Nixon, etc - because they were scattered all over the place, and didn't have as much "screen time."
Staying true to the story is not a flaw, but it makes the story (like the characters) disjointed. If you were to write a book, fiction, of course, you wouldn't do that.
@George-K said in What are you reading now?:
@Aqua-Letifer said in What are you reading now?:
If you were to write a book, fiction, of course, you wouldn't do that.Depends on how you do it. Happens plenty in books, but movies, too. For example, no one complains about Pulp Fiction being disjointed.
Not saying that's some formula they should have followed, just that the problem could have been overcome if they were more deliberate about it.
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About ⅔ of the way through this:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Lost_Fleet:_Dauntless
The Lost Fleet: Dauntless is a science fiction novel by American writer Jack Campbell, the first in his The Lost Fleet series, published in 2006. Dauntless sets the stage for the six novel saga about a fleet of over 200 ships trapped deep behind enemy lines and cut off from traveling to their home territory.
I've always enjoyed SF. This is pretty derivative, and actually, boring stuff. There's little imagination other than the descriptions of two large fleets fighting each other.
I'll finish this, but my enthusiasm for going farther into the series is pretty low.
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@George-K said in What are you reading now?:
@Aqua-Letifer said in What are you reading now?:
You'd really not like Masters.
It was OK - it just didn't have the cohesive feel that Band of Brothers did. I couldn't relate to the characters until halfway through. The fact that they tried to shoehorn so much real history into a relatable tale made it feel that way.
BoB, however, follows ONE set of guys, each of whom is relatable from the outset.
That's how it happened, though. It's harder to write a cohesive story about the 8th Air Force because it's harder to find the exact same group of guys who stayed together all throughout the war.
I thing "The Pacific" had the same flaw, though I don't remember much of it.
I didn't think that was a flaw. Sledge and Leckie had very different perspectives about the same experiences. I think they didn't go hard enough with portraying that. To reject one over the other would have been a disservice.
@Aqua-Letifer said in What are you reading now?:
@George-K said in What are you reading now?:
@Aqua-Letifer said in What are you reading now?:
You'd really not like Masters.
It was OK - it just didn't have the cohesive feel that Band of Brothers did. I couldn't relate to the characters until halfway through. The fact that they tried to shoehorn so much real history into a relatable tale made it feel that way.
BoB, however, follows ONE set of guys, each of whom is relatable from the outset.
That's how it happened, though. It's harder to write a cohesive story about the 8th Air Force because it's harder to find the exact same group of guys who stayed together all throughout the war.
I thing "The Pacific" had the same flaw, though I don't remember much of it.
I didn't think that was a flaw. Sledge and Leckie had very different perspectives about the same experiences. I think they didn't go hard enough with portraying that. To reject one over the other would have been a disservice.
Pick one and stay with him. The backstory is an integral part of the story and how an audience becomes invested in a character and his world.
If you haven't read it, I think this would make a great movie or miniseries:
The guy I'd follow in that book is George McGovern. Yeah, that McGovern. Over 30 combat missions and some of them were pretty harrowing.
https://www.americanairmuseum.com/archive/person/george-stanley-mcgovern
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I had low expectations for this book as I haven't been a fanboy of Elon Musk, but I like the author, enjoyed the Steve Jobs biography - and the library system had the audiobook available free online.
Well, it's excellent. I knew Musk was a little nuts - but it's been interesting learning a bit of his life story, how he thinks and how he has approached business. I don't know that I'd have him run Boeing - but he certainly would NOT have made the mistakes the current management made. Taking the Apple slogan - he thinks different. By way of example, He abhorred that the government was doing bidding on space initiatives on a cost plus basis - where the government did the specs and let people have cost overruns - due to the fact that a lot of the government specs are arbitrary or not thoroughly understood. He's gambler with a mission - and quite willing to "lose it all" on a roll of the dice. Musk thrives on risk - a bit like Trump - which is likely at least partly why he supports and understands Trump.
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I had low expectations for this book as I haven't been a fanboy of Elon Musk, but I like the author, enjoyed the Steve Jobs biography - and the library system had the audiobook available free online.
Well, it's excellent. I knew Musk was a little nuts - but it's been interesting learning a bit of his life story, how he thinks and how he has approached business. I don't know that I'd have him run Boeing - but he certainly would NOT have made the mistakes the current management made. Taking the Apple slogan - he thinks different. By way of example, He abhorred that the government was doing bidding on space initiatives on a cost plus basis - where the government did the specs and let people have cost overruns - due to the fact that a lot of the government specs are arbitrary or not thoroughly understood. He's gambler with a mission - and quite willing to "lose it all" on a roll of the dice. Musk thrives on risk - a bit like Trump - which is likely at least partly why he supports and understands Trump.
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Why not?
"Now look here, you Baltic gas passer... " - Mik, 6/14/08
The saying, "Lite is just one damn thing after another," is a gross understatement. The damn things overlap.
