Finished LOTR: Return of The King, by J. R. R. Tolkien

Started and finished A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgress

A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess - at the end of Part One. It's a lot like Lolita so far, with the charismatic villain protagonist detailing his crimes. In both cases there's a mix of knowing in hindsight that they've done wrong while also reliving the joy that it brought in that moment.

Redeployment, by Phil Klay - bit of progress on this one, through "War Stories". I've gotten a couple of responses about my previous updates saying that this story is "devastating" or that one is "astounding", and I'm never quite sure what that means.

It certainly feels true to life, neither candy-coating the truth nor embellishing to make it sound more badass, and I respect Klay for that. I can't say I'm astounded though, and I guess that's because this isn't new to me; I've seen the same things in my family and friends, neighbors and classmates. Maybe things are different in the big cities, where veterans are rare enough that they're almost an abstract concept.

The Count of Monte Cristo, by Alexandre Dumas - chapter 24, "The Isle of Monte Cristo", wherein Dantes goes searching for his fortune.

Finished A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess - the last chapter was excluded when the book came to the US, and I think the book's better without it. If you've ever seen Kevin Smith's original ending to Clerks, it's like that; it changes the tone and takeaway of everything you've just seen, and not for the better. It resolves the open ending of the prior chapter and hammers home a message that doesn't necessarily fit the rest of the work.

Finished Redeployment, by Phil Klay - a pretty good collection overall, feels very true to life. As I mentioned last week, I assume the over-the-top praise comes from people who are so insulated from military life that this comes as a complete revelation, like "You mean to tell me that Marines aren't one great hive mind chanting 'kill kill kill', they're actually a large group of people with different experiences and opinions? head explodes"

The Count of Monte Cristo, by Alexandre Dumas - chapter 30, "The Fifth of September", in which Dantes plays the last and greatest of his Gutenpranken.

Started I Remember When, by Molly Hootch Hymes - This is a memoir of the subsistence lifestyle practiced by many Alaska Natives. Like rural life in general, Native life has changed considerably in the last few decades due to greater connection with the outside world and the influence of commercial operations. While this outside money has improved the material standard of living, there's probably something lost in the transition from subsistence fishing to commercial fishing.

Started The Blue Fox, by Sjón - This is a novella, so far about a hunter on the trail of a rare blue fox. The prose has a lovely poetic quality to it, and the story itself has that disorienting touch of magical realism, so I'm not sure what to make of it just yet.

Finished:

Exit West, by Mohsin Hamid

Less, by Andrew Sean Greer

Why Buddhism is True, by Robert Wright

Started:

A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess

Destined for War: Can America and China Escape Thucydides's Trap?, by Graham Allison

This week I finished London's Triumph: Merchant Adventurers and the Tudor City, by Stephen Alford, which I found really engaging and interesting. It helped that the chapters were bitesized (10-15 pages) with a really well crafted narrative throughout.

I have been reading A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess which has been on my list for a long time, and thus far it is brilliant. I love the writing, the words, the prose, etc.

Finished A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess. I love this book. Every time I read it I find something new at which to marvel.

Will continue Gravity's Rainbow, by Thomas Pynchon. Sometimes I have no idea what's going on but it's an enjoyable ride so far.

Will finish Adjustment Day, by Chuck Palahniuk. I haven't read a book that has gone off the rails so dramatically before. The first half has promise and introduces an interesting concept. The second half becomes a jumble mess that finds the concept boiled down to a miasmic soup of nonsense. I know the second half of Palahniuk's oeuvre tends to be very love it or hate it (with a seemingly greater amount of hate) but I don't understand how this can be seen as much more than a disastrous failure. I still have a little under a hundred pages to go but nothing short of a miracle can turn this into a coherent story.

Will start Neuromancer, by William Gibson.

Finished:

Lord of the Flies, by William Golding Pretty good, now I understand where that Simpsons episode came from.

Of Mice and Men, by John Steinbeck Really good, also tons of references I now understand

Slaughterhouse-Five, by Kurt Vonnegt Really good, liked the writing style a lot.

Started:

A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess Loved it from the start, figuring out the language has been reallly fun.

Finished:

A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess

Started:

Impeachment: A Citizen's Guide, by Cass R. Sunstein*

Einstein's Dream, by Alan Lightman

Saga: Book 1, by Brian K. Vaughan

Still reading:

Borne, by Jeff Vandermeer (really behind on this month's book selection here, this is the first month I've participated)

Finished The Tin Drum, by Günter Grass (1959). Dark, weird, shocking magical realist story set around WW2. I liked its mild surreal atmosphere, its repulsive but sympathetic protagonist. I liked the murky, teasing symbolism and the constant echoes of earlier events that define the later half of the book. Each episode, each past experience is built into a refrain in the story's present. This device makes the novel a bit repetitive in places but it also makes the imagery of the narrator's formative events stand out really well.

After The Tin Drum I started and finished A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess (1962) which of course is also very dark and weird. The language blew me away. What a crazy read. Devoured it in a couple days.

After that I quickly started on Atonement, by Ian McEwan (2001), which so far has been a lighter modern-family litfic sort of thing. Nice to spend time with characters who aren't like stunted outcasts and violent sociopaths. I'm only a few chapters in, I was writing a lot more than reading over the weekend, but I should have time this week to get deeper into it.

Not the best week for reading, had some family medical stuff to deal with. Still:

Redeployment, by Phil Klay - only read one story this week, albeit one of the longer ones, "Prayer in the Furnace", told from the perspective of a Catholic chaplain. That's got to be tough, trying to give actual guidance while the higher-ups just want you to do shit at ceremonies and then shut the hell up, and your counterparts are evangelical ministers who see the young Marines' anger and vulnerability as opportunities to grow the flock.

I assume the title is a reference to the book of Daniel in which the prophet's companions were thrown into a furnace but their faith protected them and they escaped unharmed. Modern Iraq does not work that way.

A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess - started this on Monday, and I'm on Chapter 4 now. There's a bit where Alex says something like, "If I die or get locked up, too bad for me." That reminds me of a line in Dan "Nitro" Clark's memoir Gladiator about the trouble of talking to teens about drugs.

One of the biggest problems is that a kid sees Barry Bonds [doing steroids and benefiting from it]. He's forty-four. To a sixteen-year-old, that's more than a lifetime from now. I once heard a kid say, "I'm seventeen years old; forty-four is an old man. I don't care if I'm dead then."

It's so far off they scarcely think of it as real, and what they do see of that age is all negative. Why give up experiences now for something that they don't really want and may never happen?

The Count of Monte Cristo, by Alexandre Dumas - chapter 17, "In the Abbe's cell", wherein Edmond and the Abbe tempt fate by explaining their plans in front of the reader.

I finished A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess which was a pretty cool read, more thought-provoking than I expected it to be. I started reading Lord of the Flies, by William Golding because I never read it and got it cheap recently.

I also put away The Silk Roads, by Peter Frankopan. I got halfway but it's really not what I expected. So then I started reading The Sixth Extinction, by Elizabeth Kolbert which I've wanted to read for a long time and does not disappoint so far.

I finished reading A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess. I thought it was quite good, and the usage of Nadsat was very cool. I apparently read it without the last chapter that was present in British editions of the book, and after reading about it I gotta say I agree with the choice to leave it out.

A couple of days ago I started reading Cocaine Nights, by JG Ballard. I read Crash by the same author and was extremely intrigued/horrified so I wanted to check out some more of Ballard’s writing. I’m not super far into the book yet, but it’s shaping up to be a bizarre mystery and I’m liking it so far.

Finished:

​

A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess Loved it, one of the best, or maybe the best, book I have ever read, Alex was so charismatic, it was sad to say goodbye to him.

​

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, by Hunter Thompson Really good, having experimented with a lot of drugs myself, the book was very relatable, the adrenochrome section almost made me sick.

A Court of Thorns and Roses, by Sarah J. Maas. I decided to give this book a go, because I liked the idea of a retelling of Beauty and the Beast. And I did enjoy the plot and world, but I really didn't like the main character. I can say the ending is pretty closed, so you don't get left on a massive cliffhanger. I won't be continuing the series - 2.25/5

Down Among the Sticks and Bones, by Seanan McGuire. I do quite enjoy this series, Wayward Children. I like the concept and the characters. But the books are too short - I've found both felt too rushed. So as much as I liked the books, I'm not sure McGuire is very good at writing plot, which may be why it feels so rushed. Overall, enjoyable, but room for improvement - 4/5

Starting A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess. The first time I picked this book up was when I was about 15; it had an interesting title, I'd heard it was a classic, and it only had a glass of milk on the front. I did not know anything about it, and after attempting to read the first few pages, I gave up figuring I must be too dumb to understand it and wondered if I was more illiterate than I thought (not realising that it had non-english words). A friend recently read it, so I decided to brave it again, and I tell you what, age and (literary) experience makes a big difference. So far, so good. edit: fantastic book 5/5.

Finished The Brothers Karamazov, by Fyodor Dostoevsky and The Joy Luck Club, by Amy Tan.

Will read A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess.

Will start Adjustment Day, by Chuck Palahniuk and Gravity's Rainbow, by Thomas Pynchon.

A clockwork orange, By Anthony Burgess Weird Christmas read but I really liked the use of language with all the Nasdat used, though it did take me a lot of time trying to read and re read the first couple of chapters to understand what was going on.

Started: A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess Bloody 'ell.

Quit reading: Ack-Ack Macaque, by Gareth L. Powell Just wasn't feelin' it!

Finished A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess. I’ve heard good things about the movie, but instead of watching the movie and not finding enough motivation to read the book, I’m doing the opposite. Still haven’t watched the movie but I will soon. And plus book readers get the controversial last chapter, a great area of debate. I loved reading the book with no knowledge about nadsat slang and getting a hang of it just by context and the main character’s description. It was fun to do it that way, for me. (Although I didn’t pick up on horrorshow = good/great until later on in the book.)

Then I started A Secret History, by Donna Tartt. I took a Latin class a few semesters ago and it was incredibly interesting, learning a language that would have easily vanished and been forgotten. When I started reading and found out the main character/narrator was a whiz at Greek and is going to take Latin, it’ll be very cool to see how it goes. I might learn a few things I forgot as well. There is a professor in the book that lectures in a very flowery and decorated way, and it’s absolutely magical, like I’m part of the lecture as well, yet it’s the first class I would gladly put everything down and listen to the professor lecture. These are my impressions from only the first 50 pages, and seemingly, the prologue (only two pages long) outright spoils the death of a character? Is there a good reason for this? I’ll probably just have to find out. Still, it’s a very enthralling read.

Finished A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess

For a change of pace, I thought I'd read Lovecraft, by I.N.J Culbard, which is a graphic novel collection of his adaptations of Lovecraft's stories The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath, The Case of Charles Dexter Ward, At the Mountains of Madness and The Shadow Out of Time.

Finished:
Julius Caesar, by William Shakespeare

Romeo and Juliet, by William Shakespeare

A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess

Julius Caesar was the latest book in my ongoing Shakespeare project (and one of those where I own an individual copy, which is why I'm claiming it as a finished book, otherwise I'm reading everything out of The RSC Shakespeare). Romeo and Juliet was a reread, since I'd already read it earlier this year, but this time I wanted to read it prior to seeing the encore broadcast of Roméo et Juliette by Charles Gounod with Vittorio Grigolo and Diana Damrau last Wednesday. On Saturday, I saw a midnight matinee of the Kubrick film of A Clockwork Orange, so I read the book earlier in the day. The Princess Bride is next week's matinee, so I may read the Goldman novel next before seeing the movie.

​

Started:

The Inimitable Jeeves, by P. G. Wodehouse

South: The Story of Shackleton's Last Expedition 1914 - 1917, by Ernest Shackleton

The Portable Greek Historians, by M. I. Finley (ed.)

The first two are two audiobooks I started on Sunday, driving up to see the world premiere of Anthony Davis' The Central Park Five (which was awesome). I listened to the Wodehouse (narrated by Frederick Davidson) on the journey up, and listened to the Shackleton (narrated by Steven Crossley) on the return leg of the journey, which I drove along Pacific Coast Highway. Thus I was able to read about sailing the ocean while looking at the ocean. The Portable Greek Historians was part of my latest Thriftbooks haul, which arrived on Saturday. I took The Portable Greek Historians with me to read before the midnight matinee on Saturday night and during the intermission of the opera on Sunday.

started a clockwork orange, by anthony burgess the writing style is so interesting, but quite challenging at times...

Just got home from the library where I checked out The Two Towers by Tolkien, Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess, and Walden by Thoreau. And just like that I’ve began pecking away at my [list of books to read] (https://imgur.com/a/lEy7B45). If anyone has any book suggestions to add to the list, please do!

Over the last few days I finished The Fellowship of The Ring by Tolkien and How To Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie. Still need to finish the Dark Tower series by Stephen King

Finished: A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess

It was a nice book. But the ending left a bad taste in my mouth. Also, I didn't really understand why the denying of free will is something bad for criminals like Alex.

Started: Oryx and Crake, by Margaret Atwood

Finished A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess

Started Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage, by Haruki Murakami

finished:

Jingo, by Terry Pratchett

I'm really upset I never got in to Discoworld until after Pratchett passed, but better late than never. I bought this last year but just got around to reading it this passed week. 10/10 would read again

Started:

A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess

Not really enjoying this so far; the Nadsat is just making it hard going. Will slog along for a bit more to see if that changes or if it goes in the DNF pile

Windup Girl, by Paolo Bacigalupi

This has been on my e-reader half-finished (for reasons I can't remember; I actually liked what i'd read) for almost 5 years now. Decided to start back at the beginning and try to finish it this time. It's just as good as I remember it being the first time around if a bit "genre"-y in places.

First as Tragedy, Then as Farce, by Slavoj Zizek

I like to to call these kinds of books my "protein" reading and I always try to have at least one in the rotation at all times. The kind of book where you take notes and go back and reread stuff. Not particularly hard, as far as Zizek books go, but it's not a leisure-time read.

just finished a clockwork orange, by anthony burgess

started reading chess novel, by stefan zweig