What are you currently reading?

[MADGRZ]

One for fun, and one that takes work.

 

[Nameless Range]

Finished this the other day. Very good.

 

[Hem]

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Added to my list.

 

[Hem]

Just finished Edward Abbey Fire on the Mountain.
Read, reread, read again Hills Like White Elephants.
Pretty soon this f-ed up country will be suing teachers for providing such reading material.

 

[WesternWyoming]

Just started An Immense World: How Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around Us by Ed Yong. Fascinating read!

 

[FairWeather]

Just finished the first chapter of this one. Enjoying it so far!

 

[OntarioHunter]

Very interesting and very readable.

 

[np307]

Currently diving back into Faulkner by reading As I Lay Dying. Enjoying this one much more than The Sound and the Fury. I've particularly found his descriptions in this read to be excellent. I don't know how well a work like this translates to someone without a close reference to the early 20th century South, but for me it's intensely nostalgic of the stories my grandparents used to tell. I can hear some of the lost accents as I read it.

Some quotes:

“We’ll need that three dollars then, sure,” I say. He gazes out over the land, rubbing his hands on his knees. Since he lost his teeth his mouth collapses in slow repetition when he dips. The stubble gives his lower face that appearance that old dogs have. “You’d better make up your mind soon, so we can get there and get a load on before dark,” I say.

A-laying there, right up to my door, where every bad luck that comes and goes is bound to find it. I told Addie it want any luck living on a road when it come by here, and she said, for the world like a woman, “Get up and move, then.” But I told her it want no luck in it, because the Lord put roads for travelling: why He laid them down flat on the earth. When He aims for something to be always a-moving, He makes it long ways, like a road or a horse or a wagon, but when He aims for something to stay put, He makes it up-and-down ways, like a tree or a man. And so He never aimed for folks to live on a road, because which gets there first, I says, the road or the house? Did you ever know Him to set a road down by a house? I says. No you never, I says, because it’s always men cant rest till they gets the house set where everybody that passes in a wagon can spit in the doorway, keeping the folks restless and wanting to get up and go somewheres else when He aimed for them to stay put like a tree or a stand of corn. Because if He’d a aimed for man to be always a-moving and going somewheres else, wouldn’t He a put him longways on his belly, like a snake? It stands to reason He would.

The sun, an hour above the horizon, is poised like a bloody egg upon a crest of thunderheads; the light has turned copper: in the eye portentous, in the nose sulphurous, smelling of lightning.

 

[Nameless Range]

I'm only about half way through this one, but its been interesting. This fellow was a Montana Game Warden in the middle of the 20th century. Times, and public servants, were quite different back then.

 

[Potsie]

I’m about half way through the second part of “Legends of the Fall” because @neffa3 talked me into reading Harrison.

He the writing is amazing, but having a hard time reading it for the story. Both Revenge and The Man Who Gave Up His Name haven’t really drawn me into the story, or given any kind of emotional tie to the characters.

It’s good writing, bad storytelling.

 

[ChaosOneZero]

This will prob fall on deaf ears - with the exception of @wllm - as it’s a sci-fi/fantasy series, but I’m currently reading (on book 3) the Red Rising series by Pierce Brown. It’s excellent. Like Hunger Games meets Game of Thrones.

 

[Deleted member 28227]

This will prob fall on deaf ears - with the exception of @wllm - as it’s a sci-fi/fantasy series, but I’m currently reading (on book 3) the Red Rising series by Pierce Brown. It’s excellent. Like Hunger Games meets Game of Thrones.

Red Rising

One of my favorites.

 

[fulldraw]

Reflections on Captivity by Porter Halliburton. A tapestry of stories by a Vietnam War POW.

 

[Irrelevant]

I’m about half way through the second part of “Legends of the Fall” because @neffa3 talked me into reading Harrison.

He the writing is amazing, but having a hard time reading it for the story. Both Revenge and The Man Who Gave Up His Name haven’t really drawn me into the story, or given any kind of emotional tie to the characters.

It’s good writing, bad storytelling.

Dang, I liked Revenge, not a fan of the Man Who Gave Up His Name.

 

[hank4elk]

View attachment 263358

Wow. and you guys didn't tell me about it?

I been reading HT and getting lots of laughs and maybe in trouble in commenting.

 

[Beignet]

Very interesting and very readable.
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Reading a book about Waterloo on "the Loo?"

 

[hank4elk]

I just got my dad's Bluejacket Manual from a sister. 1940
Now I can see what I missed when I declined a promotion to Ensign.
A time when folks had rules to live by.

 

[Straight Arrow]

SEND A RANGER
Tom Habecker, who has retired to a home appearing much like a ranger station in the woods of the Bridger Mountains near Bozeman, wrote an enthralling and descriptive book detailing thirty-two adventurous years as a park ranger in some of America’s most historic and scenic National Parks. He chronicles his training and experiences from newbie ranger to highly qualified and experienced top-level ranger.

His stories of exciting projects, challenges, and adventures in Yosemite, Glacier, and Denali National Parks are fascinating and highly impressive. Tom’s medical training evolved increasingly to often life-saving advanced EMT skills. SAR (Search And Rescue) operations became second nature to him as he organized and implemented plans and operations to find lost or injured park adventurers, and sadly, dealt with fatalities. Wildland and structural firefighting skills also became part of the skillset and were dramatically employed on a number of stressful occasions.

Habecker’s career included the fun and adventures dreamt of by young boys and girls and aspired to by backcountry enthusiasts and thrill seeking adults. Continuously gaining experience and abilities involved trapping and “managing” bears, flying many hours in helicopters and planes, horseback patrols, investigating and dealing with criminal activities (including murder), and surviving many wilderness challenges, often on his own. Tom mushed huskies, skied, hiked, snowmobiled and rode horseback countless miles across isolated wilderness areas “just doing his job” as a ranger. His family, wife and two girls, always close at hand, experienced a stimulating and adventurous lifestyle, enjoying the parks and wilderness as few are able.

Although not one to tout his own abilities, his vivid descriptions of events and interactions with others whom he often praised attest to his own high level of management and professional interpersonal skills. Accounts of the continuous educational and welcoming interactions with tourists paints a portrait of the ranger we all are so delighted to meet in our National Parks.

It is difficult to encapsulate the wonderful essence of this book in a few paragraphs. It’s a great read, the kind you focus on looking forward to the next adventure … then turn the page back to ensure you didn’t miss anything in that story!

 

[Hem]

 

[OntarioHunter]

SEND A RANGER
Tom Habecker, who has retired to a home appearing much like a ranger station in the woods of the Bridger Mountains near Bozeman, wrote an enthralling and descriptive book detailing thirty-two adventurous years as a park ranger in some of America’s most historic and scenic National Parks. He chronicles his training and experiences from newbie ranger to highly qualified and experienced top-level ranger.

His stories of exciting projects, challenges, and adventures in Yosemite, Glacier, and Denali National Parks are fascinating and highly impressive. Tom’s medical training evolved increasingly to often life-saving advanced EMT skills. SAR (Search And Rescue) operations became second nature to him as he organized and implemented plans and operations to find lost or injured park adventurers, and sadly, dealt with fatalities. Wildland and structural firefighting skills also became part of the skillset and were dramatically employed on a number of stressful occasions.

Habecker’s career included the fun and adventures dreamt of by young boys and girls and aspired to by backcountry enthusiasts and thrill seeking adults. Continuously gaining experience and abilities involved trapping and “managing” bears, flying many hours in helicopters and planes, horseback patrols, investigating and dealing with criminal activities (including murder), and surviving many wilderness challenges, often on his own. Tom mushed huskies, skied, hiked, snowmobiled and rode horseback countless miles across isolated wilderness areas “just doing his job” as a ranger. His family, wife and two girls, always close at hand, experienced a stimulating and adventurous lifestyle, enjoying the parks and wilderness as few are able.

Although not one to tout his own abilities, his vivid descriptions of events and interactions with others whom he often praised attest to his own high level of management and professional interpersonal skills. Accounts of the continuous educational and welcoming interactions with tourists paints a portrait of the ranger we all are so delighted to meet in our National Parks.

It is difficult to encapsulate the wonderful essence of this book in a few paragraphs. It’s a great read, the kind you focus on looking forward to the next adventure … then turn the page back to ensure you didn’t miss anything in that story!

He may paint a rosy picture of a park service career but I certainly didn't see it that way. My experience, with just two notable exceptions, was working in a toxic environment of managers ridiculously out of their intellectual ability and staff so desperate to survive in a world of seasonal and tenacious "full time" employment (that was invariably anything but full time), they do anything to climb the ladder ... brown nosing, back stabbing, etc. My exposure to law enforcement was limited but I didn't see much that was different on that end. Resource management and interpretation was generally a shitshow of grandiose incompetence. I loved working with the public. Loved it. But working for the NPS was awful. I could definitely fill a book with stories that would make anyone scratch their head.