Korean Job Discussion Forums

[JacktheCat]

Summer is here and vacation is just around the corner (well for some of us it is).

Recommend a good summer reading book.

You know, something light, something trashy, and something long.

Your basic beach read.

[livinginkorea]

[Bulsajo]

"Skinny Dip" is pretty much Carl Hiassen on auto-pilot; If you liked his others you'll enjoy this one (but in terms of innovation you'd swear he's developed a 'quirky S Florida detective novel'-writing algorithm).

[Ya-ta Boy]

By law, summer beach books have to be long. I recommend "Aztec" by Gary Jennings. Lots of blood. Some sex. A page turner. Exceptionally good for historical fiction.

[blunder1983]

I just finished "The Shadow of the Wind" its really good, translated from Spanish so its got some wierd words but highly reccommended.

Also check out

His Dark Materials (Phillip Pullman)
Lovely Bones (Alice Sebold) VERY moving
The Curious Incident of the Dog at Night-time (Mark Haddon)
The Time Travellers Wife (can't remember)

They are all good.

[peppermint]

the His Dark Materials trilogy is great- much cooler than Harry Potter, though you know that's on everyone's beach reading list.

[crazylemongirl]

First they killed my father .... easy read on cambodia during the bloody years
Unberable lightness of being ... I'm enjoying that.
The alchemist... read in a night
I'm also reading a series of short essaies on New Zealand. Which I enjoy but then I'm from New ZEaland.

[chiaa]

I get lists liked this emailed to me everyday. Some of these might not be released yet. I have put a * with ones that I agree with

NPR's Morning Edition: Summer Reading Picks from Local Bookshops

The Beach Book Melcher Media

*Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim Sedaris, David

Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close Foer, Jonathan Safran

The Garden Angel Friddle, Mindy

Gods in Alabama Jackson, Joshilyn

Meet You in Hell: Andrew Carnegie, Henry Clay
Frick, and the Bitter Partnership That Transformed America Standiford, Les

Novel Singleton, George

The Orange Blossom Special Carter, Betsy

Other Electricities: Stories Monson, Ander

Play It as It Lays Didion, Joan

The Portrait Pears, Iain M.

Rammer Jammer Yellow Hammer: A Road Trip Into the Heart of Fan Mania St John, Warren

Red Ant House Cummins, Ann

The Same Sweet Girls King, Cassandra

Vacationland Monson, Ander


Summer Reading Picks from CBS News Sunday Morning

Adored Bagshawe, Tilly

Captain Alatriste Perez-Reverte, Arturo

The Genius Factory: The Curious History of the Nobel Prize Sperm Bank Plotz, David

The Greatest Man in Cedar Hole Doyon, Stephanie

The Historian Kostova, Elizabeth

*The Men Who Stare at Goats Ronson, Jon

One Shot Child, Lee

The Starter Wife Grazer, Gigi Levangie

The Traveler Hawks, John Twelve


August 2005 Book Sense Picks

Booking Passage: We Irish & Americans Lynch, Thomas

Deadly Slipper: A Novel of Death in the Dordogne WAN, Michelle

The Death Collectors Kerley, Jack

Evening Ferry Towler, Katherine

The Greatest Man in Cedar Hole Doyon, Stephanie

In Perfect Light Saenz, Benjamin Alire

Little Chapel on the River: A Pub, a Town and the Search for What Matters Most Bounds, Gwendolyn

*A Long Way Down Hornby, Nick

Mad Girls in Love West, Michael Lee

Magic for Beginners Link, Kelly

*No Country for Old Men McCarthy, Cormac

Queen Emma and the Vikings: Power, Love, and
Greed in 11th Century England O'Brien, Harriet E.

*Sky Burial: An Epic Love Story of Tibet Xinran

*Snow Pamuk, Orhan

Specimen Days Cunningham, Michael

Sweetgrass Monroe, Mary Alice

Trace Evidence Becka, Elizabeth

True North Harrison, Jim

The Witch of Cologne Learner, Tobsha

The Woodsman's Daughter Rubio, Gwyn Hyman

[kermo]

David Sedaris-- I recommend "Me Talk Pretty One Day" (it's stronger than "Naked" but not as long)

Nick Hornby-- You know and love him from the movies his books inspired: "High Fidelity" and "About a Boy." "How to Be Good" is quite serious, but intriguing.

Lisa Jewell-- Normally I would never pick up this sort of thing (I tried Bridget Jones but nearly tore my retinas out in protest,) but a friend lent it to me, and I found it absolutely compelling. I checked the cover *twice* to make sure the author was actually female, because the male characters were so believable. Apparently the one I read-- "A Friend of the Family"-- is her best, so read that one.

William Goldman-- THE PRINCESS BRIDE-- maybe the best summer book of them all. It's just been reprinted, so it should be easy to find.

[JacktheCat]

I've just about finished up How to Make Love like a Porn Star: A Cautionary Tale by Jenna Jameson.

A very interesting read and quite candid.

[Qinella]

Seems to me like the perfect follow-up book to that would be Nabakov's Lolita.

A good summer book, though not very long, is Kerouac's On the Road. It's the kind of book that takes you back, and summer's the good time to go back to places you never went.

[lawyertood]

The Memory of Running McLarty, Ron

Ron McLarty has joined the ranks of writers of the quirky hero with The Memory of Running. His hero, Smithy Ide, is in the grand tradition of Ignatius J. Reilly of A Confederacy of Dunces and Quoyle of The Shipping News. What these gentlemen have in common is their lumpen-loser looks, their outsider status and their general befuddlement about the way the world works and their place in it. Smithy rises above them because of his self-effacing nature, his great capacity for love, his inability to show it and his endless willingness to forgive.
Smithy is a 279-pound, hard-drinking, chain-smoking, 43-year-old misfit who works in a G.I. Joe factory putting arms and legs on the action heroes. (How did McLarty come up with that?) He is also the most beguiling anti-hero to come into view in a long, long time. McLarty, an award-winning actor and playwright best known for his many appearances on TV in Law & Order, Sex and the City, The Practice, and Judging Amy, has added another star to his creative crown with this novel.

The first sentence of the book is: "My parents' Ford station wagon hit a concrete divider on U.S. 95 outside Biddeford, Maine, in August 1990." This tragic accident eventually claims both their lives. It is on the day of their funeral that Smithy finds a letter to his father about Bethany, his beloved and deeply troubled sister, stating that, "Bethany Ide, 51, died from complications of exposure... and she has since that time been in the Los Angeles Morgue West." Beautiful Bethany, given to taking off her clothes in public places, holding impossible poses for long periods of time, responding to voices that only she can hear, and disappearing for no known reason. This time, she has been gone for many years and now Smithy knows that she died destitute and alone. When he reads the letter, he is drunk, grief-stricken and, despite a house full of people, he is alone. He goes out to the garage to smoke and have another drink and spies his old Raleigh bicycle. He sits on it, flat tires and all, wheels it to the end of the driveway--and--Smithy doesn��t know it yet, but he is going to ride a bicycle from Maine to Los Angeles to claim his sister's remains.

On the road he meets the good, the bad, and the really bad. He frequently calls Norma, the Ides' across-the-street neighbor, confined to a wheelchair for years, and always in love with him. He has never acknowledged nor returned her ardor, but he starts to count on her friendship during his travels. Their conversations are sweet and revelatory. McLarty has done a superb job of showing us who Smithy is and who he is becoming. It's a wonderful story told with great poignancy and humor. --Valerie Ryan

[bits]

I have almost finished "Why men don't listen and why woman cannot read maps" by Allan Pease. It's potent, I never read Men from Mars Women from Venus. But this one kept me interested. (good way to start conversations with the opposite sex too) Just thinking about it makes me want to go home and start reading...ahhh.. good bye PC Room...

[Ya-ta Boy]

[JacktheCat]

Actually I like my books like I like my women, it's all good; fiction, non-fiction, autobiographies, whatever.

At the moment I'm waiting on a collection of Frank Miller graphic novels, Sin City Series, Dark Kight Returns Series, that I ordered up from WhattheBook.

Only 7 more days ...



Good recommendations people, keep 'em coming.