So, What Are You Reading?

Read William C. Davis' Touched by Fire.

 

Read William C. Davis' Battle at Bull Run.

 

Read William C. Davis' Duel Between the First Ironclads.

 

Read B. A. Botkin's A Civil War Treasury of Tales, Legends, and Folklore.

 

Read Alfred Bellard's Gone for a Soldier.

 

Currently I'm reading The Cuckoo's Call by Robert Galbraith (who is really J.K. Rowling)

Here's a tip - Long Reads From The Internet - Our favorite long reads from around the internet, with new picks every day.

http://digg.com/channel/longreads

 

I think it would be difficult to find an individual who has more time than I do, that can be used for reading... except possibly Ted Heiks. I can basically read whenever I like. All day and night, if I want to. Or play guitar, harmonica, dulcimer... or play with my computer. Lately, when I'm not on the Javascript path, learning Anglo-Saxon or trying to play Lightnin' Hopkins runs, I've been reading Tony Hillerman's stories. I just finished three stories about Lt. Joe Leaphorn, a very likeable Navajo policeman. It's not my first encounter with Mr. Hillerman's work. I really enjoy his understanding of Southwest Natives' customs and culture.

Another writer I enjoy - again one who combines mystery and portrayal of distinctively American cultures, is James Lee Burke. He writes usually in the first person - many stories as Dave Robicheaux, a Louisiana native, once a Detective in New Orleans, then a Sheriff's Deputy in New Iberia. Mr. Burke writes other novels mainly narrated by Hackberry Holland, a sheriff on the Texas-Mexican border. His descriptions and historical narratives are superb. Nobody creates regional atmosphere better than he does. Nobody. Not even Mr. Hillerman, though it's a pretty even match.

In the Dave Robicheaux novels, we frequently encounter Dave's daughter, Alafair, first as a young girl and later as a grown woman, soon to graduate from law school. Alafair Burke, the author's real-life daughter, is a fine novelist in her own right. She's also a former prosecutor and a law professor. http://alafairburke.com/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dave_Robicheaux

 

Well, I usually don't enter my current readings until I've finished reading the book(s) in question. But since my current reading is an 800+ page doorstop of a book, I think I will mention that I've read some 500 pages of The Collected What If?, by Robert Cowley.

Next Up: The History of the World, by Sir Walter Raleigh.

Not sure when I'll get back to reading Summa Theologica, by St. Thomas Aquinas (Great Books edition).

 

That's a tough, dense read, Ted. Thinking of becoming a monk? After you get through work in the Monastery garden and turning out manuscripts in the Scriptorium, you might get a chance to read --- between Vespers and Compline, maybe. Lights out after Compline...

 

Thinking of a Great Books degree.

 

either Harrison Middleton University or Faulkner University - whoever will accept me

 

What is the most influential book of the last 20 years? Maybe one of these

https://www.chronicle.com/interactives/influential-books?essay=Bloom

 

David Armitage's The History Manifesto looks good. I put it on my Amazon wish list.

 

In the meantime

https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/687177

 

Thanx for the review!

 

Made it to page 214 (of 411 pages) of Sir Walter Raleigh's History of the World.

 

I don't there is such a thing as a Protestant monastery.

 

Read Yvette Elderbroom's Naming Your Child Christian Names.