What are you reading?

[strocube]

(PILOS @ Aug. 01 2010,00:40) So, 'strocube', you think I can use that argument to justify my mongering?!!  

Looking through "Red Light Nights, Bangkok Daze", William Sparrow --- maybe I've just been doing it too long, but Mr. Sparrow seems to be something of a newbie from his reflections(?).

An interesting (in part) read was "My Thai Girl and I", Andrew Hicks  --- he seems happy, but marriage to a Thai sounds like a one-way street ... in her direction.

Sure, PIOLS whatever works for you.

Also, I found that after reading it I'm feeling a bit less misanthropic. For the most part we're all just a bunch of really horny maladapted apes doing the best we can given the conditions in which we find ourselves.

[Instant Kama]

White Tiger
by
Aravind Adiga

[thegame925]

"A nail through the heart" by Timothy Hallinan not up to the standard of John Burdett's first two novels, but better than his third - now just about to start "The Fourth Watcher" by the same author (Hallinan) featuring the same characters.

I like to read about the seedier side of Bangkok when far away from Thailand, although I miss the pictures that come with real Trip Reports.

[DexterH]

Simon Majumdar Eat my Globe -an occasionally hilarious, sometimes stomach-wrenching account of an Anglo-Indian obsesses with food who travels around to sample local dishes, from dog and rat in China to LOTSOFMEAT in Texas etc etc.

For those of you with a PhD in post-structuralism/semiotics a recent article in the journal 'Social Semiotics' should prove challenging:

We Who Are Sexy: Christine Jorgensen's transsexual whiteness in the postcolonial Philippines
Author: Susan Stryker

Abstract
This article offers a close reading of the little-known 1962 Filipino feature film Kaming Mga Talyada (aka. We Who Are Sexy), an ostensibly comic popular entertainment that revolves around the appearance of transsexual celebrity Christine Jorgensen at a Manila nightclub. The film stages substantive questions about the effects of the Eurocentric medico-juridical discourse of transsexuality on the densely layered colonial histories of local Filipino constructions of sex/gender/sexuality - particularly the intertwined categories of talyada and bakla. Transsexual embodiment and gender identity are interpreted as anatamo-political somatechnologies that enmesh individual bodies with the biopolitical project of the state-based sovereignty; thus, the micro-political agonistics of transsexual/talyada interactions within the film enact a complementary narrative, played out on the macro-political scale, about the construction of the heteronormative Christian nationalist genders that sustain and reproduce Filipino sovereignty against the twin threats of Islamist and US imperialist challenges to the sovereign territorial integrity of the Republic of the Philippines.

[El_hefe]

Thanks for reminding me again why I changed my college major from anthropology!

[Torurot]

Just finished all the Stieg Larsson books in the "The Millennium Trilogy"
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
The Girl who played with fire
The Girl who kicked the hornets nest

SIMPLY OUTSTANDING!!!!!!!!. Couldn't put down, clever stuff!! Pity he died before writing any more.

[thegame925]

Agreed -Superb books

I've just seen the Swedish film of the first book (with English sub-titles) - really excellent.

The second book has been filmed and due out in a couple of months (Again the Swedish version)

Rumour has it that pre-production work on the Hollywood version is now underway with Carey Mulligan (the girl in last years movie "An education") taking the female lead.

[Torurot]

Why Hollywood feels the need when the Swedish versions are already there. The "subtitle problem" I guess.

[Chinaman]

(strocube @ Jun. 05 2008,10:11) I'm currently reading "The Man Who Loved China" by Simon Winchester. It's a biography of Joseph Needham. I had no idea what an amazing person he was; a true Renaissance man.

I know this post goes back more than 2 years by now but I just started to go through it.

I listened to the audiobook of "The Man Who Loved China" and found it equally fascinating.
I can also recommend 2 other books by Simon Winchester: "River at the Centre of the World: A Journey Up the Yangtze, and Back in Chinese Time" where he travels from the estuary of the Yangtze near Shanghai to its origin in Tibet, and "Korea: A Walk Through the Land of Miracles" which is based on his walk on foot through South Korea from its souther part all the way up to the DMZ.

There seems to be another, more recent book on John Needham by S.W. called "Bomb, Book and Compass, Joseph Needham and the Great Secrets of China". Has anyone read it so far?

BTW, I found Chiang Mai's 2nd hand book store a great source for picking up S. Winchester's books. Didn't find many or actually any in Pattaya whenever I looked, apart from the new ones at Asia Books but the store at the Avenue seems to have reduced their book selection on Asian topics in general.

Lately, I have switched to getting my books as e-books through amazon.com and have started to read them on my small iPod Touch - actually quite good and I can take it virtually anywhere. The iPad is still too large to just take along whenever you leave the house.

Currently I am reading Lawrence Osbourne's "Bangkok Days" as an e-book. It's ok but I have to admit that I expected a bit more, just in terms of more variety. The book mainly revolves around 3-4 characters of which he is one and the odd people he runs into. Not much outside a loner's adventures in BKK who most of the time is out of pocket as well. I have read similar books about China and also the ones by before mentioned S.W. offer just a wider repertoire of topics and viewpoints.

Can e-books actually be exchanged or passed on to friends or are they limited to the one device one buys them for? And I am not alking about the legal aspect here but the practicability of it.

[Tomcat]

" The Richness of life" by Stephen Jay Gould(RIP)

Took me a year to finish this on and off as its not a slim book. About his take on Darwinian evolution and that natural selection is only one way that evolution occurs. A bit technical in parts but he did have some interesting theories

One interesting point he makes was that around 700 years ago most medical men in Academia refused to experiment on bodies or the like prefering to just philosophise about biology instead of practice it

Therefore if you were in need of an op, it were better to call on the local medieval barber surgeon , grisly though the affair was, as he actually had day in day out hands on experience and therefore more know how than the fine gentlemen in Academia

[DrWillie]

(Torurot @ Aug. 17 2010,16:58) Just finished all the Stieg Larsson books in the "The Millennium Trilogy"
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
The Girl who played with fire
The Girl who kicked the hornets nest

SIMPLY OUTSTANDING!!!!!!!!.    Couldn't put down, clever stuff!!   Pity he died before writing any more.

I have read the first two books and am about to start the third book. these are good reads.

[balibeachboy2122]

Currently reading
-the presidents Graubard... give clairvoyant,witty and a little sarcastic account of the USA president counting from Roosevelt(Teddy) till Obama (his chapter on Eisenhower is especially well written)
-Brothers Yu Hua contemporary comedy...give a good pictures of modern day china
-the next Asia stephan Roach book about the possibilities of Asia by one of the grand old Masters himself.

[Tomcat]

The History of Western Philisophy by Bertrand Russell

apparently one of the books you must read before you die. I agree 100%. Amazing book even though it was written over 70 years ago its still a classic in Adademia. I big book and im up to Pythagoras at the moment.

The Ancient Greeks fascinate me and no wonder when you consider that over 2000 years ago they theories of Atomic structure and invented maths,  Geometry ,Science ,philosophy and so on and on...If i could live in another time this would be it..Greece 450 BC.  maybe the best time to have lived, unless you were a slave of course

Its not all about the city states and The Greek thought  but around half the book is and the rest leads up to the 20th Century

[Ivor Biggun]

(Torurot @ Aug. 17 2010,16:58) Just finished all the Stieg Larsson books in the "The Millennium Trilogy"
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
The Girl who played with fire
The Girl who kicked the hornets nest

SIMPLY OUTSTANDING!!!!!!!!.    Couldn't put down, clever stuff!!   Pity he died before writing any more.

You can download all 3 of the movies in Swedish with english sub-titles from the net. Very Bergman-ish. They are re-filming (currently in pre-production) with Daniel Craig in the Blomquist role at present, due out some time next year

[balibeachboy2122]

Russel was given to me as a gift as well.

Still have to make some time to read it.

Currently reading Necronomicon by Lovecraft (commemorative edition),best horror stories ever written by far.

Also reading D-day by Beaver

And reading Drucker again (always insightful even in more modern times)

As for the whole millenium series,i personally liked them though the style of writing annoyed me at times.

I really though the first book (and the first movie for that matter) where easily the best of the bunch (usually are i guess).

And even though i liked the books i thought the second and third movies where quit bad.

Personally i take Mankell over Larsson any day..I personally like Lapidus as well,kind of reminds me of the Pusher movies (those where great).