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[Ancre]

I have finished another book. "Electre" by Jean Giraudoux (french theater, again).

It was much better than the first one I've read. Full of people who want to know the truth, and other people who protect their secrets, and in the end everything is revealed, and everybody dies because of it. It was a very good read, and I wonder what it would look like on a theater scene.

Also, I really have to read the ancient greeks' tragedies. I'll put it in the list somewhere.

Spoiler: The List (click to show/hide)

Jean Giraudoux - La guerre de Troie n'aura pas lieu (the Trojan war will not happen)
Jean Giraudoux - Electre

[Caz]

Finished The Mammoth Hunters. It's longer than I remembered, and just sorta stops short at the end. I wish they'd got a proper goodbye instead of "oops sry we have to get to our journey now! bye!!" or that they'd even left at all. The Plains of Passage has its interesting points with the Attaroa conflict and the woman with the badly broken arm, but Shelters of Stone is a mess and I'm not gonna even talk about Painted Caves. Big Jon is a dumb character and his kin are even worse.

Series could have been so much better if the author hadn't got research-crazy.

Spoiler:  11/100 (click to show/hide)

The Hunger Games - Suzanne Collins  (387 pages)
The Hunger Games: Catching Fire - Suzanne Collins (391 pages)
The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Suzanne Collins (390 pages)
The Four Agreements - Miguel Ruiz (144 pages)
Grotesque - Natsuo Kirino (480 pages)
Mammoth - Stephen Baxter (277 pages)
Theodore Boone - John Grisham (272 pages)
A Prison Diary - Jeffrey Archer (272 pages)
The Clan of the Cave Bear - Jean M Auel (512 pages)
The Valley of Horses – Jean M Auel (560 pages)
The Mammoth Hunters - Jean M Auel (784 pages)

Finished Animal Farm, by George Orwell.

't Was a nice book.

Must steal this idea. I love Orwell.

[Lectorog]

At first I thought Grotesque was about people, but it's not. It's about sex. Either way, I finished it on schedule. I'll put up a page count sometime.

Next up is Crime and Punishment because I chose to read it for a class. Who knows; I might actually enjoy it.

[Realmfighter]

Spoiler: 4/52 completed (click to show/hide)

• Poké Wars: The Subsistence
  118,768 words
  Decent concept and interesting actions scenes, but the typos are fairly obvious even if you're not looking for them.
• Practical Ethics, By Peter Singer
  359 pages of content, 395 with notes and index
  Philosophy is fun, especially when you're a awkward introspective seventeen year old!
• Poké Wars: The Coalescence
  72,269 words
  It's definately readable, I'll give it that.
• The Last Dragon Slayer, By Jasper Fforde
  289 pages
  Jasper Fforde is one of my favorite authors, and this book is a good example why. Witty, fun and with amazing world building.

[Jimmy]

Next up is Crime and Punishment because I chose to read it for a class. Who knows; I might actually enjoy it.

Dude kills one old lady, then spends most of the book either in bed or wandering around thinking everyone's onto him. Enjoy.

[vagel7]

So I finished Ian Fleming's Diamonds are Forever. Penguin published all of the Fleming books in 2009 with new covers, these very beautiful artistic covers and I'm collecting them. I like the Bond books, they are very entertaining and quick reads.

Spoiler: 2/52 (click to show/hide)

1.A Dance With Dragons - George R.R. Martin - 959 pages
2.Diamonds are Forever - Ian Fleming - 304 pages

Next stop, A Rakvere Novel by Jaan Kross. An Estonian book that I have to read for school. It is especially interesting because it takes place in my hometown.

[fqllve]

You know, I've not actually read Crime and Punishment even though I'm a big fan of Dostoevsky just because so many people have such a negative reaction to it. I've kind of been avoiding it (although I think I will read the Garnett translation this year) but I also have a hard time believe the man who wrote The Brothers Karamazov could write a novel that was anything less than amazing. Dostoevsky just had an astounding ability to create real people, and make them sympathetic and endearing even in their flaws and failings. I think, particularly, the Underground Man suggests that Raskolnikov, who I understand to be a fellow misanthrope, would be written with consummate irony and yet truth, because that is how the Underground Man is portrayed.

In any case, even if Crime and Punishment is as lackluster as I've been lead to believe, I highly recommend Dostoevsky's other works, particularly The Brothers Karamazov, Notes from Underground, and The House of the Dead. I've yet to come across another author who can write a character like Dostoevsky, and his deep humanism, particularly in Brothers, has had a profound effect on me.

[Sappho]

I tried really hard to read The Brothers Karamazov once. I spent months forcing myself to slog through the pages, most of which I had to read more than once because by the end of a paragraph I had no idea what I had read. Maybe it was just the translation, but it was denser and more difficult to read than a law textbook. After two chapters (and about three months) I finally threw in the towel, though I was disappointed because I had heard it was a really good book.

By way of comparison, I first read The Lord of the Rings in its entirety when I was 10 and it only took me about 2 months.

[vagel7]

The Brothers Kazmarov and such books are hard due to the way that they are written. They are very serious and so called high Russian literature. 20th century Estonian literature is the same, very serious and philosophical. Everybody here must read Dostoyevsky and Tolstoi, it has been like this for generations and every generation whines about it.

[fqllve]

The first book of Brothers is really dry, I'll give you that. I almost didn't make it through all that background material the first time I read it either. But I think once Dostoevsky cedes the stage to his characters they come to life and we grow attached to them, particularly Alyosha. It can still be a difficult read, with all of it's omniscient narrative intrusion, but once you actually get to the argument between Mitya and his father the book really picks up.

There are some really bad translations too. The first I read was... not very good at all. It was a Penguin Classics edition, the Margarshack translation. Stay away from that, far away from that. The other I've read is the Garnett, and that was significantly better, but it's still outdated and I've heard a number of complaints about omissions. Nabokov was, in particular, highly critical of her. I bought the Pevear and Volokhonsky translation a few months back and I'm planning on reading that this year, I've heard from a lot of sources that not only is it highly readable, but it's also the most faithful of the translations. It also has the benefit of being only about 20 years old so I'm betting it's more fresh. That's probably the translation I would recommend.

[varnish]

I honestly loved Crime and Punishment, (well, loved large portions of it and was intensely frustrated with others), and will defend it against a lot of criticism. Though perhaps not well. And I don't think it's nearly as difficult to start as the Brothers Karamazov can be.

Dostoevsky just had an astounding ability to create real people, and make them sympathetic and endearing even in their flaws and failings

This is true of Crime and Punishment as well. Both Sonya's father and Raskolnikov's family are real people, even when they aren't the focus of the story.

[Sappho]

Honestly I think it might be easier to learn Russian and read it in the original than make any further attempts at reading it in English. I don't know what version I had (it was borrowed from a former flatmate) but it was really just impossible to read. Then again, I can read hundreds, maybe thousands of amazing books in English or other languages that don't require you to put in 200 hours of "background" reading before it gets good, so I don't have any more motivation to finish the Brothers Karamazov than I do to finish the Silmarilion. Kudos to those who are able to get through it, though.

Sometimes I do think it might be beneficial to learn Russian eventually, once I feel I've mastered Czech. There are so many Russian tourists here demanding help from random passers-by who assume that everyone in central/Eastern Europe still speaks Russian just because they owned the area 20 years ago, and get all pissy when you shrug and say "English, Cesky, Deutsch. Sorry."

[Trif]

Finished Cat's Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut.
It's crazy how dark this book is. If it hadn't been so funny, I would be pretty depressed right now.

Spoiler: List of books (click to show/hide)

• If On A Winter's Night A Traveler (Italo Calvino)
• Cat's Cradle (Kurt Vonnegut)

[FearfulJesuit]

The Brothers Kazmarov and such books are hard due to the way that they are written. They are very serious and so called high Russian literature. 20th century Estonian literature is the same, very serious and philosophical. Everybody here must read Dostoyevsky and Tolstoi, it has been like this for generations and every generation whines about it.

What are some examples of Estonian lit...?

[vagel7]

What are some examples of Estonian lit...?

The problem with Estonian lit is that it isn't frequently translated to English, it is more available in French, German or Finnish.
"Truth and Justice" by A.H. Tammsaare, it is a penatlogy that is often compared to greats such as "War and Peace" etc. But the pentalogy isn't available in English yet, for some reason. Another excellent author is Jaan Kross, he has a number of books in English: "The Czar's Madman", "Professor Marten's Departure", "Sailing Against the Wind", "Treading Air". There is also the national epic "Kalev's Son"("Kalevipoeg") which has been translated to English. A bit more modern is Armin Kőomägi who has received numerous European literature awards. I have his book "The Good Firm", but haven't gotten around to reading it yet.
Really, the main problem is that Estonian lit isn't translated to other languages.