Wednesday, June 08, 2005
I've been "tagged" on a book chain blog by Kent. I'll admit that I normally don't do this kind of thing, but its true, I humor Kent more than I should. I'm tempted to omit the trash SF reading just to make myself look more intellectual ... ok, that won't be too convincing I know. Kent tagged me probably because he knows I read as much history as he does and he's trying to suck more reading subjects from me. I read whatever I buy almost immediately therefore the last books read list would be a repeat, so I listed under last books read books I've recently pulled out of the library and read. As for the five books that mean the most to me, that's going to be a hard one as I don't know that I've done a lot of thinking on that topic. But I'll come up with something even if I decide to revise it later. By the way, I buy a lot from used bookstores so some of these may be out of print.
Last books purchased:
- Shadowmarch by Tad Williams
- The Punic Wars by Adrian Goldsworthy
- The Structure of Aikido by Gaku Homma
- Open Source Licensing by Lawrence Rosen
- An Army at Dawn by Rick Atkinson
Last books read:
- Interstellar Patrol II by Christopher Anvil
- His Excellancy George Washington by Joseph Ellis
- Eleventh Month, Eleventh Day, Eleventh Hour: Armistice Day, 1918, World War I and Its Violent Climax by Joseph Persico
- The Green and The Gray by Timothy Zahn
- General Patton : A Soldier's Life by Stanley Hirshson
Five Books that mean the most to me:
- The Moon is a Harsh Mistress by Robert Heinlein
- A Soldier of the Great War by Mark Helprin
- Death By Government by R.J. Rummel
- History of the English Speaking Peoples by Winston Churchill
- Carnage and Culture by Victor Davis Hanson
By now you've figured out that I either read non-fiction ( a lot! ) or fantasy/science fiction. I don't read much in the way of literature. The five books that mean the most to me category would rotate through a score or more of books depending on the mood you found me in. Titles just swirl around in my head. In F/SF, Ender's Game and Speaker for the Dead by Orson Scott Card; the Memory, Sorrow, Thorn series by Tad Williams ( which I prefer to Tolkien ); and I have a lot of fondness for titles from my youth like the Heinlein juveniles that formed a lot of my early world-and self-view and E.E. "Doc" Smith. A collection of Gene Fowler's old hunting stories from his Parting Shots column.
I'll just have to risk the appearance of pretence. Now who should I tag? I figure Steve Verdon, as I'm sick of reading about Kevin Drum ...
UPDATED - I notice I forgot to mention how many books I own. I've not counted lately, but when we last moved interstate I counted approx. 1100 volumes. I've pared that down a bit in the last couple of years but I've not done a new count, so I'd guess 800+ today.
Robin 10:05 PM