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Socoder -> Books -> Any good books, lately?

Sun, 29 Aug 2010, 13:19
Jayenkai
My current aversion to coding seems to want a short amount of book reading to keep it slowly charging to normal levels.

Anyone read anything good recently (nothing codey!)
Or should I finally dig into the Battle Royale that I got a couple of years ago?

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Sun, 29 Aug 2010, 13:45
mole
I read the first 24 pages of the Life of Pi the other day but got bored.

I read very infrequently. I think the last book I read was an economics one: The Bottom Billion. It was very interesting; it is about the less developed countries, why they are poor, how they can stop being poor etc. It's an easy read (hence it being teh only economics book I have actually finished) and really quite good. The stuff inside it was so useful that it made up the vast majority of both the geography and economics essays in the recent exams.
Sun, 29 Aug 2010, 14:36
shroom_monk
On the non-fiction side of things, I recently read 'Bad Science' by Ben Goldacre. It's an entertaining but interesting read on pseudoscience and alternative medicine. Currently, I'm reading 'Can a Robot be Human' by Peter Cave. Again non-fiction, it's a book of some interesting philosophy questions.

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A mushroom a day keeps the doctor away...

Keep It Simple, Shroom!
Sun, 29 Aug 2010, 14:50
JL235
You should finally dig into Battle Royale! It's an awesome book.

You should also check out Masters of Doom, which is also awesome. It's a biography about John Carmack and John Romero starting up Id Software.
Sun, 29 Aug 2010, 15:22
Afr0
I'm currently reading 'My Struggle' by the Norwegian author Karl Ove Knausgård. Tis a fantastic book.
The link says the British version was (is?) released on Harvill Secker, and the American on Archipelago.

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Afr0 Games

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Sun, 29 Aug 2010, 19:21
blanko1324
If you ever get a chance to read Microserfs, do it! In short, it's about a group of programmers who quit their day jobs and start their own indie software company in a garage. What really makes it stand out is how realistic the characters are; the book avoids all the tired 'geek' character clitches that you'd find in a movie or on TV. It's funny and, at times, very emotional, and I guarantee everyone on here could identify with the characters in some way.

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Sun, 29 Aug 2010, 21:07
Cower
Could read the Baroque Cycle by Neal Stephenson. That's a pretty good series.
Mon, 30 Aug 2010, 02:56
Afr0
I couldn't actually find any evidence that 'My Struggle' has been released in it's English form yet, but I did find the previous book that Knausgaard wrote. It's available on Amazon.

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Mon, 30 Aug 2010, 03:58
JL235
Of course 'My Struggle' shouldn't be confused with it's wikipedia page (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Struggle) which is the UK edition of a seperate book by a certain famous German author.
Mon, 30 Aug 2010, 04:06
Mog
@Joe: I was going to make a joke but thought it would be inappropriate.

@Cower: Awesome. Neal Stephenson is one of my favorite authors, though last thing i read by him is Snow Crash

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Current Project: Pyroxene
Mon, 30 Aug 2010, 06:01
Afr0
Yeah, the book (which I understand is to be released next year) will get the title 'Sterben', meaning 'To Die' in Germany.
But the author was aware of the title when he named the book, and although not directly alluding to it in the text, the book contains plenty of evidence why his life is a struggle.

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Project Dollhouse on Github - Please fork!
Mon, 30 Aug 2010, 08:47
Mog


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I am Busy Mongoose - My Website

Dev PC: AMD 8150-FX, 16gb Ram, GeForce GTX 680 2gb

Current Project: Pyroxene
Tue, 31 Aug 2010, 05:11
waroffice
i was going to suggest Neuromance by William gibson but as you mentioned Snow Crash im going to assume you have read that already.

I too dont read often but found the forgotten realms books very good, the Drizzt tale is very very good indeed.

Im currently reading Count Zero by Will Gibson but have been since october :S
Thu, 07 Oct 2010, 12:42
Afr0
Thought I might add this!

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Afr0 Games

Project Dollhouse on Github - Please fork!
Tue, 27 Mar 2012, 10:13
Afr0
First book has now been translated to English!

To the heart, life is simple: it beats for as long as it can. Then it stops. Sooner or later, one day or another, this thumping motion shuts down of its own accord. . . . The changes of these first hours happen so slowly and are performed with such an inevitability that there is almost a touch of ritual about them, as if life capitulates according to set rules, a kind of gentleman's agreement.

Almost ten years have passed since Karl O. Knausgaard's father drank himself to death. He is now embarking on his third novel while haunted by self-doubt. Knausgaard breaks his own life story down to its elementary particles, often recreating memories in real time, blending recollections of images and conversation with profound questions in a remarkable way. Knausgaard probes into his past, dissecting struggles—great and small—with great candor and vitality. Articulating universal dilemmas, this Proustian masterpiece opens a window into one of the most original minds writing today.


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Afr0 Games

Project Dollhouse on Github - Please fork!
Tue, 27 Mar 2012, 10:55
Jayenkai
Oddly not finding myself in a reading mood.
Shrugs

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Wed, 28 Mar 2012, 23:25
9572AD
After seeing John Carter and being unfamiliar with the source material, and then discovering it free on Kindle, I've started reading Edgar Rice Burroughs' "A Princess of Mars".

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Fri, 30 Mar 2012, 01:43
spinal
I always suggest K-PAX to people, mainly because it's one of the few books I have ever read more than once. I assume you've probably seen the movie with Kevin Spacey, but the book is much better.

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Fri, 30 Mar 2012, 04:52
rockford
Re-read Clive Barker's Books Of Blood (1-6) again recently. Great if you like horror.
Fri, 30 Mar 2012, 10:12
Andy_A
George R. R. Martin's "A Song of Ice and Fire" (5 book series).

Excellent writing, awesome character development, and stuff to make you empathize with characters.

All in all a great read.
Fri, 30 Mar 2012, 11:31
9572AD
K-PAX is short, a decent read, and, yes, far better than the movie. I read it before the film arrived, and was sorely disappointed in the flick.

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All the raw, animal magnetism of a rutabaga.
Fri, 30 Mar 2012, 15:37
jprofitt
I just recently finished reading Ready Player One by Earnest Cline, I enjoyed the book a lot.

www.amazon.com/Ready-Player-One-ebook/dp/B004J4WKUQ/ref=kinw_dp_ke?ie=UTF8&m=AG56TWVU5XWC2

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Sun, 01 Apr 2012, 04:47
spinal
9572AD
K-PAX is short, a decent read, and, yes, far better than the movie. I read it before the film arrived, and was sorely disappointed in the flick.


The problem is, I read the book after seeing the movie, and, well, now I can't imagine prot as anyone other than Kevin Spacey, even though he's described as being quite a bit different.

I wasn't overjoyed by the fourth book though.

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Tue, 03 Apr 2012, 00:04
HoboBen
I'm half way through The Ragged-Trousered Philanthropists. It was written in 1910 but still very modern, "widely regarded as a classic of working-class literature". I think Afr0 would like it, not too sure about everyone else!

The copyright has expired, so you can get it for free as an ebook from gutenberg

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