Lionel Nashe's list of books that he starts but doesn't necessarily finish

LionelNashe

Just finished the L.A. Noir trilogy by James Ellroy. Not bad - good central character in 'Crazy Lloyd Hopkins'. Its about a driven cop in 80's LA who hunts down serial killers and so on. The first of the three books was turned into a mediocre film with James Woods 20 years ago ("Cop", 1988).

Starting L.A. Confidential by the same author (50 pages in). Again, an L.A. police story, but set in the 50s (I think). Am glad to find that so far its not exactly the same as the film (which I think is a great film). There is more character background, and some events/shootouts/fights/characters that weren't in the film at all.

LionelNashe

Finished LA Confidential a few days ago. The plot was unnecessarily convoluted. I'd have to read it again to fix all the conspiracies in my mind. The film was better and simpler. I might read another Ellroy to see what happens to the characters (White Jazz is set a couple of years later) but not straight away.

Am dipping into 'The Emporer's New Mind' by Roger Penrose. I bought this 6 months ago and read the first few chapters. He spends a long time waffling on about Turing machines. He does his best to lose the reader's interest. Still, I might flick forward to some of the later sections and see if I can find some parts that are less putdownable.

LionelNashe

Well, Penrose, I tried, but Life's too short. Have abandoned 'Emperor's New Mind' for now. I have a shelf full of popular science and philosophy books that get to the point a lot quicker.

Am five chapters into 'Hunting Badger' by Tony Hillerman. It starts off at a good pace. Three unknown gunmen rob an Arizona Casino, killing staff in the process. The FBI are involved in the manhunt, but also the local Tribal Police (The main characters are Native American, Navajo and what-not). Its moving along well so far as a decent police/detective story.

LionelNashe

OK, finished that last night. Its a fast read. An alright cop story, with a couple of twists, made a little bit different by the fact that the cops are Navajo. Just alright, not great.

LionelNashe

Hmm, this log of mine didn't last long. Here is what I can remember:
In the last couple of months, I've read a couple of Ian M. Banks' sci-fi: ("The Player of Games" & "Feersum Endjinn"). Good. I liked the worlds descibed in each. Will read more of his stuff.

"The Better Mousetrap" by Tom Holt. Disappointing. I tired of Terry Pratchett a long time ago and this was similar, but worse. There were plenty of references to characters that I felt were aimed at readers of his earlier books. I won't be reading any of those.

"Drood" by Dan Simmons. A fictionalised account of a few years in the life of Charles Dickens & his friend Wilkie Collins (the narrator), and their encounter with a dark Jack-The-Ripper type figure called Drood. It reminded me a lot of Sherlock Holmes stories, complete with pea-soup fog and Whitechapel alleyways. It is peppered with references to real characters and events from Dickens' and Collins' lives, which I am sure would appeal to anyone who was already familiar with them. I wasn't familiar with them, and I don't think I have ever read a Dickens novel, but I found the book to be a good read.

A popular science/popular philosophy/economics book: "The Black Swan" by Nassim Taleb. Good, but a bit repetitive. It didn't really need 300 pages. He argues against common misconceptions and biases that people have in regards to risk. Its fairly spot-on, considering the financial crash that has happened since it was written. Taleb has a couple of good things to say about "Critical Mass" by Philip Ball. It talks about how scientific methods & theories (thermodynamics, statistical mechanics, fractals and others) can be applied to understanding and explaining societal changes.

Now, the reason for restarting this log:
Am giving Critical Mass a rest for now because I have just picked up "The Blade Itself" by Joe Abercrombie. The heading above the first section, which is 3 pages in length, is "The End", and it describes a man struggling barefoot through wet snow and pine needles, being pursued by I-don't-know-who (yet). I love the fact that it starts with the end of the story, and that "The End" is there in bold font at the top of the page. I have flicked through and read a couple of paragraphs from later parts of the book, and I like the writing style. Looking forward to it.

LionelNashe

Finished The Blade Itself. Didn't do much else over the weekend but read and sleep. It was as good as I expected. The 3 main characters are a crippled torturer, who does a good line in cynicism; a vain, arrogant young noble who doesn't have much in the way of redeeming features; and a scarred fighter from a northern land who has had more brushes with death than he can count. I've ordered the second and third book of the trilogy.