here's the list:
dean koontz - false memory - more enjoyable than I thought. Hadn't read koontz in years. psychological thriller using mind control.
alain de botton - how proust can change your life - de botton writes really well on general subjects (the news, status) but this bored me, when his books are usually engaging
tom slemen - strange but true - book of short unexplained mysteries i've had knocking around for years
brian peston - pot planet:adventures in global marijuana culture - aka will it be legalised, and if so as a medicine, or social drug
stephen king - dreamcatcher - nutcase log novel that was very weird, not unenjoyable, and the ending wasn't absolutely terrible (as can be the case with king)
robert harvey - the war of wars - napoleonic wars overview. big and heavy
giant book of classic chillers - collection of short thrillers, including e a pe, dickens, wells and loads of others. hit & miss
louis althusser - the future lasts forever - althusser's book written/published after he killed his wife. kinda answering his critics, but lacking something ertaily. interesting read though.
laurence rees - the nazi's, a warning from history - bbc book accompanying the well known series
erving goffman - the presentation of the self in everyday life - classic social interactionist study taking the notion that all the worlds a stage one step further, examining how people interact
peter singer - how are we to live? - ethics tome by highly regarded aussie philosopher. thought provoking, though didn't agree with him a lot
stephen king - nightmares and dreamscapes - collection of short stories, with 1 novella included
escher on escher - exploring the infinite - collection of lectures, letters and unpublished stuff by the artist giving his own perception of his work. actually enjoyed this a lot. struggled to get into it at first.
george dyson - darwin among the machines - dyson speculates that the various forms of AI we already use will evolve into fully functioning AI, if it hasn't already. It won't, and it definitely hasn't.
the adventures of robin hood - classic
richard bach - jonathan livingston seagull - nice little book that a lot of people should read. encourages flexibility
f scott fitzgerald - the great gatsby - not a single likeable character. makes me wonder how such a vacuous society existed
nick davies - hack attack -phenomenal read. journalistic overview of the uncovering of the hacking scandal, written by the journalist who broke the story. fucking loved it.
iain banks - the bridge - recommended to me by a lot of people who think it is possibly banks finest. Think I expected to much from it, as found it a bit meh.
ben goldacre - i think you'll find its a bit more complicated than that - essentially a collection of his guardian columns, plus a few other bits. Wide array of targets, and useful wrath. Doesn't get into the level his other 2 books did which I preferred to this tbh
penn jilette - god no! - half of penn and teller explains why he's an atheist. not convncing, but decent
the a to z of british ghosts - another book that's been lying around a while. peter underwood explores, and offers no evidence at all
the secret diary of laura palmer - re-read in anticipation of the new twin peaks (more of which shortly) & noticed a lot of bits and bobs i'd not picked up on before
eric schlosser - reefer madness - an exploration as to haw 3 underground economies (drugs, illegal workers, and pornography work, impact, and contrasts these "black economies" with the societal perception of itself
john armstrong - how to worry less about money - the school of life have a few variations on self help books that are accessible, and have some interesting notions
iain banks - walking on glass - 3 nuts scenarios that transpire to be linked, even though they appear to be in different universes
tolkien - the hobbit - first time i ever read anything by tolkien! more fun than i thought.
ken kesey - one flew over the cuckoos nest - didn't realise the book is from the cheifs perspective. liked it a lot.
al sechel - visual illusions -loads of opicall illusions in art, hit & miss regards the quality of the insight
otto penzler - the big book of jack the ripper - vast collection of jtr fiction. confirmed that i'm not interested in jtr fiction, though there are a couple of good stories in their own right, especially the time traveller ones
tom wescott - ripper confidential - as recommended on another thread, wescot presents some modern research, and goes into some detail. a wonderful change from the formulaic thing that happens with a lot of ripper books.
dick kirby - laid bare - retired police officer gives his take on the hammersmith nudes murders. comes across as an arrogant fuck with little compassion and a sense of self importance
robin jarossi - the hunt for the 60's ripper - then this fella shows kirby up with a well researched book that is respectful towards th victims, and has a much more honest appraisal of the theories regarding suspects
ben goldacre - bad pharma - brilliant, but quite scary expose of the pharmaceutical industry. should really be mandatory reading for every single person
robert smith - 25 years of the diary of jack the ripper - also discussed on anotherthread, smith shows the diary has not been proven a forgery, and tries to give it some provenance. the jtr diary is a proper anathema to some, and a bizarre mystery in its own right
francis fukuyama - our postmodern future - fairly good exploration of how tech & especially biotech defines us. struggled to agree with many of his overly optimistic conclusions however
george page - the singing gorilla - an exploration of the potential consciousness of animals. frequently slips into anthropomorphism, but generally not bad
bruce dickinson - what does this button do - 500ish pages, and could easily have been 4 or 5 times as long. focuses on dickinson, so maiden are a side story here. very interesting, partially because you know loads of other interesting stuff hasn't been included.
andre comte-sponville - a short treatise on the great virtues - dry as fuck and reminded me why i hated ethics when at uni
truman capote - in cold blood - re-read what i still think is my favourite book
mark frost - the secret history of twin peaks - first of 2 books to accompany the new series. some of my thinkings about the original series were confirmed, lots of other batshit mental stuff here too!
karl hyde & john warwicker - mmm skyscraper, i love you - typographical novel/art book based on new york
karl hyde & john warwicker - in the belly of st pauls - typographical novel/art book based on london
susan greenfield - the private life of the brain - much more accessible overview than her usual output on the inner workings. greenfield struggles with any distinction between mind and brain for me (though so do thousands of years of philosophy tbf!) however she uses this to suit her when she wants the words to be interchangeable. That said, I do think there is something to her idea of degrees of consciousness
charles dickens - a christmas carol - cos it was christmas!
mark frost - twin peaks the final dossier - a wrapping up of the characters, or some of them
trevor royle - the road to bosworth field - very detailed exploration of the events running up to the battle of bosworth. enjoyed it. the over-simplified version of wiki/school books leaves a lot to be understood
dan farson - never a normal man - autobiography of a character, though also bit of a twat. found a significant document in the ripper investigation, but hardly covers it in the bok.
peter hodgson - through the mists of time - self published overview that is sometimes too brief, then bizarrely names cutbush as a preferred suspect from nowhere
iain banks - the quarry - banks final novel, and tough to read (a main character has terminal cancer), one has to wonder how much of banks is in that, or the other arguably autistic character (which is a great & well written character). really enjoyed this, not exactly a happy novel though
