August Knights book club

[[AK]The Beast]

*digs this thread up out of the graveyard*

For those who enjoy the WWII books, I recommend Panzer Commander: The Memoirs of Colonel Hans von Luck. It's sort of the exact opposite of Band of Brothers: the tale of a high-born, high-ranking commissioned officer, fighting for the Axis, that tends to emphasize the wonderful places and people he saw and met, and downplay the bloodshed. Very interesting read, with forward by Stephen Ambrose.

[[AK]Choozoo]

I was always partial to "One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish" and MAD magazine.

I did read Clancy's "Without Remorse" in two days though, literally, I couldn't put it down.

"Dispatches" written by a Michael Herr. Book that Full Metal Jacket was based upon.

I haven't read Panzer Commander, but it is on the list (and has been).

"Catch-22" is one of my all time favorites ... Yossarian

Besides that, It's all classics, and PHP manuals and such. I haven't actually read a non-technical book since '97.

[[AK]Squidly]

I usually read diving books, but I'm currently reading A Drinking Life

[[AK]The Beast]

Get outta here--I never realized Full Metal Jacket was based on a book. I'm going to have to add that one to my must-read list. A Drinking Life looks interesting, too. I just polished off a computer thriller by Jeffrey Deaver (mentioned in the early days of this thread) called The Blue Nowhere. It's probably the most accurate "computer fiction" I've read. I'm working on the Artemis Fowl series (by Eoin Colfer, an Irishman) right now--think Harry Potter with Harry as a criminal mastermind and a lot of gun/karate combat.

[[AK]Sonic Boom]

Originally posted by [AK]Garrett
if your big on counterterrorism, and military stuff I shouldnt have to mention Tom Clancy.
Its rare when I put one of his books down.

I dunno, Clancy's last two have been absolute pieces of crap, particularly his latest, The Teeth of the Tiger.

It's so ridiculous and far-fetched that I almost couldn't finish it. I did think of a good tagline, though:

Tour de Farce.

[[AK]Bribo]

Is he still writing? I thought he sold that franchise out ?

[[AK]Sonic Boom]

He sure as hell sold something out. His latest tripe is absolute pulp.

[Garrett]

Reading Margaret Weis & Tracy Hickman's Well of Darkness
VOlume one of the Sovereign Stone Trilogy.
Its really good if you like fantasy settings...
I read Teeth of the tiger...I wasnt hostile to it. It was done the same way as his other books, but I agree that the meat was a bit far fetched.

[[AK]Sonic Boom]

I suppose I'm only comparing it to his prior good works. The entire plotline of realizing that he's used up the Jack Ryan franchise and resorted to the obvious and predictable cop-out of switching gears to "Jack Ryan Junior" doesn't fly with me.

I solidly stand by my tagline:

Tour de Farce.

[[AK]The Beast]

Dark Tower V, baby...Stephen King's Wolves of the Calla is in my grubby little mitts. I'm going to polish off the book I'm reading now and dig right in. We've talked about the series earlier in the thread, so I won't rehash it...suffice to say that I've very much enjoyed the first four books of the series (yes Wid, even Wizard and Glass--read it again the other week and it really grew on me with a second reading) and highly recommend them to fans of epic fantasy, Westerns, or King in general.

[[AK]StitchJones]

I'm almost done re-reading all of the Dark Tower Books, I will have book V this weekend!

[[AK]Hardnok]

I'm not a huge reader but the last two books I read were pretty cool. The Celestine Prophecies and The Tenth Insight both by James Redfield were awesome. I believe that was his name. Only thing was I was disappointed they were categorized as fiction. Check them out if you want.

[[AK]Bribo]

I need to finish Wizard and Glass! Too much BF1942 and CoD!

[[AK]The Beast]

The cool thing about the Dark Tower series is that a lot of Stephen King's other books tie into it as well, not just the books that actually make up the series. The two books he cowrote with Peter Straub, The Talisman and (to a much greater extent) Black House overlap into the Dark Tower world, and are a very similar "style"--I'd call them a must-read for Dark Tower fans, even if you don't like anything else King does. Insomnia ties in at the end, as does the beginning of Hearts in Atlantis (the movie with Anthony Hopkins was actually just the first piece of this book--the rest is less supernatural but still a very good read). Everything's Eventual has a Roland short story that takes place just before the events of The Gunslinger.

S
p
o
i
l
e
r

s
p
a
c
e

And those who've read Wizard and Glass know that it ties into The Stand, in a way. Finally, I don't think it's spoiling too much to say that there's a character from Salem's Lot who shows up in Wolves of the Calla. I'm a sucker for complicated plots in big, tied-together worlds.

[[AK]Leonidas]

Originally posted by [AK?]Sonic Boom
I dunno, Clancy's last two have been absolute pieces of crap, particularly his latest, The Teeth of the Tiger.

FWIW, I heard that Clancy went through a nasty divorce some years ago. The divorce judge decided that the Jack Ryan character was property subject to division, and awarded half of any Jack Ryan proceeds to his ex-wife. If Clancy's writing has gone downhill, I'd suspect that the divorce decree effectively forcing him to abandon his main character has something to do with it.