The Reader’s Nook - The N&G Book Thread

sorcerer said:
"The Deep", a new book from Rivers Solomon, is available for pre-order on hardcover, paperback, and e-book here
www.simonandschuster.com

The Deep

Winner of the 2021 Audie AwardONE OF NPR’S BEST BOOKS OF 2019 The water-breathing descendants of African slave women tossed overboard have built th...
www.simonandschuster.com www.simonandschuster.com

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"Yetu holds the memories for her people—water-dwelling descendants of pregnant African slave women thrown overboard by slave owners—who live idyllic lives in the deep. Their past, too traumatic to be remembered regularly, is forgotten by everyone, save one—the historian. This demanding role has been bestowed on Yetu.

Yetu remembers for everyone, and the memories, painful and wonderful, traumatic and terrible and miraculous, are destroying her. And so, she flees to the surface, escaping the memories, the expectations, and the responsibilities—and discovers a world her people left behind long ago.

Yetu will learn more than she ever expected to about her own past—and about the future of her people. If they are all to survive, they’ll need to reclaim the memories, reclaim their identity—and own who they really are.

Inspired by a song produced by the rap group Clipping for the This American Life episode 'We Are In The Future,' The Deep is vividly original and uniquely affecting. "

It currently has a 4.2/5 on GoodReads with 157 ratings. Releases on November 5th. 176 pages.

This is the song that the book is based on

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I remember that episode of TAL and love clipping. very interesting.
 
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sorcerer said:
After picking it up on a whim in May, 2018, I have finally finished "The Known World" by Edward P. Jones.
This book is a masterpiece. By far the most intricate story I've read. Almost every character is developed in some way, and everything in the story is connected.
The choice to switch between different timeframes throughout the book is something unlike anything I've ever read, and I felt it to be my favorite part of the book.
It's written beautifully, and once you're engrossed in a chapter it becomes very hard to leave it.

There are many scenes from the book, like Stamford getting the blueberries or Counsel on his deathly journey, that would work amazingly in a television series. Unfortunately, the way that the book is written makes it borderline un-adaptable, and the wide array of characters would probably confuse a lot of people. If a really talented cast and team come together to do it, it would certainly be a sight to behold, but it may be a while.

This review dedicated 7 paragraphs to it and I felt it was a better explanation than what I could give regarding the contents of the book.
It doesn't spoil anything that would ruin more than the first page of the book. It would be incredibly hard to spoil everything in the book anyways, as there are many many many surprises in it.
www.nytimes.com

People Who Owned People (Published 2003)

John Vernon reviews following books: The Known World by Edward P Jones; and Truth by Jacqueline Sheehan; drawing (M)
www.nytimes.com www.nytimes.com
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I was looking for my next book to start today. So thank you! I just borrowed this ebook from my library.
 
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sorcerer said:
One thing you may want to know going into it is that Jones introduced a lot of characters in the first 100 pages or so. Like, so many that it was hard for me to remember who some of them even were.
Fortunately, almost every time he writes about a character that isnt one of the main ones, especially if they haven't been brought up in a while, he'll introduce them with their occupation and relationship to the main characters. So by the end of the book there are like 30+ people you can describe.
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Thank you for telling me this! I get really overwhelmed when I can't keep the characters straight in my head. And I've been known to come up with a spread sheet to help with that for really dense books. You have preempted the panic with your advice.
 
sorcerer said:
Now that my I'm ready for another book, I think it's time I give this one a try

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Indymisanthrope said:
I'm gonna try tackling that one for the first time during the holiday break this year when I can give it uninterrupted attention.
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I reread the first half earlier this summer, then set it aside due to my ever-growing backlog. Trying to keep the reread closer to the movie's release next year (so hyped). It's good stuff; the first time I got all the way through it was my fourth or fifth stab at it; knowing Herbert was interested in ecology helped put a lot of the ideas and worldbuilding into perspective.
 
Bull Shannon said:
I reread the first half earlier this summer, then set it aside due to my ever-growing backlog. Trying to keep the reread closer to the movie's release next year (so hyped). It's good stuff; the first time I got all the way through it was my fourth or fifth stab at it; knowing Herbert was interested in ecology helped put a lot of the ideas and worldbuilding into perspective.
Click to expand...
My plan was to read, then watch Lynch's version, then watch the Jodorowsky doc, then be ready for the new one.
 
sorcerer said:
After picking it up on a whim in May, 2018, I have finally finished "The Known World" by Edward P. Jones.
This book is a masterpiece. By far the most intricate story I've read. Almost every character is developed in some way, and everything in the story is connected.
The choice to switch between different timeframes throughout the book is something unlike anything I've ever read, and I felt it to be my favorite part of the book.
It's written beautifully, and once you're engrossed in a chapter it becomes very hard to leave it.

There are many scenes from the book, like Stamford getting the blueberries or Counsel on his deathly journey, that would work amazingly in a television series. Unfortunately, the way that the book is written makes it borderline un-adaptable, and the wide array of characters would probably confuse a lot of people. If a really talented cast and team come together to do it, it would certainly be a sight to behold, but it may be a while.

This review dedicated 7 paragraphs to it and I felt it was a better explanation than what I could give regarding the contents of the book.
It doesn't spoil anything that would ruin more than the first page of the book. It would be incredibly hard to spoil everything in the book anyways, as there are many many many surprises in it.
www.nytimes.com

People Who Owned People (Published 2003)

John Vernon reviews following books: The Known World by Edward P Jones; and Truth by Jacqueline Sheehan; drawing (M)
www.nytimes.com www.nytimes.com
Click to expand...

I finished this book yesterday. Wow. Now *that* is some epic storytelling. There were times when the author had us going from one timeline to another and back again all within 2 sentences. And it wasn't confusing. Incredible writing. I can see why you say it would be hard to adapt as a series. It took me about 100 pages to really get into it. But once I did, it was hard to put down. Excellent recommendation, thank you!
 
sorcerer said:
omg you finished it already. I would've only been like 50 pages into it if I had started it couple weeks ago.
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I have challenged myself to read 52 books in a year. Which means I need to read 1 a week. And I think it took me 8 days. Also - I was sick last week. Home from work one day. And didn't go out this weekend. That was a lot of reading time.

Otherwise, yes, it would have taken me a good bit more time.
 
Teeeee said:
I have challenged myself to read 52 books in a year. Which means I need to read 1 a week. And I think it took me 8 days. Also - I was sick last week. Home from work one day. And didn't go out this weekend. That was a lot of reading time.

Otherwise, yes, it would have taken me a good bit more time.
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How are you tracking on that for the year? I've been trying to keep pace for 26 a year, and struggling in the summertime, then falling behind. I don't like to give up on books, but I can definitely tell when I run into a book that I don't like, because my progress slows to a crawl.

Anyway, I started to realize that when I focused less on the number of books, and more on the amount of reading I was doing, that targeting ~30 pages a day felt attainable, and would get me to 27 400-page books a year (+/- depending on actual page counts).

I feel more accomplishment when I read multiple books, but I actually end up reading more when I try to maintain a steady rate.
 
Indymisanthrope said:
How are you tracking on that for the year? I've been trying to keep pace for 26 a year, and struggling in the summertime, then falling behind. I don't like to give up on books, but I can definitely tell when I run into a book that I don't like, because my progress slows to a crawl.

Anyway, I started to realize that when I focused less on the number of books, and more on the amount of reading I was doing, that targeting ~30 pages a day felt attainable, and would get me to 27 400-page books a year (+/- depending on actual page counts).

I feel more accomplishment when I read multiple books, but I actually end up reading more when I try to maintain a steady rate.
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I am at 22 books for 18 weeks. Which is great, it gives me some breathing room for the more difficult books.

I have a note in my phone where I keep track. I try to make sure I start a new book every Sunday. So, if I finish one earlier in the week, I can start a new one or just give myself a few days to read magazines or whatever. And if I use my kindle, I know I should read 17% of a book a day in order to get myself to that 1 a week (I did some weird internal calculus to come up with that number). So that is very similar to your number of pages per day. If I'm reading a book, I'll divide the total pages by 7 and try to aim for that daily amount. I know that sounds like a lot of rules for myself. But I get distracted with other things. So giving myself daily and weekly goals keeps me from being distracted. And it also is making it become more of a habit than a rule. I just do it now.

I can also tell if I don't like a book - I don't finish my 17%. And it helps me decide whether or not to call it a loss or to kick my butt into gear.
 
Teeeee said:
I am at 22 books for 18 weeks. Which is great, it gives me some breathing room for the more difficult books.

I have a note in my phone where I keep track. I try to make sure I start a new book every Sunday. So, if I finish one earlier in the week, I can start a new one or just give myself a few days to read magazines or whatever. And if I use my kindle, I know I should read 17% of a book a day in order to get myself to that 1 a week (I did some weird internal calculus to come up with that number). So that is very similar to your number of pages per day. If I'm reading a book, I'll divide the total pages by 7 and try to aim for that daily amount. I know that sounds like a lot of rules for myself. But I get distracted with other things. So giving myself daily and weekly goals keeps me from being distracted. And it also is making it become more of a habit than a rule. I just do it now.

I can also tell if I don't like a book - I don't finish my 17%. And it helps me decide whether or not to call it a loss or to kick my butt into gear.
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I should say - I didn't start on Jan 1. I started on July 1. I don't know why, I think it just happened to be that month that the idea popped into my head. I hit 42 books last year. So I'm hoping to best that this year.
 
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LeSamourai said:
100ish 😬

I set a goal of 52 for this year to try to read less (not joking), but it didn't work. Maybe next year.
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Wow, I'm impressed. That is 2 a week or so. But why are you trying to cut back? Reading is awesome.

BjorgenFjorgen said:
Oh man, I just try to read 5,000 pages a year. I haven't come close to 10,000 since university.
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I have never thought to make total number of pages my goal. Mostly because I'm bad at math - roughly how many books would you say that is?
 
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LeSamourai said:
100ish 😬

I set a goal of 52 for this year to try to read less (not joking), but it didn't work. Maybe next year.
Click to expand...
Wow. What kind of books are we talking? I can get through something fairly quickly if I'm trying to understand the gist of an idea and am sort of scanning for important points, but it's tough for me to absorb fiction/pleasure reading at that rate for sure.
 
Teeeee said:
I have never thought to make total number of pages my goal. Mostly because I'm bad at math - roughly how many books would you say that is?
Click to expand...
I use Goodreads (and a spreadsheet) to keep track, so it adds it all up for me. But I read books of varying lengths all the time, so it seems more accurate for me to compare years that way, instead of reading five fewer books in a year I tackle Gravity's Rainbow or something and thinking I that I didn't read much.
 
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