author: Truman Capote
name: Alex
average rating: 3.87
book published: 1958
rating: 4
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date added: 2025/02/03
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Since his triumphant release in 1990 from more than a quarter-century of imprisonment, Mandela has been at the center of the most compelling and inspiring political drama in the world. As president of the African National Congress and head of South Africa's anti-apartheid movement, he was instrumental in moving the nation toward multiracial government and majority rule. He is revered everywhere as a vital force in the fight for human rights and racial equality.
The foster son of a Thembu chief, Mandela was raised in the traditional, tribal culture of his ancestors, but at an early age learned the modern, inescapable reality of what came to be called apartheid, one of the most powerful and effective systems of oppression ever conceived. In classically elegant and engrossing prose, he tells of his early years as an impoverished student and law clerk in a Jewish firm in Johannesburg, of his slow political awakening, and of his pivotal role in the rebirth of a stagnant ANC and the formation of its Youth League in the 1950s.
He describes the struggle to reconcile his political activity with his devotion to his family, the anguished breakup of his first marriage, and the painful separations from his children. He brings vividly to life the escalating political warfare in the fifties between the ANC and the government, culminating in his dramatic escapades as an underground leader and the notorious Rivonia Trial of 1964, at which he was sentenced to life imprisonment. Herecounts the surprisingly eventful twenty-seven years in prison and the complex, delicate negotiations that led both to his freedom and to the beginning of the end of apartheid. Finally he provides the ultimate inside account.]]>
author: Nelson Mandela
name: Alex
average rating: 4.34
book published: 1994
rating: 0
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date added: 2015/01/27
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author: J.K. Rowling
name: Alex
average rating: 4.57
book published: 2005
rating: 5
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date added: 2014/04/28
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Why did he have to fight his battle, not against his enemies, but against those who needed him most, and his hardest battle against the woman he loved? What is the world鈥檚 motor 鈥� and the motive power of every man? You will know the answer to these questions when you discover the reason behind the baffling events that play havoc with the lives of the characters in this story.
Tremendous in its scope, this novel presents an astounding panorama of human life 鈥� from the productive genius who becomes a worthless playboy 鈥� to the great steel industrialist who does not know that he is working for his own destruction 鈥� to the philosopher who becomes a pirate 鈥� to the composer who gives up his career on the night of his triumph 鈥� to the woman who runs a transcontinental railroad 鈥� to the lowest track worker in her Terminal tunnels.
You must be prepared, when you read this novel, to check every premise at the root of your convictions.
This is a mystery story, not about the murder 鈥� and rebirth 鈥� of man鈥檚 spirit. It is a philosophical revolution, told in the form of an action thriller of violent events, a ruthlessly brilliant plot structure and an irresistible suspense. Do you say this is impossible? Well, that is the first of your premises to check.]]>
author: Ayn Rand
name: Alex
average rating: 3.67
book published: 1957
rating: 1
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date added: 2014/02/22
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Jason Bourne
Reenter the shadowy world of Jason Bourne, an expert assassin still plagued by the splintered nightmares of his former life. This time the stakes are higher than ever. For someone else has taken on the Bourne identity鈥攁 ruthless killer who must be stopped or the world will pay a devastating price. To succeed, the real Jason Bourne must maneuver through the dangerous labyrinth of international espionage鈥攁n exotic world filled with CIA plots, turncoat agents, and ever-shifting alliances鈥攁ll the while hoping to find the truth behind his haunted memories and the answers to his own fragmented past. This time there are two Bournes鈥攁nd one must die.]]>
author: Robert Ludlum
name: Alex
average rating: 4.12
book published: 1986
rating: 2
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date added: 2014/02/22
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author: Ian Fleming
name: Alex
average rating: 3.82
book published: 1959
rating: 1
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date added: 2014/02/22
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The best American novel to emerge from World War I, A Farewell to Arms is the unforgettable story of an American ambulance driver on the Italian front and his passion for a beautiful English nurse. Hemingway鈥檚 frank portrayal of the love between Lieutenant Henry and Catherine Barkley, caught in the inexorable sweep of war, glows with an intensity unrivaled in modern literature, while his description of the German attack on Caporetto鈥攐f lines of fired men marching in the rain, hungry, weary, and demoralized鈥攊s one of the greatest moments in literary history. A story of love and pain, of loyalty and desertion, A Farewell to Arms, written when he was thirty years old, represents a new romanticism for Hemingway.]]>
author: Ernest Hemingway
name: Alex
average rating: 3.67
book published: 1929
rating: 3
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date added: 2014/02/22
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A devastating new weapon of destruction.
When world-renowned Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon is summoned to a Swiss research facility to analyze a mysterious symbol -- seared into the chest of a murdered physicist -- he discovers evidence of the unimaginable: the resurgence of an ancient secret brotherhood known as the Illuminati...the most powerful underground organization ever to walk the earth. The Illuminati has now surfaced to carry out the final phase of its legendary vendetta against its most hated enemy -- the Catholic Church.
Langdon's worst fears are confirmed on the eve of the Vatican's holy conclave, when a messenger of the Illuminati announces they have hidden an unstoppable time bomb at the very heart of Vatican City. With the countdown under way, Langdon jets to Rome to join forces with Vittoria Vetra, a beautiful and mysterious Italian scientist, to assist the Vatican in a desperate bid for survival.
Embarking on a frantic hunt through sealed crypts, dangerous catacombs, deserted cathedrals, and even the most secretive vault on earth, Langdon and Vetra follow a 400-year-old trail of ancient symbols that snakes across Rome toward the long-forgotten Illuminati lair...a clandestine location that contains the only hope for Vatican salvation.
An explosive international thriller, Angels & Demons careens from enlightening epiphanies to dark truths as the battle between science and religion turns to war.]]>
author: Dan Brown
name: Alex
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2000
rating: 2
read at:
date added: 2014/02/22
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author: Robert Ludlum
name: Alex
average rating: 3.86
book published: 1977
rating: 2
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date added: 2014/02/22
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author: Anthony Burgess
name: Alex
average rating: 3.74
book published: 1962
rating: 3
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date added: 2014/02/22
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AND HE MAY HAVE NO FUTURE.
His memory is a blank. He only knows he was fished out of the Mediterranean Sea, his body riddled with bullets. There are a few clues. A frame of microfilm surgically implanted beneath the flesh of his hop. Evidence that plastic surgery has altered his face. Strange things that he says in his delirium -- maybe code words. Initials: "J.B.". And a number on the film negative that leads to a Swiss bank account, a fortune four million dollars, and, at last, a name: Jason Bourne. But now he is marked for death, caught in a maddening puzzle, racing for survival through the deep layers of his buried past into a bizarre world of murderous conspirators -- led by Carlos, the world's most dangerous assassin. And no one can help Jason Bourne but the woman who once wanted to escape him.]]>
author: Robert Ludlum
name: Alex
average rating: 3.83
book published: 1980
rating: 3
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date added: 2014/02/22
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Marlowe's about to give up on a completely routine case when he finds himself in the wrong place at the right time to get caught up in a murder that leads to a ring of jewel thieves, another murder, a fortune-teller, a couple more murders, and more corruption than your average graveyard.]]>
author: Raymond Chandler
name: Alex
average rating: 4.12
book published: 1940
rating: 3
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date added: 2014/02/22
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author: Thomas Pynchon
name: Alex
average rating: 4.01
book published: 1963
rating: 5
read at: 2008/01/04
date added: 2014/02/22
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Thomas Pynchon is the kind of author you read for the sheer brilliance of his prose. V. is a profoundly twisted and confounding book, throwing in story lines and characters from so many different directions and time periods that it's impossible to always understand what's happening. Some chapters rely too heavily on form and too little on content, causing them to drag a bit, but most of Pynchon's first novel, especially the chapters that focus on the "Whole Sick Crew," is delightful and pleasantly challenging to read. It may be the kind of book that makes absolute sense the second time around, but it's going to be a while before I tackle it again, so for now, I recommend reading it for the insight into the mind of one the 20th century's most talented writers, and don't worry too much if you're totally lost every now and then.
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author: Khaled Hosseini
name: Alex
average rating: 4.34
book published: 2003
rating: 3
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date added: 2014/02/22
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Harry has had enough. He is beginning to think he must do something, anything, to change his situation, when the summer holidays come to an end in a very dramatic fashion. What Harry is about to discover in his new year at Hogwarts will turn his world upside down...]]>
author: J.K. Rowling
name: Alex
average rating: 4.50
book published: 2003
rating: 3
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date added: 2014/02/22
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Trout, modeled according to Vonnegut on the science fiction writer Theodore Sturgeon (with whom Vonnegut had an occasional relationship) is a desperate, impoverished but visionary hack writer who functions for Eliot Rosewater as both conscience and horrid example. Rosewater, seeking to put his inheritance to some meaningful use (his father was an entrepreneur), tries to do good within the context of almost illimitable cynicism and corruption.
It is in this novel that Rosewater wanders into a science fiction conference--an actual annual event in Milford, Pennsylvania--and at the motel delivers his famous monologue evoked by science fiction writers and critics for almost half a century: "None of you can write for sour apples... but you're the only people trying to come to terms with the really terrific things which are happening today." Money does not drive Mr. Rosewater (or the corrupt lawyer who tries to shape the Rosewater fortune) so much as outrage at the human condition.
The novel was adapted for a 1979 Alan Menken musical. The novel is told mostly thru a collection of short stories dealing with Eliot's interactions with the citizens of Rosewater County, usually with the last sentence serving as a punch line. The antagonist's tale, Mushari's, is told in a similar short essay fashion. The stories reveal different hypocrisies of humankind in a darkly humorous fashion.]]>
author: Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
name: Alex
average rating: 3.94
book published: 1965
rating: 3
read at: 2008/12/27
date added: 2014/02/22
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author: J.K. Rowling
name: Alex
average rating: 4.56
book published: 2000
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2014/02/22
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While in Paris on business, Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon receives an urgent late-night phone call: the elderly curator of the Louvre has been murdered inside the museum. Near the body, police have found a baffling cipher. While working to solve the enigmatic riddle, Langdon is stunned to discover it leads to a trail of clues hidden in the works of Da Vinci -- clues visible for all to see -- yet ingeniously disguised by the painter.
Langdon joins forces with a gifted French cryptologist, Sophie Neveu, and learns the late curator was involved in the Priory of Sion -- an actual secret society whose members included Sir Isaac Newton, Botticelli, Victor Hugo, and Da Vinci, among others.
In a breathless race through Paris, London, and beyond, Langdon and Neveu match wits with a faceless powerbroker who seems to anticipate their every move. Unless Langdon and Neveu can decipher the labyrinthine puzzle in time, the Priory's ancient secret -- and an explosive historical truth -- will be lost forever.
The Da Vinci Code heralds the arrival of a new breed of lightning-paced, intelligent thriller utterly unpredictable right up to its stunning conclusion.]]>
author: Dan Brown
name: Alex
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2003
rating: 2
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date added: 2014/02/22
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author: Chuck Palahniuk
name: Alex
average rating: 4.19
book published: 1996
rating: 4
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date added: 2014/02/22
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Mother Night is a daring challenge to our moral sense. American Howard W. Campbell, Jr., a spy during World War II, is now on trial in Israel as a Nazi war criminal. But is he really guilty? In this brilliant book rife with true gallows humor, Vonnegut turns black and white into a chilling shade of gray with a verdict that will haunt us all.]]>
author: Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
name: Alex
average rating: 4.23
book published: 1961
rating: 4
read at: 2007/12/01
date added: 2014/02/22
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I have also read Cat's Cradle, Breakfast of Champions, and the legendary Slaughterhouse-Five, and I believe this, Mother Night, to be the finest among them. Mother Night couples the reliably brilliant writing style of Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. with a truly fascinating story. It is a beautiful, darkly comic investigation of the warped human psyche, and I highly recommend it to anyone and everyone.
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In his blistering new novel, Cormac McCarthy returns to the Texas-Mexico border, the setting of his famed Border Trilogy. The time is our own, when rustlers have given way to drug-runners and small towns have become free-fire zones.
One day, Llewellyn Moss finds a pickup truck surrounded by a bodyguard of dead men. A load of heroin and two million dollars in cash are still in the back. When Moss takes the money, he sets off a chain reaction of catastrophic violence that not even the law鈥搃n the person of aging, disillusioned Sheriff Bell鈥揷an contain.
As Moss tries to evade his pursuers鈥搃n particular a mysterious mastermind who flips coins for human lives鈥揗cCarthy simultaneously strips down the American crime novel and broadens its concerns to encompass themes as ancient as the Bible and as bloodily contemporary as this morning鈥檚 headlines.
No Country for Old Men is a triumph.]]>
author: Cormac McCarthy
name: Alex
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2005
rating: 4
read at: 2008/01/01
date added: 2014/02/22
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Cormac McCarthy uses his minimalist style to great effect in No Country for Old Men, making for an unstoppable and fascinating read. Most enticing perhaps is the villain character Chigurh, defined by an inconquerable will and a penchant for philosophical musings delivered to his future victims. The pitting of Chigurh against Llewelyn Moss reminded me of the dynamics between Russell Crowe and Christian Bale in 3:10 to Yuma, featuring an antagonist who demanded respect and a protagonist who wasn't perfect but won over your sympathies. Any scene featuring either of the two is impossible to stop reading. Hats of to McCarthy for grabbing hold and not letting go.
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author: Evelyn Waugh
name: Alex
average rating: 3.81
book published: 1945
rating: 4
read at: 2012/01/16
date added: 2014/02/22
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This edition is the enduring original text, updated with the author鈥檚 own revisions, a foreword by his granddaughter, and with a new introduction by National Book Award winner Jesmyn Ward.
The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald鈥檚 third book, stands as the supreme achievement of his career. First published by Scribner in 1925, this quintessential novel of the Jazz Age has been acclaimed by generations of readers. The story of the mysteriously wealthy Jay Gatsby and his love for the beautiful Daisy Buchanan is an exquisitely crafted tale of America in the 1920s.]]>
But despite its magic, the rhetoric is just that, and it is a cruel facade. Behind the stunning glitter lies a story with all the discontent and intensity of the early Metallica albums. At its heart, The Great Gatsby throws the very nature of our desires into a harsh, shocking light. There may never be a character who so epitomizes tragically misplaced devotion as Jay Gatsby, and Daisy, his devotee, plays her part with perfect, innocent malevolence. Gatsby's competition, Tom Buchanan, stands aside watching, taunting and provoking with piercing vocal jabs and the constant boast of his enviable physique. The three jostle for position in an epic love triangle that lays waste to countless innocent victims, as well as both Eggs of Long Island. Every jab, hook, and uppercut is relayed by the instantly likable narrator Nick Carraway, seemingly the only voice of reason amongst all the chaos. But when those boats are finally borne back ceaselessly by the current, no one is left afloat. It is an ethical massacre, and Fitzgerald spares no lives; there is perhaps not a single character of any significance worthy even of a Sportsmanship Award from the Boys and Girls Club.
In a word, The Great Gatsby is about deception; Fitzgerald tints our glasses rosy with gorgeous prose and a narrator you want so much to trust, but leaves the lenses just translucent enough for us to see that Gatsby is getting the same treatment. And if Gatsby represents the truth of the American Dream, it means trouble for us all. Consider it the most pleasant insult you'll ever receive.]]>
author: F. Scott Fitzgerald
name: Alex
average rating: 3.93
book published: 1925
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2014/01/13
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The Great Gatsby is your neighbor you're best friends with until you find out he's a drug dealer. It charms you with some of the most elegant English prose ever published, making it difficult to discuss the novel without the urge to stammer awestruck about its beauty. It would be evidence enough to argue that F. Scott Fitzgerald was superhuman, if it wasn't for the fact that we know he also wrote This Side of Paradise.
But despite its magic, the rhetoric is just that, and it is a cruel facade. Behind the stunning glitter lies a story with all the discontent and intensity of the early Metallica albums. At its heart, The Great Gatsby throws the very nature of our desires into a harsh, shocking light. There may never be a character who so epitomizes tragically misplaced devotion as Jay Gatsby, and Daisy, his devotee, plays her part with perfect, innocent malevolence. Gatsby's competition, Tom Buchanan, stands aside watching, taunting and provoking with piercing vocal jabs and the constant boast of his enviable physique. The three jostle for position in an epic love triangle that lays waste to countless innocent victims, as well as both Eggs of Long Island. Every jab, hook, and uppercut is relayed by the instantly likable narrator Nick Carraway, seemingly the only voice of reason amongst all the chaos. But when those boats are finally borne back ceaselessly by the current, no one is left afloat. It is an ethical massacre, and Fitzgerald spares no lives; there is perhaps not a single character of any significance worthy even of a Sportsmanship Award from the Boys and Girls Club.
In a word, The Great Gatsby is about deception; Fitzgerald tints our glasses rosy with gorgeous prose and a narrator you want so much to trust, but leaves the lenses just translucent enough for us to see that Gatsby is getting the same treatment. And if Gatsby represents the truth of the American Dream, it means trouble for us all. Consider it the most pleasant insult you'll ever receive.
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author: P.D. James
name: Alex
average rating: 3.69
book published: 1992
rating: 1
read at: 2007/12/01
date added: 2014/01/01
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I was disappointed by the film, finding myself unable to muster sympathy for the characters, but I was intrigued by the basic plot and so ventured out to explore the novel. PD James' original creation follows a plot significantly different compared to that of the movie, but I found it to be no less disappointing. The main character, Theo, was perhaps even less likable, due mostly to his lack of conviction about anything during the first half of the book. I was never able to develop an intense fear of or hatred for the government against which the main characters rebelled; the "Council of England" did seem to ignore a few issues of compromised civil-rights, but for the most part presented fairly logical arguments for their pragmatic approach to governance as the human race aged into its final days. Thus, when the inevitable revelation of human pregnancy was revealed and the protagonists embarked on a quest to evade the government until the baby was born, I was unable to share their feelings of fear and despair, and I cared little when characters died. The book moved quickly, especially the second half, which allowed me to follow its absurd plotline through to its disappointing completion - the story was mostly well-written, save for moments of impending excitement that would be introduced with the sentence, "And then it happened." I commend James for her imagination; the basic premise is indeed quite intriguing. I can't say her execution held my interest, though.
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Fueled by a world-weariness that belied Capote鈥檚 tender age, this novel tempers its themes of waylaid hopes and lost innocence with an appreciation for small pleasures and the colorful language of its time and place.
This new edition, featuring an enlightening Introduction by John Berendt, offers readers a fresh look at Capote鈥檚 emerging brilliance as a writer of protean power and effortless grace.
From the Hardcover edition.]]>
author: Truman Capote
name: Alex
average rating: 3.80
book published: 1948
rating: 3
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date added: 2012/01/25
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author: Thomas Pynchon
name: Alex
average rating: 4.01
book published: 1973
rating: 5
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date added: 2012/01/25
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author: Patricia Highsmith
name: Alex
average rating: 3.91
book published: 1955
rating: 3
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date added: 2008/12/21
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author: Robert Ludlum
name: Alex
average rating: 4.07
book published: 1979
rating: 2
read at:
date added: 2008/10/30
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A father and his son walk alone through burned America. Nothing moves in the ravaged landscape save the ash on the wind. It is cold enough to crack stones, and when the snow falls it is gray. The sky is dark. Their destination is the coast, although they don鈥檛 know what, if anything, awaits them there. They have nothing; just a pistol to defend themselves against the lawless bands that stalk the road, the clothes they are wearing, a cart of scavenged food鈥攁nd each other.
The Road is the profoundly moving story of a journey. It boldly imagines a future in which no hope remains, but in which the father and his son, 鈥渆ach the other鈥檚 world entire,鈥� are sustained by love. Awesome in the totality of its vision, it is an unflinching meditation on the worst and the best that we are capable of: ultimate destructiveness, desperate tenacity, and the tenderness that keeps two people alive in the face of total devastation.]]>
author: Cormac McCarthy
name: Alex
average rating: 3.99
book published: 2006
rating: 4
read at: 2008/10/30
date added: 2008/10/30
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Together this dynamic pair begin a journey through space aided by quotes from The Hitchhiker's Guide ("A towel is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have") and a galaxy-full of fellow travelers: Zaphod Beeblebrox--the two-headed, three-armed ex-hippie and totally out-to-lunch president of the galaxy; Trillian, Zaphod's girlfriend (formally Tricia McMillan), whom Arthur tried to pick up at a cocktail party once upon a time zone; Marvin, a paranoid, brilliant, and chronically depressed robot; Veet Voojagig, a former graduate student who is obsessed with the disappearance of all the ballpoint pens he bought over the years.
Where are these pens? Why are we born? Why do we die? Why do we spend so much time between wearing digital watches? For all the answers stick your thumb to the stars. And don't forget to bring a towel!]]>
author: Douglas Adams
name: Alex
average rating: 4.21
book published: 1979
rating: 4
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date added: 2008/03/30
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This beloved story -first published more than fifty years ago- introduces readers to Milo and his adventures in the Lands Beyond.
For Milo, everything鈥檚 a bore. When a tollbooth mysteriously appears in his room, he drives through only because he鈥檚 got nothing better to do. But on the other side, things seem different. Milo visits the Island of Conclusions (you get there by jumping), learns about time from a ticking watchdog named Tock, and even embarks on a quest to rescue Rhyme and Reason! Somewhere along the way, Milo realizes something astonishing. Life is far from dull. In fact, it鈥檚 exciting beyond his wildest dreams. . . .]]>
author: Norton Juster
name: Alex
average rating: 4.19
book published: 1961
rating: 3
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date added: 2008/03/29
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For 6,557 miles, Chuck Klosterman thought about dying. He drove a rental car from New York to Rhode Island to Georgia to Mississippi to Iowa to Minneapolis to Fargo to Seattle, and he chased death and rock 鈥榥鈥� roll all the way. Within the span of twenty-one days, Chuck had three relationships end鈥攐ne by choice, one by chance, and one by exhaustion. He snorted cocaine in a graveyard. He walked a half-mile through a bean field. A man in Dickinson, North Dakota, explained to him why we have fewer windmills than we used to. He listened to the KISS solo albums and the Rod Stewart box set. At one point, poisonous snakes became involved. The road is hard. From the Chelsea Hotel to the swampland where Lynyrd Skynyrd鈥檚 plane went down to the site where Kurt Cobain blew his head off, Chuck explored every brand of rock star demise. He wanted to know why the greatest career move any musician can make is to stop breathing...and what this means for the rest of us.]]>
author: Chuck Klosterman
name: Alex
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2005
rating: 2
read at: 2008/02/01
date added: 2008/03/29
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Chuck Klosterman's day job is as a rock critic for Spin Magazine, and that's quite apparent in Killing Yourself to Live. The book, an extension of a project he did for Spin involving a cross-country trip to sites where rock stars died, is engaging so long as Chuck sticks to music. The problem is, somewhere along the line he decided music wouldn't be enough. He makes several attempts at broad, philosophical generalizations about death, but none are particularly insightful and most are simply irritating. At one point he mentions Dave Eggers' suffocating influence on the memoir genre, and one can only hope Chuck realizes that he is perhaps the guiltiest of all in terms of Eggers style plagiarism. He even goes so far as to include a mock dialogue between himself and three of his female interests, a badly concealed homage to Eggers' imagined interview with an MTV's Real World talent scout in A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius. What keeps the reader going is the anticipation of the plot returning to anything relevant to music, so perhaps the book's greatest strong point is its pacing. In the end, though, no amount of witty rock criticism could overshadow the nagging doubt that maybe this project should never have been expanded from its original article form. The upside is that the title becomes quite relevant; the inclusion of the additional subject matter - faux intellectualism, every detail of Chuck's personal life, etc. - may be what allow the project to live in book form, but unfortunately that's also what's killing it.
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With rigor and wit, Dawkins examines God in all his forms, from the sex-obsessed tyrant of the Old Testament, to the more benign (but still illogical) Celestial Watchmaker favored by some Enlightenment thinkers. He eviscerates the major arguments for religion, and demonstrates the supreme improbability of a supreme being. He shows how religion fuels war, foments bigotry, and abuses children, buttressing his points with historical and contemporary evidence.
The God Delusion makes a compelling case that belief in God is not just wrong, but potentially deadly. It also offers exhilarating insight into the advantages of atheism to the individual and society, not the least of which is a clearer, truer appreciation of the universe's wonders than any faith could ever muster.]]>
author: Richard Dawkins
name: Alex
average rating: 3.89
book published: 2006
rating: 4
read at: 2008/02/07
date added: 2008/01/24
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author: Joan Didion
name: Alex
average rating: 3.94
book published: 1970
rating: 3
read at: 2008/01/01
date added: 2008/01/21
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Play It As It Lays may have been written almost forty years ago, but it reads immediate and modern, bringing the Hollywood culture to life in all its nihilistic, maddening glory. The novel reads incredibly quickly, and the story does not disappoint, especially for fans of the darker side of things.
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Tender Branson鈥攍ast surviving member of the so-called Creedish Death Cult鈥攊s dictating his life story into the flight recorder of Flight 2039, cruising on autopilot at 39,000 feet somewhere over the Pacific Ocean. He is all alone in the airplane, which will crash shortly into the vast Australian outback. Before it does, he will unfold the tale of his journey from an obedient Creedish child and humble domestic servant to an ultra-buffed, steroid- and collagen-packed media messiah, author of a best-selling autobiography, Saved from Salvation, and the even better selling Book of Very Common Prayer (The Prayer to Delay Orgasm, The Prayer to Prevent Hair Loss, The Prayer to Silence Car Alarms). He'll reveal the truth of his tortured romance with the elusive and prescient Fertility Hollis, share his insight that "the only difference between suicide and martyrdom is press coverage," and deny responsibility for the Tender Branson Sensitive Materials Sanitary Landfill, a 20,000-acre repository for the nation's outdated pornography. Among other matters both bizarre and trenchant.
Not since Kurt Vonnegut's Mother Night and Jerzy Kosinski's Being There has there been as dark and telling a satire on the wages of fame and the bedrock lunacy of the modern world. Unpredictable, compelling, and unforgettable, Survivor is Chuck Palahniuk at his deadpan peak; and it cements his place as one of the most original writers in fiction today.]]>
author: Chuck Palahniuk
name: Alex
average rating: 3.92
book published: 1999
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2007/12/24
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But Ender is not the only result of the experiment. The war with the Buggers has been raging for a hundred years, and the quest for the perfect general has been underway almost as long. Ender's two older siblings, Peter and Valentine, are every bit as unusual as he is, but in very different ways. While Peter was too uncontrollably violent, Valentine very nearly lacks the capability for violence altogether. Neither was found suitable for the military's purpose. But they are driven by their jealousy of Ender, and by their inbred drive for power. Peter seeks to control the political process, to become a ruler. Valentine's abilities turn more toward the subtle control of the beliefs of commoner and elite alike, through powerfully convincing essays. Hiding their youth and identities behind the anonymity of the computer networks, these two begin working together to shape the destiny of Earth-an Earth that has no future at all if their brother Ender fails.]]>
author: Orson Scott Card
name: Alex
average rating: 4.31
book published: 1985
rating: 4
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New introductions commissioned from today's top writers and scholars
Biographies of the authors
Chronologies of contemporary historical, biographical, and cultural events
Footnotes and endnotes
Selective discussions of imitations, parodies, poems, books, plays, paintings, operas, statuary, and films inspired by the work
Comments by other famous authors
Study questions to challenge the reader's viewpoints and expectations
Bibliographies for further reading
Indices & Glossaries, when appropriate
All editions are beautifully designed and are printed to superior specifications; some include illustrations of historical interest. Barnes & Noble Classics pulls together a constellation of influences鈥攂iographical, historical, and literary鈥攖o enrich each reader's understanding of these enduring works.
听
If the 鈥淩oaring Twenties鈥� are remembered as the era of鈥渇laming youth,鈥� it was F. Scott Fitzgerald who lit the fire. His semi-autobiographical first novel, This Side of Paradise, became an instant best-seller and established an image of seemingly carefree, party-mad young men and women out to create a new morality for a new, post-war America. It traces the early life of Amory Blaine from the end of prep school through Princeton to the start of an uncertain career in New York City.
Alternately self-confident and self-effacing, torn between ambition and idleness, the self-absorbed, immature Amory yearns to run with Princeton鈥檚 rich, fast crowd and become one of the 鈥済ods鈥� of the campus. Hopelessly romantic, he learns about love and sex from a series of beautiful young 鈥渇lappers,鈥� women who leave him both exhilarated and devastated. Fitzgerald describes it all in intensely lyrical prose that fills the novel with a heartbreaking sense of longing, as Amory comes to understand that the sweet-scented springtime of his life is fragile and fleeting, disappearing into memory even as he reaches for it.
听
Sharon G. Carson is Professor Emerita in the English Department at Kent State University, where she has taught for thirty-five years. She is the author of numerous articles and essays on modern and contemporary fiction.]]>
author: F. Scott Fitzgerald
name: Alex
average rating: 3.67
book published: 1920
rating: 3
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A story of classic simplicity, based on a Mexican folk tale, The Pearl explores the secrets of man鈥檚 nature, greed, the darkest depths of evil, and the luminous possibilities of love.]]>
author: John Steinbeck
name: Alex
average rating: 3.52
book published: 1947
rating: 2
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First published in 1939, The Grapes of Wrath summed up its era in the way that Uncle Tom's Cabin summed up the years of slavery before the Civil War. Sensitive to fascist and communist criticism, Steinbeck insisted that "The Battle Hymn of the Republic" be printed in its entirety in the first edition of the book鈥攚hich takes its title from the first verse: "He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored." At once a naturalistic epic, captivity narrative, road novel, and transcendental gospel, Steinbeck鈥檚 fictional chronicle of the Dust Bowl migration of the 1930s is perhaps the most American of American Classics.]]>
author: John Steinbeck
name: Alex
average rating: 3.88
book published: 1939
rating: 3
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A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius is an instant classic that will be read for decades to come.]]>
author: Dave Eggers
name: Alex
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2000
rating: 3
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One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them, One Ring to bring them all and in the darkeness bind them
In ancient times the Rings of Power were crafted by the Elven-smiths, and Sauron, The Dark Lord, forged the One Ring, filling it with his own power so that he could rule all others. But the One Ring was taken from him, and though he sought it throughout Middle-earth, it remained lost to him. After many ages it fell into the hands of Bilbo Baggins, as told in The Hobbit.
In a sleepy village in the Shire, young Frodo Baggins finds himself faced with an immense task, as his elderly cousin Bilbo entrusts the Ring to his care. Frodo must leave his home and make a perilous journey across Middle-earth to the Cracks of Doom, there to destroy the Ring and foil the Dark Lord in his evil purpose.
--back cover]]>
author: J.R.R. Tolkien
name: Alex
average rating: 4.36
book published: 1954
rating: 3
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"Aldous Huxley is the greatest 20th century writer in English." 鈥擟hicago Tribune]]>
author: Aldous Huxley
name: Alex
average rating: 3.99
book published: 1932
rating: 5
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They are an unlikely pair: George is "small and quick and dark of face"; Lennie, a man of tremendous size, has the mind of a young child. Yet they have formed a "family," clinging together in the face of loneliness and alienation. Laborers in California's dusty vegetable fields, they hustle work when they can, living a hand-to-mouth existence. But George and Lennie have a plan: to own an acre of land and a shack they can call their own.
While the powerlessness of the laboring class is a recurring theme in Steinbeck's work of the late 1930s, he narrowed his focus when composing Of Mice and Men, creating an intimate portrait of two men facing a world marked by petty tyranny, misunderstanding, jealousy, and callousness. But though the scope is narrow, the theme is universal: a friendship and a shared dream that makes an individual's existence meaningful.
A unique perspective on life's hardships, this story has achieved the status of timeless classic due to its remarkable success as a novel, a Broadway play, and three acclaimed films.]]>
author: John Steinbeck
name: Alex
average rating: 3.88
book published: 1937
rating: 4
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author: J.R.R. Tolkien
name: Alex
average rating: 4.29
book published: 1937
rating: 3
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The book tells the story of a group of farm animals who rebel against their human farmer, hoping to create a society where the animals can be equal, free, and happy. Ultimately, however, the rebellion is betrayed, and the farm ends up in a state as bad as it was before, under the dictatorship of a pig named Napoleon.
One night, all the animals at Mr. Jones' Manor Farm assemble in a barn to hear old Major, a pig, describe a dream he had about a world where all animals live free from the tyranny of their human masters. Old Major dies soon after the meeting, but the animals 鈥� inspired by his philosophy of Animalism 鈥� plot a rebellion against Jones.
Two pigs, Snowball and Napoleon, prove themselves important figures and planners of this dangerous enterprise. When Jones forgets to feed the animals, the revolution occurs, and Jones and his men are chased off the farm. Manor Farm is renamed Animal Farm, and the Seven Commandments of Animalism are painted on the barn wall...]]>
author: George Orwell
name: Alex
average rating: 3.90
book published: 1945
rating: 4
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author: George Orwell
name: Alex
average rating: 4.15
book published: 1949
rating: 4
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In this final, seventh installment of the Harry Potter series, J.K. Rowling unveils in spectacular fashion the answers to the many questions that have been so eagerly awaited.]]>
author: J.K. Rowling
name: Alex
average rating: 4.61
book published: 2007
rating: 4
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author: J.K. Rowling
name: Alex
average rating: 4.57
book published: 1999
rating: 4
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And strike it does. For in Harry鈥檚 second year at Hogwarts, fresh torments and horrors arise, including an outrageously stuck-up new professor and a spirit who haunts the girls鈥� bathroom. But then the real trouble begins 鈥� someone is turning Hogwarts students to stone. Could it be Draco Malfoy, a more poisonous rival than ever? Could it possibly be Hagrid, whose mysterious past is finally told? Or could it be the one everyone at Hogwarts most suspects鈥� Harry Potter himself!]]>
author: J.K. Rowling
name: Alex
average rating: 4.42
book published: 1998
rating: 4
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author: J.K. Rowling
name: Alex
average rating: 4.47
book published: 1997
rating: 4
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author: William Faulkner
name: Alex
average rating: 3.86
book published: 1929
rating: 2
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This edition reproduces the corrected text of As I Lay Dying as established in 1985 by Noel Polk.]]>
author: William Faulkner
name: Alex
average rating: 3.71
book published: 1930
rating: 4
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Moscow --- a city under siege by hardcore Communists threatening to plunge the country back into Stalinist darkness. Into the heart of the firestorm, American ambassador Stephen Metcalfe has been summoned to find the one man who controls the levers of power in absolute secrecy --- an official known only as the Dirizhor. His support of the bloody coup will bring the entire world to the brink of nuclear war. Metcalfe is the only man with the cunning to reach him and to convince him to resist. It's up to Metcalfe to change the course of history. He's done it before.
THE POWER OF THE PAST
For Metcalfe, returning to Russia is also a personal mission that will stretch across three continents and fifty years into his past where the loyalties of a former love --- a woman both impossibly beautiful and possibly treacherous --- were tested; where the shadow of a Nazi assassin still haunts; and a debauched German aristocrat manipulated the destiny of everyone he touched. Now, as past and present converge, Metcalfe braces himself for a new trial of trust and betrayal, one with chilling implications that could threaten what remains of the free world.]]>
author: Robert Ludlum
name: Alex
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2003
rating: 2
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Almost fifty years ago, a classic was born. A searing portrayal of the Mafia underworld, The Godfather introduced readers to the first family of American crime fiction, the Corleones, and their powerful legacy of tradition, blood, and honor. The seduction of power, the pitfalls of greed, and the allegiance to family鈥攖hese are the themes that have resonated with millions of readers around the world and made The Godfather the definitive novel of the violent subculture that, steeped in intrigue and controversy, remains indelibly etched in our collective consciousness.]]>
author: Mario Puzo
name: Alex
average rating: 4.39
book published: 1969
rating: 5
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author: Anthony Burgess
name: Alex
average rating: 3.44
book published: 1964
rating: 3
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author: Anthony Burgess
name: Alex
average rating: 3.69
book published: 1966
rating: 3
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This edition includes the controversial last chapter not published in the first edition and Burgess's introduction "A Clockwork Orange Resucked."]]>
author: Anthony Burgess
name: Alex
average rating: 3.98
book published: 1962
rating: 5
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author: Truman Capote
name: Alex
average rating: 3.43
book published: 2005
rating: 3
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As Truman Capote reconstructs the murder and the investigation that led to the capture, trial, and execution of the killers, he generates both mesmerizing suspense and astonishing empathy. In Cold Blood is a work that transcends its moment, yielding poignant insights into the nature of American violence.]]>
author: Truman Capote
name: Alex
average rating: 4.08
book published: 1966
rating: 5
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First published in The New Yorker as two sequential stories, 鈥楩ranny鈥� and 鈥榋ooey鈥� offer a dual portrait of the two youngest members of J. D. Salinger鈥檚 fictional Glass family.
Franny Glass is a pretty, effervescent college student on a date with her intellectually confident boyfriend, Lane. They appear to be the perfect couple, but as they struggle to communicate with each other about the things they really care about, slowly their true feelings come to the surface. The second story in this book, 鈥榋ooey鈥�, plunges us into the world of her ethereal, sophisticated family. When Franny鈥檚 emotional and spiritual doubts reach new heights, her older brother Zooey, a misanthropic former child genius, offers her consolation and brotherly advice.
Written in Salinger鈥檚 typically irreverent style, these two stories offer a touching snapshot of the distraught mindset of early adulthood and are full of the insightful emotional observations and witty turns of phrase that have helped make Salinger鈥檚 reputation what it is today.]]>
author: J.D. Salinger
name: Alex
average rating: 3.97
book published: 1957
rating: 4
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Fleeing the crooks at Pencey Prep, he pinballs around New York City seeking solace in fleeting encounters鈥攕hooting the bull with strangers in dive hotels, wandering alone round Central Park, getting beaten up by pimps and cut down by erstwhile girlfriends. The city is beautiful and terrible, in all its neon loneliness and seedy glamour, its mingled sense of possibility and emptiness. Holden passes through it like a ghost, thinking always of his kid sister Phoebe, the only person who really understands him, and his determination to escape the phonies and find a life of true meaning.
The Catcher in the Rye is an all-time classic in coming-of-age literature- an elegy to teenage alienation, capturing the deeply human need for connection and the bewildering sense of loss as we leave childhood behind.
J.D. Salinger's (1919鈥�2010) classic novel of teenage angst and rebellion was first published in 1951. The novel was included on Time's 2005 list of the 100 best English-language novels written since 1923. It was named by Modern Library and its readers as one of the 100 best English-language novels of the 20th century. It has been frequently challenged in the court for its liberal use of profanity and portrayal of sexuality and in the 1950's and 60's it was the novel that every teenage boy wants to read.]]>
author: J.D. Salinger
name: Alex
average rating: 3.81
book published: 1951
rating: 5
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author: Betty Smith
name: Alex
average rating: 4.29
book published: 1943
rating: 4
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In Breakfast of Champions, one of Kurt Vonnegut鈥檚 most beloved characters, the aging writer Kilgore Trout, finds to his horror that a Midwest car dealer is taking his fiction as truth. What follows is murderously funny satire, as Vonnegut looks at war, sex, racism, success, politics, and pollution in America and reminds us how to see the truth.]]>
author: Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
name: Alex
average rating: 4.08
book published: 1973
rating: 4
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Cat's Cradle, one of Vonnegut's most entertaining novels, is filled with scientists and G-men and even ordinary folks caught up in the game. These assorted characters chase each other around in search of the world's most important and dangerous substance, a new form of ice that freezes at room temperature. At one time, this novel could probably be found on the bookshelf of every college kid in America; it's still a fabulous read and a great place to start if you're young enough to have missed the first Vonnegut craze.]]>
author: Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
name: Alex
average rating: 4.11
book published: 1963
rating: 4
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An instant bestseller, Slaughterhouse-Five made Kurt Vonnegut a cult hero in American literature, a reputation that only strengthened over time, despite his being banned and censored by some libraries and schools for content and language. But it was precisely those elements of Vonnegut鈥檚 writing鈥攖he political edginess, the genre-bending inventiveness, the frank violence, the transgressive wit鈥攖hat have inspired generations of readers not just to look differently at the world around them but to find the confidence to say something about it.
Fifty years after its initial publication at the height of the Vietnam War, Vonnegut's portrayal of political disillusionment, PTSD, and postwar anxiety feels as relevant, darkly humorous, and profoundly affecting as ever, an enduring beacon through our own era鈥檚 uncertainties.]]>
author: Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
name: Alex
average rating: 4.10
book published: 1969
rating: 4
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author: Thomas Pynchon
name: Alex
average rating: 3.70
book published: 1966
rating: 4
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