Recommend a Book

And to follow up on Leyton Orient, home to some crowd called Man City on Saturday in the FA Cup, live on the Beeb.

Back to books, if anyone is interested in a good social history then Beyond the Wall, East Germany 1949-1990 by Katja Hoyer is an interesting read. it is, as the name suggests, a history of East Germany until the fall of the wall.

It does need a follow up to see how society and attitudes has changed since unification.
 
I’m reading Fahrenheit 451, or rereading it as I read it first as a teenager but probably didn’t fully understand it. It’s remarkably prescient considering it was written more than 70 years ago.
 
I have two on the go at the moment, down from the usual three or four.

John & Paul: A Love Story in Songs by Ian Leslie.

Astonishing book, when maybe some of thought there was little else to know about the Dynamic Duo.

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Brehon Laws: The Ancient Wisdom of Ireland

What we were and what we had long before Christianity ruined us. An eye-opener.
 
The siege by Ben Mcintyre which tells the story of the Iranian embassy siege in 1980. Really well told story, and also it's links to the greater geo-political politics at the time. Makes me wonder what would have happened Maggie had the SAS assault gone pear-shaped, live on National TV. (Although I do love the fact that ITV left Coronation Street finish before they cut over to what was happening live)
 
Just finished Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver. Fantastic read. It's a modern take on David Copperfield (admittedly I have never read David Copperfield so I'm paraphrasing the author here). It's the story of one boys struggle through childhood, starting with a single parent, then moving through foster care and all the challenges along the way, including references to the Oxycontin problems in the States. It's heartbreaking, funny and inspiring sometimes all in the one chapter! I would go so far as to say it's a modern day classic.
 
How to Win the Premier League by Ian Graham. Gives an interesting insight in the use of analytics in assessing players. Ian was Liverpool's head of research. Like Moneyball but not for baseball.
 
Hope I Get Old Before I Die - David Hepworth

I really enjoyed this book from a music journalist who has watched music change over the decades and especially since Live Aid (which Hepworth covered for the BBC) changed the perception of 'older' artists. Lots of interesting titbits about the economics of music, personal stories, feuds in bands. The broader theme is artists like Rolling Stones, Paul McCartney etc setting a path for older artists to still be a major element in the music business once they get through what he terms the difficult 'middle age' of follow-up records of little interest.

There's 36 short chapters, each reads like an article, so easy to pick up and return to. I tried to listen to songs of the namechecked artists as I went.

Random quote on
All the bands that promoted universal love seemed to feel that this shouldn’t interfere with their right to dislike each other heartily... An action of this kind will tend to support the view of those people who believe that although you can take the band out of the sixth-form common room, you can never entirely take the sixth-form common room out of the band. Middle age was never going to change that.

I read Hepworth's "Uncommon People: The Rise and Fall of the Rock Stars" a few years back, it has a similar structure and enjoyed it a lot also.
 
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Peanuts20 said:
And to follow up on Leyton Orient, home to some crowd called Man City on Saturday in the FA Cup, live on the Beeb.
Click to expand...
And now on to Wembley for the play off final with a goal scored by an Irishman, a penalty save by an Irish Goalie from Meath in the shoot-out( A goalie who incidentally also won Orient's goal of the season competition!) and the winning penalty scored by a man from County Antrim.

Sorry, off topic but sometimes you just have to be happy
 
Spent some time reading and rereading some old/classic books. The Old Man & The Sea, Slaughter-House 5, A Moveable Feast, The Man in the High Castle and A Dolls House.

First three were rereads and as good as ever. Always something new that you pick up in them and that's probably down to the frame of mind you're in. Didn't like the fourth one, dystopian stuff not really my thing. Picked up the last one to just put a 'read' tick beside it but it's really well written and has a great flow to it.
 
Age of revolutions by Fareed Zakira was a book I found fascinating. He looked at a number of historical revolutions over 5 histories in economics, technology and politics and used it as a framework for explaining where the world is right now.. Not saying I agree with everything he says and some of it was a bit of a leap but a very thought provoking book for anyone trying to understand the current world.
 
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