The Hit List

Mark Scollon · Post by **Mark Scollon** » Mon Jul 18, 2005 1:41 pm

Come on Fez, don't sit on the fence. Tell us what you really think of it.

Post by **Mike** » Tue Jul 19, 2005 8:16 am

I have finished Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince now. It was an entertaining story. I must admit that, as always, it is not challenging to read or understand however it is an entertaining story indeed. My only objection is the length. How short can you make a single book. I barely got into the story before everything was coming to a close.

It also looks like the final book in the series will be filled with death and demolition away from the wonderful world of Hogworts. I personally dont know whether this is a curse or a blessing.

Post by **Mike** » Tue Jul 26, 2005 4:47 pm

the five people you meet in Heaven - Mitch Albom

Book Synopsis wrote:'All endings are aslo beginnings. We just don't know it at the time. . . .'

On his eighty-third birthday, Eddie, a lonely war veteran, dies in a tragic accident trying to save a little girl from a falling cart. With his final breath, he feels two small hands in his - and then nothing. He awakend in the afterlife, where he learns that heaven is not a luch Garden of Eden bu a place where your earthly life is explained to you by five people who were in it. These people may have been loved ones or distant strangers. Yet each of them changed your path forever.

This is an interesting book and I am looking forward to the ending very much.

Fez · Post by **Fez** » Sat Sep 17, 2005 7:25 pm

LOVE ALL THE PEOPLE - Bill Hicks

the late bill hicks was a controversial stand up comedian with a mind like a knife blade and a sense of humour equally as sharp and compelling, which made him not only a devastatingly funny man but one of ferocous insight and intelligence. his brand of political angst about american government and personal candidness about his own life is now often copied by other comedians, though none have been able to capture the same firey and combative delivery. the impact of this man, described by john cleese as the funniest stand up he had ever seen, can clearly be felt when on the tenth anniversary of hicks' death he was remembered in the house of commons and recognised as a great loss to both politics and comedy alike.

love all the people is a collection of stand up routines, interviews and scraps of writing by hicks covering in particular the last ten years of his career before he died of cancer, but containing information about his whole life and rise to cult status here in the uk and the struggles he had in his native america. much more interesting than any biography could be, and often involving shockingly funny material about subjects most people wouldn't even dare talk about in public, this is a must have book for anyone who likes their humour political and dangerous.

Fez · Post by **Fez** » Sat Sep 17, 2005 7:39 pm

FAREWELL TO ARMS - Ernest Hemmingway

set in spain during the first world war, this is a compelling story about an ambulence driver falling in love after being injuried in a bomb blast and his subsequent affair with his nurse, followed by his dessertion from the army when he finds out she is pregnant and their escape to Swizterland. generally auto-biographical and written in an uncomplicated style, hemmingway details a life of sex and survival carrying on in the depths of war with an ending that is truly heartbreaking and bleak. the best book by one of america's best writers...even if he was a bull murdering bastard.

Fez · Post by **Fez** » Sat Sep 17, 2005 7:50 pm

SOMETHING HAPPENED - Joseph Heller

bob slocom is an office worker living in fear of his colleagues, married to a wife who thinks he no longer loves her, father to a son and daughter with some serious teenage problems and a second son who has been disabled since birth and can't communicate with the world around him. convinced every new opportunity is a thinly veiled problem come to increase his woes, slocom staggers through life trying to get the better of everyone else at the office while desperatly trying to avoid them doing the same to him.

unfairly, heller's career is dominated by the success of his first book catch-22, and little of what he did after is given as much praise despite the fact the later novels were just as funny if not better written as well. something happened is heller's second novel and brings the same anarchic wit of his debut war story to an office environment where things can be just as dangerous.

Post by **Mike** » Thu Oct 27, 2005 9:14 am

Red Mars - Kim Stanley Robinson

This is a book about the colonisation of Mars. I find the text faintly prophetic as I am sure that this is a good representation of the future and an attempt to colonise the red planet. . . . .

That said the book is captivating and well worth a read. The trilogy continues with Green Mars and Blue Mars. These map the original colonists life on the planet and how the struggle to assimilate the arrival of hundred and thoasands of settlers.

Claire · Post by **Claire** » Sun Oct 30, 2005 8:15 pm

Do i have to do plot summaries?
Anyhooo...
Last really good book i read was 'The Five People you meet in heaven' by Mitch Albom. It's about this old man who dies and the people he meets in heaven - everyone gets to meet 5. the people have all had a pivotal role to play in your life, though you didn't necessarily know them. Very good, but heart-wrenching at the end.
Half way through 'The Hours'.very good so far, very poetically written. 'Birdsong' and 'His Dark Materials' are next on my list.
Think the 6th Harry Potter is possibly the most well-written (thought not necessarily the best?) Potter so far.
'Memories of a Geisha' is a great book - heard a rumour they were making it into a film - anyone else heard that?

Post by **Mike** » Mon Oct 31, 2005 7:54 am

Claire wrote:Last really good book i read was 'The Five People you meet in heaven' by Mitch Albom. It's about this old man who dies and the people he meets in heaven - everyone gets to meet 5. the people have all had a pivotal role to play in your life, though you didn't necessarily know them. Very good, but heart-wrenching at the end.

Oooh the second recommendation for this book, that means it must be good! :D

Claire wrote:'Memories of a Geisha' is a great book - heard a rumour they were making it into a film - anyone else heard that?

I have heard something similar but I can not remember where I read it. I suppose it will be on the web somewhere though.

Post by **Mike** » Mon Nov 21, 2005 9:55 pm

I saw someone on the train reading Wilkinsons Road and Traffic Offences Personally I think he was reading it for work but it deffo has a catchy title don't it!

Lizzie · Post by **Lizzie** » Tue Nov 22, 2005 8:29 am

Sounds like a read you could definately 'put down' !!

Fez · Post by **Fez** » Tue Nov 22, 2005 9:51 am

i always preferred wilkinson's earlier work before he went all preachy and judgemental. wilkinson's fifty things to do with a traffic cone has long been a personal favourite

Kirstypie · Post by **Kirstypie** » Tue Nov 22, 2005 11:01 am

But for the classic American book, it has to be Massachusetts Motor Vehicle Offenses by William W. Teahan.

Lizzie · Post by **Lizzie** » Tue Nov 22, 2005 1:10 pm

Should I know what these 'traffic' books are ???

Post by **Mike** » Tue Nov 22, 2005 1:13 pm

I am guessing that they are a legal book which lists all of the traffic offenses. I bet that they are a super duper read that will keep your eyes glued shut.

rileyuk.co.uk

The Hit List

Red Mars - Kim Stanley Robinson

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