What are you reading?

The Abdulhamid Truth by Orhon Kologlu

Tolstoy's War and Peace

Introduction to Political Science by Munci Kapani (over 15.edition)

The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle

Impressive lists! At the moment I'm reading a translation of the Odyssee (finally I got to reading the real thing and not some modern version), which is a little bit old-fashioned and crappy, but whatever... I'll check out a better translation later on and read it all in Greek one day! I find it really great to read the real story and am trying to figure out if the events on Odysseus' trips can be seen as metaphores of a journey in his mind or something, but I find that kinda difficult (I only really started reading like this during the last few weeks thanks to a friend of mine who sorta pushed me to it with his MSN poetry sessions, before that my reading of classics was a bit more superficial).
I'm also reading Kafka's Der Prozess in German for the second time (I read it at school once), this time trying to truly comprehend it (which is probably just a difficult as for the Odyssee). I'm sorry to tell you I haven't even finished the first chapter yet

Fortunately our summer vacation in Scotland has given me a lot of time to (re)read books, so I re-read the Gilgamesh-epic (great, although some tablets are fragmentary which is rather annoying in my opinion) and re-read De Avonden [The Evenings] by Gerard Reve. It describes the last ten days of the year 1946 seen through the eyes of an adolescent who can't find any meaning in the pathetic life he and his relatives/friend are living. It is a great book and is generally considered as one of the peaks of post-war literature in the Netherlands. Highly recommended, if you find a translation, pick it up!
When I was in Inverness I bought The Oxford History of Byzantium, my first decent introduction into Byzantium, although I had learnt bits and pieces from reading parts of the Time Life World History Series (indeed great books, Cywr!).

By the way, like many others here I really enjoyed The Name of the Rose. Eco gives such a great impression of the Middle Ages and combines it with a fascinating detective story: great book. I've also seen the movie, but that one was a bit weaker because it obviously couldn't contain the richness the book contains.

EDIT:
I haven't read the Da Vinci Code either
Also, I must confess that the presence of the computer and upcoming study business are chipping a lot of time away that should have been spent on books

Röde Orm is one of the most enjoying books I've read. Nobody will understand what we are talking about though, since the English title is The Long Ships. As a tidbit, the German title is Die Abenteuer des Röde Orm - somehow the translator missed that "Röde" is just a nick meaning "-the Red".

I have also enjoyed Red Orm and i think i have read it for 3 or 4 times. Fortunatelly the translation into polish is excact and it is "Rudy Orm" what means the same as "Röde Orm". I wonder on how many languages it was translated.

Anyone knows if that author wrote more book about vikings?

Dawn wrote: Just finished a Canadian novel Jack Absulute by CC Humpries good book and about to start Butlerian Jihad (was it worth reading in your opinion Tamujin or just not bad ?)

well, i must say I always liked the idea of artificial intelligences taking over the Human world, and I liked the concept of the Butlerian Jihad as an outline of the original Dune. I always wanted to read a book about it, so I had high expectaitions of it and I must say I was overall very pleased, though they implemented one or two side-story too much and they messed up the end like in the previous books, but ptobably this is related to the fact that they wrote the book as an triology... the main plot humans vs. bots is excellent, it's no good vs evil, humans fight for both sides, both sides make use of Human slaves etc... the side-plot about Selim wormrider s also excellent, though it's only got a few chapters, I'm looking forward to read the machine crusade...

Master of Puppets wrote: I'm also reading Kafka's Der Prozess in German for the second time (I read it at school once), this time trying to truly comprehend it (which is probably just a difficult as for the Odyssee). I'm sorry to tell you I haven't even finished the first chapter yet

Wow, that's most impressive! reading Kafka already makes you a superbrain, but then in a foreign language and even understand his weird stuff that's awesome!

BTW, War and peace is also one of the best books ever...I however never came around reading the brothers kamarasow or silent flows the Don...and I didn't finished reading Taras Bulba...

I'm reading Sun Tzu's Art of War in the mornings.

I'm reading Madame Blavatsky's Isis Unveiled in the afternoons.

I am reading...

message boards

Actually engineering textbooks, mostly.

Historically?

Not much at the moment.  Research in ancient history is on hold. (when is that other atlas coming in?.....)

Dawn wrote: Every history buff reads something. So tell us what you are reading now.

I'm reading two books about the mongols - Jeremiah Curtins "The Mongols - a history" and David Morgan's "The mongols". I'm also reading a fantasy novel

Now I'm reading East of Eden by John Steinbeck. Its very good. I would recommend it to anybody.