Books! How do you read and what do you read?

I just read Bambi, a Life in the Woods by Felix Salten. I wanted to see how it would compare with the Disney version. Let's just say the Disney version is very loosely based on the book. The book is a lot darker with much more violence. Disney made it into something cute with a happy ending, which is what Disney usually does. And, that's OK. I think a good movie could be made that follows the book more accurately. But, it wouldn't be a kid's movie.

I downloaded the book for my Kindle here. This is a great site for the classics.
 
I'm dyslexic, so reading is an ordeal and ungodly slow. It takes me forever to read a book. But I've gotten into Egyptology, and ancient Egypt fascinates me. I'm reading about their religion. They had thousands of gods, and if you didn't like Osiris, you could pray to Horus-nobody cared. There was nobody beating down the door, ordering you believe in Hathor. It was a complex, sophisticated religion, and there is nothing in Christianity that was not a part of the Egyptian religion.
 
I enjoy Cold Climate Area Books, the struggles to survive in extreme climate conditions,
the ones who survive the awesome weather changes. The Fiction of the surf for the truth.
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Of course that is just simply Humanities past also.
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To me, reading just seems better than watching any old movie; not to say that I don't watch one now and then. I use an 8 inch tablet with the Kindle app to read these days since I developed some vision problems from macular degeneration and glaucoma. I don't get along with the Kindle white background reader. I do much better with a black background and white adjustable font.

I love fantasy, sword/sorcery (Lord of the Rings), occasional science fiction-type books and devour many. I also love paranormal, new age (occult old age), spirituality, quantum physics books. I usually switch back and forth to each genre each day. :) Very extensive Kindle library. Would love to be a writer--maybe in my next life.
 
I like historical novels because I like history and also am interested in military leaders. What made them successful, or not? I prefer old fashioned books with covers and pages so my eyes get a rest from screens. :giggle:
 
I like historical novels too. I love love love reading and have always had at least one book on the go all of my adult life. Right now I’m reading a book to help me get off antidepressants after 18 years and I’m reading Jodi Picoult who I love. I buy my books in charity shops. I did have a kindle which died after ten or more years. I’m also reading a free book on my iPhone.
 
Topoff said:
I use an 8 inch tablet with the Kindle app to read these days since I developed some vision problems from macular degeneration and glaucoma. I don't get along with the Kindle white background reader. I do much better with a black background and white adjustable font
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My kindle Paperwhite (the one without the blue light that’s so hard on most people’s eyes) has a feature that I’ve got set to a black screen with white lettering. It’s not 8 inches, though, only 6.8; the newer ones might be bigger.
 
officerripley said:
My kindle Paperwhite (the one without the blue light that’s so hard on most people’s eyes) has a feature that I’ve got set to a black screen with white lettering. It’s not 8 inches, though, only 6.8; the newer ones might be bigger.
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I think I've seen those. They're nice. I stuck with the tablet tho as I can jump around to YouTube and Netflix or the browser. That's the main reason I like the tablet.
 
A couple days ago I finished reading 'French Braid' by Ann Tyler
The story begins in 1959, about a Baltimore family, Robin&his wife Marcy Garrett,their 3 kids, Alice, Lily,David,how their lives change over the yrs, through the pandemic
I enjoyed it
 
At the end of 'The Daughter of Time,' Josephine Tey. Was Henry VII true murderer of the princes in the tower, NOT Richard III? It's hard for me to read hard stuff these days, and this isn't hard stuff but I'm having trouble retaining all the Woodvilles and Lancasters and Yorks and the color of their Roses, but it's looking like Richard didn't do it. This isn't a spoiler, it's a different way of looking at history.
 
I recently read "The Frozen River" by Ariel Lawhon. An historical novel based heavily on the real life and personal diary of Martha Ballard, an American midwife in Maine. The life, hardships and challenges of female doctoring in those harsh, early times are central to this story about a crime of rape and murder.

Highly recommended.
 
jujube said:
I'm still a "book" lover. I need to have the book in my hand. I have a Kindle that was given to me as a retirement present nine years ago and I've never fired it up.

As for what I read? I read just about any genre, except for the "Gothic Romances", and I suppose that if I were stuck somewhere and that's all I had to read, I'd read them gratefully.

I'm having some eye problems and don't read for as long a period of time as I used to, but I still get through 3-4 books a week.

Does anyone else get books out of the library that they find they're already read and didn't remember the name? I'll get to page 20 and say, "Oh, heck, this is the one where the woman didn't know she had a twin sister and the twin sister killed the father and tried to pin it on her!!!"

I also have to get a bunch of books at a time because I may reject a third of them because I just don't like how the author writes. I just tried one and put it down because, my heavens, the author just LOVES to hear himself write. His feeling seems to be "why use three descriptive works when twelve will do?" i.e. (and I quote from the book) "The great snorting and smoking brute that had paused with brusque impatience at the meek little village station and suffered her to take her place in one of its lattermost compartments--her fingertips still retained the impression of hot plush and greasy leather--now stood gasping after its mighty efforts under the high, soot-blackened glass canopy of the throbbing terminus, disgorging on to the platform its complement of dazed and bedraggled travelers and their jumbles of baggage." And that's just on the first page......it goes downhill from there. I love a good turn of phrase, but "great snorting and smoking brute" and "throbbing terminus"?

There are some books I can read over and over again. Every year on my birthday, I read "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn" again. I still have the copy I got for my 10th birthday and it became a tradition.
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jujube said:
I'm still a "book" lover. I need to have the book in my hand. I have a Kindle that was given to me as a retirement present nine years ago and I've never fired it up.

As for what I read? I read just about any genre, except for the "Gothic Romances", and I suppose that if I were stuck somewhere and that's all I had to read, I'd read them gratefully.

I'm having some eye problems and don't read for as long a period of time as I used to, but I still get through 3-4 books a week.

Does anyone else get books out of the library that they find they're already read and didn't remember the name? I'll get to page 20 and say, "Oh, heck, this is the one where the woman didn't know she had a twin sister and the twin sister killed the father and tried to pin it on her!!!"

I also have to get a bunch of books at a time because I may reject a third of them because I just don't like how the author writes. I just tried one and put it down because, my heavens, the author just LOVES to hear himself write. His feeling seems to be "why use three descriptive works when twelve will do?" i.e. (and I quote from the book) "The great snorting and smoking brute that had paused with brusque impatience at the meek little village station and suffered her to take her place in one of its lattermost compartments--her fingertips still retained the impression of hot plush and greasy leather--now stood gasping after its mighty efforts under the high, soot-blackened glass canopy of the throbbing terminus, disgorging on to the platform its complement of dazed and bedraggled travelers and their jumbles of baggage." And that's just on the first page......it goes downhill from there. I love a good turn of phrase, but "great snorting and smoking brute" and "throbbing terminus"?

There are some books I can read over and over again. Every year on my birthday, I read "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn" again. I still have the copy I got for my 10th birthday and it became a tradition.
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I love "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn". It's the same with me when I go to the library. I take out piles of books and wind up returning a third of them unread because I just couldn't get into them. The jacket blurbs sound interesting but the actual book not so much.
 

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