What Are You Reading??

nothing significant but I am reading and it's a treat.  There's a few more foreigners here and we've set up a lending library conveniently managed buy a canuck who's managing a bar...so I get to exchange books and have a pijiu while I'm doing it.  It's wonderful to be able to just read as much as I want without worrying about running out of material...for awhile, at least. 

New books arrived from Amazon today - and more on the way!!  Yippee.

Nearly finished the Valdemar series, time to start raiding my shelves for my next binge.  Hhmmm.....what's next?  StarTrek?  Pern?  Darkover?  something of an historic nature?
Decisions, decisions, decisions 

I've just 2 Eric Frank Russell books from Amazon. Amazon is dangerous.

Eric Frank Russell is a legend.

I am reading New Scientist, Unleashing the IDea Virus by Seth Godin, Phaic Tan the travel book, Fire Time (poul anderson) and Frankenstein Unbound (Aldiss) Just finished a book on child development

and Dr Seuss one fish two fish.

Well, I did read it, but my little girl just looks at me blankly. Maybe wait a little longer before i read it to her again. Read the Sneetches to my wife while I was at it.

I'm reading 'life and death in Shanghai'by Nien Cheng. It's a cultural revolution thing - i've read quite a lot of these and this is a good one.

Also i'm half way through a biography of Billy Connelly written by his wife Pamela Stephenson. It's not as funny as i would have hoped, but a good read all the same.

Also i'm half way through a biography of Billy Connelly written by his wife Pamela Stephenson. It's not as funny as i would have hoped, but a good read all the same.

Bit hard to make abuse funny, even for those two.

Raoul's China Saloon (V3.0)

But in a few minutes, I will read some of a cookbook. Mmmm. Food. I have a cookbook with meat cuts in it, so I am showing my wife about it in the probably vain hope she can get some poor sucker to cut meat that way. Maybe not a great read, but satisfying, if I can make it work.

Two of the better cookbooks, IMHO, especially here where you can't buy stuff but must make it all from scratch:

Cooking, a commonsense guide. (it has the meat cuts, plus how to make everything from scratch. A guide for the compleat idiot, but when doing things like making basics such as flaky pastry, marmalades, pickled onions etc or pasta or gnocchi or stocks and such, which I never had to do back in Oz, I need an idiot's guide. Plus it pictures the herbs, vegies, etc so I can ask the wife, wassis in Chinese, and try to get it. All the tools and implements, too. It;s been a big help) The paper is also food-resistance and wipeable as long as not too wet or oily, and spiral bound so it stays open flat.

The other one I have here is the Margaret Fulton complete guide. It's just a big book of western cooking, many kinds of others just as good, but it IS good. I have several others I prefer, but they are in Oz. Betty Crocker is also good, but I don't have a copy.

I use the net for other things such as I am going to be making sausages soon, which I haven;t done before either. MMM real sausages.

Muffin recipes I have but never tried cooking them, so I can't recommend any. Cakes, I hardly ever use a recipe, just what's around. Except for some maniac chocolate recipes that I don;t have with me here.

I am going to try for mum's profiteroles soon, I think, which will be a test of the Chinese equipment. Maybe during the October hols. If they work, will post pics and recipe.

Should this be in "cooking" or something? But this is a book I am reading. Maybe I will copy it and find the cooking thread too.

Bit hard to make abuse funny, even for those two.

Very true LE, i never really knew much about his background but still a very interesting read. 

Wild Swans, left behind by a foreigner.  I was told by a local that the book is banned in China, can anyone confirm that?  It's very interesting since much of it is set in this part of China and a very easy read.

It is true wild swans is supposed to be banned in China, although it is also true that the author is very much respected by the chinese big wigs, as her writing is known to be quite truthful, i think wild swans is a must read for anyone trying to make sense of the chinese way of life.

After you have finished reading that i wholly reccommend her book on Mao, it is said that a lot of the old guard told her a lot of truths, due to her writing acuricies(i know thats spelt wrong, but it's late) in wild swns.
 

Yeah, I'm dying to read that.  Wild Swans was amazing; compared to it, Dog's Daughter was lame.  Heck, I[/] wanted to deport the disagreeable little creep to a camp by the end of that book.

Ian Rankin - Exit Music - Fantastic!

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows. David Copperfield. All About Spice (a cookery book. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass; Hans Christian Anderson The Life of a Story Teller ; and What's So Important About Grace by Phillip Yancey.