Thursday, December 13, 2007

Reading & '07 List

Just finished, How to Talk Back to Your Television Set by Nicholas Johnson. It was actually a decent read something I didn't expect. I thought it would be a lot more technical and textbookish. It was mostly an easy read. The reason I wanted to read this book, other than seeing it in used bookstores for many, many years, is that the way technology has exploded in these areas it seems in my lifetime. It was interesting to hear about cable TV at its beginnings and how it was then being argued if it should even be allowed in the big cities. Also the mentions of satelite TV, I wasn't aware the tech was around then either. This book was published in 1970, just to give you a year to base stuff off of. The book did have a lot of the '60s idealism, where you could for a group and overthrow the establishment type thought. It also touched on, but not really directly, the movement of blacks becoming more involved/forcing their involvement into the whole communications sector. Overall the book was better than expected, but that isn't exactly saying much in that I had pretty low expectations going in.

The Looking Glass War has kind of been pushed to the side the last few days, while I made my push to wrap up the TV book. I also have not started the S King book Cell yet either. It is late so won't be starting it tonight but might try to do a couple of pages in the Looking Glass.

By the way, one thing that I started doing since 1997 is keeping a list of books that I have read each year. I think it is kind of fun to look back at what I have read and also see how long it has been since I have read some of my favorites. The TV book is #15 for this year--a very good year for me. Here is the list for this year(one of these days I think I will probably put all of the lists since '97 in this blog).

2007 Books Read List
1. The Brothers Karamazov--Fyodor Dostoevsky, 936 pages
2. Finishing Strong--Steve Farrar, 218 (Gift from Pujols Foundation)
3. Adventures in the Mainstream--Greg Palmer, 315
4. The Story of the Confederacy--Robert Selph Henry, 470 (Hardback)
5. Summer of '49--David Halberstam, 322
6. Watership Down--Richard Adams, 475
7. One of Ours--Willa Cather, 459
8. My Brother, Ernest Hemingway--Leicester Hemingway, 256
9. The Light in the Forest--Conrad Richter, 117
10. Atlas Shrugged--Ayn Rand, 1084
11. The Bronx Zoo--Sparky Lyle & Peter Golenbock, 300
12. The Red Pony--John Steinbeck, 120
13. Hemingway and Jake--Vernon(Jake) Klimo & Will Oursler, 223
14. The Biography of Ancient Israel--Ilana Pardes, 160 (Hardback)
15. How to Talk Back to Your Television Set--Nicholas Johnson, 209

1 comment:

Peter Golenbock said...

To find ourselves placed between Ayn Rand and John Steinbeck is an incredible honor. Sparky and I thank you. Peter Golenbock