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Christopher McGovern - the Dragon SeekersChristopher McGovern has written a book about the British fossil collectors before the Darwin's work with the Origin of the Species (which appeared around 150 years ago). They collected the fossil because of curiosity, because of scientific interest but also for profit. Scholars tried to use them as a proof of Biblical flood - and some of them retouched them to make them more presentable - and marketable. ( Fossil collectors before Darwin )
Pierre de Vomecourt - Who Lived to See the Day( ”more )
Benjamin Woollet - The Queen's ConjurerJohn Dee was an astrologer and occultist in the Elizabethan England. In his predictions he supported ideas like the British Empire and wanted to find the laws of nature by asking angels themselves. ( Serious research via crystal and a fraud )
Arturo Perez-Reverte- The Seville CommunionArturo Perez-Reverte is Spanish author who has written various books (in the current publishing environment, his publisher would have forced him to stick to Captain Alatriste in the expense of everything else). But this story is placed in the modern day or, to be exact, relatively recent past. ( Magnificent book, magnificent tale )
Steve Aylett - The Inflatable VolunteerThe back cover blurb is even more wrong in this case than in many others because it tries to give an impression that there is some semblance of a story between the covers of this book. If the whoever wrote it even read the book, he probably ended up going to a dog psychiatrist asking for herbal acupuncture. ( Amusing intentional incoherence )
Tony Hillerman - Seldom DisappointedTony Hillerman was best known for his stories about the Navajo tribal police (I'm still not sure whether to cell them whodunit, police procedurals or detective stories but they are still interesting). In this particular tome he tells about his own life leading to the writing of those books - and only a little about them after all. ( How the creator of Jim Chee and Joe Leaphorn grew up )
Music meme via lady mynttiYou can learn a lot about someone by the music they listen to. So here is the game! Hit shuffle on your ipod or mp3 player and write down the first 26 songs. No cheating or skipping songs that are shameful. That is the fun! WinAmp will have to suffice... 1 Ennio Morricone - Sacco and Vancetti 2 Zebda - Toulouse 3 Alanis Morrissette - You Learn 4 Juice Leskinen - Norjalainen villapaita ( Norwegian wool shirt) 5 MASH - Suicide is painless 6 Edelweiss - Spaceship Edelweiss 7 Sarah Brightman - Eden 8 Ramones - Per Sematary 9 Monty Python - Accountancy Shanty 10 Weird Al Yankovic - Germs 11 Hector - Mandoliinimies ( The mandolin man) 12 Talking Heads - Wild Wild Life 13 Konami Yoshida - Please don't surrender ( Magic Knight Rayearth theme) 14 Queen - Who dares to live forever 15 John Lennon - Imagine 16 Evanescence - Weight of the World 17 Enya - Caribbean Blue 18 Monty Python - Lumberjack Song (weatherman version) 19 Weird Al Yankovic - UHF 20 Billy Joel - All about soul 21 Patricia Kaas - Il me dit que je suis belle 22 Celine Dion - It's all coming back to me 23 Depeche Mode - Just can't get enough 24 Udo Lindenberg - Germans 25 KLF - Last train to transcentral 26 Pink Floyd - Learning to fly
Oliver Sacks - A leg to stand onOliver Sacks is a British-born neurologist who has written about his various cases; but in this particular book he tells about what happened after his accident in Norway in 1974 - and how his leg vanished… ( I can see my leg but where is it? )
Wade Davis - The Serpent and The RainbowWade Davis is a Canadian-born ethnobotanist who went to Haiti to look for a zombi poison and became very familiar with the practitioners of Woudon. This book is also famous because it was used as a basis of a Hollywood movie (which I haven't seen). ( Botanist's immersion into woudon in Haiti )
Mon, Aug. 24th, 2009, 10:47 am Maquis
I actually borrowed this from lady aberrant1. There's an exercise in Chris Baty's book No Plot, No Problem! where you make a list of things you like in stories. Then you make a list of things you hate in stories. He calls them Magna Carta 1 and 2. He recommends that you post them somewhere obvious, because it's surprisingly easy to find yourself writing things you don't even like to read, and forgetting all about the things you do like.
So, here are my Magna Carta 1 & 2: ( Positive side )( Negative side )C'mon, let's see your Magna Cartas.
Mon, Aug. 17th, 2009, 01:02 pm Why We Love
Helen Fisher - Why We LoveHelen Fisher is an American anthropologist. I have not read anything else from her but this particular book is an exhaustive study of what makes the human heart throb for somebody else. ( Human animal is not the only one that loves )
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