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Biker Pat View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Biker Pat Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 06-November-2017 at 09:04
"Birds Without Wings" - Louis de Bernieres

"Stardust" - Joseph Kanon
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Biker Pat



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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote kbannon Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 08-November-2017 at 19:36
About to start Bruce Dickinson's bio...
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Biker Pat Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 07-May-2018 at 18:37
Three books I have finished.

Buccaneer - Tim Severin

Set in 17th century. About piracy and the goings on in the Caribbean and South Seas.

The Guilty - David Baldacci

Crime thriller set in Mississipi

Do Not Say We Have Nothing - Madeleine Thein

Set in China during Chairman Mao's Cultural Revolution and onwards. Brings to the reader what life was like during that time. I can see the link between Mao's revolution ideals and the Pol Pot idealism in Cambodia both of which caused genocide on their own people.


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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Biker Pat Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 29-May-2018 at 18:46
Just finished.

"The Hypnotist" - Lars Kepler

Excellent crime thriller.

Scandanavian crime writers are really superb.


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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Rahenyrhythm Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 30-May-2018 at 11:02
Yeah, read a couple by Jo Nesbo - "The Thirst", and I think "The Snowman". Currently reading "insidious intent" by Val McDermid sophisticated crime/thriller stuff, she's a good writer. In the wings, I have new Stephen King waiting - "Outsider". King is my favourite writer of all time, bit obvious I know but there's a reason he's so popular!!
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Biker Pat Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 21-June-2018 at 08:11
Two books read recently.

"Oystercatchers" - Susan Fletcher

"The Black Book" and "Mortal Causes" - Ian Rankin
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Rahenyrhythm Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 21-June-2018 at 12:18
Any of them good BP? I finished "Insidious Intent" by Val McDermid, and, as threatened, have also finished "Outsiders" by Stephen King. Both very readable, if neither of them classics. There's a book of short stories by McDermid - "Stranded" - which is entertaining and can be dipped in and out of, a good introduction to her writing and I'd recommend it. So I'm in a lacuna now for reading, I think I've done King to death, also Michael Connolly, Val McD, read most of Robert Harris ( excellent, excellent write, and not as "difficult" as you might think from reading some of his reviews), various other crime/thriller writers ... Is Ian Rankin any good?
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Rahenyrhythm Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 21-June-2018 at 17:44
Lol - just realised Ian Rankin wrote the foreword to that book of short stories I referenced above !!!
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Biker Pat Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 21-June-2018 at 17:53
The 2 books I mentioned were quite good. Am now reading "Conclave" by the aforementioned Robert Harris. Ian Rankin is a super crime writer.
To be honest RR I buy my books from a local charity shop. Read them and bring them back. I choose the books by their cover, not knowing what they're about. I never read the information on the back.In that way I approach the book with an open mind as to It's content. Just my style. Am seldom disappointed. So the book could be about anything. Some authors I've never heard of.
BP.

Edited by Biker Pat - 21-June-2018 at 17:55
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Biker Pat Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 21-June-2018 at 17:54
Originally posted by Biker Pat Biker Pat wrote:

The 2 books I mentioned were quite good. Am now reading "Conclave" by the aforementioned Robert Harris. Ian Rankin is a super crime writer.
To be honest RR I buy my books from a local charity shop. Read them and bring them back. I choose the books by their cover, not knowing what they're about. I never read the information on the back.In that way I approach the book with an open mind as to It's content. Just my style. Am seldom disappointed. So the book could be about anything. Some authors I've never heard of.
BP.
May be going to hell in a bucket but at least I'm enjoying the ride.



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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Biker Pat Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 21-June-2018 at 17:57
Oops double post. Tried to delete one but can't on my smartphone
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Biker Pat



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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Rahenyrhythm Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 21-June-2018 at 18:21
As good a method as any BP! I've read Conclave, good book, nice twist at a late stage...
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Biker Pat Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 21-June-2018 at 19:45
I read so much I get the books, authors and characters confused
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Rahenyrhythm Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 22-June-2018 at 00:07
Lol! Easily done BP. I am in a big reading jag the last couple months in particular, means I keep running out of books - like now! So, occasionally I will re-read stuff if I'm stuck. Anyway, will rectify all this tomorrow/Sat...
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Biker Pat Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 25-June-2018 at 16:30
"Conclave - Robert Harris

Story about the election of a new Pope and all the shenanigans that goes into such a process as a conclave.

I have no time for the Catholic church and this book adds to my dismay with how cardinals live a life of luxury whilst many of their so called "flock" suffer throughout the world.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Rahenyrhythm Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 25-June-2018 at 17:17
It's a good eye-opener into that lifestyle ok BP. The "Senior management" in any large organisation, church, State or private company, live a different lifestyle to the plebs.

I have to say reading is my other great pleasure. There is a book, published last year I think, or 2016 at the earliest, by a writer called Naomi Klein, an Americal journalist and writer. The book is called ""No", is not enough" About Trump and the shenanigans around him, and how large organisations and the ultra-rich decide how the world works. It is a book of fact, not fiction. If you really, really want to get your blood boiling, read that book. Not exactly a cheerful read, but very enlightening ...
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Biker Pat Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 02-July-2018 at 23:29
Currently reading "The Crow Girl" by Erik Ask Sund.
Swedish crime thriller.
Am just over half way through the 757 pages.
Absorbing read.
Perfect book to be reading in the garden in weather like this.🤗
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Biker Pat Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 29-July-2018 at 13:25
"River Of Smoke" - Amitav Ghosh

About the opium trade in the early 19th century in Canton, China.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Rahenyrhythm Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 29-July-2018 at 13:42
Good stuff Pat. You know it was British introduced opium to the Chinese originally, to assist in quieting/oppressing them (I'm nearly certain that is historically correct, must double-check at some stage)

I am about 80% of the way through Jo Nesbo's "Macbeth". I have really enjoyed reading other books by him, but found this one really difficult to get into, and not nearly as enjoyable as others. There is a big "scandi noir" element to it of course, but much of it written nearly as if it's a play rather than a book. Cant articulate properly what I mean by that, that's the best way I can describe it some of the language used is nearly formal, stylised English; I assume the whole thing is loosely based on Shakespeare's "Macbeth", but I never read that play so can't be 100%. I kinda wont be sorry when I finish the book, but it won't put me off going back to Nesbo's "Harry Hole" books...
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Biker Pat Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 29-July-2018 at 15:24
RR,

You are quite correct re English introducing opium to the Chinese. They grew it in India and imported it to China at great profit. Funny, they banned it from England at the same time.

The opium created havoc among the Chinese population and when the Chinese objected to it's importation the opium war ensued.

Which had serious consequences for the Chinese because they didn't have the military might that the English had so the opium trade went on.

All contained in the above book.

Re Nesbo, have read a number of his books. Love the Scandanavian crime thriller writers.
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