Ok, the books I've read lately. Listened to rather....

Caesar and Christ - Will Durant
Zombies of the Gene Pool - Sharyn McCrumb
The Renaissance, A Short History - Paul Johnson
Inside the CIA - Ronald Kessler
To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
What Liberal Media - Eric Alterman

Not in order. The first was the CIA book. I expected it to be as good as his FBI book, but it wasn't. He tried to be fair and forgiving and brushed over the bad stuff. You can tell, at least I got the impression, that if he wanted to dig in to the interesting stuff there would be much to tell. It was good, just not what it could have been.

After that I think it was the Renaissance. Dull. Not a history at all but a book documenting the art that gave this period in history it's name. If you are into the fine arts and architecture, it will probably be of interest. I guess it interests me only in how it affected events at the time.

Caesar and Christ. I've listened to this before, but because I knew nothing about the time period it didn't make a big impression. Don't get me wrong, this is boring shit. Will Durant books would only be of interest to someone that already has an idea about the times and places discussed in his books. This book is the third in his Story of Civilization series. It seems to me the whole series focuses on western civilization, and kinda skims over everything else. It's what has come to be expected of western thinkers though. After this one I tried getting into his next in the series, The Age of Faith. Boooorrrring. Like I said before, I might find it interesting after I've read other things on those periods and places. Oh, I did listen to a Teaching Company series on Ancient Rome. That was just a review, I'd listened to that one before. Actually, this was my introduction to the Teaching Company stuff.

I also tried Gibbon's Rise and Fall, finally got it on the Zen playing properly, but after listening a little I realized it's an abridged version. I hate listening to abridged stuff. Audiobook publishers will paste it all over the package if something is unabridged, but make it difficult to find if it's abridged. It's the same when you listen to it, the reader tells you it's a full length reading, or an unabridged recording. Rarely will the reader say it's abridged though.

So I decided on something light for a change and listened to Zombies of the Gene Pool. It's about a bunch of people that were really into sci-fi in their youth and buried a time capsule with stories they'd written. Most of the plot was what they went through getting back together and digging it up 30 years later. Ok, not the greatest story though.

Went on to To Kill a Mockingbird. This one was done well. The reader had the accent down far as I could tell. It's a good story, not at all what I expected, but I don't really know what I expected, just not that. It's about a white lawyer in Maycomb, Alabama that defends a black man accused of rape during the depression. It's told from the point of view of the lawyer's daughter, very well done.

Now I'm listening to the Liberal Media thing. I'm not done with it yet, but it's more of the same shit I've been muddling through, except this time it's a liberal talking about conservative media. Same old shit, just a different point of view....