Feel the Fear… And do it anyway.
Great book.
Freakonomics by Levitt and Dubner (I can see what the teacher meant when he said they bend every possible methodological principle until they reach the verge of pseudo science, but some stuff there are indeed well measured and interesting).
Development as Freedom by Amartya Sen.
O Discurso e a Cidade (The Discourse and the City) by Antonio Candido (breathtakingly good).
Semiótica Aplicada (Applied Semiotics) by Lucia Santaella (phenomenal reading, radically changes the way you see things).
On Lyric Poetry and Society by Theodor Adorno.
Hmmm, nobody said anything about reading Harry Potter yet 
Well I just started it about a week ago. I’m only about two chapters in though, I’m taking it nice and slow and appreciating every moment 
(Even had a new HP dream last night!)
I just got finished reading The Awakening by Kate Chopin. I REALLY hate how she writes in the beginning. She doesn’t weave her characters and their appearances into the story. She merely states how they look and how they act and then she goes off onto some other dumb topic… It was an easy, boring read. The ending was abrupt… In fact, the endings to each one- to two-paged chapter were extremely abrupt. I felt no attachment to any character and HATED IT.
I was too spoiled by Oscar Wilde to appreciate a different Victorian writer. 
I am currently reading “The Self-Destruction Handbook: 8 Simple Steps to an Unhealthier You” 
It includes such wonderful chapters as:
- 12 steps to developing a drinking “problem”
- Why smoking is cool
- Condoms are for suckers
hehe, best satire book I’ve read in a while
I’m reading Consider Phlebas by Iain M. Banks. It’s pretty good so far, but the writing is so darn small
IT by steven king… amazing and creepy book plus long… 1000+ pages 
Right now I’m reading Prozac Nation, and will soon be starting on Silmarillion.
I’ve had periods where I’ve felt like just kiling myself because nothing really mattered, which each lasted for weeks. And I’ve never really had a reason to be depressed, which seems to annoy my friends and parents who’s never been real depressed themselves.
The book is wonderful. And I can totally relate to it. I haven’t read the whole book yet, but still I recommend that everyone who wants to have a deeper understanding of depression, or has been through it themselves give it a read.
Good luck on Silmarillion, it’s a great book!
Just don’t stop reading it because of it’s heavy start!
Axel’s Castle by Edmund Wilson: one of the fathers of Comparative Literature, Wilson draws a throughout panorama of English–language modernist literature (from Yeats to Eliot to Joyce), establishing its roots and foundations in the French symbolist movement.
Keimusho no naka by Kazuichi Hanawa: comic book. In 1994, Hanawa was arrested for carrying weapons and ammunition illegally, and sentenced to three years in prison. In this book, he shares the experience and some of the moments of his time in jail.
A couple of microeconomics books I borrowed from the library.
Parts of L’Horreur économique, by Viviane Forrester: the book, of which I’m only reading fragments, is based in the idea that work is no longer necessary for our society given the state of the art technology we have developed in the past few centuries, and that people only still have to work and are pretty much exploited because it is not interesting for those in power to make the conversion. Although the book is a wee far off in its conspiracy–theory–ishness, it is a very relevant read for anyone into economics: after all if you agree with her premise (we could reduce human work to a minimum in current society if we wanted to), you have to agree that work is no longer the sole meaning of life—and therefore you refute Adam Smith’s single most important premise, and tear down that overwhelming phenomenon our society has become dependent on: the Economy. Controversial, subversive, at times silly, but a must for anyone who has any intention whatsoever of understanding the current world.
Papers: “Criminalité et santé sociale,” by Gabriel Tarde, and “Crime et santé sociale,” by Émile Durkheim, a debate between the authors concerning the nature and function of crime in current society; “What is a Sign?,” a collection of fragments from CS Peirce’s notes on Semiotics; “An Economic Analysis of Drug–Selling Gang’s Finances” by Steven D. Levitt and Sudhir A. Venkatesh, in which the economist and the social scientist analyse the corporate structure and social reality of a crack–cocaine—dealing gang from marginal Chicago, based on the experiences of the later among them and in a set of notebooks containing data on the gang’s financial transactions; “The Economic Organisation of a POW Camp” by RA Radford, great essay on the subject, analyses the evolution of the economic organisation of a small prisoner–of–war camp in the late years of World War II.
I’ve finished Koji Suzuki’s Loop (3 book in “the Ring”-series), it was an intelligent book taking up the same questions as The Matrix (originally relished 2 years prior to Matrix), but made the ‘a computer generated world’-ting seem more believable.
Currently I am at the end of Diana Wynne Jones’ Castle In the Air.
I’m reading the first Harry Potter book. 
I probably should have read that when I was 11…but I guess it’s never too late to read children’s books.
A couple questions about this one. What is the best translation you know of? What are the books in this series?
I’ve started that too, and the start…sounds like stuff from a NDE (all that talk about singing, creating a world on a whim, beautiful, knowledgeable, powerful beings who live in heaven totally falling in love with a hellish physical plane and willing to become ugly, weak, and stupid just to experience it, etc).
Anyone else notice the similarity?
Good choice! IT is a very good book!
I’m reading “Eldest” by Christopher Paolini. Nothing like some good ol’ fantasy.
Loop?
I only know abut the English translation by Glynne Walley (realized in US by Vertical Inc. and in UK by Harper Collins).
The rest of the series is made up by Ring, Sprial and Birthday.
Ring (the translation for this one was kind of lifeless) and Spiral is set prior to Loop and there plot has a more mystery/triller feel then Loop and… …acts inside the computer simulated world without the characters knowing so.
Ring has 8 adaptions (2 TV series, a loosely based film, an American remake of the film, a Korean remake of the film, 2 mangas & a radio-drama) and Spiral has 3 adaptions (a manga, a film & a radio-drama).
Birthday (not yet relished in English, so I haven’t read it myself) is a collection of 3 stories: “Coffin that Floats Up to the Sky” (set during Spiral), “Lemonheart” (a prequel to the books) & “Happy Birthday” (A continuation of Loop).
Birthday has been adapted into a manga excluding “Happy Birthday”.
And Lemonheart alone has been loosely adapted into a film and a movie-tie-in manga.
You don’t have to had read Ring and Spiral to read Loop, but I recommend it.
Also the books are the best versions of the series IMO.
A few days ago I went out and got Slaughterhouse Five (which I’ve been meaning to read forever). I also got The Brothers Karamazov, which is turning out to be good, but like someone else mentioned, 900-something pages. It’ll be a while, but I’m glad, it makes the book for an adventure that stays with you for a while. Like a period of your life. 
I have been reading Les Misérables for a while now.
The unabridged version is quite the read.
For school I am reading The God of Small Things, which I don’t enjoy as much.
I’m reading the book, The Giver.
Hamlet by Shakespeare
Bestest play evar.