Interesting Links and Useful Information

It's been a while since I've shared some of the stuff that has struck my interest or has me adding to my wish list.  So I thought I would take a few minutes and let you in on some of them.

I've been rather lax in my NPR listening, but I try to catch The Diane Rehm Show as often as I can.  For whatever reason we have a bunch of people at work who like to discuss religion and their feelings on it.  For the most part the discussion stays civil, but I think all of us are rather set in our beliefs, though I also think most of us are willing to listen.  Interestingly, in the last few weeks I have heard discussions over two new books that talk about religion and the way it is changing in our society.  Bad Religion: How We Became a Nation of Heretics by explores the idea of how people have changed away from "traditional" Christianity and how that is hurting the country.  The New Religious Intolerance: Overcoming the Politics of Fear in an Anxious Age by Martha Nussbaum explores religious persecution and the fear it instills in everyone.  They are both fascinating discussions with the authors, and I know I really want to read both books now.

Two "newer" social media sites have been sucking my times lately, though one more than the other.  If anyone is on Pinterest or GetGlue, please feel free to follow me on those two sites as well.

And while I'm mentioning other websites to waste time, I have to mention Pogo.com.  Now I know it's not new, nor is it a new find for me, but I've found myself going back more often lately to play my favorite games.  Whether it's Monopoly, Boggle Bash, Scrabble, dominoes, or hearts, I'm loving the game play on there again.

A few weeks ago I was complaining to a friend of mine that I don't see many butterflies anymore.  I remember being a kid in MN and seeing tons of them all the time.  Well needless to say, a few days ago a ton of them showed up out of the blue in my neighborhood.  Now I've never been very good about identifying them, so I looked up this website, Butterflies and Moths of North America, and got to work.  I sort of suck at this by the way, and I'm still not sure what I'm supposed to be looking for.  First of all, they are very hard to take pictures of when the winds are blowing, and this is Kansas so winds are always blowing.  I did manage to get three decent pics though.  It's a new camera so the pictures aren't the best.

And last, but not least I would like to share a song that I've been listening to a lot lately.  When Anne Rice wrote her novel, Violin, there was a soundtrack put out as well.  Leila Josefowicz was the violinist chosen to perform on the album, and my favorite song on it was "Moon Over Bourbon Street," which was composed by her and Sting.  I recently started listening to it again.

NPR's 100 Top Science Fiction/Fantasy Books

For this summer, NPR asked it's listeners to nominate & vote on their favorite science fiction and fantasy books.  They didn't do it alone, thank goodness, they had the assistance of a panel of experts.  

I've only read 15 of the top 100 books selected, though quite a few of them are made of multiple books.  So the actual book number would be much higher.  I do wish they would have made separate lists for science fiction and fantasy.  I think by combing the two genres, it does a disservice to both the readers and the authors.  I would have liked to see Guy Gavriel Kay & Mercedes Lackey make the list.  I also think a few names appear way too often, Neil Gaiman & Neal Stephenson being two of them.  Overall, I think it's a good list and includes some of my favorite books of all time.  It also includes a lot of books that have been on my radar for a while, now I just need to read them.  The one thing about this list I loved, no YA or horror.  So thankfully, Twilight did not make the list.

1. The Lord of the Rings Trilogy by J.R.R. Tolkien
2. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams
3. Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card
4. The Dune Chronicles by Frank Herbert
5. A Song of Ice and Fire Series by George R.R. Martin
6. 1984 by George Orwell
7. Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
8. The Foundation Trilogy by Isaac Asimov
9. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
10. American Gods by Neil Gaiman
11. The Princess Bride by William Goldman
12. The Wheel of Time Series by Robert Jordan
13. Animal Farm by George Orwell
14. Neuromancer by William Gibson
15. Watchmen by Alan Moore & Dave Gibbons
16. I, Robot by Isaac Asimov
17. Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein
18. The Kingkiller Chronicles by Patrick Rothfuss
19. Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut
20. Frankenstein by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
21. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick
22. The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood
23. The Dark Tower Series by Stephen King
24. 2001: A Space Odyssey by Arthur C. Clarke
25. The Stand by Stephen King
26. Snow Crash Neal Stephenson
27. The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury
28. Cat's Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut
29. The Sandman Series by Neil Gaiman
30. A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess
31. Starship Troopers by Robert A. Heinlein
32. Watership Down by Richard Adams
33. Dragonflight by Anne McCaffrey
34. The Moon is a Harsh Mistress by Robert A. Heinlein
35. A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter M. Miller Jr.
36. The Time Machine by H.G. Wells
37. 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne
38. Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes
39. The War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells
40. The Amber Chronicles by Roger Zelazny
41. The Belgariad by David Eddings
42. The Mists of Avalon by Marion Zimmer Bradley
43. Mistborn Trilogy by Brandon Sanderson
44. Ringworld by Larry Niven
45. The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin
46. The Silmarillion by J.R.R. Tolkien
47. The Once and Future King by T.H. White
48. Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman
49. Childhood's End by Arthur C. Clarke
50. Contact by Carl Sagan
51. The Hyperion Cantos by Dan Simmons
52. Stardust by Neil Gaiman
53. Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson
54. World War Z by Max Brooks
55. The Last Unicorn by Peter S. Beagle
56. The Forever War by Joe Haldeman
57. Small Gods by Terry Pratchett
58. The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, The Unbeliever by Stephen R. Donaldson
59. The Vorkosigan Saga by Lois McMaster Bujold
60.  Going Postal by Terry Pratchett
61. The Mote in Gods Eye by Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle
62. The Sword of Truth Series by Terry Goodkind
63. The Road by Cormac McCarthy
64. Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke
65. I Am Legend by Richard Matheson
66. The Riftwar Saga by Raymond E. Feist
67. The Sword of Shannara by Terry Brooks
68. The Conan the Barbarian Series by Robert E. Howard & Mark Schultz
69. The Farseer Trilogy by Robin Hobb
70. The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
71. The Way of the Kings by Brandon Sanderson
72. Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne
73. The Legend of Drizzt Series by R. A. Salvatore
74. Old Man's War by Jon Scalzi
75. The Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson
76. Rendezvous with Rama by Arthur C. Clarke
77. The Kushiel's Legacy Series by Jacqueline Carey
78. The Dispossessed by Ursula K. Le Guin
79. Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury
80. Wicked by Gregory Maguire
81. The Malazan Book of the Fallen Series by Steven Erikson
82. The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde
83. The Culture Series by Iain Banks
84. The Crystal Cave by Mary Stewart
85. Anathem by Neal Stephenson
86. The Codex Alera Series by Jim Butcher
87. The Book of the New Sun by Gene Wolfe
88. The Thrawn Trilogy by Timothy Zahn
89. The Outlander Series by Diana Gabaldon
90. The Elric Saga by Michael Moorcock
91. The Illustrated Man by Ray Bradbury
92. Sunshine by Robin McKinley
93. A Fire Upon the Deep by Vernor Vinge
94. The Caves of Steel by Isaac Asimov
95. The Mars trilogy by Kim Stanley Robinson
96. Lucifer's Hammer by Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle
97. Doomsday Book by Connie Willis
98. Perdido Street Station by China Mieville
99. The Xanath Series by Piers Anthony
100. The Space Trilogy by C.S. Lewis

NPR's 100 Top Killer Thrillers (Last Summer's List)

Last summer the listeners of NPR, with some expert help, nominated and voted on their top 100 Thriller Killers.  I actually meant to post about this last summer, but totally forgot all about it.  I didn't think about it again until this year's list came out, Top 100 Science Fiction, Fantasy Books.  So before I shared the new list with you, I figured I better get the old one posted.  


What do you think about the choices made?  Myself, I'm pretty impressed that some of the books I voted for made the list.  It was nice to see Agatha Christie in the top 10, though I would have liked to see more of her books on it.  Dracula, coming in at 11 was a nice surprise.  I'm actually shocked by how many of these books I have never read, I've only read 12 of them (the red highlighted ones.)  I guess I have a lot of reading to do.

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• 1. The Silence of the Lambs by Thomas Harris
• 2. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson
• 3. Kiss the Girls, by James Patterson
• 4. The Bourne Identity, by Robert Ludlum
• 5. In Cold Blood, by Truman Capote
• 6. The Da Vinci Code, by Dan Brown
• 7. The Shining, by Stephen King
• 8. And Then There Were None, by Agatha Christie
• 9. The Hunt tor Red October, by Tom Clancy
• 10. The Hound of the Baskervilles, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

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• 11. Dracula, by Bram Stoker
• 12. The Stand, by Stephen King
• 13. The Bone Collector, by Jeffery Deaver
• 14. Jurassic Park, by Michael Crichton
• 15. Angels & Demons, by Dan Brown
• 16. A Time to Kill, by John Grisham
• 17. The Andromeda Strain, by Michael Crichton
• 18. Mystic River, by Dennis Lehane
• 19. The Day of the Jackal, by Frederick Forsyth
• 20. Rebecca, by Daphne du Maurier

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• 21. Eye of the Needle, by Ken Follett
• 22. It, by Stephen King
• 23. The Count of Monte Cristo, by Alexandre Dumas
• 24. The Girl Who Played with Fire, by Stieg Larsson
• 25. Jaws, by Peter Benchley
• 26. The Alienist, by Caleb Carr
• 27. Red Dragon, by Thomas Harris
• 28. Presumed Innocent, by Scott Turow
• 29. The Maltese Falcon, by Dashiell Hammett
• 30. The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest, by Stieg Larsson

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• 31. No Country For Old Men, by Cormac McCarthy
• 32. Gone Baby Gone, by Dennis Lehane
• 33. Gorky Park, by Martin Cruz Smith
• 34. Rosemary's Baby, by Ira Levin
• 35. Subterranean, by James Rollins
• 36. Clear and Present Danger, by Tom Clancy
• 37. Salem's Lot, by Stephen King
• 38. Shutter Island, by Dennis Lehane
• 39. The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, by John Le Carre
• 40. The Poet, by Michael Connelly

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• 41. The Boys from Brazil, by Ira Levin
• 42. Cape Fear, by John MacDonald
• 43. The Bride Collector, by Ted Dekker
• 44. Pet Sematary, by Stephen King
• 45. Dead Zone, by Stephen King
• 46. The Manchurian Candidate, by Richard Condon
• 47. Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, by John Le Carre
• 48. The Talented Mr. Ripley, by Patricia Highsmith
• 49. Tell No One, by Harlan Coben
• 50. Consent to Kill, by Vince Flynn

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• 51. The 39 Steps, by John Buchan
• 52. Blowback, by Brad Thor
• 53. The Children of Men, by P.D. James
• 54. 61 Hours, by Lee Child
• 55. Marathon Man, by William Goldman
• 56. The Woman in White, by Wilkie Collins
• 57. 206 Bones, by Kathy Reichs
• 58. Psycho, by Robert Bloch
• 59. The Killing Floor, by Lee Child
• 60. Rules of Prey, by John Sandford

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• 61. The Hunger Games, by Suzanne Collins
• 62. In the Woods, by Tana French
• 63. Shogun, by James Clavell
• 64. The Relic, by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child
• 65. Intensity, by Dean Koontz
• 66. Casino Royale, by Ian Fleming
• 67. Metzger's Dog, by Thomas Perry
• 68. Timeline, by Michael Crichton
• 69. Contact, by Carl Sagan
• 70. What the Dead Know, by Laura Lippman

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• 71. The Shadow of the Wind, by Carlos Ruiz Zafon
• 72. The Cabinet of Curiosities, by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child
• 73. Charm School, by Nelson DeMille
• 74. Feed, by Mira Grant
• 75. Gone Tomorrow, by Lee Child
• 76. Darkly Dreaming Dexter, by Jeff Lindsay
• 77. The Secret History, by Donna Tartt
• 78. The First Deadly Sin, by Lawrence Sanders
• 79. Cryptonomicon, by Neal Stephenson
• 80. The Brotherhood of the Rose, by David Morrell

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• 81. Primal Fear, by William Diehl
• 82. The Templar Legacy, by Steve Berry
• 82. The Hard Way, by Lee Child [tie]
• 84. The Last of the Mohicans, by James Fenimore Cooper
• 85. Six Days of the Condor, by James Grady
• 86. Fail-Safe, by Eugene Burdick and Harvey Wheeler
• 87. Strangers on a Train, by Patricia Highsmith
• 88. The Eight, by Katherine Neville
• 89. The Lost Symbol, by Dan Brown
• 90. Goldfinger, by Ian Fleming

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• 91. Bangkok 8, by John Burdett
• 92. The Kill Artist, by Daniel Silva
• 93. Hardball, by Sara Paretsky
• 94. The Club Dumas, by Arturo Perez-Reverte
• 95. The Deep Blue Good-by, by John MacDonald
• 96. The Monkey's Raincoat, by Robert Crais
• 96. Berlin Game, by Len Deighton [tie]
• 98. A Simple Plan, by Scott Smith
• 99. Child 44, by Tom Rob Smith
• 100. Heartsick, by Chelsea Cain

Some More Interesting Links

I've never been all that interested in reading Jane Eyre, but after listening to the Reader's Review of it on The Diane Rehm show, I can't wait to get a hold of it.  Joining Diane on the show was NYT columnist Maureen Dowd, Syrie James (author of The Secret Diaries of Charlotte Bronte), and John Pfordresher (professor of English at Georgetown University).

Another interesting discussion I heard on The Diane Rehm Show was an interview with Geraldine Brooks, the author of Caleb's Crossing.  It's a fictional account of the first Native American to graduate from Harvard College in 1665. 

On the NPR show, Here & Now, Robin Young interviewed Daniel Levitin, author of Your Brain on Music.  It's a fascinating look at how music is able to convey emotion and how musicians change the emphasis while playing.

On CBS.com I've been watching a lot of  "Perry Mason" episodes.  I think when I'm done, I'll be watching  old episodes of "The Love Boat".

Mario Frangoulis is one of my favorite male vocalists alive today.  He is a Greek Tenor but also sings in English, Spanish, Portuguese, and Italian.  One of my favorites is his version of "Hijo de la Luna" or "Son of the Moon".  It's gorgeous, I think if you listen to it, you will love it.

A Few Interesting Links I Want To Share

I normally don't do these type of posts but I have come across some rather interesting things on the Internet that I feel compelled to share with you.  They have occupied quite a bit of my time and hopefully they will do the same for you.  This may turn into a semi regular thing as I find items that excite me so much that I have to share them.

I have Sheila over at Book Journey to blame for the first item I want to share with you.  She reviewed an audio book of Dracula by Bram Stoker and it reminded me of my favorite version of it.  I have always loved The Mercury Theater on the Air version that Orson Wells produced back in the 1930s.  I own it on CD but I figured I could find it online for others to listen to as well.  I eventually found it as part of a free podcast on iTunes.  It's called The Horror! (Old Time Radio).  You can subscribe to get a new podcast downloaded to your iTunes account every week.  If you don't have iTunes go to RelicRadio.com and you can not only find The Horror station but many others as well.  I've been listening for days now to old time radio shows that most times are more entertaining than television.  They knew how to tell stories back then.  Today's scribes could learn a lesson from them.  If you want to listen to Dracula go to this page and it's listed along with some other great shows.

I'm a big fan of public radio and one of the shows I listen to quite often is The Diane Rehm Show.  She is an excellent interviewer and can readily discuss politics, economics, defense, movies, literature, and social policy at any given time.  I found two book discussions to be very interesting.  On 3/21/11 she talked with Robert Lane Greene, author of "You Are What You Speak: Grammar Grouches, Language Laws, and the Politics of Identity".  It was an entertaining look at language and the way people use it, most times without thinking about it.  On 3/10/11 she talked with David Brooks, the author of "The Social Animal:  The Hidden Sources of Love, Character and Achievement."  I've since seen him on various shows discussing his book, which I really want to read.  If you click on the titles of the books it will take you to the corresponding episode of the show.

I think most of you know that I'm a huge fan of Daryl Gregory, the author of Pandemonium and The Devil's Alphabet.  He has a new book, titled Raising Stony Mayhall, slated to come out in June.  I can't wait to get my hands on it, but in the meantime the author generously put the prologue and first chapter on his site for everyone to read.  After reading it, I was even more excited to get hold of the book.

The last item I want to leave you with is a gorgeous song from Chris Botti.  It features Gladys Knight on vocals.  So please enjoy their rendition of "Lover Man".

NPR: 100 Best Beach Reads

On July 29th NPR released the results of their audience poll for the best "beach reads". After over 16,000 listeners casted about 136,000 ballots a very eclectic list emerged. Personally I think some are either a little long or serious to be called beach reads but I was not consulted on it. So with no further ado, here is the list.

1. The Harry Potter series, by J.K. Rowling
2. To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee
3. The Kite Runner, by Khaled Hosseini
4. Bridget Jones's Diary, by Helen Fielding
5. Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen
6. Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood, by Rebecca Wells
7. The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald
8. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, by Douglas Adams
9. Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe, by Fannie Flagg
10. The Poisonwood Bible, by Barbara Kingsolver
11. The Time Traveler's Wife, by Audrey Niffenegger
12. Life of Pi, by Yann Martel
13. The Joy Luck Club, by Amy Tan
14. The Hobbit, by J.R.R. Tolkien
15. The Catcher in the Rye, by J.D. Salinger
16. Gone with the Wind, by Margaret Mitchell
17. Bel Canto, by Ann Patchett
18. The Lord of the Rings, by J.R.R. Tolkien
19. Middlesex, by Jeffrey Eugenides
20. Water for Elephants, by Sara Gruen
21. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, by Mark Twain
22. The Bean Trees, by Barbara Kingsolver
23. The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency, by Alexander McCall Smith
24. The World According to Garp, by John Irving
25. Catch-22, by Joseph Heller
26. The Prince of Tides, by Pat Conroy
27. Like Water for Chocolate, by Laura Esquivel
28. The Princess Bride, by William Goldman
29. The Accidental Tourist, by Anne Tyler
30. Twilight, by Stephenie Meyer
31. A Confederacy of Dunces, by John Kennedy Toole
32. East of Eden, by John Steinbeck
33. The Red Tent, by Anita Diamant
34. Beach Music, by Pat Conroy
35. One Hundred Years of Solitude, by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
36. Rebecca, by Daphne Du Maurier
37. Ender's Game, by Orson Scott Card
38. Lonesome Dove, by Larry McMurtry
39. The Thorn Birds, by Colleen McCullough
40. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, by Michael Chabon
41. Pillars of the Earth, by Ken Follett
42. Anna Karenina, by Leo Tolstoy
43. Interview with the Vampire, by Anne Rice
44. Cold Mountain, by Charles Frazier
45. Empire Falls, by Richard Russo
46. Under the Tuscan Sun, by Frances Mayes
47. The Count of Monte Cristo, by Alexandre Dumas
48. Even Cowgirls Get the Blues, by Tom Robbins
49. I Know This Much Is True, by Wally Lamb
50. Murder on the Orient Express, by Agatha Christie
51. Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott
52. The Stand, by Stephen King
53. She's Come Undone, by Wally Lamb
54. Dune, by Frank Herbert
55. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows
56. Love in the Time of Cholera, by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
57. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, by Lewis Carroll
58. Lolita, by Vladimir Nabokov
59. The Godfather, by Mario Puzo
60. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, by Betty Smith
61. Animal Dreams, by Barbara Kingsolver
62. Jaws, by Peter Benchley
63. Good in Bed, by Jennifer Weiner
64. Angle of Repose, by Wallace Stegner
65. Snow Falling on Cedars, by David Guterson
66. The Old Man and the Sea, by Ernest Hemingway
67. The Fountainhead, by Ayn Rand
68. Breakfast of Champions, by Kurt Vonnegut
69. Cat's Cradle, by Kurt Vonnegut
70. The Big Sleep, by Raymond Chandler
71. The Sun Also Rises, by Ernest Hemingway
72. The Hunt for Red October, by Tom Clancy
73. Cold Sassy Tree, by Olive Ann Burns
74. The Lord of the Flies, by William Golding
74. Bonfire of the Vanities, by Tom Wolfe [tie]
76. Wuthering Heights, by Emily Bronte
77. Outlander, by Diana Gabaldon
78. The Shell Seekers, by Rosamunde Pilcher
79. Prodigal Summer, by Barbara Kingsolver
80. Eye of the Needle, by Ken Follett
81. Cannery Row, by John Steinbeck
81. The Pilot's Wife, by Anita Shreve [tie]
83. All the Pretty Horses, by Cormac McCarthy
84. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, by Stieg Larsson
85. The Little Prince, by Antoine De Saint-Exupery
86. The Road, by Cormac McCarthy
87. One for the Money, by Janet Evanovich
88. Shogun, by James Clavell
89. Dracula, by Bram Stoker
90. The Unbearable Lightness of Being, by Milan Kundera
91. Presumed Innocent, by Scott Turow
92. Franny and Zooey, by J.D. Salinger
93. The Secret History, by Donna Tartt
94. Dead Until Dark, by Charlaine Harris
95. Summer Sisters, by Judy Blume
96. The Shining, by Stephen King
97. How Stella Got Her Groove Back, by Terry McMillan
98. Lamb, by Christopher Moore
99. Sick Puppy, by Carl Hiaasen
100. Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson

So what are your favorite beach reads? Are they on this list or did they leave out your favorites?