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I suck at buying birthday presents. Please help me find a book on home businesses!

badmoonrising — Tue, 19 May 2009 16:17:39 -0800

I need to find a helpful book about starting home businesses for my friend. My good friend is planning to start up her own home-based company over the summer. She already has a number of creative money-making schemes up and running, including painting murals and selling (wonderfully) painted shoes by commission, but she mentioned to me recently that she'd like to get a business going during the summer to tie together all her different endeavours. She plans to keep it ticking over during the next academic year and then really get things moving once she graduates next summer. Her dream is, I think, to open a shop one day selling her various work. I include these details a) because the craft aspect may be relevant to the type of book, and b) to show that she's not planning to spring straight into renting a workshop and hiring staff, but she is thinking long term and taking it fairly seriously.

So, for her birthday I'd like to get her a decent book about small/home businesses to show that I'm supportive of her plans.

But after browsing Amazon, I find myself a little stymied. To be honest, since I know absolutely nothing about home businesses, I don't know what's useful and what's completely irrelevant at this stage. All the books seem to be either incredibly patronising and 'For Dummies' style, (which admittedly may be useful but they're rather insulting to give to someone as a present!), or dense tomes about interviewing prospective staff and buying office furniture in bulk, which isn't relevant to her at this point. I'd like something in the middle.

Specific to the UK is a bonus, but if it's a really useful book otherwise then I can be flexible on that.

So. Does anyone have any recommendations of books they've found helpful? Or, on the other hand, books to avoid like the plague?

Thanks very much everyone!

Finding new books

TrashyRambo — Sat, 07 Mar 2009 10:53:48 -0800

How do you discover new books and authors? Netflix tells me what I'd enjoy watching and Pandora helps me find new music. But beyond the slightly random "Amazon Recommends..." I depend on word of mouth to pick my next read. This is slow and unsatisfactory. What's a better way?

Help me achieve catharsis through reading

brandnew — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 08:11:47 -0800

Fiction or film recommendations with characters that undergo serious catharsis I've been having some rough times lately, emotionally. My life has suddenly become very strange and foreign after years of stability. I'm doubting all kinds of things and solid relationships are being turned upside down. I want to read my pain away. Are there any novels or films where the protagonist suddenly questions everything in their life and finds that they're not living the life they were meant to live? I'm looking for books highly character-driven, relationship-oriented,with difficult life-changing decisions to be made (or not made). modern, if possible. A lot of books these days seem to be highly clever, which is ok, but I'm more interested in empathy and emotional resonance. Surrealism and magical realism ok, but I'm looking to identify in realistic ways. Something that will hit me harder than a dose of MDMA

Books with just two (or something like that) people?

Xere — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 17:23:03 -0800

Are there any books out there that are basically just two people having a conversation and going about their business? Sort of a book version of Before Sunset, or My Dinner with Andre?

Help me naturally select some good books on speciation!

palindromic — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 06:21:05 -0800

I've become very interested in the topic of speciation lately, but I'm having a hard time distinguishing which books would be the best to start with. I've heard nothing but good things about Speciation in Birds, but I'm not sure if a somewhat knowledgeable layperson could really get into it.

What I'd like a book that provides a good overview of the field and its concepts, but if you are a biologist with personal favorites those are also welcome. I would also appreciate any information on the books that amazon, alibris and so on are not telling me.

(PS - I like birds, hominids, plants, fish, lizards - whatever - so if you get that feeling of 'Well, I do *love* this book on cockroach speciation, but nah...', you stifle that feeling and post your beloved cockroach book anyway.

Help me choose a book to travel with.

mosessis — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 21:38:48 -0800

I need a longish, interesting, well-written book (fiction) to read on an upcoming trip. Any suggestions? I'm going on a trip where I'll have plenty of time to read and not much space to pack books. I need to find a good novel-type book that could last me at least a couple of weeks. My trip is for a couple of months in non-English speaking countries, and I want something captivating to fall into as a respite from journeying.

I have read both Portrait of a Lady by Henry James and Sophie's World by Jostein Gaarder in this same situation, and those worked perfectly for my purposes. I wish I could just bring one of these again, because they were so perfect - dense, interesting, thought-provoking, lend themselves to rereading passages - but I'd really like to find something new.

My general tastes run towards late 18th Century (Burney Lennox, Austen, etc) and turn of the twentieth century (James, Wharton, Wilde, etc). I generally steer away from serializations that have been turned into novels (Dickens, Forster, etc) and overly romanticized, gothic, heroic, dramatic love type stories (Les Miserables, Goethe, etc). But of course I am completely open to trying new genres and authors that I might not yet know I love.

What book was in your backpack that kept you going through the lonely times? What's the best longish novel you've read that you wish you had had the time to just sit and read? To slightly complicate this, I'm leaving in 36 hours and will have to find this on the shelf at one of my (luckily many) local book stores.

Recommend a book - fiction or non-fiction- dealing with the uncertain, endless posibilities of life

rbf1138 — Fri, 30 May 2008 18:47:42 -0800

What should I read? Recommend a book (fiction or non-fiction), life affirming, something to be read after a heartbreak/letting go. Possibly involving fate/destiny, and the uncertainty/infinite possibilities of life.

Help me find interesting anthropology/sociology books.

lhall — Thu, 20 Dec 2007 15:50:35 -0800

Books about anthropology, psychology, sociology, modern rituals...I think. Can you point me in the right direction? This is a bit of a "duh" question, but here goes.

I'm searching for a good book to read on an international flight, but I'm not even sure where to start looking. I read this comment about the ritual aspect of a marriage ceremony and the reception that follows, and thought "Hey, that's interesting..." followed by "Where can I find more of the same?"

The books recommended in this thread (about conspiracy and superstition) and this one (on fiction) seem interesting and I'm going to check out a few, but I'm also looking for general recommendations. (Also useful would be help on how I can get a bit more specific in my searching.)

Thanks in advance!

Help me find suspense/horror books whose characters don't suck!

misha — Fri, 19 Oct 2007 10:53:55 -0800

I just finished reading Scott Smith's "The Ruins" and loved it. I want to read more books like this (and his original "The Simple Plan"). Basically, I want all the suspense and horror, but the people have to seem real to me. I don't have to like them, I just want to know what they are thinking/feeling/fearing so that they aren't just numbers on some gorefest scoreboard. Bonus points if the author is semi-prolific, so I have choices for further reading. Help me, hive mind!

Books with bumbling wizards?

killjoy — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 15:38:37 -0800

Recommendations for books with bumbling wizards? I'm looking for light, entertaining reads in the fantasy vein. Think Douglas Adams with magic. Bumbling wizards are a must--extra points for talking dragons and unicorns.

I enjoyed Terry Pratchett's Discworld series and most of Terry Brooks' Kingdom for Sale series.

Most recent books read were Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows and Martin Amis' Money.

The Dangerous Book for Non-Boys

divabat — Sat, 25 Aug 2007 03:04:27 -0800

I've read "The Dangerous Book for Boys" and I generally love those kind of books (information about anything with guides on doing stuff). What other books are out there that are in a similar vein? I'm a 21-year-old girl but would rather not have a "girly" book.

Intelligent page turners

objdoc — Sun, 22 Jul 2007 18:56:50 -0800

Recommend some bed-time and weekend fiction or non-fiction reading that will keep me enthralled after a long day or a long week I'm looking for page-turners, no specific genre, but nothing dry, hard to get into or especially long. Definitely need something plot driven. Probably set in the present, maybe political or business thrillers, maybe something else altogether... Bonus if the books are intelligent, literate, and teach me something about the world...

Book or Web Recommendations for Using Gym Equipment

Kellyu — Thu, 17 May 2007 14:26:34 -0800

I've been a member of gym now for the last few months. I've gotten some training on some of the myriad of machines at the place, but I'd like to know more about using them in-depth. Can anyone recommend good books or web sites that focus on the various exercises you can do and/or exercise machines you can work out with at a gym? P.S.: am not much interested in a *lot* of heavy weight-lifting using barbels and such, just mostly the other devices.

Please recommend me some reading material

Solomon — Fri, 06 Apr 2007 16:19:03 -0800

I've recently realised that I'm into certain types of fiction books. Please recommend some other books/authors I might find interesting. The books seem to have the following themes - how people react to each other/relationships between people (Captain Corelli's Mandolin, The Lord Of The Rings), various methods of healing (Earth's Children) and how people interact with the physical world/nature (Ray Mears Bushcraft books/SAS survival books/books on indigenous peoples).

I've found this out by studying the books I read and reread - Captain Corelli's Mandolin has both healing and relationships stuff, for example, while the Earth's Children series has all three elements. It's important that they are realistic sounding (or are even completely realistic).

I'd prefer fiction, but nonfiction is also very acceptable, provided it isn't in the format of a highschool textbook. I hated them when I was young, I certainly don't want to read them for pleasure. :D I'm looking for something that I can enjoy reading for pleasure.

Another thing I find interesting are "Armageddon" type books, where people are put into difficult situations, and are left to sink or swim. Bonus points for telling me what this says about my inner life. :D Also, I wouldn't be averse to them containing information on the spiritual aspects of the characters.

What's the best non-fiction I haven't found yet?

croutonsupafreak — Tue, 22 Aug 2006 22:25:23 -0800

I'm looking for more great non-fiction books. Requirements: writing to make an English major swoon; a thesis or narrative structure that makes for an organized, logical flow; well-reported; interesting; true, with embellishments of known fact made known by the author. Great non-fiction gives me thrills, but I guess I have pretty high standards. I'm hard to please.

The best non-fiction book I've read recently was "The Guns of August," by Barbara Tuchman. Her prose was amazing, each sentence lead into the next, each chapter led into the next. The book has themes, a thesis and a narrative. And it's well footnoted, too.

Other books that are pretty good:
* "Under the Banner of Heavan" by John Krakauer -- fascinating subject, strong writing, well-reported, good flow, doesn't quite sing.
* "Devil in the White City," -- passages of great writing, well organized, but occasionally limping flow.

Frustrating books:
* "The Outlaw Sea," by William Langewiesche -- fantastic writing, great subject, but no central thesis stronger than "the ocean is vast and underestimated" and no sense of flow between the chapters.
* "Fast Food Nation"-- Compelling enough, I guess, but the writing was too preachy and ordinary.
* Any non-fiction by Tom Wolfe or Hunter S. Thompson -- fun to read, but not particularly artful writing and not much of a deep plot.

Never again:
* "Salt," by Mark Kurlansky -- Each chapter is a series of grammatically correct sentences on a single subject, with no clear organization. The various chapters are arranged in no particular order. No thesis. No narrative. No apparent point.

Wouldn't qualify:
* "In Cold Blood," Truman Capote -- I love this book, its writing, its structure, but too much of it comes from the writer's own imagination to qualify as non-fiction by my definition.

Pretend you are Oprah

barnone — Fri, 05 May 2006 13:23:01 -0800

My mom loved The Secret Life of Bees and The Year of Magical Thinking. She couldn't get through much of The Time Traveler's Wife. What else might she like? My mom isn't a big reader but she'll generally have a book on the go. Right now she's having a rough time and I'd like to get her a few great books to read before going to sleep. She also kind of enjoyed the Life of Pi and I think she read A Million Little Pieces and enjoyed it. She doesn't like those books that are mindless fluff (like that Shopaholic series), but she's not into the Atwood heaviness either. I'm thinking about something like A Kiss from Maddalena, Frangipani, Middlesex, A Mermaid's Chair, or The Brothers K.

I haven't read most of those though (well, none other than Middlesex) so I'm not sure if they'd be appropriate. Things that I'd like to exclude: time travel, sci-fi, 'weird' stuff (c'mon, think about a mom book club), really depressing stories, old English or complicated prose/chronology. She wants a good read, it can be thoughtful or sad in places, but not overwhelmingly heart-breaking or juvenile.

Any suggestions? Would any of the ones I listed above work? I'll go browse though a dozen or two at the bookstore to pick out a few for her, so more recommendations would be much appreciated.

Recommendation for an Epic Adventure/Fantasy novel or series to read.

mi6op — Fri, 18 Nov 2005 22:51:13 -0800

I'm searching for an Epic Adventure/Fantasy novel or series to read. I loved Lord of the Rings and feel that is a great example of what I am looking for and what I mean when I say "epic."

East Asian Books

MostHolyPorcine — Tue, 28 Jun 2005 14:47:00 -0800

Book recommendations for a bored East Asian Studies major... I work about 30 hours a week, and during that time I spend, roughly, 25 hours reading, and for the first time in god knows when my 'to-read' pile is tapped. So I need some recommendations. What I want are sort of light(er) weight books dealing with recent historical (opium war onward) and contemporary Asia. Books I've read that I would consider to fit the bill would be...Speed Tribes by Karl Taro Greenfeld, The Asian Mystique by Serridan Passos, In the Realm of a Dying Emperor by Norma Feild, hell, even John Dower's WWII histories. Basically, I want something relatively easy to read (no weighty policy journals...) but still with some substance. Thanks for any suggestions!

Like William Gibson

andrew cooke — Sun, 20 Jun 2004 10:26:29 -0800

i'm reading gibson's pattern recognition. i'd like something the same, but better. more inside. comparing pattern recognition with cryptonomicon, i find gibson's comments on culture and technology more perceptive, and his writing rather less clunky. but i'd like to go further still. gibson finds it necessary to explain "steganography" (stephenson felt the same about "256" - in snow crash, iirc - so again gibson is at least an improvement), which bugs me. he also seems to be heading towards a thriller/action plot line - i'm more interested in how people live in the modern world, not how they beat the bad guys.

so i'm looking for something that's well written (good characters, a properly planned plot - no indestructible superhero central characters that suddenly become mortal after 300 pages, hint hint - and convincing dialogue, for example), along with an interest in modern culture and technology, but from an author that doesn't feel the need for fight sequences or those conversations in which one character carefully explains to another what the preceding long word meant.

thanks....

Like David Eggers, only female.

ronv — Sun, 04 Apr 2004 19:58:01 -0800

my girlfriend is a fan of writers such as chuck palahniuk, dave eggers, jeffrey eugenides, david sedaris.
recently,she's expressed interest in finding an author (or authors) with a similar style-- but female.

any thoughts or suggestions?