Shogun is great. I binged on James Clavell some years ago. Normally, I can only read a few pages a day (night). Do my best reading when travelling. Try to keep a couple of books on the night table. Something easy and something dense. My latest easy reading was Asimov’s The End of Eternity, for maybe the millionth time. Dense reading: Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman. I got through about 2/3 of it, then needed to start over again. A surprise on every page. Pretty freaking dense.
Reading “Moneyland”
Learning a lot about how the rich hide their wealth to the detriment of us all.
I’m currently reading (listening on Audible) Rick Wilson’s “Everything Trump Touches Dies.”
It’s pretty good and actually funny in parts.
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Currently reading “Aztec and Maya The Complete Illustrated History” by Charles Phillips. It’s a well researched volume with beautiful photos to hold the reader’s interest. With Mexico 
& Central America so often in the news, what better place to learn about their histories than starting with the original inhabitants & Spanish exploration & conquest?
I love that this thread is about normal books. Previous threads on the old forum it was as if some of the posters were trying to find the most obscure books possible all in the desire to come across as intellectual.
Thanks for keeping it real.
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Finished “Force of Nature” by Jane Harper, liked it a lot. Pacing was excellent. Went on to “Defending Jacob” because it was our next book club pick. Basically, “The Bad Seed” meets “Before and After.” I wasn’t crazy about it but several of the club who’d read it liked it a lot.
Moving on to reread “Wedlock”, nonfiction by Wendy Moore about the richest woman in early 19th century England who is tricked into making a disastrous marriage to a fortune hunter, and becomes one of the few people, and far fewer women, to obtain a divorce. Reads like fiction.
Actually read, read!, a book this week bringing me up to two books I’ve read in the last two months. Wanted by Robert Crais. It the latest in his long running Elvis Cole Private Detective series. Like most of his books it kept me entertained but it didn’t do anything new or surprising except this is the first book in the series where I’ve truly noticed that Crais has abandoned having his characters age with us. When the series started, back in the late 80’s I believe, Cole was in his late 30’s and a vietnam vet. For a while it seemed like he was having Cole age as if he lived in real time with us but he’s obviously stopped aging him as Cole would be nearing 70 by now.
If you like the Harry Bosch novels by Michael Connelly you’ll like these books. The two authors are friends and had fun one year having each other’s character cameo in the others book. You would miss it if you weren’t familiar with both characters but to those of us who read both it was obvious and cool.
I’m juggling books. Returned a library book, “The Girl At the Grave”, which could have been a good historical suspense but got weighted down with romantic storyline 
. Which suitor will Valentine choose
Swore I’d be in and out, but that never works. Steven Cooper’s new read, “Dig Your Grave” was out & I grabbed it. I love the Detective Alex Mills/ Psychic Investigator Gus Parker series as I do believe in psychic phenomena. Gus Parker has a day job as an Imaging Tech, and there’s a lot of humor in the series, of which this is the second.
Also found Harlen Coben’s “Promise Me”, which looks promising. I have two weeks to finish the new release, but most likely will end up renewing Coben’s work.
This is one of his Myron Bolitar books, #8 in the series I believe. Have you read the others? If not then you should stop right now and go back to the beginning to the first Myron book which is called Dealbreaker. I love this series and while its not absolute that you have to read them in order you will miss out on a lot if you don’t as the character’s personal lives do change a lot throughout the series.
Coben is my favorite non sci fi / fantasy author and I literally have read or listened to every novel he’s written. All except the first two books he wrote (Play Dead and Miracle Cure) exist in the same universe and take place in the New Jersey / NYC area. As such there are recurring characters that appear in many of them. Obviously so in the Myron books but even in the non Myron books there are a few characters who pop up more than once and Myron or his supporting cast even cameo now and then in the non Myron books though you probably wouldn’t realize it if you hadn’t read them.
Finished listening to Dark Sacred Night by Michael Connelly in just under a day as it was a slow night at work and I listen at 1.5 speed. He merges his Renee Ballard and Harry Bosch universes so its book #2 with Ballard and book #twenty something with Bosch. Its largely a sequel to the last Bosch book, Two Kinds of Truth, where Bosch helped a drug addict who fell into drugs after the unsolved murder of her daughter some years ago. Bosch decides he’s going to solve the case for her and Ballard becomes involved when she catches Bosch snooping around in LAPD files after hours and decides to help him. There are also several other subplots going throughout with both Ballard and Bosch.
I read a recent New Yorker piece about the author of the bestseller “The Woman in the Window”, and reading through the plot description, I immediately thought - sounds like the movie “Copycat.” Later in the article, the writer came to the same conclusion. It was last year’s bestseller and slated to be a film, or may already have been filmed. The plot is about an agoraphobic psychologist who may or may not see a crime from her window. Basically it’s “Rear Window” meets “Copycat”. One of those books I call a three-hundred page novel squeezed into 400+ pages. But a fast read.
Just started reading “The Philosophy Book” from the Big Ideas Simply Explained series. So far it’s a great popular level introduction to philosophy.
I know several middle class (varying degrees) that hide income. They are self employed. Hairdressers, a tavern owner, custom woodworking/home remodel guy, cement finisher, electrician, plumber. My aunt sews custom dresses for prom/homecoming and weddings. Her daughter does wedding photography, family & senior portraits. All unreported or under-reported income.
This isn’t that.
Moneyland is about Kleptocracy… not normal people having a side hustle.
This only proves that many middle class people don’t really understand the depths of money hiding of the ultra-wealthy and think they are doing the same thing with their personal jobs.
Also, I’ve done the same thing. A lot of those people are probably losing out by not reporting. If you’re reporting your income, you also get to deduct every single item your purchase for the job, every mile they drive, the space in the home that they use, etc. It’s not hard to have enough deductions to zero out or minimize the income.
Not anymore. All of those deductions got taken away.
Now one would have to operate under a LLC.
Are you sure about that? I just did our taxes and all those deductions were still there for my husband’s side job. The software even kept urging me to go back and check for more expenses.
Maybe I am wrong.
I very well could be.
Currently reading this book.
Still early in the book. Interesting to learn about the reaction from the power structures in the state of my birth,Virginia, to Brown V Board of Education.
Still struggling through a listen of Midnight Tides by Steven Erickson (Book five of the Malazan series). Its a whole new setting and cast of characters in a series that already has way too many characters. And chronologically it occurs before the first four books. Apparently book six will bring it all together.
This book is definitely the least interesting plotwise as well. I think I have 8 hrs left which at my 1.5 listening speed would be 1-2 days at work in a book that interested me but as it will probably take me a full week as I’ll keep drifting off and then listening to music instead.
