[TSS] the Origins of the Vampire Mythos

Dracula: I've been wanting to read some Vampire lore for a while now, and knowing the stories of the real Vlad Sepesh (?spelling?) I figured Stoker's novel, probably the most famous portrayal of the blood sucking count, would be the best place to start. I haven't got very far in it yet, but its an intriguing read. The book is written mostly in journal form, and is an engaging read. The copy I have is heavily annotated, and the annotations can be a bit distracting at times, including everything from descriptions of towns that are mentioned, to recipes for dishes mentioned in the text and just about everything else you can imagine. This means that occasionally there will be a page with only about a dozen pages of actual text, the rest being footnotes.

Insomnia: Gave up on this officially today. Still might go back to it, but with so much on my TBR pile, I decided to take a break.

History of God: Being a Comparative Religion major, I thought this would be largely review, and while there has been some stuff I already knew, like the information about the four documents hidden in the Torah, and the history of Islam, theres been more than a fair amount of new information. I'm currently reading a chapter on God as seen by the philosophers of the three Abrahamic faiths, having just finished one on God as seen by Muslims. This is one of the books I would highly recommend to all members of the Abrahamic faiths. It may test your faith, but you'll learn a lot of interesting stuff.

Sleepless in Derry

Title: Insomnia
Author: Stephen King

I'm not giving up on this quite yet, I may well come back to it, and I'm definitely not giving up on King just yet, but I think I'll try one of his more well known books, like Cujo, or the Stand. Insomnia is about an old man who loses his wife to cancer, and subsequently begins to suffer from insomnia, sleeping less and less each night, using varying folk remedies to no effect. There's a promising subplot with an insane neighbor who claims to see a man he calls "the Little Bald Doctor" and fights against "the Crimson King" who is supposedly harvesting unborn babies in the local abortion clinic. I know the book is 700 some odd pages, but I read the first 130, and just didn't care much about the characters. Maybe its because the main character is an old man in his 70's or 80's, and I'm in my early 20's, but I found it kind of hard to connect with him. Unfortunately it looks like "Insomnia" is going on the "gave up" list. I am, however, looking forward to giving King another chance with something a bit shorter and better known.

New Arrivals!

I signed up for the Quality Paperback Book club a while ago, and my welcome package just arrived. I'm now the proud owner of copies of the following:

You: the Owner's Manual

A People's History of American Empire: a Graphic Adaptation by Howard Zinn

the Tibetan Book of the Dead: First Complete Translation

a Short History of Myth by Karen Armstrong

the Great Transformation: the Beginning of Our Religious Traditions by Karen Armstrong

the Dangerous Book for Boys by Conn & Hal Iggulden

and

Insomnia by Stephen King

I'm looking forward to reading all these, and you can expect reviews of them to appear here over the summer.