What's On Your Bedside Table Right Now?
 

State your name and current book!

Mine be "The Theory And Practice Of Hell," written by Eugen Kogon - 'the classic account of the Nazi concentration camps used as a basis for the Nuremberg investigations. It's really organized, informative and details a lot of camp life way back in the bad 'ol days.

It's a bit better than "Man's Search For Meaning," of the same subject matter.

Well I got 4 books on there right now, 3 of which I'm actively reading- "Melmoth the Wanderer" by Maturin, "The Trial" by Kafka, "The Idiot" Dostoyesky- and 1 of which I read in sections- "In Search of Lost Time"- The Entire thing in a big pile, by Proust.

Oh god I read that and hated it. It was soooooo boring and obvious. I mean, postmodernism, am I right? ha ha naw, just funnin'

I've got two, the first being "The Twilight Watch" by Sergei Lukyanenko, and "Perfect Dark: Initial Vector" by Greg Rucka.

Most of his other work is better.

I've got Camus' The First Man and Steven Brust's Jhegaala on the stand, the latter replacing the trade paperback of Fell.

Prank the Monkey by Sir John Hargrave.

Invasive Procedures by Orson Scott Card and Aaron Johnston.

I mean, more Did Not Do The Research moments than you can shake a stick at, but damn, Card can write a compelling storyline! (Unless it was Johnston. Or maybe it was both. But hell, I recommend it wholeheartedly.)

The Castle and America are both far better. The Trial is good but not great like his other works.
But man, the movie version of the Trial by Orson Welles. It's totally totally awesome. Seriously stop reading this post, go find it and watch it.

Names on the Land by George R. Stewart. Basically, how a bunch of shit in America got named. The guy is a hell of a writer and it's really interesting to see the origins of words you always took for granted.

Right now I'm reading Writer's Guide to Character Traits, 2nd Edition by Linda Edelstein. It's a really phenomenal addition to my resources to assist with my current novel-in-progress. It was written by a psychologist who basically adequately defines the personalities and behaviorisms of everyone from sadistic rapists to closeted gays to narcissists to nine year old boys and girls (and more!) She divides adults into twenty-three general personality types, defines similarities and differences, and then further extrapoliates into subdivisions. It's really helped me better define and write characters who I have absolutely nothing in common with.