false 7 47 25 true 5789104 read 4 true 3432420 currently-reading 18 true 3432419 to-read http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/79431786 The Human Brain Book (Hardcover) by Rita Carter
bookshelves: to-read
]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/77633167 The Maze Runner (Maze Runner, #1) by James Dashner
bookshelves: to-read
]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/71694541 Professional Microsoft Robotics Studio (Paperback) by Kyle Johns
bookshelves: currently-reading
]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/72580956 to: In the Eye of the Storm (Hardcover) by John H. Groberg
Lots of good stories and good perspective from a very different part of the world than what I know. I like nonfiction more than fiction most of the time because I can care more about it rather than just being whatever someone made up. This is a book that takes you on a journey while still being very real.

Offers some nice perspective on Church history, too.
]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/71698312 to: The Princess Bride (Paperback) by William Goldman
Entertaining oddities toward the beginning, but the plot changes direction rather inexplicably in the middle. The movie was more consistent (even if not fully so), but the book definitely had some fun stuff in it that was missing from the movie. ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/71698274 1984 (Paperback) by George Orwell
bookshelves: to-read
]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/71693247 Planning Algorithms (Hardcover) by Steven M. LaValle
bookshelves: currently-reading
]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/68775320 to: Don't Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability (Paperback) by Steve Krug
Lots of great material. Nothing revolutionary, and I agree with the author that this is a good thing. Revolution has its places, but this book is more about learning common sense. That sometimes takes reading from other people's experiences, and Krug obviously has some experience. He's even smart enough to admit that different people have different opinions. And the main technique for improvement is cheap user testing. I can't echo enough what he has to say about cheap.

This book is definitely worth a read by folks building web sites, especially in a corporate setting. (I've been there, so I knew what he was talking about.)

The least valuable material is in relation to the specific technology of the time. General support and acceptance for DHTML is far beyond what he described in the first edition of the book. Some more modern techniques also invalidate some of Krug's comments. Hopefully the second edition (which I didn't read) fixed some of these points. Still, this was just a small fraction of the book, and it including general principles, too. (Keep the action where the user expects it.) And the idea of giving on what could be good ideas but just aren't realizable is also worth taking into account.

Also, I can't say I'm a fan of navigation tabs, as Krug claims to be. They just don't scale like lists. Even Krug's favorite site in the book (namely, Amazon) doesn't have tabs anymore. I'm not sure what he thinks about that.
]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/68775751 Diaspora: A Novel (Hardcover) by Greg Egan
bookshelves: to-read
]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/63449272 to: Around The World in 80 Days (Audio CD) by Jules Verne
I enjoyed the book, even despite the ridiculous aspects. I was glad to see Fogg become more human as the story progressed and we got to know him better. He was hard to appreciate at the beginning. Getting across the Atlantic was the coolest part of the story, I thought, by the way.

As for the depiction of peoples around the world, I think it's interesting to see the snapshot of a European perspective on these things at the time, though perhaps purposefully twisted to support a fun story. I'm not sure entirely. The culture I know best in the book is Mormonism, being Mormon myself. It wasn't a fully accurate portrayal, but he obviously did at least some study before writing, so I found that much encouraging at least.

As for the audio, I liked this reader. We listened to it in a car trip, and our two oldest (oldest being 9 at the time) really got into the story.
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