false 29 21 21 true 5800987 read 0 true 333732 currently-reading 0 true 333731 to-read http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/5309053 to: Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Harry Potter, #5) by J.K. Rowling
Call me Doubting Jacob. Or f*** it, just call me Doubting Thomas and let me stick a finger in Her Majesty Rowling's head and see if she really did write all of these books because I am having a difficult time believing it. This lady has had the pressure of the world on her shoulders since book three and has not hicupped once. Even the NY Times' Michiko Kukatani admitted the books were good. That's like ol' Dubya admitting that sometimes God makes mistakes.
Regardless of how pretentiously literary or anti-Westernization you may be (and assuming Harry, Hermione, and Hagrid are the work of a single individual) you can't deny the fact that the Harry Potter series is something special. I am using The Order of the Phoenix as the figurehead for the entire Hogwarts saga, and though I debated for a considerable amount of time whether it deserved three or four stars, when I find myself sitting on stoops walking home just to finish the last three pages of a chapter or holding the book in a subtle manner so I can sneak it into the bathroom at work, I have to smile and admit that a good story is still what every writer should be aiming for and J.K. has nailed it. ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/3040694 to: The Tragedy of King Richard III (Oxford World's Classics) by William Shakespeare
(Warning: This review contains an idea intended to be very clever and impressive.)

I hear a lot of people say that Iago, when it really comes down to it, was Shakespeare's purest villain. Well, I disagree. I think Richard III was the purest villain. While Iago was a consistent 95% villain throughout "Othello", Richard III was given a brief chance somewhere in the fourth act when his villainy dropped down to around 60% before quickly shooting back up to an even 100% villainous. Basically, bad ol' Dickie the Third was given a chance to redeem himself, to be sympathetic and he didn't take it. If I can make an analogy between Iago/Richard and Al Queda/Columbine shooters: Iago is like international terrorists such as Al Queda in that they have never presented nor given themselves a chance to be sympathetic in our eyes. Richard is like the boys at Columbine in that for a brief second you let yourself consider what may have driven them there. Either way, though, the ultimate answer is that they are all evil and there is nothing more fascinating to our minds then a villain. So enjoy Shakespeare's greatest. ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2916122 to: My Wicked Highlander: The MacDonell Brides Trilogy (The Macdonell Brides Trilogy) by Jen Holling
When I worked at Barnes & Noble, I would often be caught flipping through books in the Romance section. I learned two things: that people think it's sad if an English major is drawn to romance novels, and nearly half of all these books seem to take place in the Scottish Highlands. Can I say kilty pleasures? Fine. Several years later, I felt vindicated in a master's literature class when Prof. Cappetti described the true beginnings of the novel as semi-autobiographical accounts of female subjects in medieval Italian courts. Her emphatic conclusion was that males had gotten a hold of the novel and turned it into a pretentious, brain/muscle-flexing bore. Inspired, I went to the nearest Barnes & Nobles, returned to my beloved Romance shelves and purchased a story about one wicked Highlander and the independent but fiercely wanton Scottish damsel who corraled him. It sucked. The sex scenes sucked, the characters sucked, and it sucked that I wasn't surprised in the least bit that it sucked. Still, the next three books I read were pretentious literary juggernauts that I had been meaning to conquer for years, so if you are looking for motivation to slay the mighty Ulysses (either one) then look for a book with a kilt and bursting cleavage and settle down for the following twenty minutes it will take to read it. ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/3010491 to: Classic World Atlas (Hardcover) by Rand McNally
I use the world atlas twenty times more than anything else besides the Spokane yellowpages and it has failed to disappoint only a handful of times. I've counted the number of cities in China with populations over a million (61) and the Rhineland village south of Cologne where the Fergens lived before South Dakota (Gladbach). I traced the trends of the 2004 presidential election over the agricultural map of the United States and found it very, very interesting. When someone tells a story of where they were born or where they've been, it is simply better to look at a map. It's like seeing a picture of your friend's ex they have only described - only better. I full-heartedly recommend this to anyone who knows anybody who is anywhere. Or anyone who has gone anwhere themselves. It's proof. ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2950655 to: Chronicle of the Narvaez Expedition (Penguin Classics) by Alvar Nunez Cabeza De Vaca
People hate Columbus because he represents the end to the buffalo and wild berries and peace pipes and rain dances that were the daily norm before the white man arrived with his gold mints and white picket fences. And it's true - this world is worse for the wear. But, if you read Cabaza de Vaca's account of his five year captivity among different tribes across the Southern United States and Northern Mexico (as they stand now) the idyllic world of the Native American grinds to a draught-ridden, blood-thirsty halt. Just as not every Spaniard came to throw Aztecs from their pyramids, neither did every Native American live a life of boundless aplenty and harmony with Coyote Earth. Dying of thirst and starvation, murderous raids for survival, and desperate ignorance were common in the early 16th century when de Vaca and several crew members washed up on the Florida shore. Though he began as a slave, he ultimately became a messianic figure followed by thousands of Native Mexicans, many of whom were enslaved or slaughtered by his countrymen who found him. It is worth reading for one of the first accounts of a virginal American continent and questions that are uncomfortable at first to consider. ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2677377 to: Master and Commander (Aubrey/Maturin Book 1) by Patrick O'Brian
My friend Charlie is a land surveyor in Connecticut. He sent me an email one day asking for contemporary book recommendations. Though I am sadly deficient in this arena, I sent him back a list of twenty books, assuming he'd buy two. I spoke to him a few months later and he admitted he hadn't even read through the list. And why? "I'm gonna read Master & Commander again!" He has read this 17-part Patrick O'Brian series that revolves around the dashing, bumbling, soldierly, hot-headed, violin playing, sword-swinging, bear-suit wearing, optimist Captain Jack Aubrey and the botanizing, zoologizing, philosophizing, cello-playing, sharp shooting, bee-keeping, eternal pessimist surgeon's mate Stephen Maturin at least five times. He claims to read nothing but. So I finally gave it a chance and had to stop myself after the third book in the series because I wouldn't have read anything else for the next nine months. I full-heartedly recommend this to anyone who is considering a third round of Nightwood. It is a supremely satisfying break.

]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2915145 to: Spokane & the Inland Empire: An Interior Pacific Northwest Anthology (Paperback) by David H. Stratton
If you're not from Spokane, this book will hold zero interest for you. If you are from Spokane, or maybe you've heard me mention the name of my hometown an average of eleven times a minute, this book might hold 1% of interest for you. If that is the case, then throw it in your Amazon shopping cart and wait with tingly toes for essays on everything a good ol' American town should have - world-renowned wheat-based agriculture, greedy Dutch bankers, futile suffragist movements, displaced Native Americans, a World Expo or two, and an architect with the last name Cutter. If that doesn't intrigue you then, well, buy me a beer instead of the book and I'll tell you all about it in lengthy and inspired detail. ]]>