false 13 453 394 true 5700106 read 3 true 5000372 currently-reading 56 true 5000371 to-read 100 false 5000382 history 89 false 5000381 fiction 35 false 5018607 biographical-autobiographical 33 false 5020444 sci-fi-fantasy 29 false 5018612 humor 18 false 5000387 nature 18 false 5020971 horror 16 false 5020437 hypnosis-self-help-health 13 false 5020816 mystery 12 false 5060951 true-adventure 10 false 5020441 travel 9 false 5021050 fantasy 6 false 5021137 romance 5 false 5060852 true-crime 4 false 5000385 writing 3 false 5060848 political 3 false 5060851 satire 2 false 5021120 children 2 false 5022108 stageplay 1 false 5255929 science 0 false 5020432 hobbies http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/79556498 to: Relic (Pendergast #1) by Douglas Preston
bookshelves: fiction, horror
]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/79244734 to: The Monster of Florence (Audio Cassette) by Douglas Preston and Mario Spezi
bookshelves: biographical-autobiographical, history, true-crime, writing
To paraphrase Preston in his own book, most authors wouldn't have the guts to create some of the true-life characters he ran into during his trip down the rabbit hole while living abroad in Italy. What started out as an innocent curiosity about a local series of killings rapidly turned into a vortex that not only sucked the author into the world of conspiracy theories and justice system run amuck, but ended with him being one of the accused. This reads like a true thriller novel, but all of it is true and astounding. There are truely some dark shadows under the sun of Tuscany. ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/79245442 No Heroes: A Memoir of Coming Home (Paperback) by Chris Offutt
bookshelves: to-read
]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/78378096 to: Easy Company Soldier: The Endless Combat of a Sergeant from World War II's "Band of Brothers" (Hardcover) by Don Malarkey
Listened to book on CD...

I found this one of the better memoirs I've read recently. It was well-written, descriptive, thoughtful, moving, and really amazing when you think of what he and so many others endured during the war, particularly as volunteers. I also liked the tidbits he offered regarding the HBO series Band of Brothers, both good and bad. If you're interested in learning what the war in Europe was like from the POV of someone who saw more than his share of action on the front lines, this is a good one. ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/55814320 Lost on Planet China: The Strange and True Story of One Man's Attempt to Understand the World's Most Mystifying Nation, or How He Became Comfortable Eating Live Squid (Hardcover) by J. Maarten Troost
bookshelves: currently-reading
]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/55873656 to: The Joy of Writing Sex: A Guide for Fiction Writers (Paperback) by Elizabeth Benedict
bookshelves: writing
I've gotten some good, insightful pointers! Probably the best thing, though, is the explanation about how use of dialogue is far more interesting, not to mention character-developing--than writing about the act itself. There are a couple of things I might disagree with in here--I think it depends on why you pick up a book that contains sex scenes in it, because in some cases that's exactly what you DO want, rather than anticeptic implications that something happened, which was often the sort of example she gives. But overall a decent book if you're a writer struggling with writing adult content of any sort. ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/72385779 The Jungle Is Neutral (Classics of World War II the Secret War) by F. Spencer Chapman
bookshelves: to-read
]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/78376536 to: The Forgotten 500: The Untold Story of the Men Who Risked All For the Greatest Rescue Mission of World War II (Hardcover) by Gregory A. Freeman
bookshelves: history
This book covers some of the experinces of American fliers forced to crash-land behind enemy lines in Yugoslavia/Hungary/etc., and the top-secret rescue effort to airlift them out. However, I never got that far to find out how they pulled it off...

While the topic is fascinating, I found the writing so melodramatic and repetitive that I've quit a couple of chapters into it. Granted, I'm listening to this on CD while commutting, so much of that drama is due to the overwraught reading style of the actor. I really don't enjoy having somebody yelling dialogue at me, particularly in cheesy accents, so that turned me off from the book. The writing itself is repetitive and a bit too simplistic, and when I find myself yelling back, "Get on with it!" that's just not a good sign. I doubt I'll be putting the disks back into my player before they're due back at the library. I think I'll try to find out more about this aspect of the war from other more credible sources. ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/78012079 to: Goodbye, Darkness (Audio Cassette) by William Raymond Manchester
bookshelves: biographical-autobiographical, history
This book is really two books combined into one--half of it is made up of the author's personal war experiences on Guadalcanal and Okinawa, and the other half is set decades later when he returned to the Pacific to both revisit those islands, as well as tour other battlefields and islands. It's a memoir and general history of the war against Japan. It's elegant one moment and shockingly brutal the next. I think it's possibly one of the best personal accounts of that theater of war that I've read. ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/73304703 to: The Day of Battle: The War in Sicily and Italy 1943-44 (Hardcover) by Rick Atkinson
bookshelves: history
I actually liked this book better than his first in this 3-part series (the third book is still pending at this time). I delves deeply into the theories, planning, scheming, folly, tragedy, valor, and pyrrhic success of the battles in Sicily and Italy. Not only does it touch on more famous scandals, like the famous Patton slapping incidents and the infighting between Allied generals, but it takes the reader right into the fox holes of the typical GI. This theater of war quickly fell into the shadows of events in Western Europe (the capture of Rome didn't even enjoy one whole day in the headlines before attention was ripped away by D-Day in Normandy) and to most people is all but forgotten now, but this book provides a moving, often tragic, narrative that should never be forgotten.

Whether you're a student of WWII or just have a pedestrian interest in the War, I highly recommend this book. ]]>