Werner Lind's reviews > Likes and Comments

For whatever it's worth, here's the link to my review of 2019 on Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... . :-) I've done one of these annual summaries ever since Goodreads started offering this feature, and I find it really enjoyable to look back over the past reading year!

Historical fiction has been a favorite genre of mine since I was about seven years old, so it's not surprising that my customized Goodreads bookshelf for that category has 123 books on it. Since I've only reviewed 68 of them (69, counting the new review posted this afternoon, of The Pendragon by Catherine Christian) I clearly have a lot more "retrospective" reviews to write. (Luckily, I enjoy writing them!) The newest one is here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

This month, in another group I belong to, several of us have taken part together in a multi-person buddy read of The White Company by one of my favorite authors, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. I first started to read this one way back in junior high school (9th grade), but got sidetracked --long story! So it's been a "loose end" on my radar for a long time, making me glad to finally read it; and doubly glad when it earned five stars. Here's my review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

This was a busy week for reviewing, since besides reading a book in paper format, I've also been reading a novella on my Kindle app, and finished them just a day apart. The latter was a freebie series opener (although having read it, I don't plan to pursue the series), Gears of a Mad God: A Steampunk Lovecraft Adventure by Brent Nichols. My three-star review is here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... . (Note: it's not actually "steampunk!")

Mary Connealy is a writer I've mentioned here before, and one whose work both Barb and I greatly like. Yesterday, we finished reading another of her novels, Wildflower Bride, the third book in her Montana Marriages trilogy (yes, we're reading it in reverse order --long story!). Here's my five-star review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

Today I finished, and reviewed, The Ghost of Thomas Kempe by Penelope Lively, which I've been reading as a common read in another group. It was my first exposure to the author's work; I liked the book from the start, but ultimately rated it higher than I'd originally expected to, as I explain in my review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

H. P. Lovecraft is a writer I didn't really discover until around the end of the 80s; but he's since become a favorite. My intention this year is to finish reading any of his fiction that I haven't read before; and pursuant to that project, yesterday I finished reading and reviewed the last of HPL's book-length writings that I'd never read, The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath. My five-star review is here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

Marketed for younger readers, The House of Dies Drear by Virginia Hamilton was published in 1968, the year I turned 16. Of course, there's often no reader more eager to turn up a nose to "children's" books than a callow teen anxious to prove he's an adult, and this is one of many books I missed back then on that account. But I've finally remedied that, and my four-star review is here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

Earlier today, I wrote my first review in three weeks; it's another "retrospective" one, of Berserker, the story collection by Fred Saberhagen which kicks off his well-known Berserker series: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... . I read it back in 1996, as required reading for a graduate-level Univ. of Iowa correspondence course in science fiction I was taking at the time; I've saved all of my reflection papers from that class, and the one on this book was a big help in writing the review! :-)

George Orwell's 1984 was a book I read the summer before I started college, and one of the fiction reads that had the most impact on shaping my thinking; but until today, I'd never reviewed it here. Today, I finally remedied that, and my five-star review is here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

For me personally, the novels and stories of my friend Andrew M. Seddon have never disappointed. Here's my review of his latest novel, Farhope, a science-fiction tale set in a widely human-colonized galaxy in the 26th century, in the midst of a war with another space-faring race: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... . It's a prequel to the author's Wreaths of Empire, which I reviewed here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

Since I've been reading HPL's work for over 30 years, I'd already read most of the material contained in The Complete Fiction of H. P. Lovecraft before I started reading the collection late last month; but I wanted to read all of the stories I'd never read before. Now that I've done so, it marks sort of a milestone in my reading --there's nothing more unread by this author to look forward to! My five-star review is here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

I've now read Life is a Miracle: An Essay Against Modern Superstition by Wendell Berry three times, but until yesterday I'd never reviewed it. That's now remedied, and my four-star review is here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... . Berry is definitely an author whose work I want to read more of.

Here's the link to my latest review (posted this afternoon) of The Abolition of Man by C. S. Lewis: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

My review of Great Ghost Stories: 101 Terrifying Tales is here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... . Since I read this anthology intermittently, the review was written in bits and pieces; so it was sprawling, kind of disjointed, and repetitive, as my anthology reviews usually are in those cases. This time, though, the Goodreads program wouldn't let me write any more on it because of the character limit; so I had to edit it, condensing and rearranging text to make it a unified composition. Apologies to anyone who's "liked" it earlier; hope the changes won't make you "unlike" it. :-) (It's actually a lot easier to read in its present incarnation!)

Although I read Faerie Tale by Raymond E. Feist over 30 years ago, and really liked it, until this afternoon it was one of the many pre-Goodreads reads that I'd never gotten around to reviewing here. But I've now remedied that, and my review is here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... . Altogether, I've read five novels by this author; but this is the one I liked the best, so I'm glad to have finally gotten a chance to give it the recommendation it deserves.

Here's my review of The Casebook of Carnacki the Ghost Finder by William Hope Hodgson: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... . There was a first edition in 1913 that only had six stories (all that the author had written up to that time) and that's apparently the one used for the free public domain e-books available online. However, this edition is based on the 1947 Arkham House edition, and has all nine of the Carnacki stories WHH wrote.

This afternoon, I posted another of my "retrospective" reviews, part of my slow process of reviewing the many worthy books I read pre-Goodreads. This one is of Yarrow by Charles de Lint, and falls under the umbrella of "urban fantasy:" https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

Last year, when I thought about my reading plans for 2020, I resolved that this would be the year in which I finally read Harper Lee's masterpiece To Kill a Mockingbird. (Yes, I know, I should have a long time ago!) I've done that at last, and my five-star review is here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... . When the writers of the blurb describe this as "unforgettable," they aren't using exaggerated hype.

Best-selling political thriller Seven Days In May, the debut novel by the writing team of journalists-turned-authors, Fletcher Knebel and Charles W. Bailey II, is another book I read in my younger days but still remember pretty well. The weekends are when I'm able to write book reviews; and since I don't have a current read to review this time, I took the opportunity for a retrospective review of this one, here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

A recent "like" I got on my review of Journey to Fusang by William Sanders, which I'd posted several years ago, reminded me that I'd never linked to it here until now: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... . It's alternate-world SF, a sub-genre that I like and would enjoy reading more of.

Back in my first year on Goodreads (2008), I wrote a review of a nonfiction book I found quite fascinating: Olde New England's Strange Superstitions by Robert Cahill. Like most of my reviews in those days, it's pretty short, and not very interesting in itself; but I thought it might be worth sharing here, in order to make readers interested in folklore and New England history aware of a worthwhile book.
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

This review of Successful Part-Time Farming by Haydn S. Pearson, https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... , is another one of my older Goodreads reviews (from my first year on the site, in this case), which I'd never linked to here before. (At the time I wrote it, it was also a retrospective review, of a book I'd read back in the early 70s.) While I don't plan to eventually link to all of my older reviews here (because some of them, for one reason or another, aren't really worth linking to!), this particular book, IMO, deserves a notice.

Agatha Christie is a favorite author of mine; but she was so prolific (and my reading is so eclectic and scattered :-) ) that there are still a lot of her books that I haven't read. Taking part in a common read in another group this month gave me the motivation to read another one of her novels that I'd missed hitherto, Death on the Nile. Here's the link to my five-star review, posted this afternoon: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

In the past few days, I've finished two reads in electronic format, both of them supernatural fiction: Beyond Castle Frankenstein, A Short Story by Paula Cappa, and The Vampire Sword by T. L. Cerepaka. My reviews are here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... and https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

This weekend was another one for a doubleheader of reviews, both of recently finished, but very different reads. One is of a short story which was a common read in another group, A Whimsy of the World by Amor Towles: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... . The other is of a review book from my Goodreads friend Liana Zane, The Harlequin & The Drangùe: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

A week ago, my Goodreads friend Steve Haywood and I started a buddy read of His Last Bow: 8 Stories, one of several story collections in Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes canon. It turned out that I'd read all or most of the stories before in other places, which was one factor that made this a very quick read on my part; but I did reread or closely skim most of them, and enjoyed the refresher! Here's my review, posted this afternnoon: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

Independent author Steve Haywood has written a number of excellent short stories, in the best classic tradition of the short fictional format, that have been published online in various venues. I've read several of them (he and I became Goodreads friends recently, but I read the stories before that), and have greatly liked every one that I read; but up until now, I've been remiss in reviewing them. (Though in my defense, I only learned recently that some of them are in the Goodreads database!) Here's my review of one of his best, Christmas in the Trenches: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

As a common read in another group, I've just finished reading (and reviewing) Beowulf, generally recognized as THE foremost masterpiece of Old English literature in the Anglo-Saxon period. Since I can't read Old English, I read it in a Modern English translation, choosing for the purpose the one done by William Ellery Leonard in 1923, Beowulf: A New Verse Translation For Fireside And Class Room. My three-star review is here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... . (Three stars is a positive rating, on Goodread's scale!)

Over the weekend, I finished reading, and reviewed, two books, both very different; but overall, I really liked each one in its own way. One is a Western romance novel, The Husband Tree, the second installment in Mary Connealy's Montana Marriages series, reviewed here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... . The other is Favorite Ghost Stories, edited by Aidan Chambers, which I've reviewed here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

As I expected it would, Ghost Stories of an Antiquary by M. R. James proved to be a quick read. My review is here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

Here's my five-star review of Daughter of the Legend, by 20th-century Appalachian writer Jesse Stuart: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... . At nearly 250 pages, I'd expected this to be a somewhat longer read than it was, but it flew by pretty quickly!

By working steadily at it ever since finishing the book, to my surprise, I completed my review (it's on the long side!), of The French Revolution: A Concise History by Norman Hampson a full week before I expected to, and posted it just now: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... . Now, when I finally read The Scarlet Pimpernel (hopefully early next year), I'll have a much solider grasp of the historical background.

Hope Leslie: or, Early Times in the Massachusetts by Catharine Maria Sedgwick wasn't a quick read, but it was a really rewarding and enjoyable one! My five-star review is here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... . This is a 19th-century historical novel (set mostly in 17th-century Massachusetts) by an author who, IMO, isn't nearly as well known to modern readers as she deserves to be.

Over this weekend, I posted reviews of two recently completed short fiction reads. One is of a dystopian short e-story, Payday: A Short Story by Joe Vasicek. That review is here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

The other was of The Regatta Mystery and Other Stories by Agatha Christie, a common read in another group. Here's that one: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

Here's my four-star review of Sad Cypress by Agatha Christie: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... . This is another one of several reads or rereads I've done this year of books featuring Christie series sleuth Hercules Poirot, which I owe to some reading buddies in another group who are working through all of the Poirot books in order. (I don't join in every month, but I'm enjoying taking part when I can!)

Historical fiction and mystery writer Heather Day Gilbert is not only one of my Goodreads friends, but one of my favorite authors. Her latest fictional work, the novella The Distant Tide (the first book of a projected duology, Hearts of Ireland) was published this past August. I snapped up a copy as soon as it went on sale (which is rare for me), and read it as soon as I could; my review is here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

This weekend, I posted two reviews, of very different books in different genres, one read in electronic format and one on paper.

Oscar Wilde's The Canterville Ghost was a common read in another group this month, and a reread for me. https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

The Case of the Stuttering Bishop, a Perry Mason mystery by Erle Stanley Gardner, was a re-visiting of an author whose work I read quite a bit as a kid. https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

Here's my review of The Scarlet Pimpernel by Emmuska Orczy, posted this afternoon: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... . I've long wanted to read this one, and it didn't disappoint! Even though I don't plan to read any more in the series (it's the kind of book that I think doesn't need sequels to add anything to the reading experience), I gave it five stars.

Although I read it nearly 30 years ago, I still have a pretty good memory of People of the Wolf, by W. Michael and Kathleen O'Neal Gear, and hopefully did it justice in the retrospective review I posted this afternoon, here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... . This is the opening novel of the husband-and-wife author team's (pre)historical fiction series North America's Forgotten Past, but it's the only book in the series that I've read.

Offers of free review copies of e-books from Goodreads authors aren't uncommon, but offers of a paperback copy (which is more costly to purchase and ship) are a lot rarer. Our fellow group member Lance, remembering my preference for paper reads, was kind enough to recently gift me with the paperback edition of his latest novel (and opener for a projected series), Zrada. That won my gratitude, but the book's merits won it its stars. My review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

It's relatively rare for me to reread things, just because there are so vastly many still-unread books out there that I want to read. But Clemence's Housman's 1896 short story/novella The Werewolf was recently picked as a common read in another group; so, since I hadn't read it since the early 90s and it's short, I joined in. I'm really, really glad I did, because I'd truly forgotten what a rewarding read it was! My five-star review is here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

As I explained at the beginning of my new review of Iron Scepter by my friend Andrew M. Seddon, here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... , I'd previously read the original edition in 2006, and reviewed it from memory in 2012. However, I just completed a read of the new 2020 edition; and since this was a read of a new version with a different text, I've also completely re-written the review (which is now switched to this edition.).

Perfect Victim is the second of two follow-up novellas that popular Canadian author Kelley Armstrong wrote to her Nadia Stafford trilogy. I've now read both of them (they're currently only available as an omnibus edition, Double Play / Perfect Victim, which I read in print format, but there's no individual Goodreads record for this book in that format), and liked it the best of the two. My review is here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

Here's my review of Kate Douglas Wiggin's very short 1886 novella, The Birds' Christmas Carol: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... . It's a quick seasonal read, which I liked and would recommend to those looking for Christmas-themed reading.

I thought I'd posted a link to one of my earlier reviews, of Some Principles of Literary Criticism by Caleb Thomas Winchester, in this group some time ago! But it turns out I was mistaken in that; so without further ado, here's that link:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... . This is an older book, published in 1899 (as I explained in my review, I deliberately sought out an older treatment of the subject); but I found it very constructive, and it got four stars from me.

These are a couple of reviews of nonfiction books that I read and reviewed before joining this group, but hadn't linked to here before:

Science Speaks: Scientific Proof of the Accuracy of Prophecy and the Bible by Peter W. Stoner. https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

How to Read a Novel by John Sutherland. https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

My three-star review of The Diamond Lens and Other Strange Tales by Fitz-James O'Brien is here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... . This was a very quick read for me, partly because it only has 169 pages to start with, and partly because I'd already read four of the nine selections.

The Hanging Stones by Manly Wade Wellman is one of many books I read pre-Goodreads, and reviewed "retrospectively" before joining this group, but never got around to linking to here until now. That five-star review is here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... . This is actually the fourth book in the author's outstanding Silver John series, all the books of which my wife and I both love; but to date, it's the only one of the novels that I've reviewed.

This morning, Barb and I finished reading Montana Rose by Mary Connealy, a favorite author for both of us, whom I've mentioned several times before on this thread. This particular novel is the first volume of her Montana Marriages trilogy; but since we read the latter in reverse order, this finishes the series for us. My four-star review is here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .