Nicholas Bruner's Blog, page 18

What I’m Reading: The Unteachables

The Unteachables is about a class of seven eighth-graders in the Self-Contained Special (SCS) class at Greenwich Middle School. The SCS class is widely known among both students and teachers as “the unteachables,” kids who teachers just can’t reach and shouldn’t even bother. This year, they’re being taught by Mr. Kermit, a once brilliant and inspiring teacher who quit caring after he was unfairly blamed for a cheating scandal on a national exam in his class twenty-seven years before. If he can j...

What I’m Reading: The Confessions

St. Augustine, a bishop in the time of the late Roman Empire, wrote his Confessions in 397 A.D. It is a foundational book of Western culture. It was the first autobiography ever written and a major theological work. I imagined when I started reading that it was a likely candidate to be designated for my Shortcuts to Smartness series. But in fact, I don’t think I will add that tag to it. While there are definitely some interesting passages and ideas, I have to say I’m disappointed overall. I also...

What I’m Reading: Orfeo

So I guess people think this book would be up my alley, since in the past few years, I’ve twice been gifted Orfeo. And I can see why, as the main character, Peter Els, is a composer obsessed with music, and in particular 20th century classical. I’m far from obsessed with the topic myself, but it’s something I’ve dabbled in. Indeed, some of the pieces mentioned in the book are works I own on CD and am familiar with–Shostakovich’s Fifth Symphony, Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time. Other piece...

What I’m Reading: Superman: The Greatest Stories Ever Told, Volume 2

I picked this up at a sale at a local comic store last Free Comic Book Day (i.e., Nerd Christmas, the first Saturday every April), but didn’t get around to reading it until now. (For a review of other books I picked up at the sale, go here.) I’m normally much more of a Marvel guy than a DC guy, and from DC, Batman and Swamp Thing are the only ones who I’m particularly interested in, but the price was hard to beat on this one. Plus, it’s Superman’s Greatest Stories (volume 2), so these should be ...

What I’m Reading: Murder on the Orient Express

Okay, I think this one is pretty well-known: Murder on the Orient Express, by Agatha Christie. Hercule Poirot, a Belgian detective who works in London, has just finished solving a case for the French Army in Syria, and is now on his way back home, though he plans to spend a few days sight-seeing in Istanbul. In Istanbul, he receives a telegram that a case in London that’s been on the backburner has just had a big breakthrough and he needs to hurry back.

He books a ticket on the Orient Express, a...

What I’m Reading: Tom Brown’s Schooldays

Hmm, I’ve just finished a book about an average English boy who gets called away to a special private school. When he arrives there, he’s accepted to one of several houses that each have their own special character. He’s not so hot academically and often gets in trouble with his small group of schoolmates, but finds acceptance in the school by proving himself on the field playing the school’s favorite sport. After several years at the school, he defeats great evil, becomes friends with the wise ...

What I’m Reading: The King’s Best Highway

The King’s Best Highway is a history of what was once called the Boston Post Road–the road from New York to Boston that developed in colonial times from a series of Indian trails, became the most important and trafficked road in America in the 19th century, and still exists in piecemeal form, largely as the modern Route 1.

Lots of interesting stuff in here. I thought the two best chapters were the early one on how the road’s early improvements were largely driven by Benjamin Franklin in the 1760...

What I’m Reading: Round-Up

My family is taking a fun trip to Mexico over Christmas break, and I’ve been practicing my Spanish! I’ve been listening to the Pimsleur CDs from the library (up to Level 5!) and reading books from the “Easy Readers” series. This is a series of actual Spanish literary works simplified down to certain specified levels–Level A requires a vocabulary of about 600 words to read (not to brag, but these are way too easy for me), Level B a vocabulary of about 1,200 words (this is a bit easy for me), Leve...

Scary Movies: The Babadook

Okay, last scary movie of the season, and we come to The Babadook, a movie who a couple people recommended to me as a really scary, really well-done movie. They weren’t wrong! Let me just say right now my discussion of it is going to have spoilers, because I’ve got some ideas or theories about this movie.

When the movie opens, Amelia is a single mother in Australia to her six-year-old son, Samuel. Her husband, Oskar, died in a car crash when she was on the way to the hospital to give birth to Sa...