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What Are You Reading / Reviews - January thru June 2023
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: One L – Scott Turow – 3.5***
Subtitle: The Turbulent True Story of a First Year at Harvard Law School. Turow wrote this memoir just after his first year of law school, and it was published before he had graduated. I was very interested in the psychology of his experience. Turow and his fellow , all high-achievers when they arrived, were thrown into a competitive atmosphere where they felt pitted against one another, with the result that many of them began to seriously doubt themselves and became suspicious of their colleagues. The stress – both external and self-imposed – was palpable.
LINK to my full review
Leonard Susskind and André Cabannes,
General Relativity: The Theoretical Minimum
[2023] 372 pagesGeneral Relativity is the fourth book of the Theoretical Minimum series, and is based on a course of ten lectures of the same name. The previous books included brief explanations of derivatives, integrals, partial derivatives, vectors and so forth, and were apparently aimed at the layman interested in physics and wanting to go beyond the usual popularizations and understand the physics with the relevant mathematics, which would describe my own situation. In the preface to this book, however, it is stated that the target audience of the series is people who studied physics "at the undergraduate or graduate level" but "went on to do other things" and want essentially an up-to-date refresher. I think this represents a certain change, and the book is a bit more difficult than the earlier ones. It is not a "stand-alone" book; to be comprehensible at all, it requires that the reader have read books one and three (classical physics and special relativity; the second book is on quantum theory and uses an entirely different set of mathematical tools, so it is more of a "stand-alone") or have learned that material in other courses or from textbooks. I can't claim to have "studied physics at the undergraduate level" although I did have two semesters of introductory physics, which the course description claimed were "calculus-based" because they used simple calculus, but were not in the way these books are (starting from Lagrangians and least action.) In fact, since this book just came out, about six and seven years after I read the first and third books, I was quickly lost until I found my notes on those. (And yes, this is the kind of book you need to take notes on.)
The first thing to be clear about is that these are physics books, not math books. To make an analogy, my high school ATA course (basically today's Precalculus with a short introduction to calculus) taught vectors in some depth; my high school physics class, which did not require Precalculus, also taught how to use vectors, but without as much explanation of the "why's". These books similarly teach the necessary math from the standpoint of how to manipulate the symbols and do the calculations in the physics rather than from the standpoint of explaining it as math. I was actually surprised how much they did explain, and in the previous books and about the first two lectures of this one I was generally able to fill in the "why's" myself; but from the end of lecture two here, that is from the point at which Susskind moves from tensor algebra into tensor calculus with the covariant derivative, I essentially understood the "what's" and most of the "how's" but not the "why's" (of the math). Which is what the book is about, doing physics, not mathematics. It is however frustrating that the text is mostly presented abstractly and the actual calculations are left to "exercises" with no examples and no answers given.
The book begins, like most popularizations, with Einstein's thought experiment of the elevator and the equivalency principle. It then goes on to explain coordinate transformations and Riemannian geometry. The second lecture is devoted to tensors (without ever really explaining clearly what a tensor actually is, although after a while I figured it out) and the algebra of vectors and tensors. The third lecture continues on into tensor calculus and finishes the math "toolbox" with the curvature tensor. Then, after a bit more math (Minkowski geometry, hyperbolic coordinates), the book returns at the end of lecture four and in lecture five to the physics with gravity as curvature (the Schwarzchild metric), and proceeds through an explanation of black holes in lectures six through eight, a general explanation of Einstein's field equations in lecture nine, and ends up with gravity waves in lecture ten. Contrary to the claim in the subtitle, this is not all you need "to do physics" but it will give an idea of what it is really about if you spend the effort to understand it. At the end, Susskind announces the next two volumes, book five on cosmology and book six on statistical mechanics.
When I read the first two volumes of the series (and Roger Penrose's The Road to Reality) some seven years ago, I was motivated to begin working my way through math starting with what I already knew and going on a bit further. I got off to a good start with a book on logic and set theory, a couple histories of math, and rereading my high school ATA text; then I got diverted to other subjects and haven't read a lot of anything mathematical for another four or five years. Perhaps this book will motivate me to get started again, now that I am retired and have more time to read and study.
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On Gold Mountain –Lisa See – 4****
Subtitle: The One-Hundred-Year Odyssey of a Chinese-American Family. This is See’s “biography” of her family, starting with her great-great-grandfather, Fong Dun Shung, who immigrated to America (“The Gold Mountain”) in 1861 as an herbalist / healer working for the railroad. In chronicling her family’s story she also explores the history of immigration policy / discrimination in the U.S., particularly in regards to those of Pan-Asian origin. Very interesting and readable.
LINK to my full review
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Fox & I – Catherine Raven – 4****
Subtitle: An Uncommon Friendship. Alone in the world, and self-isolating in a cabin on a remote piece of land in Montana, Raven “befriended” a fox. I loved this memoir of finding friendship in an unexpected way, and of the healing power of connecting to nature and to another being.
LINK to my full review
All the Queen’s Men (CIA Spies #2) by Linda Howard
4 ★
It has been 5 years since Niema Burdock lost her husband on a mission and she hasn’t seen anyone else form the mission since. Now CIA Black Ops specialist John Medina, whom Niema knew by another name, has returned and needs her help again.
This was an intense story right from the start. The mission that Niema and her husband are on is dangerous and they know they may not make it out alive. Niema never really got over the loss and when John shows back up it brings back the pain. The chemistry between Niema and John is immediate.
The arms dealer that John and Niema go after, Louis Ronsard, has a truly sad back story. It does not excuse what he does, but I understood his position. Many would have done the same thing. The simple mission they go on ends up turning bad and their pursuit through the French town turns deadly.
Even though the ending is expected, I enjoyed the story and the romance. There was a scene that I don’t think needed to be there or at least I don’t feel like it needed to go as far as it did, but it ends up working by making Niema and John finally tell each other how they feel.
Brother Odd (Odd Thomas #3) by Dean Koontz
5 ★
It the end of the last book, Odd Thomas had decided to stay for a time at an isolated monastery to help him deal with the death of Stormy Llewellyn, the love of his life. All is well until a dark force enters the picture. He finds out the truth behind the death of a monk who supposedly killed himself and then a young girl at the monastery school and hospital speak the words Stormy used to say all the time and points Odd to a young man in another room. What I love about this series is how every book starts out with a bang and continues at a fast pace till the end.
There is a lot of science in this book and I found it very interesting. What one of the brothers has created is ingenious, scary, and a bit hard to believe. The dark presence now on the monastery grounds is dangerous and out to harm the children. The backgrounds of many of the monk’s make for a good team against the creatures and the true identity of one proves to Odd that he is on the right track.
I highly enjoyed this book and am amazed at the story telling talent that Dean Koontz has. I look forward to continuing the series.
Claude Lévi-Strauss,
From Honey to Ashes
[1965, tr. 1973] 512 pages {Kindle, Open Library]The second volume of Lévi-Strauss' series Mythologiques, this follows the same method as in the first volume (Le cru et le cuit/The raw and the cooked) which it continues (and which I read last month). As I could not find a free or inexpensive copy of this volume in French, and I already have physical copies of the last two in English, I had to switch to reading the translation.
The first volume began with myths about the origins of cooking, or culture as opposed to nature, and expanded to other myths which Lévi-Strauss considered as "transformations" where traits were transformed along various axes according to discoverable laws. In this volume, the subject is myths about honey and tobacco, which are investigated in the same way. In fact, it is almost all about honey and other foods associated with the dry season. Lévi-Strauss considers that these myths are connected with initiation, and have the double function of teaching the boys about providing food and choosing wives. As with the first book, it is much too complex to attempt to summarize.
When I am reading a fairly long e-book, I generally alternate with physical books, so I have something to read while my Kindle is recharging. I was reading this along with Leonard Susskind and André Cabannes, General Relativity: The Theoretical Minimum, which is also concerned with transformations (of coordinate systems) according to specific rules, and there seemed to be a similarity between the two discussions. I don't know which was more difficult, the relativity book which introduced advanced mathematics which I had to learn as I went along or this book which refers to almost three hundred myths by numbers, many from the first volume (my memory couldn't cope with that.) Both books had my brain giving me "buffer overflow" errors. Perhaps this represents a "structure" of early twentieth-century scientists?
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Small Wonder – Barbara Kingsolver – 3.5***
This is a series of essays Kingsolver wrote in the year following the 9-11 attack on the World Trade Center. Kingsolver can come across as preachy, but she also writes elegant passages about the restorative power of connecting with nature. There’s plenty of horrible in the world still, but reading this book of essays reminds me of those things will can help relieve the terror, fear, anguish, and find joy and hope again. I read this as a book, and it’s due back at the library now, but I think this is a collection that would be good to have handy to read a chapter or two every once in a while
LINK to my full review
Hrotsvitha of Gandersheim,
Hrotsvithae Opera
Book II [mid-10th century] 108 pages [Kindle, Open Library] [in Latin]The second book contains the six plays, for which she is best known. These were the first plays (so far as we know) written since the first century CE. Although she describes them as having been written in the style of Terence but with a Christian moral content, they are written in a rhythmic prose while Terence wrote his in verse. What they do have in common is the use of a simple, spoken form of Latin (not simple for us, of course, since we are much more familiar with the formal written language, both in antiquity and the middle ages.) They are not really tragedies, since they all have "happy endings" (usually the torture and death of the heroines, which is what they want — to achieve the palm of martyrdom — and their spirits joining their sacred husband Jesus in heaven); neither are they really comedies, although they have some comic scenes. While these plays are certainly important for the history of theater and of mediaeval Latin, the content is far from attractive to the modern reader, being mostly concerned with an obsession about celibacy, as were her verse legends of saints. There are no faithful wives in any of the plays, although there are some widows, but only women who are devoted to celibacy and prostitutes — it seems that her view is that anyone who is not a nun or monk is essentially a prostitute or a deceiver.
To discuss the individual plays in the order of the manuscripts, which may not be the order of composition:
The first is Gallicanus, which may actually be the earliest, since it seems to me to be poorly constructed. The Emperor Constantinus asks his greatest general, Gallicanus, to undertake a campaign against the Scythians who threaten the empire; Gallicanus agrees, but asks to marry Constantine's daughter Constantia on his return. (Hrotsvitha of course regards Roman generals in the light of tenth-century independent feudal lords who have to be persuaded by rewards to fight.) Constantia (of course) has decided to devote her virginity to God, but agrees on the condition that Gallicanus take her confessors, Paulus and Iohannes, along with him (I assume that "primicerius" here must mean something like "confessor", since none of the actual definitions I could find, either secular or ecclesiastic, seem to fit the context) and leave his two sisters with her. Having arrived in Scythia, the army of Gallicanus is quickly surrounded by the Scythians and his officers decide to surrender; Paulus and Iohannes then convince him to accept the "true God" and a miraculous force of angels immediately defeats the Scythians. He returns to Rome and he, his two sisters, and Constantia all live celibately ever after. This would seem to be the end, but we are then transported several decades later to the reign of Julian the Apostate, and after a couple of cryptic sentences about Gallicanus going to martyrdom in Alexandria, the play becomes a drama about the martyrdom of Paulus and Iohannes.
The second play, Dulcitius, is the play which is most often translated and anthologized, perhaps because it is the least obviously concerned with celibacy, or because it has a comic scene in which the villainous jailer Dulcitius mistakes cooking pots and frying pans for the girls he intends to violate and kisses and embraces them, becoming so covered with soot that when he returns to his guards they think he is a devil and run away. The basic plot is that three sisters are being persecuted under Diocletian for being Christians, and unlike most of the other plays it is not overly emphasized that they are celibate (although of course we know they are.) In the end they all receive the palm of martyrdom and the crown of virginity.
In the third play, Callimachus, the protagonist Callimachus is in love with Drusiana, a married woman who has become a Christian and therefore no longer has sex with her husband Andronicus (again, for Hrotsvitha becoming a Christian and becoming a nun are essentially synonymous.) Drusiana rejects him, and when he says that he will continue to harass her she prays and dies. He then bribes the funeral director Fortunatus to let him see her body, but when they open the sepulcher Fortunatus is attacked and killed by a venomous serpent and Callimachus is killed by an angel. Then Andronicus arrives with Saint Iohannes, who prays to Jesus to resurrect Callimachus and Drusiana. When Drusiana returns to life, she insists that Fortunatus should also be resurrected since three miracles would correspond to the three persons of God, but Callimachus objects that Fortunatus is unworthy of the miracle. There ensues a dialogue about how no one merits anything but it all a matter of God's free grace and no one should envy God's grace to anyone else. When Fortunatus is finally resurrected, he says that if Drusiana and Callimachus have been resurrected then he prefers to remain dead, and he dies again. The others all live celibately ever after.
The fourth play, Abraham, concerns two hermits, Abraham and his friend Efraim. Abraham adopts an orphaned niece, Maria, and raises her to be a nun in a cell with only one small window; a man disguised as a monk gets in to her and she runs away to become a prostitute (for Hrotsvitha, the only alternative to being a nun.) Eventually Abraham finds her, convinces her to repent and spend the rest of her life in an interior cell with no window lamenting her sins. The fifth play, Pafnutius, also deals with a monk and a prostitute whom he converts and locks up in a cell to lament her sins. Some of the same dialogue is actually repeated in the two plays.
The last play, Sapientia, is the simplest; essentially it is the story of a mother, Sapientia (Wisdom) and her three daughters Fides, Spes and Karitas (Faith, Hope and Charity). The play opens with the villain, Antiochus, informing the Emperor Adrianus (Hadrian) that a family of Christians have arrived in Rome and present a threat to the empire; he says that they have made many converts and the women will no longer have relations with their husbands. Adrianus sends for them to appear before him. He asks Sapientia how old the girls are and she gives him an erudite lesson in mathematics which he can't follow, but eventually tells that they are twelve, ten and eight years old, respectively. They have all devoted their virginity to God. (If this seems strange, we should remember that in the tenth century girls generally entered convents at seven or eight, as was probably the case with Hrotsvitha herself.) He then demands that they worship Magna Diana, and when they refuse he attempts to torture the three girls, who remain unharmed until he finally has their heads cut off, to the great joy of their mother, who then prays to die so she can be reunited with them in heaven.
The book ends with a relatively short poem, "Iohannes", which is basically a vision of heaven.
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The Opposite of Everyone – Joshilyn Jackson – 3.5***
I really like Jackson’s books. I love her quirky Southern characters, with their colorful sayings and folk wisdom. I frequently want to shake some sense into them, and more often want to sit down with them over a few glasses of wine and just get to know them better. However improbable the many coincidences, I bought this story hook-line-and-sinker. There is more than one broken character here, but they learn to rely on one another and take steps toward healing.
LINK to my full review
Abdulrazak Gurnah,
Afterlives
[2020] 309 pagesGurnah's most recent novel, Afterlives is a historical novel set in the former German East Africa. The first two chapters introduce the characters of Khalifa and Ilyas, respectively. While both have some backstory on their childhoods, the narrative really begins in 1907 with the marriage of Khalifa and his boss's niece Bi Ashi. Ilyas rents a storeroom in Khalifa's house. We also meet Ilyas' young sister Afiya, who will become one of the major characters. As the First World War approaches, Ilyas suddenly decides to join the askari or schutztruppe, the native forces recruited by the Germans, and leaves the young Afiya with another family, who mistreat her because she knows how to read and write. Khalifa rescues her and brings her up as an adopted daughter. The third chapter then begins in an askari recruiting camp, not with Ilyas as we expect but with a new character, Hamza. Much later we get bits and pieces of Hamza's backstory, and apart from the name he could be a sequel to Yusuf in Gurnah's 1994 novel Paradise. The major part of the book deals with Hamza and the First World War battles in East Africa, although we get occasional glimpses of the earlier characters. The book continues until the early 1960s, although after about the end of the thirties it becomes much less detailed. (I might mention that the summary of the book on the book flap is quite incorrect in its description of events.)
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Spoilers after this point.
After the British win the war and take up their "mandate" over the former German colony, Hamza returns to the town he started out from, which turns out to be the same town in which Khalifa and Bi Ashi live. He gets a job in the same warehouse where Khalifa works, and ends up moving in with Khalifa. In the end, he marries Afiya. The novel then follows their lives in the twenties, thirties and forties, and their son, also called Ilyas after his uncle. Ilyas never contacted them again after leaving for the war, and eventually they begin to search for him. The book continues at a much quicker pace through the fifties and early sixties. I won't reveal the ending or what they find out about Ilyas.
While not exactly a conventional happy ending, Gurnah avoids the kind of tragedy that is so often obligatory for "literary" fiction. This was one of the best novels I have read by him.
Eagle (Linear Tactical #2) by Janie Crouch
4 ★
Charlotte “Charlie” Devereux and Finn “Eagle” Bollinger were high school sweethearts who were separated by circumstances beyond their control. Circumstances that Charlie would not tell Finn. She has returned to Oak Creek and Finn is determined to find out the truth.
Charlie and Finn are 2 very head-strong individuals who clash at every turn and it made for a very intense story. You can tell right from the start that Finn never got over Charlie and that she still loved him. It took so long for the two of them to confront each other and address the issue, even if it was just a small bit at a time.
Finn is involved in an undercover mission that Charlie inadvertently gets pulled into. I like how the author combined Charlie’s job as a tutor with the mission. It was quite ingenious. Charlie takes quite a beating during the mission and it makes Finn realize how much she really means to him. It was kind of a repeat from the first book, but still very enjoyable. There are some pretty passionate scenes throughout the book as well.
The author used a situation from this story to set up the storyline for the next book, Shamrock. I’m definitely going to try to get to it next month.
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E Is For Evidence – Sue Grafton – 3***
Book five in the “alphabet” series has PI Kinsey Milhone dreading a not very merry Christmas; she’s accused of insurance fraud and finds herself out on her own trying to clear her name. What I love about the series is the time frame – no cell phones or computers. Kinsey has to rely on her wits and good old-fashioned leg work to ferret out the information she needs. There are a lot of characters, most of whom are suspects, and enough twists and turns to keep this reader guessing right up to the reveal.
LINK to my full review
Harriet Crawford, ed.,
The Sumerian World
[2013] 660 pages [Kindle]Recommended to me by someone on Goodreads, The Sumerian World is the most technical work I have read on the Ancient Near East since the first two volumes of The Cambridge Ancient History (third edition) nearly half a century ago, and it is also the most recent by nearly a decade, so it had much that was new to me. The book consists of thirty-two articles by different authors, all recognized specialists working in the discipline, divided into six parts. The intended audience is neither the general reader (such as myself) nor other specialists in Sumerology, but specialists in related areas who are looking for comparative data, who are familiar with the methodology and terminology. I admit I had to look up several technical terms. It is part of a series of similar "The ____ World" books published by Routledge.
As with any multi-author book there was some unevenness in quality and interest (to me), but all but one were worthwhile. (The article on "Women and Agency" was so disorganized and ungrammatical that it was essentially incoherent.) Many of the articles had issues with grammar that occasionally made them harder than necessary to understand (surprisingly not in the articles by foreign authors); the book could have used a good copy-editor. This is really unforgiveable in a book by a reputable publisher which cost me $45.00 for the Kindle edition (and sells for $250.00 in hardcover — obviously for ripping off libraries.) There were also, naturally, some repetition and some differences of opinion.
The first part was called "The Background" and contained some of the best (although most technical) articles in the book. One was on the physical geography of Mesopotamia, one (with some repetition of the first) dealt with the irrigation systems and how they changed over time, and one was on agriculture and land management. Although I had picked up from other books that exploitation of the marsh resources had probably preceded large-scale irrigation, the detailed information here made it much more real to me, and also explained the probable reasons (climate change and other ecological factors) why the economic system changed over time. There was also an article on the transition from the Ubaid to the Uruk period, and one on the Sumerian language which was extremely interesting to me. Sumerian is described as an agglutinative, ergative, and verb-final language, apparently a very unusual combination of features. Despite some background in linguistics I had never come across the distinction between nominative-accusative and ergative-absolutive languages, and the discussion was very clear. Also interesting is that Sumerian had two grammatical "genders", not masculine and feminine but human and non-human. The last article in this part was a brief summary of the standard history and chronology necessary for understanding the other articles.
The second part was on "The Material Remains". The first article was on settlement patterns, especially as revealed by air and satellite imaging. The other five were interesting but had less that was new to me. The third section, on "Systems of Government" and the fourth section called "Life and Death" on everyday life, also had less new material but some of the articles were still of interest.
The last two sections, "The Neighbors" and "The Ends of the Sumerian World" were the most fascinating. They dealt with the relations and trade of Sumer with the surrounding regions (North Mesopotamia, Western Syria and the middle Euphrates Valley, Anatolia, Mari and Ebla) and regions farther off (the Iranian Plateau and Highlands (not just Elam but many other cultures), the Gulf (Dilmun and Magan), and the Harrapan Civilization (Meluhha). Mesopotamia had the first pre-Greek civilizations to be discovered, apart from Egypt, and especially after the discovery of Sumer it became the primary if not exclusive subject for archaeological and historical research in Western Asia (with the exception of "Israel"). We all learned that "History began in Sumer." After the 1995 Gulf War and the subsequent invasion and occupation of the present century, on-the-ground archaeological research ceased in Iraq, and the focus of archaeologist by necessity moved into the surrounding areas, with unexpected results. While the influence of the Ubaid cultures remains important, it now appears that significant urbanization did not simply diffuse from Sumer in the "Uruk Expansion" but appeared simultaneously throughout the region including Syria, Anatolia and Iran, largely independently of developments in Sumer. Sumer may have developped more quickly and progressed somewhat farther but the entire region made contribution to "History." It is not even certain that writing was invented at Uruk; the "Proto-Elamite" tablets from Susa cannot be dated with enough certainty to say whether they came before or after the assumed Sumerian tablets from Uruk, and since both were essentially logographic we cannot be sure what languages they represented (the Sumerian tablets were probably in Sumerian, since there is continuity with later tablets that are definitely Sumerian, but the "Proto-Elamite" writing system died out before the language could become evident.) There was a "Proto-Elamite" Expansion similar to the "Uruk Expansion" and which ended as mysteriously. Many of the supposed influences of Mesopotamia in the Gulf and elsewhere actually seem to resemble Iranian rather than Mesopotamian features. Finally, I learned that entire new cultures have been discovered recently (recently compared to my reading) such as the Oxus Civilization.
Each chapter, in keeping with the book's purpose, has its own two or three page bibliography, mainly of articles but some books as well. I was gratified that I had actually read some of the older and more general books.
In short, I would recommend the book to those who are interested in a somewhat technical in-depth consideration of the subject, and have the money to buy it or can find it in a university library. It is probably too long to try to read on Interlibrary Loan, which I considered.
Brian Greene,
Until the End of Time: Mind, Matter, and Our Search for Meaning in an Evolving Universe
[2020] 428 pagesHaving read some of Brian Greene's other books, which are all heavily into string theory, I was interested in what his take would be on the failure of the LHC to find many of the things string theory predicts.(See my review of Lisa Randall's Warped Passages.) This is not that book. Basically, it is the same kind of book as the Carl Sagan and Anne Druyon Cosmos books, a popular account of the universe from the Big Bang to the end(s), with descriptions of the origin of life, mind, religion and art along the way. General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics (but not string theory) are mentioned in connection with Black Holes and the various end-time scenarios (mainly in the more advanced and mathematical end-notes) but primarily the book focuses on the two classical themes of Entropy and Evolution. His explanations of entropy and how it can decrease in particular structures by exporting it to the environment are very clear, especially with regard to stars.
As often when a physicist or astronomer approaches questions outside those fields, the chapters on the beginning and end of the universe are more credible than what he says about the human endeavors, though that is mostly well-thought-out and never as superficial as with some "scientific" writers. He has a clear physicalist bias, but it's one I share so no problem. What was a problem for me was that he has a very sociobiological approach to cultural traits. If humans have religions, art and music, those must have evolved by natural selection and be part of our genetic heritage. (He's on more solid ground with language, which does seem to be a genetic adaptation.) He discusses, for example, the possibility that religion increased the cohesion of early human groups and their ability to cooperate, which may well be true. However, he then immediately tries to explain how that could result in an adaptive advantage to the individuals involved: Perhaps the groups with increased cohesion could have massacred the groups without it (I concede that religious groups have often massacred non-religious groups), or perhaps the greater cooperation allowed them to have more offspring, etc. and therefore the genes for a predisposition to religion would have increased by natural selection. He considers various alternative explanations, but not the one that seems most obvious to me: that the cultures with greater cohesion would have been more successful as cultures and thus have spread at the expense of other cultures. Would this not account for the fact that most cultures (but not anywhere near all individuals) have religious beliefs, without any individual biological predisposition needed? He does the same thing for art and storytelling, and his suggestion that they serve as "flight simulators" to consider possible scenarios before they occur is plausible (though I think myths and art do more than that) but again, why could the propensities to art and story not be cultural rather than based on some genetic control of behavior? In the first part of the book he considers evolution before life, i.e. "Molecular Darwinism", but he doesn't seem to consider "cultural evolution" of what seem to be obviously cultural traits.
I don't want to seem too negative; this was actually a good book and I learned about many new ideas and ongoing research projects in many areas. I was surprised at how seriously some scientists apparently take the problem of "Boltzmann Brains" and related ideas which seem to be more philosophical than scientific problems, and the description of the possible endings of the universe ("Physical eschatology") went beyond anything I had read about previously. Many of the most interesting ideas are actually in the notes rather than the text.
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High Tide In Tucson – Barbara Kingsolver - 4****
Kingsolver was already a successful novelist when this collection of essays was published. She relates her thoughts on family, home, politics, nature, social issues and personal responsibility with humor, compassion, wit and integrity. Her training as a scientist is evident, as is her talent as a poet.
LINK to my full review
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Bookish And the Beaast – Ashley Poston – 3***
Book number three in the Once Upon a Con series can easily be read as a standalone. Rosie Thorne, high school senior and geek girl bookworm, and Hollywood bad boy Vance Reigns, who plays the villain in the Starfield movies, are the lead couple. It’s a YA romance, full of the drama of homecoming, friends, frenemies, gossip, the pitfalls of social media, and a bit of Comic-Con nerdiness thrown in. I can certainly see the appeal for the intended audience.
LINK to my full review
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The Four Winds – Kristin Hannah – 4****
As she did in The Nightingale , Hannah uses female characters to tell a bit of the history of a time and place. In this work, the timeframe is 1920s to mid-1930s, and the place is America, specifically the Great Plains and California. I loved the three central women in the books: Elsa, her daughter Loreda, and her mother-in-law Rosa. Very reminiscent of Steinbeck’s masterpiece The Grapes of Wrath
LINK to my full review
Hrotsvitha of Gandersheim,
Hrotsvithae Opera
Book III [mid-10th century] 52 pages [Kindle, Open Library] [in Latin]The third and final book of Hrotsvitha's writings, this consists of two verse works, one on the reign of Otto the Great and one on the history of her convent of Gandersheim.
The Gesta Ottonis was apparently written at the suggestion (or command?) of her abbess Gerbirga, who was the daughter of Otto's brother Henry. It commences with a prologue in which, among the usual protestations of her inadequacy to write it, she tells us that she is the first to write the history of Otto I, or if others have written about him she hasn't seen their works. The actual history then begins with a sentence saying (in my poor but literal translation) that "after the king of kings who alone rules in the ages by himself transmuting the times of kings ordered the kingdom to be transferred from the Franks to the famous people of the Saxons, having their name from boulders (saxa) through their hard firm minds, the son of the great and venerable duke Otto, namely Henricus, first took on the kingship . . . ". This bit of etymology seems to come out of the blue. At the end of December and beginning of January of this year, I read the Rerum gestarum Saxonicarum libri tres of Widukind of Corvey, of which the second and third books deal with the period of Otto's reign. In his first book, Widukind gives an etymology of the name Saxons, deriving it from the name of a certain kind of knife. In his case, the etymology is introduced more naturally; he is at that point giving a general account of the Saxons and has just described a scene in which the Saxons hid their knives under their cloaks in order to surprise an enemy with whom they were supposedly making peace. He then adds that they were called Saxons because of those knives. It seems to me that Hrotsvitha is very probably contradicting Widukind here, in which case she must have seen at least his first book. (Both etymologies are equally fanciful, but at least Widukind has them named in German and not in Latin.)
This same sentence also highlights the difference between the two works; although Widukind is a monk, his prose account is basically secular, only introducing religion where the church or clergy is actually involved in the actions, whereas Hrotsvitha presents the historical events as essentially a struggle between the "eternal king" ("rex perennis") and the "ancient enemy". In other words, she is writing not so much a history or biography of Otto as a religious epic poem based on the events of his reign.
She then goes on to say that King Henricus (i.e. Henry the Fowler) had three sons, Otto, Henricus and Brun, of whom Otto was destined to be king after him, Henricus was a great warrior, and Brun became a bishop. She makes no mention of his oldest son by his first marriage, Thancmar. The first real episode in the poem is the mission to England to secure Edith, the daughter of King Edward (i.e. Edward the Elder) and half-sister of the current king Athelstan, as Otto's wife; her perfections are described at some length. After the wedding, Hrotsvitha jumps to the death of King Henricus, and almost immediately to the rebellion of Otto's brother Henricus (skipping over a long period including the earlier rebellion of Thancmar.) If Widukind is circumspect in his treatment of the family infighting between Henricus and Otto, Hrotsvitha, writing for Henricus' daughter, is even more so; she solves the problem by describing the rebellion as a misunderstanding caused by the deceits of the ancient enemy and emphasizes the "sadness" of both brothers at their disputes. There are a few lines mentioning Evurhardus rather cryptically — cryptically because she has omitted Thancmar and all the previous background. The rebellion is soon over and the two brothers reconciled.
We next find Otto conquering Italy. At this point we get the most vivid and interesting episode of the poem, not least because Hrotsvitha is the only source. After the death of the King of Italy, his widow Aedelheitha (also spelled Aethelheitha) is overthrown and imprisoned by Berengarius. She escapes with the help of a loyal bishop, and flees, hiding in the daytime and traveling at night, with Berengarius' soldiers in hot pursuit, until she reaches the bishop's house with the strong walls. Then Otto arrives to defeat Berengarius and ultimately marry Aedelheitha. The Empire finally has peace and prosperity — until the ancient enemy causes Otto's son and heir Liudulphus to believe that he is being ignored and his appropriate honors given to the king's brother Henricus due to the influence of Aedelheitha. Then . . . the last two-fifths of the manuscript are lost, except for two short fragments, one describing Liodulphus' return from exile and one summarizing the poem and ending with the final prayer.
The Primordia Coenobii Gandesheimensis gives us an insight into the founding of an early mediaeval convent. It begins with a woman named Aeda who is stretched out praying at the altar of John the Baptist. She sees a man's feet in front of her and raises her head to see a figure all in shining white. It is of course John the Baptist himself, and he promises her that her descendants will be the most powerful rulers in the world and tells her to found a convent. This Aeda happens to be the mother of Oda, the wife of Duke Liudulphus of the Saxons. (This is not Liudulphus the son of Otto from the previous poem, but Otto's great-grandfather.) At the urging of his wife and mother-in-law, Liudulphus agrees to build a convent at his own expense, and gets his overlord, King Hludowicus (II) of the Franks, to donate a parcel of land near the town of Gandersheim on the Gandes River. The next step is a pilgrimage to Rome to obtain the permission of Pope Sergius and some impressive corpses of saints to be the convent's relics.
The poem continues with the actual building of the convent, mainly the church, and the collection of the first nuns with Liudulph's daughter Hathumoda as the first abbess. Then it mainly becomes a description of deaths and funeral, with Hathumoda succeeded by the first Gerbirga (the sister of Hludowic's queen), and then Cristina. Interestingly, the first abbess Gerbirga leaves her husband to become abbess, like a heroine of one of Hrotsvitha's plays. The connections with the ruling families is evident, and the gifts of the kings and dukes are another main theme of the poem. It ends before the time of the second Gerbirga who is Hrotsvitha's abbess (and as mentioned above the niece of Otto I).
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Buy a Whisker – Sophie Ryan – 3***
Book two in the Second Chance Cat Mystery series, featuring Sarah Grayson, proprietor of Second Chance, a consignment shop in North Harbor, Maine, and her rescue cat, Elvis. It’s a pretty typical cozy mystery. There are enough suspects and red herrings to keep the reader engaged and guessing, and an interesting regular cast of colorful, quirky characters.
LINK to my full review
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Family Reunion – Nancy Thayer – 3***
Thayer specializes in family dramas set on Nantucket. As per usual there is at least one troubled marriage, a grandchild that relates more to grandma than to parents, a possible new romance (or two), and at least one pet too cute for words. And in this case, there is also a major decision regarding whether to keep the home that’s been in the family for generations or sell out to developers willing to pay millions of dollars for prime ocean-front land. It’s a quick read full of mostly likeable characters in recognizable situations. Perfect choice for a vacation read.
LINK to my full review
Little Black Lies by Sharon J. Bolton
5 ★
Catrin Quinn lives on a small island and is still dealing with a great loss from years earlier. Two children have gone missing and when a third disappears Catrin helps in the search.
This story is told in 3 parts and over 4 days. Each part is from a different character’s perspective and covers the same 4 days. It was an interesting way to tell a story and I found it quite intriguing. It was neat to see what was going on in other areas of the island during the 4 days and what each character was thinking during it. This way of storytelling kept the narrative moving and kept my interest.
There are some troubling scenes involving beached whales and the discovery of one of the missing children. Catrin, Rachel and Callum have secrets that come out during their part in the story and they are quite shocking. The mystery behind what happened to the third missing child is twisted throughout the 3 parts and really quite mind boggling. The last chapter threw me for a loop and had me staring at the book in disbelief. It was an unexpected ending that just rattled me. Great storytelling on the authors’ part.
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Iona Iverson’s Rules For Commuting – Clare Pooley – 3***
This is a delightful ensemble piece featuring Iona Iverson, a woman of a certain age, who has long held a position as an advice columnist, and the other regular riders of a particular tube route in London. I really liked all these characters, even the insufferable Piers, and enjoyed watching how their expanded circle of friendship affected each of them. I worried for some of them as their backstories unfolded and cheered them all on as they emerged from their troubles and all vowed to “be more Iona.” It’s my own new rallying cry!
LINK to my full review
Pablo Neruda,
Odas elementares
[1954] 271 pages [Kindle, Open Library] [in Spanish]A first sight, a somewhat slighter book than the Canto general; not only is it only half as long (probably less than half if one subtracts the long introduction by the editor), but it is lighter in tone, more lyric than epic, more humorous than tragic. Yet it is a book full of ideas and clever images, really fun to read. Many of these odes certainly are committed to the struggle of the workers and peasants, but the book is less exclusively political than the earlier one. I would recommend it to anyone who enjoys poetry.
Book Concierge wrote: " Iona Iverson’s Rules For Commuting
– Clare Pooley – 3***
This is a delightful ensemble piece featuring Iona Iverson, a woman of a certai..."
Our local book club read this a couple of months ago. We liked it!
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The World That We Knew – Alice Hoffman – 4****
Hanni Kohn recognizes the imminent danger the Nazi’s pose, so she goes to a rabbi for help. But it is the rabbi’s daughter, Ettie, who offers to make the mystical golem who will protect Hanni’s daughter, Lea. Once Ava is brought to life, she will join with Lea and Ettie to escape to France. Although separated their paths are fated to intersect. I was skeptical about reading another WW2 story, but Hoffman’s writing captured my attention and kept me interested and engaged throughout
LINK to my full review
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The Chicken Sisters – K J Dell’Antonia – 3.5***
Two competing chicken restaurants founded a century ago by sisters are the subject of a reality-TV “food war.” In addition to the long-running family feud continues with a current “feud” of sorts between sisters Amanda and Mae. There are some family secrets that come out, a new hunky chef, a manipulative TV producer who wants more conflict, and more than one effort to sabotage the competition which all serve to keep the plot moving forward with surprises, twists and insights into the family dynamic. There can only be ONE winner of “Food Wars” and in this case, it’s the reader.
LINK to my full review
Queen of Volts (The Shadow Game #3) by Amanda Foody
5 ★
The twenty-two most powerful, notorious people in New Reynes have been dealt cards in a new dangerous card game. This final game pits everyone against each other and winning will cost them everything, for there can only be one winner.
The legends of New Reynes let loose in this final book and the reader gets a closer look at the evils from the past. As in the other books, each chapter is told from a different character’s point of view. The author added a few different ones this time and it made for a great story. The reader gets to see all sides of the game.
This trilogy was very dark and violent. I was surprised by some of it, but the author does a nice job of separating the incidents. This book had a few very unexpected and gut wrenching deaths. Enna and Levi play a pretty good game. There are tricks and plot twists throughout the book.
I have enjoyed this trilogy and look forward to reading more by Amanda Foody.
Sea Swept (Chesapeake Bay Saga #1) by Nora Roberts
4 ★
Cameron Quinn lives the high life and he loves it. He races boats and enjoys the attention he gets from the ladies. His plans do not include returning home, at least not for good, but when his dying dad requests that Cam and his brothers care for Seth, a troubled young boy that he took in; Cam is unable to say no. He was that troubled young boy once and he owes his dad.
This is a sweet family story that speaks to the heart. Ray and Stella Quinn took 3 troubled boys in and cared for them. The three boys each grew up very different, but ultimately end up coming back together to care for Seth. There are many draw backs to this and there are many disagreements, but I liked how they worked things out. Even though they were all adopted and at different ages, they are definitely brothers.
Cam is an adrenaline junkie and likes to move at a fast pace. It was fun seeing him learn how to slow down and enjoy the simple things. He and Seth are two peas in a pods and butt heads quite frequently, but because they are so alike Cam can see past Seth’s tough guy attitude. It’s a very heartwarming journey.
Anna, the social working assigned to Seth’s case, is a spitfire and keeps Cam on his toes. The romance between the two is quick and intense. It’s so intense that one expects it to fizzle fast. Thankfully it does not and the reader gets to ride the bumpy rode to happiness with them.
This story was a quick read that had me laughing and tearing up in the same chapter. I look forward to reading about Cam’s brother, Ethan, in the next book. I foresee a very different path to love for Ethan that will not be as intense as Cam’s.
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Mistress Of the Ritz – Melanie Benjamin – 3.5***
As she has done for many other women in history, Benjamin, turns her attention to a previously little-known woman who made a significant impact. This novel focuses on Blanche Auzello, a former American actress who was married to Claude Auzello, the manager of the Hotel Ritz in Paris, and their experiences during the Nazi occupation of Paris. I was completely caught up in the story from beginning to end. It’s worth reading the author’s note at the end to learn the few facts the author had on which to frame this engaging work of fiction.
LINK to my full review
Olga Tokarczuk,
Jeu sur tambours et tambourins
suivi de
L'Armoire et autres nouvelles
[2001, Fr. tr. 2023] 394 pages [Kindle] [in French]This e-book contains recent French translations of two collections of short stories by 2020 Nobel Prizewinner Olga Tokarczuk. As far as I can tell, unlike the case of her novels, none of her story collections have yet been translated into English.
L'Armoire et autres nouvelles was her first collection, first published (in Polish) in 1997, and consists of three stories; "L'Armoire" (1985) is a strange story about a piece of furniture and how it affects its owners, "Les numéros" (1989), which is the longest, follows a hotel chambermaid through her day at work, and "Deus ex" (1985) is about a computer genius who codes and plays Sim games.
Jeu sur tambours et tambourins contains nineteen stories, and I won't try to summarize them individually, but there are certain themes which recur in many of the twenty-two stories. One is artificial copies of life; in addition to "Deus ex", there is a story which features an incredibly detailed doll house, one about a creche which models the world, and one about a re-enactment of the capture of Jerusalem in the first crusade. Her first success as a novelist, Primeval and Other Times has a similar theme (a game which models the world.) There is another story about the life of a cleaning woman, which also includes dolls. Several of the stories are about ordinary people in almost surrealistic situations; two are about characters caught up in the "state of war" following the protests in December of 1981, and one is about an unidentified catastrophe which may be the end of the world. Nearly all are written in a sort of stream-of-consciousness, even if some are told from the outside in third person.
All in all, this is an intriguing group of experimental stories.
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Invisible Women – Caroline Criado Pérez – 5*****
Subtitle: Data Bias In a World Designed For Men. The author explores how the gender data gap harms women, sometimes with life-threatening results. Criado Pérez has done extensive research but she does more than just present her findings. Her writing is clear, logical, and compelling. Read this book!
LINK to my full review
Odd Hours (Odd Thomas #4) by Dean Koontz
5 ★
After being haunted by dreams of a red tide, Odd Thomas finds himself in the small California town of Magic Beach. Here he meets a strange young lady who he swears to protect and a whole list of bad guys. The story moves very quickly from beginning to end and Odd finds himself having to cross a line that he never wanted to cross.
There is some truly mystifying moments throughout the book that make the reader realize that Odd is not the only “odd” one out there. He meets some new people that I hope we will see again. They all make for one heck of a team.
There is quite a bit of violence in this story and some pretty intense moments as well. Odd keeps his sense of humor through it all and I found myself giggling quite often. Odd’s discussion with many of the characters is a back and forth dialogue with smart remarks and quick comebacks. These conversations are my favorite parts of this series.
Odd and one of his new friends hit the road at the end of this book for parts unknown and I can’t wait to move onto the next book and see where their travels take them.
Olga Tokarczuk,
Recits ultimes
[2004, Fr. tr. 2007] 291 pages [Kindle] [in French]Recits ultimes is a novel in three inter-related stories. As with many of Tokarczuk's works, they focus on very ordinary characters in abnormal (for them) situations of partial or total isolation. It may seem that this is the usual formula for most literature, but in fact in most stories about "ordinary people" they are in fact special in some way, intelligent or resourceful, independent, sensitive or brave, etc. These three women are on the contrary limited, confused by events, unsure of themselves or what they should do in the circumstances, fearful, and centered on themselves (and especially their random memories and strange ideas). All three stories contain reflections on death and dying (hence the overall title). The style is of course quite "experimental" as with most contemporary literary fiction.
The first part, "Blanche contrée" (White Country) is the story of a fifty year old woman named Ida who serves as a tour guide between the East European cities of Varsovie (Warsaw), Crakovie, Prague, Berlin and Vienna. After a short introductory section, we find her driving on a snow-covered road, planning to visit the town where her mother and father lived the latter part of their lives and where she grew up. She misses a turn in the snow and crashes the car, then manages to make her way toward a town where she finds shelter in a farmhouse with an elderly couple suffering from Alzheimer's and a dying dog. The story chronicles her inability to deal with the simplest tasks such as contacting the police about the accident or notifying friends or coworkers, alternating with her memories about her husband and the birth of her daughter Maya.
The second part, "Paraskewia, la Parque", is about Ida's mother, Paraskewia, also known as Parka (with a pun on Parcae, i.e. the Fates.) It is set about a decade earlier than the first part. She lives with her husband Petro on a mountainside which is completely isolated from the town below during the winter months. As the story opens, in mid-winter, Petro has just died. The story describes her bizarre behaviors as she tries to cope with his death, alternating with memories of World War II and the forced migrations which followed (Ukrainians into eastern Poland, Poles from eastern Poland into western Poland, German-speaking Poles from western Poland into East Germany), also a theme of one of Tokarczuk's earlier novels. The couple did not fit in with any of the mutually hostile communities, since Petro was Polish and Parka is Ukrainian, which is one reason they chose to become isolated. Her memories are obsessed with her oldest daughter, Lalka, who died on a train during one forced move, and she essentially cares nothing about Ida from whom she is long estranged.
The third part, "L'Illusionniste", is about the adult daughter Maya and her eleven-year-old son (I don't believe he is ever named,although he is one of the major characters; he is just called "her son" or "the boy".) The story begins with them travelling with a group of divers through a jungle to a port where they cross to a small island. The setting is apparently in Malaysia. Maya is writing a travel guide to the region. The story takes place mostly in or around a small hotel-restaurant owned by a man named Mike. There is much detailed description of the island and of the coral reefs among which they dive. About half-way through the story, a dying (stage) magician, Kisz, the "illusionist" of the title, arrives at the hotel, to whom Maya for no apparent reason takes an instant dislike. He teaches her son some magic tricks. This is the entire plot of the story.
Claude Lévi-Strauss,
The Origin of Table Manners
[1968, Eng. tr. 1978] 551 pagesThe Origin of Table Manners is the third volume of Mythologiques. While the first two volumes were nearly entirely about South American myths, this volume begins with some South American myths in the first half and then moves to the North American myths in the second half, which will also be the subject of the fourth and last volume which I hope to get to next month. The title is somewhat misleading as table manners, even in a rather loose sense, are a very small part of what he is describing here; mainly, the myths in this volume are concerned with time, or more exactly periodicities in time: day vs. night, the months (and menstruation and childbirth), the seasons of the year, and human lifetimes. He takes care in this volume to frequently recapitulate where he is in his argument, which makes it somewhat more understandable than the first two books (or perhaps I'm just more used to his methods after reading them), although it is still complex and introduces another two hundred or so myths which he again refers to by index numbers.
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Queen of America – Luis Alberto Urrea – 4****
Urrea picks up where he left off in The Hummingbird’s Daughter and continues the story of his great aunt, Teresita Urrea, “The Saint of Cabora” or “Mexican Joan of Arc.” Teresita is in turns sheltered and looked after, abused, taken advantage of, earning and taking charge of her celebrity, and finding peace. Set against the backdrop of historical events in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Urrea gives us a woman who has earned a place in history and legend.
LINK to my full review
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The Most Beautiful Girl in Cuba – Chanel Cleeton – 3***
For her fourth book featuring a member of the Perez family, Cleeton turned to history and one exceptional Cuban woman – Evangelina Cisneros – who was instrumental in the fight to liberate Cuba from Spanish rule. Basing most of the novel of actual events, Cleeton filled in with two fictional characters: journalist Grace Harrington, and Marina Perez, a Cuban caught in the conflict between Spain and those seeing independence for the island.
LINK to my full review
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Elementary, She Read – Vicki Delany – 3***
First in a new (to me, at least) series starring Gemma Doyle who is helping her great uncle Arthur run his bookshop. This has all the elements of a successful cozy mystery series, including a cute pet (in this case the black cat named Moriarty and a best friend who runs a complimentary business. I loved all the book references, and thought the basic premise was sufficiently plausible to keep me interested and engaged.
LINK to my full review
Aphra Behn,
Oroonoko, or The Royal Slave: A True History
[1688; Norton crit. ed. 1997] 272 pagesAphra Behn (1640-1689) was one of the most important English women authors of the seventeenth century; Oroonoko was one of the earliest English novels and one of the first literary works to deal with the slave trade and American slavery. The novel claims to be a "true history" but this is probably just a convention as with many novels of the time; however, Behn apparently did reside for some time in the English colony of Surinam (later taken by the Dutch and now the Republic of Suriname) where the novel is set, and the English characters are all historical persons.
The main character, Oroonoko, is a prince on the Gold Coast of Africa; the king, his grandfather, steals Oroonoko's wife Imoinda, and later sells her to a slave trader. Later, Oroonoko himself is kidnapped by a slaver and sold in Surinam, where he is reunited with Imoinda. He then leads an unsuccessful slave insurrection.
The novel contrasts the nobility of Oroonoko and the innocence of the Indians with the treachery of many of the English characters; the attitude of the narrator, who is based on Behn herself, towards slavery and colonialism is somewhat ambiguous, but relatively advanced for the time — following the theories of John Locke, she accepts the justice of slavery for prisoners taken in a "just war" but questions the extension of slavery to the wives and children, and both justifies the rebellion but is fearful of the results.
The edition I read was a Norton Critical Edition which in addition to the novel itself (less than seventy pages) contained over two hundred pages of excerpts from documents relating to slavery and from several late twentieth century critical books or articles about the novel. It also contained excerpts from the dramatic adaptation by Thomas Southerne which was produced in 1691 and was long very popular on the stage. (Oroonoko was one of Behn's last works, published in 1688; she died in 1689.)
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The Barbizon – Paulina Bren – 4****
Subtitle: The Hotel That Set Women Free. Bren has done her research and chronicles the history of the iconic hotel from its construction in 1927 to its conversion to multi-million dollar condominiums in 2007. As she tells the story of the hotel, she tells the story of women in America, of their hopes, dreams and aspirations as contrasted with society’s expectations and the structured roles assigned to “proper” women.
LINK to my full review
Ana Teresa Torres,
Doña Inés contra el olvido
[1992] 256 pages [Kindle, Open Library] [in Spanish] Considered a "contemporary classic" of Venezuelan literature (at least according to the publisher's description on Amazon), this is a historical novel told by the ghost of Doña Inés, a wealthy aristocrat born at the end of the seventeenth century. The history of Venezuela from the colonial period through the war of independence and the slave rebellions of the nineteenth century, the civil wars and military dictatorships of the twentieth century to the present-day of the novel (it ends in the mid-1980s) is organized around the lives of the descendants of Doña Inés and of the Black overseer of her hacienda, and the complicated property disputes concerning the land she once owned. Much of the narrative is addressed to her husband Alejandro, a former slave named Juan del Rosario who founded a Black settlement on part of her land (which her husband may or may not have given him), and other characters who are also dead.
This is a more difficult book than most historical novels because so many political figures from the early Spanish governors to the long succession of ruling generals are alluded to without any context; I think one would need to be Venezuelan to really follow the thread of the political history. The family history on the other hand is fairly clear and the stories of many of the characters are interesting and sometimes moving.
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The Gunslinger – Stephen King – 2.5**
This is the first in the novels that comprise King’s epic odyssey “Dark Tower” series. In it, he introduces the reader to Roland Deschain, a “gunslinger. ” Haunted and determined, Roland wanders a bleak landscape in search of the man in black, determined to eradicate evil. There is something about Roland that makes me want to follow him, that makes me believe that he is “a good guy” and the kind of hero I want to cheer for. Still, I’m left with more questions than answers, and a general sense of unease. I have no desire to continue the series to find out what happens next.
LINK to my full review
They Lost Their Heads!: What Happened to Washington’s Teeth, Einstein’s Brain, and Other Famous Body Parts by Carlyn Beccia
4 ★
This was a delightful and entertaining quick read. It is very morbid in spots, but very informative. The stories behind each famous body part can get pretty funny. Some sections also have extra information about other not so famous people. This is considered a middle school book, but I highly recommend it to all ages.
Fallen (Will Trent #5) by Karin Slaughter
5 ★
FBI Agent Faith Mitchell’s mother is missing and there is a lot of blood at the crime scene. It’s possible that her kidnapping may be connected to the police corruption case that lead to Faith’s mother’s retirement. She will need the help of her partner, Will Trent, but he’s the one who investigated her mom and he still believes that she was involved in it.
This is a very fast paced story with unexpected revelations throughout. The violence toward Faith’s mother is very graphic and disturbing. The strength she had throughout the torture was amazing. A lot of women her age would not have survived. I continue to be amazed at how Amanda Wagner is able to be on these cases. She is very close to Faith’s mother and has a jaded opinion of her and what she has done. I felt like it was a conflict of interest.
Sara Linton and Will Trent get even closer in this book and I am so glad. I’m still not overly happy with what happened to her husband, yes I hold grudges, but I’m glad she is moving on. Will is a fantastic character and one that I would love to have a cup of coffee with. The way his mind works truly intrigues me.
The twist at the end caught me completely off guard. Well played Ms. Slaughter. It showed a different side of Faith’s mom and explained so much about her actions in the past. I do think Faith has counseling in her future though, especially with that irritating brother of hers.
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Hidden Valley Road – Robert Kolker – 3.5***
Subtitle: Inside the Mind of an American Family. The Galvin family certainly seemed the quintessential successful post-WW2, Eisenhower-era family, but six of their twelve children were diagnosed with schizophrenia. They became the subjects of numerous research projects. I don’t think I would have read this book were it not for my F2F book group. I found interesting and informative, but it was not always compelling.
LINK to my full review
Supplemental Nights to the Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night with Notes Anthropological and Explanatory
(Richard Burton ed.) v.5 [Kindle, Project Gutenberg] approx. 350 pagesI have been working my way through Burton's edition of the Thousand Nights for a couple years now, and I'm almost finished, with only one more volume left, which I will hopefully get to in the next two or three months. This is the fifth of the six supplemental volumes which contain material not in the Buqlac manuscript which was translated in full in the first ten volumes. It contains additional stories from the Wortley Montague Codex which were either not in the Buqlac or more often are variants which differ significantly from the same tales in that edition (unfortunately usually by being much inferior.) Those tales which are substantially the same as the Buqlac edition were not re-translated here. I could only say about the same things I said about the earlier books, except that this one is almost adequately proofread.
Annie Ernaux,
La place
[1983] 114 pages [Kindle, Open Library] [in French]Written ten years after her first novel, Les armoires vides, La place tells the same basic story, but concentrating on the life of her father rather than herself.
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Blackbird House – Alice Hoffman – 3***
This is a collection of vignettes, spanning two-plus centuries, all set in the same house / farm on the tip of Cape Cod, Massachusetts. beginning when the area was still a British colony and ending in the early 21st century. I found these stories enchanting and mesmerizing, though I’m hard pressed to say what exactly it was about them that so charmed me. Maybe that is the magic of Hoffman’s storytelling.
LINK to my full review
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The Unconsoled –Kazuo Ishiguro – 3***
This is a story about Ryder, an internationally renowned pianist, who arrives in an unnamed European city to give a concert he has no memory of agreeing to give. Ishiguro is a brilliant writer, but this was a really challenging work. It is the stuff of dreams, or perhaps nightmares. People come and go, and Ryder (not to mention the reader) is left trying to puzzle out what is happening.
LINK to my full review
The Waste Lands (The Dark Tower #3) by Stephen King
5 ★
Roland of Gilead and Eddie and Susannah Dean continue their journey toward the Dark Tower and find the Beam. This is a definitive path that will lead them straight to the tower, but with many obstacles along the way. The bear they meet up with is beyond terrifying and also quite interesting. My copy has pictures and the illustrations really add to the story. The illustration of the bear was amazing.
Jake and Eddie have a connection in the book and the journey Jake takes to join the Gunslinger and his friends had me glued to the book. The way their dreams lined up, but also different, was genius story telling. It was not hard to follow though. There is no gap in the story that makes the reader forget parts that show up again for the other character. The story flows very smoothly.
The city of Lud is quite a place. Dangerous and falling apart. The inhabitants of the city have become very ingenious in their building skills. There are mazes and hiding places a plenty. The people are mean, though. Jake is taken by a guy named Gasher and taken to the Tick-Tock man. What they do to him is very violent and disturbing. There are some areas of this story that bring back memories of The Stand.
My favorite character in the story is Oy, a Billy Bumbler. He attaches himself to Jake and is just so lovey, loyal, and sweet.
The book ended is a somewhat weird way. Not so much a cliff hanger, but almost in the middle of a conversation. I look forward to continuing the series and seeing what happens next.
Quantum (Captain Chase #1) by Patricia Cornwell
3 ★
There are some weird things happening at a NASA research center and they are all pointing toward Captain Calli Chase’s twin sister, Carme. Calli’s sister has been off the grid for days and Calli needs to figure out what is going on. If Carme is involved in some kind of sabotage it could cause a major catastrophe at the upcoming launch.
Don’t let my 3 star rating scare you away. This is a very good thriller. I just found it a bit tedious with all the quantum physics terminology and references. When speeds are mentioned they are shown in kph and then in parenthesis they are shown in mph. It’s the same with the temperatures. The story is told by Calli who is a NASA pilot, quantum physicist, and cybercrime investigator and she can get very detailed with things. It can be a bit much for some of us readers who don’t quite understand quantum anything.
The story gets pretty intense toward the end and doesn’t really answer all of the reader’s questions. Looks like book 2 will do that and I do plan on reading it. They storyline kept me interested and eager to found out what happens. This topic is very different from the author’s normal genre, but I feel like she did a pretty decent job keeping it going and keeping it interesting.
The Blickling Homilies
[971] 392 pages [Kindle, Open Library] [in Old English]The Blickling Homilies are an anonymous collection of nineteen homilies (sermons) in Old English from the end of the tenth century. The edition I read was a facsimile of the first printed edition edited by Richard Morris (1880) (originally printed in three volumes, but the book I read from Open Library had the complete text). One of the homilies mentions that it is written in 971, but they may have been put together from different sources. Actually very little is known about their origins or the intended audience. They are interesting both from the viewpoint of the language and of what they tell us about the popular religion of the time.
Having read the legends and plays of Hrotsvitha a couple months ago, which were written about the same time (in Saxon Germany rather than Anglo-Saxon England and in Latin rather than the vernacular), I couldn't help compare the two. There were similarities, in that both contained unscriptural legends about the Virgin Mary and rather unbelievable legends of various saints, but overall they seemed to be from very different religions. While the works of Hrotsvitha identified Christianity entirely with celibacy, the homilies had almost nothing to say about monks or nuns and assumed that most Christians had husbands and wives. The homilies' view of Christianity was mainly about almsgiving and treating the poor with respect, which Hrotsvitha says nothing about. In other words, the homilies are much closer to the original religion of the Gospels, while Hrotsvitha represents the later monastic view of religion.
Olga Tokarczuk,
Les enfants verts ou le récit de singuliers événements survenus en Volhynie, consignés par William Davisson, médecin de Sa Majesté le roi Jean II Casimir
[2015, Fr. tr. 2016] 96 pages [Kindle Unlimited] [in French]Les enfants verts is a novella set in Poland in 1646, against the background of the Wars of Religion. I read it in French translation (from Polish); as far as I know it is not yet available in English. The story is narrated in the first person by a Scottish doctor and botanist, who was accompanying King Jean II Casimir of Poland on a voyage to Lvov when he broke his leg and was forced to remain behind in a small rural mansion. He tells the story of two children, a boy and a girl (they appear to be six and four, approximately, although he suspects that the girl at least may be older) who were discovered in the woods by the King's retinue. They were dirty and poorly dressed, apparently unable to speak, and had skins of a strange green color. The book gradually reveals their nature, although the narrator remains in doubt; I won't reveal the mystery. It was a good, fast read.
Mod
The Eyes of the Dragon – Stephen King – 3.5***
Well, this was a fairy tale I never expected from Stephen King. I was reminded of a number of classic fairy tales, adventure quests and such that enthralled and entertained me when I was a child. This story speaks directly to the child that still dwells inside me. It allows me to suspend disbelief while I cheer for the hero and hiss at the villain.
LINK to my full review
Paging All Bookworms!
Books mentioned in this topic
The Inheritance of Orquídea Divina (other topics)The Second-Worst Restaurant in France (other topics)
The Violin of Auschwitz (other topics)
Taken to the Cleaners (other topics)
Southtown (other topics)
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An Elderly Lady Must Not Be Crossed – Helene Tursten – 3***
Book two in a very short series featuring nearly-90-year-old Maud and the people who irritate and annoy her and deserve what they get. This picks up where the first book left off, and the plot alternates between her current trip to South Africa and memories of past encounters, where she got even with those who crossed her. Maud’s an astute observer and prides herself on being a quick thinker. And, of course, who pays any attention to a little old lady?
LINK to my full review