Dan Pinkerton (Author of Democracy of Noise)

Dan finished reading Wynne's War by Aaron Gwyn	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
Dec 18, 2025 08:06PM · like · preview book See a Problem? We’d love your help. Let us know what’s wrong with this preview of Wynne's War by Aaron Gwyn. Problem: Details (if other): Thanks for telling us about the problem. Not the book you’re looking for? Preview — Wynne's War by Aaron Gwyn <iframe sandbox id="wrongBookKindlePreviewScreen">
Dan rated a book really liked it The Knife Thrower and Other Stories by Steven Millhauser	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
Steven Millhauser seems like he should check all the boxes for me. Much of his work is subtly fantastical or magically realist. His prose is always stylish. His stories are imaginative. And his mode of storytelling is unique, often employing a collec ...more
Nov 29, 2025 03:43PM · like · see review · preview book See a Problem? We’d love your help. Let us know what’s wrong with this preview of The Knife Thrower and Other Stories by Steven Millhauser. Problem: Details (if other): Thanks for telling us about the problem. Not the book you’re looking for? Preview — The Knife Thrower and Other Stories by Steven Millhauser <iframe sandbox id="wrongBookKindlePreviewScreen">
Dan rated a book it was amazing All Fours by Miranda July (Goodreads Author)	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
It makes sense that the cumulative star rating of "All Fours" is around 3.5, as I imagine readers will either love or hate this book. I personally loved it, though I'd be hesitant to recommend it widely. For one thing, "All Fours" is fairly plotless. ...more
Nov 29, 2025 11:36AM · like · see review · preview book See a Problem? We’d love your help. Let us know what’s wrong with this preview of All Fours by Miranda July. Problem: Details (if other): Thanks for telling us about the problem. Not the book you’re looking for? Preview — All Fours by Miranda July <iframe sandbox id="wrongBookKindlePreviewScreen">
Dan entered a giveaway Python's Kiss: Stories by Louise Erdrich	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
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Dan rated a book liked it If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies: Why Superhuman AI Would Kill Us All by Eliezer Yudkowsky (Goodreads Author)	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
More than anything, "If Anyone Builds It" caused me to question why I was so anxious to read this book in the first place. The sign of a good nonfiction book for me is that I'm always recounting facts about it to the annoyed people around me, but I f ...more
Nov 18, 2025 12:46PM · like · see review · preview book See a Problem? We’d love your help. Let us know what’s wrong with this preview of If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies by Eliezer Yudkowsky. Problem: Details (if other): Thanks for telling us about the problem. Not the book you’re looking for? Preview — If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies by Eliezer Yudkowsky <iframe sandbox id="wrongBookKindlePreviewScreen">
Dan rated a book it was amazing The Endurance Artist: Lazarus Lake, the Barkley & a Race with No End by Jared Beasley (Goodreads Author)	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
Beasley did a great job with what was likely a very difficult subject: Gary Cantrell aka Laz Lake, someone with no fixed identity, someone who has been notoriously cagey with reporters, loose with facts, and silent about his private life. Surprisingl ...more
Nov 14, 2025 01:29PM · like · see review · preview book See a Problem? We’d love your help. Let us know what’s wrong with this preview of The Endurance Artist by Jared Beasley. Problem: Details (if other): Thanks for telling us about the problem. Not the book you’re looking for? Preview — The Endurance Artist by Jared Beasley <iframe sandbox id="wrongBookKindlePreviewScreen">
Dan rated a book really liked it Future Boy: Back to the Future and My Journey Through the Space-Time Continuum by Michael J. Fox	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
This is a light read, a fun book - it's always great to hear Michael J. Fox's voice - but there isn't much new or revelatory here. "Future Boy" will likely put you in the mood to watch "Back to the Future" again, but if you're already a fan of the fi ...more
Nov 10, 2025 07:21AM · like · see review · preview book See a Problem? We’d love your help. Let us know what’s wrong with this preview of Future Boy by Michael J. Fox. Problem: Details (if other): Thanks for telling us about the problem. Not the book you’re looking for? Preview — Future Boy by Michael J. Fox <iframe sandbox id="wrongBookKindlePreviewScreen">
Dan rated a book it was amazing When All the Men Wore Hats: Susan Cheever on the Stories of John Cheever by Susan Cheever	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
Good books are like good concerts. After the concert's over, you have a greater appreciation of the band. You want to listen to them on the car ride home. You want to put them on repeat for the next month or so. "When All the Men Wore Hats" made me w ...more
Nov 07, 2025 01:20PM · 2 likes · like · see review · preview book See a Problem? We’d love your help. Let us know what’s wrong with this preview of When All the Men Wore Hats by Susan Cheever. Problem: Details (if other): Thanks for telling us about the problem. Not the book you’re looking for? Preview — When All the Men Wore Hats by Susan Cheever <iframe sandbox id="wrongBookKindlePreviewScreen">
Dan rated a book it was amazing Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln by Doris Kearns Goodwin	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
"Team of Rivals" is a fantastic book. It seems like Goodwin set out to write a group biography of Lincoln and the men he chose for his cabinet, most of whom were his political rivals. But she gravitated (rightly so) toward Lincoln and the way he was ...more
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Dan rated a book really liked it Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk (Goodreads Author)	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
At this point, it's impossible to separate the film version of "Fight Club" from the book. While reading, I was picturing Edward Norton in the role of the uptight narrator who, incidentally, never divulges his name. Once you've seen the movie and kno ...more
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Wynne's War
by Aaron Gwyn

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The Knife Thrower and Other Stories
by Steven Millhauser

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Steven Millhauser seems like he should check all the boxes for me. Much of his work is subtly fantastical or magically realist. His prose is always stylish. His stories are imaginative. And his mode of storytelling is unique, often employing a collec Steven Millhauser seems like he should check all the boxes for me. Much of his work is subtly fantastical or magically realist. His prose is always stylish. His stories are imaginative. And his mode of storytelling is unique, often employing a collective first person ("we") narrator, a chorus of townspeople, which then enables him to tell stories in a different way, not so much linear and plot-driven as circular, swelling, or accumulative narratives. However, his preoccupations or themes start to call attention to themselves and become redundant. Over and over, there recur turn of the century carnivals, amusement parks, and department stores. This collection starts out strong with the title story. At this point, the carnival is still new. The collective narrator consists of an audience who attend the performance of a traveling knife thrower whose antics become increasingly violent and criminal. It's a thrilling story, because the stakes are high. The following story, "A Visit," is strange but somewhat less effective. The narrator visits an old friend in the country who has married a frog. "The Sisterhood of Night" involves a town where girls sneak out at night to do, well, no one knows, which becomes the story's conflict. It's a narrative reminiscent of "The Virgin Suicides." Some of Millhauser's stories have a musty, dated feel to them. The middle of the collection is taken up with flying carpets. Automatons make repeated appearances. There are likewise recurrences of young teens struggling to fall asleep on summer nights and sneaking out to witness or participate in strange things. A couple of the later stories are, or are close to, historical fiction set in Western Europe. "The Dream of the Consortium" seems like a likely precursor, or is strongly derivative of, "Martin Dressler." The same boy begins working in his father's tobacco shop, then becomes a hotel clerk, and finally owns a gigantic department store with numerous subterranean levels. The idea of the underground recurs in "Paradise Park" and in "Beneath the Cellars of Our Town." Thematically, Millhauser seems to be saying that beneath the normal, ordinary affairs of our lives are deeper, subconscious levels where sometimes sinister or at least unexplained phenomena occur, and there's always a risk in digging too deep. The final story, "Beneath the Cellars," calls to mind Calvino's "Invisible Cities. The idea of being underground also echoes Murakami. In his effort to tether the real world to the fantastical, Millhauser can become tedious, specifically when he's listing detail upon detail. One writer he is not inspired by is Hemingway. For example, a shingle isn't merely a shingle here; instead, it's a red asphalt shingle. The reader gets bogged down in description, and the action, which can be minimal to begin with, grinds to a halt. I will continue to read Millhauser, but not really out of love for his work, more in admiration for the singularity of his style. ...more

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All Fours
by Miranda July (Goodreads Author)

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It makes sense that the cumulative star rating of "All Fours" is around 3.5, as I imagine readers will either love or hate this book. I personally loved it, though I'd be hesitant to recommend it widely. For one thing, "All Fours" is fairly plotless. It makes sense that the cumulative star rating of "All Fours" is around 3.5, as I imagine readers will either love or hate this book. I personally loved it, though I'd be hesitant to recommend it widely. For one thing, "All Fours" is fairly plotless. The protagonist, a fictionalized version of the author, comes into some money after a blurb of hers (she's a writer and artist) is used in a whiskey commercial, so she decides to go on a cross-country drive to New York. This is where the plot, such as it is, starts to unravel. She only gets about twenty miles from home when she settles into a room at a roadside hotel and decides to spend all her earnings redecorating the room. This is the point I knew I was in July Land. As a reader, I felt tense about the protagonist's choice. She didn't clear this with the hotel owner. She lied to her husband, Harrison, and her son, Sam, convincing them she continued on to New York. Then she strikes up a semi-sexual relationship with a young local dancer named Davey who is currently working at Hertz and whose wife is the interior decorator of the hotel room. I loved that nothing in "All Fours" was expected: the detour to the hotel room, the interior decorating scheme, the fact that the relationship with the younger dancer is never consummated. The protagonist initially finds Davey and his dancing silly, so she herself is surprised by the depth of the relationship and the steps she'll take to advance it, despite her faithful husband and child at home. Trust and betrayal are recurring themes in the book. Despite the silliness of the initial detour to a cheap hotel and the impulsive decision to redecorate the room, "All Fours" captures real emotions in a way that few other books do. Maybe the very fact that the book isn't plot driven allows readers to become more invested in the protagonist, who attributes her sudden attractions and feelings to being perimenopausal. There's certainly an element here of youth slipping away. And while the protagonist remains convinced that bodies should do what they want, including casual relationships outside of marriage, she is deeply hurt when the tables are turned by Harrison and when she's rejected by a woman she enters into a relationship with. There are emotions involved. And what will be the end result of all of this on their child, Sam? Sam is carefully non-gendered ("they" pronouned) throughout, and is fed a healthy diet that frankly sounds horrible for a kid, but this all seems ironic, as the self-absorption of Sam's parents overshadows their choices about Sam's school lunches. There's also a theme about fame and wealth. The narrator is, as she describes it, "semi-famous," but is jealous of Harrison's client, who is more famous (Harrison's a record producer), and part of the reason Davey is attracted to the narrator is because he recognizes her. Eventually, his own fame eclipses her own, and the book ends with her meeting a famous singer who wanted to talk with her, but not for the reasons she suspected. There's a lot going on here. "All Fours" begins with July's trademark comedy but opens up into something deeply felt, with clever writing throughout. ...more

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Python's Kiss: Stories
by Louise Erdrich

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If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies by Eliezer Yudkowsky

If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies: Why Superhuman AI Would Kill Us All
by Eliezer Yudkowsky (Goodreads Author)

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More than anything, "If Anyone Builds It" caused me to question why I was so anxious to read this book in the first place. The sign of a good nonfiction book for me is that I'm always recounting facts about it to the annoyed people around me, but I f ...more

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The Endurance Artist: Lazarus Lake, the Barkley & a Race with No End
by Jared Beasley (Goodreads Author)

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Beasley did a great job with what was likely a very difficult subject: Gary Cantrell aka Laz Lake, someone with no fixed identity, someone who has been notoriously cagey with reporters, loose with facts, and silent about his private life. Surprisingl ...more

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Future Boy: Back to the Future and My Journey Through the Space-Time Continuum
by Michael J. Fox

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This is a light read, a fun book - it's always great to hear Michael J. Fox's voice - but there isn't much new or revelatory here. "Future Boy" will likely put you in the mood to watch "Back to the Future" again, but if you're already a fan of the fi ...more

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When All the Men Wore Hats by Susan Cheever

When All the Men Wore Hats: Susan Cheever on the Stories of John Cheever
by Susan Cheever

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Good books are like good concerts. After the concert's over, you have a greater appreciation of the band. You want to listen to them on the car ride home. You want to put them on repeat for the next month or so. "When All the Men Wore Hats" made me w Good books are like good concerts. After the concert's over, you have a greater appreciation of the band. You want to listen to them on the car ride home. You want to put them on repeat for the next month or so. "When All the Men Wore Hats" made me want to immerse myself in the whole Cheever universe, and it's a big universe. As Susan Cheever points out, there are of course the stories, the novels, the biographies, her own earlier memoir, plus "The Swimmer" was made into a movie and spawned an entire free swimming movement, Cheever inspired "Mad Men," which basically gave prestige TV its start. There's the new show, "Your Friends and Neighbors," etc. I've gone through a Cheever addiction in the past, reading some of the short stories, some of the novels, and the Blake Bailey biography, but I feel like it's time for another fix. Susan Cheever plays a role in this story but not an intrusive one. She was the author's daughter--it would be weird if she didn't insert her own thoughts and opinions into this book. But it isn't really a shared biography. I would almost call it an "appreciation" of the author. Susan Cheever starts each chapter by quoting from one of her father's stories and tying it in some way to his life, but as she points out, he was cagey about his writing process and quick to shoot down any efforts to connect his work to his biography. More than anything, "When All the Men Wore Hats" draws out John Cheever's many contradictions. He was a teacher who hated school and teachers himself. He was a patrician without much money. He was a closeted gay man living as a husband and father in McCarthy era suburbia. He was a bohemian artist who donned a suit and tie to go to work every day. Seems like it was these terrible conflicts raging within Cheever that led him to alcoholism. He was the prototypical hard-drinking, hard-smoking midcentury New Yorker writer. Susan Cheever ably points out that his fiction was much more than that, and some of his best stories were actually spurned (at least at first) by the New Yorker, including his classic "The Swimmer." He had a magic realist bent that the magazine wasn't quite ready for. John Cheever wasn't a saint. He could be mean and biting. But this isn't his daughter's revenge. She truly seemed to love her father and his writing. If anything, I felt sadness at the end for a man who was never really able to be his truest self. He was such an amazing writer that I do wonder what kind of work he was capable of if unconstrained by money worries or social norms. I'd like to think there would've been more wildly experimental stories. ...more

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Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln
by Doris Kearns Goodwin

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"Team of Rivals" is a fantastic book. It seems like Goodwin set out to write a group biography of Lincoln and the men he chose for his cabinet, most of whom were his political rivals. But she gravitated (rightly so) toward Lincoln and the way he was "Team of Rivals" is a fantastic book. It seems like Goodwin set out to write a group biography of Lincoln and the men he chose for his cabinet, most of whom were his political rivals. But she gravitated (rightly so) toward Lincoln and the way he was able to manage the egos and ambitions of these men. More than anything, the book demonstrates what a towering figure Lincoln was and is. He's one of the several top politicians in our nation's history and arguably one of the few that could've steered this country through the civil war. This is a big book but nothing seems superfluous. It's almost impossible to comprehend everything that has changed in the past 160 years. Lincoln, when he traveled the state as a lawyer, and the nation as a political figure, would often share a bed with fellow lawyers and politicians. Goodwin has to point out that there's nothing sexual about it. This is just the norm. In general, the bonds of love grow quite deep between Lincoln, Seward, and Stanton. They weep openly at tragedies, and there are plenty in this book. Lincoln losing his son, Willie, was devastating, but others lost family members to sickness. Seward's family was damaged by the assassination attempt on him. The White House at this point was the people's house. Ordinary citizens met with Lincoln seeking political appointments. Lincoln shook thousands of hands. Goodwin boils down the president's genius beautifully in the final chapter. She remarks that he was perhaps not the greatest general and not the greatest statesman, but his moral compass caused him to stand out. This is absolutely true. He had great empathy toward his fellow man. The contrasts to our current state of affairs are impossible to overlook. Political rivals no longer work together to compromise. The people's house is no longer the people's house. The administration has no empathy and no regard for anyone. Lincoln was a self-made scholar and voracious reader; our current leader doesn't read. Lincoln loved the soldiers and the slaves. One of the most inspiring parts of "Team of Rivals" is the way Lincoln welcomed Frederick Douglass as a friend and equal. Lincoln was always a step ahead and allowed his rivals, ultimately, to self-destruct. I would argue that he was an amazingly astute statesman, and I also think he had good military instincts. He knew McClellan would sputter out. Allowing him to do so rather than removing him earlier might've been a mistake. There are certainly a few men who come off looking like fools in this book, and McClellan is one of them. Salmon Chase is another. Both men suffered from pomposity and greed. With Lincoln, there are a lot of "what-ifs" to contemplate. What if he hadn't won the nomination? (Because this was no sure thing.) What if the South, after its string of early victories, had kept winning battles or maybe drawn England into the war? What if Grant had accompanied Lincoln to Ford's Theater, as he had originally intended? What if Lincoln would've lived? "Team of Rivals" caused me to ponder these things. The book demonstrates what a great man Lincoln was. The reader can't help but be inspired learning how he went to the front to meet his soldiers, ignoring the danger to himself, the way he visited injured troops in the hospital, his great oratorical skills, his wealth of anecdotes, his sense of humor, the way he loved poetry and drama and could quote large chunks of Shakespeare. It's almost impossible to believe a person like this truly existed or could ever exist again. ...more

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Fight Club
by Chuck Palahniuk (Goodreads Author)

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At this point, it's impossible to separate the film version of "Fight Club" from the book. While reading, I was picturing Edward Norton in the role of the uptight narrator who, incidentally, never divulges his name. Once you've seen the movie and kno ...more

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	Democracy of Noise it was amazing 5.00 avg rating — 3 ratings	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Green Mountains Review (Volume 29, Number 1) by Dan Pinkerton (Goodreads Author) (Contributor), Giuseppe Taurino (Contributor), C.A. Kaufman (Contributor) 0.00 avg rating — 0 ratings	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

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