Member: Periodista

CollectionsYour library (237)

Reviews186 reviews

Tagsnonfiction (81), fiction (68), novel (56), US writer (37), books I didn't finish (27), short stories (19), airport book (16), memoir (15), journalism (12), essays (12) — see all tags

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About meMost people finish reading a book and don't have an opinion of it. Reviewing a book forces you to have an opinion. That's a paraphrase, but V.S. Naipaul said that. At least Paul Theroux says so in Sir Vidia's Shadow.

I don't do much of it nowadays, but I used to review books for regional newspapers and magazines. For the most part, I reviewed history, politics and other nonfiction related to Asia. The habit Naipaul speaks of has remained with me. I never reach the finish line or the halfway mark with the standard Web review: I hated/loved/identified/related/couldn't identify. I have enough details and arguments to spew a review of a thousands words or more.

The reviews here aren't anything like my formal published reviews. They're just notes to myself. Maybe if I download them, I'll stop running the review in my head. These scattered thoughts might be useful someday.

About my libraryThese books don't constitute my library. I'm going to use Library Thing to keep track of what I've read, though I might throw in the occasional old faithful. Because I live abroad and have moved a lot, I try very hard not to accumulate books. It hasn't been so difficult. If I know a book is in one of the libraries in town, or that a friend owns it, that's almost as good as owning it. Sometimes I donate a book to one of these libraries, so I can retrieve it if need be. Books of the airport/beach reading variety are recycled back to a secondhand bookstore.

I've let myself collect the best reference works, mostly academic stuff, on Southeast Asia, especially Cambodia, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam. If it's marginal, I donate it to the library.

GroupsA Quieter LibraryThing, Arab, North African and Middle Eastern Literature, Asian Fiction & Non-Fiction, Atwoodians, Club Read 2011, Feminist Theory, Girlybooks, Language, Le Salon du peuple pour le peuple, Literary Snobs —show all groups, Non-Fiction Readers, Reading Globally, Thailand: Language, Books and Culture, Travel and Exploration literature, Writer-readers

Favorite authorsCormac McCarthy (Shared favorites)

LocationThailand

Account typepublic, lifetime

URLs http://www.librarything.com/profile/Periodista (profile)
http://www.librarything.com/catalog/Periodista (library)

Member sinceAug 11, 2007

Currently readingThe Best American Magazine Writing 2004 (Best American Magazine Writing) by American Society Of Magazine Editors
Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance by Barack Obama
I Cannot Get You Close Enough 1ST Edition by Ellen Gilchrist
The Bin Ladens: An Arabian Family in the American Century by Steve Coll
Baghdad without a Map and Other Misadventures in Arabia by Tony Horwitz
Bangkok Inside Out by Daniel Ziv and Guy Sharett
The Outlaw Sea: A World of Freedom, Chaos, and Crime by William Langewiesche
Guests of the Ayatollah the First Battle by Mark Bowden
We Wish to Inform You That Tomorrow We Will be Killed With Our Families: Stories from Rwanda by Philip Gourevitch
An Alchemy of Mind: The Marvel and Mystery of the Brain by Diane Ackerman
Come On Shore and We Will Kill and Eat You All: A New Zealand Story by Christina Thompson
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