Bragan reads ALL THE BOOKS in 2013, part 2

A new thread for me for the second quarter of 2013! I've even decided to be all ambitious and organized and include a list of The Stories Thus Far:

JANUARY:
Cold Days by Jim Butcher
Aetheric Mechanics: A Graphic Novella by Warren Ellis
The Making of the Fittest: DNA and the Ultimate Forensic Record of Evolution by Sean B. Carroll
The House With a Clock in Its Walls by John Bellairs
And Another Thing... by Eoin Colfer
What Would MacGyver Do?: True Stories of Improvised Genius in Everyday Life edited by Brendan Vaughan
Christine by Stephen King
ChronoSpace by Allen Steele
Inflight Science: A Guide to the World from Your Airplane Window by Brian Clegg
Kim by Rudyard Kipling
Some Kind of Fairy Tale by Graham Joyce
The Walking Dead Chronicles: The Official Companion Book by Paul Ruditis

FEBRUARY:
The Lottery and Other Stories by Shirley Jackson
Animal Wise: The Thoughts and Emotions of Our Fellow Creatures by Virginia Morell
The Curse of the Blue Figurine by John Bellairs
America Again: Re-Becoming the Greatness We Never Weren't by Stephen Colbert
The Resurrectionist by E.B. Hudspeth
Holmes and Watson by June Thomson
The Hour Before Morning by Arwen Spicer
Warm Bodies by Isaac Marion
The Man Who Lied to His Laptop: What Machines Teach Us About Human Relationships by Clifford Nass, with Corina Yen
Master and Commander by Patrick O'Brian
Simon's Cat in Kitten Chaos by Simon Tofield
Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs

MARCH:
Stuff: Compulsive Hoarding and the Meaning of Things by Randy O. Frost & Gail Steketee
Anonymous Rex by Eric Garcia
Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn
Einstein: His Life and Universe by Walter Isaacson
Complete Zombies vs Robots by Chris Ryall & Ashley Wood
The Treasure of Alpheus Winterborn by John Bellairs
The Vacuum Cleaner: A History by Carroll Gantz
The 1984 World's Best SF edited by Donald A. Wollheim
Doctor Who: The Visual Dictionary by Neil Corry, Jacqueline Rayner, Andrew Darling, Kerrie Dougherty, David John and Simon Beechcroft
The Postmortal by Drew Magary
Impossibility: The Limits of Science and the Science of Limits by John D. Barrow

Quite what that reading list says about me, I would not venture to say. I will, however, say that I'm looking forward to another three months' worth of interesting reading. Onward through 2013!

(And, huh. This message refuses to preview. I hope it posts OK. Let's see...)

36. The Spellman Files by Lisa Lutz



The Spellmans are a quirky family of private investigators who seem to spend more time spying on each other than they do on their clients. The plot is paper-thin and the characters' antics are sometimes a bit on the sitcom-y side for my tastes, but this is a quick, breezy, fairly amusing read. I've already got the next two in this series, and while I won't exactly be rushing to get to them, I will definitely read them eventually. Preferably when I'm in the mood for something fluffy.

Rating: 3.5/5

37. Economix: How Our Economy Works (And Doesn't Work) in Words and Pictures by Michael Goodwin, illustrated by Dan E. Burr



An extremely well-written, well-illustrated, and generally well-put-together history of the economy -- primarily the US economy, that is, although with a fair amount of global context included -- from the 17th century right up to the current mess. I found it absolutely fascinating. Seriously, fascinating, to the point where I resented having to put it down so I could sleep or go to work. Who would have ever, ever thought a book about economics could be a page-turner? But this volume managed to painlessly explain things to me that I have never before been able to read about without my eyes glazing over, and actually made the driest parts of American history class -- all those economic acts whose names I memorized just long enough to pass the test without ever really understanding what they were -- seem exciting and relevant. Certainly the last couple of chapters, covering recent history and the present, are extremely relevant, even if their main effect was to make me want to run screaming from the whole horrible mess and set up housekeeping on the moon.

It should be noted that this is not a politically neutral take on the subject. Goodwin has some very pointed (and, in my estimation, generally very sane) things to say about wealth inequality and the problems that arise when huge corporations exert too much influence on the economy and the government. If there is a central idea here, it's that both completely unrestrained capitalism and absolute top-down control are truly terrible ways to run an economy. And it's an idea that's argued remarkably well.

Heartily recommended, whether you think you're actually interested in economics or not.

Rating: 4.5/5

Great review of Economix, but perhaps you can't sleep so easily in your bed after reading it.

I studied economics at university and at that time there was a big debate as to whether the subject should be in the arts or the sciences, I always thought that was the least of it's problems.

Economix sounds like a great book. My philosophy is is if you've ever earned a $1 in your life, you're interested in economics - whether you know it or not. But that didn't keep me from falling asleep during my Econ. 101 class, although I did get an A in that class, I still can't figure out why. My economics teacher also taught Philosophy 101 so I figured back then there was a connection.

>4 baswood:: I haven't slept yet since I read the most disturbing chapters, so we'll see. :)

The impression that Goodwin gives is that it's really neither an art nor a science, but is perhaps best described as a hugely (and dangerously) over-simplified representation of reality.

>5 avidmom:: That sounds like a reasonable philosophy to me! But recognizing that economics is relevant to your life and actually finding it within yourself to take an active interest are two different things. I managed a degree in astrophysics, which I like to think means I am not entirely stupid, and yet somehow every time someone starts talking about stocks and bonds and interest rates, my brain seems to just shut down entirely. Which is why I found this particular book so impressive.

Wow. I can safely say that this is the absolute first time I've added a book on economics to my wishlist. I'll have to order a copy. And buy a bottle of wine for the final chapters.

I hope it impresses you as much as it did me! And that wine might not be a bad idea...

You got my attention too. Economix is on my wishlist.

It's one I feel pretty good about recommending!

Going on my wish list, too!

Yay my library has Economix! Thanks for the great review.

We shall all understand the economy and despair!

Here's a relevant comic I coincidentally saw today.

38. The Long Earth by Terry Pratchett & Steven Baxter



There are, it turns out, many Earths besides this one: a long, perhaps infinite chain of them stretching out in two directions through some dimension we can't perceive. They vary a lot, but they all have one thing in common: there are no other human beings on any of them. And all it takes to get there is one little machine so simple that even a child can build it.

Stephen Baxter is an imaginative writer and one with a good head for scientific detail, but he's not great with characters, and he's really not much of a storyteller. Pratchett, on the other hand, is a storyteller extraordinaire, but one who is sadly no longer at the peak of his cognitive abilities. I had some real hope that these two writers would complement each well and produce something that showcases the best strengths of both of them, but, alas, that's not quite what happened. The result of their collaboration instead feels a bit... schizoid. There'll be lots of rather flat, exposition-laden Baxterian prose, and then suddenly there will be a passage that's lively and funny and clever and pretty much pure Pratchett, then it'll fade back into being Baxtery again. And the whole thing is very poorly structured; it feels more like a loose collection of interesting ideas that don't really go much of anywhere than it does like any kind of actual narrative.

On the upside, it is a really great premise, one with lots and lots of fascinating implications that are at least touched on in some thought-provoking ways. In fact, there's enough richness in this concept and this setting to carry a dozen novels, easily. I just wish the one that we got lived up to that promise better.

Rating: 3/5

A shame that The Long Earth doesn't live up to its potential. I'm going to read it in any case... sometime.

I'm not actually sorry I read it, because the ideas in it were interesting to think about. But as a novel, it was disappointing.

Ok, doggone it, quit reading books that I have to add to my lists so that my TBR piles become life threatening. ;)

Hey, if I have to have life-threatening TBR piles, then everybody should have life-threatening TBR piles. It's only fair. :)

Only if you can find books in MY stacks ;)

Yes, I am combing your library for gravity-temptation potential. (Or, as I and a friend with similar clumsiness call it, grabbity).

Wow, I see we already have a very large overlap! Although I guess a fair amount of those are actually on my wishlist. Because every book in the universe is on my wishlist, I think.

Yeah, a lot of those are in my "to get" lists (like a wishlist but with less wishing and more pressure on the credit cards). But I've already dug up about 4 books from the "borrow" list , doggone it!

Funny, I share 31 or 32 books with each of you and so far I have only loaded 150 or so.

I think I have so many books that I have some in common with everybody. :)

Bragan, do we need to teach you to knit or something? ;)

Alas, I am hopeless when it comes to any kind of activity involving manual dexterity. My mother tried to teach me to crochet when I was younger, and it never worked. So I think knitting is right out. No, it's nothing but books for me, I'm afraid!

Knitting is the opposite of crochet -- I can't crochet but I can knit. My husband the engineer brain can crochet, but knitting confuses him.

I suppose I'll have to wait until my book lists start to cross pollinate your library to be revenged ;)

I don't think my brain is capable of even processing the difference. It's all mysterious things done with hands and odd implements, as far as I'm concerned.

And I don't imagine your cross-pollination revenge will take very long! My library is extremely fertile that way. The books breed fast, and the wishlist breeds even faster (and quite promiscuously). :)

Books are lascivious critters, aren't they? Not as soft as bunnies, but nearly as prolific!

Luckily, some of the books on your list are already in my waiting (and groaning) shelves, but not yet listed because, well, it's embarrassing....

Embarrassment never stopped me!

Well, there's also a problem with most of them being in boxes in a storage room...my "Book Dungeon". The current house is too small by about 5 bookshelves...no, make that 7 bookshelves..

39. Uranium: War, Energy, and the Rock That Shaped the World by Tom Zoellner



This book is surprisingly light on the science of uranium or radioactivity, covering the necessary basics as quickly as possible with the help of a few uninspired metaphors. I found that a little disappointing, although I suspect that for many readers it's likely to be a point in favor. Mostly it covers the global political and economic impact of uranium, and of the bombs and power plants it's used for. The result is a little unfocused, drifting around from topic to topic, and there are certainly better and more thorough treatments of subjects like the the Manhattan Project. But it does also cover a lot of ground that was both interesting and new to me, including considerable (and often rather shocking) details about uranium mining, which ultimately made it a worthwhile read.

Rating: a very slightly generous 4/5

Sounds like intriguing info tho.

I really had no idea there was so much to know about uranium mining!

40. Reached by Allie Condie



The conclusion to the YA trilogy that started with Matched.

I really liked Matched. I thought the dystopian-masquerading-as-utopian society it features was well-drawn and interesting, despite a few implausibilities, and I found the main character likable and sympathetic. The second book, Crossed, was disappointing by comparison, as the characters all seemed to have been flattened out and the plot was nothing more than one long slog from point A to point B. The middle book of a trilogy often hits a bit of a slump, though, so I was hoping for things to pick up some in this one. Alas, I was still to be disappointed.

I remember thinking when I first read Matched that given the level of control the society it depicts seems to have and the degree to which its people seem to happily accept it, the inevitable successful rebellion this kind of story demands was more than a little hard to imagine. Unfortunately, that's still true. The social upheaval here, when it happens, takes place largely off-screen, so to speak, and is far too quick and simple. It does turn out there's some justification for that, given late in the book, but it still feels rather anti-climactic, and it's never very satisfying. Rather than focusing primarily on the rebellion, this installment instead concentrates largely on an attempt to cure a plague, and it's a rather limp, not very suspenseful or believable plot. Also, the very simplistic, slightly-too-young-for-its-teen-audience writing style, which I decided while reading the first book was actually appropriate for first-person narration from a character who grew up in a culturally impoverished environment, has by this point become just plain annoying.

I will say that I think this series' heart is in the right place. There's some nice thematic stuff about the value of creativity and freedom of choice, even if it all gets stretched a bit thin by the end, and it at least attempts to handle the usual teen love triangle elements in a mature fashion. But, much as it pains me to say it given how much I enjoyed the first book, I really just cannot recommend this trilogy as a whole.

Rating: 2.5/5

41. The Bible According to Mark Twain: Irreverent Writings on Eden, Heaven, and the Flood by America's Master Satirist by Mark Twain, edited by Joward G. Baetzhold & Joseph B. McCullough



A collection of fictional pieces by Mark Twain on various subjects relating to religion and the Bible. Most of these were unpublished in Twain's lifetime, or were published only partially, and aren't necessarily complete.

The book is divided into three sections. The first consists of extracts from the diaries of various Biblical characters, starting with Adam and Eve and continuing, somewhat haphazardly, up through accounts of a great pre-Flood civilization that bears a not entirely coincidental resemblance to Twain's own. The tone varies a lot through these, from sardonic commentary to delightfully silly humor to some passages that are really quite unironically touching. While Twain's writing is, as always, great, it's clear that most of this material never got finished and put together quite the way Twain would have liked it, making it a somewhat choppy and not entirely satisfying read.

The second section deals with the concept of heaven, and includes two very similar stories about people dying and going to heaven (or dreaming they've died and gone to heaven), satirizing the somewhat unappealing popular conceptions of heaven as a rather limited little place full of harps, hymns, and halos, and not much else. There's also a bitingly funny little piece about an obnoxiously uncouth evangelist who enters heaven, immediately resulting in other people wanting to leave.

The third section contains the longish "Letters from the Earth," in which Satan pays a visit to Earth and writes letters back to his buddies in heaven detailing these ridiculous humans' ridiculous ideas about religion. The editors quote Twain as saying "this book will never be published," and it's not too difficult to see why he'd think so. Where the earlier pieces are comparatively gentle in their criticisms of Christianity, in this one Twain looses the full force of his scathing, acidic wit on the Bible's logical and moral flaws, and takes no prisoners. Godless heathen that I am, I loved it to pieces.

There is also a substantial set of appendices, which feature alternate versions of a few of these stories with deleted passages included, some of Twain's notes and outlines, and a couple of non-fictional excerpts in which he covers many of the same points the other works in this volume make, and which clarify his own essentially deistic take on religion.

Rating: 4/5. Because even when he's not producing a polished finished product, Twain is awesome.

Back before Club Read, when the Happy Heathens group still had some life, we read some of these Twain pieces. I recall reading parts of the second and third section. "Letters from the Earth" has some brilliant bits in it.

I still remember reading Letters from the Earth and the diaries of Adam and Eve when they were first published together in the 1960s... Adam's repeated diary entries saying nothing but "Pulled through" and his conclusion that Eve must be a fish. It had a lot to do with making me a godless heathen too (not the fish part, of course, that was just funny). I need to find this new edition so I can read them again. Thanks for your review.

>36 dchaikin:: I was really surprised by how much I loved "Letters from the Earth." The brilliant bits are brilliant, indeed. (And I'm sorry to know that the Happy Heathens group is lifeless these days, even if I never participated there, myself.)

>37 StevenTX:: Adam's whole long period of confusion about whether little Cain was a fish or a bear or a kangaroo or what was pretty hilarious, too. And it's clear that was one of the more polished bits in the collection.

Really, I was surprised by how fresh and relevant lot of his commentary still seems, especially in "Letters from the Earth," not to mention how frankly (and entertainingly) he dealt with sexual subjects in that piece.

42. Await Your Reply by Dan Chaon



This novel tells three stories in alternating chapters, each of which begins with a car ride: A young man, bleeding badly, is being rushed to a hospital through the rural woods of Michigan. A nineteen-year-old girl, having just recently graduated high school, is running off to Nebraska with her former high school history teacher. And another man is driving through Canada in search of his long-missing twin brother, who might or might be not schizophrenic. At first, none of these stories appear to have much of anything to do with each other, but it becomes more and more apparent as the novel goes on that they are intimately tied together...

I enjoyed this a lot. It's got a corker of an opening, and it just keeps going from there, with the intriguing hints of connection between these three very different stories making for a puzzle whose answers creep up on you gradually in an interesting and satisfying way. It's also very well-written, with vivid characters and pages that just seem to fly by. If it weren't for annoying little things like sleep and work, I think I could easily have finished this in one sitting.

Rating: 4.5/5

Await Your Reply sounds quite interesting.. I might just have to add it to my wish list.

I can't resist putting that one on the list!

I do recommend it! It is, I think, doing something interesting with its structure that might very well not have worked... but really, really does

43. The Infinite Resource: The Power of Ideas on a Finite Planet by Ramez Naam



The world right now is facing some pretty serious problems. We're running out of the fossil fuels that power our civilization, our planet is warming up at an alarming rate, we're rapidly depleting the edible fish from our oceans, and in many places fresh water is becoming an increasingly scarce resource. Ramez Naam paints a starkly realistic view of all these problems, but he believes that technological innovation provides the key to solving them. He discusses -- in great detail and with almost too many examples -- the point that technological progress has significantly and steadily increased our standard of living and, in general, made the world a better and healthier place. Past decades' dire projections of imminent worldwide famine, he points out, have not come to pass, thanks to the fact that new agricultural developments have more than kept pace with the the growing global population. And we've already managed to solve some fairly significant environmental problems, such as ozone depletion. So the best way to survive and thrive as a species, in his view, is to harness the power of human ingenuity.

His recipes for doing that are mostly not anything terribly surprising or new, largely focusing on developing renewable energy technologies and increasing the efficiency and cleanness of existing fossil fuel technology through a combination of free-market enterprise and some simple, sensible government regulations designed to encourage things in the right direction. Although he does also make a few more controversial suggestions, such as completely revamping our educational system and being willing to give a second chance to some currently unpopular technologies. (In particular, he contends that nuclear power is less dangerous than coal and could provide a useful stopgap during the transition to greener energy sources, and argues that genetically modified crops are potentially a great boon to both humanity and the environment.)

Although Naam doesn't pull any punches when it comes to describing the severity of our current difficulties, the overall tone of the book is extremely optimistic. Possibly a little too much so, since, after all, there are limits to how confident we should be when projecting past trends into the future, including the trend of technological progress. It is entirely possible that we've now reached a sort of tipping point where our technological advancements have begun to cause problems larger than technology can solve, or faster than it can solve them, and, to his credit, Naam does acknowledge this as a possibility.

It's interesting to compare this book with Bill McKibben's Eaarth: Making a Life on a Tough New Planet, which I read a couple of years ago (and which, coincidentally, I also got through LibraryThing's Early Reviewers program). McKibben believes that we've pretty much already crossed a point of no return when it comes to global warming and that our only hope as a civilization is to pare back, to give up our expectations of constant growth, and to adopt a simpler, less energy-intensive, more locally oriented lifestyle. He makes a pretty good, if very depressing, case for his point of view. But Naam has some very good points, as well. I truly don't know which of them is right, but I'm certainly hoping that it's Naam. Even putting aside the question of which world we'd rather live in, I honestly don't see any practical way of getting to the future McKibben envisions without a major social and economic collapse. Whereas Naam is basically suggesting that we just need to keep doing more or less the same things we have been doing, only smarter. Only time will tell.

Rating: 3.5/5

(Note: This was an Early Reviewers book from the March batch.)

Bragan, this is such an important topic. Thank you for the review. There are still so many people who think that global warming is a hoax. Conflicting theories may muddy the water a little bit, but if some of the urgency rubs off on the naysayers, it can't be a bad thing..... right????

>44 NanaCC:: Naam has some useful things to say to people who are still unconvinced about global warming, even though the science really is there: Most of us in our daily lives take out insurance for big risks, even if they're pretty low-probability, so if there's even a small chance that there really is a global catastrophe in the making here, shouldn't we take out some insurance against it? He also uses an analogy to make a point I always kind of want to make to people whose response is, "OK, so the world is warming, but you can't prove it's humanity's fault. These things just happen." Which is: when a fire is threatening your house, you don't stand around debating about whether it was started by lightning or arson, you just start worrying about how to put it out.

Await Your Reply was good. I wasn't sure how the three stories would link and I thought the way they pulled together was particularly fascinating.

>46 RidgewayGirl:: I particularly liked the way the links between the three slowly became clearer and clearer the more I read, but didn't completely pull together for me into a complete picture until near the end. That's actually a pretty impressive balancing act.

Great review of the Infinite Resource bragan, I don't know who is right either, McKibben or Namm. I was wondering whether you were aware of any political agenda in the two books. The Naam book sounds very much like free enterprise, capitalism and the American way, while the McKibben book is probably the opposite.

McKibben, from what I recall, did strike me as something of a crunchy liberal, but I don't actually remember the political details of his arguments. Naam is clearly striving very hard to transcend partisan politics and to appeal to people on both sides of the aisle (with the very clear recognition that when you're talking about issues like global warming, this is a harder sell with the conservatives, and they need some extra convincing). He is clearly a strong advocate of capitalism, and makes a lot of points about how free-market competition is essential to spurring innovation, but he also sees a gaping flaw in the free-market system in that, unchecked, it leads directly to the "tragedy of the commons." So, unlike many right-wingers, he's very much in favor of certain kinds of government regulation and believes government has an important role to play in guiding markets in the right direction. If I had to take a guess at how he identifies in his personal politics, I'd peg him as one of that increasingly rare breed: a moderate Republican.

44. The Girl Who Played with Fire by Stieg Larsson



I finally got around to reading this sequel to The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, ages after everybody else in the world. It has, I think, a lot of the same elements as the first book: Lots of sex and violence and sexual violence. A sort of feminist sensibility that reviles misogyny and violence against women mainly by showing us lots and lots of it and then giving the worst perpetrators equally violent comeuppances. And a moderately interesting mystery/thriller plot delivered in a clunky, repetitive, annoyingly infodump-y style, complete with so much dull, extraneous information that if it were all cut out, the book would probably be half as long and much the better for it.

There is, I think, a decent story buried in here somewhere, albeit one with a few highly implausible elements. And Lisbeth Salander is, at least potentially, an interesting character. But I still have no idea why the heck Larsson is so ridiculously popular.

Rating: 2.5/5

45. If People Were Cats by Leigh W. Rutledge



A short collection of doggerel -- uh, catterel? -- about what the world would be like if people were more like cats. It's fairly cute, mostly without going too far towards being cutesy, although it's sometimes a near thing.

A sample:

If people were cats
The hairdresser's job
Would not be to give you
A perm or a bob

Instead the salon
is where you'd be seen
Having your hair
Licked wonderfully clean.

Rating: 3.5/5

>51 bragan: LOL! And ewww ......

>52 avidmom:: For a while, I had a kitten who liked to lick and, even more often, to chew on my hair. I thought it was cute, but my mother, whom he ultimately ended up living with, is not amused by it. :)

If people were cats
They’d fly into rages
On seeing a reader
Who dog-eared his pages

>54 StevenTX:: LOL!

>54 StevenTX: That made me smile. I must admit I hate to see people dog-ear their pages.

46. Them: Adventures with Extremists by Jon Ronson



Journalist Jon Ronson hangs out with and introduces his readers to a variety of "extremists," from an Islamic Jihadist living in a semi-detached house in London, to a Klansman desperately trying to improve the Klan's PR, to David Icke, who believes that the world is controlled by a secret cabal of alien lizard people. (Or possibly Jews. But he probably really does mean lizards.) Actually, the one thing most of these people have in common is a belief that the world is controlled by some secret group that meets in a room somewhere to pull society's strings, so Ronson also sets out to explore this supposed conspiracy and find that room, if it exists. The result is... interesting.

Ronson comes across as a very laid-back guy with a great, low-key sense of humor, and while he does offer us his perceptions of the people he's profiling, he mostly tries to keep his judgments to himself (one notable outburst towards the end aside). Generally, these people and their beliefs come across simultaneously as amusingly wacky in ways that are impossible to take seriously, but also as disturbing or even dangerous... and just occasionally, you can't help wondering if some of them might have a tiny germ of a point in there somewhere, buried in among all the crazy. It's entertaining, but also rather unsettling, and all the more so because it can actually be difficult to tell just who's worth laughing at and who is actually worrying.

Rating: 4/5

I wondered, while reading The Psychopath Test, how Ronson could get these people to speak with him so openly, but I've since heard him speak and he's so non-threatening and low key that I can see how easy it would be for someone to just talk and talk to him. He has a moment in The Psychopath Test as well where his outrage momentarily overcomes him. It made me like him quite a lot. (Which, incidentally, also happened when I saw Russell Brand's long gone television show in which he interviews various nutters. His approach was similar to Ronson's and was enhanced by his air of being up for pretty much anything, but he had to walk out of an interview with a member of UKIP (the British Nationalist party.))

Yeah, I've heard interviews with him a number of times now, and once you hear him talk, you really do understand it. He comes across as just about the most non-threatening guy in the entire world, in such a way that you can kind of see how even the nastier types might be more inclined to tolerate him or even adopt him as a sort of mascot rather than viewing him as an enemy or a target. I suspect it's saved him from some serious problems more than once... Like when he was outed as a Jew at the Jihadist meeting.

Okay, I'm reading that soon. I have a long trip in mid-May and this will do perfectly (along with several other books, because delays might happen. What if another volcano erupts?) especially as it seems as though we won't be able to sit near each other on the plane. Let other people entertain my children for the international flight. I'll be reading.

Heh. In my opinion, the only good thing about long plane trips is the opportunity they provide for uninterrupted reading time. And I always, always bring more books that I'll ever have time to get to, because I am desperately afraid of being stuck on a plane with nothing to read.

Ronson, by the way, has another book that just came out, Lost at Sea: The Jon Ronson Mysteries, which I picked up at the same time as Them but haven't read yet.

I've listened to Lost at Sea, read by Jon Ronson and liked it. It's a collection of longer articles about various things, so it's less focused, but still entertaining. And it was great as an audiobook, which I don't tend to like much.

I'll be looking forward to reading it!

47. My Life As a White Trash Zombie by Diana Rowland



Angel is a pill-popping high school dropout with an alcoholic father and absolutely no direction in life. Then one night she suffers an overdose -- and maybe a car crash, although her memory is fuzzy -- and after that everything is different, starting with the fact that some mysterious person has left her a six-pack of some kind of weirdly meaty slushy drinks and a note saying she now has a job at the local morgue that she never applied for. Something really strange has happened to her, but she doesn't actually mind very much. In fact, being undead may be just what she needs to turn her life around. Now if she could just figure out why all those headless bodies keep turning up...

So, it's a zombie story with the kind of setup that you usually get in vampire tales, except that instead of craving blood, our protagonist has a hankering for brains. I honestly can't decide whether that constitutes a clever twist on familiar supernatural tropes, or an unimaginative re-purposing of a familiar formula. Ultimately, I'm not sure I care much, though, because either way this turned out to be a quick, fun, surprisingly entertaining read, and apparently that's exactly what I was in the mood for. (I don't recommend reading it while eating, though. It gets pretty gross in places.) I'm not going to be rushing right out to get the next book in the series, but I liked this one enough that I'm definitely interested in reading it eventually.

Rating: I'm rather surprised to find myself giving this one a 4/5. But, while it's not exactly aiming for any great literary heights, what it does it does pretty well.

I'm not sure why but I really really love that title.

It is eye-catching, isn't it? I think the title was the main reason why I couldn't resist.

48. The Wild West on 5 Bits a Day by Joan Tapper



A guidebook to the American West, presented as if it were written in 1880 (although it often can't resist coyly alluding to "future" events). It's not terribly in-depth, and I imagine it's likely to be of somewhat limited use to any actual time travelers, although it does include useful tips on subjects such as where to get a decent meal in Tombstone. But it captures the enthusiastic tourist guide sensibility amusingly well, and it's a fun way to learn a little about a colorful period in US history.

Rating: 3.5/5

49. Days of Atonement by Walter Jon Williams



This is an interestingly ambitious novel, in that it's trying to be a lot of different things at once: a hard SF story; a police procedural with a mystery so strange it appears supernatural; an intimate look at life in a seedy, slowly dying New Mexico mining town; a thoughtful meditation on science and religion and the kinds of miracles that each can produce; and a portrait of a man who, depending on how you look at it, is either a corrupt bully or a righteous protector of his town and his people, or maybe both. These are all good things, and individually, the novel deals pretty well with all of them (even if the scientific premise isn't all that plausible), but somehow, for me at least, it never quite gels together fully, with the wilder SF aspects feeling a little out of place in the story about life as a small-town cop, and the slow-paced story about the small-town cop sometimes feeling like it bogs down what could otherwise have been a nicely suspenseful SF mystery. I get what Williams is doing in attempt to integrate all these disparate elements together, and in theory I appreciate it, but while the result is interesting, I think it misses the bullseye by a couple of inches.

Rating: 3.5/5

50. Parasite Rex: Inside the Bizarre World of Nature's Most Dangerous Creatures by Carl Zimmer



Yes, it's a book about parasites. Many of which are bizarre and fascinating, going through convoluted life cycles you could never in a million years have imagined if they didn't exist and beautifully demonstrating the endless, freaky inventiveness of evolution. Zimmer also makes the point that parasites, which were unfairly neglected by biologists for far too long, are actually an incredibly important, even a dominant feature of Earth's ecosystems, and a driving force in the evolutionary history of their hosts. It's interesting stuff, and it does give one quite a new perspective on the subject of life on Earth. But it has also made me want to go and spend the rest of my life in a sterile bubble somewhere, because these things are horrifying.

Rating: 4/5

51. The 1988 Annual World's Best SF edited by Donald A. Wollheim



I read the 1983 and 1984 volumes of this series not long ago, having picked them up along with this 1988 installment at a library sale a while back, and I'm finding it interesting to compare them. Both the '83 and the '84 versions had a mixture of two very different kinds of SF stories. On one hand, there were a smattering of very old school-style works, with scientific ideas (or, occasionally, adventure plots) taking firm precedence over character and prose, and on the other were stories with more of a literary sensibility, ones that were more inclined to be emotionally evocative and maybe a little experimental. Although that's something of a false dichotomy, of course; a lot of the stories actually come somewhere between those two ends of the spectrum. Well, I don't know whether it's a statistical fluke, an indicator of a trend in the history of SF, or simply a result of the editor's evolving tastes, but this installment features only the more soft/literary/experimental stuff and some of those in-between kinds of stories, with none of that real old school SF sensibility at all. Which, honestly, is fine by me. I like good classic SF as much as the next geek, but I just didn't think the examples in those previous volumes were all that great; they often had a stale, backwards-looking feel about them. With this batch, even the ones I didn't care for that much were reasonably well-written, free of clunky exposition, and at least trying to do something creative.

A breakdown of the specific stories:

"The Pardoner's Tale" by Robert Silverberg: The story of a computer hacker who alters people's records for a fee, in a world that's been occupied by aliens. It's decently written, in a breezy sort of way, and I kind of like the way the lightly sketched worldbuilding deliberately leaves a lot to the imagination. But it's very slight, and the vaguely cyberpunky elements feel almost quaint now. (Hey, remember when "megabyte" was an impressive-sounding word?)

"Rachel in Love" by Pat Murphy: A scientist imprints the memories and personality of his dead teenage daughter onto a chimpanzee. Then he dies, and the chimp is sent to a primate research facility. The result is a quiet, understated little story about identity and adolescence and the fuzzy dividing line between humans and animals.

"America" by Orson Scott Card: A strange story about a repressed and rather sanctimonious Mormon kid, a middle aged Indian woman from the Brazilian rainforest, prophetic dreams, some kind of mystical force or god, and a ruler destined to reclaim the Americas from the Europeans. Well-written, but it's debatable whether it's more science fiction or fantasy, and there's something about it that makes me feel vaguely uncomfortable, and not in a good way. Although that may have as much or more to do with what I know of Card and the fact that I sort of expect to dislike any political or religious statement he might be making than with anything inherent in the story itself. It's really hard to say.

"Crying in the Rain" by Tanith Lee: A quietly disturbing little story about everyday life -- short, sad, limited everyday life -- in a world so contaminated by poison and radioactivity that even walking in the rain is deadly.

"The Sun Spider" by Lucius Shepard: The story of a scientist obsessed with the idea of finding life on the sun, and his wife, and... well, I'm honestly not entirely sure. It was interesting, taking ideas that could have been handled in a pulpy fashion and doing something much more complicated with them, but ultimately it was a little too abstract, and I had difficulty connecting with it.

"Angel" by Pat Cadigan: The story of an alien exiled to Earth, and the humans he bonds with, in his strange, alien way. The basic concept has an almost too-familiar sort of feel to it; the idea of a creature who is in some way beyond human who comes among us and has a profound effect on the people he encounters is older than science fiction itself. But the execution isn't bad.

"Forever Yours, Anna" by Kate Wilhelm: A graphologist is asked to analyze the handwriting on some letters, and discovers an unexpected connection with the letter-writer. A very short story with a Twilight Zone-ish twist ending that works better than it really ought to.

"Second Going" by James Tiptree, Jr.: Humanity encounters some seemingly friendly aliens, and discovers that they've also brought their gods along to Earth with them. Kind of an odd story, and far from Tiptree's best, but, like most Tiptree stories, it's weirdly thought-provoking.

"Dinosaurs" by Walter Jon Williams: A nicely chilling glimpse of the far-future descendents of humanity, who are much, much more alien than the aliens they're trying to have diplomatic relations with. This one is definitely my favorite of the anthology. It's disturbing in some subtle and effective ways.

"All Fall Down" by Don Sakers: Humanity is suffering from a devastating plague, and a race of sentient trees debates whether or not to help. This is actually a sequel to a story that was included in the 1984 volume. That wasn't one of my favorites in that collection, and I can't say I felt any happier with this one. There's just something about the wise, mystical, "like, totally in touch with the natural harmony of the universe, man!" alien tree people that rubs me the wrong way.

Rating: I'm going to give this one a slightly generous 4/5. Even if there aren't that many stand-outs, it's a worthwhile collection, overall.

Hmmm - between you and Jargoneer - I may have to try some of these collections. I've only read a couple of SFs but intend to read more.

From what I've read of them -- and my sampling has admittedly been pretty spotty -- I think I'd generally recommend Gardner Dozois' best of the year anthologies over Wollheim's.

Thanks bragan.

Slowly but surely catching up on threads - enjoyed the discussion on hoarding in your previous thread! And have added Warm Bodies, The Postmortal, Economix, Await Your Reply and My Life as a White Trash Zombie to my wishlist. Also happy to hear your thoughts about Jon Ronson - I have his Lost at Sea on my TBR - and the Einstein biography, which my BIL gave me as a birthday present. I've also been enjoying your commentary on the SF anthologies. I have a ton of these - both the Wollheim ones and the Dozois ones. I used to keep one by my bedside all the time and would read a story every night before bed, but I just got out of it, maybe I OD'd a little on sci-fi. Sometime later this year I'll pick one out and start in on it again I think.

That's quite a lot of additions to your wishlist! I don't know whether to be proud or vaguely apologetic (in case your wishlist is anywhere near as out of control as mine), but I do hope you enjoy those as much as I do, if and when you get to them!

I still have several other best-of-the-year SF anthologies from various random years to read, even if I have finished all the Wollheim ones I just bought. I used to read more SF short stories than I seem to these days, and I like the idea of getting back to it.

Enjoying your reviews of the sci-fi collections.

>76 baswood:: Thanks!

52. The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters



A novel about the crumbling remains of a once-great English manor house, the now-impoverished aristocratic family struggling with its upkeep, and the family doctor who finds his life becoming increasingly intertwined with theirs. And, perhaps, also of something else, something in the house that might be a ghost, or might be the projected imaginings of unhappy, stressed-out souls, or neither, or both.

Objectively, this is a rather slow book. It takes at least a hundred pages before anything at all happens, and it doesn't exactly get much more fast-paced from there. And, while the are some moderately spooky moments, it's not slow in that creepy, building-up-suspense way, either, exactly. It just quietly takes its time. But Waters' writing flows so effortlessly and is so utterly readable, that it doesn't really feel slow. In fact, I found it pretty absorbing, in an oddly low-key sort of way. Similarly, the ending, which is suggestive and ambiguous, rather than building to a big revelatory climax, doesn't seem like it should be entirely satisfying, but pretty much worked for me, anyway.

Rating: 4/5

>78 bragan:

Nice review... and very interesting sounding book. :)

The Little Stranger sounds strange, but in a good way..

I liked The Little Stranger a lot too, for a lot of the reasons you give, although I didn't think it quite held up to Fingersmith.

I've been looking at some of the other reviews here on LT, and I'm not surprised to note that they range from "loved it" to "hated it," with a lot of "this could have been good, but it was too slow and/or the ending didn't explain things enough" in between. I think it may be one of those books where how you feel about it depends very much on how you approach it and what you expect to get from it. Me, I thought it was an interesting variant on the haunted house story, one that doesn't really read like a haunted house story, except for those moments when it does.

>79 AnnieMod:: Thanks!

>80 NanaCC:: My first thought was, hmm, I don't know if "strange" is quite the word I would use, but then I realized that that's because I have a very high bar for what constitutes strangeness. I mean, I did start out the month with a book called My Life as a White Trash Zombie. :)

>81 rebeccanyc:: Yes, I have to agree, while I liked The Little Stranger, Fingersmith was better, and I'd probably be quicker to recommend it.

Catching up - an impressively eclectic collection as usual.

Going to have to put Economix on the list.

Interesting comparison of The Infinite Resource and Eaarth.

I read The Psychopath Test also and would be up for more by Jon Ronson. There certainly were a lot of examples of people who were amusingly wacky in ways that are impossible to take seriously, but also as disturbing or even dangerous in that one.

I've been looking for more Sarah Waters to read after I found The Night Watch to be quite addictive - looks like Fingersmith is the one everyone recommends.

DieF, I started Fingersmith at a friend's house and I had to "steal" it because I couldn't put it down!

Well Fingermith is on its way to me. My library also had the DVD. Anyone seen it?

Fingersmith is now on my wish list. All I can say is that Club Read has made it IMPOSSIBLE for me to read all of the books I want to read. But it sure will be fun trying. (I would have put that impossible in BOLD instead of caps, but I can't figure out how to change fonts on this site.)

>83 DieFledermaus:: Thanks! That's me, still keepin' it eclectic! :)

>85 mkboylan:: There's a movie version of Fingersmith? I didn't even realize that!

>86 NanaCC:: Hoo boy, don't I know it! My wishlist is now just as out of control as the TBR Pile. Mind you, I think I'm just about the world's most suggestible person when it comes to book suggestions. My thread title doesn't lie. I really do want to READ ALL THE BOOKS!

If you want to bold something in a message, just include <B> before the part you want in bold, and </B> after it. You can use I instead of B for italics, too.

53. The Professor and the Madman: A Tale of Murder, Insanity, and the Making of the Oxford English Dictionary by Simon Winchester



The story of James Murray, who was the driving force behind the truly massive undertaking that is the Oxford English Dictionary, and of W.C. Minor, an American Army doctor who was one of the dictionary's most prolific and dedicated contributors. The interesting wrinkle here is that Minor did all his dictionary work while locked up in Broadmoor asylum for the criminally insane, having killed a man after confusing him with the hallucination he'd believed had just broken into his room. It's an interesting topic; the making of the dictionary is itself a truly impressive feat, and the connection with murder and madness adds an extra dollop of fascination to the whole thing. But I can't really say I'm a fan of Winchester's writing style. It's not bad, exactly, but it somehow conveys the impression that he's trying a little too hard to make what is really a rather quiet (and, in some ways, very sad) story feel dramatic and lively and exciting.

Rating: 3.5/5

>87 bragan: Thank you for the tips. I have wanted to use this so many times!

bragan the movie popped up when I was searching my public library, then i found it on netflix and ordered it. I'll report back - I know i'm not going to be able to wait till I read the book.

>89 NanaCC:: You're welcome! It's often handy to know a few basic HTML tags like those.

>90 mkboylan:: Yes, do report back! I am curious about it now.

>88 bragan: What a story!

Somebody Wonderful here (not me, of course) on LT has a thread dedicated to basic HTML: http://www.librarything.com/topic/59470

>92 avidmom: Avidmom, what a wonderful link. Thank you!

54. Reawakened: A Once Upon a Time Tale by Odette Beane



I have recently become utterly, obsessively addicted to the TV show Once Upon a Time. Which is almost a little embarrassing to admit, given that it took me quite a while at the beginning to even make up my mind whether it was a good show or a bad one, not to mention the fact that it's, well, about a bunch of fairy tale characters condemned by an evil curse to live amnesiac lives in a small town in Maine. (Honestly, that premise makes more sense than it remotely ought to! Eventually.) But I've grown to love it for its complex storylines, its great cast, its often clever and twisty reinterpretations of its fairy tale source material, and the way it features so many interesting female characters in so many diverse and important roles. It's also got some of the best bad guys I've ever seen on TV, or just about anywhere else. These are the kind of characters you want to punch in the face for being awful, awful human beings at the exact same time that you really want to give them a hug and tell them how sorry you are that their lives are so painful and difficult, and I'm a complete sucker for that.

So, now that the second season has finished and left me without any new episodes, I kind of had to snap up this first of the show's tie-in novels. This one is, more or less, a novelization of the first season. It's moderately faithful; the basic events happen here as they do on the show, although some details and a lot of dialog have been changed. (And, in the case of the dialog, at least, inevitably changed to be much blander than the original. Why do novelizations do that?)

It's not really possible, though, to reduce the contents of 22 full episodes into one 337-page book, and the approach the author takes to dealing with that is a bit problematic. Basically, the entire thing is told exclusively from the point of view of only two characters: our main protagonist Emma Swan (for the scenes set in our world), and Snow White (mostly in the fairytale world flashbacks). Anything not directly witnessed by one of those two characters is either very briefly mentioned, usually by means of Henry summing up in a few sentences what he's read in his storybook, or left out altogether. Which means large chunks of the overarching story are just... not here. It also means that characters who aren't Emma, Snow, or (to a lesser extent) Henry, get short shrift, with their backstories and character development either greatly condensed or entirely missing. I found this particularly disappointing in the case of Rumplestiltskin, who is a) my favorite character on the series, and b) absolutely fundamental to the story in ways that aren't even touched on here. I will say that it is at least somewhat interesting to get an exclusively Emma's-eye view of the goings-on in Storybrooke, and her characterization, while not terribly deep, does feel right. But, still...

Bottom line: Reading this book is definitely no substitute for actually watching the TV series -- in addition to all those gaps in the narrative, I think it fails to capture much of the show's charm -- and if you have watched the series, it's not going to add a whole lot to your viewing experience. But if, like me, you're a pathetic Once addict jonesin' for a hit between seasons, hey, it's better than nothing. Which, let's face it, isn't necessarily true for all novelizations.

Rating: 3/5

My other aunt came out here to So Cali. to visit and told me all about this show and how she love, love, loved it. She's not one for much TV watching, so I figured it must be pretty good!

It is ridiculously, stupidly addictive. It does, I admit, have some flaws, particularly in the first season, and it took me a while to get into it, but once I did -- Wham! So much love. I just adore all the characters, even the awful ones. Heck, especially the awful ones.

55. Britten and Brülightly by Hannah Berry



A noir-ish graphic novel detective story featuring troubled PI Fernandez Britten, who is hired to prove that an apparent suicide was in fact murder and along the way discovers some truths that neither he nor his client really wanted to know. The artwork is wonderful, full of dark, rain-washed street scenes, and the writing is also great, combining an air of melancholy with a dry, droll sense of humor. My one big complaint is that the narrative text, written in a cramped, handwritten font, was uncomfortably difficult to read, I also think I probably should have read this when I was a little more awake, as the solution to the mystery, once it was unveiled, did not come together in my brain nearly as readily as it should have. Even given that, though, it was still a highly worthwhile read.

Rating: 4/5

Once Upon a Time is one of the shows I decided not to watch when it first began. From things I've heard, I am a little sorry that I resisted. And at this point, two seasons' catch up would be a lot. I am way behind on a few of the series I do watch. I think I have five or six episodes of Mad Men just waiting....

I hadn't even heard of it when it first began. These days, it's actually kind of rare for me to start watching a TV series when it first comes on, anyway. It's just so hard to know what's going to be worth the time. More often than not, I wait for people who have been watching from the beginning to recommend something to me, then I start watching it on DVD. (All hail Netflix!) I did do that with OUaT, in fact, but I feel so much in love with it that I couldn't wait for season two to finish and come out on disc, so I caught up with the season two episodes I'd already missed online so I could start watching it as it aired. I love the fact that I can do that these days!

But, of course, the fact that just about anything I want to watch is fairly easily available means that movies and TV shows I want to see tend to pile up on me almost as fast as the books...

it's actually kind of rare for me to start watching a TV series when it first comes on, anyway.
The only show I've ever started watching from the pilot and then was hooked on until (almost) the very end (Season 9 was deplorable) was Scrubs!

Scrubs is one I definitely need to watch sometime. Season 9 aside, I've heard good things about it.

Once Upon a Time is my Sunday night addiction -- as a fairy-tale aficionado -- I knew I had to watch it. But I don't think I'm the least bit interested in any novelization of the series.

Nice to see a fellow addict here! I really do like stories that play around with and reinterpret fairy tales, especially if they manage to subvert some of the stuff that's problematic about traditional fairy tales, like the whole Damsel in Distress thing. I wasn't sure when I started it whether Once Upon a Time was going to pull that off to my satisfaction, but then, well, they really, really did. I like the way they sometimes riff on the Disney versions in amusing ways, too.

But, yeah, take it from me, the novelization is exceedingly skippable. I gather they have some other tie-in books coming out soon which, me being me, I will probably feel compelled to pick up, but I don't have very high expectations of them.

The whole damsel in distress thing can be very annoying. Disney/Pixar had the movie Brave with a strong female character. I heard that she has been added to the princess lineup at Disney World, but the World has opted to restyle her a bit to fit in with the other princesses.

Once Upon a Time is our family show. We are all very happy to settle in on Sunday night and spend an hour watching it. It's just a lot of fun, with Robert Carlyle added to make it compelling.

>104 NanaCC:: Yes, I've heard about that. Apparently there was a big outcry over it, and while it seems like kind of a trivial thing, I can't really blame anybody for being upset, particularly people with young daughters who want them to have better messages and fewer stereotypes. When you look at the restyled version, compared to the other Disney Princesses, she comes off well enough, I think, but when you compare her to the movie version, whose entire point was that she had no desire to be a traditional girly princess and who hated people trying to make her look like one... Sigh. Somebody clearly just does not get it. Or doesn't care.

>105 RidgewayGirl:: It's a good family show, apparently! My sister recently watched season one with her twelve-year-old son, and they both really liked it, too. She said it was nice to have something they could watch together and enjoy; I guess not a lot on TV qualifies.

And Robert Carlyle is amazing. I'm constantly impressed by how much talent and range he has. One moment, he's prancing around being delightfully over the top, and the next he's breaking my heart.

56. Faster: The Acceleration of Just About Everything by James Gleick



James Gleick considers our modern obsession with time, with subdividing the hours and minutes into smaller and smaller pieces, with cramming as much as possible into every moment, with saving time and spending time. Which is a potentially very interesting subject, but I found this book kind of disappointing. It's jumpy and unfocused, flitting around from topic to topic in a rather superficial way. Possibly this is Gleick attempting to capture the nature of his subject material by echoing it in his writing style, but whatever the motivation, I found the result unsatisfying and often rather tiring. He also, frankly, leaves me with the impression that he cares more about sounding clever and zippy than he does about conveying information or making any kind of coherent point.

Oddly enough, I think the most interesting thing about this volume is in the way that it's dated -- it was originally published in 1999. Some of the social and technological topics it touches on just seem rather quaint now, but it's surprising how often I had the feeling that I was getting a glimpse back at the early days of many trends that have become fundamental parts of our current Internet Age, with all that that's meant for the acceleration of our society and our lives.

Rating: 3/5

Interesting - what sort of trends/changes?

>107 bragan: I love the cover. Sounds interesting. I have the same question wandering_star has.

>108 wandering_star:: It's actually surprisingly difficult to give a specific answer to that, mainly because Gleick himself is so vague and all-over-the-place. But I did have the strong, repeated sense that here was someone writing from a really interesting place in recent history, with one foot still in the pre-internet age and one in the 21st century, in a position to see the beginnings of how the wired world would shape peoples' lives but not to quite have the full picture yet. For instance, he's in a position to talk a lot about the impact of e-mail as a fast means of communication, and about the way people tend to skim-read online, but his chapter on how much time we spend on paperwork doesn't remotely anticipate online banking or electronic filing of tax forms, and his discussion about how quickly books cycle through bookstores mentions Amazon, which then only sold books, but doesn't quite seem to comprehend its importance. (Or, of course, to predict the way it will eventually offer free two-day shipping as a premium perk for the truly impatient.) And there's a whole chapter on wristwatches and their increasingly complicated impractical-for-a-wristwatch functions which have now been taken over by smartphones. I honestly can't make up my mind whether that one is kind of prescient or so dated as to be meaningless.

I think the thing that struck me most on that score, though, was when he's talking about people's personal time management and quotes a guy who gets up in the morning, turns on his computer, makes breakfast while it's booting, then reads the news online while he eats. "Don't laugh!" the guy says, like this is some sort of strange, micro-time-managed, utlra-wired, obsessively-multitasked behavior and not, uh, pretty much exactly what I do every day. (Except that my breakfast is often mostly coffee.)

He also at one point mentions the then fairly new trend of squashing the credits of shows and movies onto some tiny portion of the screen so the rest can be given over to promos or other material meant to hold your attention and keep you from flipping channels. I remember how very, very much that bugged me at the time, and it was something of a shock to realize how used to it I've gotten now.

>109 avidmom:: Unfortunately, I think exactly how interesting it ultimately is depends a lot on whether or not you find the scattershot writing style agreeable. A skim through the reviews on LT suggests that a lot of people do, but that I'm far from the only one who doesn't.

57. Lost Encyclopedia by Paul Terry and Tara Bennett



I've been dipping in and out of this for months, and, lo, I have finally finished with it!

This is pretty much exactly what the title might lead you to expect: an encyclopedic guide to the various characters, places, and events of the TV show Lost. I, like a lot of people, got pretty hooked on this show, and I was less put off than many by the ending, even if it didn't remotely come close to tying everything up with a neat little bow. So I thought this might be a fun way to revisit the world of Lost for a bit. And, while I wasn't foolish enough to expect this volume to provide any answers that the show didn't or to make any more sense out of anything, I did think perhaps it might provide some interesting little "hey, did you notice?" trivia and maybe draw some interesting connections that I'd missed or forgotten. But, while there was a little of that, there really wasn't much, and the text was mostly not particularly well-written or interesting. It also wasn't terribly well organized, with some characters being listed under their first names and some under their last names, without a whole lot of rhyme or reason It does look really pretty, though. It's a big, heavy, oversized book with lots and lots of color pictures on nicely laid-out pages. If you're a die-hard Lost fan who really wants something to look nice on your coffee table while proclaiming your love for the show, this is probably the book for you. Otherwise, with the much more detailed and interesting Lostpedia available online for free, I'm not really sure this one is worth it, no matter how much of a fan you are. It's certainly not worth the hefty $45 cover price, which is probably why I never did see it selling anywhere for more than about half that.

Rating: 2.5/5

58. Elantris by Brandon Sanderson



The city of Elantris was once inhabited by godlike beings. Godlike beings who were once ordinary people, thanks to a transformation that could strike anyone in the surrounding kingdom, randomly and unexpectedly giving them physical superiority and magical abilities. But ten years ago, something disastrous happened and now, far from being godlike, people taken by the transformation exist in a sort of undead state: unable to die, but also unable to heal even the smallest wounds, never needing to eat, but always wracked with hunger pains, powerless and pitiful. When Raoden, the king's son, is taken by the transformation, he's locked into the decaying city like all the others, but the truth is covered up with a story about his sudden death. Meanwhile, a foreign priest has arrived with the mission to convert the kingdom, or at least its nobles, in the few months remaining before his country's theocratic ruler sends his armies to destroy it instead. And Raoden's fiancée has just arrived to discover that she's now technically married to a dead man, which she finds a little disconcerting, but which isn't going to discourage her from playing an active role in local politics.

Objectively, I think this book has some flaws. It's a bit slow, with rather a lot of talky exposition, especially towards the beginning. There are lots of names whose pronunciation can only be guessed at. Raoden himself is perhaps a little too wonderful and competent and perfect. (Within a couple of weeks of diving into the hellhole that is Elantris, he's already accomplishing a zillion things that apparently nobody else there thought to do any time in the last ten years, I guess because none of them are nearly as awesome as he is.) And, arguably, there are a few two many plot twists piled on at the end.

But, oddly enough, none of that really bugged me much, and overall I found this story very enjoyable. The premise is interesting; the world-building, while not perfect, has clearly had a lot of thought put into it; the protagonists are likeable enough, even if they can be a little too perfect at times; the main antagonist is gratifyingly nuanced and three-dimensional; and there's lots of entertaining political machinations and scheming and battles of wits. So, ultimately, the positives pleasantly outweighed the negatives.

This particular type of chunky, court-intrigue-and-magic fantasy novel isn't something I read very often these days. I'm really pleased by the fact that, when I do dip back into the genre, I seem to be picking the right books to do it with.

Rating: 4/5

That sounds really good

she's now technically married to a dead man, which she finds a little disconcerting ....

Well, you know, nobody's perfect. ;)

>113 avidmom:: It's apparently extremely well regarded among fantasy fans, but I was still surprised by how much I ended up liking it. I wasn't at all sure I was going to at first.

Well, you know, nobody's perfect. ;)

LOL! Except, of course, for how he turned out to not be dead at all. Or maybe only a very little bit dead.

59. Asteroid Rendezvous: NEAR Shoemaker's Adventures at Eros edited by Jim Bell and Jacqueline Mitton



In February of 2000 (on, appropriately enough, Valentine's Day), the NEAR Shoemaker spacecraft went into orbit around the asteroid Eros, becoming the first spacecraft to accomplish such a feat. It spent a year taking pictures and observing Eros with various instruments, then, despite the fact that it was never actually designed to do so, it landed successfully on the surface and transmitted data from there for another two weeks.

This book covers the mission's development and execution (including a near-disastrous problem which put the probe significantly off course and resulted in the rendezvous being delayed for over a year), as well as discussing in detail what its observations revealed about Eros' geography, composition, and possible history.

Each chapter is written by a different person (or two) involved with the mission, and the individual styles range from dry and technical to lucid and lively. You don't need to be a planetary geologist or an aerospace engineer to understand any of it, but at least a little familiarity with planetary exploration is likely to be helpful, as it does use a bit of specialized terminology and isn't always consistent about explaining it. This is also definitely a book for people with a real interest in the subject; even though it's only 108 pages (including a lot of pictures), it provides way more information about this one lumpy space rock than most people are ever going to want. But if you do have a genuine interest in the exploration of the solar system in general, and asteroids in particular, it's kind of nice to take an in-depth look at one of the many wonderful (and, frankly, unappreciated) unmanned space missions of the last few decades.

Rating: 3.5/5

60. Amsterdam by Ian McEwan.



Vernon is a newspaper editor desperate to improve his paper's circulation. Clive is a classical composer working on what he is convinced will be the masterpiece of the new millennium. The two men have quite a few things in common, including driving ambition, a long mutual friendship, a history with a woman named Molly (whose funeral starts off the novel), and the fact that they're both about to be faced with an ethical dilemma.

I can't say this is my favorite of the McEwan novels I've read (which, so far, includes Solar, The Comfort of Strangers, Enduring Love and On Chesil Beach). Compared to most of them, it feels pretty slight, and the ending, while entertaining in a pleasantly tragicomic way, is both easy to guess and difficult to believe. But I do like McEwan's writing, which as usual pulled me effortlessly along. And while his characterization may not be particularly deep here, comparatively speaking, I don't think he's capable of doing characterization badly, even if his characters are often bad (or at least unlikeable). So, even if it's not his best, I did find it enjoyable. "Not McEwan's best," after all, still leaves quite a lot of room for quality.

Rating: 4/5

Elantris has 121 reviews nearly as many as Amsterdam with 131, poor old Asteroid Rendezvous only has 2 (actually I was surprised that Asteroid rendezvous had another review apart from yours.)

I was actually a little surprised by that, too, but it's nice to see that I'm not the only person on LT who cares about asteroids.

Speaking of asteroids, my sweetie told me about a really cool one that swung by yesterday -- it is a double, with a "moon" orbiting it. Being a TV news junkie, he saw this on CNN and told me about it.

Yes, and they discovered the object's moon by bouncing radar off of it and observing the results with radio telescopes, which is very cool! Actually, pointing radio telescopes (and then babysitting them, and calling people to fix them when they break) is what I do for a living, so I've occasionally gotten to participate in that process, myself. The observatory where I work wasn't involved in observing that particular object, though. (We also don't have a radar transmitter, so we can only observe the radar reflection.)

What a cool job!

The job sounds cooler than it is, really, but the science is pretty awesome. :)

61. Curse of the Spellmans by Lisa Lutz



Book two in Lisa Lutz's series about Izzy Spellman, PI, and her quirky, manipulative PI family. This time out, Izzy obsesses over her family's attractive but suspicious new next-door neighbor, poses as the fiancee of her teenage sister's middle-aged cop friend so people won't find their association creepy (which, it's really not), takes note of strange changes in her friends' and family's behavior patterns, and gets up to various kinds of nuttiness.

I thought the first book was moderately entertaining, in a breezy, fluffy sort of way, but its sense of humor didn't entirely click with me, for some reason. I don't know if I was just more in the mood for it this time, or what, but I enjoyed this one much more thoroughly. It kept me smiling all the way through, and I was genuinely interested in the characters' relationships and the question of what the suspicious neighbor was actually up to (even if the answer wasn't really all that surprising).

I'll definitely be continuing on with this series.

Rating: 4/5

>110 bragan: - I suppose he didn't anticipate that Amazon would be selling things like Tuscan Whole Milk, uranium, tanks, or the Three Wolf Moon T-shirt?

>116 bragan: - It's been a while since I read Amsterdam but I remember liking the unsympathetic main characters. That was also the book that got me reading again after a dry patch so I always have positive associations with it even though I agree it's not McEwan's best.

>124 DieFledermaus:: In fairness, I suppose that was a bit difficult to anticipate. :)

And I sort of intermittently liked the main characters in Amsterdam, myself, even if they turned out to be pretty unlikeable in the end. Which did make them more interesting.

62. What's the Matter with Kansas?: How Conservatives Won the Heart of America by Thomas Frank



This was originally published in 2004, so it's definitely dated, but I'd say it's still relevant. Perhaps depressingly relevant.

Thomas Frank ponders the fact that, once upon a time, it was considered almost self-evident that the Democratic party was the party of the ordinary working stiff. But that's changed fairly dramatically, especially in places like Frank's former home state of Kansas, where there has been a great and passionate upsurge in right-wing sentiment among people whose economic self-interest would not seem to be in alignment with the Republican's policies of tax breaks for the rich and minimal support for the rest of us. What gives? Frank claims that it's largely down to the far right's politicians who, capitalizing on backlash against the social upheavals of the 1960s, have reframed the conservative vs. liberal dichotomy as a cultural one -- beer-drinking, NASCAR-loving, churchgoing salt-of-the-earth Plain Folks vs. latte-drinking, Volvo-driving, morally permissive, snootily superior elites -- while sidelining the economic issues almost entirely, deliberately focusing attention on such issues as abortion or the teaching of evolution in schools, and away from questions of material benefit.

I am weirdly torn, here, between finding this thesis oversimplistic and perhaps just a little too cynical (although we are talking about politicians, here, so maybe not all that overly cynical) and thinking it's obvious enough to almost not require spelling out. I do think some of his commentary and opinions are more lucid than others (not to mention more sensitively expressed), but overall, I'd say he does have some things to say about the origins of America's current Red vs. Blue conflict that are worth listening to.

Rating: 3.5/5

I found your review interesting; this is such a frustrating and complicated and, as you say, often oversimplified topic, including the whole Red vs. Blue thing too. My sweetie, the conspiracy theorist, would say this all goes back to decreases in funding for education years ago and a plan to dumb people down so they would be susceptible to this kind of influence.

It is a frustrating and complicated thing. The issues are incredibly complex, despite people trying to pretend they're simple, and more often than not, I find myself thinking that everybody is wrong in one way or another. As for decreases in education funding and other conspiracies, though, I'd cite the old adage, "never attribute to malice what can be adequately explained by incompetence." :)

"This was originally published in 2004, so it's definitely dated, but I'd say it's still relevant. Perhaps depressingly relevant." Depressing is an apt word for politics today.

>129 NanaCC:: It really is. Few things can depress me quite as quickly and effectively as politics these days.

I keep thinking I need to stop reading depressing political books and focus on reading about people who are just living their lives in a better way e.g. Yes magazine, etc. and then I remember Helen and Scott Nearing trying that and ending up involved again, because if you aren't, you get run over.

I'm constantly torn, really, between the desire to just stick my head in the sand when it comes to political issues, a sense that I have an obligation as a citizen to pay attention whether I want to or not, and a sick, train-wreck type of fascination with the worst elements of the political landscape.

beer-drinking, NASCAR-loving, churchgoing salt-of-the-earth Plain Folks vs. latte-drinking, Volvo-driving, morally permissive, snootily superior elites . Well I think I am in the second category only because I am not in the first.

Personally, I think there must surely be more than two categories.

I'd rather have strong black coffee or espresso than a latte. I drive a BMW, not a Volvo. I'm not morally permissive, and I try to keep my snootiness to myself. ;-)

On one hand, I'm an SUV-driving (we have two large dogs) soccer mom living in the South who likes a cold beer on a hot day. On the other hand, I'm pretty far left of center.

And, yeah, I'm pretty sure the moral here, in case it wasn't obvious, is that those stereotypes are pretty stupid. :)

For the record, I live in a small town in middle-of-nowhere New Mexico, drive an unprepossessing Honda hatchback, enjoy an occasional mocha cappuccino, hate auto racing (as I do most sports of any kind) but used to be a pretty avid bowler, don't believe in God but do believe in people being decent to each other, wouldn't have any idea how to go about being snooty if you paid me to, and am registered Independent but vote Democrat.

135 - "keep my snootiness to myself" laughing out loud

63. The Infernals by John Connolly



The sequel to John Connolly's YA novel, The Gates. In that one, young Samuel Johnson defeated an army of demons attempting to invade the Earth. This time, the leader of those demons drags Samuel (along with his dog Boswell, two policemen, a van full of miscreant dwarfs, and an ice cream truck) into Hell, where he finds himself at the center of a demonic civil war. It's a lot of fun, and often laugh-out-loud funny, in a way that's sometimes reminiscent of Terry Pratchett. I'm particularly fond of the scientific and historical footnotes, which often manage to be simultaneously educational and hilarious. Some of the more serious bits (including Dante-esque descriptions of souls in Hell) are a bit more hit and miss, and there were one or two small things that rubbed me the wrong way. ("Women don't tinker"? Really, Mr. Connolly? Really?) But overall, it was highly entertaining.

Rating: Let's call it 4/5.

64. The Plague of Doves by Louise Erdrich



I think this book is more than a little difficult to describe. But, essentially, it's about the lives of various people living on an Indian reservation in North Dakota, and in a nearby small town. It's about a shocking murder that took place many decades before and the massive injustice that followed, in which three innocent Indian men were lynched. It's about the complex, tangled consequences of that act, reverberating down through the generations as the families of the victims and the perpetrators intertwine. But mostly it's about the people that were shaped by those events, directly or indirectly, and about their individual stories. It's beautifully written, in a slow, intricate, meandering sort of way, and I found it quite compelling, the sort of novel that lingers with you for a little while after you turn the final page.

Rating: 4.5/5

Nice review of The Plague of Doves; I'll have to move it higher on my TBR list.

I definitely recommend it. Between this and Shadow Tag, which is the only other book of hers that I've read, I'm extremely impressed with Louise Erdrich.

I have a couple of her books on my iPod. I really should get to them.

You all should read (more of) Louise Erdrich. I think she's great!

I am definitely intending to read more by her! I already have a copy of Four Souls, and I have been eying The Round House for some time now.

I really can't decide which Louse Elderich book I should try first. Your review Hasn't helped that dilemma!

Sorry! It's a good kind of dilemma to have, though!

Oh its the best. I just got to suck it up and buy one.

65. Super Pop!: Pop Culture Top Ten Lists to Help You Win at Trivia, Survive in the Wild, and Make It Through the Holidays by Daniel Harmon



This is, basically, a collection of recommendations for books, movies, TV shows, comic strips, songs, podcasts, YouTube videos, and websites. It's organized into lists with a nominal "how to" theme, but few of them are really about learning how to do anything; they're mostly just an excuse to gather together a bunch of works that may or may not have anything obvious in common. I like this rather offbeat approach, which nicely avoids rehashing any of the tired, familiar top ten lists that can be found all over the internet, and I really like the eclectic nature of the choices, which range from the classic to the current, from the highbrow to the trashy. And, in my opinion, at least, a lot of those choices are pretty good ones. Sadly, despite all that, I don't think this book was terribly successful at what it was trying to do. It never resulted in any additions to my Netflix queue or my LibraryThing wishlist, never made me want to run out and sample any of this supposedly great stuff it was talking about. At most, it made me mildly curious about a handful of things. The thing is, when I was familiar with the work in question, more often than not I found myself nodding in agreement and smiling a little at the in-jokes, but when I wasn't, there was seldom enough substance here to tell me why I should want to familiarize myself with it or to make me feel particularly interested. Far too often, it felt like the author was too busy trying to be cool and funny and wacky and hip (with varying levels of success) to pay enough attention to actually having something worthwhile to say. So, while it was reasonably entertaining to flip through, it was ultimately a bit of a disappointment.

Rating: A slightly generous 3.5/5

(Note: This was an Early Reviewers book, from the April batch.)

Still, I think I might enjoy flipping through it.

I got it for free, so it was worth it for me, but it's not something I'd recommend running out to buy. More the sort of thing to check out of the library and browse through in spare moments.

Well then maybe I'll skip it. I actually have a few of those types of books already. Thanks.

...although I should probably note that, based on the reviews, there seem to be a fair number of people who were more impressed with it than I was.

66. Alfred Hitchcock Presents: 12 Stories They Wouldn't Let Me Do on TV edited by Alfred Hitchcock



Twelve stories of horror, some of the supernatural kind, some just featuring good, old-fashioned murder. The idea that these are too shocking to be shown on TV is a little provocative, until you consider that they weren't being shown on TV in 1957, and in some cases that has as much to do with the fact that the necessary special effects didn't exist as with anything else. By today's standards, these are pretty mild, even low-key. Which, I should add, is not necessarily a bad thing. Two or three of them, though, probably wouldn't be acceptable on television these days, for entirely different reasons, having either an implicitly or explicitly racist sensibility. (The common theme among them seems to be that you just shouldn't trust those dark-skinned foreigners, because even when they seem friendly, they're secretly plotting to murder you. Which... yeah.) Putting that aside, if you can, it's not a bad collection. The stories are all decently written, although some of them were old even in the fifties and have a decidedly old-fashioned style, and several of them have very nicely creepy premises. More often than not, I think it's possible to see exactly where the story is going to go, but that's not always as big a problem as you might think.

Rating: I'd give this one a very solid 3.5/5 if it weren't for the presence of the pieces that, uh, haven't aged very well. As it is, I feel compelled to knock off half a star, so we'll call it 3/5.

the Hitchcock sounds like kind of a fun read tho, once again.

A lot of it was kind of fun, even if there weren't any real standouts and the collection as a whole left me with some mixed feelings. It also had a very funny introduction by Hitchcock himself.

67. Drop Dead Healthy: One Man's Humble Quest for Bodily Perfection by A.J. Jacobs



A.J. Jacobs spent a little over two years on a project to become as healthy as possible, concentrating on different health regimes and different parts of the body at different times, and he reports the results of both his research and his personal experiences here. He tries out a number of different health and fitness philosophies, from the well-established to the decidedly fringe, but he generally does a reasonable job of trying to maintain a healthy skepticism (um, so to speak), and to make it clear whether the scientific support for a particular health recommendation is solid, iffy, or non-existent. (Most of it, honestly, seems to come somewhere in the "iffy" category.)

It's a quick, easy, breezy read, and some of the odd corners of fitness and medicine he explores are fairly interesting, but I have to say, I don't feel all that much more enlightened on health issues for having read it. Some of that is no doubt due to the fact that each chapter is pretty short, so no one topic is explored in great depth, but I think it's probably mostly because all the best, most well-established health advice is still common-sense stuff you already know, but, if you're like me, find ridiculously difficult to actually live by: eat less junk food and more vegetables, get some exercise or at least try to be less sedentary, get enough sleep, don't smoke, don't stress, have friends. All of which is worth being reminded of, but not necessarily all that exciting to read about.

And with some exceptions (mostly involving visits to his elderly grandfather, who seemed like an interesting person), I also found Jacobs' personal experiences and insights in this one less compelling than I did in his The Year of Living Biblically. Which is odd, considering that I don't have a religion but do have a body. But there it is. Ultimately, I found this one perfectly readable, but also pretty forgettable.

Rating: 3.5/5

Which is odd, considering that I don't have a religion but do have a body.
LOL!

I exercised today - and then I had some pizza.
The lady on the video said to have a "sensible diet" - so I only had one piece.
Seemed sensible to me.

Sounds like a fun book.

Laughing out loud - "I don't have a religion but I do have a body" I liked the other book, won't be getting this one.

158 was it one of those big double pieces they sell as one piece these days at street fairs tho? Ha! We are both laughing right not at the same line of bragans. I love the internet.

eta: laughing NOW, not NOT

>158 avidmom:: Oh, man, I do that all the time! Spend 20 minutes on the treadmill, and then have ice cream!

>159 mkboylan:: I seem to have oddly mixed feelings about Jacobs' books. I thought The Know-It-All was kind of annoying. It read like it was written by a pretentious neurotic who was trying far too hard to impress. But then I picked up The Year of Living Biblically, anyway, and found it really interesting and thoughtful and funny. I guess this one just fell somewhere in the middle.

I start out great every day, and then it just seems to go downhill later in the evening. I will have to start going to bed at 7:00 to avoid the extra calories. :)

I also liked your review. You always have such a way with words. Made me smile. :)

Aww, thank you!

Exercising is so boring, eating is so interesting, I think it would have to an exceptional writer to make health regimes sound interesting or even funny.

I think that may be part of the problem! Well, he does also talk a lot about eating, but, blueberries and mangos aside, not generally about eating anything I'd actually want to put in my mouth.

68. Un Lun Dun by China Miéville



Two girls make their way to UnLondon, London's supernatural companion city, the place where everything that becomes obsolete and discarded in London ultimate ends up. There, they learn that one of them is the chosen one, destined to face down a terrifying enemy that threatens UnLondon. But not everything goes according to plan...

This one is written for a younger audience than Miéville's other books. (Or most of them, anyway. I haven't yet read Railsea, but I gather that one falls somewhere in the YA category.) It's every bit as weird and wonderful and endlessly inventive as his adult fiction, though, and although it started out a bit slow, by the end the story had me utterly enthralled, and I finished it up with a great big grin on my face. I particularly like the way Miéville takes so many of the usual fantasy tropes about prophecies and Chosen Ones and quests and turns them neatly on their heads. This one's definitely recommended for both adults and kids.

Also, I will never, ever look at an empty milk carton the same way again.

Rating: 4.5/5

>68 bragan: Betty, do you think a 10 year old would like listening to this one? I take long car rides with a couple of my grandchildren, and like to have books that they enjoy. It is really nice if I enjoy them too. :)

Nana -- I think a 10 year old would be entertained with this one -- especially a girl as it has female protagonists.

I agree, I think a ten-year-old would be likely to enjoy it. I would say whether I'd give it to a ten-year-old to read or not might depend on exactly where their reading levels are -- kids that age can vary a lot -- but in audio, I don't think that's an issue.

Thank you.

Now boo hiss. I don't see an audio version.

I've got Un Lun Dun, but haven't read it yet. Glad to hear that adults will also enjoy it, and thanks for the excellent review!

>170 NanaCC:: I wonder if maybe there's not one. There are illustrations in the story, and at least one bit of wordplay that would be difficult to pull off in audio, so maybe it was deemed to be something better left in book form?

>171 dmsteyn:: I hope you enjoy it as much as I did!

I am sure you are right. I have checked all of the audio sources I use, and there is nothing. But it sounds like a great gift for this 10 year old.

That's too bad! But if the ten-year-old in question is a reader and likes fantasy, I bet she'll love it in book form, too. I'm pretty sure I would have when I was ten.

Oh a kids book, not sure if I want to read Un Lun Dun now. Excellent review

I'd say it's very much one of those books that has a lot of potential appeal to both adults and kids (or at least to adults whose capacity for childhood wonder isn't so withered up that they automatically turn their noses up at fantasy or "kids' stuff" ;)).

Maybe she'll read it out loud to you in the car.

>177 mkboylan: :) They get car sick, thus the need for listening things, rather than reading things. They are all great readers! Thank goodness....

69. i know i am, but what are you? by Samantha Bee



Samantha Bee, best known for her job as a "correspondent" on The Daily Show, offers up a humorous sort-of-a-memoir, in which she talks about her parents and her misspent youth and tells wacky stories about her experiences with pets, flashers, and bad Christmas gifts. A lot of it is dirty, and a surprising amount of it is downright appalling (especially her descriptions of the kind of things she got up to as a teenager). Her writing style is generally pretty funny -- not necessarily laugh-out-loud hilarious, but amusing. Her subject matter, though, sometimes gets a little uncomfortable for me. I like to think I have a fairly uninhibited sense of humor, but there does seem to be a limit to how much I can laugh at stories that involve sexual predators going after thirteen-year-old girls, or people neglecting their pets. The frequent jokes about things like how disgusting she finds the idea of elderly people having sex got a little old, too, especially as I'm on the side of the seniors on that one. I say, enjoy yourselves as long as you can, guys!

Rating: 3/5

70. Post Captain by Patrick O'Brian



I had kind of mixed feelings about Master and Commander, the first book in this series. I found it slow to the point of tedium, but I could see some real promise in it, so I gamely forged ahead to this second book. And, boy, am I glad I did! This one was a lot more readable, and it featured much more of the things I actually liked about the first book, mainly the humor and the weirdly wonderful odd-couple friendship between the hearty Captain Jack Aubrey and the scholarly Dr. Stephen Maturin. (My little geeky heart keeps wanting to compare them to Captain Kirk and Mr. Spock, although the comparison really only goes so far.) That relationship is increasingly complex and entertaining in this one, strained as it is by the two of them having a conflicted interest in the same woman, and the humor was plentiful and delightful. And, although the plot meanders a lot, it felt like there was a lot more story here than in the first book, and that story was much more interesting. There were still a few places where navally-ignorant me had some trouble following things, but that wasn't nearly as much of a problem as last time. I'm very interested in reading the rest of the series now!

Rating: 4/5

I have the first two of the Aubrey-Maturin series on my iPod. You have prompted me to try them. I think very soon. I am headed home from Massachusetts today, and could put a dent in the first one.

I hope you like them! I did have some trouble getting through the first one, but I'm thinking the effort was probably worth it, if the rest of the series is anywhere near as good as Post Captain

I'm going to wait for your views on a couple more before I decide whether to embark on such a long series ;-)

I started listening to Master and Commander yesterday on my way home from MA. I am enjoying it so far. :)

>183 wandering_star:: I don't know how long you'll have to wait, as I don't have book 3 yet, but it is now at the top of my wishlist.

>184 NanaCC:: I'm glad to hear it! It may be a good series to travel with. I read much of Post Captain on airplanes. :)

I now have a new post up for the second half of the year! Apparently this thread wasn't quite long enough for LJ to offer me their "continue this topic" feature, but that's OK. You can find it right here.