mstrust is TWO a girly swot

1. Crop Rotation in the 14th Century (Non-Fiction)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=12W34XWIQwU

1. The Mother Tongue- 3 stars
2. Otherwise Engaged: The Life of Alan Bates 4 stars
3. Tea With Jane Austen 4 stars
4. American Beauty: Paintings from the Detroit Institute of Arts 4.5 stars
5. Home Away From Home: Motels in America 4 stars
6. Brandwashed 4.5 stars
7. Vintage Handbags 4 stars
8. Quiet 5 stars
9. Queens of Noise 4.5 stars
10. Candy: A Century of Panic and Pleasure 4 stars

2. BoomShanka (Asian Authors or Asian Subjects)

1. In The Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson- 3 star
2. My Year of Meats 3.5 stars
3. Geisha: the Life, the Voices, the Art- 5 stars
4. A Comrade Lost and Found 4.5 stars

3. Neil, Why Are You Wearing That Dress? (British Female Authors)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBMTK3iLSlY

1. No Fond Return of Love- 4 stars
2. The Black Tower 3.5 stars

4. Can You Actually Kill Yourself With Laxative Pills? (First Hand Accounts)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Shk8HawnCTs

1. Pies and Prejudice: In Search of the North- 4 stars
2. My Love Affair with England- 4.5 stars
3. Malled: My Unintentional Career in Retail- 4 stars
4. The Sweet Life in Paris 4.5 stars
5. Waiter Rant 4 stars

5. A Special Blend of Psychology and Extreme Violence (Mystery & Crime)

1. N or M? 4 stars
2. Knots and Crosses 4 stars
3. The Blackheath Poisonings 3 stars
4. Murder in Retrospect 3.5 stars
5. The Professionals 13: The Untouchables 4 stars
6. Death Comes As the End 4 stars

7. Codpiece Face (Another Year of Shakespeare)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=07YGG2Mr2wo

8. Give Me Some More Money, You Bastard (Books About Money or Gambling)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ANquX0YHFhw

1. I'll Take It 3 stars

9. I've Told You A Million Times, Do Not Exaggerate (Humor)

1. Downtrodden Abbey 3 stars
2. Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? 3 stars
3. Paddle Your Own Canoe 2.5 stars
4. Barry Trotter and the Unauthorized Parody 2.5 stars
5. Naked Pictures of Famous People 3 stars
6. The Greedy Bastard Diary 3.5 stars
7. I Suck At Girls 3.5 stars

10. I've Killed A Hippie (Autumn/Halloween)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HR7wQ9c_-6Q

11. I Didn't Get Them At Tesco's, Okay? (Published In The Last 14 Years)

1. 2009- Catching Fire 4 stars
2. 2010- The Night Bookmobile 4 stars
3. 2006- Winter's Bone 4 stars
4. 2013- The Last Animal 3 stars

12. It's Our Song, Baby, Let's Dance (Authors I Like)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qz2S2JYUoxY

1. Fortunately, The Milk 4.5 stars
2. Jamie Oliver's Food Escapes 4.5 stars
3. The Song Is You 4.5 stars
4. The Ocean at the End of the Lane 4.5 stars
5. Die A Little 4 stars
6. The Getaway 4 stars

13. Cock-A-Doodle Do, Neil. What Are You Talking About? (Not Famous Authors)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YOAz4nPNvLI

1. Polar- 4 stars
2. Dear American Airlines 4 stars

14. Sausages and Plants and Goldfish (Everything Else)

1. Titus Groan- 3.5 stars
2. The Girl on the Fridge- 4 stars
3. The Walking Dead: Volume 4- 3 stars
4. The Walking Dead: Volume 8 2.5 stars
5. Lying 4 stars
6. The Metamorphosis 4 stars
7. Passion Play 4 stars
8. The Four & Twenty Blackbirds Pie Book 4 stars
9. Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam 2 stars
10. The National Trust: Historic Interiors 4.5 stars
11. Hidden Britain 4 stars

It's a new thread! Let's party like it's 1975!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4D3_U_Gx2pc

28. The Night Bookmobile by Audrey Niffenegger. Published in the last 14 years. The story of Alexandra, who discovers a battered RV on a nearby street in Chicago one lonely morning and is invited to peruse the library it holds inside. Her obsession over finding the bookmobile again quickly overrules her life.
The illustrations are really hit or miss, but they work well with the haunting story. 4 stars

29. The Walking Dead: Volume 4 The Heart's Desire by Robert Kirkman. Everything Else. My first of the series. Surprising pairings, with everyone hooking up in the prison and Dale still alive. 3 stars

Ok, I don't know why my new thread title didn't pick up. Anyone know how I can change that without going through wiping all my categories out and starting over?

Not sure, but I'm willing to mentally replace TWO with THREE for the duration of your shiny new thread :)

I don't think there is a way to fix a thread title. I doubt anyone minds. You can pick up your theme again with your fourth thread which will probably be in a couple of weeks. ;-)

>15 mstrust: Great idea... but the singer's shirt displays the numbers 68....;-)

Don't worry about the thread title. We know where to find you!

Oh no, I watched that video, and then Ballroom Blitz and then Little Willy. That song is gonna be stuck in my head all night.

>19 rabbitprincess:, 20, 22 Princess, Mamzel & Violet Maybe I will leave it because I'm feeling lazy right now. :)

>21 lkernagh: Lori Maybe he was confused about what year he was in? I understand that happened for a lot of people in the 70's

>22 VioletBramble: That's because they had so many good songs! Here's another from them that I'm sorta obsessed with because everything about this video is wrong. The overcast beach, their weird outfits, the steel drum player using a student drum while dressed head to toe in polyester and aviators. The first time I saw it I was horrified. Then the song stuck in my head and I watched over and over. And I love how the bassist, Steve Priest, looks so embarrassed while the singer, Brian Connolly, puts all his heart into selling it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Gl-EGFf4_4

Steve Priest is the guy in the stars and stripes outfit, right? That outfit alone should make him embarrassed. The video is weird. I was worried about that man possibly catching on fire while limbo-ing. That video stressed me out. I don't know how you managed to watch it multiple times.

Yes, that's Steve Priest, and I like to wonder what was going through his head when he was choosing what to wear for this video. That must have been some rich inner dialogue. But then there are videos of him wearing much, much worse, as this is one of their very early songs. Later on he became partial to wearing hooker make-up and shiny materials.
Sorry about your stress, but I watch it and giggle!

Well looking back, you can sure see that our fashion sense was missing during the 70's, but I have to admit, I have hair envy!

Happy new thread.
>26 DeltaQueen50: I have to say you're not alone. My hair's due a cut again and I'm thinking of going somewhat shorter and more drastic than my usual mid back, all one length. His fringe & layered thing has certain attractions... But no way am I admitting that to my hairdresser!

>26 DeltaQueen50: Didn't he have the most perfect shag? It took some work though, as I've seen just one photo of him backstage in curlers.

>27 Helenliz: I don't think most hairstylists now would know what a shag was, so if you try to describe it you'd probably end up with either The Rachel or a mullet, lol! But I know what you mean by needing a change as I get bangs every other year, then grow them out...

Happy new thread!!

Hi Eva!

So did anyone else see this week's "Well Read"? The American producer who chooses the programs that appear on "Masterpiece Theatre" was on because she's written a book called Making Masterpiece. Of course she talked about "Downton Abbey". The book is on my WL.

No, I didn't see it but am intrigued by this book. On to the wishlist it goes!

It was interesting to see her explaining why she passed on a new show called 'Downton Abbey' the first time it was offered to her.
I really wish there was a book about the making of "I, Claudius".

30. Queens of Noise: The Real Story of The Runaways by Evelyn McDonnell. Non-Fiction. A bio of the ground-breaking all girl teenage rock band of the 70's. The Runaways were controversial in every way, from their formation by the Svengali weirdo Kim Fowley, to the way they dressed, to having to repeatedly prove that they did play their instruments, to the lawsuits over money more than a decade after breaking up. This is the band that spawned Joan Jett and Lita Ford, and made Fowley, a Hollywood fixture of decadence, into a world renown villain.

I discovered The Runaways maybe fifteen years ago and I love them. Not all the songs are great, in fact, some are lousy. But when they got it right they were amazing. Not just for the fact that while the band lasted, their ages ranged from 15 to 19 years old, but they had a rough, garage sound that I love, and most of the girls contributed their own songs, with Jett's being particularly good. So that's why I wanted to read this one. And the book is written by a music critic who is also teaches journalism at Loyola, with interviews by nearly everyone involved who is still alive. Her researching is thorough. She even got the unpublished memoirs of drummer Sandy West, who died in 2006. I think McDonnell focuses too much on the sexuality of a couple of the girls, turning it into a platform for her personal feelings at times. The band had no political statements, and the members fought hard to be seen as musicians rather than being sexualized (they hated Cherie Currie's lingerie stage costumes). The Runaways did face a whole lot of 70's misogyny and battled through it, due to the fact that women weren't suppose to play hard rock, especially high school girls, so getting on stage made them targets. But this book does a really good job at untangling the mess and the rumors. It's a good choice if you want to read about a rock band.4.5 stars

If you know any of their songs, it's probably "Cherry Bomb", when Cherie Currie was their main singer. Here's a great one with Jett singing that really shows how good they were.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GvmIwhXe6rE

31. The Walking Dead: Volume 8 Made To Suffer by Robert Kirkman. This is the volume that has the prison war between Rick's group and The Governor's. Meh. I'll read more of TWD only if I come across it; I won't try to hunt one down. I like the show much better. 2.5 stars

We went to the annual plant sale at the Botanical Gardens this morning, and came away with a yellow lantana and three books. Do they grow them there?
Six Against the Yard, The Best Man to Die, and Absent in the Spring.

Queens of Noise looks good. 4.5 stars? I've gotta get that. I'm also reminded that I have Cherie Currie's memoir Neon Angel on the kindle tbr pile.

I gave it a high rating because (for me) it deserved it. The author did the research, which couldn't have been easy as there isn't a whole lot of written information on the band, so she did lots of interviews and went through the files and documents for Mercury records and their management. Also, the author is a good writer. I've read band bios where the author can't draw a straight line and it's annoying. Finally, because it's taken too long for a book like this to come out.
I want to read Neon Angel too. McDonnell does use that book as a source for Currie's view on many subjects.

#33 Thank you for the review of Queens of Noise. I like Joan Jett and Lita Ford. While I was reading your review I was singing Che-Che Che-Che Cherry Bomb! Will be on the look out for this one.

Glad to hear from another fan!

Today was the second test of the term in my guitar class, this time playing two memorized pieces for the instructor. I got a B. I'm a horrible test taker and told the instructor to stop talking while I played. :D

A B is very respectable!

It's not bad at all, and it's simply a pass/fail class for me. But I want an A for everything, lol.

Good job! :)

Thanks, princess!



32. Winter's Bone by Daniel Woodrell. Published in 2006. Sixteen year-old Ree Dolly is barely holding her family together when she learns that her father, a meth cook, signed the family home and land as collateral on his bail bond. With his court date a week away and her father missing, Ree goes looking for him among their extended and dangerous Ozark family.

I've been wanting to read some Woodrell for a while now as he gets good reviews on LT and I remember how good this movie was. He'll go to the top of my list of authors I want to read more. 4 stars

As I was finishing Winter's Bone I realized that the movie version starred the same actress who was in the Hunger Games: Catching Fire, which I watched three days ago after finishing the book. All a coincidence. I swear I'm not stalking Jennifer Lawrence.

I'm glad you liked Daniel Woodrell, he moved into my favorite author category after I read Winter's Bone, he can be a bit bleak, but I love his writing!

Bleak is right! But the plot is so intriguing. I'm glad he has several more to pick up.

I'm reading two books right now and feel like I'll never reach the end of either. One is interesting but so thick and densely written that after four or five days I'm still only 50 pages in. The other is a mystery that I've been wanting to read but it feels like I'm slogging through mud. I keep thinking it will become interesting but I know I'm forcing myself to keep going.
So who knows when I'll post another review?

Oh dear! I hate when that happens, especially if you have a shelf full of other books clamouring for attention as well. Hope the mystery gets interesting soon!

You must have sent me some good vibes because, finally, someone in that book died. So while it's still not great, it's more interesting than before.

I was surprised how much I enjoyed the film Winter's Bone (so much about it is just not my sort of thing)--good to hear that the book is worth reading! I must find a copy.

The movie was pretty great. I would have never seen John Hawkes as Uncle Teardrop, probably because he was so mild-mannered in "Deadwood", but he was very convincing as the scary uncle.

>48 mstrust: Glad to be of inadvertent assistance! ;)

33. Candy: A Century of Panic and Pleasure by Samira Kawash. Non-Fiction. A study of the downside of candy and sugar in general. Anything that can give pause to the usual happiness of eating candy is included: the rise of the industrial machine that made candy cheaper and put people out of work, female big business owners who are now forgotten, nutrition experts who touted candy as meal replacements, then other experts who said eating candy was the same as alcoholism, unsafe adulterated candy and the urban legend of poisoned Halloween candy. And so much more.

Whew. This book should have been called "The Encyclopedia of Bad Candy Knowledge". To say it covers every angle of sugar bummers gives you an idea. The author leaves out nothing. At 342 pages that barely have breaks between topics, the author really has packed too much information in, as topics tend to jump from one into the other every three or four paragraphs. It really should have been broken into two books, one for the "how it came to be" aspect and another for the health topic. The author's (truly) exhaustive research is to be admired. 4 stars

Oh, I was going to say bookbullet when I saw the cover, but perhaps I don't want to know that much....

Ha! I'm sorry to get your hopes up, and I don't want to dissuade anyone from it. But it truly is for someone who wants the whole history.
If you haven't read it, I can recommend Candyfreak, which I love.

I picked up Sugar, Salt, Fat and started reading it when a student returned it. Oh, my! I walk around the supermarket now wondering how we ever let these corporations do this to us. Very illuminating!

I hadn't heard of that one, but it sounds good. And disturbing.
I still keep in mind that old tip of filling most of your cart from the store's periphery because that's where the mostly unprocessed stuff is.
The Peeps and Hershey eggs are on the Easter aisle.

I've noticed now that I've read 10 Crop Rotation (Non-Fiction) books, so I've completed a category! I never complete categories, never. I'm sure I'll have plenty more non-fictions this year, though, so it will continue to expand.

Yay, congrats on completing a category!

Thanks, Christina!

My resolution to not buy books isn't going so well. Last night I bought:

Witness for the Prosecution
The Aeneid
The Woman in Black
The Brontes Went to Woolworth's
Henry Miller: The Paris Years
Dear American Airlines
The Philosophy of Punk
Landscapes of Texas
Classic British Movies

Ha! Another LTer just reminded me that today is my 6th Thingaversary. There's my excuse for buying.

Not an excuse, but an obligation.

Happy Thingaversary! Looks like a great haul :)

Happy Thingaversary!!! Are you sure you didn't just figure out a way to change your date to be today...? :)

I have looked at Candyfreak, but since I didn't grow up in the US, I've never heard of most of those candies and it didn't feel completely relevant, unfortunately.

Happy Thingaversary!

>60 RidgewayGirl: I like your thinking.

>61 rabbitprincess: Thanks! This was me controlling myself. I know I went past my six book count, but I'm greedy.

>62 -Eva-: Thanks, Eva! Claiming it's a special day is a good idea, isn't it? I have one of those calendars that has the holidays from all over the world, so that could be handy. Next month I can celebrate St. George's Day and Showa Day by buying more.

Yes, if you're unfamiliar with old American candy, Candyfreak would do you no good (aside from it being pretty funny). Sorry.

>63 virginiahomeschooler: Thank you! This is actually the first Thingaversary I remembered.

Belated Happy Thingaversary!!

Thanks, Judy! I just happen to have some champagne.

Anything to justify a haul of interesting books!

>67 hailelib: You know it!



34. The Song Is You by Megan Abbott. Authors I Like. Gil Hopkins is the handsome and charming publicist for a Hollywood movie studio around 1951. He's been in the city for a couple of years, has plenty of connections and knows lots of starlets and wanna-bes, whom he often takes advantage of. One particular night on the town with a couple of these girls and some big movie stars comes back to haunt Hop even years later, as the disappearance of one of the girls moves him to investigate if the rumors are true.

And then she was handing him a short glass of brandy and she was drinking a tall tumbler of water and something happened. Something knocked loose inside him and suddenly he could hear his own voice talking, talking nonstop, about how he'd seen Jean Spangler the night she'd disappeared, about how Marv Sutton and Gene Merrel-yes, that Sutton and Merrel, silver-tongued crooners, fleet-footed dancers, the whole song and dance- had joined them at a little dive called the Eight Ball. And how they'd taken her off with them and how he didn't know for sure what happened but that he knew everything had turned very bad somehow.

I read Abbott's Queenpin a few years ago and meant to follow up with more from her right away. This one is every bit as good. 4.5 stars

With Queenpin and then The Song Is You, Megan Abbott vaulted onto my favorite authors list!

> I love noir, and Abbott has to be the best at it right now. I really want to read Die A Little next.

I meant to add this after my review of The Song Is You, as it really seems to fit. Great song.

The Gentle Waves:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ZWC3Zc7TEM

35. The Last Animal by Abby Geni. Published in 2013. A collection of short stories, many having an animal or other creature as a central focus. One of the stories included, "Captivity", about a young woman suddenly contacted by her long-missing brother's weird girlfriend, won a prize from Glimmer Train and it's one of the best in the book. I liked another, "The Girls of Apache Bryn Mawr", about a favorite counselor at a summer camp who goes missing and the group of twelve year-old girls who try to figure out what happened.

The writing is fine and a couple of the stories involve interesting settings, like a Museum of Natural History. The reason I rated this book with three stars was because of the unrelenting misery, something that many young writers see as being Serious. Each story, without exception, tells of varying degrees of suffering: the little boy who discovers his father's infidelity, the teenager boyfriend who manipulates his girlfriend through suicide attempts, brain cancer, Alzheimer's...
It actually wasn't a tough read, but it got monotonous after realizing that there wouldn't be any variation. 3 stars

36. The Blackheath Poisonings by Julian Symons. Murder and Crime. In Victorian London, the large, extended Collard and Vandervent families, toy makers, share a couple of large homes, throwing spouses and in-laws into constant contact and bringing business talk to the dinner table. When Roger, the president of the company, becomes suddenly ill and dies at home, it's considered a tragedy, but when the family matriarch dies under similar circumstances a few months later, rumors about poisonings begin. Things get worse when it's discovered that Roger was having an affair with his sister-in-law, a woman who refused to accept the end of the relationship.

I remember seeing the movie version of this novel a few years ago, which played out the creepiness at the end of the story much more than the book does. It's a solid mystery once it gets going, but I struggled to get into it as the first death doesn't happen until 65 pages in (well, it is a murder mystery) and I had some difficulty keeping track of who's who in this large family. Once you've got them sorted, it's fine.3 stars

I read The Blackheath Poisonings last year - or was it the year before? - and I struggled a bit with the story, as written, like you did. I enjoyed the 1992 Masterpiece Theatre TV miniseries better. ;-)

If that's the one with Ian McNiece and Kenneth Haigh, that's the one I saw.
Speaking of McNiece, I'm so glad the new season of "Doc Martin" has begun.

Yup, that's the one.... and Yay for the new season of "Doc Martin"! We have been going through withdrawal symptoms in our house. ;-)

I just read this and wanted to pass it along. The subject is the recent removal of a Sherman Alexie book from a school curriculum, with the activity from the school board meeting posted in real time.
http://bookriot.com/2014/04/03/absolutely-true-diary-real-time-book-censorship/

#77 - Interesting!

Isn't it? Also sad and disturbing.

I see that today is the anniversary of the great and disturbing author Jim Thompson's death. Everybody run out now, get drunk and steal something! Let's honor the man!

Thank you for posting the link, Jennifer. I haven't read the Sherman Alexie book but I am always deeply disturbed by book bans or the threat of a book ban. Right now in the Okanagan region of BC, one father is trying to get Stephen Chbosky's The Perks of Being a Wallflower banned from the school district's grade 10 curriculum and pulled from the shelves. At least the school district is taking the position that they are using an approved book, have allowed the father's son to read a different book as part of his curriculum requirements and they will convene an independent committee of members that will have to read the book before looking at the issue.

http://www.theprovince.com/news/Kamloops+wants+pornographic+book+Perks+Being+Wal...

I read that article from the Bookriot post this morning. I also enjoyed the examples from Booktube that they shared. I had fun with the gangsta version of The Hobbit. I want to use the one from the book store for my orientation classes to illustrate how books get organized and put away. ;-0

>76 lkernagh: He seems, if possible, to be more surly than in previous seasons. Maybe because you kind of expected him to be a little more cheerful now he has a family, but no, he's just as miserable as ever. Hee!

>80 lkernagh: I haven't read the Alexie or Chbosky yet, but now I will just for spite. I don't have kids but I do believe parents should be aware of what is happening in their kids' classrooms. The problems arise in situations like these two, were one parent believes their values should be applied to everyone's child. At least the father read the Chbosky book before complaining. But his son was not being forced to read the book, so he just chose different book.
And don't you love how the father threatens that if he doesn't get his way they will be dealing with him for ten years?

>81 mamzel: BookRiot is great, though their new format makes it slower to go through the articles. I admit that one of my favorite columns is "Book Fetish" that shows all the book related stuff to buy. Good luck with your class!

>82 mstrust: - I have a copy of The Perks of Being a Wallflower and I am looking forward to making time to read it, because I am curious now to see what might be causing this particular father concern. As you have pointed out, the son was allowed to read another book so it is more the father's continued drive to have the book removed from the curriculum and I am guessing the school library shelves that has me a little concerned. Heck, I read all of the Judy Blume novels as a young teen and I don't think they damaged me in any way. ;-)

I read and loved all the Judy Blume books too! For many years, everything I knew about whaling I learned from Blubber.
As to that father, it does seem like the people who have so much determination and energy are often people whose personal values have been insulted. They have missions to save us all from ourselves.

Nothing makes me buy a book faster than hearing someone is trying to censor a book. However, I felt sort of burned by this when I bought and read The Perks of Being a Wallflower. It really isn't a very good book, but the thing that really bothered me is that it was so obviously written with the intent of raising controversy and getting itself onto all the banned lists. It's as if the committee that wrote it said "Teenage sex? check. Underage drinking? check. Drugs? check. Homosexuality? check. Suicide? check. Abortion? Do we have abortion? No? Quick, write an abortion scene. Yeah, that should do it. Or should we add a rape?" (insert large eye roll here). I have no problems with these topics for teens, but the way they are handled here appears to be manipulate readers and generate sales. Looking back I see I gave it 2 stars--I guess I was feeling kind that day.

The book should be banned on it's lack of artistic merit. (Turning of cranky mode now.)

ETA: I also read the Alexie book, which I rated as "okay." It didn't appeal to me, but it has artistic merit and there is no way it should be censored. (And I hear his adult books are better.)

37. My Year of Meats by Ruth L. Ozeki. Asian Authors. Out-of-work documentarian Jane helps create a Japanese tv program called "My American Wife!" that will show Japanese housewives how American women feed their families. As the show is really advertisement for imported American meats, each show focuses on displays of large amounts of meat, with cooking methods and recipes. At first Jane is happy to cross America, meeting families and telling their wholesome stories, but eventually she begins fighting her boss, Japanese businessman Ueno, over being more inclusive about which families should be featured. She also begins learning more disturbing information about the meat industry and feels guilty about contributing to its growing popularity among the fish-eating Japanese.
In Tokyo, Ueno's timid wife Akiko is even more unhappy. He requires her to watch, cook the recipes, and rate what she thinks of each episode of the show. She has yet to produce a child, which her abusive husband holds against her.

This was Ozeki's first novel, and for the most part, it's a good debut. The stories of Jane and Akiko are interesting, and each chapter begins with a selection from The Pillow Book of Sei Shonagon. But there is a real clunkiness to the writing once Jane begins researching the meat industry, with dialogue that sounds as if the characters are speaking in article paragraphs and inner dialogue that reads as if it's been taken from propaganda booklets. If it wasn't for these chunks of bad writing I'd be able to score it higher, as I liked the characters, but too many big issues were introduced and sermonized. 3.5 stars

38. Lying by Sam Harris. Everything Else. Harris is a neuroscientist and author of several books on science and religion. With this book he begins by describing a course he took at Stanford while an undergraduate. The class was called 'The Ethical Analyst" and was taught by Ronald A. Howard, and would be life-changing for Harris as it examined one question: is it wrong to lie?
Harris proposes that our society has become one where we expect to be lied to because so many people lie. The book is broken into three sections, the first is his essay about committing to total honesty and what can be gained or lost by this commitment. Then there is a conversation with Howard about why people lie and scenarios are posed, many involving life or death situations. The third section consists of questions posed by readers. All this in just 95 pages.

It's a heavy subject and some of the scenarios posed, ones where Harris mostly advises complete honesty, made me wonder if he had any remaining relationships (he does), but Harris does a credible job with explaining the benefits of his belief. 4 stars

The Sam Harris book sounds like it belongs on my wishlist. Thanks for drawing it to my attention.

Happy to help!

Yes! My library has The Blackheath Poisonings in book AND video form! Added to the TBR (and TBW -- to be watched list). Actually the library has a lot of Julian Symons, which surprises me for some reason.

>85 Nickelini: I'm sorry I didn't respond sooner, but I didn't see your message until now when I was scrolling upwards.
Thanks for letting me know about the books. Chbosky clearly knew that teens love their drama! It sounds like it ricochets from one controversy to another.

>90 rabbitprincess: I hope you like them! And be prepared to see McNeice as you've never seen him before. **runs away before princess can ask any questions**

39. Murder in Retrospect by Agatha Christie. Mystery. Young Carla Crale asks Poirot to investigate her father's murder from sixteen years ago. Carla's mother was found guilty of the murder and is dead too, but Carla believes the murderer was one of the several houseguests present, which included the woman her father was leaving her mother for.
Also known as Five Little Pigs. 3.5 stars


I'm having to go to my husband's business to use his computer for who knows how long, as something happened to our home computer yesterday. Suddenly the screen went black and the room smelled of electrical smoke, so it's likely toasted.

Yes, I would suspect that a smoking computer means the end of said computer. Hope you get a new one soon! Looking forward to reading that particular Christie whenever I get to it during my rereading of her work. It sounds vaguely familiar but not one that stood out.

At first I was getting all excited thinking that here was an Agatha Christie that I must have somehow missed in the past, but then I saw the alternative title and remembered that I have read it.

Uh-oh that does not sound good for the computer! Poor thing.

>77 mstrust:
Aren't high school sophomores 15 or 16 years old? What in that book doesn't kids that age already know???

What in that book doesn't kids that age already know???

Exactly. Even if they go to the most polite of private schools. Unless you keep them in a cave . . .

>92 mstrust: Murder in Retrospect was my first Agatha Christie! But I haven't read it in years...should probably remedy that someday soon!

>93 LittleTaiko: We'll probably end up having to get a new modem. The main concern is that we have hundreds of vacation photos, family photos and my short stories and articles on there. It'd be horrible if they've been wiped out.
My husband came home last night and updated the software on the laptop, so that's what I'm using now.

>94 DeltaQueen50: Isn't that awful that about 3/4 of her books have alternative titles? And for underhanded reasons too. I get changing a title when it has to be translated to another language, but the publishers should have just stuck with one Christie title by now.

>95 rabbitprincess: It's had a long life and had been grumbling and complaining for a while now. The end had to come. The smoke was just it going out with a bang.

>96 -Eva-: & 97 That's exactly what I was thinking. Even if they don't read it in a book, they talk to other kids and watch t.v. And, as the articles said, they don't have to read the books the parents object to.

>98 christina_reads: Awww, don't you keep a soft spot for your first Christie? Mine was A Pocketful of Rye, and I think it was my first mystery ever.

Yikes on the computer deciding it was time to go "puff". Don't they know they - meaning computers - are not supposed to pack it in on a schedule of their choosing without informing us owners first? ;-)

They know. They just don't care. Computers can be unfeeling.

I'm still 250 pages away from finishing The Fry Chronicles, the latest autobiography by Stephen Fry, which is fascinating, though thick. Here's a quickie in the meantime:



40. The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka, adapted by Peter Kuper. Kafka's story of Gregor Samsa's transformation, done in the style of 20th Century cartoonist Winsor McCay, a man who had a dark streak in his work. The bleak black and white work fits Kafka perfectly. 4 stars

And here's a perfect combination of "The Young Ones" and Motorhead, just because I saw them on Tuesday and I love them!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YOAz4nPNvLI

>103 mstrust: Yay best Young Ones episode ever! :)

I tried to read Kafka's The Metamorphosis two years a go and either I just wasn't in the mood for the story at the time or I don't get Kafka, or both, which is a shame because I tend to enjoy bleak stories.

>104 rabbitprincess: I agree! All of them were great, but "Bambi" was the best.

>105 lkernagh: I enjoyed the original story many years ago, but then I like surrealism. As good as he was, Kafka definitely isn't for everyone. Isn't it a shame that he didn't live to know how well-regarded his work is?

41. Barry Trotter and the Unauthorized Parody by Michael Gerber. Humor. Grown-up Barry still lives at Hogwash, where he takes full advantage of his fame as the central character in J.G. Rollins' series of children's books. He doesn't work, but is allowed to remain as his fame continues to bring pupils to the school, and draws hordes of Muddle groupies, which Barry also takes advantage of. Lon Measly is still there too, due to a brain injury, but Ermine Cringer works as a teacher in a low-level magic school. Together they travel from London to New York to L.A. trying to track down Rollins and get her to stop the upcoming Barry Trotter movie from being released.

It has some funny bits- Ermine is always on the make, Rollins publishing company keeps her hostage in order to force her to write day and night, Serious is a mooch- but it's not hilarious. Definitely not for children. 2.5 stars

I started this a while ago looking forward to great puns but I quit after I got the feeling that the author really hated the real books.

I had that impression too, until the very last pages when he makes it about the love of the books and how people will remember them fondly as a part of their childhood.
There were some funny lines and I really don't have anything against the book, it just wasn't as clever as I expected. The author has a list of "also by" books and I do want to find out if "Are You There, God, It's Me, Hitler" is real.

>109 mstrust: "Are You There, God, It's Me, Hitler" cracked me up! I would also read that.

>97 Nickelini: Back when I was in high school the students of the private Christian school were definitely ahead of their public school peers in getting away with things.

Jennifer, we had a computer crash and lost all of our baby pictures. They can be retrieved from the hard drive, but only at an exorbitant cost. Someday we'll do that.

>110 christina_reads: Since it doesn't come up on LT, I assume it's a fake title. But I do wish it were real.

>111 RidgewayGirl: I sorry you lost access to those photos! Ugh, there's something to be said for tangible items, like that lady in the commercial who posts her photos to her wall.
When I was a kid, my sister and I were in Job's Daughters, which is a Masonic group for young girls, and that turned out to be my introduction to punk music and mohawks, hee!

>110 christina_reads: Since it doesn't come up on LT, I assume it's a fake title. But I do wish it were real.

>111 RidgewayGirl: I sorry you lost access to those photos! Ugh, there's something to be said for tangible items, like that lady in the commercial who posts her photos to her wall.
When I was a kid, my sister and I were in Job's Daughters, which is a Masonic group for young girls, and that turned out to be my introduction to punk music and mohawks, hee!

42. The Fry Chronicles by Stephen Fry. First Hand Accounts. The latest of Fry's autobiographies, this one covers some of his school years, Cambridge, the beginning years of show business and many years since. He discusses his relationships with people such as Emma Thompson, Rowan Atkinson and Hugh Laurie, that famous article about his celibacy, and his feelings about depression and bi-polar disorder.
I love this guy. How anyone can have so many career paths and be successful at nearly all of them leaves me in awe. This is a thick book, over 400 pages of text along with four sections of photos, that made my hands ache from holding it, but it was never boring (o.k., when he got to talking about his love of computers) because he was always working on something. I really want to read his earlier autobiographies as well.4.5 stars

>102 mstrust:
You might be interested in this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y3Pyp0HJqLw

It was written and directed by the new Doctor, Peter Capaldi (which only matters if you're a Doctor Who fan, of course).

Thanks for that, it's plenty creepy! I've seen about one and a half episodes of Doctor Who in my life, and that was because Julian Glover was in a storyline in the late 70's. I'm a fan of Richard E. Grant though, who played Kafka in your link. He was an excellent Scarlet Pimpernel.

I've spent the last few days away from the computer and trying to get through the enormous pile of magazines I've ignored for months. I did get one read finished though:



43. The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman. Favorite Authors. A man returns to the Sussex village he spent his childhood to attend to a funeral. The return jars his memory, bringing back an episode when he was seven, when the man who boarded with his family committed suicide, which led to the boy meeting the Hempstock family at the end of their long lane. Through this connection the boy becomes a pawn between supernatural creatures.

Finally, I got hold of this book! It's dark and tense and I enjoyed it. This was published in 2013, which I believe is also the year Fortunately, The Milk was published. So, two in one year- you go, Neil. 4.5 stars

I went to the library warehouse sale yesterday and did pretty well with filling my cart.

The Easy Art of Cooking with Nuts
Squash: A Country Garden Cookbook
Date Recipes (for my mom who loves dates)
The Essential African Cookbook
The Chisellers
Painting in the Musee d'Orsay
The British Museum
Miss Marple's Final Cases
So Many Steps to Death
Dead Man's Folly
Towards Zero
The Lost Painting
Great Apes
The Other Poe
Come On Shore and We Will Kill and Eat You All
A Fairly Dangerous Thing
The Bad Beginning
The Reptile Room
The Late Hector Kipling
Mr Chartwell
One Of Our Thursdays is Missing
Me Talk Pretty One Day
I Lock My Door Upon Myself
Little Children
Brideshead Revisited
Watchman
Doors Open
A Short History of a Small Place
The Case of the Missing Books
The House of Silk
The Night Circus
Health and Happiness
A Monster's Notes
Vermont: A Seasonal Celebration
New Hampshire: A Living Landscape
Greater Phoenix: The Desert in Bloom
Hidden Britain
Gardens of Europe
and the audio set of Dead Man's Folly, performed by David Suchet.

Phew. And I always get comments from the volunteers about how they don't know how I could have fit so much into my little old lady wheelie cart.

Looks like some pleasurable hours ahead. The one I recognize and hope your will enjoy the Jasper Fforde.

Ooh, lots of Agathas! Have you heard David Suchet narrate before? He's brilliant. I saw him in The Last Confession in Toronto last week and it was such a thrill to be in the same room as him :D

If you decide to read Brideshead this year, let me know and I'll read along :)

You came out with an interesting assortment. Enjoy!

Lots of interesting reading. I can't think of Fry as anything other than a comedian! Lots of careers? I thought he hooked up with Thompson & Laurie in college? & I can't believe someone did a graphic novel of Metamorphosis! That's brilliant in a way, and scary in another way.

>119 mamzel: It's been a couple of years since I've read a Fforde. I've read The Eyre Affair a couple of times, but I wasn't impressed by the following Thursday books. I really liked The Fourth Bear though.

>120 rabbitprincess: No, Ive never heard Suchet's narrations and I'm looking forward to it. At this point he is so familiar with Christie I think it would be as close to her reading her own work as we can get.
What a lucky girl you are to have seen him in person! And I will definitely let you know when I'm starting the Waugh as it will be great to do a read-along.

>121 hailelib: Thank you! My surprise find was the Poe book, as it's his short stories that aren't horror or suspense, and I didn't know he wrote anything but those genres. I'm also so glad to get those Vermont and New Hampshire photography books as I love looking at New England in the Fall.

>122 cammykitty: Fry did meet Thompson and Laurie at Cambridge, and that's when he and Laurie began writing sketches together.
By lots of careers I was referring to his success as an actor, writer, playwright, t.v. show presenter and documentary filmmaker. He seems to never stop working.
This version of The Metamorphosis seems so natural for the story, having a 1920's depression era look to it.

44. Die A Little by Megan Abbott. Favorite Authors. School teacher Lora and her cop brother, Bill, live in L.A. and only have each other. Then Bill meets Alice and they marry so quickly that Lora barely has time to get used to Alice before becoming suspicious of her low-rent friend who is always bruised, and the work credentials that never appear. Lora takes on the job of digging through Alice's past because her brother is too much in love to see that something isn't right.

L.A. noir set in the 50's and done so well. At first it seems like Lora is just an over-protective sister, or, a sister who is jealous of losing her brother to his new wife, but the story that unfolds gets quite juicy. 4 stars

45. Naked Pictures of Famous People by Jon Stewart. Humor. Short stories, many featuring famous or infamous people. Princess Diana pressuring Mother Theresa to be her pen pal, Larry King interviewing Hitler, Martha Stewart giving very personal advice and Gerald Ford's problems with being the president. The funniest was "A Very Hanson Christmas, 1996-1999", which follows the band's rise and implosion as written by their mother. 3 stars

46. Passion Play by Peter Nichols. Everything Else. Also published under the title Passion, this is a play about middle-aged James and Eleanor. Married twenty-five years, they are happily comfortable with each other until their friend dies and his much younger mistress sets her sights on James, who isn't attracted to the woman, yet can't resist the offer.
An interesting take on infidelity, as James' conscience splits off and becomes another character, while the dead friend's wife becomes the voice of foreboding for Eleanor. 4 stars

47. Geisha: the Life, the Voices, the Art by Jodi Cobb. Asian authors or subjects. Cobb was a photographer for National Geographic, and the photography captures the beauty of the geisha, but also moments the outsider doesn't usually see. The process of make-up application, a made-up face without the hair or costume, a geisha smoking or cradling the face of a drunken client. There are geisha histories, photos of very elderly geisha, traditional geisha songs and interviews of geisha, with some surprising comments that make it clear that behind some of the cheerful faces are real women who sometimes find it hard to fit into the ideal. If you have any interest in the subject, this one is recommended. 5 stars

I love Megan Abbot's Noir books and luckily, I have Die A Little waiting on my shelves for me.

Then you have something good to look forward to. I believe I have just two more of her books before I'm all caught up, so she needs to write a little faster.

She's getting faster now that she's using modern settings. Abbott used to put one out every other year, but Fever is only a year after Dare Me. And now I've revealed that I pay way too much attention to her books.

Ha! No, not too much, it's just the right amount of obsession. Thanks for letting me know about her switch to modern times, as those two you mention are the ones I haven't read yet. I have to admit that I really love her 50's settings though.

48. 100 Years of Painting in Georgia by Gudmund Vigtel. Georgia. Published by the Alston & Bird law firm of Atlanta, this is a an unusually specific art book covering paintings from 1892-1992. Most, but not all, of the artists are natives of Georgia, and most, but not all, of the paintings are still to be found in Georgia, in museums, government collections or loaned by the artists. The paintings run from abstract, realism or outsider. I didn't recognize a single name, but much of the work was amazing. I'm sure I picked this one up this past February at the huge book sale, so I got lucky.
My category of Georgia authors and subjects is because of my dad, who was from a little town called Rockmart. 4 stars

49. The Professionals 13: The Untouchables by Ken Blake. Crime. In this book of the series, an assassin with diplomatic immunity leads to Bodie playing the sucker in high stakes underground poker, and Cowley hiring a prostitute as a temporary agent. 4 stars

<134 Oh dear, that brings back memories...

Oh squee! I'm a big fan, though I only discovered them about 5 years ago. But it seems that you are not. ; )

Happy Mother's Day!

Here's a mother and her babies:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_lLcxgfQLbc

>136 mstrust: Actually, I was a big fan when they were first shown on German TV, and I was in my teens. There was an embarrassing moment in a packed cinema with Lewis Collins on the stage asking if we wanted to hear his latest musical offering. Deafening silence...

Oh no! Ha, I've seen the video for "Take It Out On Time" and wondered why he recorded such a Vegas lounge act of a song.
So- did he go ahead and sing after that underwhelming response?

Made it to number 50!



50.Death Comes As the End by Agatha Christie. Mystery. I'm still reading the Christie catalog by publication date, which I've been doing for about three years now. This one is from 1944, and it's the oddest Christie I've come across so far.
Set in Ancient Egypt, in the home of mortuary priest and landowner Imhotep. He has two grown sons with families, one teenage son and one young widowed daughter, along with a household of servants and employees. One day Imhotep returns from business with a beautiful young concubine who quickly sets the old man against his family. Death follows death in quick succession until the field of suspects is narrowed way down.

At first I was not that interested in this one, as picking up a Christie usually means reading about a wealthy family on an English estate with all the back-biting relatives fighting over an inheritance. Well, guess what? This story turns out to be about a wealthy family on an Egyptian estate fighting over an inheritance. I'm assuming Christie was married to Max Mallowan at this point, because she did spend time going on his digs in the Middle East, so she would have had knowledge of this period. What's strange is how she brought so much contemporary Western attitude into a story about Ancient Egypt. Referencing the devil, calling someone "Lord Yahmose" like he's about to join the fox hunt, using phrases such as, "handsome is as handsome does," the use of buttons, all are out of place. Which may have been oversights, but could very likely have been intentional if Christie worried that her readers wouldn't have accepted a more authentic story and so compromised with a blend of modern English and Ancient Egyptian. With a bit of a love story thrown in. 4 stars

I've just finished watching the whole "Breaking Bad" series, so of course I have to put this up. Don't worry, it's not a spoiler. What a great show.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C53QAuOoSgc

51. Dear American Airlines by Jonathan Miles. Not Famous Authors. Bennie Ford writes a complaint letter demanding a refund while stranded at Chicago's O' Hare. Since he has time on his hands and he is a literary translator, his letter goes on to explains his desperation to reach California to take part in his daughter's wedding, an invitation he had never expected after decades of separation. Bennie continues on to explain the relationship between he and the girl's mother, the marriage of his parents and his mother's instability, his years of alcoholism and his brief moment of success as a poet.

An interesting take on the looking-back-over-my-failed-life genre, as Bennie the Younger goes into his relationship with the woman who would matter most to him as a clueless, damaged young man already dependent on enormous amounts of alcohol, while the older, sober Bennie writing the letter is still lost but full of insight and dark humor. 4 stars

52. The Four & Twenty Blackbirds Pie Book by Emily & Melissa Elsen. Everything Else. Four & Twenty Blackbirds is a pie shop in Brooklyn that was named "Artisan of the Year" just a year after its 2010 opening. The Elsen sisters are from South Dakota and excel at homey flavors that have an unusual tweak, so you get apple-rosewater pie, lavender blueberry, gooseberry galette, sweet potato & apple crumble, pear and juniper berry, and maple buttermilk custard, which sounds and looks fantastic. There are some I would never be tempted to make (green chili chocolate), but somebody has to like it because this shop has a loyal following, especially for their niche flavors. 4.5 stars

53. Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Everything Else. Khayyam lived in Persia during the late 11th Century, and this translation, by Edward Fitzgerald, was produced seven centuries later. Which makes it impossible to pinpoint why 90% of this went over my head. I suspect that there was a theme but I couldn't tell what, as the words seemed to have no particular meaning to me other than to rhyme. Which also makes me suspect that this translation couldn't have much in common with the poet's original words or rhythm, and so possibly lost his point. And I could be wrong about all of this. 2 stars

>143 mstrust: - Oooh, the cover alone makes me want to rush out and buy the book. Think I'll buy a copy for a friend of mine who is a huge pie fan.

>143 mstrust: Looks like a good book although the thought of 4 and 20 blackbirds baked in a pie has never appealed to me.

>145 LittleTaiko: Doesn't it look decadent? I've got the ingredients on my shopping list for that maple buttermilk pie, but I also want to try one of the honey pies (with candied lavender or salted) because they sound so good.

>146 thornton37814: When I was in kindergarten we had to recite that poem often, and I always thought, "yuck, who would eat that?"
Luckily, all these recipes are non-bird, though there is a recipe that is a spin on an old New England salted pork pie. From the spices used and the meat being put through a sieve, it's probably similar to a mincemeat.

>143 mstrust: Their pie is served in the cafe of the main branch of the Brooklyn Public Library. I found the salted-caramel apple pie to be underwhelming, but am planning to try a different flavor every library trip....

>148 ELiz_M: Wow, getting pie at the library would even get my husband to go. Have a slice before looking at the books, have a slice after... And that's the first public library I've heard of that has a cafe. Somebody was thinking.

>148 ELiz_M: - Pie.... did someone mention "pie"? None of our local libraries have cafes attached to them, probably because of the abundance of coffee shops but still, the ability to eat pie in the same building as the library appeals to me. ;-)

Somebody was thinking.

I know... brilliant!

And what a great idea for helping to finance the libraries, as I assume the cafe/pie shop is paying rent.

54. The Greedy Bastard Diary: A Comic Tour of America by Eric Idle. Humor. The daily diary Idle kept in 2005 while touring America and Canada playing smaller venues with new material and favorites from Monty Python. He writes of building the show, the constant revisions and cuts, the cast and crew, traveling by tour bus, often to smallish cities, and more personal memories like his boarding school experience and his mother's life and death. He also is friends with just about every famous musician from the seventies, so there's lots of name-dropping. 3.5 stars

A bit late to your thread but just want to sneak back a month before fully catching up.

Stephen Fry has only one other autobiography, Moab is My Washpot, the rest are all novels except Paperweight which is a collection of his journalistic bits and bobs along with some other odds and ends.

Ok, I don't remember why reading that one gave me the impression that he had written more than two autobiographies, but maybe he was referencing his other non-fictions.

Going back to message #143 Four & Twenty Blackbirds Pie Book, I made the Maple Buttermilk Custard Pie last night and it's pretty good with a light mapley flavor and a sturdy cornmeal crust. It's a lot like a maple flavored Greek yogurt actually, as it's mildly sweet and has a cup of both sour cream and buttermilk, along with butter. It wasn't until after I'd made it that I realized how calorie-dense it must be, because all I saw were the words "Maple Custard". It's pretty good though and mine turned out looking just like the photo in the book.

I ordered the cookbook and it should be delivered today - can't wait! Am planning on baking a pie over the holiday weekend, just not sure which one yet.

The one you made sounds delicious! Congrats on a successful pie.

Thanks, and I'm looking through to see what the next one will be! Let me know what your first choice is and how it turns out.

The chapter in Greedy Bastard Diary that I return to the most is the one where he talks about his friendship with George Harrison.

They did have a long friendship. And it's funny that a rock star was telling Idle to take his partying down a notch.

>149 mstrust:, >150 lkernagh: It definitely helps to get me there. It's about a 35 minute walk from where I live, so I need to replenish calories by the time I get there. ;)

I had the Black Bottom Oat the last time and it was yummy -- chocolate bottom with sweet (pecan pie like? filling) and and oatmeal cookieish top.

My other favorite Brooklyn institution is One Girl Cookies -- I LOVE their pumpkin whoopie pies.

I'm definitely going to have to get The Greedy Bastard Diary if there is a chapter about George Harrison.

I've seen the Four and Twenty Blackbirds pies at McNally-Jackson bookstore cafe, but none of the flavors I've seen look like anything I'd eat.

>160 ELiz_M: That's a very sensible way of looking at it. And I was looking at that Black Bottom recipe yesterday but I didn't have enough oats for it. It looks really good, like a pie version of the Hershey No-Bake cookies.
Yum, pumpkin whoopie pies.

>161 VioletBramble: Idle talks about Harrison throughout the book, so you get many short stories that include him. Definitely a good choice for a Harrison fan.
About the pie- I'm sorry, I didn't understand that.

55. A Comrade Lost and Found by Jan Wong. Asian Authors and Subjects. Wong is a Canadian journalist of Chinese heritage who has been a correspondent for many major newspapers around the world. But in the early seventies, just out of high school, she went to Beijing to continue her education at Beijing University. The Cultural Revolution was in full swing and Wong was a disciple. She was taught Mandarin, the official language, she did manual labor in a factory and in the fields, she was housed with the other, few, foreign students and potential friends were vetted, and in one instance, she ratted out a girl who asked for help getting to America. It's that action that brings Wong, now with a husband and two teenage sons, back to Beijing thirty-three years later, in hopes of finding the girl she wronged, or at least finding out what became of her, as she disappeared from school soon after Wong turned her in. With only a surname to go by, Wong tries to track down this woman in a city of millions, in a place where no one wants to remember what they did and what was done to them during the Revolution.

This story is not only about Wong's search for the person she turned in, but an inside look at how the Revolution worked under Chairman Mao and the Communist Party, and how China and Beijing have drastically changed in modern times with the country becoming "the factory of the world". Wong re-connects with friends, roommates and enemies from her university days in an attempt to track this girl, but leaves nearly each meeting feeling that a cover-up is in progress, turning this non-fiction into a mystery. I had a hard time putting this one down. 4.5 stars

Now that sounds good -- I've added it to my wish list.

I hope you like it too, Alison. I was surprised by the uneven reviews it gets on LT, as I thought nearly all the angles were interesting. Wong did a good job at keeping the focus on people rather than letting it seem like a faceless political party.

I read Jan Wong's Red China Blues when it came out years ago, and found it fascinating. She is a bit of a controversial figure here in Canada, but I can't remember why.

I've never heard of her before, but it looks like Red China Blues gets good reviews from others too.

Time to report back on my pie baking experience - made the Strawberry Balsamic pie yesterday and it was delicious! Need to work on the lattice aspect of the crust - not pretty at all, but at least it tasted good. Looking forward to trying more later this summer. Thanks again for mentioning the cookbook!

I'm glad your pie turned out well! Lattice is difficult- I've only done it once.
I made one of the recipes today, the lavender honey pie, but I had to leave out the lavender oil and candied buds as my husband wouldn't touch it with those things in it. Too exotic. So it's just a honey pie, which has a more complex flavor than I expected as the baking brings out notes in the honey that don't show up when it's raw.

I never would have considered strawberry and balsamic as a flavour blend in a pie... I am most intrigued! I cannot make a pie crust if my life depended upon it. It always comes out dense as opposed to light and flaky. I think I overwork the dough.

I've never had it in a pie but I have had freshly made strawberry ice cream with balsamic drizzled on top, and it was delicious.
Before that maple pie last week, I hadn't made a pie crust in probably eight or nine years. And I once took a pie class, so I should know that it shouldn't be intimidating, but it still is.

I have a bottle of cinnamon-pear basalmic vinegar, which is delicious drizzled on good vanilla ice cream.

With pie crust, I find that the more hurried and distracted I am, the better the crust turns out. Maybe something to do with not overworking the dough?

That could be it; the more you work it the warmer it gets so you end up with a less flaky texture. But I usually just unroll it quickly from the package. ;)

I found that following their directions really helped me with the pie crust. I even refrigerated it overnight which made it nice and easy to roll out the next day. Next up is freezing some dough so that I can make a pie later without it being a two day process.

Good thinking. I put the cornmeal crust in the fridge for just two or three hours because I wanted the pie for dessert that night, but it turned out great. And I picked up the tip of poking the fork on the sides of the crust to prevent bubbling.

56. The Black Tower by P.D. James. British Female Authors. After his release from the hospital, Dalgliesh travels to a country facility for invalids to visit an old family friend, the on-staff priest. He arrives too late, as Father Baddeley died recently and has already been buried, leaving Dalgliesh his books in his will. But the priest isn't the only recent death, as a wheelchair-bound patient threw himself off a cliff just days before Dalgliesh's arrival. The two deaths prompt the Commander, who has decided to quit the police, to keep asking questions even though he hates what he's doing.
I believe this is the sixth of the series about the reluctant, poetry writing detective. It's almost a And Then There Were None plot, with a home out on the edge of the sea, and a small cast of characters in constant contact because of the near-isolation, but unable to leave, and nearly all the staff members with a motive.3.5 stars

57. I Suck At Girls by Justin Halpern. Humor. A second book by Halpern, author of the book and twitter called Sh*t My Dad Says. This time it's a collection of essays about trying to find a girl who likes him. It begins with his non-stop harassment of the little girl who sits next to him in second grade, to stealing porn from homeless men, traveling all the way to Ibiza for a two-day bender that ends in an emergency room and finally to the weird situation at a Halloween party when he begins dating the woman he would later marry. I thought this one was funnier than his first book. 3.5 stars

58. Hidden Britain by Tom Quinn. Everything Else. A big book of color photography and text of the history for hundreds of houses, churches, follies or interesting spots that aren't well-known or often visited. Good recommendations for seeing things that won't be so crowded. Sorry, no cover image.4 stars

59. The National Trust: Historic Interiors by Andreas Von Einsiedel. Everything Else. I read lots of books about historical houses, and most will give a beautiful photo of the exterior of a house, and if you're lucky, one interior pic. This book is the opposite, with big color photos of the inside of a home, which because they belong to the National Trust, are often grand mansions full of artwork, statues, carved wooden walls and marble fireplaces. It's all beautiful. 4.5 stars

And that makes eleven in my Everything Else category, so that's two down.

Keep talking about pies! I'm tasting them vicariously from here :)

I'm afraid it will be awhile before I'm making pies again- we're at 110 degrees this week and it won't get any better til October. I leave my oven off as much as possible during our six months of summer, cooking with the crockpot, microwave and grill. Or not at all, making all kinds of salads.
But it's now ice cream making season.

Totally understand - we're in the upper 90's and as soon as summer hits we try to use the oven as little as possible too. I am hoping that once my newly insulate remodeled house might make things cooler so I can use it some. I'd hate for all those nice fruit based pies to not get made.

It would be a tragedy, hee! I'll have to keep myself busy practicing homemade coconut or cinnamon chocolate ice cream.

60. Waiter Rant by Steve Dublanica. First Hand Accounts. For several years the author was the anonymous "Waiter" of a blog about the life of a restaurant server, which is when this book was written (he's no longer anonymous), and before that he was a seminary student and worked in the mental health field. He writes about paranoid owners who install cameras to watch his employees and pay some a little extra to rat out their co-workers, about waitstaff who gravitate to the job because of the quick cash, and customers, often drunk, who treat the employees like servants. It's not all bad and Dublanica also talks about good people, but the bad gets more attention.
A really interesting read, aside from the times the author gets philosophical. 4 stars

Good to see Waiter Rant get four stars since I have it on Mt. TBR!! :)

I hope you like it, Eva. I remembered hearing about it when it came out, but I saw the author on tv not long ago discussing how waiters get even with rude customers.

61. The Getaway by Jim Thompson. Authors I Like. Doc McCoy has set up the perfect bank heist: he gets two associates to do the dirty work and bring him the money, then they pick up Doc's wife and hole up in the middle of nowhere until things cool off. The robbery goes off as planned, but Doc underestimated just how violent and resilient the pie-headed Rudy could be. He also never anticipated the day when he couldn't trust his beloved wife, a woman he'd plucked from the library.

A good, solid noir. I'd like to see how Peckinpah handled this with his movie version. 4 stars

I need some help. Yesterday I pulled up LibraryThing on my husband's phone and must have hit a button/bar, because it changed my "My Posts", "My Groups" and all the other home options to include all the interactions I've had over the years on LT. In other words, it isn't what's going on now, it's filled the columns with the discussions from 4-5 years ago. Any ideas?

Just stopped by to mention that I saw on the news that Rik Mayall had passed away. I thought about your Young Ones thread.

>188 mstrust: - this was happening on my home page as well and I hadn't changed anything. Threads I had starred in 2009 were popping up. I un- starred them. Then I clicked through all the headings---my groups, my posts, etc-- and it seemed to correct itself.

>189 VioletBramble: that was one of the thoughts that crossed my mind too when I saw the news. That and how did he manage to cram that much into life and only be 56. Very sad.

It's very sad. We should all do something inappropriate in memoriam.

Oh no. I had not heard of it. Too young.

Here's the scoop:
http://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-27770266

Very sad.

>189 VioletBramble: Thanks, Violet, for the news and the suggestion.
It hasn't worked yet. I've clicked on the "settings" and so forth, but there doesn't seem to be a way to change the dates.

>190 Helenliz: He was an energetic guy. All that bouncing around he did during his stand-up always reminded me of a hyperactive child.

>191 RidgewayGirl: Thanks for posting that pic. The Young Ones will always be my favorite Mayall role. It would be great to have some kind of memorium. I'll put some clips. And of course, if you have more pics or clips, you're very welcome to post them here.

Here's a good start. It's The Young Ones with Cliff Richard:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gGOU0o9K89g

I couldn't let that invitation pass without a Flashheart clip. I never watched the Young Ones - I was just a bit too young when that started (and we didn't have a TV), but Flash is a character you can't help loving, even though you know you ought to hate him.

And I couldn't resist another one. I can imagine a certain turn of mind finding that puerile and offensive, but it makes me snigger every time.

The first thing that popped into my head was Rick cramming on the train on the way to University Challenge and trying to read "Crop Rotation in the 14th Century." I'm shocked to hear this news. Fifty-six is far too young.

>196 Helenliz: & 197 Those are great clips of him. Love his answer to Hugh Laurie in the second one!

>198 rabbitprincess: that clip is under my "Crop Rotation" non-fiction heading at the very top of this thread. I had to include it because I love a good Rik hissy fit.

And in case you want some Rik reading, he co-wrote Bachelor Boys: The Young Ones Book, which I bought all those years ago in London and still love. He also wrote an autobiography full of hilarious stories called Bigger Than Hitler, Better Than Christ.

Mayall was a huge loss. I loved Adrian Edmonson's statement: "There were times when Rik and I were writing together when we almost died laughing. They were some of the most carefree stupid days I ever had, and I feel privileged to have shared them with him. And now he’s died for real. Without me. Selfish b*****d."

I thought that quote was perfect too.

Here's another great bit from Mayall, his pre-Young Ones Kevin Turvey.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=84XbjYS3XLc

He did a Famous Five parody with Adrian Edmonston and Jennifer Saunders (among others, including Robbie Coltrane). It's really funny. Part one is here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xUo4-SwSdyM

I just watched Drop Dead Fred with the kids, and listened to his reading (on Jackanory) of George's Marvellous Medicine.

I remembered that Famous Five parody from years ago, though I have to say, that not having a clue what the Famous Five were, most of it went over my head at the time.

I think he narrated several audiobooks, so I need to find them. I've had the version of "Jesus Christ Superstar" that he appeared in in my Netflix queue for a long time, so I need to bump it up.

A great bit from my favorite episode. With the Kevin Turvey character you can see the beginnings of TYO Rik, that arrogant geek with delusions of grandeur.

Come see me at my new one!