Today I read Heartless, by H.G. Parry. I don’t care much about Peter Pan, but I’ve really enjoyed some books inspired by it, and this was no exception. Plus she’s a great writer. It’s quite a short book, but packs a wallop. Recommended.
Finished A Different Kind of Christmas, by Alex Haley, not recommended; and Is That a Fish in Your Ear? Translation and the Meaning of Everything, by David Bellos, which is okay if you’re very interested in the topic.
Next up: A Highland Christmas, by M. C. Beaton, and Let It Glow, by Marissa Meyer and Joanne Levy.
I am here today to recommend Robert Jackson’s Bennett The Tainted Cup with three words: Fantasy Nero Wolfe. I’m definitely reading the next book in the series.
I liked the first book very much, the second one… let’s say I’ll read the third (if there’s one) only in hopes that the second was some kind of outlier.
Finished listening to The Hunting Wives by May Cobb. I had watched the Netflix series and enjoyed that, so I read the book. Per usual, the book was better than the TV series. Recommended.
Just read
You Thought You Knew
By Kevin Federline.
It gave me another viewpoint on the whole Britney situation.
Since I can’t afford to buy books, I asked my library to order two books for me and they did!
Just finished both in 4 days.
The Dream
The Reveal.
Recommended.
Awaiting The Road Map.
I’m currently reading Kill the Beast by Serra Swift. It’s a fantasy novel about two incompatible people who must work together to take vengeance on a magical creature who has killed their loved ones. It’s not wonderfully well-written, and I despise the main character, but the quest holds my interest.
Finished A Highland Christmas, by M. C. Beaton, not recommended, and Let It Glow, by Marissa Meyer and Joanne Levy, which was okay.
Next up: Got Your Answers: The 100 Greatest Sports Arguments–Settled, by Mike Greenberg with Paul “Hembo” Hembekides, and The Language God Talks: On Science and Religion, by Herman Wouk.
The Buried City: Unearthing the Real Pompeii
Gabriel Zuchtriegel
The author, the current director of the site, describes some recent discoveries and ponders their meaning. Not a comprehensive description of the site, but more like a series of essays about a few aspects of Pompeii, especially art history.
Not really particularly interesting or well-written (or maybe not well translated).
Tigers Between Empires
A modern success story rescuing Siberian tigers from the brink of extinction.
Very engaging and long ranging…a few heart stoppers too.
The geo-political world then was better than now.
Currently reading The Place Where They Buried Your Heart, by Christina Henry. It’s a haunted house story, and has me riveted.
Finished Got Your Answers: The 100 Greatest Sports Arguments–Settled, by Mike Greenberg with Paul “Hembo” Hembekides, which was fun and would probably be enjoyed more by sports fans, which I’m not; and The Language God Talks: On Science and Religion, by Herman Wouk. This book is okay, but it’s all over the place, content wise. My favorite parts were about his writing life. The science in the book is well known to me from other places.
Next up: Tales of Time and Space, edited by Ross R. Olney; and The Amish Wedding and Other Special Occasions of the Old Order Communities, by Stephen Scott.
Still going, and still feeling the same.
Finished John McPhee’s Coming Into the Country, a 1976 nonfiction book about Alaska, its people, climate and challenges. It’s good but not great, I’d say. The most interesting part for me was about the expensive (and ultimately failed) effort to move the state capital from Juneau.
I’m now about two-thirds of the way through an audiobook of Ian McEwan’s latest novel, What We Can Know. It’s pretty engrossing. A literature professor in 2119 England tries to find a famous lost poem, only one copy of which ever existed, and which was read in public only once, at a 2014 dinner party hosted by the poet. The future history is interesting, too, if mostly bleak: global climate change has flooded most of the British Isles, several limited nuclear wars (including no fewer than three between the U.S. and China) have left lingering radiation in the environment, AI is depended upon by young people for all major life decisions, and the Nigerian Empire is the world’s sole superpower.