Just for once, I’d like to see the “Chosen One” is actually “chosen” to be the new Dark Lord. 
You mean, like Anakin Skywalker?
Just finished John Scalzi’s The God Engines. A very weird sf book with some interesting things to say about faith, technology and slavery. Much bloodier and violent than his other work, and with hardly a trace of his usual humor, but worth a read.
I’ve begun an audiobook of Ernest Hemingway’s 1926 novel The Sun Also Rises, a fictionalized account of his years as a struggling writer in Paris between the wars. William Hurt is the reader and does the different characters’ voices well. His pronunciation of French individual and place names is also, to my untrained ear, smoothly fluent.
I’m almost done with the sad and gorgeous novel All the Light We Cannot See, by Anthony Doerr. I knew going in that any book is set in France in the late 30s through the mid 40s meant that things were not going to go well for any of the characters, which is predictably depressing. It’s an amazing book, though. Beauifully written and intensely visual which is interesting and effecting because the main character is blind. And awesome.
Finished Four Past Midnight, a collection of four Stephen King novellas. It was okay, but I expected better based on what I’d heard. My favorite was probably the fourth one, The Sun Dog, about a boy who gets a Polaroid Sun 660 for his birthday, and no matter where you point the camera, it keeps taking photos of a very large and mean-looking dog who looks more ready to attack the photographer with each picture.
Yesterday started Washington: A Life, by Ron Chernow. Enjoying it. I never knew anything about Washington’s early years. With this and his Alexander Hamilton, I think Chernow has become one of my favorite historians.
I haven’t finished ANY of the books upthread that I said I was reading. sigh
Instead:
Too Many Crooks Spoil the Broth, by Tamar Myers. Cozy mystery. It’s very funny, and I remember enjoying books from this series in the past, but it just felt like it was trying too hard and I wanted everyone to drop dead.
The Death of the Necromancer, by Martha Wells. Wells is really good. I’m a fangirl at this point. This isn’t really spectacular, though it is good, but she’s just so reliably solid.
At the Bride Hunt Ball, by Olivia Parker. A fairly run of the mill romance. Probably a bit more humor than most.
Sounder, by William H Armstrong. Newbery. An effective, depressing book with a narrative gimmick (no one has names except the dog) that works but is also troubling in some ways.
I just finished The Patriots by Sana Krasikov. Thoroughly absorbing and well written. It’s about an American woman who immigrates to the Soviet Union in the 1930s. Also about her son and grandson, and their lives in the USSR, the US, and contemporary Russia. Some aspects of the novel seemed to strain credibility from a historical standpoint but I would definitely recommend it.
I have begun Eggshells by Caitriona Lally. Not read enough yet to draw any conclusions.
Agreed. Both books are excellent. Someday I’ll read his prize-winning Titan, about John D. Rockefeller.
I am reading Revolutionary Summer, by Joseph Ellis, whom I really enjoy. There are some fine quotes in the book about the Summer of 1776. Describing the delegates to the Continental Congress:“They knew what they were against but they did not know what they were for.” And John Adams’ comment to Abigail on the battle for New York: “In general, our generals were out-generalled.”
About a week ago I finished Laura Lippman’s Wilde Lake. My overwhelming feeling upon finishing it was “meh.” I struggle to even summarize the plot in my own words, but I will say that I definitely don’t agree with Amazon’s description of it being “a modern twist on To Kill a Mockingbird”! It wasn’t badly written, or something I had to force myself to finish, but I think the main draw for me were the chapters set in Columbia, MD, in the early '70s. I grew up near there, and am only 1 year younger than the narrator, so the “memory lane” aspect was entertaining. But the action constantly shifted between the '70s and the present day, and I found neither storyline to be very compelling. I wouldn’t call it bad, but I won’t seek out anything else by Lippman without a strong recommendation.
I read my Kindle sample of Craig Carlson’s Pancakes in Paris – the story of the Breakfast in America restaurants in Paris that Dendarii Dame mentioned upthread – but I wasn’t interested enough to buy the book/keep reading after finishing the sample. There’s a Breakfast in America location very close to the hotel I’ll be staying in at the end of September, though, and I intend to check it out. 
I have returned to my comfort zone, and am currently reading David Baldacci’s The Target: #3 in the Will Robie (CIA hitman) series. It’s a few years old, but #5 is coming out in November and I’m trying to catch up before then.
This was in my Goodreads deals this morning.
Ha! 
I know others enjoy her and liked this book, so I definitely wouldn’t say “don’t bother.” I just wasn’t impressed.
It doesn’t sound like my genre of choice anyway. I was just amused.
New thread! ZOMBIES!!!