Books Read 2014

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A nonny mouse
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by A nonny mouse »

A nonny mouse wrote:
Carpet_pissr wrote:
A nonny mouse wrote:( I agree with Carpet_pissr "Children" is a realy good book).
Just to clarify, I haven't read "Children" yet...still deciding whether I will or not, or skip it and just read Ender's Shadow instead.
Sorry. I meant speaker for the dead.

And I read Ender's shadow way back when just after i read Ender's game (I thought it was the next book in the "main" storyline). I really liked it because it told the story from Bean's viewpoint
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YellowKing
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by YellowKing »

I haven't quite finished it yet. but wanted to post because it's such a captivating read.

Abominable Science! Origins of the Yeti, Nessie, and Other Famous Cryptids by Daniel Loxton and Donald R. Protherto.

I've always been fascinated by cryptozoology, Bigfoot, Nessie, etc. and this book will totally crush the dreams of anyone who holds out hope these fanciful creatures might actually exist. Through embarrassingly simple logical arguments, Loxton and Protherto explore the origins of the myths, debunk the most compelling evidence, and explain how such legends made the leap from imagination to million-dollar monster hunts.

What I enjoyed the most was finding out how some of the basic tenets of the Nessie and Bigfoot lore have been proven untrue or largely discredited. Think some of those "big" cases are still unexplained, leaving scientists scratching their heads? Think again.

Like Sagan's The Demon Haunted World, this is must-read material for the skeptic. However, don't expect a preachy tome of condescension. Loxton was a boyhood fanatic of all things cryptozoologic, and his love for the creatures, despite his conclusions, shines through in his writing.

This book led me to just go ahead and delete all the episodes of Finding Bigfoot I had on the DVR, but the story of how these things crossed into mainstream culture may be more interesting than the creatures themselves.
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by McNutt »

WYBaugh wrote:
McNutt wrote:
WYBaugh wrote: Read it in 2013. Excellent book that I highly recommend.
Looking back I see that it was your recommendation in the 2013 thread that got me to purchase the book. Much appreciated.
Sweet! I'm glad some of my posts can help. Have you checked out Blood Song? Amazingly good read for a book that was originally self-published.
Just bought it. The reviews are great. Thanks for the heads up!
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by Brian »

"Don't believe everything you read on the internet." - Abraham Lincoln
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by Jeff V »

Limbus, Inc. by Jonathan Maberry, Joseph Nassise, Anne C. Petty (Editor) :binky: :binky: :binky: :binky: :binky: :binky:

Multiple authors writing short stories to the same parameters is nothing new. I was a big fan of the "Thieves World" books back in the day. Up and coming sci-fi/horror publisher JournalStone turned some of its stable of authors loose on a simple concept: an employment agency where anything goes.

The result is not quite as structured as I would have liked; there probably needs to be a few more parameters defining the state of the world. Other than that, the stories created were all interesting. While Limbus recruiters really do match employees to their talent and desires -- in one story, a college drop out was given a well-paid dog-walking job. But all have a catch, involving either the occult or sci-fi aliens.

Most of the folks getting jobs are in desperate straits. They sign a contract without reading the fine print, and then might find themselves slaughtering alien cattle for an insatiable alien princess. The candidates move from very mundane jobs to far more than they bargained for (and yet possess precisely the right aptitude to accomplish the job). The aforementioned dog walker even winds up pitted against another Limbus employee -- an assassin hired to kill the alien the dog walker is working for.

My only real complaint is how quickly these newly employed accept a world suddenly turned on its ear by the likes of aliens and demons. But then again, these are short stories. And I hope JournalStone continues with another volume, perhaps like Thieves World, giving us updates on some of the characters we met in this book.
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Pyperkub
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by Pyperkub »

Pyperkub wrote:Finished:

Red Seas under Red Skies (Locke Lamora #2) - not sure how into this I am. It hasn't grabbed me like the first one yet. - Update after finishing - meh. Middle 3rd of Piracy was ok, but on the whole the caper didn't matter at all to me, and while the rogue-ish charm of Locke and Jean is still there, the parts I liked best about the first (Bondsmage conflict/resolution and Crooked Warden ideal/ideas) were mostly missing. Not sure if I'll read #3. Have to look at reviews and wait for the price to become reasonable.

Currently Reading:

Haven't decided yet.
Bump for finish of Red Seas/Skies. Meh. Suspect that more fun is in book 3 and that this entire book could be skipped without losing anything. Finished with a lame cliffhanger, which was very disappointing as the first one tied up all of its loose ends well. The writing was very uneven as well and most of the characters (especially anything resembling an antagonist) were very forgetful and uninspiring.
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by disarm »

Last year's accomplishments...nine novels and two autobiographies. While that's fewer books than previous years, I think the number of pages may be comparable thanks to the length of each book in my reading of almost half the Wheel of Time series last year. Most of this year will probably be spent on finishing the WoT, but I do plan on working some others in along the way...


Finished

A Crown of Swords (The Wheel of Time - Book Seven) - Robert Jordan -January 20
The Path of Daggers (The Wheel of Time - Book Eight) - Robert Jordan - March 6
Winter's Heart (The Wheel of Time - Book Nine) - Robert Jordan - May 13


In Progress

Crossroads of Twilight (The Wheel of Time - Book Ten) - Robert Jordan
Last edited by disarm on Sun May 18, 2014 9:09 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by Rumpy »

So just a few days ago, I finished Encounter with Tiber by Buzz Aldrin and John Barnes last night. Wow! I enjoyed it all the way through and felt it was one of the most compelling sci-fi stories I've read, and I've read a lot. This one easily became one of my all-time favourites. I haven't felt this moved by a sci-fi story in some time.
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by YellowKing »

Updated my post on Page 1. I've been working through quite a lot of non-fiction this year. Part of the reason is that I've been taking the kids to the library more often, and I can't leave there without nabbing an interesting book or two. Got two I'm working on next - Monster of Florence by Douglas Preston which is about a serial killer and Preston's investigation into the mystery, and another one about the golden age of magic.

I've also been trying to read books I've had on my bookshelf for (in some cases) years that I've never read. So you'll see a pretty eclectic mix of stuff in my reading log here shortly.

Also, while I haven't been able to keep my 100 page a day pace that was part of my New Year's challenge, I have been trying to average at least a book a week. I'll be happy if I can finish up the year with 50 under my belt.
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by Jeff V »

Wow, you actually GO to the library? The only time I ever went to the library in my town was to pick up my library card -- I check out ebooks or audiobooks from the privacy of my own phone.

I fully expect libraries to be thoroughly obsolete by the time my baby would need to use one.
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by hitbyambulance »

i go to the library at least once a week. i can't stand listening to audiobooks and i'd rather have the physical hard-copy book than the e-text. mainly, i go for music CDs - i get new releases there on a regular basis.
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by YellowKing »

JeffV wrote:Wow, you actually GO to the library? The only time I ever went to the library in my town was to pick up my library card -- I check out ebooks or audiobooks from the privacy of my own phone.
There are only two reasons we really go:

1. It's about 2 minutes from my house.
2. They have a really good children's section with lots of puzzles and art centers, and my daughter loves going in there. Free kid entertainment - yes, please!
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by McNutt »

Little kids love libraries. In talking LOVE.
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by WYBaugh »

Finished Heroes Die by Matthew Stover

Ok, the wiki says it better than I can:
The novels are set in a future dystopia Earth where a parallel world called Overworld reminiscent of the worlds featured in post-Tolkien secondary world fantasy has been discovered. The corporations that run Earth send actors into Overworld in order to provide the masses of an overcrowded world with virtual-reality entertainment.

Hari Michaelson is a famous Actor and son of a now-mentally ill libertarian professor. On Overworld, he is the assassin Caine, while his estranged wife Shanna is another Actor playing the mage Pallas Ril. In this world Actors are people who travel to Overworld through advanced technology and assume an alternate persona which they then use to carry out 'adventures'. Pallas is captured by Ma'elKoth, the Emperor of Overworld's human kingdom of Ankhana on one of her adventures. Ma'elKoth's plan to rule Ankhana by wiping out a final resistance group, is blocked by a spell that causes others to forget the existence of the resistance group's members. The remainder of the book plays out the conflict between Ma'elKoth, Caine and the resistance. Hari finds himself manipulated by both the powers on Overworld and the Studio on Earth, and must defeat them both in order to save himself and Pallas Ril from death.
The book was entertaining but not great. If I had been reading it rather than listening (I tend to be more lenient when listening) I would have probably stopped midway through. This is the type of book where the author comes up with a very convoluted plan that only the main character knows and somehow it all works out in the end.
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by Carpet_pissr »

YellowKing wrote:
JeffV wrote:Wow, you actually GO to the library? The only time I ever went to the library in my town was to pick up my library card -- I check out ebooks or audiobooks from the privacy of my own phone.
There are only two reasons we really go:

1. It's about 2 minutes from my house.
2. They have a really good children's section with lots of puzzles and art centers, and my daughter loves going in there. Free kid entertainment - yes, please!
Same.

And sometimes, especially for kids books, they only have a hard copy, not a digital copy. I have no doubt though that in 15 years, the library will have much less physical "inventory" than they do today. It's all going to be about digital copies going forward.
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by McNutt »

WYBaugh wrote:
McNutt wrote:
WYBaugh wrote: Read it in 2013. Excellent book that I highly recommend.
Looking back I see that it was your recommendation in the 2013 thread that got me to purchase the book. Much appreciated.
Sweet! I'm glad some of my posts can help. Have you checked out Blood Song? Amazingly good read for a book that was originally self-published.


I'm halfway through Blood Song and am really enjoying it.
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by Jeff V »

The Twelve by Justin Cronin :binky: :binky: :binky: :binky:

Upon reading book two of The Passage trilogy, my recommendation to author Justin Cronin remains the same: get an editor, or at least seek medical help for diarrhea of the typewriter (I don't care if nobody uses typewriters anymore -- the affliction is what it is). The action at the end of The Passage left me hopeful that we hit the action phase of this story, but Cronin sends us reeling into back stories for characters we don't really care about, and in excruciating detail. I kept wanting to yell, "GET ON WITH IT ALREADY!"

I would have much rather heard more about "The Twelve", original virals, each with a following of turned former humans. What did they think? What were there goals? How did their background affect their current behavior? They are all criminals, that we know. Well, except for Amy. And she's part of the 12 only because one was killed in the first book.

After all of the slow development of the main plot, the climax seemed rushed. We know a little about some of the 12, but not all. People I had hoped perished in the final battle sadly did not, and Cronin drones on about them setting about mundane lives. But not for one of them...one character, abused during the story, is telepathically anointed as the spark to ignite book three.

I really think a good editor could have tightened up this story to make it more of a page turner. It took me several months to get through The Passage, only because I kept losing interest. This time, it was a time-limited audiobook from the library that forced me to get through it in a few weeks. Probably when book 3 comes out, I'll put myself through this torture again...after all, I've invested so much time into it. Whereas Peter Jackson took a relatively short book, The Hobbit, into three movies (and in the end with extended editions, no less), I could see a director squeeze this trilogy into a single 2 hour movie.
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by Godzilla Blitz »

Finished Divergent, because my ten-year-old daughter was raving about the book and wants to go see the upcoming movie. I actually enjoyed it quite a bit, although it was much darker than I anticipated. Felt a lot like the mood in Hunger Games. Some of the adolescent themes were a little tiring, but on the whole I'm glad I read it, and I scored points with my daughter. We're planning to go to the midnight opening when the movie is released. Good stuff.

Original post updated as well.
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by The Meal »

Updated my post with this review:

Non–fiction
How to Be a Poker Player: The Philosophy of Poker Haseeb Qureshi (Amazon)
This is from my least favorite genre of poker strategy, "soft" strategy, which mostly discusses mental issues or frameworks to adjust your mindsets when playing or learning. That said, it's easily the best of the bunch from what I've read. The author makes assumptions about the reader (i.e., that you are in your early-to-mid 20's playing online poker) when giving advice (and much of this advice is more in the lifestyle department, how you should eat, exercise, sleep, etc.) and shows a general lack of life experience on many topics. However, when focused on the act of participating in and studying poker the advice is solid. The author is a good writer, which helps. I can't give an unqualified recommendation, but if you struggle with mental aspects of playing poker or if you can't form a mindset for learning new topics (poker-related or otherwise), this book won't hurt. A ding against the author is his participating in one of the online scandals from recent memory, so it'll be difficult to find reviews or discussions of the book that are divorced from that topic.
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by Jaddison »

Just finished Thank You for Your Service by David Finkel.

This told the story of several soldiers trying to deal with PTSD and how it impacts the lives of everyone around them. Also covers a bit about the inner workings of how the Army has and is trying to address the problem.

Good book but very disturbing. Hard to believe these guys fought a wars that lasted longer than WWII and WWI combined. But because there was direct intent to not make the country as a whole sacrifice to fight these wars the people who fought in them are sort of afterthoughts or at least that is how it seems. With no draft of any kind many of these people did multiple tours and often back to back.

I highly recommend reading the book but it will leave you drained.
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by Jag »

I liked the Passage, but it was way too long. I keep forgetting it's a trilogy.
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by Jeff V »

Jag wrote:
I liked the Passage, but it was way too long. I keep forgetting it's a trilogy.
Cronin has a bad problem with overdeveloping characters that I still don't care about. The action scenes are good, it just takes a painfully long time to get there.
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by Torfish »

Godzilla Blitz wrote:Finished Divergent, because my ten-year-old daughter was raving about the book and wants to go see the upcoming movie. I actually enjoyed it quite a bit, although it was much darker than I anticipated. Felt a lot like the mood in Hunger Games. Some of the adolescent themes were a little tiring, but on the whole I'm glad I read it, and I scored points with my daughter. We're planning to go to the midnight opening when the movie is released. Good stuff.

Original post updated as well.
My fifteen yr old daughters also are wanting me to read the Divergent series. Glad to know it is worth the read. It is a very popular series right now. Our small town local library has 50 people on the waiting list (hold list) for the third book.
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by Zarathud »

Divergent has better characters and concepts than Hunger Games but the last book in each trilogy suffers.
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by McNutt »

Blood Song

WYBaugh recommended this one and I loved it. A kid is given to a religious order that trains him and other children to be fighters for the order. Things are not always what they appear and everyone has their own secrets. This is the first in a series and I will get the next instalment as soon as it's released.
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by WYBaugh »

McNutt wrote:Blood Song

WYBaugh recommended this one and I loved it. A kid is given to a religious order that trains him and other children to be fighters for the order. Things are not always what they appear and everyone has their own secrets. This is the first in a series and I will get the next instalment as soon as it's released.
I'm glad you enjoyed it and I've trying to get the word out on it. What's next on your list?
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by WYBaugh »

WYBaugh wrote:
McNutt wrote:Blood Song

WYBaugh recommended this one and I loved it. A kid is given to a religious order that trains him and other children to be fighters for the order. Things are not always what they appear and everyone has their own secrets. This is the first in a series and I will get the next instalment as soon as it's released.
I'm glad you enjoyed it and I've trying to get the word out on it. What's next on your list?
If you're not sick of the genre this new book is worth a look at too The Grim Company by Luke Scull
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by McNutt »

I'm reading The Turn of the Screw right now, but might switch to Black Prism by Brent Weeks when I'm done. Do you have anything else for me? Your recommendations carry a lot of weight with me.
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by WYBaugh »

McNutt wrote:I'm reading The Turn of the Screw right now, but might switch to Black Prism by Brent Weeks when I'm done. Do you have anything else for me? Your recommendations carry a lot of weight with me.
I quoted myself above but I read this after Blood Song and really enjoyed it. Has a lot of action going on without being overwhelming:

The Grim Company by Luke Scull

I hope you like it!
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by Jeff V »

The Dead Lands by Rick Hautala :binky: :binky: :binky: :binky:

I don't commonly read this genre, and the author didn't ring a bell. After reading the book, I looked him up on Wikipedia and discovered he had died about a year ago at age 63. This book was apparently the first in an intended series, but complete none the less. What shocked me most is that Rick Hautala was rather celebrated in his genre. Even though the book was about teenage ghosts, it really didn't need to read as if it was written by a teenager.

One girl, dead over 100 years, rises in ghost form from the grave to greet another recently dead girl about her own age. The second girl comes to terms with her being dead rather readily. Abby, 100 years a ghost teen, becomes her guide in "the dead lands", a sort of purgatory inhabited by reapers who escort recently deceased up or down as the case might be. Abby is unsure why she is still there, and a demon from her past, a preacher uncle, torments her when given the opportunity. That thread is never resolved in the book.

Megan, the recently dead girl, is the victim of a rather weak murder mystery. The ghosts pretty much make sure the mystery is never a head-scratcher, we know pretty early on who did it and why. They manage to contrive events in the land of the living so the perp doesn't get away with the crime. That they could do so in of itself was a contrivance, and "foreshadowing" by having Abby constantly say "I'll tell you about that later" gets tedious, quickly.

There's no indication that this book was written to target an adolescent audience, but I can't imagine adult readers being very engaged in the story. While I was saddened to hear the author is no longer with us, I would not have been surprised to learn he was exceptionally young. I'm not really interested in reading any more of his books, but I'll allow for the possibility that he intentionally wrote this for a very young audience.
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by paulbaxter »

My New Year's resolution was simply to keep track of the books I've read during the year. I always read quite a bit, but I don't keep any sort of records, then I don't end up remembering or sharing what I read. I decided to do index cards for each book and then report on them each month. So here's my January, in no particular order:

A World Undone, by G.J. Meyer

Probably one of the finest one volume overviews of WWI available. Meyer had a wonderful solution to the problem of dealing with all of the background historical issues of the war, which was to put short "interlude" chapters between the chapters on the course of the war. These began with the story of Franz Ferdinand and went on to things like an overview of the Ottoman Empire, Rasputin, and even one on war poetry. Someone new to WWI studies would be encourage to follow up with more detailed or critical works on specific areas, such as Niall Ferguson's excellent The Pity of War. Highly recommended.

Teen Proofing, by John Rosemond

John Rosemond is my favorite author on parenting issues, and he's without a close second. This particular book deals, obviously, with issues surrounding raising teenagers. Rosemond is very big on the concept of responsibility, so one the the main ideas here is that teenagers are and should be considered responsible for their own decisions. Part of what this means is that a) they will make bad decisions and b) those decisions are not your fault as a parent. The focus, then, is the subtitle of the book: "fostering responsible decision making in your teenager." Some of the book deals with how that should begin during the early and middle childhood years. Much of the book is Q&A from parents dealing with various issues with their teenagers. Very highly recommended.

Hospital, by Julia Salamon

I picked this one up to get a little background before beginning nursing school. Salamon spends a year at Moses Maimonides hospital in Brooklyn. It's a very fast paced, very multi-cultural hospital. One of the big things I picked up was a statement from on of the doctors that the fact that a patient doesn't speak English should be considered a risk factor on the level of other very serious risk factors. Communication barriers within a healthcare setting can be very serious. Recommended.

Deconstructing Theodicy, by David Burrell

This one is subtitled "Why the Book of Job has Nothing to Say to the Puzzle of Suffering." I attended a seminar on the book of Job a few years ago and found it very interesting. I also regularly hear questions specifically about the problem of evil and suffering, so I had high hopes that this book would be enlightening. It turned out to be a little too dry for my tastes (and I have a decent tolerance for dry books). Burrell seems to take the line that the book is more about the nature of men's relationship to God than it is about suffering and evil as such. I don't have any particular criticisms of his work other than the fact that I found it difficult going.

Focus, by Daniel Goleman

Did you know that you'll do better at something if you pay attention to what you're doing? If not, then you can thank me now for this nugget of wisdom. If you already knew that, then you really have no need to read this book. Waste of paper.

Beyond Belief, by Jenna Miscavige Hill

Ms. Hill's uncle is the person who took over the Scientology movement following the death of L. Ron Hubbard. She grew up entirely within Scientology, and thus provides a very intimate and detailed look inside. One of the things I learned is that there are basically three types of people associated with Scientology: seekers who are checking things out, getting their toes in the water; celebrities, the perpetual VIPs of the group; and insiders who do all of the physical and organizational work. Ms. Hill spent the majority of her life as an insider. This meant, for instance, putting in fours hours of heavy physical labor every morning before starting school (a school run on very odd principles, as you would expect). It also meant having very little contact with her own parents. Hubbard had been in the Navy, and structured his organization on military lines. This meant a very strict hierarchy where you lived and worked wherever your superiors said you would live and work, regardless of your family situation. Highly recommended.

The Crimson Petal and the White, by Michael Faber.

This is a big victorian novel stood on its head. Instead of being centered on wealthy Londoners dealing with issues of social upheaval, it centers on a prostitute (and one with a skin disease at that) who sets her eyes on rising to respectability. It's fairly dirty, so if you like that in a book, you'd probably enjoy this one (and the converse).

Brightest Heaven of Invention: A Christian Guide to Six Shakespeare Plays, by Peter Leithart

Peter Leithart is one of my favorite Christian authors, and I like Shakespeare, so I figured this was a no-brainer. However I ended up tabling this one. There's nothing wrong with it, per se, but it is written specifically as a text book for high school aged readers (with lots of exercises at the end of each chapter), so I'm going to put it back on the shelf until my kids are old enough to work through it.

Poor Economics: A Radical Rethinking of the Way to Fight Global Poverty, by Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo

The authors here look to approach various problems associated with poverty through an evidence based approach. They contrast the work of Jeffrey Sachs, on the one hand, who teaches that the poor face a big hump of various infrastructure problems which could be overcome by a concerted charitable commitment on a large scale, and William Easterly, on the other, who teaches that large scale solutions always tend towards failure for various reasons and that solutions need to stem from the poor themselves. Duflo and Banerjee put aside these positions and set up experiments regarding various specific issues (e.g. distribution of mosquito nets) to see what actually works and what doesn't. Their conclusions are complicated as each issue seems to have its own set of sub-issues which drive how we should think about development problems. Very highly recommended if you have any interest in international development problems.

Earthworks, by Brian Aldiss

A dystopian novel of overpopulation. The plot and characters didn't grab me in the slightest. Gave up on it, despite it being fair short.

The Sweet Hereafter, by Russell Banks

I saw the film based on this one many years ago and found it utterly heart breaking. As always, reading the novel is a very different experience, but in this case one just as good. Banks' characters are as beautifully drawn as any I can remember from any novel. Very highly recommended.
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El Guapo
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by El Guapo »

Finished Worm: The First Digital World War

This book is great. Mark Bowden (most famous for writing Black Hawk Down) is my favorite author, and I've loved all of his stuff (read The Killing right before this book), so it's not really a surprise. It's about the Conficker worm, which currently infects an estimated 9 million - 15 million computers world wide, creating a botnet of unprecedented size. The book focuses on a group of technies (who dubbed themselves the Cabal) who endeavor to contain the worm, and how incredibly difficult that is. Lots of interesting speculation about the origin of the worm, plus speculation about what it is for, given that it initially did nothing harmful and didn't clearly have a profit motive.

It also talks about the incredibly harmful potential of botnet worms, and their potential use as weapons of war by nation states and/or terrorism by individuals or groups.
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The Meal
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by The Meal »

Updated my post with this review:

Fiction
The Line (Witching Savannah, Book One) J.D. Horn (Amazon)
Quite possibly the worst piece of fiction I've ever completed. It's another targeted-to-juveniles book with a female protagonist, but this time in the witch-centric world of Savannah, Georgia. The author clearly has an interesting story in mind, but the way he advances the plot is jarring and when he seems to paint himself into the corner the ol' pocket-frannistan of writing gets whipped out. Despite that (or because of that), what are meant to be twists are not clever revelations for the reader. I wanted to loan this one to MHS, but even she refused to take this one from my Amazon lending library.
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paulbaxter
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by paulbaxter »

The Meal wrote:Updated my post with this review:

Fiction
The Line (Witching Savannah, Book One) J.D. Horn (Amazon)
Quite possibly the worst piece of fiction I've ever completed. It's another targeted-to-juveniles book with a female protagonist, but this time in the witch-centric world of Savannah, Georgia. The author clearly has an interesting story in mind, but the way he advances the plot is jarring and when he seems to paint himself into the corner the ol' pocket-frannistan of writing gets whipped out. Despite that (or because of that), what are meant to be twists are not clever revelations for the reader. I wanted to loan this one to MHS, but even she refused to take this one from my Amazon lending library.
Reminds me of some conversations I had back in college:
"This candy is terrible. Do you want some"
"Sure, OK...you're right, this IS terrible."
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The Meal
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by The Meal »

That's *exactly* it.
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Jeff V
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by Jeff V »

Hidden in Plain Sight: The Other People in Norman Rockwell's America by Jane Allen Petrick :binky: :binky: :binky: :binky: :binky:

I remember Norman Rockwell paintings from my youth -- both from his Saturday Evening Post covers, and his Boy Scouts Calendar. My impression of him for all these years has been as a white-bread advocate of an idealized Americana, and nothing more. To be fair, Rockwell himself had the same opinion of himself at one point.

After reading Jane Allen Petrick's book, however, I realize how off-base my opinion was. The credit is all hers...the focus on this book isn't simply stories about the people in Rockwell's paintings, as I expected...but instead, stories about minorities in particular. What I didn't realize, amongst all of the white bread imagery of suburban American, that Rockwell was very much a clandestine advocate of minority causes...something that wore on him as he got older and eventually led to terminating his contracts with some of his biggest cash cows.

Petrick meets with some of the minorities who, as children, posed for Rockwell for the staggering sum on $10-25 per session. Many have not gone on to live notable lives, and are somewhat put out by their status as a Rockwell model. Others are a little more embracing of this past, but none have exactly profited.

Thanks to this book, I have a lot more respect of what Norman Rockwell had to deal with in his professional career, and what he managed to accomplished by flipping the bird to the man. It is also heartwarming that he managed to inspire many minority artists in his wake. I really didn't expect this from the book -- I thought I was getting some stories about the people in the paintings, but I had no idea how significant this might be. Kudos to the author for discovering Rockwell's motives and then exposing them for us all to appreciate.
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xwraith
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by xwraith »

Gil's All Fright Diner :binky: :binky: :binky:

A fun, unserious romp through lovecraftian horror through the eyes of two good ol' boys, one a werewolf and the other a vampire.
I forgot to call it "a box of pure malevolent evil, a purveyor of
insidious insanity, an eldritch manifestation that would make Bill
Gates let out a low whistle of admiration," but it's all those, too.
-- David Gerard, Re: [Mediawiki-l] Wikitext grammar, 2010.08.06
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Godzilla Blitz
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by Godzilla Blitz »

Gosh, a six-hour flight turned into a 12-hour flight, three nights in a hotel room, and a return six-hour flight turned into a lot of reading:

The Happiness Trap
Crossing the Chasm: Marketing and Selling Disruptive Products to Mainstream Customers
Slow Getting Up: A Story of NFL Survival from the Bottom of the Pile
Ranger's Apprentice: The Burning Bridge

Happiness Trap was surprisingly good and useful. Crossing the Chasm will be helpful for work, although the Kindle version is outdated. Slow Getting Up could have used more editing, and is imminently forgettable. The Burning Bridge was quite good for YA Fantasy, and I'll push ahead with the series in a bit.
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by Jeff V »

A History of Warfare by John Keegan :binky: :binky: :binky: :binky: :binky: :binky:

Eminent Military Historian John Keegan does not endeavor to give us a chronology of wars and battles -- that has been done many times over by lesser authors. Instead, he begins with a look Clausowitz' On War, and expands on some of the German historian's fundamental concepts -- mostly that war is an extension of politics.

The course of the book is a winding one -- while there is some marching order through time, Keegan will often take an example from stone age through Classical through Medieval to modern -- discussing Rome at one moment, Napoleon the next. Why there are wars is as important as studying the wars themselves -- especially if we ever hope to evolve past them.

This book was written after the first Gulf war. In the 20 years since, I wonder what additional commentary Keegan might have. While "mutually assured destruction" might have helped avert a third world war during the second half of the 20th centuries, conventional was are as numerous now as they ever have been. While damaging to the societies of the combatants as a whole, motivation and driving force is often a cult of personality where the few stand to profit the most.
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Isgrimnur
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Re: Books Read 2014

Post by Isgrimnur »

He's got plenty of works after that one:
The Battle for History: Refighting World War Two (Vintage Canada, 1995) ISBN 0-679-76743-6
Warpaths (Pimlico, 1996) ISBN 1-84413-750-3
Fields of Battle: The Wars for North America (1997) ISBN 0-679-74664-1
War and Our World: The Reith Lectures 1998 (London: Pimlico, 1999) ISBN 0-375-70520-1
The Book of War (ed.) (Viking Press, 1999) ISBN 0-670-88804-4
The First World War (London: Hutchinson, 1998) ISBN 0-09-180178-8; (New York: Knopf, 1999) ISBN 0-375-40052-4
Winston Churchill (2002) ISBN 0-670-03079-1
Intelligence in War: Knowledge of the Enemy from Napoleon to Al-Qaeda (2003) ISBN 0-375-40053-2
The Iraq War (2004) ISBN 0-09-180018-8
Atlas of World War II (ed.) (London: Collins, 2006) ISBN 0-00-721465-0 (an update of the 1989 Times Atlas)
The American Civil War (London, Hutchinson, 2009) ISBN 978-0-09-179483-5
It's almost as if people are the problem.
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