Treacle Walker, Alan Garner

 

Tracle Walker by Alan Garner was short listed for the Booker Prize

Started: 11/25/2023
Completed: 11/26/2023
Recommendation: Highly Recommended
Recommended By:  Nobody

Words for which I sought help:

ruckle -- compress or move (cloth or clothing) so that it forms a number of untidy folds or creases

Review:

This is a short story in the form of a Fairy Tale or Folk Tale.  I enjoyed how the author played with both time and place as well as tying in recurrent characters who helped place the story in one form of reality or another as well as one of the main characters who helped bridge the gap.  This story didn't make sense and it shouldn't.  I enjoyed, however, the playful made up words and the deeper philosophical concepts explored.

Iron Flame, Rebecca Yarros

 

Iron Flame by Rebecca Yarros is the second book in the Empyrean series.

Started: 11/19/2023
Completed: 11/25/2023
Recommendation: Mild Recommendation
Recommended By: Nobody

Review:

The soft port theme continues.  This one escalates from "struggle to survive" to "struggle to save the world."  *SPOILER* The return of Jack is unpleasant and not well explained.  The "will they won't they" continues to be annoying.  It feels like this book is a collection of cliches and I find that mildly annoying.  So, not certain I will read any more of this series.  Still, I have to admit that the concepts are good and some of the staging is excellent.  The dialog is stilted at best and check caresses combined with the ardent desires held at abeyance for the other is droll.  I just feel like this book would have been much better if there was more time on the way friendships form and less on the "need" for one another.  I almost laughed out loud at some of the dialog..."you are my gravity."  So, I can mildly recommend it if you can skip/get by the soft porn, oh, and the torture (which is not as graphic, thankfully, as it could have been).

Democracy Awakening, Heather Cox Richardson

 

Democracy Awakening:  Notes on the state of America by Heather Cox Richardson 'cause I read Letters From An American!

Started: 11/13/2023
Completed: 11/19/2023
Recommendation: Highly recommended
Recommended By: My mother, my sister J, my sister-in-law R

Review:

As usual, HCR brings historical context to events of the present day.  In a sense, however, that is the shortcoming of this book.  It is backward looking.  It would be nice to know how to awaken democracy rather than document that the awakening may be imminent and really important.  So, this book is not really action oriented, more contextual.

Sedition Hunters, Ryan J. Reilly

 

Sedition Hunters:  How January 6th broke the justice system by Ryan J. Reilly

Started: 11/9/2023
Completed: 11/13/2023
Recommendation: Highly Recommended
Recommended By: My Wife

Review:

My wife and I followed Reilly's reporting on Twitter when we were both on that platform.  Reilly is a journalist, so there is a small amount of retelling.  Given the myriad stories, however, this is closer to being actually helpful than it is annoying.  Reilly has done a very good job of mixing together the stories of individuals (those who perpetrated the insurrection, those who defended, and those who covered) so that if feels like the huge tapestry of that day, its precursors and its postlude are well laid out without spending a huge amount of time on well-covered personalties.

Collision of Power, Martin Baron

 

Collision of Power:  Trump, Bezos, and the Washington Post by Martin Baron

Started: 11/2/2023
Completed: 11/8/2023
Recommendation: Recommended
Recommended By: My Wife

Review:

Martin Baron is the former executive editor of the Washington Post.  This book was, therefore, much more about the Post then it was about anything else.  Bezos, as the owner, showed up and his foil, Trump, did as well.  More though, this book was about the culture of the Post and Baron's effort to keep an even hand.  From the book, it seems Baron despised both Trump and Clinton, so his politics were adequately hidden.  This book is written by a journalist and reads like that.  There are frequent explanations of the same topics throughout the book as though one has only read a chapter and not the book in its entirety.  This often happens in books by journalists who are used to constantly re-explaining the context of the current story with the group of larger stories that have graced the medium.  I really dislike that.  I also didn't particularly enjoy the remarkably defensive tone throughout the latter half of the book which is often Baron on Baron.  Overall, this was a decent book with a modern history of The Post as told by the one who crafted it.  I can recommend it, but it is not a read that grabbed me and it did not live up to its title.

The Fall of the House of Usher, Edgar Allan Poe

 

The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe is a short story I'm sure I read in school but cannot remember.

Started: 11/3/2023

Completed: 11/4/2023

Recommendation: Recommended

Recommended By: Nobody

Words for which I sought help:

cataleptical -- affected by or characteristic of catalepsy

prolix -- using or containing too many words; tediously lengthy

tarn -- a small mountain lake

Review:

I truly remembered nothing of this story.  It is mildly spooky, but as I read it, I kept imagining that it contained several excellent pieces that could be used for theater auditions.

The Tower of Fools, Andrzej Sapkowski

 

The Tower of Fools by Andrzej Sapkowski is the first book of the Hussite Trilogy.

Started:  3/28/2023
Completed: 11/3/2023
Recommendation: Not Recommended
Recommended By: Kobo

Words for which I sought help:

nolens volens -- whether a person wants or likes something or not

Review:

This was such a hard book to read!  Italicized quotations in several different languages went untranslated--I was constantly looking up Latin phrases.  One might argue that these didn't really matter to the book, but it feels like that conclusion is the author looking down at the reader.  The book was plodding and the plot was disjoint.  I truly didn't care about any of the characters.  Blech.

Mr. Texas, Lawrence Wright

 

Mr. Texas by Lawrence Wright because I need some comedy.

Started: 10/29/2023
Completed: 11/2/2023
Recommendation: Mild Recommendation
Recommended By: Nobody

Review:

A political book about Texas?  How is this not something like eating a bowl of vomit?  It is funny and that helps.  A lot.  The romance is weak and the recovery is weaker.  The political stuff had some merit and the effort to build a buffoon and then make him a real person worked reasonably well.  The lobbyist was, well, greasy, and that is what you expect.  The other personalities were all fairly weak including the protagonist who played the role of Mr. Smith going to Washington.  So, I don't have a lot to recommend it.  It wasn't like eating a bowl of vomit.