The Witchwood Crown, Tad Williams

 

The Witchwood Crown by Tad Williams is the first book  in the Last King of Osten Ard

Started: November 23, 2024
Completed: May 16, 2025
Recommendation: Highly recommended
Recommended By: Nobody, but I did read the first set of books in this series quite some time ago.  I have met the author at a book signing and brought all my copies of his books when I did meet him.  He was kind enough to sign them all and I really enjoyed talking with him.

Review:

It is with relief and a sense of homecoming that I have rejoined Osten Ard, once more in trouble and struggling to resolve issues likely beyond simple understanding.  As this book ended, I felt I was immediately ready to dive into the next!  It took me so long to read, however, as I had to take it out of the library several times in order to finish it and there were frequently long delays between holds.  It seems likely that I will need to purchase the next one.  I enjoy the richness of the races, the detail of this other world, and the growth and development of the characters.

Abundance, Klein and Thompson

 

Abundance:  How we build a better future by Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson

Started: May 9, 2025
Completed: May 12, 2025
Recommendation: Mild Recommendation
Recommended by: Nobody, I seem to be on an Ezra Klein kick

Review:

So, the thesis of this book seems to be:  create abundance and then we will live in abundance.  That is true.  The obstacles to abundance are, well, OK.  If regulations are relaxed, then it will be easier and faster to build, well, everything.  So, why not ease the regulations?  After all, some of them don't make sense, like, well, zoning.  Oh, and, also make it easier to get research grants and make those grants on high risk projects.  After all, nobody is going to abuse that funding.  So, this is the liberal agenda without any safe guards.  Or is it?  Is this the conservative agenda?

Experience has shown that easing regulations leads to abuse.  Now, taking bigger risk on research grants and making it easier to comply with the paperwork for a research grant makes some sense.  The problem is that whenever regulations are eased, there are abuses and the those abuses (for, say, construction or even research) have been seriously egregious.  There is a case to be made that private money can get this stuff done faster.  When it happens that way, though, we end up fires that take out Chicago or San Francisco.  We end up with sinking buildings in Florida and buildings/roadways that cannot survive an earthquake in LA.  We end up with mining tailings in the water and air so thick it cannot be breathed.  But just the relax the regulations.  Maybe the onerous ones that prevent industrial sites near schools (Love Canal anyone)?  Or the ones that govern how mines are managed (Centralia Pennsylvania)?

I get that there is a real problem with NIMBYism and I can see how regulations (particularly zoning laws) facilitate that.  This book, however, simply says that those regulations which make it hard to build stuff (like environmental impact studies) should just be removed.  So, yes, the building would move forward faster and cheaper, but the world would not be better for the effort.  Why not look at how to make environmental impact studies for efficient and faster?  Maybe more people working on the impact study would help?  Maybe there is a way to consider cascading impacts that could be handled by integrated assessment teams?  Maybe NIMBY can be solved by reducing the impact of the rich on government (hold meetings when everyone can attend like 2:00 on the weekend), require petitions with signatures to halt things (instead of some wealthy guy hitting up his friend on council), and require quality of life impacts that match the quality of life impact of completing the project (so reduced value of the neighborhood housing is not used to weigh against providing housing for more people).  I don't know, but it feels to me like the authors cherry picked some regulations that they don't like and decided that no regulations are good if they impact PROGRESS.

The Dream Hotel, Laila Lalami

 

The Dream Hotel by Laila Lalami

Started: May 4, 2025
Completed: May 9, 2025
Recommendation: Not recommended
Recommended By: I really enjoyed Conditional Citizens, so I thought I should give the author another try.

Review:

In this dystopian near future, constant monitoring of activity and even dreams leads to crime prevention by putting people in retention facilities prior to committing a crime.  These facilities are capriciously run by for-profit companies.  I really found it hard to constantly immerse myself in this environment.  I did not enjoy the experience nor find it enlightening (this kind of thing is already happening in our existing prison system).  The solution to the problem (instead of not being noticed, basically, be noticed for reasons the for profit doesn't like) seems pat and too quick.  I did not enjoy it.

A Brief History of Intelligence, Max Bennett

 

A Brief History of Intelligence:  Evolution, AI, and the five breakthroughs that made our brains by Max Bennett

Started: April 28, 2025
Completed: May 4, 2025
Recommendation: Recommended

Recommended By: Nobody

Review:

This book is what it says it is in the title.  I thought it might be a book skewed towards AI because it was written by Bennett, but it is not.  This book is far more skewed towards the evolution of intelligence and, more pointedly, toward the 5 major changes in that evolution that Bennett thinks led to modern intelligence.  Because Bennett is an AI expert and not an evolutionary biologist (or anyone who is an expert in the history of intelligence), I have decided to take his breakthroughs with a grain of salt.  In fairness, he makes a good case and he is motivated by his study of AI to do a good job in his analysis.  I could see a few obvious mistakes, but I also could feel his passion for the subject and that that made up for the issues.  There is nothing glaring and there is good reason to believe that this 5 breakthroughs are pretty reasonable tilting points (thinking of Gladwell) that led to modern intelligence.  My ignorance of the field overall makes it difficult for me to claim any sort of understanding that would allow me to judge for certain what is and what is not crucial.

Babylonia, Costanza Casati

 

Babylonia by Costanza Casati

Started: February 2, 2025
Completed: April 28, 2025
Recommendation: Recommended
Recommended By: Nobody

Review:

I have read a lot about ancient Greece and ancient Rome.  My knowledge of ancient Persia and ancient Babylon is more sparse.  I am familiar with the myths and legends of the former, but know little of the myths and legends of the latter.  This book was a welcome look at some of the legends.  A female ruler in that era was virtually unknown and so it is always good to read a little bit more about how a woman might have come to power.  Surely, the author has gone into a considerable amount of fiction in order for this book to work as the actual historical record amounts to so little.  Nonetheless, I found the book enjoyable and an interesting way to imagine a woman coming to power in an environment where it seems so unlikely.  The cutthroat period was also something I knew only from an occasional glance at Bas reliefs and those were pretty awful.  Casati does a good job of offering a possible explanation for both how such things came about and how they might have affected those involved.  A good read.

The Diamond Age, Neal Stephenson

 

The Diamond Age Or, a Young Lady's Illustrated Primer by Neal Stephenson is a book that has been on the shelf for a while.  I generally enjoy Stephenson.

Started: August 31, 2021
Completed: April 25, 2025
Recommendation: Not Recommended
Recommended By: Nobody

Words for which I sought help:

abattoir -- a slaughterhouse

abos -- An Aboriginal person

adumbrate -- indicate faintly

afflatus -- a divine creative impulse or inspiration

aleatory -- depending on the throw of a dice or on chance; random

anfractuous -- sinuous or circuitous

ashlar -- masonry made of large square-cut stones, used as a facing on walls of brick or stone rubble.

atelier -- a workshop or studio, especially one used by an artist or designer

barquentine -- a sailing ship similar to a barque but with only the foremast square-rigged and the remaining masts rigged fore and aft

brocade -- a rich fabric woven with a raised pattern, typically with gold or silver thread

caducity -- the infirmity of old age; senility

callipygious -- having a shapely or beautifully formed buttocks

caryatid -- a stone carving of a draped female figure, used as a pillar to support the entablature of a Greek or Greek-style building

castellan -- the governor of a castle

cicatrix -- the scar of a healed wound

coarct -- compress or constrict; press together

cocklebur -- a herbaceous plant in the daisy family with broad leaves and burred fruits, native to tropical America

coronach -- (in Scotland or Ireland) a funeral song

coruscating -- flashing; sparkling

crepuscular -- resembling or relating to twilight

decussate -- (of two or more things) cross or intersect each other to form an X

dramaturge -- a dramatist

dromond -- a large medieval ship of a kind used for war or commerce, chiefly in the Mediterranean

empennage -- an arrangement of stabilizing surfaces at the tail of an aircraft

enchiridion -- a book containing essential information on a subject

faience -- glazed ceramic ware, in particular decorated tin-glazed earthenware of the type which includes delftware and maiolica

foolscap -- a size of paper, about 330 x 200 (or 400) mm

foramen -- an opening, hole, or passage, especially in a bone

gallimaufry -- A confused jumble or medley of things

gamine -- (of a young woman) attractively boyish

histological -- studying microscopic biology or tissue under a microscope 

imprecation -- a spoken curse

ineffable -- too great or extreme to be expressed or described into words

ingenuous -- (of a person or action) innocent and unsuspecting

integument -- a tough outer protective layer, especially that of an animal or plant

jocose -- playful or humorous

knacker -- tire (someone) out

lacuna -- an unfilled space; a gap

lambent -- (of light or fire) glowing, gleaming, or flickering with a soft radiance

liminal -- occupying a position at, or on both sides of, a boundary or threshold

masculate -- mark with a spot or spots; stain

mickle -- a large amount

milfoil -- the common Eurasian yarrow

Minnesinger -- a German lyric poet and singer of the 12th-14th centuries, who performed songs of courtly love

opprobrious -- (of language) expressing scorn or criticism

opprobrium -- harsh criticism or censure

oriel -- a large upper-story bay with a window, supported by brackets or on corbels

palimpsest -- a manuscript or piece of writing material on which later writing has been superimposed on effaced earlier writing

particolored -- having or consisting of two or more different colors

pentatonic -- relating to, or based on, or denoting a scale of five notes, especially one without semitones equivalent to an ordinary major scale with the fourth and seventh omitted

Percheron -- a powerful draught horse of a grey or black breed, originally from France

perfidy -- the state of being deceitful and untrustworthy

perfuse -- permeate or suffuse with a liquid, color, or quality

petrichor -- a pleasant smell that frequently accompanies the first rain after a long period of warm, dry weather

pibroch -- a form of music for the Scottish bagpipes involving elaborate variations on a theme, typically of martial or funerary character

pissant -- an insignificant or contemptible person or thing

prurient -- having or encouraging an excessive interest in sexual matters, especially the sexual activity of others

ramify -- spread or branch out; grow and develop in complexity or range

retroussé -- (of a person's nose) turned up at the tip in an attractive way

salver -- a tray, typically one made of silver and used in formal circumstances

scapular -- a short monastic cloak covering the shoulders

sintered -- produced by or subjected to sintering (the process of coalescing a powdered material into a solid or porous mass by means of heating without liquefaction)

snug -- a small, comfortable public room in a pub or inn

soporific -- tending to induce drowsiness or sleep

spall -- break (rock, ore, or stone) into smaller pieces, especially in preparation for sorting

spirochaete -- a flexible spirally twisted bacterium, especially one that causes syphilis

tantivy -- a rapid gallop or ride

tatterdemalion -- tattered or dilapidated

thermogenic -- relating to or involving the production of heat, especially in a human or animal body

trencherman -- a person who eats in a specified manner, typically heartily

vituperative -- bitter and abusive

Weltanschauung -- a particular philosophy or view of life

whilom -- formerly; in the past

Review:

I started this book as a loan from the library, but it was a very slow start and the constant need to look up words had me on the Kobo. The story plods along and I found it very hard to engage until near the end.  The sub-stories interlocked, but it took so long for each piece to find the other that it felt like I was reading several books at once within this one book.  The frequency of words that were obscure or unusual in their use made the book feel unapproachable.

Murder the Truth, David Enrich

 

Murder the Truth:  Threats, intimidation, and a secret campaign to protect the powerful by David Enrich

Started: April 18, 2025

Completed: April 25, 2025
Recommendation: Recommended
Recommended By:  Nobody

Review:

Enrich does a good job of bringing together the stories of individual cases and several law firms to argue that there is an active conspiracy to make it easier for the powerful to shut down news stories via libel suits.  It seems like the suits rarely (if ever) target the thrust of the article, but find some tiny mistake around the edges and attempt to tar the media organization as malicious.  There are some notable exceptions (Dominion's suits against media organizations like FOX, go after the heart of the matter).  Meanwhile, the lawyers who attack the media argue that the laws need to be changed as they face an exceedingly uphill battle to "hold the media accountable."  That is as it should be.  Media should minimize their mistakes (and, when a mistake is made, should own up).  There should be no need to go to court.  When media is doing its job well, it should be very difficult to sue them because they are, well, doing their jobs well!

Toto, A. J. Hackwith

 

Toto by A. J. Hackwith

Started: April 12, 2025
Completed: April 18, 2025
Recommendation: Mild Recommendation
Recommended By: Nobody

Review:

I have read a lot of books that take place in Oz.  This wasn't awful and it was an interesting take of sorts.  The "good dog" is taken to quite an extreme and I did not find it compelling.  If you like dogs, this may work.

Gender Trouble, Judith Butler

 

Gender Trouble by Judith Butler  the subtitle for this book is generally "Feminism and the subversion of identity"

Started: April 7, 2025
Completed: April 12, 2025
Recommendation: Highly recommended
Recommended By: My cousin

Review:

This is a technical book written in the jargon of the professional in gender studies.  I found a lot of the terms seemed archaic (to my ears the use of terms were just so unusual).  I listened to an audio book where the performer pronounced words like, "corollary" as "carol-aerie," and I found the pronunciation jarring as well as quickly making the sentence unintelligible.  I coped by going back and listening again, frequently.  This book is far from an easy read, but it is kind of fun to hear Butler reduce Freud to gibbering nonsense.

The Tusks of Extinction, Ray Nayler

 

The Tusks of Extinction by Ray Nayler

Started: April 5, 2025
Completed: April 7, 2025
Recommendation: Recommended
Recommended By: Nebula Award Committee

Review:

This book is both a conservation work as well as a Science Fiction work.  That is a tough combination.  I have been sort of wrapped up in the concept of "uploading" one's intellect into a computer and this book examines that possibility while also looking at the possibility of recreating extinct creatures (not really Jurassic Park) while at the same time examining how those creatures would impact the environment and still be subject to the very conditions that brought them to extinction.  This is well done for the most part and the shifting perspectives are useful.  The book is brief, however, so it feels like the characters are truncated and only one of the characters undergoes meaningful change or development.

When the Clock Broke, John Ganz

 

When the Clock Broke:  Con men, conspiracies, and how America cracked up in the early 1990s by John Ganz

Started: March 30, 2025
Completed: April 5, 2025
Recommendation: Mild recommendation
Recommended By: Nobody

Review:

I feel like this book was intended to show how politics became broken and how that led to electing a broken candidate like Trump.  Then, it feels, like there were slight modifications to the text to understand how he could be elected again.  I sort of feel like politics were less broken and were more an actualization of some pretty horrible points of view.  Those points of view remain and there does not seem to be some kind of a change or generally realization of how wrong Trump is, but some kind of acceptance of his horrible assumptions as being an accurate reflection of reality.  This is very scary to me.

Open Socrates, Agnes Callard

 

Open Socrates:  The case for a philosophical life by Agnes Callard

Started: March 8, 2025
Completed: March 15, 2025
Recommendation: Highly Recommended
Recommended By: Nobody

Review:

Talking about raising children, "Every time I approach my kids and am in a corrective mood to nudge them towards what I see as a superior way of living, I feel as though I've walked on the the stage of a play where the characters were given their direction at some previous time by some previous person.  Sometimes it amazes me--how could it be that I missed my chance to give my instructions given that I've been around since the minute that they were born?"

This book completely changes the way I have looked at Socrates.  I bought a copy and I'm reading it again and marking passages.

The Witch’s Heart, Genevieve Gornichec

 

The Witch's Heart by Genevieve Gornichec

Started: March 25, 2025
Completed: March 30, 2025
Recommendation: Recommended
Recommended By: Nobody

Review:

I really enjoyed this retelling of a Nordic myth.  It is hard to make me like the Nordic gods and so it was good that this book didn't do that!  I like the story behind the creatures in the book and it is hard for me to look away from Loki.

The Anxious Generation, Jonathon Haidt

 

The Anxious Generation:  How the great rewiring of childhood is causing an epidemic of mental illness by Jonathan Haidt

Started: March 23, 2025
Completed: DNF
Recommendation: Not Recommended
Recommended By: Nobody

Review:

The research presented was great.  The solution (free range kids) was not.  Free range kids may work in a rural environment, but I think it is a real challenge in an urban or even suburban environment.  Crime has come down and we probably don't need the detailed helicopter style parenting, but part of the way that free range worked was because neighbors were empowered to help raising children.  Now, however, neighbors may not even be home and I remember from being a key latch kid that the responsibility devolved onto the oldest sibling--not a good arrangement (that sibling becomes a substitute for parents, not another kid).  Excellent perspective and a good broad solution, but the details need some serious work.

Intermezzo, Sally Rooney

 

Intermezzo by Sally Rooney

Started: March 16, 2025
Completed: March 23, 2025
Recommendation: Recommended
Recommended By: Nobody

Review:

I have heard many good things about Sally Rooney, but I was not thrilled with Normal People.  I guess I am a bit of a prude because I found the amount and descriptions of sex to be a lot and rather graphic.  On the other hand, as the book unwound the need for the sex scenes with their similarities and differences did feel important to the book.  The foreshadowing was excellent and the writing was very good.  The ability to view several different character flaws through the lens of different characters (both internally and externally) was very well done.  I'm a weirdo and I wish that there had been more chess, but I get that it was a means, not an end.

Untethered Sky, Fonda Lee

 

Untethered Sky by Fonda Lee

Started: March 15, 2025
Completed: March 16, 2025
Recommendation: Recommended
Recommended By: I cannot remember how I came across this book, but it has been on my To Be Read audio book list for quite a while.

Review:

I enjoyed this book.  It was an odd combination of romance and adventure which was not fully part of either.  This was an interesting way to look at the start of a new profession.  Sort of a journey woman thing, but also a look at adventure that comes from a challenging profession.

A Man On The Moon, Andrew Chaikin

 

A Man On The Moon:  The voyages of the Apollo astronauts by Andrew Chaikin

Started: February 14, 2025
Completed: February 22, 2025
Recommendation: Recommended
Recommended By: Nobody

Review:

This was a good walk through the history of the Apollo program.  A lot of this was familiar to me, but it included details I had not heard before.  One thing that always catches me off guard was that Ed White was one of the three astronauts who died in the fire on the pad.

Project Hail Mary, Andy Weir

 

Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir

Started: December 6, 2024
Completed: March 14, 2025
Recommendation: Highly Recommended
Recommended By: Nobody

Review:

Wow, what a great book.  This has everything that I'm looking for in a Science Fiction novel.  Some real science, character development, aliens, just everything.  The book was very well written and extremely engaging.  The audio book is completely worth it--Ray Porter is awesome (I love him also in the Bobiverse books).  Cannot recommend this highly enough.

The Forever War, Nick Bryant

 

The Forever War:  America's Unending Conflict With Itself by Nick Bryant

Started: March 2, 2025
Completed: March 8, 2025
Recommendation: Mild recommendation
Recommended By: I think that this came via The Guardian, but I cannot find a review from them, so I'm not sure how I stumbled across it.

Review:

I really thought that this was going to be about January 6th, the cover fooled me, mea culpa.  I am very familiar with the history that was reviewed in this book and I found only one memorable quotation:  America does not need to learn how to live with civil war, America needs to learn how to live with civil peace (or something like that...I listened to the book and I did not jot down the quotation as I heard it because I have a bit of a life today).  Aside from that, this is American history fairly well recounted with a focus on contentious issues (slavery, abortion, etc.)  I just really spent too much time on the book as it was mostly a retelling of history with which I was already familiar.

The Most Powerful Court in the World, Stuart Banner

 

The Most Powerful Court in the World:  A history of the Supreme Court of the United States by Stuart Banner

Started: February 28, 2025
Completed: DNF
Recommendation: Not Recommended
Recommended By: Nobody

Review:

I did not check when I started, but Stuart Banner is a member of the Federalist Society.  I knew something was off as I started reading the book because the first step was to normalize politicization of the Supreme Court.  It worried me as it started, but as the book went on it became an apologist for such things as Dred Scott (bad decision, but Tawney was a pretty good guy).  As I was listening to the book after about a quarter of the way through things added up and I checked to see if Banner was a member of the Federalist Society.  Sure enough, he was.  So I started this book thinking that I was getting a historian's perspective and I realized that I was getting a right twist on everything.  Really threw me off coming from a UCLA professor in good standing.

Stone Yard Devotional, Charlotte Wood

 

Stone Yard Devotional by Charlotte Wood

Started: February 26, 2025
Completed: February 28, 2025
Recommendation: Not Recommended
Recommended By: Booker Prize committee

Review:

As I have read more Booker Prize winners, I've come to understand that the committee has a long standing favoritism for blood, gore, and torture.  This particular book only falls short on the torture angle (though there is a fair amount of emotional distress and general angst).  I think I am going to use the Booker Prize as an indicator of a book I do not want to read.

The Silence of the Girls, Pat Barker

 

The Silence of the Girls by Pat Barker

Started: February 23, 2025
Completed: February 25, 2025
Recommendation: Mild recommendation
Recommended By: The Booker Prize folks

Review:

You cannot get a Booker Prize unless there is some horror in your book.  That is just the truth.  This book is about the horror of women surviving the sack of their city (in this case in and around Troy).  It is pretty horrible.  Lots and lots of blood and gore as well as serial rape.  Not a fun read.  Well written

The Strategists, Phillips Payson O'Brien

 

The Strategists:  Churchill, Stalin, Roosevelt, and Hitler how war made them and how they made war by Phillips Payson O'Brien

Started: January 24, 2025
Completed: February 2, 2025
Recommendation: Recommended
Recommended By:  This probably came to me through The Atlantic magazine where O'Brien is a frequent contributor

Review:

This book is neither history nor biography.  It looks at the development of strategic thinking of the major leaders during World War II.  To some extent it is amazing what we now know of how they thought.  It was also interesting to see what drove their thinking.  I cannot say that this will change my thinking (I don't operate on a global scale), but it was interesting to see how failure functioned and how success required deference.

Someone Like Us, Dinaw Mengestu

 

Someone Like Us by Dinaw Mengestu

Started: January 13, 2025
Completed: January 20, 2025
Recommendation: Recommended
Recommended By: I'm sure I read a review someplace, but I cannot remember where.

Review:

This is an oddly introspective book which is reminiscent of MC Escher's drawing of hands drawing hands:

There is also a playfulness with both tense and location.  This book is interesting in other ways as it looks at death from several different angles.  At one point, the narrator is told how to lie:  basically, use Steve Bannon's approach of "flooding the zone" with extraneous information so that it is difficult to tell what is the lie and what isn't and basically distracts the questioner from the question that was asked.  It was shocking to realize that this is what my own children did (I cannot count the number of times I pointed out that they had provided a lot of information without actually answering the question I had asked).  It must be a cultural thing that is common in many cultures, but seems to be lacking in American culture (or maybe it is simply lacking in my friend circle).

Night Watch, Jayne Anne Phillips

 

Night Watch by Jayne Anne Phillips

Started: January 14, 2025
Completed: January 19, 2025
Recommendation:  Not Recommended
Recommended By: The Pulitzer Prize Committee

Review:

Why is torture so important to prize winning novels?  This book had horrifying descriptions of systemic abuse.  I don't know what to say.  The prose was excellent, the character development was good, the plot was a little bit easy to see, but, on the other hand, there were good and reasonable twists.  I just couldn't get over the torture and will always remember this book with a chill.

The Cost of Free Land, Rebecca Clarren

 

The Cost of Free Land:  Jews, Lakota, and an American inheritance by Rebecca Clarren

Started: January 13, 2025
Completed: January 13, 2025
Recommendation: Highly Recommended
Recommended By: Nobody

Review:

This is a great look at how native Americans were pushed back from their land and how others benefitted.  More importantly, this is also a good book about how to try to heal the impact of that loss for the Lakota.  I have had the good fortune of meeting one of the decedents of Red Cloud and I have seen first hand the impact of native American disenfranchisement.  Clarren does  a good job of capturing the impact from a white person's point of view and also has done some deep soul searching to try and figure out how to make amends.  Truly a good book that is actually doing good.

The Anthropologists, Ayşegül Savaş

 

The Anthropologists by Ayşegül Savaş

Started: January 13, 2025

Completed: January 13, 2025

Recommendation: Not recommended

Recommended By: Barack Obama

Review:

I dunno.  I guess that this book was supposed to be a character study and I just did not find it interesting.  The characters seemed flat and I simply did not care what happened to them.  Their lives seemed banal and maybe that was the point, but I really don't know.  It is hard to walk away from this book thinking anything but that this was sort of someone writing a book about what was just sort of happening nearby (person, woman, camera, etc.)  Maybe the problem isn't the book, it is that I'm too thick to get it.  It felt like modern art.  Something that almost anyone could write, but was somehow raised up on a pedestal.

The Hunger of the Gods, John Gwynne

 

The Hunger of the Gods by John Gwynne is the next book in the Bloodsworn Saga

Started: January 3, 2025
Completed: January 12, 2025
Recommendation: Recommended
Recommended By: Nobody

Review:

This book feels like a Norse saga.  Without the detailed torture scenes this book would be highly recommended despite the violence.  The world building is excellent and it feels like, despite the high level of detail, no detail is unnecessary.  This is a large book, but it does not feel like anything is wasted.  The book is tight and thorough...maybe after reading subsequent books, I'll fell like the torture scenes are important (some people feel that way about books like Pierce Brown's Red Rising Saga, I just don't).

The Weight of Nature, Clayton Page Aldern

 

The Weight of Nature:  How a changing climate changes our brains by Clayton Page Aldern

Started: January 2, 2025
Completed: January 3, 2025
Recommendation: Highly Recommend
Recommended By: Nobody

Review:

It is striking the way that the weather, environment, and even the sounds of nature impact humans.  I was aware of the physical risks of higher temperatures, but did not understand or properly consider the impact of all the other components of the environment and how those affect mental state, not just the physical ability to live.

Question 7, Richard Flanagan

 

Question 7, Richard Flanagan

Started: December 30, 2024
Completed: January 2, 2025
Recommendation: Recommended
Recommended By: I cannot remember

Review:

This was an odd book in many ways.  The most striking thing was the odd use of tense which handled both being dead and being alive.  It was difficult to pick up on unsaid, but implied Australian/Tasmanian understandings.