Books

I like books. Here is some record of what I've been reading recently and chosen (or remembered) to note down. If you care to, You can also see the complete list of what I've ever entered into this system.

February

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January

  • Rudy F. Favretti and Gordon P. DeWolf. Colonial Gardens. 1972 - A combination of horticulture and history that reads like poetry (to me at least): the perfect book! At least if you enjoy lists of 17th century brief descriptions of plants.
  • Kristin Kimball. The Dirty Life: On Farming, Food, and Love. 2011 - Stereotypical NY journalist-meets-rugged-farmers story, but what a farm! I could wish less about the food and the love, but my preferences are probably not those of the mainstream audience. A very enjoyable book.
  • Howard Blum. The Floor of Heaven: a True Tale of the Last Frontier and the Yukon Gold Rush. 2011 - The author wanted to write a readable and character-driven pop-history book vaguely about the Yukon Gold Rush, and he did that—but he forgot to include any history beyond that of his characters. So novelistic he might as well have written a novel.

December

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November

  • Rebecca Stead. First Light. 2007 - [j] I wanted to like this book about a hidden glacier civilization—good premise and good packaging—but the setting and characters failed to convince and every plot twist was harder to believe than the last.
  • David Gessner. My Green Manifesto: Down the Charles River in Pursuit of a New Environmentalism. 2011 - A wandering self-absorbed monologue about how much cooler the author is than both other environmentalists and normal people, conceived while he was boating on the Charles. Well-nigh unreadable.
  • Cynthia Peale. The Death of Colonel Mann. 2000 - This historical fiction mystery story includes some superficial details about upper class Boston at the beginning of the 20th century—gentlemen's clubs, scones, broiled cod—but doesn't really evoke the period particularly well. What it evokes is a run-of-the-mill murder and blackmail story, but it's at least readable once the plot gets going.
  • Louis Sachar. Dogs Don't Tell Jokes. 1997 - [j] Sachar knows better than any other YA author about how adults can be so utterly horrible to kids without even realizing it. Although I don't think a 12-year-old could really come up with a comedy routine as good as the one the hero pulls together for the story's climax.
  • Larry Niven. Ringworld's Children. 2004 - Niven is so taken with his own cleverness and the intricacies of his universe that he neglected to make this story believable or even particularly interesting.
  • Terry Pratchett. Thud!. 2005 - Discworld books are amusing but generally serious as well; this one is especially serious. Basically a hard-boiled detective story.
  • Terry Pratchett. Going Postal. 2004 - [r] This one is about a recovering con man reopening the postal service. Who could imagine?
  • McKay Jenkins. What's Gotten Into Us?: Staying Healthy in a Toxic World. 2011 - A breathless, panic-stricken account of how everything—everything!—is made out of chemicals and that they're going to poison us all and destroy our ecosystem. And how does the author suggest we deal with this? Be better consumers! A deeply useless book.
  • Terry Pratchett. Unseen Academicals. 2009 - Wizards, football, and being true to yourself. How could you even conceive of a better book?! Well, there could have been a little more football...
  • Terry Pratchett. Thief of Time. 2001 - There was a time when I refused to read Terry Pratchett's books because I though they were too dorky. I since discovered that's not the case—they're just dorky enough! This one is about history monks and incarnations of abstract ideas.
  • Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett. Good Omens. 1990 - Some good ideas and good writing from two clever authors, but to me it doesn't all quite hang together as a convincing tale. It does make you think about the motivations for the Apocalypse, though.
  • Terry Pratchett. Night Watch. 2003 - [r] Pratchett is very good at writing funny, well-plotted books that are also serious. And this one has some relatively plausible time-travel, so even better!

October

  • Katherine Langrish. Troll Fell. 2004 - [j] A surprisingly bad story, given the good set-up: a novelized young-adult Norwegian troll story. The author didn't really sell it, though.
  • Diana Wynne Jones. The Merlin Consipiracy. 2003 - A good story: I didn't read it before now because of being put off by the title and (mostly) the cover (I know, I know). In the nature of Homeward Bounders, but a little less bleak.
  • Earl Swift. The Big Roads: The untold story of the engineers, visionaries, and trailblazers who created the American superhighways. 2011 - Who would have thought that a historical account of the committee meetings and engineering decisions behind the American freeway system would be so gripping? Well, me, obviously; that's why I read it. Should be required reading, for background, for anyone who got worked up by Fast Food Nation.
  • Terry Pratchett. I Shall Wear Midnight. 2010 - Not as tightly plotted as some of his other stories, but still a very good read: great characters and themes. Read the other Tiffany Aching books first, though.
  • Joanne Harris. Runemarks. 2008 - [j] A young adult novel with a world like Terry Pratchett's and writing like Rick Riordan's. Incomplete realization of the setting and terrible shallow characterization make it nothing more that a pastiche. And 526 pages of non-stop action is too much.

September

  • Helen DeWitt. Lightning Rods. 2011 - Nothing like The Last Samurai except that it's sparklingly well-written and unarguably logical. The humor is rather broader.
  • Edward Tufte. The Visual Display of Quantitative Information. 1983 - [r] Reading this book again, I can see why Tufte appeals to Helen DeWitt. This particular book basically just has one thing to say, but it says it well and looks pretty.
  • Gordon Korman. Schooled. 2008 - [j] A young-adult novel about middle-schoolers and hippies by someone who writes like he's never met either. Almost a positive message despite that handicap, but it's ruined by the ending.
  • Timothy Beal. Roadside Religion: In Search of the Sacred, the Strange, and the Substance of Faith. 2006 - As much about the author's own faith as it is about the attractions, which makes the book better than it would have been otherwise. The fact that he didn't intend it to be that way when he started writing makes it worse. Still, well worth reading.