This is an internet age, and from what I can tell all of the information in this book is very basic, and very much on the internet. In short, it doesn’t need to be in book format. The information isn’t horrible or false, it just is surface level stuff that if you aren’t a beginning runner, you already know. Read More »
I Read a Lot of Books
I read a lot of books. Sometimes I review them.
Midwinterblood by Marcus Sedgwick
Sometimes it is hard to know if I’ve judged a book harshly or not… Midwinterblood falls into that category. Read More »
It’s Okay to Laugh (Crying is Cool Too) by Nora McInerny Purmort
Sigh… where to begin? Reviewing a book like this is a bit of a challenge. Purmort’s biggest claim to fame, and her reason for writing a memoir in the first place, is that her husband died of cancer. So, if you criticize a book like this, you come across as a jerk… So with that understanding, I am going into this immediately letting you know that I DISLIKED this book. Read More »
Run Gently Out There: Trials, Trails, and Tribulations of Running Ultramarathons by John Morelock
Ah, the book that single-handedly killed my love of running. Just kidding. I’m being a bit dramatic, but in a running book my bar is reasonably low: Does this book make me want to run? If the answer is no, then it isn’t a great running book. But I get ahead of myself. Read More »
S is for Silence by Sue Grafton
Rarely do I feel so viscerally about a Grafton book. Generally they fall on the good sort of okay scale don’t make me regret the time spent on them, but are very forgettable once they are done. Read More »
Sixpence House: Lost in a Town of Books by Paul Collins
Help me out there book-lovers: Do you find yourselves getting sucked into reading books about books? That is how Sixpence House came into my hands. Read More »
Farewell: The Greatest Spy Story of the Twentieth Century by Sergie Kostin and Eric Raynaud translated by Catherine Cauvin-Higgins
This book was so disappointing. So. Disappointing. I don’t know how you can make such an interesting story boring, but the writers managed to make this book an actual snoozefest if such a thing exists.
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A Moment of War by Laurie Lee
This is the final of autobiographical work of Laurie Lee, a British dude who enjoyed romping around Europe. A Moment of War follows him as he decides to go battle against Franco’s forces in the Spanish Civil War. As you can imagine, it didn’t go well. Read More »
For Colored Girls who have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow is Enuf: A Choreopoem by Ntozake Shange
I get it. I get it. I get it. This is a “choreopoem”. It isn’t supposed to be read but performed, but hey, you publish it and put it in a bookstore and I’m gonna read it. That’s just the kind of girl I am. As I was reading this book I found it challenging to review. Should I look at it as poetry? Should I take it as a play? Lyrics? At times it is all of the above, so I genuinely don’t think my grade will meet a universal expectation of grades. This was so close to a C- that I teetered on the brink and eventually I had to go with D+, because it is written and I am not seeing a theatrical performance. I believe that I’d enjoy the show. Read More »
Berlin: Portrait of a City Through the Centuries by Rory McLean
When I was 16 I won an all expense paid “study tour” of Germany sponsored by Diamler-Benz and the Goethe Institute. I jest not. My school was chosen to provide a participant, an essay contest ensued, and I won the opportunity to traipse about Germany with a group of 50 other North American teens (some Canadians came as well). The final stop was in Berlin. Read More »
The Only Girl in the Car by Kathy Dobie
*Sigh. Where to begin? Sometimes I read a book and I just shake my head over it. This is one of those. Read More »
The Sojourner by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings
Of all the depressing books I’ve read where not much goes on… well, what to say? It was depressing and not much happens. I could stop there, but I know you want to know more. Read More »
Crow Killer: The Saga of Liver-Eating Johnson by Raymond W. Thorp and Robert Bunker
Though I don’t typically read mountain man books, this was a birthday gift that looked pretty interesting. Also, I know very little about any but the most famous mountain men and I am always interested in learning new things. Sadly, Crow Killer ended up being a little too folksy and not academic enough for me. Read More »
Cruel and Unusual by Patricia Cornwell
I’ve never read a Corwell novel, but I see them everywhere in the supermarket, airport, bookstores. I understand that she is extremely popular and though I enjoy mysteries, I’ve never felt compelled to read her stuff. Cruel and Unusual came from bin of free books that my little brother dropped off for me. Read More »
The First Wives Club by Olivia Goldsmith
This book was… just disappointing in many ways. It was worse than meh, but not quite the most horrible thing I’ve ever read. Ringing endorsement, I know. Read More »
A Body to Die For by Kate White
Apparently this is the second book in a series, but it came to me free so I dove right in. I guess I have been spoiled by great mystery writers (Tana French, Alan Bradley) or really fun mystery writers (Sue Grafton, Janet Evanovich), because White’s effort fell flat. Read More »
11 Days in December: Christmas at the Bulge, 1944 by Stanley Weintraub
I know I promised a break on non fiction WWII books, but this has been on the shelf since I married my husband (it came with him) and it was Christmastime so I thought, why not? Mistake. Read More »
A Nasty Piece of Work by Robert Littell
I enjoy a good mystery, so I was excited to receive Littell’s novel for Christmas, my excitement faded when I delved in and discovered that, despite success writing stories about the CIA, A Nasty Piece of Work was rife with cliche. Read More »
Road Dogs by Elmore Leonard
This was the first book of Leonard’s that I have ever read, and most likely the last. I enjoy crime books, but not necessarily criminal books. Do you see the distinction? Read More »
America Back on Track by Edward M. Kennedy
Oh, Ted, Ted, Ted… So many things to write about this book. First, for those of you OUT of the political know, Ted Kennedy died way back in 2009. Also, my political beliefs rarely line up with the late Mr. Kennedy, but I do like to keep informed about different ideas and the values behind them. I also got this book for free and I will read anything that comes into my hands for free. Read More »
The Wednesday Letters by Jason F. Wright
Confession time, my husband likes yard sales. I really don’t like them, but whenever he goes I tell him to pick me up some books. Sometimes he hits, and sometimes he misses, but I appreciate new books no matter where they come from, or how they turn out. The Wednesday Letters was a miss. Read More »
The Mammoth Book of Jacobean Whodunnits edited by Mike Ashley
Full disclosure, historical fiction is high on the list of things I avoid reading. No judgments against those who enjoy it, I just find it a bit silly, trying to force the characters into unlikely scenarios that inevitably are interesting historical events. For this, and many other reasons I’ll enumerate later on, I REALLY disliked The Mammoth Book of Jacobean Whodunnits. Read More »
Travels in a Thin Country: A Journey Through Chile by Sarah Wheeler
Have you ever gone on a trip with someone loatheable? I have… in Ireland… and the beauty of the country could not eclipse the nagging annoyance of the person I was with. That was what reading Travels in a Thin Country felt like. Read More »
There is Something in the Air by David Yarbrough
This book was a hard read, full of the problems that one encounters in the world of the self published book, which is truly a shame because I feel that there is a story here that needs to be told. Unfortunately, There is Something in the Air, is not the best way to tell it. Read More »
American Adulterer: A Novel by Jed Mercurio
I hated this book. That is all you should really know, but let me go into the details. This “novel” details the life of JFK beginning with his Inauguration as President of the United States until his assassination. Mercurio calls it a novel in order to not do the due diligence type of research that a non fiction book of the same topic would require. Read More »
Death in the Andes by Mario Vargas Llosa
Confession, I bought this book because my sister-in-law is Peruvian, and the author is a Nobel Prize Winner from Peru. Other than that, meh, I wasn’t sure what it would have in store for me. We all know my reluctance to read books by Nobel Laureates. Or perhaps you don’t. In that case, I generally find books written by Nobel Prize winners to be pretentious and not that great. There are a few exceptions, but this wasn’t one of them. Read More »
Barack Like Me: The Chocolate-covered Truth by David Alan Grier with Alan Eisenstock
Ugh, I hated this book. Mercifully, it was written so that an elementary student could have gotten through it quickly had they wanted to… and I sincerely hope none would. Read More »
Born Liberal Raised Right: How to Rescue America from Moral Decline-One Family at a Time by Reb Bradley
This book was a gift… at the time of the receipt of said gift, I had (okay I guess I technically STILL have just the one kid) one kid who was not yet a year old. So I am not sure if this was a reflection on my current parenting, or a future warning… either way, another book that didn’t need to be written. Read More »
Raising a Riot by Alfred Toombs
This non fiction comes to us via my husband and the yard sale. It is another of the ‘christian fiction’ set, though Christianity is not displayed quite so prominently, or prominently at all. If I did not know where this book came from, I would just assume it was another set of memoirs that didn’t need to be written as nothing of import actually happens. Read More »
The Bascombe Novels by Richard Ford
Technically, there are three novels composed in the Bascombe Novels. First, The Sportswriter, second, Independence Day, and third, The Lay of the Land. I toyed with the idea of reviewing each of these separately, but I read them together and neither book stands above or below the others. So, all together now… Read More »