This is the kind of book I say is a three-out-of-three stars. It’s not shooting for the moon in terms of literary merit, it’s just a pulpy little story told reasonably well. The three time frames are balanced, the telling draws you in, and things escalate enough to keep you going. I can’t say I care too much for all the baseball stuff, and the end is a mite anticlimactic, but I had fun reading it.
One of the best know Holmes stories for a reason, The Hound of the Baskervilles makes great use of the juxtaposition of the detective’s logical, worldly perspective against the phantasmagoric specter of an infernal hound. What’s more, Conan Doyle cleverly tucks away his genius detective for much of the story so that the mystery can deepen and confound as we explore it through the eyes of the more human (but still admirable) Watson. Delightful.
There’s a lot of talk these days about cozy fiction as a new phenomenon, but I’m in my happy place with Holmes and Watson. Their comfortable Victorian lives, intellectual repartee, and the way they never seem to let the stakes of the mystery get in the way of tucking into a good breakfast curtesy of Miss Hudson; it’s all just wonderful. And of course, this particular collection has the added drama of “The Final Problem” as the last story.
Picking up right where I, Claudius left off, the story of this accidental emperor finds its tragic conclusion. Far more than the first book, this one brings home its themes of inevitability and the blind selfishness of human nature. And because over the course of the two books you’ve learned to like Claudius so much, every betrayal he faces lands like a sting in your heart.
Lem has an incomparable imagination for the alien, for the unknowability and incompatibility of the infinite unknown. The Invincible takes us to a world where something inhuman, unthinking, something that isn’t even really alive lurks waiting. We follow a no-nonsense crew of space professionals who must struggle to fathom what is going on. And I love the careful, scientific way they approach the problem — none of the insufferable trope of them making obviously stupid choices for the sake of drama.
My only complaint is that the ending is rather unsatisfying. But in way, that is appropriate; how can you find a satisfying resolution with something so truly alien?
This book does a good job of exploring the historical context in which the christian religion found its way to ascendency in the Roman Empire. It includes some astute observations, most notably that at the time the idea of a proselytizing, theologically exclusive faith had never before existed, and that alone can account for much of the way this new cognitive meme was able to spread so quickly. No one yet had any mental framework against which to pit such a thing.
That said, it never really lives up to the grandeur of the title. What I was really after was not an explanation just of the triumph of christianity over paganism in Rome; I wanted the whole story, with two thousand years and the vastness of the entire globe accounted for. I suppose that is asking a lot, but it seemed to be the promise the title was making.
Like every Asimov novel, The Naked Sun is imminently readable and somehow manages to explore ideas that are incredibly expansive at the same time.
I love the way Asimov explores the neuroses of entire cultures in this one, with Elijah Baley at once the mirror and the reflected. At once boisterous and terrified.
I think this may be the tightest writing of any Asimov novel I’ve read so far, and I think the semi-noir mystery setup really helps.
The Wayward Bus doesn’t have a protagonist. Instead, it drifts between the perspectives of a cast of characters who range from the despicable to the merely sad. Small people with small lives playing out their small dramas. That’s the point, I think, to explore the limited minds of characters just living their lives. There’s a poetry in that, but this novel is not for me. I’m all too aware of the pettiness and paltriness of human nature without spending time inside the heads of these characters.
There’s a lot of fascinating history in this book. Sadly, Larson has no idea how to structure it, how to edit it down, or how to make it satisfying in any way. It’s just an endless cavalcade of facts and events, centered around a pair of vaguely related topics. But his prose is indulgently self-satisfied, so that you’re sure he thinks he’s writing the greatest thing ever put down on paper.
I think I’ve said it before, but Adrian Tchaikovsky excels at depicting cultural disconnects and the fear we feel when we misunderstand the other. This book may be one of his greatest achievements in that vein. He makes a lot of weird choices, but they all really work at building to a climax of difference. Plus, the guy really likes sentient spiders.
I was pretty disappointed by this book, not least because I enjoyed the first one in this series quite a bit.
Even if not for the character issues I’ll mention shortly, the best I could say for this book is that it’s more of the same. The Riverworld scenario is set up, and we once again follow a man driven to find out the truth as he navigates and negotiates a landscape (riverscape?) squabbled over by petty warlords. We see technology emerge and political alliances come and go, but the situation changes little.
But what really doesn’t work for me is that Farmer chooses Samuel Clemens as his protagonist. As a big Twain fan, I feel I have a certain understanding of the man, and I just can’t buy him as someone involved in statecraft, political intrigues, or grand obsessions. Put as many folksy witticisms in his mouth as you like, this just doesn’t feel like Clemens and the attempt is incredibly distracting.
There are also some attempts to unravel mankind’s struggles with race that are pretty cringey by modern standards. In a way, this aspect is the most like Twain’s own writing in that the intentions are good, but the specifics don’t stand up to today’s sensibilities.
I can see themes emerging in the series about the difficulties of achieving something worthwhile in a world controlled by those who lust for power and wealth, so I hope those lead somewhere in subsequent installments.
Very much a potpourri of assorted facts and anecdotes, this book still does a great job of teaching you about what the Classical world was like, both at the everyday level and in terms of broad historical events. More than that, Garrett Ryan’s style is so easy to read, that I enjoyed it even in the chapters that didn’t teach me much I didn’t already know. I’ll definitely pick up the second in this series at some point.
This book is perhaps somewhat unclear in its organization and primary thesis, but it’s about libraries and language and printing and learning, all things I love. Full of fascinating facts and anecdotes, I never really minded if the overall point was somewhat obscure.
I’m disappointed to say that this is the first of the Library of Congress Crime Classics series that is a major fail for me. The basic setup of a New York-based Sherlock Holmes knockoff with some added detective rivalry is all well enough, and the first story or two are decent, if not quite as well crafted as one expects from Conan Doyle himself.
But then there’s the story in which one of the detectives himself turns out to be the killer (which could be a good twist), but because the victim is someone considered sub-human, it’s perfectly okay with all our heros that he strangled her and cut off her head, hands, and feet. That’s a major no for me. Also, there was a talking chimpanzee, so take that for what you will.
Mark Twain’s wit and charm are enough for me to enjoy just about anything he’s ever written, but with my own upcoming trip to Hawaii(!), it’s especially fascinating to to hear his account of the archipelago as it was a century and a half ago. And Twain gives a fantastic accounting of the land, the politics, the culture, the history, and the native mythology.
Of course, as I’d say about so much of his writing, Twain was a man of his time, and his prejudices and limitations are sometimes uncomfortable to read. But at times it’s also remarkable how progressive and sympathetic to the natives he can be.
Wow, what a book. Nominally for children, the stakes, culture-building, character growth, and prose all elevate it to something of real literary merit. All I can say is to read it. Nothing more will suffice.
Dickens is so good at prose, at characters, and at crafting a narrative that you just fall into his novels. A Tale of Two Cities is epic, even for him. The French Revolution and The Terror become a proving ground for human nature; all that is good, all that is vengeful. It’s heart-rending, suspenseful, and feels oh so true.
I love Michael Pollan books for his honest and curious attitude as he flits after whatever topics catch his fancy, as enthusiastic as a bee in his garden. In The Botany of Desire, he buzzes around the stories of four plants, rather loosely tied together by the idea that the way we typically talk about domestication is rather too anthropocentric. It’s certainly fascinating and fun to read, if perhaps a little unfocused at times.
I didn’t finish this one. There’s something of an irony when a book about good writing isn’t itself all that well written. Sure, the author has some great explanations of how to make a weak sentence stronger, but his voice isn’t all that compelling. And the endless writing examples pulled from contemporary news sources may represent the journalistic world Evans represents, but they sure don’t make the reading experience very fun.
I was hesitant to pick up a vampire book, even though I know Martin is a fantastic writer. It’s not that I don’t love vampires; it’s just that it seems very difficult to do much that’s very original with the genre. Well, I needn’t have worried, because Georgie R’s deft hand at creating compelling characters and an immersive world kept me turning page after page.
Compared with A Song of Ice and Fire, this story is remarkably focused, with only two protagonists and a narrative that drives straight forward. There’s a clear subtext, but it’s never front and center to the point of becoming crass allegory. And Martin certainly knows how to make you care about what happens next.
A lot of very fascinating perspective on the infrastructure that we all rely on but tend to take very much for granted. It’s less technical than I anticipated, and more about the role infrastructure plays in our society.
I confess that I skimmed over some long sections about climate change and the threats it poses to our aging and under-maintained systems of infrastructure. Not because it isn’t very good material, but because I just can’t face any more climate anxiety.
