Some people collect coins, stamps, or Star Wars memorabilia — I used to write book reviews and may even get back to it someday. These are in alphabetical order, so look around and use the tags, too.
Book review: 100 Ghastly Little Ghost Stories
100 Ghastly Little Ghost Stories edited by Stefan Dziemianowicz, Robert Weinberg, and Martin H. Greenberg. Recommended. Like other tales, ghost stories set a tone that may be terrifying, mournful, moralistic, thought provoking, whimsical, or even humorous. In this anthology, ghosts appear for … Continue reading →
Book review: 100 Hair-Raising Little Horror Stories
100 Hair-Raising Little Horror Stories edited by Al Sarrantonio and Martin H. Greenberg. Highly recommended. The best horror fiction is subtle. This point is missed by the producers of today’s horror films, in which blood and gore — and the anticipation thereof … Continue reading →
Book review: 365 Nights: A Memoir of Intimacy
365 Nights: A Memoir of Intimacy by Charla Muller with Betsy Thorpe. New York: The Berkeley Publishing Group, 2008. 288 pages. Charla Muller’s epigraph for 365 Nights: A Memoir of Intimacy is from dramatist Jean Anouilh: “To say yes, you have to sweat … Continue reading →
Book review: A Beautiful Mind: The Life of Mathematical Genius and Nobel Laureate John Nash
A Beautiful Mind: The Life of Mathematical Genius and Nobel Laureate John Nash by Sylvia Nasar. Recommended. The prologue to Sylvia Nasar’s biography of Nobel Laureate John Nash, Jr., summarizes the mathematical marvel’s life thus: genius, madness, reawakening. Nash, who was awarded … Continue reading →
Book review: A Confederacy of Dunces
A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole. Highly recommended. He’s egotistical, erudite, ejaculatory (literally), and explosive. He’s “emptily verbose” (Merriam-Webster’s definition number 3 for “gassy”). He’s also that — gassy, a man with a flux. He’s Ignatius J. Reilly, … Continue reading →
Book review: A Short History of Nearly Everything
A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson. New York: Broadway Books. 2003. 560 pages. To me, the sciences are fascinating but elusive. The concepts are marvelous and compelling, but the details are difficult and tedious, especially if your grasp … Continue reading →
Book review: A Treasury of Royal Scandals: The Shocking True Stories of History’s Wickedest, Weirdest, Most Wanton Kings, Queens, Tsars, Popes, and Emperors
A Treasury of Royal Scandals: The Shocking True Stories of History’s Wickedest, Weirdest, Most Wanton Kings, Queens, Tsars, Popes, and Emperors by Michael Farquhar. Recommended. If you eagerly await each issue of The National Enquirer but wish it were less about Jennifer Lopez and … Continue reading →
Book review: A Virtuous Woman
A Virtuous Woman by Kaye Gibbons. Not recommended. In A Virtuous Woman, Kaye Gibbons tells the story of the daughter of Southern gentry, Ruby Pitt Woodrow Stokes; her tenant farmer second husband, Jack Stokes; and those who affect their lives most — Burr, … Continue reading →
Book review: A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail
A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail by Bill Bryson. Recommended. Bill Bryson is known for his wry humour, and this is my first experience of it. Bryson gets it into his head to walk the … Continue reading →
Book review: A War Like No Other
A War Like No Other: How the Athenians and Spartans Fought the Peloponnesian War. New York: Random House. 2006. 416 pages. In my 50+ years on Earth, I’ve lived through the middle and end of the Cold War, nuclear proliferation, … Continue reading →