Life Lived Wild
Rick Ridgeway’s writing has a bit of a rough-hewn, simple style that I don’t think will win many awards - and at first, that I didn’t think I liked that much. But there is also a deep, earnest sincerity to...
male-author
A Christmas Carol
A classic that stands the test of time! Tiny Tim did not die and Scrooge was a doofus but he bought a goose so it is all good.
Wellness
A double-negative in a sentence performs in my mind a kind of fascinating transformation of meaning; ostensibly the sentence works just the same without it, but practically there is something else, a différance that drives the meaning around and into...
A Gentleman In Moscow
It is a bit suspicious that this was published after Wes Anderson’s The Grand Budapest Hotel came out, but as much of a Anderson fanboy as I am, I think this may have done it better. Declining customs of an...
Red Sorgum
There is I think probably a thread of brilliance that winds its way though this novel - but I was rarely quite able to grasp it. I am a bit suspicious of the translation; the writing has a kind of...
Into The Silence
Impressive, compelling and detailed story of a bunch of crazy Britishers, gallivanting through life, clinging to the glory of a bygone era, callously causing wanton death and performing feats of greatness. It is astonishing their arrogance, what they lived through,...
Great Expectations
Dickens for me stands a bit a part as a master of the weave of a plot. Emblematic and mostly straightforward characters bounce around to surprising and delightful ends. I’m a bit concerned for the future of Dickens though -...
The Mysteries
Gotta love Bill Watterson and anything he makes
The Master
A sweet and thoughtful novel, a little bit lonely, Henry James looking back on an interesting and humane life and set of relationships, father and sister and artist friends. Contemplative but never (terribly, I suppose it is in the eye...
The Rise And Fall Of The Dinosaurs
Brusatte takes you through an excellent history of both the dinosaurs themselves and the field of paleontology, from a few crazy pioneers (I could stand to learn a bit more about Baron Nopsca, scientist, swashbuckler and spy) to the high-tech...