Wow, it’s been 7 years since I posted a revue. I started this post in 2019 and then didn’t finish it, let’s see if I can finish it now.
I made a note that I had started a lot of library books that then expired before I finished them. That still happens. I won’t review those.
Chris Smith – The Daily Show (the Book): An Oral History (2016)
I think I remember this one. If I recall it was a series of statements or recollections by different people who worked on the Daily Show from its very start, into Jon Stewart’s tenure and through to when he left. In particular I recall it captures how the show changed after 9/11 and became a cultural force. I liked it, it makes you think about what it would be like to write for a comedy show.
Arthur C. Clarke – Rendezvous With Rama (1973)
Classic sci-fi novella about an encounter with an alien spacecraft drifting through the solar system. Earthlings are sent to explore it and strange things happen.
I heard of this story when Oumuamua shot around the sun a couple years ago and folks were comparing it to Rama. I liked it.
N. K. Jemisin – The Fifth Season (2015), The Obelisk Gate (2016), The Stone Sky (2017) (aka the Broken Earth Trilogy)
This was just so weird, I still think about it sometimes, the bits I remember: a world with enormous stone formations floating in the sky; people who are born with the ability to move the earth with their minds, and are either persecuted or enslaved for it, or both (I don’t quite recall); how nothing is made of metal because it’s unreliable and inconstant. It was so creative, and yeah weird. I should read it again.
Jeff VanderMeer – Annihilation (2014), Authority (2014), Acceptance (2014) (aka the Southern Reach Trilogy)
Reading the first book of this series was such an odd feeling, it was just so weird. The story is weird and the way it’s told is weird, it gives you little glimpses at a time of what’s going on and it takes a while to put a picture together that never quite coalesces while still drawing you in. In short: some mysterious event decades ago on some small coastal area of the U.S. created a world-within-the-world that changes anyone who enters in unknowable ways. I thought it was great, though the second and third books lose some of that mystery.
Volker Ullrich – Hitler: Ascent, 1889-1939 (2013)
I picked this up shortly after the 2016 election, put it down for a year or so, then finished it. I remember now reading it on a rocking chair while while my infant son napped on my lap. Fascinating history of Hitler’s rise to power and the historical conditions that enabled it. It’s odd at times as the author clearly admires his subject and has to interject every now and again to remind himself and us that Hitler was bad. I look forward to reading the next volume. I wonder what happens?
Brian Cox & Jeff Forshaw – Why Does e=mc²? (2009)
File this under books that help you feel smarter. I loved this one, because it very clearly explained special relativity; building each concept logically onto the next, starting from one observation: that, once scientists were able to measure the speed of light, they kept getting the same number despite differences in velocity between sources and sensors. Pursuing the implication that light actually has the same speed for all observers, given other physical laws, led Einstein to discovering a relationship between mass and energy.
I recall some concepts toward the end of the book that were harder to grasp, I should read this one again too.
Michelle McNamara – I’ll Be Gone in the Dark:
One Woman’s Obsessive Search for the Golden State Killer (2018)
I came upon this one back when I read Twitter and followed Patton Oswalt. The author had been his wife, and had died before finishing the book. There’s a documentary series about it. As I recall she gathers much of the available evidence and finds that it points to one suspect, who was charged shortly after the book was published and later found guilty. I recall the book was super creepy. The 70s were nuts.
George Orwell – Down and Out in Paris and London (1933)
Orwell wrote this memoir about his young adulthood slumming it in Paris. At least that’s how I remember it. Two images in particular remain with me: dirty, sooty kitchens in the basement of fancy hotels, and the author and some friend of his having to share the same suit in order to keep a job in those kitchens. I think. There was a lot of talk about a suit.
Scott Pape – The Barefoot Investor: the Only Money Guide You’ll Ever Need (2016)
I don’t remember anything about this.
Ben Macintyre – A Spy Among Friends (2014)
An English spy turns and starts spying for Russia during or shortly after WWII, and another English spy has to catch him. It was good.
Vanessa McGrady – Rock Needs River: A Memoir About a Very Open Adoption (2019)
If I’m remembering the right book, the author came off as pretty unlikeable.
Ling Ma – Severance (2018)
A post apocalyptic novel following an American woman of Chinese descent who works at a company importing things from China when a pandemic starts that turns people into zombies. I recall the banality of the woman’s life as the disease spreads but she keeps going to the office, as coworkers and her foreign contacts start dropping out of the picture. They’re not like “braiinns” zombies, more like a person catches the disease and stops being sentient. The story follows her as she leaves the city and finds other people who have been resistant to the disease, and then the story becomes about authoritarianism. I think.
Rebecca Solnit – Men Explain Things to Me (2014)
A famous book that’s both funny and eye-opening. Sobering? Naw, I’m not one of those men. Well, actually…
Manuel Gonzales – The Regional Office Is Under Attack! (2016)
I don’t remember this at all, even after reading a synopsis on wikipedia. Maybe I didn’t read it.
James S. A. Corey – Leviathan Wakes (2011)
I had to read a synopsis to remember this. Like a lot of sci fi I remember bits and pieces of it, particularly the scenes on Ceres ring a bell. I don’t think I read any of the others in the series.
Annie Proulx – The Shipping News (1993)
I remember reading this and thinking it was great, and that I knew more about Newfoundland than I did before. Or thought I did. It’s an enjoyable novel. I think I read Barkskins afterward because I liked it so much. Or it was the other way around? Who knows.
Tom Hansen – American Junkie (2017)
This one stayed with me. Partly because it paints a bleak picture of deep heroin addiction. Partly because it involved the similarly deep heroin addiction of some rock stars I like. And partly because the protagonist describes staying at the Bailey-Boushay House, in front of which I used to catch the bus. Also it’s pretty well-written.
Tom Hansen somehow survived extreme addiction and lived to tell about it, though he died in 2023. Mark Lanegan, who also survived extreme addiction and died somewhat recently, mentions Tom in his memoir. They mention each other in their memoirs, that’s nice.
George Saunders – Lincoln in the Bardo (2017)
Another weird but amazing book and the first I’ve read by George Saunders, so now I get why he’s a genius. That said, years later now mostly I just remember it was about ghosts and it was written in a weird way that was very affecting and that I liked it.
Katherine Dunn – Geek Love (1989)
Another one where even after reading a synopsis I don’t recall a single bit of it. Either I didn’t read it or I need to write these posts faster or I need a physician.
Jenna Fischer – the Actor’s Life: A Survival Guide (2017)
Part memoir, part career advice to actors. She almost quit but stuck it out. I liked it.
Alright I did it! Caught up to 2019.
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