I was reminded of a cross between Hogwarts and Miss Peregrine’s schools. After her mother catches her floating in her sleep, Amy is sent to an all-girls boarding school, Drearcliff-Grange, that she discovers is actually intended for girls with special abilities like her, and/or daughters of famous criminals, scientists, and magicians. The school is divided up into houses as in Harry Potter, but unlike Harry Potter, these houses are named for Shakesperean ladies: Viola, Goneril, Desdemona, Tamora, and Ariel (even though Prospero’s spirit is referred […]
More mythology please
This is a good retelling of some of the basic elements of Norse mythology, but it felt a little light and incomplete to me. I was hoping for a fuller presentation of the whole saga, which granted would make this book twice or thrice as long as it is. For example, there is very little about the lady goddesses, some of whom do have their own stories. There’s a note in the introduction about how many Norse stories have been lost, which is true of […]
Die Ross!
Things have improved in my mind just a little since the disaster that was introducing Ross 2 books ago. There are still irritating moments when Hannah “struggles” to adjust to being married (What if Ross doesn’t like this?, I think I might want kids, but does he?), but at least the mystery solving is back to what it usually is, and there’s more Hannah and friends-family to bring back the banter. The twist this time is that Hannah actually does not discover any bodies. This […]
Pie to Pi but a Little Underbaked
How to Bake Pi uses analogies to cooking and baking (and lots of other everyday things) to explain some fairly advanced mathematical concepts. These work nicely, especially for someone like me who hasn’t done anything beyond calculus 2, and that over 10 years ago. The invention of an olive oil plum cake recipe for example becomes a way of explaining generalization (how can something be called a ‘cake’ if it is not completely really a cake) and the mathematical practice of proof by contradiction (proving something […]