On a recent work trip, I was reading Home Fire by Kamila Shamsie, and it was heavy. There’s a lot going on in my life, and that book was too much for me to handle in a hotel room on my own, so ducked into a library to find something a bit frothy. I immediately came across Crazy Rich Asians by Kevin Kwan. I am absolutely excited to see the forthcoming movie (mostly because of that amazing cast and because let’s see something different), but […]
Jack Reacher with a Soul
Though I still read the latest Lee Child every time one arrives at my local library, I’ve become just a bit uncomfortable with the faint taste of revenge porn I get every time I accompany Reacher to an isolated rural town where trouble and a body count are sure to follow. It was after reading Worth Dying For in 2011 that I let rip a Goodreads review that tried to express (and maybe exorcise) my discomfort: These are all bad, bad men but the fact that […]
Do nothing because it is righteous or praiseworthy or noble to do so; do nothing because it seems good to do so; do only that which you must do and which you cannot do in any other way.
This is the third of the Earthsea Cycle, which I assume is the earliest and primary trilogy in the world. This is from 1972, and less so than the previous two novel, but still plenty, this novel feels like it’s from 1972. What this means is that while it’s still very good, it’s so endemic of early fantasy novels. The scope of the novel’s plot outpaces it’s tone and size. It’s too big a story for a relatively short novel. I think about Middlemarch when it […]
Well-written Novel That Left Me Cold
I heard about Harry Crews from a friend a long time ago who described his book as “sleazy, dark fiction set in Florida” (sold). I’ve been meaning to read something of his and decided to give “Body” a try. I was especially psyched to read it because the central plot point is a bodybuilding competition and I love lifting weights and will take any motivational workout porn I can get (seriously, even that scene in “The Mirror Has Two Faces” where Streisand goes to the […]