I loved, loved, loved this one. If you have any curiosity about how the world works — evolution, viruses, astrobiology, anything — then check this out. It’s written beautifully, with all of the wonder that Nye inspired in us when we were kids. “I’ll admit that the discovery of evolution is humbling, but it is also empowering. It transforms our relationship to the life around us. Instead of being outsiders watching the natural world go by, we are insiders. We are part of the process; we […]
“All those layers of silence upon silence.”
My main complaint about the other Donna Tartt book that I recently read — The Goldfinch — boiled down to it simply being too long. The Secret History is similarly long, and dense, and full of rambling descriptions and actions, but I found the story and the characters so much more compelling here. “Does such a thing as ‘the fatal flaw,’ that showy dark crack running down the middle of a life, exist outside literature? I used to think it didn’t. Now I think it does. And I […]
New from Margaret Atwood — featuring a surprising amount of sex with chickens
This one started out great but went downhill about 2/3rds of the way through. I love Margaret Atwood, and I don’t mind when she gets a little weird, but this one had just a little too much weirdness for me. “I don’t think they’ll ever replace the living and breathing,” says Gary. “They said that about e-books,” says Kevin. “You can’t stop progress.” Sometime in the (probably near) future, the economy has gone way downhill. After losing their jobs, Charmaine and Stan have been reduced to living a […]
I liked the bits with the horses
Sheltering Rain begins in the 1950s in Hong Kong, when Joy meets her future husband, Edward, during the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II. They eventually marry and produce two children — Christopher and Kate. In the late 1990s, Joy and Edward live in a falling-down estate in Ireland. Kate — now in her mid-thirties and splitting with her live-in boyfriend — sends her sixteen year old daughter, Sabine, from London to Ireland to spend time with her grandmother and ailing grandfather, despite the fact that Kate […]