Is that not the greatest cover ever? The book doesn’t quite live up to it, but I enjoyed it nonetheless. Maria finally convinces her father to let her spend a year in New York with her estranged mother — partly to get to know her mother, partly to get away from some bad kids in the rural town where she’s living with her dad. Maria’s grandmother enrolls her in a fancy prep school, Maria packs her things, and she moves to New York. Of course, things don’t […]
I get the obsession, if not the subject
I like Patton Oswalt — his guest spots on various shows (Parks & Rec, for one) have always cracked me up, and while I don’t do the Twitter, I always enjoy seeing his funny tweets when they go viral. Sadly, a general like for a funny dude did not translate to great love for his book about film — but if you’re a film buff (I am not, although I do love a good — meaning bad — disaster movie), you might want to check this […]
Takes a while to get going, but then — wow!
I was a little nervous when I first started this one. Y’all were posting a review a day, gushing over it, but it took me a while to get into it. I think my problem was I was listening to it as audiobook while running, so I only got about an hour a day. And it starts a little slow. And whiny (Simon). But once Baz shows up — the whole thing takes off and I fell just as much in love as y’all did. […]
…would probably be just fine, thank you
Written in 2007, Alan Weisman’s The World Without Us examines exactly that: what would happen to the world if all the humans suddenly disappeared? The answer basically boils down to: the world would probably be much happier and healthier, thank you very much. “All of us humans have myriad other species to thank. Without them, we couldn’t exist. It’s that simple, and we can’t afford to ignore them, anymore than I can afford to neglect my precious wife–nor the sweet mother Earth that births and holds us […]