It may help to understand human affairs to be clear that most of the great triumphs and tragedies of history are caused, not by people being fundamentally good or fundamentally bad, but by people being fundamentally people. I cannot emphasize enough how much of a treat Good Omens is. Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett will also tell you how much of a treat it is. They will tell you in their introduction and their afterward how much they wrote it for the love of it […]
A war, depression, and a sociopath. And three other books not about the 2016 election.
64. Pacific Crucible: War at Sea in the Pacific, 1941-1942 by Ian W. Toll (5 stars) The Pacific Crucible examines the naval war in the Pacific theater of WWII from Pearl Harbor to Midway, and traces its origins back to the naval strategist Alfred Thayer Mahan’s seminal book, The Influence of Sea Power Upon History. This is the first in a nonfiction trilogy about the Pacific theater of WWII. The second, The Conquering Tide, was published in 2015. I think it’s a fairly stellar book about […]
A Nazi is a Nazi is a Nazi
I absolutely hate reading books about war because they upset me so much. I usually end up angry and crying. Or angry and with a headache because I’m trying not to cry. Basically, it all just upsets the crap out of me and I don’t like it. The Nightingale, by Kristin Hannah, is no exception. I didn’t think it would be and although it was on my To-Read list, I probably wouldn’t have gotten around to reading it if it wasn’t selected by my book […]
It’s time to go to war
Spoiler warning! This review is going to contain spoilers for earlier books in the series, and possibly some mild ones for the content of this book too. If you’re not caught up, you probably want to skip this review for now. Come back when you’ve read the books, they’re worth your time if you like action-packed fantasy. The beginning of this book finds Fayre back at the Spring court, after Tamlin made a bargain with the the High King and had her bond with Rhysand […]