User Profile

I've probably read 10 books now over the last 5 of so years about the Christian Right and this was by far the most engaging (her first book was also excellent). I will warn readers that the second part, devoted to education, family dynamics, and childrearing are intense, with the chapter devoted to the last topic quite disturbing.

Good, but the title and subtitle are misleading because although a substantial part of the book is devoted to the nominal subject of the deciphering of Old Persian and Akkadian, a majority is on the archaeological work that made it possible. (Also, the subtitle refers to "the world's oldest writing," but in the body of the book it's made clear that it's only the script itself which is oldest but the language for which it was first used was Sumerian, which receives only paying discussion.)

Lively journalistic account of Elon Musk and his businesses. Although it's not at all a biography, it does give great insight into the nature of his personality.

Fun YA romantasy which I'd almost completely forgotten 12 years after my first reading; this was another time also reading it aloud to my wife.

Interesting, but there was a lot of speculation about what people in the past civilizations thought and felt about what was going on. Apart from that I thought it was quite good and very educational.

CW: #YesTheDogDies, suicide. But a beautiful if largely rather grim book with a happy(-ish) ending.

A thoughtful and engaging treatment, not entirely negative as you might expect from the title. The explanation of the relationship between language and meaning was brief but insightful.