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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.

The first part of the book is composed of pointed and (to me) cogent criticism of the Jesus Seminar and their way of approaching early Christianity. The second part presents Johnson's positive alternative and includes an excellent explanation for why the resurrection is not "historical": it's not at all that it's didn't happen, but that by his definition history is purely naturalistic and the supernatural nature of the resurrection therefore puts it outside the bounds of history. I was very glad to have been pointed toward this book by Fleming Rutledge's Crucifixion, which I also recommend.

Well-written survey of the efforts of the New Right to destroy democracy. I appreciated in particular that the author includes a chapter devoted to the UK and other parts of Europe. It's got a torrent of names and organizations, so take it slowly if the subject is largely new to you.

A good balance of romance, peril, and mystery. I was sorry that Molly seemed rather less ASD than in the earlier books, though.