Interested in tech, history, social science, and 20th century literature, but I always like to branch and out be surprised, too.
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25% complete! John G. has read 3 of 12 books.
Last Train to Paradise is acclaimed novelist Les Standiford's fast-paced and gripping true account of the extraordinary construction and spectacular …
A manifesto exploding what we think we know about disability, and arguing that disabled people are the real experts when …
Mind bending. The author's interrupting personal backstory is uncompelling and unsympathetic but his overview of research on this topic is well done and surprising. A good introduction to the topics. Skip Chapter 1, which is an irrelevant preface.
Every turn of Slide's surreal adventure came alive with the author's electric writing. The best part of the novel is its persistent, quiet wisdom. Underlying the story is a strange, confident idea that this is how it is; this is how the world really works, and it feels true.
Blackshirts & Reds explores some of the big issues of our time: fascism, capitalism, communism, …
Clear and clairvoyant - hard to believe it was written in 1997 and yet it perfectly describes the moves of the neo-right that have happened since. The book is mistitled. Though it describes the historical blackshirts and reds, it is more far-reaching, and isn't really a history book as one might think. The book convincingly dissects fascism as authoritarianism in service to capitalism and explains how the intentional conflation of capitalism with democracy has suppressed freedoms all over the world. Very well written with compelling historical examples. A good, challenging read.
"Beautifully written and meticulously researched."—St. Louis Post-Dispatch. This updated study of the economics, politics, and …
This book is to Chinatown what an ocean is to a puddle. Of course, LA's ill-begotten water is part of this account, too. But the boek makes abundantly clear that the water woes go far beyond one city and one region and are a matter (and result of) federal policy, which to the date of his writing is incoherent at best and counter-productive in most places.
Cadillac Desert hit me over the head with the idea that dams are pretty much always bad until, to my surprise, I had to agree.
I would give the book five stars except for its irritating and unfortunate tendency to add unnecessary polemics and personal biases against individuals and places in a way that undermines the credibility of the information otherwise plainly presented. Nevertheless, the book is a readable policy paper that masquerades as a surprisingly compelling story with a heavy foreshadowing of a …
This book is to Chinatown what an ocean is to a puddle. Of course, LA's ill-begotten water is part of this account, too. But the boek makes abundantly clear that the water woes go far beyond one city and one region and are a matter (and result of) federal policy, which to the date of his writing is incoherent at best and counter-productive in most places.
Cadillac Desert hit me over the head with the idea that dams are pretty much always bad until, to my surprise, I had to agree.
I would give the book five stars except for its irritating and unfortunate tendency to add unnecessary polemics and personal biases against individuals and places in a way that undermines the credibility of the information otherwise plainly presented. Nevertheless, the book is a readable policy paper that masquerades as a surprisingly compelling story with a heavy foreshadowing of a bleak future absent change.
Raymond Chandler: Raymond Chandler Omnibus (1964, Random House Inc (T))
The Big Sleep (1939) is a hardboiled crime novel by Raymond Chandler, the first to feature the detective Philip Marlowe. …
Who says you can't run away from your problems?
You are a failed novelist about …
I'm not keen on the solipsism of writers writing about writing or the explicit (and anachronistic?) adventurism of a "round the world tour", but Less makes up for it with dazzling descriptions of the people and places the protagonist encounters. Some sentences ring with truth in a way that makes the fictional and foreign uncannily familiar ("oh yeah, that is what that looks like"). Unfortunately, the novel's structure is also too familiar, and the framework of a hero's journey is too obvious and the novel doesn't take enough risks to make it memorable. I'm also not sure I buy the conceit of the narrator in the end.
a true tale of shipwreck, mutiny, and murder
A fantastically interesting story about the disastrous Wager voyage, very well told. Every chapter brings surprises and the book overall raises interesting questions about the importance of individual stories in writing history.
An intriguing investigation of the idealistic pioneers of early bombing technology who wanted to "make wars better" to save lives. By telling the story as a (seemingly exaggerated) conflict between two commanders, however, the author seems to sell short the broader history, and, frustratingly, the author concludes by merely mentioning the profound and novel ethical questions that arise from the use of precision bombing, leaving much more thought provoking material unexplored.
At 01:23:40 on April 26th 1986, Alexander Akimov pressed the emergency shutdown button at Chernobyl’s fourth nuclear reactor. It was …
An interesting story told with occasional dry humor and irony. The Cold War tensions are either overblown in the title or underreported in the book, however. The story is mostly about the zookeepers, who were interesting and quirky characters, ambitious to a fault.
Fourteen-year-old Alma Singer is trying to find a cure for her mother's loneliness. Believing that …
A fantastic story of lives coming together around a lost book. The characters are compelling and the end was breathtaking.
A rediscovered classic, originally published in 1938 and now an international bestseller.When it first appeared …
A short, powerful story.
Charles Bukowski: Factotum (2002, Ecco)
One of Charles Bukowski's best, this beer-soaked, deliciously degenerate novel follows the wanderings of aspiring writer Henry Chinaski across World …
