Tag Archives: book reviews

A Beautiful Mind by Sylvia Nasar

Posted by melydia on June 22, 2010 1 comments

A Beautiful Mind by Sylvia Nasar: This is another book I picked up because I liked the movie. I liked the book, too, but was a little disappointed to learn how little resemblance there is between the two. For example, neither Nash’s college roommate nor his tendency to draw on windows were mentioned in the book, while Nash’s homosexuality and illegitimate son were left out of the movie. Once I realized that there was such a huge disparity, however, I was able to appreciate them as separate works. This biography of mathematician John Nash, Nobel Laureate and recovered schizophrenic, was simply fascinating. It manages a balance between the mathematics and the insanity without becoming either too dry or too sensationalist. I kind of wish there had been a cast of characters listing somewhere to keep all the names straight, but by and large I had no trouble following it. In short, I enjoyed it. However, if you’re just looking for a glimpse inside the mind of a schizophrenic, give this one a pass. Nash’s specific delusions are not described in depth, and most of the information is secondhand anyway. That said, I would recommend it to people who love a good biography, especially one that reads almost like a novel.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

A Golfer’s Tail by Roscoe Watkins

Posted by melydia on June 21, 2010 None comments

A Golfer’s Tail by Roscoe Watkins: This is the story of a feline golfer and his quest for the double slam: wins at the all the major golf tournaments, senior and regular, in one year. I’ll say up front that I neither know nor care a lick about golf, but I’ve found that you don’t always have to be a sports fan to enjoy a sports story. Unfortunately, I don’t think that’s the case here. While the cat-related quips were somewhat entertaining, such as the importance of tail dynamics, the rest of the book consisted play-by-play descriptions of each golf tournament. I found it to be a somewhat exhausting laundry list of birdies, pars, eagles, and bogeys, occasionally punctuated by the crowd going “wild” and/or a “feeling of calm” settling over Roscoe. That said, I’m sure it would be very interesting to an avid golfer. However, between that and the cringe-inducing Japanese stereotype serving as Roscoe’s main adversary, it took me a very long time to finish this slim novel. If you’re a huge fan of both golf and cats, this may well be the book for you. It’s just not the book for me.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

A Dirty Job by Christopher Moore

Posted by melydia on June 14, 2010 None comments

A Dirty Job by Christopher Moore: Charlie Asher is a pretty regular guy until the birth of his daughter and death of his wife. Then strange things begin to happen. Suddenly his life revolves around sewer harpies, hellhounds, and soul vessels. I’ve found Moore to be hit or miss (mostly miss), but this was pretty consistently funny, especially considering it dealt so much with grief and loss. I liked several of the characters, such as Jane and Lily, but the whole thing started to fall apart near the end, when Audrey and the squirrel people started showing up. It felt more like a scramble to tie up loose ends than anything planned in advance, as if the whole thing had been written off the cuff in response to some sort of random prompt, which is a complaint I’ve had about Moore in the past. All in all, it was a decently funny story, just not a very polished novel.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

Wishful Drinking by Carrie Fisher

Posted by melydia on June 9, 2010 1 comments

Wishful Drinking by Carrie Fisher (unabridged audiobook read by the author): Man oh man, I never expected to fall in love with Carrie Fisher. Aside from Star Wars and a cameo appearance in one of the Austin Powers movies, I’m pretty much completely unfamiliar with her work. I’ve never read any of her novels or seen any of her other movies. But you know, this was really fantastic. She’s brutally honest about her upbringing as a product of “Hollywood inbreeding”, her bipolar disorder, her addictions, and her romantic follies. This is a pretty short book, but it goes a mile a minute, jumping from topic to topic without ever feeling too scatterbrained. There are some sad parts and some touching parts, but most of it is just plain old hilarious. I laughed out loud on a number of occasions and had a big old grin on my face for much of the rest of it. Highly recommended.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton

Posted by melydia on June 8, 2010 None comments

The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton: Ponyboy Curtis is a Greaser, a member of a gang, an enemy of the Socs (short for Socials). I kind of wish I’d read this back in middle school before I’d encountered a hundred other stories just like it. The rival social groups, the brawling that goes too far, and even the killing off of characters rather than having them face the difficult (and potentially interesting) consequences of their actions – nothing came as a surprise. It’s even told from the point of view of the character who is unusually smart and bookish, a stereotype which detracts a bit from the realism for me. I understand why this shortcut is so often taken by authors (who are often smart and bookish) to elicit sympathy from the reader (who is also often smart and bookish), but I would have rather heard from Soda or even Two-Bit, Greasers who were more participants than observers. The teenager narrative voice is realistic, which is kind of to be expected considering how much has been made of the fact that the author was only 16 when she wrote it. I’m not saying this is a bad book – far from it. It’s certainly something I would recommend to young adults. I just felt like I’d read it before, that’s all.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

The Nanny Diaries by Nicola Kraus and Emma McLaughlin

Posted by melydia on June 7, 2010 None comments

The Nanny Diaries by Emma McLaughlin and Nicola Kraus (abridged audiobook read by Julia Roberts): College senior Nanny takes a job as – you guessed it – a nanny for Grayer, the son of the extremely wealthy Mr. and Mrs. X. The Xes turn out to be every nanny’s worst nightmare: rich, snobbish, and completely self-absorbed. It’s actually strikingly similar to The Devil Wears Prada, except that I actually had sympathy for the narrator here. There’s a child involved, so she really can’t just quit. Nanny is actually quite graceful and professional in the face of such torment. The use of aliases like “X” and “Nanny” is an interesting device, making it sound more like nonfiction, except that everyone else in the book has a regular name. I don’t know that I’d seek out other books by these authors, but this one was decent.

On the audio version: Roberts is an okay narrator, but it took me a while to get into the groove of her slightly too-fast monotone.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

Absolute Power by David Baldacci

Posted by melydia on May 26, 2010 1 comments

Absolute Power by David Baldacci: The set-up of the story is simple: Luther Whitney, an aging thief, witnesses the lady of the house he is robbing in a tryst with Allen Richmond, the President of the United States. Things get out of hand and she is killed by secret service agents. Luther gets his hands on a key piece of evidence and is suddenly on the run for his life. Seth Frank is the detective on the murder case; Walter Sullivan is the millionaire husband of the deceased and good friend to the President; Jack Graham is Luther’s defense lawyer, the ex-boyfriend of Luther’s estranged daughter Kate, and the target of the President’s men for much of the book. It’s a decent cat-and-mouse tale, with a high body count and reasonably likeable characters. There were a surprising number of first-names-as-last-names in this book: Frank, Collin, Simon, Graham, Russell, Whitney. Usually I don’t notice things like that, but it got a little confusing at times. I don’t see myself picking up any more Baldacci titles, but it was decently engaging.

I am now very interested to see the movie made from this book, as apparently they cut out Jack Graham entirely.

I listened to this on audiobook read by Scott Brick, whom I thoroughly enjoyed as a narrator of Card’s Ender series. He was no disappointment here. Included in this version was the short story “No Time Left”. It was, in a word, terrible. The second the client said his name I knew exactly where it was going, and I was exactly right. Don’t bother with it.

Also posted on BookCrossing.
Read as part of the Books Won Challenge

Marooned in Fraggle Rock by Barbara McClintock

Posted by melydia on May 19, 2010 None comments

Marooned in Fraggle Rock by David Young, illustrated by Barbara McClintock: Red and Boober wander off together so the others can finish preparing for Boober’s surprise birthday party, and are trapped by a cave-in. The characterization and dialogue were spot-on with my memories of the show (a favorite from childhood), and the illustrations were great. The story was surprisingly dark and scary. A happy ending is assured, of course, but there’s a lot going on here. Which is what made Henson’s creations so compelling: even the children’s shows have layers and complexity. Add some wonderful music and you have the show distilled into book form.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency by Douglas Adams

Posted by melydia on May 18, 2010 None comments

Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency by Douglas Adams: As a longtime fan of Adams’s Hitchhiker’s Guide series, I’ve been meaning to read this for quite a while. Unfortunately, it’s clear why this series does not have the cult following of the other. It has the same random humor and just-go-with-it meandering style of plot, but somehow it doesn’t quite gel as a novel. The titular character doesn’t even show up until about halfway through the book. The narration shifts constantly between a computer programmer, his boss, his girlfriend, an Electric Monk, and Bizarre Omniscient. The characters are amusing on their own but one needs more than good characters to make a good novel. Don’t get me wrong: there are some very funny anecdotes and asides, but the main story is so confusing that the humor is nearly overshadowed. I haven’t decided yet if I’m going to read the sequel.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

Shakespeare’s Landlord by Charlaine Harris

Posted by melydia on May 17, 2010 None comments

Shakespeare’s Landlord by Charlaine Harris: First of all, forget old Willie; the title comes from Shakespeare, Arkansas, where our story takes place. The landlord in question is the murder victim. The protagonist is Lily Bard, a standoffish housecleaner with a dark past, whose only hobbies appear to be working out at the gym, taking martial arts classes, and obsessing over whether or not people have learned her secrets. When she happens to see the body being transported using her garbage cart one dark evening she quickly discovers that she must find the killer in order to prevent her secrets from being blasted all over town. As this is the first book in a series, we are introduced to tons of characters and even a couple of potential love interests, neither of which are particularly interesting. The cover art made me think it would be a touch more light-hearted, but in the end it’s a somewhat humdrum murder mystery with just barely enough suspense to keep the reader involved. The ending was too predictable to justify the lead-up, but I won’t say that I necessarily saw it coming from a mile away either. It was fine as a quick gym read, keeping my attention while I was on the stationary bike, but I won’t be reading any more in the series.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

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