Tag Archives: books

A Calculated Risk by Katherine Neville

Posted by melydia on February 27, 2008 None comments

A Calculated Risk by Katherine Neville: This is my third Neville book (of three, as far as I can tell) and I think it’s probably my second favorite (with The Eight being the clear winner). All of these books have followed strong, intelligent women dealing with high-risk situations. There is also another plot, which takes place hundreds of years earlier, that somehow relates to the modern storyline. In this case, we have Verity Banks, a vice president of Bank of the World (Neville worked for Bank of America; perhaps there is a parallel here?), continually fighting with her chauvenistic management who dismiss her suggestions unless they can somehow claim them as their own. Fed up, she decides to demonstrate how faulty their computer security is by temporarily stealing money herself. Enter Zolan Tor, Banks’s brilliant former mentor, who decides that he wants to play too, and can do it better. So they make a bet. The historical side story is about the Rothschild family some 200 years ago, who apparently have a lot to do with why banking is the way it is. I couldn’t quiet follow it, and I don’t think it added anything to the story. The modern thread, on the other hand, was a real page-turner. I just couldn’t put it down. Banks and Tor had a wonderful chemistry, and the other characters were a blast. My favorite was Lelia, the French Russian dame who spoke no language well and thus several broken languages at once. I would certainly recommend this one if you’re looking for a fun thriller, but if you only read one Neville book, I’d still have to steer you towards The Eight.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke

Posted by melydia on February 7, 2008 None comments

Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke: For centuries, the study of English magic has been entirely theoretical. Spells have not actually worked in three hundred years or more. Enter Mr. Norrell and later his apprentice Jonathan Strange, who work toward the return of practical English magic at the turn of the 19th century, with somewhat unexpected consequences. I loved this book, but I will be the first to admit it’s not for everyone. You’ve got to be in it for the long haul. And I do mean long: almost 800 pages (though there are a fair number of poorly drawn illustrations thrown in for no discernable reason other than to add heft). It’s also not the sort of story where you can grasp the gist of the plot from the first couple chapters. Rather, you have to simply enjoy what you are presently reading and trust the basic arc of the story will become clear in time. It does, but there are a lot of seemingly spurious asides that don’t appear to have much to do with anything for quite a long time. It’s written more like a history, complete with footnotes, with the author writing with the voice of a contemporary of most of the events described. I found this angle charming and quite convincing, to the point where I almost forgot that people like Martin Pale and John Uskglass never really existed. I will definitely be on the look-out for Clarke’s future novels.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

Books read in 2007

Posted by melydia on January 1, 2008 None comments

1. The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver
2. Cover the Butter by Carrie Kabak
3. Gullible’s Travels by Cash Peters
4. The Satanic Verses by Salman Rushdie
5. The Seven Towers by Patricia C. Wrede
6. The Husband by Dean Koontz
7. Hal Spacejock by Simon Haynes
8. Blue Springs by Peter Rennebohm
9. A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers
10. Ambercore by Troy Williams
11. The Tin Drum by Gunter Grass
12. The Hindi-Bindi Club by Monica Pradhan
13. Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer
14. Hick by Andrea Portes
15. Eats, Shites and Leaves by A. Parody
16. The Stand by Stephen King
17. Ana’s Story by Jenna Bush
18. Bill the Galactic Hero by Harry Harrison
19. Innumeracy by John Allen Paulos
20. The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
21. Anybody Can Write by Roberta Jean Bryant
22. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling
23. Bill the Galactic Hero on the Planet of the Robot Slaves by Harry Harrison
24. The Good Guy by Dean Koontz
25. The Echelon Vendetta by David Stone
26. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon
27. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
28. The Pelican Brief by John Grisham
29. The Color Purple by Alice Walker
30. Neuromancer by William Gibson
31. Thinner by Stephen King
32. Not a Happy Camper by Mindy Schneider
33. Island of the Blue Dolphins by Scott O’Dell
34. Mistress Masham’s Repose by T.H. White
35. The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson
36. The Colour of Magic by Terry Pratchett
37. The Weatherman by Steve Thayer
38. Two for the Dough by Janet Evanovich
39. Stargirl by Jerry Spinelli
40. The Five People You Meet in Heaven by Mitch Albom
41. Nine Tomorrows by Isaac Asimov
42. Berserker by Fred Saberhagen
43. Death Note Volume 1 by Tsugumi Ohba
44. Jim Henson’s Designs and Doodles by Alison Inches
45. Wolf Whistle by Lewis Nordan

All in all, I averaged about eight days per book. Not bad, not bad at all. My increased commute time meant more audiobooks too, a trend that will doubtless continue through 2008.

Books listened to in 2007
1. The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner
2. Pompeii by Robert Harris
3. The Time Machine by H.G. Wells
4. How I Write by Janet Evanovich and Ina Yalof
5. 1776 by David McCullough
6. Labyrinth by Kate Mosse
7. Little Earthquakes by Jennifer Weiner
8. Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury
9. The Legend of Sleepy Hollow and Rip Van Winkle by Washington Irving
10. Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse
11. The Turn of the Screw by Henry James
12. Goodnight Nobody by Jennifer Weiner
13. The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova
14. The Devil Wears Prada by Lauren Weisberger
15. Everything Is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer
16. Animal Farm by George Orwell
17. Captains Courageous by Rudyard Kipling
18. The Witch of Blackbird Pond by Elizabeth George Speare
19. The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century by Thomas L. Friedman
20. Coraline by Neil Gaiman
21. The Guy Not Taken by Jennifer Weiner
22. A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole
23. Odd Thomas by Dean Koontz
24. The Egyptologist by Arthur Phillips
25. The Planets by Dava Sobel
26. Don’t Know Much About the Civil War by Kenneth C. Davis
27. Superstition by David Ambrose
28. Fragile Things by Neil Gaiman
29. Ticktock by Dean Koontz

Books started but not finished
* The Dilbert Principle by Scott Adams
* Their Eyes were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston
* Witch Hunt by Ian Rankin
* Darwin’s Radio by Greg Bear
* Disclosure by Michael Crichton
* Go Ask Alice by Anonymous
* The Black Dahlia by James Ellroy
* Blood Music by Greg Bear

Ticktock by Dean Koontz

Posted by melydia on December 28, 2007 None comments

Your typical Dean Koontz story: Ordinary Man finds ordinary life turned upside down out of nowhere by Pure Evil, in an event that is usually inexplicable and/or random. Most of book involves Ordinary Man being chased by Pure Evil. Along the way he finds or confirms his True Love. In the end, Pure Evil is destroyed, Ordinary Man is (re)united with his True Love, and everything ends happily.

In Ticktock, Vietnamese-American Tommy Phan discovers a strange ragdoll on his doorstep which turns into a demon trying to kill him. Most of the book is spent on Tommy and his newfound love Del fleeing from said demon. Del is extremely mysterious in what I suppose was meant to be an amusing way, but I thought she was really obnoxious, and I couldn’t figure out what Tommy saw in her. On the other hand, I loved Tommy’s mother.

Yes, the story is a tad silly (Del’s secrets, when finally revealed, are even sillier), but it’s Koontz. If you like Koontz, you’ll like this one. It’s a fun, light read.

The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson

Posted by melydia on November 11, 2007 None comments

The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson: This is really two books. One is the story of Daniel Burnham and the construction of the World’s Columbian Exposition, also known as the Chicago world’s fair. The other is about serial killer H. H. Holmes. Other than time and place, the two stories have almost nothing in common, but this doesn’t distract from the book as a whole. This is nonfiction written like a novel, with vivid details and memorable characters. I was completely sucked in, perhaps all the more because I knew it was true. I never realized just how much modern popular culture stems from this fair. The story of Holmes was fascinating as well, to the point where I’m kind of surprised I’d never heard of him. Definitely recommended to anyone with an interest in this time period.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

Not a Happy Camper by Mindy Schneider

Posted by melydia on October 16, 2007 None comments

Not a Happy Camper by Mindy Schneider: This memoir about the author’s experiences at an eight-week camp in the summer of 1974 is not one I would have read had I not won it in a contest, but it was a nice story. The author spends most of her time in the woods bemoaning her unpopularity and chasing boys, which is made more interesting with a thorough sprinkling of amusing anecdotes. While I don’t expect this quick little read to appeal to anyone who was never a 13-year-old girl or a camper, it was a pleasant diversion.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

Thinner by Stephen King

Posted by melydia on October 14, 2007 None comments

Thinner by Stephen King: It’s a painfully simple concept for a story: overweight man runs down gypsy, man’s judge friend gets him off, gypsy’s father curses man, man begins to lose weight at a horrifying rate, man hunts down gypsy’s father to get curse removed. Considering all the stuff up to and including the man getting cursed happens before the book even begins, there is definitely not enough story here to fill 300+ pages. It all feels like padding – the altercation with the doctor, the stories of the judge and police chief, even the lengthy bit of tracking down the gypsy caravan. It would have been much better as a short story. I hear the movie is good, which makes sense – this is something that could easily be condensed into a 90-minute film without losing anything. (Though I hear the ending is different, which is a shame since that was one of the few parts of the book that didn’t drag on endlessly.)

Also posted on BookCrossing.

Neuromancer by William Gibson

Posted by melydia on October 5, 2007 None comments

Neuromancer by William Gibson: This was described to me as the archetypal cyberpunk novel. And perhaps it is. The world was interesting, the characters were dynamic, and the view of the future was familiar yet radically different. However, I had a terrible time following the storyline. I got what happened in a general sense, but there was still some stuff that went over my head. Like what happened to Wintermute at the end. So honestly I’m not sure if I’d recommend this book to anyone else, because I’m not entirely sure how I feel about it. Perhaps I should reread it sometime.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

The World is Flat by Thomas L. Friedman

Posted by melydia on August 31, 2007 None comments

The World is Flat by Thomas L. Friedman (unabridged audiobook read by Oliver Wyman): This book, while a reasonably interesting discussion of globalization, is way too long and repetitive. I can summarize it in a few bullet points:

* Outsourcing grunt work saves money and frees up Americans to be innovative and specialized. It also improves the standard of living in the countries receiving the new jobs.
* The internet = teh awesome.
* Collaboration benefits everyone.
* OMG they have computers in Asia!
* Americans need to buckle down in science and math education or they will be left behind.
* Change is difficult but inevitable.
* Knowledge-based work is like an ice cream sundae.
* Sometimes companies in one country have employees in other countries, or they work with companies in other countries.
* Terrorists have access to the same technologies we do.
* The world is flat. The world is flat. The world is flat.

Okay, so maybe I’m being a tad flip. This was probably far more groundbreaking when it came out in 2004 and the off-shoring/outsourcing panic really started picking up speed. Though I didn’t come away with any major new insights, I did enjoy a lot of the little nuggets of information, like the Indian school for untouchables and JetBlue’s housewives in Utah. And there was certainly no shortage of anecdotes.

Basically, if you’re new to the globalization game and want a general overview with lots of specific examples, this is a good book for you. However, if you’re already reasonably familiar with just how multinational your average multinational corporation is, you might want to look for something more in depth.

One final note: the narrator was okay, but it was a little strange how he gave everyone he quoted a subtle Indian accent.

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon

Posted by melydia on August 17, 2007 1 comments

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon: I’m not sure how to feel about this one. In brief, it’s about 15-year-old Christopher Boone’s attempts to discover who killed his neighbor’s dog, and he learns some surprising things about his mother along the way. Though it’s never mentioned explicitly, one assumes he has a form of autism. And while I’ve heard this book is supposed to be a real eye-opener and help people be more understanding of autistic people, I honestly developed far more sympathy for Christopher’s parents. I don’t know if I could handle taking care of someone like that. My hat’s off to all the parents, teachers, and other caretakers who work with special needs kids every day. You are truly amazing people.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

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