Peter's bookshelf: all en-US Wed, 11 Dec 2024 15:26:21 -0800 60 Peter's bookshelf: all 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg <![CDATA[Minority Report and Other Stories]]> 534004 Viewed by many as the greatest science fiction writer on any planet, Philip K. Dick has written some of the most intriguing, original and thought-provoking fiction of our time. This collection includes stories that will make you laugh, cringe...and stop and think.

The Minority Report: a special unit that employs those with the power of precognition to prevent crimes proves itself less than reliable...
We Can Remember It For You Wholesale: an everyguy's yearning for more exciting "memories" places him in a danger he never could have imagined (basis of the feature film Total Recall)...
Paycheck: a mechanic who has no memory of the previous two years of his life finds that a bag of seemingly worthless and unrelated objects can actually unlock the secret of his recent past � and insure that he has a future...
Second Variety: the UN's technological advances to win a global war veer out of control, threatening to destroy all of humankind (basis of the movie Screamers)...
The Eyes Have It: a whimsical, laugh-out-loud play on the words of the title.

]]> 6 Philip K. Dick 0060095261 Peter 3 science-fiction, sf 3.94 1987 Minority Report and Other Stories
author: Philip K. Dick
name: Peter
average rating: 3.94
book published: 1987
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2024/12/11
shelves: science-fiction, sf
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Soul Machine: The Invention of the Modern Mind]]> 25621293 Soul Machine takes us back to the origins of modernity, a time when a crisis in religious authority and the scientific revolution led to searching questions about the nature of human inner life. This is the story of how a new concept—the mind—emerged as a potential solution, one that was part soul and part machine, but fully neither.


In this groundbreaking work, award-winning historian George Makari shows how writers, philosophers, physicians, and anatomists worked to construct notions of the mind as not an ethereal thing, but a natural one. From the ascent of Oliver Cromwell to the fall of Napoleon, seminal thinkers like Hobbes, Locke, Diderot, and Kant worked alongside often-forgotten brain specialists, physiologists, and alienists in the hopes of mapping the inner world. Conducted in a cauldron of political turmoil, these frequently shocking, always embattled efforts would give rise to psychiatry, mind sciences such as phrenology, and radically new visions of the self. Further, they would be crucial to the establishment of secular ethics and political liberalism. Boldly original, wide-ranging, and brilliantly synthetic, Soul Machine gives us a masterful, new account of the making of the modern Western mind.]]> 656 George Makari 0393248690 Peter 4 3.81 2015 Soul Machine: The Invention of the Modern Mind
author: George Makari
name: Peter
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2015
rating: 4
read at: 2016/07/28
date added: 2024/09/17
shelves:
review:

]]> Beijing Payback 40651659
Victor Li is devastated by his father’s murder, and shocked by a confessional letter he finds among his father’s things. In it, his father admits that he was never just a restaurateur—in fact he was part of a vast international crime syndicate that formed during China’s leanest communist years. Victor travels to Beijing, where he navigates his father’s secret criminal life, confronting decades-old grudges, violent spats, and a shocking new enterprise that the organization wants to undertake. Standing up against it is likely what got his father killed, but Victor remains undeterred. He enlists his growing network of allies and friends to finish what his father started, no matter the costs.]]> 301 Daniel Nieh 0062886665 Peter 0 3.39 2019 Beijing Payback
author: Daniel Nieh
name: Peter
average rating: 3.39
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at: 2019/08/19
date added: 2024/07/31
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Complete Book on Hand Evaluation in Contract Bridge]]> 1251821 194 Mike Lawrence 0939460270 Peter 5 3.88 Complete Book on Hand Evaluation in Contract Bridge
author: Mike Lawrence
name: Peter
average rating: 3.88
book published:
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2024/06/13
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[On Earth as It Is on Television]]> 62874129 First Contact stories have never been as intoxicating and fun as in Emily Jane’s novel of the sudden arrival—and equally sudden departure—of spaceships above Earth.

The arrival of spaceships can bring up a lot of big questions:
What does it mean that we’re not alone?
Why did aliens come here?
Who knew beforehand?
Where�. are the aliens going?

Wait� They can’t just leave! Without inviting us into their galactic federation—or at the very least obliterating us!

In Emily Jane’s debut—a rollicking paean to what it means to be alive in the twenty-first century—the fleeting presence of alien vessels, and the certainty that humans are not alone in the universe, sparks intense uncertainty as to our place within it.

Blaine has always been content to go along with whatever his supermom wife and television-addicted, half-feral children want. But when the kids blithely ponder skinning people to see if they’re aliens, and his wife announces a surprise road trip to Disney World, even steady Blaine begins to crack.

Half a continent away, Heather, bored in a Malibu pool while the ships hover overhead, watches as the Arrival heralds the demise of her dead-end relationship and sets her on a quest to understand herself, her accomplished (and oh-so-annoying) stepfamily, and why she feels so alone in a universe teeming with life.

And Oliver, suddenly conscious and alert after twenty catatonic years, struggles to piece together broken memories and understand why he’s following a strange cat on a westward journey and into the greatest adventure of his—or anyone’s—lifetime.]]> 352 Emily Jane 1368092993 Peter 4 science-fiction 3.60 2023 On Earth as It Is on Television
author: Emily Jane
name: Peter
average rating: 3.60
book published: 2023
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2023/09/18
shelves: science-fiction
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Mathematician's Brain: A Personal Tour Through the Essentials of Mathematics and Some of the Great Minds Behind Them]]> 1678306

Consider the case of British mathematician Alan Turing. Credited with cracking the German Enigma code during World War II and conceiving of the modern computer, he was convicted of "gross indecency" for a homosexual affair and died in 1954 after eating a cyanide-laced apple--his death was ruled a suicide, though rumors of assassination still linger. Ruelle holds nothing back in his revealing and deeply personal reflections on Turing and other fellow mathematicians, including Alexander Grothendieck, René Thom, Bernhard Riemann, and Felix Klein. But this book is more than a mathematical tell-all. Each chapter examines an important mathematical idea and the visionary minds behind it. Ruelle meaningfully explores the philosophical issues raised by each, offering insights into the truly unique and creative ways mathematicians think and showing how the mathematical setting is most favorable for asking philosophical questions about meaning, beauty, and the nature of reality.



The Mathematician's Brain takes you inside the world--and heads--of mathematicians. It's a journey you won't soon forget.]]> 176 David Ruelle 0691129827 Peter 3 math
Nevertheless, what I could follow was fairly interesting, but also quite scattered.

The subtitle of the book is also somewhat misleading. This book doesn't cover what I would regard as "the essentials of mathematics" and, while it does talk about some great mathematicians (Grothendieck, Turing, a bit of Newton) I wouldn't say this is a sampling of the great mathematicians.

I think I was expecting something of an updating and blend of books such as *What is Mathematics?" and "Men of Mathematics". That isn't what I got.

]]> 3.55 2007 The Mathematician's Brain: A Personal Tour Through the Essentials of Mathematics and Some of the Great Minds Behind Them
author: David Ruelle
name: Peter
average rating: 3.55
book published: 2007
rating: 3
read at: 2023/09/08
date added: 2023/09/08
shelves: math
review:
In the Preface, Ruelle writes: "My ambition is to present here a view of mathematics and mathematicians that will interest those without training in mathematics, as well as many who are mathematically literate." I don't think he really succeeds. I like mathematics, I've read a good deal of "popular math", I worked as a statistician, and I took some math in college. But there was much here that I could not follow.

Nevertheless, what I could follow was fairly interesting, but also quite scattered.

The subtitle of the book is also somewhat misleading. This book doesn't cover what I would regard as "the essentials of mathematics" and, while it does talk about some great mathematicians (Grothendieck, Turing, a bit of Newton) I wouldn't say this is a sampling of the great mathematicians.

I think I was expecting something of an updating and blend of books such as *What is Mathematics?" and "Men of Mathematics". That isn't what I got.


]]> <![CDATA[A Memory Called Empire (Teixcalaan, #1)]]> 39873472
Now, Mahit must discover who is behind the murder, rescue herself, and save her Station from Teixcalaan's unceasing expansion—all while navigating an alien culture that is all too seductive, engaging in intrigues of her own, and hiding a deadly technological secret—one that might spell the end of her Station and her way of life—or rescue it from annihilation.

A fascinating space opera debut novel, Arkady Martine's A Memory Called Empire is an interstellar mystery adventure.]]> 472 Arkady Martine 1250186455 Peter 0 4.27 2019 A Memory Called Empire (Teixcalaan, #1)
author: Arkady Martine
name: Peter
average rating: 4.27
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at: 2023/09/08
date added: 2023/09/08
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Every Good Boy Does Fine: A Love Story, in Music Lessons]]> 58690857 A beautifully written, witty memoir that is also an immersive exploration of classical music--its power, its meanings, and what it can teach us about ourselves--from the MacArthur Genius Grant-winning pianist

"Jeremy Denk has written a love letter to the music, and especially to the music teachers, in his life."--Conrad Tao, pianist and composer

In Every Good Boy Does Fine, renowned pianist Jeremy Denk traces an implausible journey. His life is already a little tough as a precocious, temperamental six-year-old piano prodigy in New Jersey, and then a family meltdown forces a move to New Mexico. There, Denk must please a new taskmaster, an embittered but devoted professor, while navigating junior high school. At sixteen he escapes to college in Ohio, only to encounter a bewildering new cast of music teachers, both kind and cruel. After many humiliations and a few triumphs, he ultimately finds his way as a world-touring pianist, a MacArthur "Genius," and a frequent performer at Carnegie Hall.

Many classical music memoirs focus on famous musicians and professional accomplishments, but this book focuses on the everyday: neighborhood teacher, high school orchestra, local conductor. There are few writers capable of so deeply illuminating the trials of artistic practice--hours of daily repetition, mystifying advice, pressure from parents and teachers. But under all this struggle is a love letter to the act of teaching.

In lively, endlessly imaginative prose, Denk dives deeply into the pieces and composers that have shaped him--Bach, Mozart, and Brahms, among others--and offers lessons on melody, harmony, and rhythm. How do melodies work? Why is harmony such a mystery to most people? Why are teachers so obsessed with the metronome?

In Every Good Boy Does Fine, Denk shares the most meaningful lessons of his life, and tries to repay a debt to his teachers. He also reminds us that we must never stop asking questions about music and its purposes: consolation, an armor against disillusionment, pure pleasure, a diversion, a refuge, and a vehicle for empathy.]]> 368 Jeremy Denk 0812995988 Peter 4 4.01 2022 Every Good Boy Does Fine: A Love Story, in Music Lessons
author: Jeremy Denk
name: Peter
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2022
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2023/08/06
shelves:
review:

]]> Stormy Weather (Skink #3) 9083126
Among the predators are Edie Marsh, an entrepreneurial young woman whose scheme to sleep with a Palm Beach Kennedy has fizzled, freezing her to concoct a colossal insurance rip-off; Lester Maddox Parsons, a murderous ex-con whose violent encounter with a game warden has left him with the fitting name of “Snapper�; and Avila, a crooked building inspector-turned-roofer who dabbles somewhat unsuccessfully in the occult.

Caught in the middle are Max and Bonnie Lamb, newlyweds torn in wildly different directions by the storm. It is Max’s fateful decision to abort their Disney World honeymoon and race to Dade County to see the terrible devastation. Armed with a video camera, the ambitious young advertising executive can’t wait to show his hurricane tapes to his buddies back in New York.

Over Bonnie’s objections, Max eagerly sets out through the rubble, debris and mayhem—and promptly vanishes. The only clue to his a runaway monkey. The only person who can help Bonnie’s a mysterious young man with a tranquilizer gun and a roomful of human skulls.

But there’s also a man called Skink who has devoted his very strange existence to saving Florida from the kinds of people blown in by the hurricane. It is he, crazed and determined, who prowls the swath of the storm and forever changes the lives of Max, Bonnie, Edie and the others.

Their paths—tangled before they even know it—come together in a novel that continues the hilarious and scathing muckraking tradition that Carl Hiaasen has so mercilessly made his own. In Stormy Weather, there is no calm eye.

This edition includes an excerpt from Carl Hiaasen's Bad Monkey.]]> 404 Carl Hiaasen Peter 0 currently-reading 4.21 1995 Stormy Weather (Skink #3)
author: Carl Hiaasen
name: Peter
average rating: 4.21
book published: 1995
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/07/29
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> Crossfire (Crossfire, #1) 12113223
Crossfire is the story of a human colony settling on a distant planet, a colony formed by Jake Holman-- a man trying to escape a dark past. But as this diverse group of thousands comes to terms with their new lives on a new world, they make a startling discovery: primitive humanoid aliens. There are only a few isolated villages, and the evidence seems to indicate the aliens aren't native to the planet-even though they live in thatched huts and possess only primitive tools. When the humans finally learn the truth, they find themselves caught up in an interstellar war.

In the end, this handful of human colonists will have to choose sides in the struggle. A lot is riding on their decision--not just the fate of their new home, but the fate of all humanity.

At the publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management software (DRM) applied.]]> 368 Nancy Kress Peter 5 3.94 2003 Crossfire (Crossfire, #1)
author: Nancy Kress
name: Peter
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2003
rating: 5
read at: 2016/03/02
date added: 2023/07/25
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[National Dish: Around the World in Search of Food, History, and the Meaning of Home]]> 63889384 The acclaimed international food writer and award-winning author of Mastering the Art of Soviet Cooking explores the history and future of six of the world's most fascinating and iconic food cultures--France, Italy, Japan, Spain, Mexico, and Turkey

We all have an idea in our heads about what French food is--or Italian, or Japanese, or Mexican, or.... But where did those ideas come from? Who decides what makes a national cuisine? Anya von Bremzen, award-winning international food writer, has written definitive cookbooks for Russian, Spanish and Latin American cuisine, and delved into the world's great food traditions as a three-time James-Beard-award-winning food journalist. Now, in National Dish, she embarks on a fascinating journey to the heart of six of the world's most storied food traditions, going high and low, from world-famous chefs to people on the street, in search of how cuisine became connected to place.

Paris is where the whole idea of a country's food as its national heritage was first invented, and so it is where Anya must begin. With an inquisitive eye and unmistakable wit, she ponders the invention of the restaurant, the codification of French food, and the tension between the cosmopolitan and locavore tendencies of the modern eater. From France, she moves quarters to Naples, where she comes face to face with the myth and reality of the pizza in the city where it all began, and takes on the Italian-ness of pasta in the bargain. Next is Tokyo, where Anya and her partner Barry explore the mystique of ramen, rice, and the distance between Japan's future and its past. From there they move to Seville, to search for the essence of Spain's tapas culture and sense of community, and then Oaxaca, where culture wars over the pretty dream and the complex reality of postcolonial cultural integration find expression in the form of maize, mole, and mezcal. In Istanbul, a traditional Ottoman potluck with friends becomes a lens on how a great multi-cultural empire defined its food heritage. Finally, they land back in their beloved home in the melting pot of Jackson Heights, Queens, for a Ukrainian dinner centered around borscht, a meal which has never felt more loaded, or more precious.

A book of astonishing range and connoisseurship, National Dish peels back the layers of myth, commercialization, and fetishization around these great world cuisines. In so doing, it brings us to a deep appreciation of how the country makes the food, and the food the country.]]> 352 Anya von Bremzen 0735223165 Peter 4 food
In each chapter, the author travels to a city to explore not just the food, but the food traditions and what makes (or fails to make) a dish "national". I'm not going to put in a bunch of spoilers, but here is one example: The first great Italian cookbook, known as L'Artusi, had 720 recipes. Only 20 were for pasta, only two of those involved tomatoes. And there was only one recipe for pizza, and that was a dessert.

I really enjoyed this book. I thought the strongest chapters were on Naples (pizza, pasta, pomodoro) and Tokyo (ramen and rice), and the weakest on Oaxaca (maize, mole, mezcal), but that may be because I am more familiar with Italian and Japanese food than I am with Mexican.

Ms. von Bremzen also makes a lot of social commentary, mostly from a fairly liberal (by US standards, anyway) point of view. This is fine with me as a) That's my POV too and b) She backs it up and c) She's not strident or one-sided about it. On this aspect, I think her final chapter, an epilogue about borsch, Ukraine, and Russia, is the best. (von Bremzen was born in the Soviet Union and is Russian, but her sympathies are all with Ukraine).

I did have one annoyance. The author frequently uses foreign words and then puts the English in parentheses. This is OK once in a while, but she does it a lot. I found that distracting.

Overall, though, I recommend this book to anyone who finds food and culture and their interaction interesting. ]]> 3.51 National Dish: Around the World in Search of Food, History, and the Meaning of Home
author: Anya von Bremzen
name: Peter
average rating: 3.51
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2023/07/17
date added: 2023/07/20
shelves: food
review:
This is a fascinating and surprising book about national dishes in general and, more specifically, in Italy, Mexico, Turkey, Japan, and Spain (and a little bit of Russia and Ukraine).

In each chapter, the author travels to a city to explore not just the food, but the food traditions and what makes (or fails to make) a dish "national". I'm not going to put in a bunch of spoilers, but here is one example: The first great Italian cookbook, known as L'Artusi, had 720 recipes. Only 20 were for pasta, only two of those involved tomatoes. And there was only one recipe for pizza, and that was a dessert.

I really enjoyed this book. I thought the strongest chapters were on Naples (pizza, pasta, pomodoro) and Tokyo (ramen and rice), and the weakest on Oaxaca (maize, mole, mezcal), but that may be because I am more familiar with Italian and Japanese food than I am with Mexican.

Ms. von Bremzen also makes a lot of social commentary, mostly from a fairly liberal (by US standards, anyway) point of view. This is fine with me as a) That's my POV too and b) She backs it up and c) She's not strident or one-sided about it. On this aspect, I think her final chapter, an epilogue about borsch, Ukraine, and Russia, is the best. (von Bremzen was born in the Soviet Union and is Russian, but her sympathies are all with Ukraine).

I did have one annoyance. The author frequently uses foreign words and then puts the English in parentheses. This is OK once in a while, but she does it a lot. I found that distracting.

Overall, though, I recommend this book to anyone who finds food and culture and their interaction interesting.
]]> <![CDATA[Arsenic and Adobo (Tita Rosie's Kitchen Mystery, #1)]]> 54351235 The first book in a new culinary cozy series full of sharp humor and delectable dishes—one that might just be killer....

When Lila Macapagal moves back home to recover from a horrible breakup, her life seems to be following all the typical rom-com tropes. She's tasked with saving her Tita Rosie's failing restaurant, and she has to deal with a group of matchmaking aunties who shower her with love and judgment. But when a notoriously nasty food critic (who happens to be her ex-boyfriend) drops dead moments after a confrontation with Lila, her life quickly swerves from a Nora Ephron romp to an Agatha Christie case.

With the cops treating her like she's the one and only suspect, and the shady landlord looking to finally kick the Macapagal family out and resell the storefront, Lila's left with no choice but to conduct her own investigation. Armed with the nosy auntie network, her barista best bud, and her trusted Dachshund, Longanisa, Lila takes on this tasty, twisted case and soon finds her own neck on the chopping block�
]]> 336 Mia P. Manansala 059320168X Peter 4 mysterythriller
Lila works in her family's restaurant in small town Illinois. Then a customer dies. And her family is suspect. Then things escalate. This is sort of standard plotting for a mystery -- not bad, but not all that memorable or interesting.

But it's an interesting look at a community that I don't know much about, it has some good humor, and the relationships, as I said, are cool. So, 4 stars. I'll look for the next book in the series.
]]> 3.54 2021 Arsenic and Adobo (Tita Rosie's Kitchen Mystery, #1)
author: Mia P. Manansala
name: Peter
average rating: 3.54
book published: 2021
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2023/06/29
shelves: mysterythriller
review:
This was a fun read. The protagonist, Lila, is delightful and the details of Filipino-American life and her relationships with her relatives and friends are well-rendered.

Lila works in her family's restaurant in small town Illinois. Then a customer dies. And her family is suspect. Then things escalate. This is sort of standard plotting for a mystery -- not bad, but not all that memorable or interesting.

But it's an interesting look at a community that I don't know much about, it has some good humor, and the relationships, as I said, are cool. So, 4 stars. I'll look for the next book in the series.

]]> <![CDATA[Eating Korea: Reports on a Culinary Renaissance]]> 30653709 320 Graham Holliday 0062400762 Peter 3 3.50 2015 Eating Korea: Reports on a Culinary Renaissance
author: Graham Holliday
name: Peter
average rating: 3.50
book published: 2015
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2023/05/23
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Bangalore Detectives Club (Bangalore Detectives Club, #1)]]> 59435984
When clever, headstrong Kaveri moves to Bangalore to marry handsome young doctor Ramu, she's resigned herself to a quiet life.

But that all changes the night of the party at the Century Club, where she escapes to the garden for some peace and quiet—and instead spots an uninvited guest in the shadows. Half an hour later, the party turns into a murder scene.

When a vulnerable woman is connected to the crime, Kaveri becomes determined to save her and launches a private investigation to find the killer, tracing his steps from an illustrious brothel to an Englishman's mansion. She soon finds that sleuthing in a sari isn't as hard as it seems when you have a talent for mathematics, a head for logic, and a doctor for a husband . . .

And she's going to need them all as the case leads her deeper into a hotbed of danger, sedition,Ěýand intrigue in Bangalore's darkest alleyways.]]> 352 Harini Nagendra Peter 4 3.62 2022 The Bangalore Detectives Club (Bangalore Detectives Club, #1)
author: Harini Nagendra
name: Peter
average rating: 3.62
book published: 2022
rating: 4
read at: 2022/09/19
date added: 2022/09/19
shelves:
review:

]]> Battle of the Linguist Mages 54431070 “This is a stand-alone novel with material enough for six... By the halfway point, it had blown my mind twice... an audacious, genre-bending whirlwind.� �New York Times

“It reads like Snow Crash had a dance-off with Gideon the Ninth, in a world where language isn't a virus from outer space, it's a goddamn alien invasion.� —Charles Stross

In modern day Los Angeles, a shadowy faction led by the Governor of California develops the arcane art of combat linguistics, planting the seeds of a future totalitarian empire.

Isobel is the Queen of the medieval rave-themed VR game Sparkle Dungeon. Her prowess in the game makes her an ideal candidate to learn the secrets of "power morphemes"—unnaturally dense units of meaning that warp perception when skilfully pronounced.

But Isobel’s reputation makes her the target of a strange resistance movement led by spellcasting anarchists, who may be the only thing stopping the cabal from toppling California over the edge of a terrible transformation, with forty million lives at stake.

Time is short for Isobel to level up and choose a side—because the cabal has attracted much bigger and weirder enemies than the anarchist resistance, emerging from dark and vicious dimensions of reality and heading straight for planet Earth!

At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.]]> 448 Scotto Moore 1250767695 Peter 0 currently-reading 3.45 2022 Battle of the Linguist Mages
author: Scotto Moore
name: Peter
average rating: 3.45
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/07/12
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Too Like the Lightning (Terra Ignota, #1)]]> 26861260
The world into which Mycroft and Carlyle have been born is as strange to our 21st-century eyes as ours would be to a native of the 1500s. It is a hard-won utopia built on technologically-generated abundance, and also on complex and mandatory systems of labelling all public writing and speech. What seem to us normal gender distinctions are now distinctly taboo in most social situations. And most of the world's population is affiliated with globe-girdling clans of the like-minded, whose endless economic and cultural competition is carefully managed by central planners of inestimable subtlety. To us it seems like a mad combination of heaven and hell. To them, it seems like normal life.

And in this world, Mycroft and Carlyle have stumbled on the wild card that may destablize the system: the boy Bridger, who can effortlessly make his wishes come true. Who can, it would seem, bring inanimate objects to life...]]> 433 Ada Palmer Peter 0 currently-reading 3.89 2016 Too Like the Lightning (Terra Ignota, #1)
author: Ada Palmer
name: Peter
average rating: 3.89
book published: 2016
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/04/24
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Department of Rare Books and Special Collections]]> 57687890
Liesl Weiss long ago learned to be content working behind the scenes in the distinguished rare books department of a large university, managing details and working behind the scenes to make the head of the department look good. But when her boss has a stroke and she's left to run things, she discovers that the library's most prized manuscript is missing.

Liesl tries to sound the alarm and inform the police about the missing priceless book, but is told repeatedly to keep quiet, to keep the doors open and the donors happy. But then a librarian unexpectedly stops showing up to work. Liesl must investigate both disappearances, unspooling her colleagues' pasts like the threads of a rare book binding as it becomes clear that someone in the department must be responsible for the theft. What Liesl discovers about the dusty manuscripts she has worked among for so long—and about the people who care for and revere them—shakes the very foundation on which she has built her life.

The Department of Rare Books and Special Collections is a sparkling book-club read about a woman struggling to step out from behind the shadows of powerful and unreliable men, and reveals the dark edge of obsession running through the most devoted bookworms.]]> 336 Eva Jurczyk 1728238609 Peter 0 currently-reading 3.51 2022 The Department of Rare Books and Special Collections
author: Eva Jurczyk
name: Peter
average rating: 3.51
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/03/09
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Feet of Clay (Discworld, #19; City Watch, #3)]]> 6567840 371 Terry Pratchett 0061807028 Peter 0 currently-reading 4.51 1996 Feet of Clay (Discworld, #19; City Watch, #3)
author: Terry Pratchett
name: Peter
average rating: 4.51
book published: 1996
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/02/11
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> Erasmus of Rotterdam 27313845
Hailed as a parable for modern times, Erasmus of Rotterdam is the biography of a great humanist who, when pressed for a confession of faith, said, “I love freedom, and I will not and cannot serve any party.� At no time does Zweig mention Hitler by name, but it is obvious that his biography of a man who tried to remain above the battle, and who was torn to pieces by both Lutherans and Catholics, was aimed to illustrate the predicament of a man who refrains from activism and prefers to focus on his work.

Erasmus believed in a united Europe, and thought that Luther was splitting it in two. He first tried to reconcile the Pope to Luther’s Wittenberg theses, then to bring the German Protestants together with the representatives of Rome. Zweig portrays a steadfast Erasmus, unwilling to let emotion betray the lucidity of his thought, who knew he was the most famous intellect of his age, and evaded any commitment that would bring a host of enemies down upon his head. In Erasmus, Zweig may have seen parts of himself. (adapted from “Book of the Times� by John Chamberlain, The New York Times, November 2, 1934)

“Under Zweig’s magic pen Erasmus leaps into vital existence... The books is a quietly astounding bit of biographical and historical achievement.� � Percy Hutchison, The New York Times]]> 124 Stefan Zweig Peter 0 currently-reading 4.16 1934 Erasmus of Rotterdam
author: Stefan Zweig
name: Peter
average rating: 4.16
book published: 1934
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/02/08
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Fortune Favors the Dead (Pentecost and Parker #1)]]> 55561829
Three years later, Will and Lillian are on the Collins case: Abigail Collins was found bludgeoned to death with a crystal ball following a big, boozy Halloween party at her home—her body slumped in the same chair where her steel magnate husband shot himself the year before. With rumors flying that Abigail was bumped off by the vengeful spirit of her husband (who else could have gotten inside the locked room?), the family has tasked the detectives with finding answers where the police have failed.

But that's easier said than done in a case that involves messages from the dead, a seductive spiritualist, and Becca Collins—the beautiful daughter of the deceased, who Will quickly starts falling for. When Will and Becca's relationship dances beyond the professional, Will finds herself in dangerous territory, and discovers she may have become the murderer's next target.]]> 336 Stephen Spotswood 0385546564 Peter 0 currently-reading 4.25 2020 Fortune Favors the Dead (Pentecost and Parker #1)
author: Stephen Spotswood
name: Peter
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/01/26
shelves: currently-reading
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]]> Axiom's End (Noumena, #1) 52848072 THE INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

The alternate history first contact adventure Axiom's End is an extraordinary debut from Hugo finalist and video essayist Lindsay Ellis.

Truth is a human right.

It’s fall 2007. A well-timed leak has revealed that the US government might have engaged in first contact. Cora Sabino is doing everything she can to avoid the whole mess, since the force driving the controversy is her whistleblower father. Even though Cora hasn’t spoken to him in years, his celebrity has caught the attention of the press, the Internet, the paparazzi, and the government—and with him in hiding, that attention is on her. She neither knows nor cares whether her father’s leaks are a hoax, and wants nothing to do with him—until she learns just how deeply entrenched her family is in the cover-up, and that an extraterrestrial presence has been on Earth for decades.

Realizing the extent to which both she and the public have been lied to, she sets out to gather as much information as she can, and finds that the best way for her to uncover the truth is not as a whistleblower, but as an intermediary. The alien presence has been completely uncommunicative until she convinces one of them that she can act as their interpreter, becoming the first and only human vessel of communication. Their otherworldly connection will change everything she thought she knew about being human—and could unleash a force more sinister than she ever imagined.]]> 371 Lindsay Ellis 1250256747 Peter 0 currently-reading 3.94 2020 Axiom's End (Noumena, #1)
author: Lindsay Ellis
name: Peter
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/01/21
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> Maskerade (Discworld, #18) 6567843 Perdita's expected to hide in the chorus and sing arias out loud while a more petitely presentable soprano mouths the notes. But at least it's an escape from scheming Nanny Ogg and old Granny Weatherwax back home, who want her to join their witchy ranks.

Once Granny sets her mind on something, however, it's difficult -- and often hazardous -- to dissuade her. And no opera-prowling phantom fiend is going to keep a pair of determined hags down on the farm after they've seen Ankh-Morpork."

]]> 363 Terry Pratchett Peter 0 currently-reading 4.34 1995 Maskerade (Discworld, #18)
author: Terry Pratchett
name: Peter
average rating: 4.34
book published: 1995
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/12/30
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Slow Horses (Slough House, #1)]]> 19191674
London, England: Slough House is where the washed-up MI5 spies go to while away what's left of their failed careers. The "slow horses," as they’re called, have all disgraced themselves in some way to get relegated here. Maybe they messed up an op badly and can't be trusted anymore. Maybe they got in the way of an ambitious colleague and had the rug yanked out from under them. Maybe they just got too dependent on the bottle—not unusual in this line of work. One thing they all have in common, though, is they all want to be back in the action. And most of them would do anything to get there─even if it means having to collaborate with one another.

River Cartwright, one such “slow horse,� is bitter about his failure and about his tedious assignment transcribing cell phone conversations. When a young man is abducted and his kidnappers threaten to broadcast his beheading live on the Internet, River sees an opportunity to redeem himself. But is the victim who he first appears to be? And what’s the kidnappers� connection with a disgraced journalist? As the clock ticks on the execution, River finds that everyone has his own agenda.]]> 320 Mick Herron Peter 0 currently-reading 4.16 2010 Slow Horses (Slough House, #1)
author: Mick Herron
name: Peter
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2010
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/12/22
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Interesting Times (Discworld, #17)]]> 6567845 226 Terry Pratchett Peter 0 currently-reading 4.34 1994 Interesting Times (Discworld, #17)
author: Terry Pratchett
name: Peter
average rating: 4.34
book published: 1994
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/12/07
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Ninefox Gambit (The Machineries of Empire, #1)]]> 29503206
Cheris’s best hope is to ally with the undead tactician Shuos Jedao. The good news is that Jedao has never lost a battle, and he may be the only one who can figure out how to successfully besiege the fortress. The bad news is that Jedao went mad in his first life and massacred two armies, one of them his own.

As the siege wears on, Cheris must decide how far she can trust Jedao � because she might be his next victim.]]> 265 Yoon Ha Lee Peter 0 currently-reading 3.95 2016 Ninefox Gambit (The Machineries of Empire, #1)
author: Yoon Ha Lee
name: Peter
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2016
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/11/26
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> The Sand-Reckoner 8712169 The Sand-Reckoner from author Gillian Bradshaw is a historical account that reimagines the life of one of ancient Greek's greatest minds. The young scholar Archimedes has just had the best three years of his life at Ptolemy's Museum at Alexandria. To be able to talk and think all day, every day, sharing ideas and information with the world's greatest minds, is heaven to Archimedes. But heaven must be forsaken when he learns that his father is ailing, and his home city of Syracuse is at war with the Romans.Reluctant but resigned, Archimedes takes himself home to find a job building catapults as a royal engineer. Though Syracuse is no Alexandria, Archimedes also finds that life at home isn't as boring or confining as he originally thought. He finds fame and loss, love and war, wealth and betrayal-none of which affects him nearly as much as the divine beauty of mathematics.At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.]]> 584 Gillian Bradshaw Peter 4 4.50 2000 The Sand-Reckoner
author: Gillian Bradshaw
name: Peter
average rating: 4.50
book published: 2000
rating: 4
read at: 2021/11/25
date added: 2021/11/25
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]]> The Categories 59479244 48 Aristotle 1531278876 Peter 3 3.00 -350 The Categories
author: Aristotle
name: Peter
average rating: 3.00
book published: -350
rating: 3
read at: 2021/11/13
date added: 2021/11/13
shelves:
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]]> <![CDATA[Bangkok 8 (Sonchai Jitpleecheep, #1)]]> 8115762 Bangkok 8 is a sexy, razor-edged, often darkly hilarious novel set in one of the world’s most exotic cities.Witnessed by a throng of gaping spectators, a charismatic Marine sergeant is murdered under a Bangkok bridge inside a bolted-shut Mercedes Benz. Among the witnesses are the only two cops in the city not on the take, but within moments one is murdered and his partner, Sonchai Jitpleecheep—a devout Buddhist and the son of a Thai bar girl and a long-gone Vietnam War G.I.—is hell-bent on wreaking revenge. On a vigilante mission to capture his partner’s murderer, Sonchai is begrudgingly paired with a beautiful FBI agent named Jones and captures her heart in the process. In a city fueled by illicit drugs and infinite corruption, prostitution and priceless art, Sonchai’s quest for vengeance takes him into a world much more sinister than he could have ever imagined.]]> 318 John Burdett 1400040914 Peter 0 3.93 2003 Bangkok 8 (Sonchai Jitpleecheep, #1)
author: John Burdett
name: Peter
average rating: 3.93
book published: 2003
rating: 0
read at: 2021/10/10
date added: 2021/10/10
shelves:
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]]> <![CDATA[Analytic Philosophy: A Very Short Introduction]]> 36384053 152 Michael Beaney 0191083917 Peter 0 currently-reading 3.78 2017 Analytic Philosophy: A Very Short Introduction
author: Michael Beaney
name: Peter
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2017
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/09/02
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Philosophy of Science: A Very Short Introduction (Very Short Introductions)]]> 31281699 160 Samir Okasha 0191062790 Peter 5 4.19 2002 Philosophy of Science: A Very Short Introduction (Very Short Introductions)
author: Samir Okasha
name: Peter
average rating: 4.19
book published: 2002
rating: 5
read at: 2021/08/16
date added: 2021/08/20
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Quietly in Their Sleep (Commissario Brunetti, #6)]]> 18886760 A nun has left her convent after a series of suspicious "Leon's novels are always a pleasure." --The Washington Post

In Venice, Italy, Commissario Guido Brunetti comes to the aid of a young Catholic sister, who has left her convent after five of her nursing home patients died unexpectedly. In the course of his inquiries, Brunetti encounters an unusual cast of characters, but discovers nothing that seems criminal. The police detective must determine whether the nun is simply creating a smoke screen to justify abandoning her vocation--or if she has stumbled onto something very real and very sinister that places her own life in imminent danger.

"Leon's books shimmer in the grace of their setting and are warmed by the charm of their characters." --The New York Times Book Review

Also published under the title The Death of Faith]]> 321 Donna Leon 1555849059 Peter 0 currently-reading 4.24 1997 Quietly in Their Sleep (Commissario Brunetti, #6)
author: Donna Leon
name: Peter
average rating: 4.24
book published: 1997
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/08/19
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[A Noble Radiance (Commissario Brunetti, #7)]]> 19456120
In A Noble Radiance a new landowner is summoned urgently to his house not far from Venice when workmen accidentally unearth a macabre grave. The human corpse is badly decomposed, but a ring found nearby proves to be a first clue that reopens an infamous case of kidnapping involving one of Venice's most aristocratic families. Only Commissario Brunetti can unravel the clues and find his way into both the heart of patrician Venice and that of a family grieving for their abducted son.

]]> 292 Donna Leon Peter 5 4.42 1998 A Noble Radiance (Commissario Brunetti, #7)
author: Donna Leon
name: Peter
average rating: 4.42
book published: 1998
rating: 5
read at: 2021/08/16
date added: 2021/08/17
shelves:
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]]> <![CDATA[A Venetian Reckoning (Commissario Brunetti, #4)]]> 11057598 302 Donna Leon Peter 0 4.15 1995 A Venetian Reckoning (Commissario Brunetti, #4)
author: Donna Leon
name: Peter
average rating: 4.15
book published: 1995
rating: 0
read at: 2021/08/08
date added: 2021/08/08
shelves:
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]]> <![CDATA[Dressed for Death (Commissario Brunetti, #3)]]> 19073299 The New York Times-bestselling series and its Italian detective explore the seedy underworld of "Procedural writing at its best" (The Washington Post).

Commissario Guido Brunetti's hopes for a refreshing family holiday in the mountains are once again dashed when a gruesome discovery is made in Marghera--a body so badly beaten the face is completely unrecognizable. Brunetti searches Venice for someone who can identify the corpse but is met with a wall of silence. He then receives a telephone call from a contact who promises some tantalizing information. And before the night is out, Brunetti is confronting yet another appalling, and apparently senseless, death.

"[One of] the real charms of this series [is] the endearing character of Brunetti and his compassionate insights into the heart of Venice and the soul of its people. . . . Truly, a refreshing hero." --The New York Times Book Review

"Despite the gruesome way in which this murder, and subsequent ones, take place, it's really a cheery, breezy mystery, filled with good humor and adventure. The ending can only leave the reader waiting avidly for the next time we meet Brunetti and his lively friends and cohorts." --Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

"Leon delivers her plot in an unassuming, graceful and beautifully paced prose that hides its measured elegance." --The Washington Post

"One of the most appealing of recent detectives, Brunetti stars in a case that brings out his canniness and his compassion--and shows his creator spreading her wings more powerfully than ever." --Kirkus Reviews

"Richly evocative. . . . Venice takes on a deep noir tint in Leon's latest well-crafted work." --Publishers Weekly]]> 287 Donna Leon 1555849008 Peter 5 4.35 1994 Dressed for Death (Commissario Brunetti, #3)
author: Donna Leon
name: Peter
average rating: 4.35
book published: 1994
rating: 5
read at: 2021/08/07
date added: 2021/08/07
shelves:
review:

]]> The Truants 45416895 One of the New York Times Book Review's Top Ten Best Crime Novels of 2020One of USA Today's Best Books 2020"[A] hypnotic debut. . . .[An] uncommonly clever whodunit."--New York Times Book ReviewPerfect for lovers of Agatha Christie and The Secret History, The Truants is a seductive, unsettling, and beautifully written debut novel of literary suspense--a thrilling exploration of deceit, first love, and the depths to which obsession can drive us.People disappear when they most want to be seen.Jess Walker has come to a concrete campus under the flat gray skies of East Anglia for one to be taught by the mesmerizing and rebellious Dr. Lorna Clay, whose seminars soon transform Jess's thinking on life, love, and Agatha Christie. Swept up in Lorna's thrall, Jess falls in with a tightly knit group of rule-breakers--Alec, a courageous South African journalist with a nihilistic streak; Georgie, a seductive, pill-popping aristocrat; and Nick, a handsome geologist with layers of his own.But the dynamic between the friends begins to darken, until a tragedy shatters their friendships and love affairs, and reveals a terrible secret. Soon Jess must face the question she fears what is the true cost of an extraordinary life?An Entertainment Weekly Best Book of JanuaryA USA Today Must-Read Book of WinterAn Observer Book of the Year (UK)A Marie Claire Top 5 Christmas Read (UK)A Times Best New Crime Novel (UK)A Guardian Top 10 Golden Age Detective NovelAn Irish Times Best Debut of 2019An Apple Books Pick for January]]> 319 Kate Weinberg 0525541985 Peter 0 currently-reading 3.63 2019 The Truants
author: Kate Weinberg
name: Peter
average rating: 3.63
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/07/28
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Finder (Finder Chronicles, #1)]]> 40796392 From Hugo Award-winning debut author Suzanne Palmer comes an action-packed sci-fi caper starring Fergus Ferguson, interstellar repo man and professional finder.

Fergus Ferguson has been called a lot of names: thief, con artist, repo man. He prefers the term finder.

His latest job should be simple. Find the spacecraft Venetia's Sword and steal it back from Arum Gilger, ex-nobleman turned power-hungry trade boss. He'll slip in, decode the ship's compromised AI security, and get out of town, Sword in hand.

Fergus locates both Gilger and the ship in the farthest corner of human-inhabited space, a gas-giant-harvesting colony called Cernee. But Fergus' arrival at the colony is anything but simple. A cable car explosion launches Cernee into civil war, and Fergus must ally with Gilger's enemies to navigate a field of space mines and a small army of hostile mercenaries. What was supposed to be a routine job evolves into negotiating a power struggle between factions. Even worse, Fergus has become increasingly--and inconveniently--invested in the lives of the locals.

It doesn't help that a dangerous alien species thought mythical prove unsettlingly real, and their ominous triangle ships keep following Fergus around.

Foolhardy. Eccentric. Reckless. Whatever he's called, Fergus will need all the help he can get to take back the Sword and maybe save Cernee from destruction in the process.]]> 400 Suzanne Palmer 075641511X Peter 4 3.89 2019 Finder (Finder Chronicles, #1)
author: Suzanne Palmer
name: Peter
average rating: 3.89
book published: 2019
rating: 4
read at: 2021/07/28
date added: 2021/07/28
shelves:
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]]> <![CDATA[Death in a Strange Country (Commissario Brunetti, #2)]]> 19013014 The New York Times-bestselling series continues with the murder of an American soldier in "This is definitely an author to watch (Kirkus Reviews).

Early one morning, Commissario Guido Brunetti of the Venice police confronts a grisly sight when the body of a young man is fished out of a fetid canal. All clues point to a violent mugging, but for Brunetti the motive of robbery seems altogether too convenient. When something discovered in the victim's apartment suggests the existence of a high-level conspiracy, Brunetti becomes convinced that somebody, somewhere, is taking great pains to provide a ready-made solution to the crime.

Rich with atmosphere and marvelous plotting, Death in a Strange Country is a superb novel in Donna Leon's chilling Venetian mystery series.

Praise for Donna Leon and the Commissario Brunetti Mysteries
"One of the best international crime writers is Donna Leon, and her Commissario Guido Brunetti tales set in Venice are at the apex of continental thrillers." --Rocky Mountain News

"Leon's books shimmer in the grace of their setting and are warmed by the charm of her characters." --The New York Times Book Review

"Brunetti . . . long ago joined the ranks of the classic fictional detectives." --Evening Standard

"Commissario Brunetti, most charismatic current Euro-cop, uncovers deadly ants' nest of corruption. A highly accomplished, scary read." --The Guardian]]> 401 Donna Leon 1555848982 Peter 0 currently-reading 4.20 1993 Death in a Strange Country (Commissario Brunetti, #2)
author: Donna Leon
name: Peter
average rating: 4.20
book published: 1993
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/07/04
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Death at La Fenice (Commissario Brunetti, #1)]]> 33799144 356 Donna Leon Peter 5 4.17 1992 Death at La Fenice (Commissario Brunetti, #1)
author: Donna Leon
name: Peter
average rating: 4.17
book published: 1992
rating: 5
read at: 2021/06/29
date added: 2021/07/04
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Ocean Prey (Lucas Davenport #31, Virgil Flowers #13)]]> 54747051
They're federal officers killed on the job, which means the case is the FBI's turf. When the FBI's investigation stalls out, Lucas Davenport of the U.S. Marshals Service gets a call. The case turns even more lethal and Davenport needs to bring in every asset he can find, including a detective with a fundamentally criminal mind: Virgil Flowers.]]> 431 John Sandford 0593087038 Peter 0 4.40 2021 Ocean Prey (Lucas Davenport #31, Virgil Flowers #13)
author: John Sandford
name: Peter
average rating: 4.40
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at: 2021/06/28
date added: 2021/06/28
shelves:
review:

]]> Red Widow (Red Widow, #1) 54100975
Lyndsey Duncan worries her career with the CIA might be over. After lines are crossed with another intelligence agent during her most recent assignment, she is sent home to Washington on administrative leave. So when a former colleague, now Chief of the Russia Division, recruits her for an internal investigation, she jumps at the chance to prove herself once more. Lyndsey was once a top handler in the Moscow Field Station, known as the "human lie detector" and praised for recruiting some of the most senior Russian officials. But now, three Russian assets have been discovered--including one of her own--and the CIA is convinced there's a mole in the department. With years of work in question, and lives on the line, Lyndsey is thrown back into life at the agency, only this time tracing the steps of those closest to her.

Meanwhile, fellow agent Theresa Warner can't avoid the spotlight. She is the infamous "Red Widow," the wife of a former director killed in the field under mysterious circumstances. With her husband's legacy shadowing her every move, Theresa is a fixture of the Russia Division, and as she and Lyndsey strike up an unusual friendship, her knowledge proves invaluable. But as Lyndsey uncovers a surprising connection to Theresa that could answer all of her questions, she exposes a terrifying web of secrets within the department, if only she is willing to unravel it...]]> 352 Alma Katsu 0525539433 Peter 0 currently-reading 3.88 2021 Red Widow (Red Widow, #1)
author: Alma Katsu
name: Peter
average rating: 3.88
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/06/08
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Andrew Zimmern's Field Guide to Exceptionally Weird, Wild, & Wonderful Foods: An Intrepid Eater's Digest]]> 19258533 209 Andrew Zimmern Peter 0 currently-reading 4.83 2012 Andrew Zimmern's Field Guide to Exceptionally Weird, Wild, & Wonderful Foods: An Intrepid Eater's Digest
author: Andrew Zimmern
name: Peter
average rating: 4.83
book published: 2012
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/06/08
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Galaxy, and the Ground Within (Wayfarers, #4)]]> 53469412 Return to the universe of the Galactic Commons to explore another corner of the cosmos—one often mentioned, but not yet explored—in this absorbing entry in the Wayfarers series, which blends heart-warming characters and imaginative adventure.

With no water, no air, and no native life, the planet Gora is unremarkable. The only thing it has going for it is a chance proximity to more popular worlds, making it a decent stopover for ships traveling between the wormholes that keep the Galactic Commons connected. If deep space is a highway, Gora is just your average truck stop.

At the Five-Hop One-Stop, long-haul spacers can stretch their legs (if they have legs, that is), and get fuel, transit permits, and assorted supplies. The Five-Hop is run by an enterprising alien and her sometimes helpful child, who work hard to provide a little piece of home to everyone passing through.

When a freak technological failure halts all traffic to and from Gora, three strangers—all different species with different aims—are thrown together at the Five-Hop. Grounded, with nothing to do but wait, the trio—an exiled artist with an appointment to keep, a cargo runner at a personal crossroads, and a mysterious individual doing her best to help those on the fringes—are compelled to confront where they’ve been, where they might go, and what they are, or could be, to each other.

]]> 333 Becky Chambers Peter 4 4.50 2021 The Galaxy, and the Ground Within (Wayfarers, #4)
author: Becky Chambers
name: Peter
average rating: 4.50
book published: 2021
rating: 4
read at: 2021/06/08
date added: 2021/06/08
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]]> <![CDATA[Kid Scientists: True Tales of Childhood from Science Superstars]]> 40659133 From the author who brought young readers KID ATHLETES, KID PRESIDENTS, KID ARTISTS, and KID AUTHORS comes KID SCIENTISTS, a lively look into the childhoods of the world's most brilliant scientists.]]> 208 David Stabler 1683690753 Peter 0 currently-reading 4.51 2018 Kid Scientists: True Tales of Childhood from Science Superstars
author: David Stabler
name: Peter
average rating: 4.51
book published: 2018
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/04/20
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Eddie's Boy (Butcher's Boy #4)]]> 53710783 A hit man is called back into action in this explosive thriller from the New York Times bestselling author and "master of nail-biting suspense" (Los Angeles Times).

Michael Shaeffer is a retired American businessman, living peacefully in England with his aristocratic wife. But her annual summer party brings strangers to their house, and with them, an attempt on Michael's life. He is immediately thrust into action, luring his lethal pursuers to Australia before venturing into the lion's den--the States--to figure out why the mafia is after him again, and how to stop them.

Eddie's Boy jumps between Michael's current predicament and the past, between the skillset he now ruthlessly and successfully employs and the training that made him what he is. We glimpse the days before he became the Butcher's Boy, the highly skilled mob hit man who pulled a slaughter job on some double-crossing clients and started a mob war, to his childhood spent apprenticed to Eddie, a seasoned hired assassin. And we watch him pit two prominent mafia families against each other to eliminate his enemies one by one.

He's meticulous in his approach, using his senior contact in the Organized Crime Division of the Justice Department for information, without ever allowing her to get too close to his trail. But will he be able to escape this new wave of young contract killers, or will the years finally catch up to him?

As the San Francisco Chronicle said about this Edgar Award-winning series, "The best thing about Thomas Perry's thrillers are the devilishly ingenious schemes his protagonists devise to outwit their pursuers . . . Perry can really write."]]> 288 Thomas Perry 0802157793 Peter 0 currently-reading 4.39 2020 Eddie's Boy (Butcher's Boy #4)
author: Thomas Perry
name: Peter
average rating: 4.39
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/03/25
shelves: currently-reading
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]]> Anathem 6250159 981 Neal Stephenson 006147410X Peter 5 sf 4.23 2008 Anathem
author: Neal Stephenson
name: Peter
average rating: 4.23
book published: 2008
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2021/03/22
shelves: sf
review:
My review is here:
]]> <![CDATA[The Art of Violence (Lydia Chin & Bill Smith #13)]]> 54027595 In the latest mystery from S. J. Rozan, Bill Smith and Lydia Chin must track down a serial killer stalking women in New York's contemporary art scene.Former client Sam Tabor, just out of Greenhaven after a five-year homicide stint, comes to Bill Smith with a strange request. A colossally talented painter whose parole was orchestrated by art world movers and shakers, Sam's convinced that since he's been out he's killed two women. He doesn't remember the killings but he wants Smith, one of the few people he trusts, to investigate and prove him either innocent or guilty. NYPD detective Angela Grimaldi thinks Sam's "a weirdo." Smith has no argument with diagnosed with a number of mental disorders over the years, Sam self-medicates with alcohol, loses focus (except when he's painting), and has few friends. But Smith doesn't think that adds up to serial killer. He enlists Lydia Chin to help prove it. Smith and Chin delve into the world surrounding Sam Tabor, including his brother, two NYPD detectives, and various other artists, dealers, collectors, curators, and art connoisseurs. No answers appear. Evidence is found and lost again. And more bodies turn up. Sam Tabor might be just a crazy artist. But someone is killing people in his orbit. If not Sam, who? Why? And who will be next?]]> 285 S.J. Rozan Peter 0 4.11 2020 The Art of Violence (Lydia Chin & Bill Smith #13)
author: S.J. Rozan
name: Peter
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at: 2021/03/13
date added: 2021/03/16
shelves:
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]]> <![CDATA[Terra Incognita (Gaius Petreius Ruso, #2)]]> 9427467 304 Ruth Downie 1596919663 Peter 0 4.02 2008 Terra Incognita (Gaius Petreius Ruso, #2)
author: Ruth Downie
name: Peter
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2008
rating: 0
read at: 2021/03/01
date added: 2021/03/13
shelves:
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]]> <![CDATA[Medicus (Gaius Petreius Ruso, #1)]]> 8489416
A serial killer is on the loose in Roman-occupied Britain, and Gaius Petreius Ruso is out to catch him... if he isn't killed first.

The Gods are not smiling on army doctor Gaius Petreius Ruso in his new posting in Britannia. He has vast debts, long shifts, and an overbearing hospital administrator to deal with . . . not to mention a serial killer stalking the local streets.

Barmaids' bodies are being washed up with the tide and no one else seems to care. It's up to Ruso to summon all his skills to investigate, even though the breakthroughs in forensic science lie centuries in the future, and the murderer may be hunting him down too.

If only the locals would just stop killing each other and if only it were possible to find a decent glass of wine, and someone who can cook, Ruso's prospects would be a whole lot sunnier....

The first novel in the New York Times bestselling Gaius Petreius Ruso series. With a gift for comic timing and historic detail, Ruth Downie has conjured an ancient world as raucous and real as our own.]]> 418 Ruth Downie Peter 0 3.80 2006 Medicus (Gaius Petreius Ruso, #1)
author: Ruth Downie
name: Peter
average rating: 3.80
book published: 2006
rating: 0
read at: 2021/03/01
date added: 2021/03/01
shelves:
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]]> <![CDATA[Robert B. Parker's Old Black Magic (Spenser, #46)]]> 36101745
The heist was legendary, still talked about twenty years after the priceless paintings disappeared from one of Boston's premier art museums. Most thought the art was lost forever, buried deep, sold off overseas or, worse, destroyed as incriminating evidence. But when paint chips from the most valuable piece stolen, "The Gentleman in Black" by the Spanish master El Greco, arrive at the desk of a Boston journalist, the museum finds hope and enlists Spenser's help.

Soon the cold art case thrusts Spenser into the shady world of black market art dealers, aged Mafia bosses, and old vendettas. A five-million-dollar-reward by the museum's top benefactor, an aging and unlikable Boston socialite, sets Spenser and pals Vinnie Morris and Hawk onto a trail of hidden secrets, jailhouse confessions, and decades-old murders.

This is classic Spenser doing what he does best.

Librarian's note: this is one of the Ace Atkin's Spenser series. As of 2021, there are 9 volumes by Atkins. The first was "Lullaby" in 2012, the 40th in the overall series created by Robert B. Parker; the most recent, "Someone to Watch Over Me," is the 48th.]]> 320 Ace Atkins Peter 0 currently-reading 3.93 2018 Robert B. Parker's Old Black Magic (Spenser, #46)
author: Ace Atkins
name: Peter
average rating: 3.93
book published: 2018
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/02/18
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Shanghai Moon (Lydia Chin & Bill Smith #9)]]> 8707097 The Shanghai Moon, S. J. Rozan returns to her award-winning, critically acclaimed, and much-loved characters Lydia Chin and Bill Smith in the first new novel in the series in seven years.

Estranged for months from fellow P.I. Bill Smith, Chinese-American private investigator Lydia Chin is brought in by colleague and former mentor Joel Pilarsky to help with a case that crosses continents, cultures, and decades. In Shanghai, excavation has unearthed a cache of European jewelry dating back to World War II, when Shanghai was an open city providing safe haven for thousands of Jewish refugees. The jewelry, identifed as having belonged to one such refugee—Rosalie Gilder—was immediately stolen by a Chinese official who fled to New York City. Hired by a lawyer specializing in the recovery of Holocaust assets, Chin and Pilarsky are to find any and all leads to the missing jewels.

However, Lydia soon learns that there is much more to the story than they've been told: The Shanghai Moon, one of the world's most sought after missing jewels, reputed to be worth millions, is believed to have been part of the same stash. Before Lydia can act on this new information, Joel Pilarsky is murdered, Lydia is fired from the case, and Bill Smith finally reappears on the scene. Now Lydia and Bill must unravel the truth about the Shanghai Moon and the events that surrounded its disappearance sixty years ago during the chaos of war and revolution, if they are to stop more killings and uncover the truth of what is going on today.]]> 384 S.J. Rozan Peter 4 4.01 2009 The Shanghai Moon (Lydia Chin & Bill Smith #9)
author: S.J. Rozan
name: Peter
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2009
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2021/02/02
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Paper Son (Lydia Chin & Bill Smith #12)]]> 42772265 The latest Lydia Chin/Bill Smith mystery takes the acclaimed detective duo into the Deep South to investigate a murder within the Chinese community.


The Most Southern Place on Earth: that’s what they call the Mississippi Delta. It’s not a place Lydia Chin, an American-born Chinese private detective from Chinatown, NYC, ever thought she’d have reason to go. But when her mother tells her a cousin Lydia didn’t know she had is in jail in Clarksdale, Mississippi—and that Lydia has to rush down south and get him out—Lydia finds herself rolling down Highway 61 with Bill Smith, her partner, behind the wheel.



From the river levees to the refinement of Oxford, from old cotton gins to new computer scams, Lydia soon finds that nothing in Mississippi is as she expected it to be. Including her cousin’s legal troubles—or possibly even his innocence. Can she uncover the truth in a place more foreign to her than any she’s ever seen?]]> 318 S.J. Rozan Peter 0 4.14 2019 Paper Son (Lydia Chin & Bill Smith #12)
author: S.J. Rozan
name: Peter
average rating: 4.14
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at: 2021/01/26
date added: 2021/01/26
shelves:
review:

]]> Prodigal Son (Orphan X, #6) 53319801
As a boy, Evan Smoak was pulled out of a foster home and trained in an off-the-books operation known as the Orphan Program. He was a government assassin, perhaps the best, known to a few insiders as Orphan X. He eventually broke with the Program and adopted a new name―The Nowhere Man―and a new mission, helping the most desperate in their times of trouble. But the highest power in the country has made him a tempting offer―in exchange for an unofficial pardon, he must stop his clandestine activities as The Nowhere Man. Now Evan has to do the one thing he’s least equipped to do―live a normal life.

But then he gets a call for help from the one person he never expected. A woman claiming to have given him up for adoption, a woman he never knew―his mother. Her unlikely request: help Andrew Duran―a man whose life has gone off the rails, who was in the wrong place at the wrong time, bringing him to the deadly attention of very powerful figures. Now a brutal brother & sister assassination team are after him and with no one to turn to, and no safe place to hide, Evan is Duran’s only option. But when the hidden cabal catches on to what Evan is doing, everything he’s fought for is on the line―including his own life.]]> 432 Gregg Hurwitz 1250252296 Peter 0 currently-reading 4.51 2021 Prodigal Son (Orphan X, #6)
author: Gregg Hurwitz
name: Peter
average rating: 4.51
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/01/26
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> An Unnatural Life 50616864 Murderbot meets To Kill a Mockingbird in Erin K. Wagner's An Unnatural Life, an interplanetary tale of identity and responsibility.

The cybernetic organism known as 812-3 is in prison, convicted of murdering a human worker but he claims that he did not do it. With the evidence stacked against him, his lawyer, Aiya Ritsehrer, must determine grounds for an appeal and uncover the true facts of the case.

But with artificial life-forms having only recently been awarded legal rights on Earth, the military complex on Europa is resistant to the implementation of these same rights on the Jovian moon.

Aiya must battle against her own prejudices and that of her new paymasters, to secure a fair trial for her charge, while navigating her own interpersonal drama, before it's too late."]]> 192 Erin K. Wagner 1250752086 Peter 0 currently-reading 3.56 2020 An Unnatural Life
author: Erin K. Wagner
name: Peter
average rating: 3.56
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/01/24
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim]]> 6509299 David Sedaris plays in the snow with his sisters. He goes on vacation with his family. He gets a job selling drinks. He attends his brother's wedding. He mops his sister's floor. He gives directions to a lost traveler. He eats a hamburger. He has his blood sugar tested. It all sounds so normal, doesn't it? In his newest collection of essays, David Sedaris lifts the corner of ordinary life, revealing the absurdity teeming below its surface. His world is alive with obscure desires and hidden motives -- a world where forgiveness is automatic and an argument can be the highest form of love. Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim is another unforgettable collection from one of the wittiest and most original writers at work today.]]> 272 David Sedaris Peter 0 currently-reading 4.17 2004 Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim
author: David Sedaris
name: Peter
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2004
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/01/21
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Robert B. Parker's Angel Eyes (Spenser, #47)]]> 44297198 In the latest thriller featuring the legendary Boston PI, Spenser heads to the City of Angels to meet old friends and new enemies in a baffling missing person case that might shake Tinseltown to its core.

Ellie Sharp left her Boston family with big dreams of making it as an actress in Hollywood. But two years later, she disappears from her Silver Lake apartment without her friends or police knowing what happened. Soon after the Sharps hire Spenser to find her, another person goes missing--this time Spenser's protege-turned-L.A. investigator, Zebulon Sixkill.

Spenser and Hawk must hit the ground running on the West Coast to follow a twisted trail into the world of drug cartels, casting couches, hedonistic parties, and a whisper network of industry players looking to take down a legendary producer. In a town where glitz and glamour are only a thin veneer over a dangerous underbelly, even Spenser will have his work cut out for him.]]> 320 Ace Atkins 0525536841 Peter 0 currently-reading 4.15 2019 Robert B. Parker's Angel Eyes (Spenser, #47)
author: Ace Atkins
name: Peter
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/01/19
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Sleeping Dogs (Butcher's Boy #2)]]> 10779401 320 Thomas Perry Peter 3 4.34 1992 Sleeping Dogs (Butcher's Boy #2)
author: Thomas Perry
name: Peter
average rating: 4.34
book published: 1992
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2021/01/03
shelves:
review:

]]> Use of Weapons (Culture, #3) 6305619 The man known as Cheradenine Zakalwe was one of Special Circumstances' foremost agents, changing the destiny of planets to suit the Culture through intrigue, dirty tricks and military action.

The woman known as Diziet Sma had plucked him from obscurity and pushed him towards his present eminence, but despite all their dealings she did not know him as well as she thought.

The drone known as Skaffen-Amtiskaw knew both of these people. It had once saved the woman's life by massacring her attackers in a particularly bloody manner. It believed the man to be a lost cause. But not even its machine could see the horrors in his past.

Ferociously intelligent, both witty and horrific, USE OF WEAPONS is a masterpiece of science fiction.]]> 352 Iain M. Banks Peter 0 4.07 1990 Use of Weapons (Culture, #3)
author: Iain M. Banks
name: Peter
average rating: 4.07
book published: 1990
rating: 0
read at: 2020/12/31
date added: 2020/12/31
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Butcher's Boy (Butcher's Boy, #1)]]> 10874717 The Edgar Award–winning novel by the “master of nail-biting suspense�(Los Angeles Times) Thomas Perry exploded onto the literary scene with The Butcher’s Boy. Back in print by popular demand, this spectacular debut, from a writer of “infernal ingenuity� (The New York Times Book Review), includes a new Introduction by bestselling author Michael Connelly. Murder has always been easy for the Butcher’s Boy—it’s what he was raised to do. But when he kills the senior senator from Colorado and arrives in Las Vegas to pick up his fee, he learns that he has become a liability to his shadowy employers. His actions attract the attention of police specialists who watch the world of organized crime, but though everyone knows that something big is going on, only Elizabeth Waring, a bright young analyst in the Justice Department, works her way closer to the truth, and to the frightening man behind it.Praise for The Butcher’s Boy“A stunning debut . . . a brilliantly plotted thriller.�—The Washington Post“A shrewdly planned and executed thriller.�—The New York Times Book Review“Thomas Perry has hit the mark.�—Houston Chronicle“Totally enthralling.�—The New Yorker]]> 313 Thomas Perry Peter 0 4.11 1982 The Butcher's Boy (Butcher's Boy, #1)
author: Thomas Perry
name: Peter
average rating: 4.11
book published: 1982
rating: 0
read at: 2020/12/29
date added: 2020/12/29
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The New Doubting Thomas: The Bible, Black Folks & Blind Belief]]> 21059946 169 Jeremiah Camara Peter 0 currently-reading 4.86 2010 The New Doubting Thomas: The Bible, Black Folks & Blind Belief
author: Jeremiah Camara
name: Peter
average rating: 4.86
book published: 2010
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2020/12/22
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Unconquerable Sun (The Sun Chronicles, #1)]]> 49249347 GENDER-SWAPPED ALEXANDER THE GREAT ON AN INTERSTELLAR SCALE

Princess Sun has finally come of age.

Growing up in the shadow of her mother, Eirene, has been no easy task. The legendary queen-marshal did what everyone thought expel the invaders and build Chaonia into a magnificent republic, one to be respected—and feared.

But the cutthroat ambassador corps and conniving noble houses have never ceased to scheme—and they have plans that need Sun to be removed as heir, or better yet, dead.

To survive, the princess must rely on her wits and her biggest rival, her secret lover, and a dangerous prisoner of war.

Take the brilliance and cunning courage of Princess Leia—add in a dazzling futuristic setting where pop culture and propaganda are one and the same—and hold on

This is the space opera you’ve been waiting for.

At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.]]> 522 Kate Elliott 1250197252 Peter 0 currently-reading 4.09 2020 Unconquerable Sun (The Sun Chronicles, #1)
author: Kate Elliott
name: Peter
average rating: 4.09
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2020/11/22
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Player of Games (Culture, #2)]]> 19819475
Praise for Iain M. Banks:

"Poetic, humorous, baffling, terrifying, sexy -- the books of Iain M. Banks are all these things and more" -- NME

"An exquisitely riotous tour de force of the imagination which writes its own rules simply for the pleasure of breaking them." -- Time Out]]> 417 Iain M. Banks Peter 0 currently-reading 4.36 1988 The Player of Games (Culture, #2)
author: Iain M. Banks
name: Peter
average rating: 4.36
book published: 1988
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2020/10/22
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Trespassing on Einstein's Lawn: A Father, a Daughter, the Meaning of Nothing, and the Beginning of Everything]]> 19743444 NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BYĚýKIRKUS REVIEWSIn a memoir of family bonding and cutting-edge physics for readers of Brian Greene’s The Hidden Reality and Jim Holt’s Why Does the World Exist?, Amanda Gefter tells the story of how she conned her way into a career as a science journalist—and wound up hanging out, talking shop, and butting heads with the world’s most brilliant minds. Ěý At a Chinese restaurant outside of Philadelphia, a father asks his fifteen-year-old daughter a deceptively simple “How would you define nothing?â€� With that, the girl who once tried to fail geometry as a conscientious objector starts reading up on general relativity and quantum mechanics, as she and her dad embark on a life-altering quest for the answers to the universe’s greatest mysteries. ĚýĚýĚýĚýĚýĚý Before Amanda Gefter became an accomplished science writer, she was a twenty-one-year-old magazine assistant willing to sneak her and her father, Warren, into a conference devoted to their physics hero, John Wheeler. Posing as journalists, Amanda and Warren met Wheeler, who offered them cryptic clues to the nature of The universe is a self-excited circuit, he said. And, The boundary of a boundary is zero. Baffled, Amanda and Warren vowed to decode the phrases—and with them, the enigmas of existence. When we solve all that, they agreed, we’ll write a book. Ěý Trespassing on Einstein’s Lawn is that book, a memoir of the impassioned hunt that takes Amanda and her father from New York to London to Los Alamos. Along the way, they bump up against quirky science and even quirkier personalities, including Leonard Susskind, the former Bronx plumber who invented string theory; Ed Witten, the soft-spoken genius who coined the enigmatic M-theory; even Stephen Hawking. Ěý What they discover is the beginnings of a monumental paradigm shift in cosmology, from a single universe we all share to a splintered reality in which each observer has her own. Reality, the Gefters learn, is radically observer-dependent, far beyond anything of which Einstein or the founders of quantum mechanics ever dreamed—with shattering consequences for our understanding of the universe’s origin. And somehow it all ties back to that conversation, to that Chinese restaurant, and to the true meaning of nothing. Ěý Throughout their journey, Amanda struggles to make sense of her own life—as her journalism career transforms from illusion to reality, as she searches for her voice as a writer, as she steps from a universe shared with her father to at last carve out one of her own. It’s a paradigm shift you might call growing up. Ěý By turns hilarious, moving, irreverent, and profound, Trespassing on Einstein’s Lawn weaves together story and science in remarkable ways. By the end, you will never look at the universe the same way again.Praise for Trespassing on Einstein’s Lawn Ěý“Nothing quite prepared me for this book. Wow. Reading it, I alternated between depression—how could the rest of us science writers ever match this?—and exhilaration.â€�—Scientific American Ěý “To Read Trespassing on Einstein’s Lawn. Reality doesn’t have to bite.]]> 434 Amanda Gefter 034553963X Peter 0 currently-reading 4.35 2014 Trespassing on Einstein's Lawn: A Father, a Daughter, the Meaning of Nothing, and the Beginning of Everything
author: Amanda Gefter
name: Peter
average rating: 4.35
book published: 2014
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2020/10/13
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Mistress of the Art of Death (Mistress of the Art of Death, #1)]]> 6581646 The national bestselling hit hailed by the New York Times as a "vibrant medieval mystery...[it] outdoes the competition." In medieval Cambridge, England, Adelia, a female forensics expert, is summoned by King Henry II to investigate a series of gruesome murders that has wrongly implicated the Jewish population, yielding even more tragic results. As Adelia's investigation takes her behind the closed doors of the country's churches, the killer prepares to strike again.]]> 514 Ariana Franklin 1101206756 Peter 0 currently-reading 4.14 2007 Mistress of the Art of Death (Mistress of the Art of Death, #1)
author: Ariana Franklin
name: Peter
average rating: 4.14
book published: 2007
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2020/10/10
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> Wyrd Sisters (Discworld, #6) 5280985
Meet Granny Weatherwax, the most highly regarded non-leader a coven of non-social witches could ever have. Generally, these loners don't get involved in anything, mush less royal intrigue. but then there are those times they can't help it. As Granny Weatherwax is about to discover, though, it's a lot harder to stir up trouble in the castle than some theatrical types would have you think. Even when you've got a few unexpected spells up your sleeve.]]> 334 Terry Pratchett 006180715X Peter 0 currently-reading 4.29 1988 Wyrd Sisters (Discworld, #6)
author: Terry Pratchett
name: Peter
average rating: 4.29
book published: 1988
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2020/10/06
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Ontogeny of Information: Developmental Systems and Evolution (Science and Cultural Theory)]]> 20209570 298 Susan Oyama 0822380668 Peter 0 currently-reading 4.00 1986 The Ontogeny of Information: Developmental Systems and Evolution (Science and Cultural Theory)
author: Susan Oyama
name: Peter
average rating: 4.00
book published: 1986
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2020/09/27
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> Sourcery (Discworld, #5) 6640566 289 Terry Pratchett Peter 0 currently-reading 4.16 1988 Sourcery (Discworld, #5)
author: Terry Pratchett
name: Peter
average rating: 4.16
book published: 1988
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2020/09/16
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> If She Knew (Kate Wise, #1) 41559688 55 year old empty nester—and freshly retired FBI agent—Kate Wise finds herself drawn out of her quiet suburban life when her friend’s daughter is murdered in a home invasion—and she is implored to help.

Kate thought she left the FBI behind after 30 years as their top agent, respected for her brilliant mind, tough street skills and her uncanny ability to hunt down serial killers. Yet Kate, bored with the quiet town, at a crossroads in life, is summoned by a friend she can’t turn down.

As Kate hunts the killer, she soon finds herself at the forefront of a manhunt, as more bodies turn up—all suburban moms in perfect marriages—and it becomes apparent there is a serial killer stalking this quiet town. She unearths secrets from her neighbors she wishes she never knew, discovering that all is not what it seems in this picture of model streets and neighbors. Affairs and lying are rampant, and Kate must sift through the town’s underbelly if she will stop the killer from striking again.

But this killer is one step ahead of her, and it may end up being Kate who is in danger.]]> 178 Blake Pierce Peter 0 currently-reading 3.90 2018 If She Knew (Kate Wise, #1)
author: Blake Pierce
name: Peter
average rating: 3.90
book published: 2018
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2020/09/07
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> Squeeze Me (Skink #8) 50644565 From the best-selling author of Skinny Dip and Razor Girl, a new novel that captures the Trump era with Hiaasen's inimitable savage humor and wonderful, eccentric characters. A surefire best seller.

Carl Hiaasen's Squeeze Me is set among the landed gentry of Palm Beach. A prominent high-society matron--who happens to be a fierce supporter of the President and founding member of the POTUSSIES--has gone missing at a swank gala. When the wealthy dowager, Kiki Pew Fitzsimmons, is later found dead in a concrete grave, panic and chaos erupt. The President immediately declares that Kiki Pew was the victim of rampaging immigrant hordes. This, as it turns out, is far from the truth. Meanwhile a bizarre discovery in the middle of the road brings the First Lady's motorcade to a grinding halt (followed by some grinding between the First Lady and a lovestruck Secret Service agent). Enter Angie Armstrong, wildlife wrangler extraordinaire, who arrives at her own conclusions after she is summoned to the posh island to deal with a mysterious and impolite influx of huge, hungry pythons . . .

Completely of the moment, full of vim and vigor, and as irreverent as can be, Squeeze Me is pure, unadulterated Hiaasen.]]> 353 Carl Hiaasen Peter 0 currently-reading 4.01 2020 Squeeze Me (Skink #8)
author: Carl Hiaasen
name: Peter
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2020/09/01
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> Blackout (All Clear, #1) 8161324 513 Connie Willis 0345519647 Peter 0 currently-reading 3.92 2010 Blackout (All Clear, #1)
author: Connie Willis
name: Peter
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2010
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2020/08/18
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> Sick Puppy (Skink, #4) 13066 464 Carl Hiaasen 0446695688 Peter 5 3.89 2000 Sick Puppy (Skink, #4)
author: Carl Hiaasen
name: Peter
average rating: 3.89
book published: 2000
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2020/08/03
shelves: mysterythriller, currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Mort (Discworld, #4; Death, #1)]]> 386372
Death is the Grim Reaper of the Discworld, a black-robed skeleton with a scythe who ushers souls into the next world. He is also fond of cats and endlessly baffled by humanity. Soon Death is yearning to experience what humanity really has to offer, but to do that, he'll need to hire some help.

It's an offer Mort can't refuse. As Death's apprentice he'll have free board, use of the company horse—and being dead isn't compulsory. It's a dream job—until Mort falls in love with Death's daughter, Ysabell, and discovers that your boss can be a killer on your love life…]]> 243 Terry Pratchett 0061020680 Peter 3 sf, currently-reading 4.24 1987 Mort (Discworld, #4; Death, #1)
author: Terry Pratchett
name: Peter
average rating: 4.24
book published: 1987
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2020/07/23
shelves: sf, currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Equal Rites (Discworld, #3; Witches, #1)]]> 34507 240 Terry Pratchett 0060855908 Peter 5 sf, currently-reading 4.06 1987 Equal Rites (Discworld, #3; Witches, #1)
author: Terry Pratchett
name: Peter
average rating: 4.06
book published: 1987
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2020/07/14
shelves: sf, currently-reading
review:

]]> Native Tongue (Skink #2) 13065 437 Carl Hiaasen 044669570X Peter 5 currently-reading 3.94 1991 Native Tongue (Skink #2)
author: Carl Hiaasen
name: Peter
average rating: 3.94
book published: 1991
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2020/07/06
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> Double Whammy (Skink #1) 11205318 “Follow the adventures of a news-photographer-turned-private-eye as he seeks truth, justice, and an affair with his ex-wife� (The New York Times) in this hilarious caper from bestselling author Carl Hiaasen.

R.J. Decker, star tenant of the local trailer park and neophyte private eye is fishing for a killer. Thanks to a sportsman’s scam that’s anything but sportsmanlike, there’s a body floating in Coon Bog, Florida—and a lot that’s rotten in the murky waters of big-stakes, large-mouth bass tournaments. Here Decker will team up with a half-blind, half-mad hermit with an appetite for road kill; dare to kiss his ex-wife while she’s in bed with her new husband; and face deadly TV evangelists, dangerously seductive women, and a pistol-toting redneck with a pit bull on his arm. And here his own life becomes part of the stakes. For while the “double whammy� is the lure, first prize is for the most ingenious murder.]]> 442 Carl Hiaasen Peter 0 4.18 1987 Double Whammy (Skink #1)
author: Carl Hiaasen
name: Peter
average rating: 4.18
book published: 1987
rating: 0
read at: 2020/07/03
date added: 2020/07/03
shelves:
review:

]]> Bidding Topics 34896845 184 Eric Rodwell 1944201041 Peter 4 bridge-and-games 1. Support doubles
2. New minor forcing
3. Mixed raises
4. Cappelletti
5. Responses to a forcing no trump
6. Inverted minor raises
7. Roman Keycard Blackwood
8. Serious 3NT
9. Last train

The book is aimed at intermediates and up; in each chapter, Rodwell starts with the basics of the convention and then gradually moves to more complex topics.

Rodwell explains things well. I, personally, would have liked more examples (and a bigger book). The book's usefulness to you will also depend on how many of the conventions you play. ]]> 4.56 2017 Bidding Topics
author: Eric Rodwell
name: Peter
average rating: 4.56
book published: 2017
rating: 4
read at: 2017/07/16
date added: 2020/06/22
shelves: bridge-and-games
review:
Eric Rodwell is one of the leading bidding theorists in bridge today. In this book he discusses nine conventions:
1. Support doubles
2. New minor forcing
3. Mixed raises
4. Cappelletti
5. Responses to a forcing no trump
6. Inverted minor raises
7. Roman Keycard Blackwood
8. Serious 3NT
9. Last train

The book is aimed at intermediates and up; in each chapter, Rodwell starts with the basics of the convention and then gradually moves to more complex topics.

Rodwell explains things well. I, personally, would have liked more examples (and a bigger book). The book's usefulness to you will also depend on how many of the conventions you play.
]]> <![CDATA[The Age of Reason : Illustrated]]> 42738222 225 Thomas Paine Peter 0 4.17 1794 The Age of Reason : Illustrated
author: Thomas Paine
name: Peter
average rating: 4.17
book published: 1794
rating: 0
read at: 2019/05/02
date added: 2020/04/15
shelves:
review:

]]> Into the Fire (Orphan X #5) 52344311 The New York Times bestselling Orphan X returns—facing his own uncertain future and undertaking one last mission.

Taken from a group home at age twelve, Evan Smoak was trained as an off-the-books government assassin: Orphan X. After breaking with the Program, he reinvented himself as The Nowhere Man, a figure shrouded in shadows who helps the truly desperate. But the government didn’t let go of him easily, sending their best to hunt him down and eliminate him. All of them failed. With his deadliest enemies behind him, Evan is facing a new challenge—what is he going to do now that no one is after him?

Max Merriweather is at the end of his rope. Separated from the woman he loves and barely scraping by, Max is a disappointment to everyone in his life. Then his very successful cousin Grant is brutally murdered. Two months before, Grant left Max an envelope with instructions to take it to a reporter if anything happened to him. Now the reporter is missing and Max’s apartment is ransacked. A man at the end of his rope, he calls The Nowhere Man.

With mixed feelings, Evan takes on this mission, easily finding the men who are after Max and executing a plan to keep him safe. But it isn’t as obvious as it seems—and Evan finds himself enmeshed in one of the most challenging missions of his life, one that he can’t survive on his own. With the help of Joey Morales, a genius-level hacker and the last Orphan recruited into the Program, and the brilliant, off-the-books gunsmith, Tommy Stojack, Orphan X once more heads…Into the Fire.]]> 392 Gregg Hurwitz 1250120470 Peter 0 currently-reading 4.56 2020 Into the Fire (Orphan X #5)
author: Gregg Hurwitz
name: Peter
average rating: 4.56
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2020/03/13
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Ionia Sanction (The Athenian Mysteries, #2)]]> 11926503 "Corby has not only made Greek history accessible—he's made it first-rate entertainment." --Kelli Stanley, award-winning author of Nox Dormienda and City of DragonsAthens, 460 B.C. Life's tough for Nicolaos, the only investigating agent in ancient Athens. His girlfriend's left him and his boss wants to fire him. But when an Athenian official is murdered, the brilliant statesman Pericles has no choice but to put Nico on the job.The case takes Nico, in the company of a beautiful slave girl, to the land of Ionia within the Persian Empire. The Persians will execute him on the spot if they think he's a spy. Beyond that, there are only a few minor being chased by brigands who are only waiting for the right price before they kill him.Somehow he has to placate his girlfriend, who is very angry about that slave girl.He must meet Themistocles, the military genius who saved Greece during the Persian Wars, and then defected to the hated enemy.And to solve the crime, Nico must uncover a secret that could not only destroy Athens, but will force him to choose between love, and ambition, and his own life.]]> 352 Gary Corby Peter 0 4.13 2011 The Ionia Sanction (The Athenian Mysteries, #2)
author: Gary Corby
name: Peter
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2011
rating: 0
read at: 2020/02/24
date added: 2020/03/02
shelves:
review:

]]> Hi Five (IQ, #4) 45726106 One woman. Five personalities. Private investigator IQ is back to piece together a Newport Beach murder with an eyewitness who gives "people person" a whole new meaning.
Cristiana is the daughter of the biggest arms dealer on the West Coast, Angus Byrne. She's also the sole witness and number one suspect in the murder of her boyfriend, found dead in her Newport Beach boutique. Isaiah Quintabe is coerced into taking the case to prove her innocence. If he can't, Angus will harm the brilliant PI's new girlfriend, ending her career.
The Christiana has multiple personalities. Among them, a naĂŻve, beautiful shopkeeper, an obnoxious drummer in a rock band, and a wanton seductress.
Isaiah's no one personality saw the entire incident. To find out what really happened the night of the murder, Isaiah must piece together clues from each of the personalities . . . before the cops close in on him.]]> 352 Joe Ide Peter 0 3.57 2020 Hi Five (IQ, #4)
author: Joe Ide
name: Peter
average rating: 3.57
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at: 2020/02/24
date added: 2020/02/24
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[A Little Bit of Advice for Self-Publishers]]> 29509321 80 Vinnie Kinsella Peter 0 currently-reading 5.00 2016 A Little Bit of Advice for Self-Publishers
author: Vinnie Kinsella
name: Peter
average rating: 5.00
book published: 2016
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2020/02/23
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Pericles Commission (The Athenian Mysteries, #1)]]> 7942422
But murder and mayhem don't bother Nico; what's really on his mind is how to get closer (much closer) to Diotima, the intelligent and annoyingly virgin priestess of Artemis, and how to shake off his irritating twelve year-old brother Socrates.

The Pericles Commission is the first in an exciting new series by first-time novelist Gary Corby, who takes us to Ancient Greece at one of the most exciting times in history. In this wonderfully approachable, historically rich novel, Athens is brought vividly to life in a mystery engaging from the first page to last.]]> 352 Gary Corby 0312599021 Peter 4 mysterythriller
My full review is here: ]]> 3.76 2010 The Pericles Commission (The Athenian Mysteries, #1)
author: Gary Corby
name: Peter
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2010
rating: 4
read at: 2020/02/14
date added: 2020/02/14
shelves: mysterythriller
review:
A humorous mystery/Courtroom drama set in Periclean Athens.

My full review is here:
]]> <![CDATA[Babel: Around the World in Twenty Languages]]> 39027389 361 Gaston Dorren 0802128793 Peter 5
My full review is here ]]> 3.78 2018 Babel: Around the World in Twenty Languages
author: Gaston Dorren
name: Peter
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2018
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2020/02/03
shelves:
review:
A fascinating look at the 20 most spoken languages.

My full review is here
]]> <![CDATA[The Word is Murder (Hawthorne & Horowitz, #1)]]> 36204075 SHE PLANNED HER OWN FUNERAL. BUT DID SHE ARRANGE HER OWN MURDER?

New York Times bestselling author of Magpie Murders and Moriarty, Anthony Horowitz has yet again brilliantly reinvented the classic crime novel, this time writing a fictional version of himself as the Watson to a modern-day Holmes.

One bright spring morning in London, Diana Cowper � the wealthy mother of a famous actor - enters a funeral parlor. She is there to plan her own service.

Six hours later she is found dead, strangled with a curtain cord in her own home.

Enter disgraced police detective Daniel Hawthorne, a brilliant, eccentric investigator who’s as quick with an insult as he is to crack a case. Hawthorne needs a ghost writer to document his life; a Watson to his Holmes. He chooses Anthony Horowitz.

Drawn in against his will, Horowitz soon finds himself a the center of a story he cannot control. Hawthorne is brusque, temperamental and annoying but even so his latest case with its many twists and turns proves irresistible. The writer and the detective form an unusual partnership. At the same time, it soon becomes clear that Hawthorne is hiding some dark secrets of his own.

A masterful and tricky mystery that springs many surprises, The Word is Murder is Anthony Horowitz at his very best.]]> 400 Anthony Horowitz 0062676784 Peter 4 3.89 2017 The Word is Murder (Hawthorne & Horowitz, #1)
author: Anthony Horowitz
name: Peter
average rating: 3.89
book published: 2017
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2020/02/03
shelves:
review:
An interesting mystery in the Sherlock Holmes mold. My full review is here:
]]> Austral 36632765
The world is still warming, sea levels are still rising, and the Antarctic Peninsula is home to Earth's newest nation, with life quickened by ecopoets spreading across valleys and fjords exposed by the retreat of the ice.
Austral Morales Ferrado, a child of the last generation of ecopoets, is a husky: an edited person adapted to the unforgiving climate of the far south, feared and despised by most of its population. She's been a convict, a corrections officer in a labour camp, and consort to a criminal, and now, out of desperation, she has committed the kidnapping of the century. But before she can collect the ransom and make a new life elsewhere, she must find a place of safety amongst the peninsula's forests and icy plateaus, and evade a criminal gang that has its own plans for the teenage girl she's taken hostage.

Blending the story of Austral's flight with the fractured history of her family and its role in the colonisation of Antarctica, Austral is a vivid portrayal of a treacherous new world created by climate change, and shaped by the betrayals and mistakes of the past.

Austral has been optioned for television by Circle of Confusion, the company who brought The Walking Dead and Locke and Key to the small screen. They've recruited award-winning screenwriter Elise McCredie ( Stateless ) and director Erik Skjoldbjærg ( An Enemy of the People , Insomnia ) to work on this exciting project.]]> 265 Paul McAuley Peter 3 science-fiction, sf
My full review is here:
]]> 3.85 2017 Austral
author: Paul McAuley
name: Peter
average rating: 3.85
book published: 2017
rating: 3
read at: 2020/02/03
date added: 2020/02/03
shelves: science-fiction, sf
review:
This is a pretty good book, stronger on ideas than on plot or character development.

My full review is here:

]]> <![CDATA[One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest]]> 332613 9780451163967

Tyrannical Nurse Ratched rules her ward in an Oregon State mental hospital with a strict and unbending routine, unopposed by her patients, who remain cowed by mind-numbing medication and the threat of electric shock therapy. But her regime is disrupted by the arrival of McMurphy � the swaggering, fun-loving trickster with a devilish grin who resolves to oppose her rules on behalf of his fellow inmates. His struggle is seen through the eyes of Chief Bromden, a seemingly mute half-Indian patient who understands McMurphy's heroic attempt to do battle with the powers that keep them imprisoned. Ken Kesey's extraordinary first novel is an exuberant, ribald and devastatingly honest portrayal of the boundaries between sanity and madness.]]> 325 Ken Kesey Peter 4 4.20 1962 One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest
author: Ken Kesey
name: Peter
average rating: 4.20
book published: 1962
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2020/01/16
shelves:
review:

]]> Flowers for Algernon 18373 Winner of both the Hugo and Nebula Awards, the powerful, classic story about a man who receives an operation that turns him into a genius...and introduces him to heartache.
Ěý
Charlie Gordon is about to embark upon an unprecedented journey. Born with an unusually low IQ, he has been chosen as the perfect subject for an experimental surgery that researchers hope will increase his intelligence � a procedure that has already been highly successful when tested on a lab mouse named Algernon.

As the treatment takes effect, Charlie's intelligence expands until it surpasses that of the doctors who engineered his metamorphosis. The experiment appears to be a scientific breakthrough of paramount importance, until Algernon suddenly deteriorates. Will the same happen to Charlie?]]> 311 Daniel Keyes 015603008X Peter 5 4.19 1966 Flowers for Algernon
author: Daniel Keyes
name: Peter
average rating: 4.19
book published: 1966
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2020/01/16
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review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Rosie Project (Don Tillman, #1)]]> 16181775
Don Tillman, professor of genetics, has never been on a second date. He is a man who can count all his friends on the fingers of one hand, whose lifelong difficulty with social rituals has convinced him that he is simply not wired for romance. So when an acquaintance informs him that he would make a “wonderful� husband, his first reaction is shock. Yet he must concede to the statistical probability that there is someone for everyone, and he embarks upon The Wife Project. In the orderly, evidence-based manner with which he approaches all things, Don sets out to find the perfect partner. She will be punctual and logical—most definitely not a barmaid, a smoker, a drinker, or a late-arriver.

Yet Rosie Jarman is all these things. She is also beguiling, fiery, intelligent—and on a quest of her own. She is looking for her biological father, a search that a certain DNA expert might be able to help her with. Don's Wife Project takes a back burner to the Father Project and an unlikely relationship blooms, forcing the scientifically minded geneticist to confront the spontaneous whirlwind that is Rosie—and the realization that love is not always what looks good on paper.

The Rosie Project is a moving and hilarious novel for anyone who has ever tenaciously gone after life or love in the face of overwhelming challenges.]]> 292 Graeme Simsion 1476729085 Peter 2 4.00 2013 The Rosie Project (Don Tillman, #1)
author: Graeme Simsion
name: Peter
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2013
rating: 2
read at:
date added: 2020/01/16
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time]]> 1618 226 Mark Haddon 1400032717 Peter 5 3.89 2003 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time
author: Mark Haddon
name: Peter
average rating: 3.89
book published: 2003
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2020/01/16
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review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Handbook of Research Synthesis and Meta-Analysis]]> 28443816 632 Harris Cooper 1610441389 Peter 0 currently-reading 0.0 2009 The Handbook of Research Synthesis and Meta-Analysis
author: Harris Cooper
name: Peter
average rating: 0.0
book published: 2009
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/12/03
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Rosie Project (Don Tillman, #1)]]> 45287327
Don Tillman, professor of genetics, has never been on a second date. He is a man who can count all his friends on the fingers of one hand, whose lifelong difficulty with social rituals has convinced him that he is simply not wired for romance. So when an acquaintance informs him that he would make a “wonderful� husband, his first reaction is shock. Yet he must concede to the statistical probability that there is someone for everyone, and he embarks upon The Wife Project. In the orderly, evidence-based manner with which he approaches all things, Don sets out to find the perfect partner. She will be punctual and logical—most definitely not a barmaid, a smoker, a drinker, or a late-arriver.

Yet Rosie Jarman is all these things. She is also beguiling, fiery, intelligent—and on a quest of her own. She is looking for her biological father, a search that a certain DNA expert might be able to help her with. Don's Wife Project takes a back burner to the Father Project and an unlikely relationship blooms, forcing the scientifically minded geneticist to confront the spontaneous whirlwind that is Rosie—and the realization that love is not always what looks good on paper.

The Rosie Project is a moving and hilarious novel for anyone who has ever tenaciously gone after life or love in the face of overwhelming challenges.]]> 316 Graeme Simsion Peter 0 currently-reading 4.23 2013 The Rosie Project (Don Tillman, #1)
author: Graeme Simsion
name: Peter
average rating: 4.23
book published: 2013
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/11/24
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> The Corrections 6562879 After almost fifty years as a wife and mother, Enid Lambert is ready to have some fun. Unfortunately, her husband, Alfred, is losing his sanity to Parkinson's disease, and their children have long since flown the family nest to the catastrophes of their own lives. The oldest, Gary, a once-stable portfolio manager and family man, is trying to convince his wife and himself, despite clear signs to the contrary, that he is not clinically depressed. The middle child, Chip, has lost his seemingly secure academic job and is failing spectacularly at his new line of work. And Denise, the youngest, has escaped a disastrous marriage only to pour her youth and beauty down the drain of an affair with a married man - or so her mother fears. Desperate for some pleasure to look forward to, Enid has set her heart on an elusive goal: bringing her family together for one last Christmas at home.
Stretching from the Midwest at midcentury to the Wall Street and Eastern Europe of today, "The Corrections" brings an old-fashioned world of civic virtue and sexual inhibitions into violent collision with the era of home surveillance, hands-off parenting, do-it-yourself mental healthcare, and globalised greed. Richly realistic, darkly hilarious, deeply humane, it confirms Jonathan Franzen as one of our most brilliant interpreters of American society and the American soul.]]> 610 Jonathan Franzen Peter 0 currently-reading 4.01 2001 The Corrections
author: Jonathan Franzen
name: Peter
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2001
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/11/11
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy (The Karla Trilogy, #1)]]> 20587606 400 John Le Carré 1101528788 Peter 0 currently-reading 4.19 1974 Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy (The Karla Trilogy, #1)
author: John Le Carré
name: Peter
average rating: 4.19
book published: 1974
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/11/03
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Smiley's People (The Karla Trilogy, #3)]]> 13519648 From the New York Times bestselling author of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy; Our Kind of Traitor; and The Night Manager, now a television series starring Tom Hiddleston. John le Carré’s new novel, A Legacy of Spies, will be available from Viking in Fall 2017.

Tell Max that it concerns the Sandman�

A very junior agent answers Vladimir’s call, but it could have been the Chief of the Circus himself. No one at the British Secret Service considers the old spy to be anything except a senile has-been who can’t give up the game—until he’s shot in the face at point-blank range. Although George Smiley (code name: Max) is officially retired, he’s summoned to identify the body now bearing Moscow Centre’s bloody imprimatur. As he works to unearth his friend’s fatal secrets, Smiley heads inexorably toward one final reckoning with Karla—his dark “grail.�

In Smiley’s People, master storyteller and New York Times bestselling author of The Spy Who Came in from the Cold and Our Kind of Traitor John le Carré brings his acclaimed Karla Trilogy, to its unforgettable, spellbinding conclusion.]]> 398 John Le Carré 1101535296 Peter 0 currently-reading 4.55 1979 Smiley's People (The Karla Trilogy, #3)
author: John Le Carré
name: Peter
average rating: 4.55
book published: 1979
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/11/03
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> Blue Moon (Jack Reacher, #24) 43903354
This isn’t one of those times.

Reacher is on a Greyhound bus, minding his own business, with no particular place to go, and all the time in the world to get there. Then he steps off the bus to help an old man who is obviously just a victim waiting to happen. But you know what they say about good deeds. Now Reacher wants to make it right.

An elderly couple have made a few well-meaning mistakes, and now they owe big money to some very bad people. One brazen move leads to another, and suddenly Reacher finds himself a wanted man in the middle of a brutal turf war between rival Ukrainian and Albanian gangs.

Reacher has to stay one step ahead of the loan sharks, the thugs, and the assassins. He teams up with a fed-up waitress who knows a little more than she’s letting on, and sets out to take down the powerful and make the greedy pay. It’s a long shot. The odds are against him. But Reacher believes in a certain kind of justice . . . the kind that comes along once in a blue moon.]]> 364 Lee Child 0399593551 Peter 0 currently-reading 4.02 2019 Blue Moon (Jack Reacher, #24)
author: Lee Child
name: Peter
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/10/30
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Making the Grade: How Boards Can Ensure Academic Quality]]> 25782258
New to the second edition:
- All new key statistics and trends
- Tips for ensuring quality while containing costs
- Advice on how to get the most from the assessment process
- Practical “Questions for Boards to Consider� after each section
- Expanded appendix, including AGB’s recent "Statement on Board Responsibility for the Oversight of Educational Quality"]]> 183 Peter Ewell 0926508261 Peter 0 currently-reading 5.00 2012 Making the Grade: How Boards Can Ensure Academic Quality
author: Peter Ewell
name: Peter
average rating: 5.00
book published: 2012
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/10/28
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Progress: Ten Reasons to Look Forward to the Future]]> 31572091 A Book of the Year for The Economist and the Observer It’s all over our televisions, newspapers and the internet. Every day we’re bludgeoned by news of how bad everything is � Brexit, financial collapse, unemployment, poverty, environmental disasters, disease, hunger, war. Indeed, our world now seems to be on the brink of collapse, and We’ve made more progress over the last 100 years than in the first 100,000 285,000 more people have gained access to safe water every day for the last 25 years In the last 50 years world poverty has fallen more than it did in the preceding 500 Contrary to what most of us believe, our progress over the past few decades has been unprecedented. By almost any index you care to identify, things are markedly better now than they have ever been for almost everyone alive. Examining official data from the United Nations, the World Bank and the World Health Organization, Johan Norberg traces just how far we have come in tackling the issues facing our species. While it’s true that not every problem has been solved, we do now have a good idea of the solutions and we know what it will take to see this progress continue. Counter-intuitive, dramatic and uplifting, Progress is a call for renewed hope in defiance of the doom-mongering of politicians and the media.]]> 304 Johan Norberg Peter 0 currently-reading 4.43 2016 Progress: Ten Reasons to Look Forward to the Future
author: Johan Norberg
name: Peter
average rating: 4.43
book published: 2016
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/10/11
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Bloody Genius (Virgil Flowers, #12)]]> 43801724
At the local state university, two feuding departments have faced off on the battleground of PC culture. Each carries their views to extremes that may seem absurd, but highly educated people of sound mind and good intentions can reasonably disagree, right?

Then one of the department stars winds up dead, and Virgil Flowers is brought in to investigate . . . and he soon comes to realize he's dealing with people who, on this one particular issue, are functionally crazy. Among this group of wildly impassioned, diametrically opposed zealots lurks a killer, and it will be up to Virgil to sort the murderer from the mere maniacs.

Librarian's note: as of 2021, there are 13 volumes in the author's Virgil Flowers series. The last was published in April 2021. It is part of the "Prey" series but Lucas Davenport and Virgil Flowers share the billing - "Ocean Prey."]]> 380 John Sandford Peter 0 4.27 2019 Bloody Genius (Virgil Flowers, #12)
author: John Sandford
name: Peter
average rating: 4.27
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at: 2019/10/06
date added: 2019/10/10
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Dreaming Stars (The Axiom #2)]]> 37467715 The crew of the White Raven returns to save the galaxy, in this brilliant space opera sequel to The Wrong Stars Ancient aliens, the Axiom, will kill us all â€� when they wake up. In deep space, a swarm of nanoparticles threatens the colonies, transforming everything it meets into computronium â€� including the colonists. The crew of the White Raven investigate, and discover an Axiom facility filled with aliens hibernating while their minds roam a vast virtual reality. Sebastien wakes up, claiming his altered brain architecture can help the crew deactivate the swarm â€� from inside the Axiom simulation. To protect humanity, Callie must trust him, but if Sebastien still plans to dominate the universe using Axiom tech, they could be in a whole lot of troubleâ€� ĚýFile ĚýScience FictionĚý[ Nanowar | Let Sleeping Gods Lie | Upgraded | For the Colony ]]]> 269 Tim Pratt 0857667688 Peter 0 4.04 2018 The Dreaming Stars (The Axiom #2)
author: Tim Pratt
name: Peter
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2018
rating: 0
read at: 2019/10/02
date added: 2019/10/02
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Portable Atheist: Essential Readings for the Nonbeliever]]> 10227887 Christopher Hitchens's personally curated New York Times bestselling anthology of the most influential and important writings on atheism, including original pieces by Salman Rushdie and Ian McEwanFrom the #1 New York Times best-selling author of God Is Not Great, a provocative and entertaining guided tour of atheist and agnostic thought through the ages--with never-before-published pieces by Salman Rushdie, Ian McEwan, and Ayaan Hirsi Ali.Christopher Hitchens continues to make the case for a splendidly godless universe in this first-ever gathering of the influential voices--past and present--that have shaped his side of the current (and raging) God/no-god debate. With Hitchens as your erudite and witty guide, you'll be led through a wealth of philosophy, literature, and scientific inquiry, including generous portions of the words of Lucretius, Benedict de Spinoza, Charles Darwin, Karl Marx, Mark Twain, George Eliot, Bertrand Russell, Emma Goldman, H. L. Mencken, Albert Einstein, Daniel Dennett, Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins, and many others well-known and lesser known. And they're all set in context and commented upon as only Christopher Hitchens--"political and literary journalist extraordinaire" (Los Angeles Times)--can. Atheist? Believer? Uncertain? No The Portable Atheist will speak to you and engage you every step of the way.]]> 480 Christopher Hitchens Peter 0 4.11 2007 The Portable Atheist: Essential Readings for the Nonbeliever
author: Christopher Hitchens
name: Peter
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2007
rating: 0
read at: 2019/09/06
date added: 2019/09/24
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Dark Vineyard (Bruno, Chief of Police #2)]]> 8534861 --------------------------------------
Benoît (Bruno) Courrèges - devoted friend, cuisinier extraordinaire and the town's only municipal policeman - rushes to the scene when a research station for genetically modified crops is burned down outside Saint-Denis. Bruno immediately suspects a group of fervent environmentalists who live nearby, but the fire is only the first in a string of mysteries centering on the region's fertile soil.

Then a bevy of winemakers descends on Saint-Denis, competing for its land and spurring resentment among the villagers. Romances blossom. Hearts are broken. Some of the sensual pleasures of the town - a dinner of a truffle omelette and grilled bécasses, a community grape-crushing - provide an opportunity for both warm friendship and bitter hostilities to form. The town's rivals - Max, an environmentalist who hopes to make organic wine; Jacqueline, a flirtatious, newly arrived Québécoise; and Fernando, the heir to an American wine fortune - act increasingly erratically. Events grow ever darker, culminating in two suspicious deaths, and Bruno finds that the problems of the present are never far from those of the past.]]> 321 Martin Walker Peter 0 4.16 2009 The Dark Vineyard (Bruno, Chief of Police #2)
author: Martin Walker
name: Peter
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2009
rating: 0
read at: 2019/09/16
date added: 2019/09/22
shelves:
review:

]]>