Pat's bookshelf: all en-US Sun, 20 Sep 2015 04:26:47 -0700 60 Pat's bookshelf: all 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg <![CDATA[The Talisman (The Talisman, #1)]]> 59219
You are about to take a journey... a terrifying trip across America where young Jack Sawyer is searching for the Talisman, the only thing that can save his dying mother. His quest takes him into the menacing Territories where violence, surprise and the titanic struggle between good and evil reach across a mythic landscape... a journey into the dark heart of horror.]]> 656 Stephen King 0375507779 Pat 0 re-reading 4.13 1984 The Talisman (The Talisman, #1)
author: Stephen King
name: Pat
average rating: 4.13
book published: 1984
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2015/09/20
shelves: re-reading
review:

]]> The Peripheral (Jackpot #1) 20821159 William Gibson returns with his first novel since 2010's New York Times–b±đ˛őłŮ˛ő±đ±ô±ôľ±˛Ô˛µ Zero History.

Where Flynne and her brother, Burton, live, jobs outside the drug business are rare. Fortunately, Burton has his veteran's benefits, for neural damage he suffered from implants during his time in the USMC's elite Haptic Recon force. Then one night Burton has to go out, but there's a job he's supposed to do—a job Flynne didn't know he had. Beta-testing part of a new game, he tells her. The job seems to be simple: work a perimeter around the image of a tower building. Little buglike things turn up. He's supposed to get in their way, edge them back. That's all there is to it. He's offering Flynne a good price to take over for him. What she sees, though, isn't what Burton told her to expect. It might be a game, but it might also be murder.]]> 485 William Gibson 0399158448 Pat 0 currently-reading 3.90 2014 The Peripheral (Jackpot #1)
author: William Gibson
name: Pat
average rating: 3.90
book published: 2014
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2015/09/20
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> Revival 20926278
In a small New England town, over half a century ago, a shadow falls over a small boy playing with his toy soldiers. Jamie Morton looks up to see a striking man, the new minister. Charles Jacobs, along with his beautiful wife, will transform the local church. The men and boys are all a bit in love with Mrs. Jacobs; the women and girls feel the same about Reverend Jacobs—including Jamie's mother and beloved sister, Claire. With Jamie, the Reverend shares a deeper bond based on a secret obsession. When tragedy strikes the Jacobs family, this charismatic preacher curses God, mocks all religious belief, and is banished from the shocked town.

Jamie has demons of his own. Wed to his guitar from the age of thirteen, he plays in bands across the country, living the nomadic lifestyle of bar-band rock and roll while fleeing from his family's horrific loss. In his mid-thirties—addicted to heroin, stranded, desperate—Jamie meets Charles Jacobs again, with profound consequences for both men. Their bond becomes a pact beyond even the Devil's devising, and Jamie discovers that revival has many meanings.

This rich and disturbing novel spans five decades on its way to the most terrifying conclusion Stephen King has ever written. It's a masterpiece from King, in the great American tradition of Frank Norris, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Edgar Allan Poe.]]> 405 Stephen King 1476770387 Pat 4 3.78 2014 Revival
author: Stephen King
name: Pat
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2014
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2015/09/20
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Intuition Pumps and Other Tools for Thinking]]> 18378002 Intuition Pumps and Other Tools for Thinking offers seventy-seven of Dennett’s most successful "imagination-extenders and focus-holders" meant to guide you through some of life’s most treacherous subject matter: evolution, meaning, mind, and free will. With patience and wit, Dennett deftly deploys his thinking tools to gain traction on these thorny issues while offering readers insight into how and why each tool was built.


Alongside well-known favorites like Occam’s Razor and reductio ad absurdum lie thrilling descriptions of Dennett’s own creations: Trapped in the Robot Control Room, Beware of the Prime Mammal, and The Wandering Two-Bitser. Ranging across disciplines as diverse as psychology, biology, computer science, and physics, Dennett’s tools embrace in equal measure light-heartedness and accessibility as they welcome uninitiated and seasoned readers alike. As always, his goal remains to teach you how to "think reliably and even gracefully about really hard questions."


A sweeping work of intellectual seriousness that’s also studded with impish delights, Intuition Pumps offers intrepid thinkers—in all walks of life—delicious opportunities to explore their pet ideas with new powers.]]> 496 Daniel C. Dennett 0393348784 Pat 4 3.76 2013 Intuition Pumps and Other Tools for Thinking
author: Daniel C. Dennett
name: Pat
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2013
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2015/09/20
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Three-Body Problem (Remembrance of Earth’s Past, #1)]]> 20518872 472 Liu Cixin Pat 5 4.08 2006 The Three-Body Problem (Remembrance of Earth’s Past, #1)
author: Liu Cixin
name: Pat
average rating: 4.08
book published: 2006
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2015/09/20
shelves:
review:

]]> Naked City 9727730 In this thrilling collection of original stories, some of today’s hottest paranormal authors delight, thrill, and captivate readers with otherworldly tales of magic and mischief. In Jim Butcher’s ”Curses�, Harry Dresden investigates how to lift a curse laid by the Fair Folk on the Chicago Cubs. In Patricia Briggs� “Fairy Gifts,�, a vampire is called home by magic to save the Fae who freed him from a dark curse. In Melissa Marr’s “Guns for the Dead�, the newly dead Frankie Lee seeks a job in the afterlife on the wrong side of the law. In Holly Black’s “Noble Rot�, a dying rock star discovers that the young woman who brings him food every day has some strange appetites of her own.

Featuring original stories from 20 authors, this dark, captivating, fabulous, and fantastical collection is not to be missed!



Contents:
Curses / by Jim Butcher --
How the pooka came to New York City / by Delia Sherman --
On the slide / by Richard Bowes --
The Duke of Riverside / by Ellen Kushner --
Oblivion by Calvin Klein / by Christopher Fowler --
Fairy gifts / by Patricia Briggs --
Picking up the pieces / by Pat Cadigan --
Underbridge / by Peter S. Beagle --
Priced to sell / by Naomi Novik --
The bricks of Gelecek / by Matthew Kressel --
Weston walks / by Kit Reed --
The projected girl/ by Lavie Tidhar --
The way station / by Nathan Ballingrud --
Guns for the dead / by Melissa Marr --
And go like this / by John Crowley --
Noble rot / by Holly Black --
Daddy longlegs of the evening / by Jeffrey Ford --
The skinny girl / by Lucius Shepard --
The Colliers' Venus (1893) / by CaitlĂ­n R. Kiernan --
King pole, gallows pole, bottle tree / by Elizabeth Bear.]]> 539 Ellen Datlow 0312385242 Pat 5 3.75 2011 Naked City
author: Ellen Datlow
name: Pat
average rating: 3.75
book published: 2011
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2014/10/08
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review:

]]> <![CDATA[Endgame: Bobby Fischer's Remarkable Rise and Fall—From America's Brightest Prodigy to the Edge of Madness]]> 8264505 Ěý
At first all one noticed was how gifted Fischer was.Ěý Possessing a 181 I.Q. and remarkable powers of concentration, Bobby memorized hundreds of chess books in several languages, and he was only 13 when he became the youngest chess master in U.S. history.ĚýĚý But his strange behavior started early.Ěý In 1972, at the historic Cold War showdown in Reykjavik, Iceland, where he faced Soviet champion Boris Spassky, Fischer made headlines with hundreds of petty demands that nearly ended the competition.
Ěý
It was merely a prelude to what was to come.
Ěý
Arriving back in the United States to a hero’s welcome, Bobby was mobbed wherever he went—a figure as exotic and improbable as any American pop culture had yet produced.Ěý No player of a mere “board gameâ€� had ever ascended to such heights.Ěý Commercial sponsorship offers poured in, ultimately topping $10 million—but Bobby demurred.Ěý Instead, he began tithing his limited money to an apocalyptic religion and devouring anti-Semitic literature.Ěý
Ěý
After years of poverty and a stint living on Los Angelesâ€� Skid Row, Bobby remerged in 1992 to play Spassky in a multi-million dollar rematch—but the experience only deepened a paranoia that had formed years earlier when he came to believe that the Soviets wanted him dead for taking away “theirâ€� title.Ěý When the dust settled, Bobby was a wanted man—transformed into an international fugitive because of his decision to play in Montenegro despite U.S. sanctions.Ěý Fearing for his life, traveling with bodyguards, and wearing a long leather coat to ward off knife attacks, Bobby lived the life of a celebrity fugitive â€� one drawn increasingly to the bizarre.Ěý Mafiosi, Nazis, odd attempts to breed an heir who could perpetuate his chess-genius DNA—all are woven into his late-life tapestry.
Ěý
And yet, as Brady shows, the most notable irony of Bobby Fischer’s strange descent â€� which had reached full plummet by 2005 when he turned down yet another multi-million dollar payday—is that despite his incomprehensible behavior, there were many who remained fiercely loyal to him.Ěý Why that was so is at least partly the subject of this book—one that at last answers the “Who was Bobby Fischer?”]]> 402 Frank Brady 0307463907 Pat 4 3.90 2011 Endgame: Bobby Fischer's Remarkable Rise and Fall—From America's Brightest Prodigy to the Edge of Madness
author: Frank Brady
name: Pat
average rating: 3.90
book published: 2011
rating: 4
read at: 2013/03/31
date added: 2013/03/31
shelves:
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]]> Stories from the Quiet War 13305970
After the end of the Quiet War, the victorious forces from Earth have taken control of the cities and settlements of the moons of Saturn and Jupiter. In 'Making History' and 'Karyl's War', the victors and the defeated discover that defining the end of the war isn't easy. In 'Incomers', a young visitor from Earth learns of an unexpected reconciliation. In 'Second Skin', a spy attempting to kidnap a valuable gene wizard discovers that he isn't quite what he thought he was. And in 'Reef', the discovery of a fast-evolving ecosystem of vacuum organisms in a planetoid in the Kuiper Belt has far-reaching implications for the spread of life throughout the Solar System.]]> 186 Paul McAuley Pat 5 4.06 2011 Stories from the Quiet War
author: Paul McAuley
name: Pat
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2011
rating: 5
read at: 2013/03/04
date added: 2013/03/04
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]]> The Dead Women of Juárez 10328165
In the last twenty years, over 3000 women have disappeared from Ciudad Juárez, on the border between Mexico and the USA. Sam Hawken takes this story of mass murder and abduction and around it weaves the story of Kelly Courter, a washed up boxer from Texas, who doesn't mind playing the stooge in the ring, so long as he gets paid. Courter is sucked into the underworld of organised crime that flourishes in the city, soon finding himself in way over his head. As his life spins out of control he becomes obsessed with seeking the truth about the female victims of Juárez. Sam Hawken is a classic American voice and Kelly Courter is a timeless American hero, fighting for freedom and justice in this fast-paced and brutal novel.]]> 324 Sam Hawken Pat 0 currently-reading 3.54 2011 The Dead Women of Juárez
author: Sam Hawken
name: Pat
average rating: 3.54
book published: 2011
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2012/04/23
shelves: currently-reading
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]]> Fifteen Days Without a Head 12387634
When Mum fails to come home one night, Laurence tells nobody, terrified he and his brother will be taken into care if anyone finds out. Instead, he attempts to keep up the pretence that Mum is still around: dressing up in her clothes to trick the neighbours and spinning an increasingly complicated tangle of lies. After two weeks on their own, running out of food and money, and with suspicious adults closing in, Laurence finally discovers what happened to his mother. And that's when the trouble really starts . . .

A compelling thriller filled with some hilarious and surreal moments. Fifteen Days Without a Head is a tender, honest story about family, forgiveness and hope.]]> 288 Dave Cousins 0192732560 Pat 4 3.87 2011 Fifteen Days Without a Head
author: Dave Cousins
name: Pat
average rating: 3.87
book published: 2011
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2012/04/23
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review:

]]> <![CDATA[Who Am I? And If So How Many? A Journey Through Your Mind]]> 11350713 320 Richard David Precht 1849011028 Pat 0 currently-reading 3.91 2007 Who Am I? And If So How Many? A Journey Through Your Mind
author: Richard David Precht
name: Pat
average rating: 3.91
book published: 2007
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2012/04/23
shelves: currently-reading
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]]> Nigger 178528 224 Dick Gregory 0671735608 Pat 5 4.38 1964 Nigger
author: Dick Gregory
name: Pat
average rating: 4.38
book published: 1964
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2012/04/23
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review:

]]> Desdaemona 11764987 Sometimes he helps the kids in other, stranger, ways. He looks like a regular teenager, but he’s not. He acts like he’s not exactly human, but he is. He treads the line between mundane reality and the world of the supernatural.
Desdaemona also knows the non-human world far too well. She tracks Jordan down and enlists his aid in searching for her lost sister Fay, who did a Very Bad Thing involving an immortal. This may be a mistake � for both of them. Too many people are interested now, and some of them are not people at all.

Ben Macallan’s urban fantasy debut takes you on a terrifying journey, lifting the curtain on what really walks our city streets.]]> 418 Ben Macallan Pat 4 currently-reading 3.74 2011 Desdaemona
author: Ben Macallan
name: Pat
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2011
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2012/04/23
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[No One Is Here Except All of Us]]> 12040405
In 1939, the families in a remote Jewish village in Romania feel the war close in on them. Their tribe has moved and escaped for thousands of years - across oceans, deserts, and mountains - but now, it seems, there is nowhere else to go. Danger is imminent in every direction, yet the territory of imagination and belief is limitless.

At the suggestion of an eleven-year-old girl and a mysterious stranger who has washed up on the riverbank, the villagers decide to reinvent the world: deny any relationship with the known and start over from scratch. Destiny is unwritten. Time and history are forgotten. Jobs, husbands, a child, are reassigned. And for years, there is boundless hope. But the real world continues to unfold alongside the imagined one, eventually overtaking it, and soon our narrator - the girl, grown into a young mother - must flee her village, move from one world to the next, to find her husband and save her children, and propel them toward a real and hopeful future.

A beguiling, imaginative, inspiring story about the bigness of being alive as an individual, as a member of a tribe, and as a participant in history, No One Is Here Except All Of Us explores how we use storytelling to survive and shape our own truths. It marks the arrival of a major new literary talent.]]> 325 Ramona Ausubel 1594487944 Pat 5 currently-reading 3.36 2012 No One Is Here Except All of Us
author: Ramona Ausubel
name: Pat
average rating: 3.36
book published: 2012
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2012/04/23
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[A Dance with Dragons (A Song of Ice and Fire, #5)]]> 10664113 Alternate cover edition of ASIN B004XISI4A

In the aftermath of a colossal battle, the future of the Seven Kingdoms hangs in the balance—beset by newly emerging threats from every direction. In the east, Daenerys Targaryen, the last scion of House Targaryen, rules with her three dragons as queen of a city built on dust and death. But Daenerys has thousands of enemies, and many have set out to find her. As they gather, one young man embarks upon his own quest for the queen, with an entirely different goal in mind.

Fleeing from Westeros with a price on his head, Tyrion Lannister, too, is making his way to Daenerys. But his newest allies in this quest are not the rag-tag band they seem, and at their heart lies one who could undo Daenerys’s claim to Westeros forever.

Meanwhile, to the north lies the mammoth Wall of ice and stone—a structure only as strong as those guarding it. There, Jon Snow, 998th Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch, will face his greatest challenge. For he has powerful foes not only within the Watch but also beyond, in the land of the creatures of ice.

From all corners, bitter conflicts reignite, intimate betrayals are perpetrated, and a grand cast of outlaws and priests, soldiers and skinchangers, nobles and slaves, will face seemingly insurmountable obstacles. Some will fail, others will grow in the strength of darkness. But in a time of rising restlessness, the tides of destiny and politics will lead inevitably to the greatest dance of all.]]> 1125 George R.R. Martin Pat 5 4.33 2011 A Dance with Dragons (A Song of Ice and Fire, #5)
author: George R.R. Martin
name: Pat
average rating: 4.33
book published: 2011
rating: 5
read at: 2012/04/23
date added: 2012/04/23
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Connectome: How the Brain's Wiring Makes Us Who We Are]]> 11346470 Connectome is a mind-bending adventure story, told with great passion and authority. It presents a daring scientific and technological vision for at last understanding what makes us who we are. Welcome to the future of neuroscience.]]> 359 Sebastian Seung 0547508182 Pat 5 3.82 2012 Connectome: How the Brain's Wiring Makes Us Who We Are
author: Sebastian Seung
name: Pat
average rating: 3.82
book published: 2012
rating: 5
read at: 2012/04/23
date added: 2012/04/23
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Cold Cold Ground (Detective Sean Duffy, #1)]]> 13008754
Audio CD is 10 hours and 3 minutes long.]]> 11 Adrian McKinty 1441785698 Pat 0 to-read 3.88 2012 The Cold Cold Ground (Detective Sean Duffy, #1)
author: Adrian McKinty
name: Pat
average rating: 3.88
book published: 2012
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2012/02/14
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Fragile Minds 11105544 Book by Seeber, Claire 416 Claire Seeber 1847562078 Pat 0 to-read 3.47 2011 Fragile Minds
author: Claire Seeber
name: Pat
average rating: 3.47
book published: 2011
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2012/02/14
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Disappeared (Retrieval Artist, #1)]]> 372000
Meet Miles Flint. His occupation: Retrieval Artist. His job: Hunt down the Disappeared, outlaws on the run, wanted for crimes against alien cultures. The catch: Flint isn't working on the side of the law. Miles becomes embroiled in a bizarre case involving a stolen spaceyacht filled with dead bodies...a triple murder, the kidnapping of two human children, and a woman on the run.

Flint must enforce the law, giving the children to aliens, solving the murders, and arresting the woman for trying to save her own life. But how is a man supposed to enforce laws that are unjust? How can he sacrifice innocents to a system he's not sure he believes in? How can Miles Flint do the right thing in a universe where the right thing is very, very wrong?]]> 384 Kristine Kathryn Rusch 0451458885 Pat 4 3.75 2002 The Disappeared (Retrieval Artist, #1)
author: Kristine Kathryn Rusch
name: Pat
average rating: 3.75
book published: 2002
rating: 4
read at: 2012/01/26
date added: 2012/01/26
shelves:
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]]> 1Q84: Books One and Two 9911160 622 Haruki Murakami 1846554071 Pat 0 to-read 3.99 2009 1Q84: Books One and Two
author: Haruki Murakami
name: Pat
average rating: 3.99
book published: 2009
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2011/12/26
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[Mockingjay (The Hunger Games, #3)]]> 7260188 My name is Katniss Everdeen.
Why am I not dead?
I should be dead.

Katniss Everdeen, girl on fire, has survived, even though her home has been destroyed. Gale has escaped. Katniss's family is safe. Peeta has been captured by the Capitol. District 13 really does exist. There are rebels. There are new leaders. A revolution is unfolding.

It is by design that Katniss was rescued from the arena in the cruel and haunting Quarter Quell, and it is by design that she has long been part of the revolution without knowing it. District 13 has come out of the shadows and is plotting to overthrow the Capitol. Everyone, it seems, has had a hand in the carefully laid plans—except Katniss.

The success of the rebellion hinges on Katniss's willingness to be a pawn, to accept responsibility for countless lives, and to change the course of the future of Panem. To do this, she must put aside her feelings of anger and distrust. She must become the rebels' Mockingjay—no matter what the personal cost.]]> 390 Suzanne Collins 0439023513 Pat 5 4.10 2010 Mockingjay (The Hunger Games, #3)
author: Suzanne Collins
name: Pat
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2010
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2011/12/02
shelves:
review:
I went into this series a skeptic and came out a believer. That sound you hear is me, giving Collins a standing ovation.
]]> <![CDATA[Real Dangerous Girl (Kim Oh, #1)]]> 12857227
And a very large gun.

All Kim wants is the job she’s worked hard for. But when her boss McIntyre throws her out on her ear, she begins dreaming of revenge. She hires Cole, a psychotic hitman who’s also been dispensed with by the same boss. Left crippled by McIntyre’s security guards, Cole tells Kim that the only way they’ll be able to pull off this hit is if she’s there with a gun in her hand as well. Before she knows what’s happening, Kim is training to be a professional assassin, with everything � including her own life � at stake. Because she’s only going to get one chance to pull it off...

Noted sf and fantasy author K. W. Jeter takes a new turn in the thriller genre, building on the dark, gritty moods of his previous science fiction and horror novels. Fans of mystery and suspense novels with smart, tough females taking the lead, from A IS FOR ALIBI to THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATOO, will find a lot to like in the new Kim Oh Thriller series.]]> 161 K.W. Jeter Pat 5 3.81 2011 Real Dangerous Girl (Kim Oh, #1)
author: K.W. Jeter
name: Pat
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2011
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2011/12/02
shelves:
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This is a hell of a lot of fun and I can't wait to read the next books in the series.
]]> <![CDATA[Mona Lisa Overdrive (Sprawl, #3)]]> 154091 Neuromancer, has written his most brilliant and thrilling work to date... The Mona Lisa Overdrive.ĚýEnter Gibson's unique world - lyric and mechanical, erotic and violent, sobering and exciting - where multinational corporations and high tech outlaws vie for power, traveling into the computer-generated universe known as cyberspace.ĚýInto this world comes Mona, a young girl with a murky past and an uncertain future whose life is on a collision course with internationally famous Sense/Net star Angie Mitchell.ĚýSince childhood, Angie has been able to tap into cyberspace without a computer.ĚýNow, from inside cyberspace, a kidnapping plot is masterminded by a phantom entity who has plans for Mona, Angie, and all humanity, plans that cannot be controlled... or even known.ĚýAnd behind the intrigue lurks the shadowy Yakuza, the powerful Japanese underworld, whose leaders ruthlessly manipulate people and events to suit their own purposes... or so they think.

]]> 308 William Gibson 0553281747 Pat 5 4.01 1988 Mona Lisa Overdrive (Sprawl, #3)
author: William Gibson
name: Pat
average rating: 4.01
book published: 1988
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2011/12/02
shelves:
review:
William Gibson is The Man. every time I read his work, I fall in love with his writing all over again. He's a True Voice.
]]> Uglies (Uglies, #1) 24770
But Tally's new friend Shay isn't sure she wants to become a pretty. When Shay runs away, Tally learns about a whole new side of the pretty world—and it isn't very pretty. The authorities offer Tally a choice: find her friend and turn her in, or never turn pretty at all. Tally's choice will change her world forever....]]> 425 Scott Westerfeld 0689865384 Pat 0 to-read 3.85 2005 Uglies (Uglies, #1)
author: Scott Westerfeld
name: Pat
average rating: 3.85
book published: 2005
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2011/12/02
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[Last Rituals (Þóra Guðmundsdóttir, #1)]]> 1613280 314 Yrsa Sigurdardottir 0061143367 Pat 0 currently-reading 3.59 2005 Last Rituals (Þóra Guðmundsdóttir, #1)
author: Yrsa Sigurdardottir
name: Pat
average rating: 3.59
book published: 2005
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2011/12/02
shelves: currently-reading
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]]> A Visit from the Goon Squad 7331435
We first meet Sasha in her mid-thirties, on her therapist’s couch in New York City, confronting her long-standing compulsion to steal. Later, we learn the genesis of her turmoil when we see her as the child of a violent marriage, then as a runaway living in Naples, then as a college student trying to avert the suicidal impulses of her best friend. We plunge into the hidden yearnings and disappointments of her uncle, an art historian stuck in a dead marriage, who travels to Naples to extract Sasha from the city’s demimonde and experiences an epiphany of his own while staring at a sculpture of Orpheus and Eurydice in the Museo Nazionale. We meet Bennie Salazar at the melancholy nadir of his adult life—divorced, struggling to connect with his nine-year-old son, listening to a washed-up band in the basement of a suburban house—and then revisit him in 1979, at the height of his youth, shy and tender, reveling in San Francisco’s punk scene as he discovers his ardor for rock and roll and his gift for spotting talent. We learn what became of his high school gang—who thrived and who faltered—and we encounter Lou Kline, Bennie’s catastrophically careless mentor, along with the lovers and children left behind in the wake of Lou’s far-flung sexual conquests and meteoric rise and fall.

A Visit from the Goon Squad is a book about the interplay of time and music, about survival, about the stirrings and transformations set inexorably in motion by even the most passing conjunction of our fates. In a breathtaking array of styles and tones ranging from tragedy to satire to PowerPoint, Egan captures the undertow of self-destruction that we all must either master or succumb to; the basic human hunger for redemption; and the universal tendency to reach for both—and escape the merciless progress of time—in the transporting realms of art and music. Sly, startling, exhilarating work from one of our boldest writers.]]> 274 Jennifer Egan 0307592839 Pat 0 currently-reading 3.70 2010 A Visit from the Goon Squad
author: Jennifer Egan
name: Pat
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2010
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2011/12/02
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Catching Fire (The Hunger Games, #2)]]> 6148028 Sparks are igniting.
Flames are spreading.
And the Capitol wants revenge.

Against all odds, Katniss Everdeen has won the Hunger Games. She and fellow District 12 tribute Peeta Mellark are miraculously still alive. Katniss should be relieved, happy even. After all, she has returned to her family and her longtime friend, Gale. Yet nothing is the way Katniss wishes it to be. Gale holds her at an icy distance. Peeta has turned his back on her completely. And there are whispers of a rebellion against the Capitol—a rebellion that Katniss and Peeta may have helped create.

Much to her shock, Katniss has fueled an unrest that she's afraid she cannot stop. And what scares her even more is that she's not entirely convinced she should try. As time draws near for Katniss and Peeta to visit the districts on the Capitol's cruel Victory Tour, the stakes are higher than ever. If they can't prove, without a shadow of a doubt, that they are lost in their love for each other, the consequences will be horrifying.

In Catching Fire, the second novel of the Hunger Games trilogy, Suzanne Collins continues the story of Katniss Everdeen, testing her more than ever before . . . and surprising readers at every turn.]]> 391 Suzanne Collins 0439023491 Pat 4 4.34 2009 Catching Fire (The Hunger Games, #2)
author: Suzanne Collins
name: Pat
average rating: 4.34
book published: 2009
rating: 4
read at: 2011/12/02
date added: 2011/12/02
shelves:
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]]> 11.22.63 10866286
If you had the chance to change history, would you?

Would the consequences be worth it?]]> 740 Stephen King Pat 4 4.38 2011 11.22.63
author: Stephen King
name: Pat
average rating: 4.38
book published: 2011
rating: 4
read at: 2011/12/02
date added: 2011/12/02
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?]]> 7082 244 Philip K. Dick Pat 5 4.08 1968 Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
author: Philip K. Dick
name: Pat
average rating: 4.08
book published: 1968
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2011/11/09
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]]> I Am a Strange Loop 123471 I Am a Strange Loop argues that the key to understanding selves and consciousness is the “strange loop”—a special kind of abstract feedback loop inhabiting our brains. Deep down, a human brain is a chaotic seething soup of particles, on a higher level it is a jungle of neurons, and on a yet higher level it is a network of abstractions that we call “symbols.� The most central and complex symbol in your brain or mine is the one we both call “I.� The “I� is the nexus in our brain where the levels feed back into each other and flip causality upside down, with symbols seeming to have free will and to have gained the paradoxical ability to push particles around, rather than the reverse. For each human being, this “I� seems to be the realest thing in the world. But how can such a mysterious abstraction be real—or is our “I� merely a convenient fiction? Does an “I� exert genuine power over the particles in our brain, or is it helplessly pushed around by the all-powerful laws of physics? These are the mysteries tackled in I Am a Strange Loop, Douglas R. Hofstadter’s first book-length journey into philosophy since Gödel, Escher, Bach. Compulsively readable and endlessly thought-provoking, this is the book Hofstadter’s many readers have long been waiting for.]]> 436 Douglas R. Hofstadter 0465030785 Pat 5 3.94 2007 I Am a Strange Loop
author: Douglas R. Hofstadter
name: Pat
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2007
rating: 5
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date added: 2011/11/09
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]]> <![CDATA[The Hunger Games (The Hunger Games, #1)]]> 2767052
Winning means fame and fortune. Losing means certain death. The Hunger Games have begun. . . .

In the ruins of a place once known as North America lies the nation of Panem, a shining Capitol surrounded by twelve outlying districts. The Capitol is harsh and cruel and keeps the districts in line by forcing them all to send one boy and one girl between the ages of twelve and eighteen to participate in the annual Hunger Games, a fight to the death on live TV.

Sixteen-year-old Katniss Everdeen regards it as a death sentence when she steps forward to take her sister's place in the Games. But Katniss has been close to dead before-and survival, for her, is second nature. Without really meaning to, she becomes a contender. But if she is to win, she will have to start making choices that weigh survival against humanity and life against love.]]> 374 Suzanne Collins Pat 4 4.34 2008 The Hunger Games (The Hunger Games, #1)
author: Suzanne Collins
name: Pat
average rating: 4.34
book published: 2008
rating: 4
read at: 2011/09/01
date added: 2011/09/25
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]]> <![CDATA[The Psychopath Test: A Journey Through the Madness Industry]]> 9378733
The Psychopath Test is a fascinating journey through the minds of madness. Jon Ronson's exploration of a potential hoax being played on the world's top neurologists takes him, unexpectedly, into the heart of the madness industry. An influential psychologist who is convinced that many important CEOs and politicians are, in fact, psychopaths teaches Ronson how to spot these high-flying individuals by looking out for little telltale verbal and nonverbal clues. And so Ronson, armed with his new psychopath-spotting abilities, enters the corridors of power. He spends time with a death-squad leader institutionalized for mortgage fraud in Coxsackie, New York; a legendary CEO whose psychopathy has been speculated about in the press; and a patient in an asylum for the criminally insane who insists he's sane and certainly not a psychopath.

Ronson not only solves the mystery of the hoax but also discovers, disturbingly, that sometimes the personalities at the helm of the madness industry are, with their drives and obsessions, as mad in their own way as those they study. And that relatively ordinary people are, more and more, defined by their maddest edges.]]> 288 Jon Ronson 1594488010 Pat 5 3.87 2011 The Psychopath Test: A Journey Through the Madness Industry
author: Jon Ronson
name: Pat
average rating: 3.87
book published: 2011
rating: 5
read at: 2011/06/01
date added: 2011/09/25
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]]> The Passage (The Passage, #1) 6690798 THIRTY-TWO MINUTES FOR ONE WORLD TO DIE, ANOTHER TO BE BORN.

First, the unthinkable: a security breach at a secret U.S. government facility unleashes the monstrous product of a chilling military experiment. Then, the unspeakable: a night of chaos and carnage gives way to sunrise on a nation, and ultimately a world, forever altered. All that remains for the stunned survivors is the long fight ahead and a future ruled by fear—of darkness, of death, of a fate far worse.

As civilization swiftly crumbles into a primal landscape of predators and prey, two people flee in search of sanctuary. FBI agent Brad Wolgast is a good man haunted by what he's done in the line of duty. Six-year-old orphan Amy Harper Bellafonte is a refugee from the doomed scientific project that has triggered apocalypse. Wolgast is determined to protect her from the horror set loose by her captors, but for Amy, escaping the bloody fallout is only the beginning of a much longer odyssey—spanning miles and decades—toward the time and place where she must finish what should never have begun.

With The Passage, award-winning author Justin Cronin has written both a relentlessly suspenseful adventure and an epic chronicle of human endurance in the face of unprecedented catastrophe and unimaginable danger. Its inventive storytelling, masterly prose, and depth of human insight mark it as a crucial and transcendent work of modern fiction.]]> 784 Justin Cronin 0345504968 Pat 5 4.04 2010 The Passage (The Passage, #1)
author: Justin Cronin
name: Pat
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2010
rating: 5
read at: 2010/12/01
date added: 2011/09/25
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]]> <![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 Pat 5 4.20 1962 One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest
author: Ken Kesey
name: Pat
average rating: 4.20
book published: 1962
rating: 5
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date added: 2011/09/19
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]]> <![CDATA[Quantum Theory Cannot Hurt You]]> 2330343 200 Marcus Chown 057123545X Pat 5 4.00 2005 Quantum Theory Cannot Hurt You
author: Marcus Chown
name: Pat
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2005
rating: 5
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date added: 2011/09/19
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]]> <![CDATA[A Feast for Crows (A Song of Ice and Fire, #4)]]> 13497 Crows will fight over a dead man's flesh, and kill each other for his eyes.

Bloodthirsty, treacherous and cunning, the Lannisters are in power on the Iron Throne in the name of the boy-king Tommen. The war in the Seven Kingdoms has burned itself out, but in its bitter aftermath new conflicts spark to life.

The Martells of Dorne and the Starks of Winterfell seek vengeance for their dead. Euron Crow's Eye, as black a pirate as ever raised a sail, returns from the smoking ruins of Valyria to claim the Iron Isles. From the icy north, where Others threaten the Wall, apprentice Maester Samwell Tarly brings a mysterious babe in arms to the Citadel.

Against a backdrop of incest and fratricide, alchemy and murder, victory will go to the men and women possessed of the coldest steel and the coldest hearts.]]> 1060 George R.R. Martin 055358202X Pat 5 4.16 2005 A Feast for Crows (A Song of Ice and Fire, #4)
author: George R.R. Martin
name: Pat
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2005
rating: 5
read at: 2011/07/10
date added: 2011/07/10
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]]> <![CDATA[Paranormality: Why We See What Isn't There]]> 8849505 341 Richard Wiseman 0230752985 Pat 5 4.02 2010 Paranormality: Why We See What Isn't There
author: Richard Wiseman
name: Pat
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2010
rating: 5
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date added: 2011/06/11
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]]> <![CDATA[The Coyote Road: Trickster Tales]]> 463033 518 Ellen Datlow 0670061948 Pat 5 3.96 2007 The Coyote Road: Trickster Tales
author: Ellen Datlow
name: Pat
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2007
rating: 5
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date added: 2011/06/11
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]]> Snow White, Blood Red 141024 Once upon a time, fairy tales were for children... But no longer.

You hold in your hands a volume of wonders -- magical tales of trolls and ogres, of bewitched princesses and kingdoms accursed, penned by some of the most acclaimed fantasists of our day. But these are not bedtime stories designed to usher an innocent child gently into a realm of dreams. These are stories that bite -- lush and erotic, often dark and disturbing mystical journeys through a phantasmagoric landscape of distinctly adult sensibilities... where there is no such thing as "happily ever after."

The "Snow White, Blood Red" Collection

#1. Snow White, Blood Red

#2. Black Thorn, White Rose

#3. Ruby Slippers, Golden Tears

#4. Black Swan, White Raven

#5. Silver Birch, Blood Moon

#6. Black Heart, Ivory Bones
]]> 414 Ellen Datlow 0380718758 Pat 5 3.74 1993 Snow White, Blood Red
author: Ellen Datlow
name: Pat
average rating: 3.74
book published: 1993
rating: 5
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]]> Fevre Dream 382450
Marsh meant to turn down York’s offer. It was too full of secrets that spelled danger. But the promise of both gold and a grand new boat that could make history crushed his resolve—coupled with the terrible force of York’s mesmerizing gaze. Not until the maiden voyage of his new sidewheeler Fevre Dream would Marsh realize he had joined a mission both more sinister, and perhaps more noble, than his most fantastic nightmare...and mankind’s most impossible dream.

Here is the spellbinding tale of a vampire’s quest to unite his race with humanity, of a garrulous riverman’s dream of immortality, and of the undying legends of the steamboat era and a majestic, ancient river.]]> 334 George R.R. Martin 0553383051 Pat 5 3.88 1982 Fevre Dream
author: George R.R. Martin
name: Pat
average rating: 3.88
book published: 1982
rating: 5
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date added: 2011/06/11
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]]> <![CDATA[A Storm of Swords (A Song of Ice and Fire, #3)]]> 62291 An alternate cover for this ISBN can be found here

Here is the third volume in George R.R. Martin's magnificent cycle of novels that includes A Game of Thrones and A Clash of Kings. Together, this series comprises a genuine masterpiece of modern fantasy, destined to stand as one of the great achievements of imaginative fiction.

Of the five contenders for power, one is dead, another in disfavor, and still the wars rage as alliances are made and broken. Joffrey sits on the Iron Throne, the uneasy ruler of the Seven Kingdoms. His most bitter rival, Lord Stannis, stands defeated and disgraced, victim of the sorceress who holds him in her thrall. Young Robb still rules the North from the fortress of Riverrun. Meanwhile, making her way across a blood-drenched continent is the exiled queen, Daenerys, mistress of the only three dragons still left in the world. And as opposing forces manoeuver for the final showdown, an army of barbaric wildlings arrives from the outermost limits of civilization, accompanied by a horde of mythical Others—a supernatural army of the living dead whose animated corpses are unstoppable. As the future of the land hangs in the balance, no one will rest until the Seven Kingdoms have exploded in a veritable storm of swords...]]> 1177 George R.R. Martin 055357342X Pat 5 4.54 2000 A Storm of Swords (A Song of Ice and Fire, #3)
author: George R.R. Martin
name: Pat
average rating: 4.54
book published: 2000
rating: 5
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date added: 2011/06/11
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]]> <![CDATA[A Clash of Kings (A Song of Ice and Fire, #2)]]> 10572
It is a tale in which brother plots against brother and the dead rise to walk in the night. Here a princess masquerades as an orphan boy; a knight of the mind prepares a poison for a treacherous sorceress; and wild men descend from the Mountains of the Moon to ravage the countryside. Against a backdrop of incest and fratricide, alchemy and murder, victory may go to the men and women possessed of the coldest steel...and the coldest hearts. For when kings clash, the whole land trembles.

Here is the second volume in George R.R. Martin magnificent cycle of novels that includes A Game of Thrones and A Storm of Swords. As a whole, this series comprises a genuine masterpiece of modern fantasy, bringing together the best the genre has to offer. Magic, mystery, intrigue, romance, and adventure fill these pages and transport us to a world unlike any we have ever experienced. Already hailed as a classic, George R.R. Martin stunning series is destined to stand as one of the great achievements of imaginative fiction.]]> 1009 George R.R. Martin 0553381695 Pat 5 4.42 1998 A Clash of Kings (A Song of Ice and Fire, #2)
author: George R.R. Martin
name: Pat
average rating: 4.42
book published: 1998
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[A Game of Thrones (A Song of Ice and Fire, #1)]]> 13496
Sweeping from a harsh land of cold to a summertime kingdom of epicurean plenty, A Game of Thrones tells a tale of lords and ladies, soldiers and sorcerers, assassins and bastards, who come together in a time of grim omens. Here an enigmatic band of warriors bear swords of no human metal; a tribe of fierce wildlings carry men off into madness; a cruel young dragon prince barters his sister to win back his throne; a child is lost in the twilight between life and death; and a determined woman undertakes a treacherous journey to protect all she holds dear. Amid plots and counter-plots, tragedy and betrayal, victory and terror, allies and enemies, the fate of the Starks hangs perilously in the balance, as each side endeavors to win that deadliest of conflicts: the game of thrones.]]> 835 George R.R. Martin 0553588486 Pat 5 4.44 1996 A Game of Thrones (A Song of Ice and Fire, #1)
author: George R.R. Martin
name: Pat
average rating: 4.44
book published: 1996
rating: 5
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date added: 2011/06/11
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]]> <![CDATA[Them: Adventures with Extremists]]> 1823
In "Them," Jon sets out, with the help of the extremists, to locate that room. The journey is as creepy as it is comic and, along the way, Jon is chased by men in dark glasses, unmasked as a Jew in the middle of a Jihad training camp, and witnesses international CEOs and politicians participate in a bizarre pagan ritual in the forests of northern California.

"Them" is a fascinating and entertaining exploration of extremism, in which Jon learns some alarming things about the looking-glass world of "them" and "us'. Are the extremists on to something? Or has Jon become one of THEM?]]> 336 Jon Ronson 0743233212 Pat 5 3.95 2001 Them: Adventures with Extremists
author: Jon Ronson
name: Pat
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2001
rating: 5
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date added: 2011/06/11
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]]> The Men Who Stare at Goats 1824 The Psychopath Test: A Journey Through the Madness Industry and So You've Been Publicly Shamed.

In 1979 a secret unit was established by the most gifted minds within the U.S. Army. Defying all known accepted military practice -- and indeed, the laws of physics -- they believed that a soldier could adopt a cloak of invisibility, pass cleanly through walls, and, perhaps most chillingly, kill goats just by staring at them.

Entrusted with defending America from all known adversaries, they were the First Earth Battalion. And they really weren't joking. What's more, they're back and fighting the War on Terror.

With firsthand access to the leading players in the story, Ronson traces the evolution of these bizarre activities over the past three decades and shows how they are alive today within the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and in postwar Iraq. Why are they blasting Iraqi prisoners of war with the theme tune to Barney the Purple Dinosaur? Why have 100 debleated goats been secretly placed inside the Special Forces Command Center at Fort Bragg, North Carolina? How was the U.S. military associated with the mysterious mass suicide of a strange cult from San Diego? The Men Who Stare at Goats answers these and many more questions.]]> 259 Jon Ronson 0743270606 Pat 5 3.64 2004 The Men Who Stare at Goats
author: Jon Ronson
name: Pat
average rating: 3.64
book published: 2004
rating: 5
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date added: 2011/06/11
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]]> Lightborn 9424256 464 Tricia Sullivan 1841494070 Pat 5 2.90 2010 Lightborn
author: Tricia Sullivan
name: Pat
average rating: 2.90
book published: 2010
rating: 5
read at: 2011/05/19
date added: 2011/05/19
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]]> <![CDATA[Out of the Ordinary: True Tales of Everyday Craziness]]> 833971 Jon Ronson s subjects have included people who believe that goats can be killed by the power of a really hard stare, and people who believe that the world is ruled by twelve-foot lizard-men. In Out of the Ordinary , a collection of his journalism from the Guardian , he turns his attention to irrational beliefs much closer to home, investigating the ways in which we sometimes manage to convince ourselves that all manner of lunacy makes perfect sense mainstream, domestic, ordinary insanity.
Whether he finds himself promising his son that he will be at his side for ever, dressed in a Santa costume, or trying to understand why hundreds of apparently normal people would suddenly start speaking in tongues in a Scout hut in Kidderminster, he demonstrates repeatedly how we all succumb to deeply irrational beliefs that grow to inform our everyday existence.]]> 320 Jon Ronson 0330448323 Pat 5 3.72 2006 Out of the Ordinary: True Tales of Everyday Craziness
author: Jon Ronson
name: Pat
average rating: 3.72
book published: 2006
rating: 5
read at: 2011/03/17
date added: 2011/03/27
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]]> Catch-22 168668
Set in Italy during World War II, this is the story of the incomparable, malingering bombardier, Yossarian, a hero who is furious because thousands of people he has never met are trying to kill him. But his real problem is not the enemy—it is his own army, which keeps increasing the number of missions the men must fly to complete their service. Yet if Yossarian makes any attempt to excuse himself from the perilous missions he’s assigned, he’ll be in violation of Catch-22, a hilariously sinister bureaucratic rule: a man is considered insane if he willingly continues to fly dangerous combat missions, but if he makes a formal request to be removed from duty, he is proven sane and therefore ineligible to be relieved.

This fiftieth-anniversary edition commemorates Joseph Heller’s masterpiece with a new introduction by Christopher Buckley; a wealth of critical essays and reviews by Norman Mailer, Alfred Kazin, Anthony Burgess, and others; rare papers and photos from Joseph Heller’s personal archive; and much more. Here, at last, is the definitive edition of a classic of world literature.]]> 453 Joseph Heller 0684833395 Pat 5 3.99 1961 Catch-22
author: Joseph Heller
name: Pat
average rating: 3.99
book published: 1961
rating: 5
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date added: 2011/03/21
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]]> <![CDATA[Pattern Recognition (Blue Ant, #1)]]> 22320
Still, Cayce is her father's daughter, and the danger makes her stubborn. Win Pollard, ex-security expert, probably ex-CIA, took a taxi in the direction of the World Trade Center on September 11 one year ago, and is presumed dead. Win taught Cayce a bit about the way agents work. She is still numb at his loss, and, as much for him as for any other reason, she refuses to give up this newly weird job, which will take her to Tokyo and on to Russia. With help and betrayal from equally unlikely quarters, Cayce will follow the trail of the mysterious film to its source, and in the process will learn something about her father's life and death.]]> 367 William Gibson 0425198685 Pat 5 3.87 2003 Pattern Recognition (Blue Ant, #1)
author: William Gibson
name: Pat
average rating: 3.87
book published: 2003
rating: 5
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date added: 2011/03/05
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]]> To Kill a Mockingbird 2657 "Shoot all the bluejays you want, if you can hit 'em, but remember it's a sin to kill a mockingbird."

A lawyer's advice to his children as he defends the real mockingbird of Harper Lee's classic novel - a black man charged with the rape of a white girl. Through the young eyes of Scout and Jem Finch, Harper Lee explores with exuberant humour the irrationality of adult attitudes to race and class in the Deep South of the 1930s. The conscience of a town steeped in prejudice, violence and hypocrisy is pricked by the stamina of one man's struggle for justice. But the weight of history will only tolerate so much.

"To Kill A Mockingbird" became both an instant bestseller and a critical success when it was first published in 1960. It went on to win the Pulitzer Prize in 1961 and was later made into an Academy Award-winning film.]]> 323 Harper Lee 0060935464 Pat 5 4.25 1960 To Kill a Mockingbird
author: Harper Lee
name: Pat
average rating: 4.25
book published: 1960
rating: 5
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date added: 2011/03/05
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]]>