Jlawrence's bookshelf: all en-US Tue, 25 Mar 2025 11:55:19 -0700 60 Jlawrence's bookshelf: all 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg <![CDATA[Portrait of Hemingway (Modern Library)]]> 42685
Ernest Hemingway was born on July 21, 1899, and to celebrate the centenary of this event, Ms. Ross has written a second portrait of Hemingway for The New Yorker, detailing the friendship the two struck up after the completion of the first piece. It is included here in an amended form. Together, these two works establish the definitive sketch of one of America's greatest writers.]]> 112 Lillian Ross 0375754385 Jlawrence 0 to-read 3.92 1950 Portrait of Hemingway (Modern Library)
author: Lillian Ross
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.92
book published: 1950
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/03/25
shelves: to-read
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]]> Picture 324954 400 Lillian Ross 0306811286 Jlawrence 0 to-read 4.04 1951 Picture
author: Lillian Ross
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.04
book published: 1951
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/03/25
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[Aku-Aku: The Secret of Easter Island]]> 375701 Heyerdahl is most controversially associated with an attempt to revive the theory that the islanders' stone carving technology came from S. America. He argued that as well as being settled by Polynesians, Easter Island was settled by people from Peru, an area described as "more culturally developed".
"Aku-aku" refers to moving a tall, flat bottomed object by swiveling it alternatively on its corners in a walking fashion. Heyerdahl theorised the Easter Island Moai (statues) were moved in this fashion, & tested this on a small Moai--tho the test was abandoned after the Moai's base was damaged. He also asserts that for the islanders, Aku Aku means a "spiritual guide."
Heyerdahl compared the highest quality stonework on the island to pre-Columbian Amerindian stonework such as at Tihuanaco. Seemingly unaware of Polynesian stoneworking traditions such as the Marae he said of Ahu Vinapu's retaining wall "No Polynesian fisherman would have been capable of conceiving, much less building such a wall". However Alfred Metraux had already pointed out that the rubble filled Rapanui walls were of a fundamentally different design to those of the Inca.
Heyerdahl claimed a S. American origin for some Easter Island plants including the Totora reeds in the islands' three crater lakes which are now recognised as a separate species to the ones in Lake Titicaca. Also the Sweet Potato, which is now reckoned to have been in Polynesia before Easter Island was settled.]]> 384 Thor Heyerdahl 0528818104 Jlawrence 0 to-read 4.01 1957 Aku-Aku: The Secret of Easter Island
author: Thor Heyerdahl
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.01
book published: 1957
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/03/17
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]]> Faust 986211 256 Johann Wolfgang von Goethe 0245543120 Jlawrence 4 4.00 Faust
author: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.00
book published:
rating: 4
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date added: 2025/03/05
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]]> <![CDATA[A Concise History of the Crusades (Critical Issues History)]]> 283099 272 Thomas F. Madden 0847694291 Jlawrence 3 3.97 A Concise History of the Crusades (Critical Issues History)
author: Thomas F. Madden
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.97
book published:
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2025/02/04
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Sometimes Madden's conclusions/proclamations seem questionable, but when he's simply relating facts, this seems to be a decent overview of Western Europe's adventures and misadventures in its medieval crusades.
]]> 98.6 709800 98.6 is a novel that marks the end of a generation of hope without giving in to hopelessness.]]> 188 Ronald Sukenick 091459009X Jlawrence 0 to-read 3.80 1975 98.6
author: Ronald Sukenick
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.80
book published: 1975
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/11/09
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]]> <![CDATA[The Complete Fiction of Bruno Schulz: The Street of Crocodiles, Sanatorium Under the Sign of the Hourglass]]> 244267 The Street of Crocodiles in the Polish city of Drogobych is a street of memories and dreams where recollections of Bruno Schulz's uncommon boyhood and of the eerie side of his merchant family's life are evoked in a startling blend of the real and the fantastic. Most memorable - and most chilling - is the portrait of the author's father, a maddened shopkeeper who imports rare birds' eggs to hatch in his attic, who believes tailors' dummies should be treated like people, and whose obsessive fear of cockroaches causes him to resemble one.

Sanatorium Under the Sign of the Hourglass is the second and final work of Bruno Schulz, the acclaimed Polish writer killed by the Nazis during World War II. In the words of Isaac Bashevis Singer, "What he did in his short life was enough to make him one of the most remarkable writers who ever lived." Weaving myth, fantasy, and reality, Sanatorium Under the Sign of the Hourglass, is, to quote Schulz, "an attempt at eliciting the history of a certain family...by a search for the mythical sense, the essential core of that history.]]> 324 Bruno Schulz 0802710913 Jlawrence 3 4.41 2005 The Complete Fiction of Bruno Schulz: The Street of Crocodiles, Sanatorium Under the Sign of the Hourglass
author: Bruno Schulz
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.41
book published: 2005
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2024/10/15
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]]> <![CDATA[Absolution (Southern Reach, #4)]]> 210367505 TOP SECRET: A clear and present threat exists. Open-ended. Existential. Confirmation via uncanny op. Nature of same: Unknown. Initiating entity: Unknown. Priority: High.

Ten years after the publication of Annihilation, Authority, and Acceptance � award winners and international bestsellers all, the first the basis for a now-classic film � Jeff VanderMeer brings us back for a surprise fourth and final foray into Area X.

Absolution opens decades before Area X forms, with a science expedition whose mysterious end suggests terrifying consequences for the future � and marks the Forgotten Coast as a high-priority area of interest for Central, the shadowy government agency responsible for monitoring extraordinary threats.

Many years later, the Forgotten Coast files wind up in the hands of a washed-up Central operative known as Old Jim. He starts pulling a thread that reveals a long and troubling record of government agents meddling with forces they clearly cannot comprehend. Soon, Old Jim is back out in the field, grappling with personal demons and now partnered with an unproven young agent, the two of them tasked with solving what may be an unsolvable mystery. With every turn, the stakes get higher: Central agents are being liquidated by an unknown rogue entity and Old Jim’s life is on the line.

Old Jim’s investigation culminates in the first Central expedition into what has now been labeled Area X. A border has come down, and a full team � well trained but eccentric � has been assembled to find Area X’s “off switch� somewhere in the volatile, dangerous terrain that has mysteriously defied all attempts to be explored, mapped, or controlled. A landscape that, one way or another, seems to consume all who enter it.

Sweeping in scope and rich with ideas, iconic characters, and unpredictable adventure, Absolution converges the past, present, and future in terrifying, ecstatic, and mind-bending ways. It is the final word on one of the most provocative and popular speculative fiction series of our time.]]> 441 Jeff VanderMeer 0374616590 Jlawrence 0 to-read 3.61 2024 Absolution (Southern Reach, #4)
author: Jeff VanderMeer
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.61
book published: 2024
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/10/09
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[I'm Starting to Worry About This Black Box of Doom]]> 203578812 A standalone darkly humorous thriller set in modern America's age of anxiety, by New York Times bestselling author Jason Pargin.

Outside Los Angeles, a driver pulls up to find a young woman sitting on a large black box. She offers him $200,000 cash to transport her and that box across the country, to Washington, DC.

But there are rules:

He cannot look inside the box.
He cannot ask questions.
He cannot tell anyone.
They must leave immediately.
He must leave all trackable devices behind.

As these eccentric misfits hit the road, rumors spread on social media that the box is part of a carefully orchestrated terror attack intended to plunge the USA into civil war.

The truth promises to be even stranger, and may change how you see the world.]]> 400 Jason Pargin 125028595X Jlawrence 0 to-read 3.97 2024 I'm Starting to Worry About This Black Box of Doom
author: Jason Pargin
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2024
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/10/08
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[John Dies at the End (John Dies at the End, #1)]]> 1857440 STOP. You should not have touched this flyer with your bare hands. NO, don't put it down. It's too late. They're watching you. My name is David Wong. My best friend is John. Those names are fake. You might want to change yours. You may not want to know about the things you'll read on these pages, about the sauce, about Korrok, about the invasion, and the future. But it's too late. You touched the book. You're in the game. You're under the eye. The only defense is knowledge. You need to read this book, to the end. Even the part with the bratwurst. Why? You just have to trust me.

The important thing is this: The drug is called Soy Sauce and it gives users a window into another dimension. John and I never had the chance to say no. You still do. I'm sorry to have involved you in this, I really am. But as you read about these terrible events and the very dark epoch the world is about to enter as a result, it is crucial you keep one thing in mind: None of this was my fault. ]]> 362 David Wong 0978970764 Jlawrence 0 to-read 3.89 2007 John Dies at the End (John Dies at the End, #1)
author: David Wong
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.89
book published: 2007
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/10/08
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Six-Gun Snow White 17563309 New York Times bestselling author Catherynne M. Valente comes a brilliant reinvention of one the best known fairy tales of all time. In the novella Six-Gun Snow White, Valente transports the title’s heroine to a masterfully evoked Old West where Coyote is just as likely to be found as the seven dwarves.

A plain-spoken, appealing narrator relates the history of her parents—a Nevada silver baron who forced the Crow people to give up one of their most beautiful daughters, Gun That Sings, in marriage to him. With her mother’s death in childbirth, so begins a heroine’s tale equal parts heartbreak and strength. This girl has been born into a world with no place for a half-native, half-white child. After being hidden for years, a very wicked stepmother finally gifts her with the name Snow White, referring to the pale skin she will never have. Filled with fascinating glimpses through the fabled looking glass and a close-up look at hard living in the gritty gun-slinging West, readers will be enchanted by this story at once familiar and entirely new.]]> 207 Catherynne M. Valente 1596065788 Jlawrence 4
More consistently melancholy than the stories of The Orphan's Tales books, but also not as dark as the darkest of those tales, it excellently mixes beautiful wordsmithing with chilling imagery, the surreal with frontier grit, social commentary with pain.

It didn't resonate with me as strongly as my favorite stories in The Orphan's Tales, but it still cast a powerful and insightful spell, and I'm looking forward to devouring more Valente from my to-read list.
]]> 3.74 2013 Six-Gun Snow White
author: Catherynne M. Valente
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2013
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2024/09/28
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Valente knows how to invert and mutate a familiar fairy tale into something harsh and beautiful better than anyone else I've read, and in this novella she does that with Snow White in an Old West setting with narration in an Old West voice.

More consistently melancholy than the stories of The Orphan's Tales books, but also not as dark as the darkest of those tales, it excellently mixes beautiful wordsmithing with chilling imagery, the surreal with frontier grit, social commentary with pain.

It didn't resonate with me as strongly as my favorite stories in The Orphan's Tales, but it still cast a powerful and insightful spell, and I'm looking forward to devouring more Valente from my to-read list.

]]> I Capture the Castle 31122 408 Dodie Smith 0312181108 Jlawrence 0 to-read 3.99 1948 I Capture the Castle
author: Dodie Smith
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.99
book published: 1948
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/09/10
shelves: to-read
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]]> The Theory of Flight 41216073 ‘On the third of September, not so long ago, something truly wondrous happened on the Beauford Farm and Estate. At the moment of her death, Imogen Zula Nyoni � Genie � was seen to fly away on a giant pair of silver wings ...�

Said to have hatched from a golden egg, Genie spends her childhood playing in a field of sunflowers as her country reawakens after a fierce civil war.

But Genie’s story stretches back much further: it tells of her grandfather, who quenched his wanderlust by walking into the Indian Ocean, and of her father, who spent countless hours building model aeroplanes to catch up with him. It is the tale of her mother, a singer self-styled after Dolly Parton with a dream of travelling to Nashville, and of her grandmother, who did everything in her power to raise her children to have character.

With the lightest of touches, a cast of unforgettable characters, and moments of surreal beauty, The Theory of Flight sketches decades of history in this unnamed Southern African nation. It does not dwell on what has been lost in its war, but on the daily triumphs of its people, the necessity of art, and the power of its visionaries to take flight.]]> 328 Siphiwe Gloria Ndlovu 141521011X Jlawrence 0 to-read 3.90 2018 The Theory of Flight
author: Siphiwe Gloria Ndlovu
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.90
book published: 2018
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/09/09
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]]> When Rain Clouds Gather 28278 188 Bessie Head 0435909614 Jlawrence 0 to-read 3.84 1969 When Rain Clouds Gather
author: Bessie Head
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.84
book published: 1969
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/08/15
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Another Present Era 3340575 244 Elaine Perry 0374105286 Jlawrence 0 to-read 4.00 1990 Another Present Era
author: Elaine Perry
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.00
book published: 1990
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/08/14
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[From Dawn to Decadence: 500 Years of Western Cultural Life, 1500 to the Present]]> 58233
In this account, Barzun describes what Western Man wrought from the Renaisance and Reformation down to the present in the double light of its own time and our pressing concerns. He introduces characters and incidents with his unusual literary style and grace, bringing to the fore those that have "Puritans as Democrats," "The Monarch's Revolution," "The Artist Prophet and Jester" -- show the recurrent role of great themes throughout the eras.

The triumphs and defeats of five hundred years form an inspiring saga that modifies the current impression of one long tale of oppression by white European males. Women and their deeds are prominent, and freedom (even in sexual matters) is not an invention of the last decades. And when Barzun rates the present not as a culmination but a decline, he is in no way a prophet of doom. Instead, he shows decadence as the creative novelty that will burst forth -- tomorrow or the next day.

Only after a lifetime of separate studies covering a broad territory could a writer create with such ease the synthesis displayed in this magnificent volume.]]> 828 Jacques Barzun 0060928832 Jlawrence 0 to-read 4.14 2000 From Dawn to Decadence: 500 Years of Western Cultural Life, 1500 to the Present
author: Jacques Barzun
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.14
book published: 2000
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/08/14
shelves: to-read
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]]> Blindsight (Firefall, #1) 48484 Two months since the stars fell...

Two months since sixty-five thousand alien objects clenched around the Earth like a luminous fist, screaming to the heavens as the atmosphere burned them to ash. Two months since that moment of brief, bright surveillance by agents unknown.

Two months of silence while a world holds its breath.

Now some half-derelict space probe, sparking fitfully past Neptune’s orbit, hears a whisper from the edge of the solar system: a faint signal sweeping the cosmos like a lighthouse beam. Whatever’s out there isn’t talking to us. It’s talking to some distant star, perhaps. Or perhaps to something closer, something en route.

So who do you send to force introductions on an intelligence with motives unknown, maybe unknowable? Who do you send to meet the alien when the alien doesn’t want to meet?

You send a linguist with multiple personalities, her brain surgically partitioned into separate, sentient processing cores. You send a biologist so radically interfaced with machinery that he sees X-rays and tastes ultrasound, so compromised by grafts and splices he no longer feels his own flesh. You send a pacifist warrior in the faint hope she won’t be needed, and a fainter hope she’ll do any good if she is needed. You send a monster to command them all, an extinct hominid predator once called “vampire,� recalled from the grave with the voodoo of recombinant genetics and the blood of sociopaths. And you send a synthesist � an informational topologist with half his mind gone � as an interface between here and there, a conduit through which the Dead Center might hope to understand the Bleeding Edge.

You send them all to the edge of interstellar space, praying you can trust such freaks and retrofits with the fate of a world. You fear they may be more alien than the thing they’ve been sent to find.

But you’d give anything for that to be true, if you only knew what was waiting for them…]]> 384 Peter Watts 0765312182 Jlawrence 3 sword-and-laser 4.01 2006 Blindsight (Firefall, #1)
author: Peter Watts
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2006
rating: 3
read at: 2011/04/19
date added: 2024/08/07
shelves: sword-and-laser
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Millennium Approaches (Angels in America, #1)]]> 92250
The play is a complex, often metaphorical, and at times symbolic examination of AIDS and homosexuality in America in the 1980s. Certain major and minor characters are supernatural beings (angels) or deceased persons (ghosts). The play contains multiple roles for several of the actors. Initially and primarily focusing on a gay couple in Manhattan, the play also has several other storylines, some of which occasionally intersect.]]> 119 Tony Kushner 1559360615 Jlawrence 4 4.27 1993 Millennium Approaches (Angels in America, #1)
author: Tony Kushner
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.27
book published: 1993
rating: 4
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date added: 2024/08/06
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]]> No, mamá, no 1665898 136 Verity Bargate 0224015575 Jlawrence 0 to-read 4.04 1978 No, mamá, no
author: Verity Bargate
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.04
book published: 1978
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/08/02
shelves: to-read
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]]> House of Leaves 24800
Of course, neither Pulitzer Prize-winning photojournalist Will Navidson nor his companion Karen Green was prepared to face the consequences of that impossibility, until the day their two little children wandered off and their voices eerily began to return another story—of creature darkness, of an ever-growing abyss behind a closet door, and of that unholy growl which soon enough would tear through their walls and consume all their dreams.]]> 710 Mark Z. Danielewski Jlawrence 0 currently-reading 4.11 2000 House of Leaves
author: Mark Z. Danielewski
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2000
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/08/02
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Starflight: How the PC and DOS Exploded Computer Gaming 1987-1994]]> 60697932
In How the PC and DOS Exploded Computer Gaming 1987�1994, author Jamie Lendino tells the full story, starting with the PC’s humble CGA and monochrome origins, moving through early ill-fated (if influential) failures such as the PCjr and Tandy 1000, and diving deep into the industry-shattering innovations in processing, graphics, sound, software, and distribution that gave the PC (and the gamers who loved it) unprecedented power and reach.

Along the way, Lendino explores more than 110 of the PC’s most entertaining and important games, revealing how they paved the way for PC supremacy while also offering players new levels of challenge and fun. From groundbreaking graphic adventures (King’s Quest, The Secret of Monkey Island), innovative role-playing games (Ultima, Might and Magic), and sprawling space combat epics (Wing Commander, X-Wing) to titanic strategy titles (Civilization, X-Com), first-person shooters (Stellar 7, Doom), wide-ranging simulations (Stunts, Falcon 3.0), and hard-driving arcade action games (Arkanoid, Raptor), you’ll discover every detail of how the PC’s games catapulted it into the computer gaming stratosphere.

Whether you were there at the time—experiencing first-hand the transition of EGA to VGA and single-voice beeps and boops to sweepingly symphonic Roland MT-32 sound, and discovering historic titles upon their release—or you’re only now discovering the wonders of the era, How the PC and DOS Exploded Computer Gaming 1987�1994 is a fresh, dynamic, and impossible-to-put-it-down look at the years when PC gaming—and computer gaming itself—changed forever.]]> 469 Jamie Lendino 1957932015 Jlawrence 3 4.09 Starflight: How the PC and DOS Exploded Computer Gaming 1987-1994
author: Jamie Lendino
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.09
book published:
rating: 3
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date added: 2024/08/02
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Mythology Book: Big Ideas Simply Explained (DK Big Ideas)]]> 36747326
From early creation stories to classical hero narratives and the recurring theme of the afterlife, experience each myth and unravel the meanings behind the stories, getting to the heart of the importance of mythology to different cultures worldwide. More than just stories, myths are a testament to the amazing creativity of humans striving to explain and make sense of the world around them. Here you will discover Zeus, god of the sky and ruler of the Olympian gods, and Loki, the cunning trickster with a knack for causing havoc, aided by his ability to change shape and gender. Beyond the gods and goddesses of Ancient Greek, Roman, and Norse myths, this book delves into the stories of the Australian aborigines, the Cherokee, and the Aztecs, each brimming with amazing characters and insights into human existence.

This newest title in the bestselling Big Ideas series pairs engaging visual style with global coverage of world myths--profiling everything from the well-known tales of the Greeks, Norsemen, and Egyptians to the legends of the Caribbean, the Americas, Oceania, and East Asia--bringing the wisdom of the ages to life.]]> 352 Various 1465473378 Jlawrence 4 4.01 2018 The Mythology Book: Big Ideas Simply Explained (DK Big Ideas)
author: Various
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2018
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2024/08/02
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]]> The horrors of love 2842688 665 Jean Dutourd 0837174813 Jlawrence 0 to-read 4.58 1963 The horrors of love
author: Jean Dutourd
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.58
book published: 1963
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/08/02
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Spinning Silver 36896898 Spinning Silver draws readers deeper into a glittering realm of fantasy, where the boundary between wonder and terror is thinner than a breath, and safety can be stolen as quickly as a kiss.

Miryem is the daughter and granddaughter of moneylenders, but her father’s inability to collect his debts has left his family on the edge of poverty—until Miryem takes matters into her own hands. Hardening her heart, the young woman sets out to claim what is owed and soon gains a reputation for being able to turn silver into gold.

When an ill-advised boast draws the attention of the king of the Staryk—grim fey creatures who seem more ice than flesh—Miryem’s fate, and that of two kingdoms, will be forever altered. Set an impossible challenge by the nameless king, Miryem unwittingly spins a web that draws in a peasant girl, Wanda, and the unhappy daughter of a local lord who plots to wed his child to the dashing young tsar.

But Tsar Mirnatius is not what he seems. And the secret he hides threatens to consume the lands of humans and Staryk alike. Torn between deadly choices, Miryem and her two unlikely allies embark on a desperate quest that will take them to the limits of sacrifice, power, and love.

Channeling the vibrant heart of myth and fairy tale, Spinning Silver weaves a multilayered, magical tapestry that readers will want to return to again and again.]]> 465 Naomi Novik Jlawrence 0 to-read 4.20 2018 Spinning Silver
author: Naomi Novik
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.20
book published: 2018
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/07/31
shelves: to-read
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]]> Parsifal 2094094 240 Peter Vansittart 0720607116 Jlawrence 0 to-read 4.83 1989 Parsifal
author: Peter Vansittart
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.83
book published: 1989
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/07/29
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Lancelot: A novel 4035558 192 Peter Vansittart 0720605164 Jlawrence 0 to-read 4.50 1978 Lancelot: A novel
author: Peter Vansittart
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.50
book published: 1978
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/07/29
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Fallen: Life In and Out of Britain's Most Insane Group]]> 6894205 336 Dave Simpson 1847671446 Jlawrence 4
The most delicious tales for a fan like me come from founding members, or from those longest-lasting ones who made some of my favorite Fall albums (like Steve Hanley, Brix Smith, Craig Scanlon), but all the tales are interesting, and paint many different views of Mark E Smith and his antics of constantly keeping group members off-guard -- through distance, cryptic instructions, playing practical jokes, harassing while playing, all the way to straight-out physical fights and seemingly arbitrary 'firing' of members -- all in the aim of destroying complacency in order to craft the creative tension that leads to the Fall sound. Its clear that there is some deliberate method to those antics both on and off-stage - but it's also clear that it sometimes veers from calculated chaos into true madness and possible alcoholism. There is also remarkable how many ex-members say they'd return if asked, despite all that intense craziness.

Fascinating to get all these different glimpses of life in the band, but the book falters when Simpson relates portions of his personal life and tries to relate them to his subject -- the potential for that to work was there, but those asides end up coming off flat and quite distracting. Still, any Fall fan will find tons to dig into here.]]> 3.86 2008 The Fallen: Life In and Out of Britain's Most Insane Group
author: Dave Simpson
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2008
rating: 4
read at: 2011/04/26
date added: 2024/07/07
shelves:
review:
The Fall is a group that's been around for 30+ years (and still going) and the only constant has been frontman Mark E Smith with his hilariously caustic and cerebral wordplay and rants, and the Fall 'sound' that's been maintained even though MES himself is not a musician and the group has had amazing turnover through the years. Dave Simpson took on the quest of tracking down all 40+ ex-members of The Fall, and for the most part succeeded, even with people who were band members for all of one gig!

The most delicious tales for a fan like me come from founding members, or from those longest-lasting ones who made some of my favorite Fall albums (like Steve Hanley, Brix Smith, Craig Scanlon), but all the tales are interesting, and paint many different views of Mark E Smith and his antics of constantly keeping group members off-guard -- through distance, cryptic instructions, playing practical jokes, harassing while playing, all the way to straight-out physical fights and seemingly arbitrary 'firing' of members -- all in the aim of destroying complacency in order to craft the creative tension that leads to the Fall sound. Its clear that there is some deliberate method to those antics both on and off-stage - but it's also clear that it sometimes veers from calculated chaos into true madness and possible alcoholism. There is also remarkable how many ex-members say they'd return if asked, despite all that intense craziness.

Fascinating to get all these different glimpses of life in the band, but the book falters when Simpson relates portions of his personal life and tries to relate them to his subject -- the potential for that to work was there, but those asides end up coming off flat and quite distracting. Still, any Fall fan will find tons to dig into here.
]]> Flowers of Evil: A Selection 128480


Flowers of Evil: A Selection contains 53 poems which the editors feel best represent the total work and which. in their opinion, have been most successfully rendered into English. The French texts as established by Yves Gérard Le Dantec for the Pléiade edition are printed en face. Included are Baudelaire's "Three Drafts of a Preface" and brief notes on the nineteen translators whose work is represented.]]> 168 Charles Baudelaire 081120006X Jlawrence 3 4.14 Flowers of Evil: A Selection
author: Charles Baudelaire
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.14
book published:
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2024/05/02
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review:

]]> North Woods 71872930
When a pair of young lovers abscond from a Puritan colony, little do they know that their humble cabin in the woods will become home to an extraordinary succession of inhabitants . An English soldier, destined for glory, abandons the battlefields of the New World to devote himself to apples. A pair of spinster twins survive war and famine, only to succumb to envy and desire. A crime reporter unearths a mass grave, but finds the ancient trees refuse to give up their secrets. A lovelorn painter, a conman, a stalking panther, a lusty beetle; as each one confronts the mysteries of the north woods, they come to realize that the dark, raucous, beautiful past is very much alive.

Traversing cycles of history, nature, and even literature, North Woods shows the myriad, magical ways in which we’re connected to our environment and to one another, across time, language and space. Written along with the seasons and divided into the twelve months of the year, it is an unforgettable novel about secrets and fates that asks the timeless how do we live on, even after we’re gone?]]> 372 Daniel Mason 0593597036 Jlawrence 0 to-read 4.11 2023 North Woods
author: Daniel Mason
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/03/18
shelves: to-read
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]]> Babel 57945316 From award-winning author R. F. Kuang comes Babel, a historical fantasy epic that grapples with student revolutions, colonial resistance, and the use of language and translation as the dominating tool of the British Empire

Traduttore, traditore: An act of translation is always an act of betrayal.

1828. Robin Swift, orphaned by cholera in Canton, is brought to London by the mysterious Professor Lovell. There, he trains for years in Latin, Ancient Greek, and Chinese, all in preparation for the day he’ll enroll in Oxford University’s prestigious Royal Institute of Translation—also known as Babel. The tower and its students are the world's center for translation and, more importantly, magic. Silver-working—the art of manifesting the meaning lost in translation using enchanted silver bars—has made the British unparalleled in power, as the arcane craft serves the Empire's quest for colonization.

For Robin, Oxford is a utopia dedicated to the pursuit of knowledge. But knowledge obeys power, and as a Chinese boy raised in Britain, Robin realizes serving Babel means betraying his motherland. As his studies progress, Robin finds himself caught between Babel and the shadowy Hermes Society, an organization dedicated to stopping imperial expansion. When Britain pursues an unjust war with China over silver and opium, Robin must decide . . .

Can powerful institutions be changed from within, or does revolution always require violence?]]> 544 R.F. Kuang 0063021420 Jlawrence 0 to-read 4.17 2022 Babel
author: R.F. Kuang
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/03/12
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[The Shadow of the Wind (The Cemetery of Forgotten Books, #1)]]> 1232 487 Carlos Ruiz Zafón Jlawrence 0 to-read 4.26 2001 The Shadow of the Wind (The Cemetery of Forgotten Books, #1)
author: Carlos Ruiz Zafón
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.26
book published: 2001
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/03/10
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[In the Dragon's Claws: The Story of Rostam and Esfandiyar from the Persian Book of Kings]]> 268838 144 Abolqasem Ferdowsi 0934211566 Jlawrence 0 to-read 4.10 1846 In the Dragon's Claws: The Story of Rostam and Esfandiyar from the Persian Book of Kings
author: Abolqasem Ferdowsi
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.10
book published: 1846
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/03/01
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Time Traders (Time Traders/Ross Murdock, #1-2)]]> 17162645
DRAFTED INTO THE ARMY OF TIME

Intelligence agents have uncovered something which seems beyond belief, but the evidence is incontrovertible: the USAs greatest adversary on the world stage is sending its agents back through time! And someone or something unknown to our history is presenting them with technologies -- and weapons -- far beyond our most advanced science. We have only one option: create time-transfer technology ourselves, find the opposition's ancient source...and take it dawn.

When small-time criminal Ross Murdock and Apache rancher Travis Fox stumble separately onto America's secret time travel project, Operation Retrograde, they are faced with a challenge greater than either could have imagined possible. Their mere presence means that they know too much to go free. But Murdock and Fox have a thirst for adventure, and Operation Retrograde offers that in spades.

Both men will become time agents, finding reserves of inner heroism they had never expected. Their journeys will take the battle to the enemy, from ancient Britain to prehistoric America, and finally to the farthest reaches of interstellar space...

]]> 361 Andre Norton 1618242482 Jlawrence 0 to-read 3.86 2013 Time Traders (Time Traders/Ross Murdock, #1-2)
author: Andre Norton
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2013
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/02/15
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[The Sabres of Paradise: Conquest and Vengeance in the Caucasus]]> 637044 512 Lesley Blanch 1850434034 Jlawrence 0 to-read 4.17 1960 The Sabres of Paradise: Conquest and Vengeance in the Caucasus
author: Lesley Blanch
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.17
book published: 1960
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/01/21
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Magic Lantern 213854 The Magic Lantern.

More grand mosaic than linear account, Bergman’s vignettes trace his life from a rural Swedish childhood through his work in theater to Hollywood’s golden age, and a tumultuous romantic history that includes five wives and more than a few mistresses. Throughout, Bergman recounts his life in a series of deeply personal flashbacks that document some of the most important moments in twentieth-century filmmaking as well as the private obsessions of the man behind them. Ambitious in scope yet sensitively wrought, The Magic Lantern is a window to the mind of one of our era’s great geniuses.

“[Bergman] has found a way to show the soul’s landscape . . . . Many gripping revelations.”�New York Times Book Review

“Joan Tate’s translation of this book has delicacy and true pitch . . . The Magic Lantern is as personal and penetrating as a Bergman film, wry, shadowy, austere.”�New Republic

“[Bergman] keeps returning to his past, reassessing it, distilling its meaning, offering it to his audiences in dazzling new shapes.”�New York Times

“What Bergman does relate, particularly his tangled relationships with his parents, is not only illuminating but quite moving. No ‘tell-all� book this one, but revealing in ways that much longer and allegedly ‘franker� books are not.”�Library Journal]]> 314 Ingmar Bergman 0226043827 Jlawrence 0 to-read 4.10 1987 The Magic Lantern
author: Ingmar Bergman
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.10
book published: 1987
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/01/12
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]]> Under the Skin 123063 Under the Skin takes us on a heart-thumping ride through dangerous territory—our own moral instincts and the boundaries of compassion.]]> 296 Michel Faber 1841954802 Jlawrence 0 to-read 3.76 2000 Under the Skin
author: Michel Faber
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2000
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/01/12
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Zeroville 921569
]]> 329 Steve Erickson 1933372397 Jlawrence 0 to-read 4.10 2007 Zeroville
author: Steve Erickson
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2007
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/01/10
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Archimedes Codex 917011 336 Reviel Netz 0297645471 Jlawrence 0 to-read 3.88 2007 The Archimedes Codex
author: Reviel Netz
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.88
book published: 2007
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/12/16
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Angel: After the Fall, Volume 1]]> 4297376 144 Joss Whedon 160010343X Jlawrence 4
The first several chapters seem low on the trademark Whedon wit, but the plot is solid. Chapter 4 and after display better and often hilarious dialogue - my guess is Joss had more of a hand in those, with the earlier chapters being more the work of co-writer Brian Lynch.

Anyway, it's great to see these characters again, there are some well-done twists and a great villian (as opposed to the somewhat lame ones in the start of Buffy season 8 - sorry I can't help but compare), so if you're an Angel fan, I heartily recommend. (It doesn't spend time explaining previous events, though, so it is truly for people familiar with the series.)]]> 3.75 2007 Angel: After the Fall, Volume 1
author: Joss Whedon
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.75
book published: 2007
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2023/12/09
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review:
Though I didn't love the art (often the drawings of main characters don't look enough like their real-life counterparts), this was a stronger 'next season via comic book' than the start of Buffy Season 8. Like in Buffy Season 8, the setting has taken some big turns, but it felt more in keeping with the feel of Angel than the 'now we're superheroes with tons of expensive technology' turn of Buffy Season 8.

The first several chapters seem low on the trademark Whedon wit, but the plot is solid. Chapter 4 and after display better and often hilarious dialogue - my guess is Joss had more of a hand in those, with the earlier chapters being more the work of co-writer Brian Lynch.

Anyway, it's great to see these characters again, there are some well-done twists and a great villian (as opposed to the somewhat lame ones in the start of Buffy season 8 - sorry I can't help but compare), so if you're an Angel fan, I heartily recommend. (It doesn't spend time explaining previous events, though, so it is truly for people familiar with the series.)
]]> Clytemnestra 61266463
For fans of Madeline Miller, a stunning debut following Clytemnestra, the most notorious villainess of the ancient world and the events that forged her into the legendary queen.

As for queens, they are either hated or forgotten. She already knows which option suits her best�

You were born to a king, but you marry a tyrant. You stand by helplessly as he sacrifices your child to placate the gods. You watch him wage war on a foreign shore, and you comfort yourself with violent thoughts of your own. Because this was not the first offence against you. This was not the life you ever deserved. And this will not be your undoing. Slowly, you plot.

But when your husband returns in triumph, you become a woman with a choice.

Acceptance or vengeance, infamy follows both. So, you bide your time and force the gods' hands in the game of retribution. For you understood something long ago that the others never did.

If power isn't given to you, you have to take it for yourself.

A blazing novel set in the world of Ancient Greece, this is a thrilling tale of power and prophecies, of hatred, love, and of an unforgettable Queen who fiercely dealt out death to those who wronged her.

"Crackles with vivid fury, passion, and strength." —Jennifer Saint, bestselling author of Elektra and Ariadne]]> 448 Costanza Casati 1728268257 Jlawrence 0 to-read 4.24 2023 Clytemnestra
author: Costanza Casati
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.24
book published: 2023
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/09/10
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]]> <![CDATA[Designers & Dragons: The '70s (Designers & Dragons, #1)]]> 22876735 400 Shannon Appelcline Jlawrence 4 4.21 2014 Designers & Dragons: The '70s (Designers & Dragons, #1)
author: Shannon Appelcline
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.21
book published: 2014
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2023/09/10
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]]> <![CDATA[The Kaiju Preservation Society]]> 59604877 The Kaiju Preservation Society is John Scalzi's first standalone adventure since the conclusion of his New York Times bestselling Interdependency trilogy.

When COVID-19 sweeps through New York City, Jamie Gray is stuck as a dead-end driver for food delivery apps. That is, until Jamie makes a delivery to an old acquaintance, Tom, who works at what he calls "an animal rights organization." Tom's team needs a last-minute grunt to handle things on their next field visit. Jamie, eager to do anything, immediately signs on.

What Tom doesn't tell Jamie is that the animals his team cares for are not here on Earth. Not our Earth, at at least. In an alternate dimension, massive dinosaur-like creatures named Kaiju roam a warm and human-free world. They're the universe's largest and most dangerous panda and they're in trouble.

It's not just the Kaiju Preservation Society that's found its way to the alternate world. Others have, too--and their carelessness could cause millions back on our Earth to die.]]> 272 John Scalzi 1529082889 Jlawrence 0 to-read 3.97 2022 The Kaiju Preservation Society
author: John Scalzi
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2022
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/09/10
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]]> Starfish (Rifters, #1) 66479
Unfortunately the only people suitable for long-term employment in these experimental power stations are crazy, some of them in unpleasant ways. How many of them can survive, or will be allowed to survive, while worldwide disaster approaches from below?]]> 384 Peter Watts 0812575857 Jlawrence 0 to-read 3.94 1999 Starfish (Rifters, #1)
author: Peter Watts
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.94
book published: 1999
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/09/10
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Mountain in the Sea 59808603 Humankind discovers intelligent life in an octopus species with its own language and culture, and sets off a high-stakes global competition to dominate the future.

Rumors begin to spread of a species of hyperintelligent, dangerous octopus that may have developed its own language and culture. Marine biologist Dr. Ha Nguyen, who has spent her life researching cephalopod intelligence, will do anything for the chance to study them.

The transnational tech corporation DIANIMA has sealed the remote Con Dao Archipelago, where the octopuses were discovered, off from the world. Dr. Nguyen joins DIANIMA’s team on the islands: a battle-scarred security agent and the world’s first android.

The octopuses hold the key to unprecedented breakthroughs in extrahuman intelligence. The stakes are high: there are vast fortunes to be made by whoever can take advantage of the octopuses� advancements, and as Dr. Nguyen struggles to communicate with the newly discovered species, forces larger than DIANIMA close in to seize the octopuses for themselves.

But no one has yet asked the octopuses what they think. And what they might do about it.

A near-future thriller about the nature of consciousness, Ray Nayler’s The Mountain in the Sea is a dazzling literary debut and a mind-blowing dive into the treasure and wreckage of humankind’s legacy.]]> 456 Ray Nayler 0374605955 Jlawrence 0 to-read 3.87 2022 The Mountain in the Sea
author: Ray Nayler
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.87
book published: 2022
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/09/10
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]]> Falling Hour 63277897 All talk, no action: The Mezzanine meets Ducks, Newburyport in this meandering and captivating debut

It's a hot summer night, and Hugh Dalgarno, a 31-year-old clerical worker, thinks his brain is broken. Over the course of a day and night in an uncannily depopulated public park, he will sift through the pieces and traverse the baroque landscape of his own thoughts: the theology of nosiness, the beauty of the arbutus tree, the pathos of Gene Hackman, the theory of quantum immortality, Louis Riel's letter to an Irish newspaper, the baleful influence of Calvinism on the Scottish working class, the sea, the CIA, and, ultimately, thinking itself and how it may be represented in writing. The result is a strange, meandering sojourn, as if the history-haunted landscapes of W. G. Sebald's The Rings of Saturn were shrunk down to a mere 85 acres.

These digressions are anchored by remarks from the letters of Keats, by snatches of lyrics from Irish rebel songs and Scottish folk ballads, and, above all else, by the world-shattering call of the red-winged blackbird.]]> 224 Geoffrey D. Morrison Jlawrence 0 to-read 4.41 Falling Hour
author: Geoffrey D. Morrison
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.41
book published:
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/09/10
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]]> <![CDATA[Hardcoregaming101.net Presents: The Guide to Classic Graphic Adventures]]> 11462002 772 Kurt Kalata 146095579X Jlawrence 4 4.21 2011 Hardcoregaming101.net Presents: The Guide to Classic Graphic Adventures
author: Kurt Kalata
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.21
book published: 2011
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2023/09/02
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]]> <![CDATA[Naked Lunch: The Restored Text]]> 7437 Naked Lunch is one of the most important novels of the twentieth century, a book that redefined not just literature but American culture. An unnerving tale of a narcotics addict unmoored in New York, Tangier, and ultimately a nightmarish wasteland known as Interzone, its formal innovation, taboo subject matter, and tour de force execution have exerted a significant influence on authors like Thomas Pynchon, J. G. Ballard, and William Gibson; on the relationship of art and obscenity; and on the shape of music, film, and media generally. Naked Lunch: The Restored Text includes many editorial corrections to errors present in previous editions, and incorporates Burroughs’s notes on the text, several essays he wrote over the years about the book, and an appendix of 20 percent new material and alternate drafts from the original manuscript, which predates the first published version. For the Burroughs enthusiast and the neophyte, this volume is a valuable and fresh experience of this classic of our culture.]]> 289 William S. Burroughs 0802140181 Jlawrence 3 3.48 1959 Naked Lunch: The Restored Text
author: William S. Burroughs
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.48
book published: 1959
rating: 3
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date added: 2023/09/02
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]]> You Are a Cat! (Pick-a-plot!) 13014089 240 Sherwin Tija 1894994566 Jlawrence 3 choose-your-own-adventure 3.69 2011 You Are a Cat! (Pick-a-plot!)
author: Sherwin Tija
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.69
book published: 2011
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2023/09/02
shelves: choose-your-own-adventure
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Monstress, Volume 1: Awakening]]> 55883882
Collects MONSTRESS #1-6

About the Creators:

New York Times bestselling and award-winning writer Marjorie Liu is best known for her fiction and comic books. She teaches comic book writing at MIT, and leads a class on Popular Fiction at the Voices of Our Nation (VONA) workshop. Ms. Liu's extensive work includes the bestselling "Astonishing X-Men" for Marvel Comics, which featured the gay wedding of X-Man Northstar and was subsequently nominated for a GLAAD Media Award for outstanding media images of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community. Prior to writing full-time, Liu was a lawyer. She currently resides in Boston.

Sana Takeda is an illustrator and comic book artist who was born in Niigata, and now resides in Tokyo, Japan. At age 20 she started out as a 3D CGI designer for SEGA, a Japanese video game company, and became a freelance artist when she was 25. She is still an artist, and has worked on titles such as "X-23" and "Ms. Marvel" for Marvel Comics, and is an illustrator for trading card games in Japan.]]> 192 Marjorie M. Liu 1632157098 Jlawrence 0 to-read 3.96 2016 Monstress, Volume 1: Awakening
author: Marjorie M. Liu
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2016
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/08/29
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow]]> 58784475 In this exhilarating novel, two friends—often in love, but never lovers—come together as creative partners in the world of video game design, where success brings them fame, joy, tragedy, duplicity, and, ultimately, a kind of immortality.

On a bitter-cold day, in the December of his junior year at Harvard, Sam Masur exits a subway car and sees, amid the hordes of people waiting on the platform, Sadie Green. He calls her name. For a moment, she pretends she hasn't heard him, but then, she turns, and a game begins: a legendary collaboration that will launch them to stardom. These friends, intimates since childhood, borrow money, beg favors, and, before even graduating college, they have created their first blockbuster, Ichigo. Overnight, the world is theirs. Not even twenty-five years old, Sam and Sadie are brilliant, successful, and rich, but these qualities won't protect them from their own creative ambitions or the betrayals of their hearts.

Spanning thirty years, from Cambridge, Massachusetts, to Venice Beach, California, and lands in between and far beyond, Gabrielle Zevin's Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow is a dazzling and intricately imagined novel that examines the multifarious nature of identity, disability, failure, the redemptive possibilities in play, and above all, our need to connect: to be loved and to love. Yes, it is a love story, but it is not one you have read before.]]> 401 Gabrielle Zevin 0735243344 Jlawrence 0 to-read 4.12 2022 Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow
author: Gabrielle Zevin
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2022
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/08/28
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]]> <![CDATA[Homeland (Forgotten Realms: The Dark Elf Trilogy, #1; Legend of Drizzt, #1)]]> 50027 Discover the origin story of one of the greatest heroes of the Realms—Drizzt Do’Urden—in this thrilling first installment of the Dark Elf Trilogy

Drow ranger Drizzt Do’Urden, first introduced in The Icewind Dale Trilogy, quickly became one of the fantasy genre’s standout characters. With Homeland, Salvatore pulls back the curtain to reveal the startling tale of how this hero came to be—how this one lone drow walked out of the shadowy depths of the Underdark; how he left behind an evil society and a family that wanted him dead.

As the third son of Mother Malice and weaponmaster Zaknafein, Drizzt Do’Urden is meant to be sacrificed to Lolth, the evil Spider Queen, per drow tradition. But with the unexpected death of his older brother, young Drizzt is spared—and, as a result, further ostracized by his family. As Drizzt grows older, developing his swordsmanship skills and studying at the Academy, he begins to realize that his idea of good and evil does not match up with those of his fellow drow. Can Drizzt stay true to himself in a such an unforgiving, unprincipled world?

Homeland is the first book in the Dark Elf Trilogy and the Legend of Drizzt series.]]> 343 R.A. Salvatore Jlawrence 0 to-read 4.26 1990 Homeland (Forgotten Realms: The Dark Elf Trilogy, #1; Legend of Drizzt, #1)
author: R.A. Salvatore
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.26
book published: 1990
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/07/30
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Zen Flesh, Zen Bones: A Collection of Zen and Pre-Zen Writings]]> 870160
Zen Flesh, Zen Bones offers a collection of accessible, primary Zen sources so that readers can contemplate the meaning of Zen for themselves. Within the pages, readers will find:

When Zen Flesh, Zen Bones was published in 1957, it became an instant sensation with an entire generation of readers who were just beginning to experiment with Zen. Over the years it has inspired leading American Zen teachers, students, and practitioners. Its popularity is as high today as ever.]]> 211 Paul Reps 0804831866 Jlawrence 4 4.17 1957 Zen Flesh, Zen Bones: A Collection of Zen and Pre-Zen Writings
author: Paul Reps
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.17
book published: 1957
rating: 4
read at: 2017/11/11
date added: 2023/07/29
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Curse of Chalion (World of the Five Gods, #1)]]> 61886
It is an assignment Cazaril dreads, for it will ultimately lead him to the place he fears most, the royal court of Cardegoss, where the powerful enemies, who once placed him in chains, now occupy lofty positions. In addition to the traitorous intrigues of villains, Cazaril and the Royesse Iselle, are faced with a sinister curse that hangs like a sword over the entire blighted House of Chalion and all who stand in their circle. Only by employing the darkest, most forbidden of magics, can Cazaril hope to protect his royal charge—an act that will mark the loyal, damaged servant as a tool of the miraculous, and trap him, flesh and soul, in a maze of demonic paradox, damnation, and death.]]> 490 Lois McMaster Bujold 0007133618 Jlawrence 5 sword-and-laser, favorites 4.14 2001 The Curse of Chalion (World of the Five Gods, #1)
author: Lois McMaster Bujold
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.14
book published: 2001
rating: 5
read at: 2013/09/18
date added: 2023/05/17
shelves: sword-and-laser, favorites
review:
Completely atypical protagonist for a fantasy novel (a dilapidated aging soldier whose brains are much more useful to him than his sword) carries this precisely-written, well-paced story of courtly intrigue, theological conundrums and brilliant turns. The way it treated its thorny theme [spoilers removed] through its strongly-developed characters made me simultaneously feel *and* think -- likely more so than any other fantasy novel has, which is why it's now a new favorite.
]]> <![CDATA[The Planiverse: Computer Contact with a Two-Dimensional World]]> 866402 278 A.K. Dewdney 0387989161 Jlawrence 5 favorites 4.18 1983 The Planiverse: Computer Contact with a Two-Dimensional World
author: A.K. Dewdney
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.18
book published: 1983
rating: 5
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date added: 2023/05/17
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Simply one of the best and most detailed/well-thought-out alternate worlds ever presented in print. From the computer simulation (oh, how I wanted to play with exactly such a program) through which the protagonists make contact with a complex, living two-dimensional world, to the many illustrations detailing that world's flora, fauna, architecture, engineering, and art: a delight. Plus Yndred's a cool fellow.
]]> Ariel 395090 Sylvia Plath's celebrated collection.

When Sylvia Plath died, she not only left behind a prolific life but also her unpublished literary masterpiece, Ariel. Her husband, Ted Hughes, brought the collection to life in 1966, and its publication garnered worldwide acclaim. This collection showcases the beloved poet’s brilliant, provoking, and always moving poems, including "Ariel" and once again shows why readers have fallen in love with her work throughout the generations.]]> 128 Sylvia Plath 0060931728 Jlawrence 5 favorites 4.22 1965 Ariel
author: Sylvia Plath
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.22
book published: 1965
rating: 5
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date added: 2023/05/17
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]]> The Phantom Tollbooth 378 Librarian's Note: For an alternate cover edition of the same ISBN, click here.

This beloved story -first published more than fifty years ago- introduces readers to Milo and his adventures in the Lands Beyond.

For Milo, everything’s a bore. When a tollbooth mysteriously appears in his room, he drives through only because he’s got nothing better to do. But on the other side, things seem different. Milo visits the Island of Conclusions (you get there by jumping), learns about time from a ticking watchdog named Tock, and even embarks on a quest to rescue Rhyme and Reason! Somewhere along the way, Milo realizes something astonishing. Life is far from dull. In fact, it’s exciting beyond his wildest dreams. . . .]]> 248 Norton Juster 0394820371 Jlawrence 5 favorites 4.19 1961 The Phantom Tollbooth
author: Norton Juster
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.19
book published: 1961
rating: 5
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date added: 2023/05/17
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]]> <![CDATA[The Traitor Baru Cormorant (The Masquerade, #1)]]> 23444482
The Empire of Masks is coming, armed with coin and ink, doctrine and compass, soap and lies. They'll conquer Baru’s island, rewrite her culture, criminalize her customs, and dispose of one of her fathers. But Baru is patient. She'll swallow her hate, prove her talent, and join the Masquerade. She will learn the secrets of empire. She’ll be exactly what they need. And she'll claw her way high enough up the rungs of power to set her people free.

In a final test of her loyalty, the Masquerade will send Baru to bring order to distant Aurdwynn, a snakepit of rebels, informants, and seditious dukes. Aurdwynn kills everyone who tries to rule it. To survive, Baru will need to untangle this land’s intricate web of treachery - and conceal her attraction to the dangerously fascinating Duchess Tain Hu.

But Baru is a savant in games of power, as ruthless in her tactics as she is fixated on her goals. In the calculus of her schemes, all ledgers must be balanced, and the price of liberation paid in full.

]]> 399 Seth Dickinson 0765380722 Jlawrence 5 sword-and-laser, favorites
Dickinson is equally skilled in world-building, moving and chilling character-study, devious courtly intrigue, and gripping flashes of action both personal and military. Sharply written, engrossing, fiercely intelligent, and devastating. ]]> 4.04 2015 The Traitor Baru Cormorant (The Masquerade, #1)
author: Seth Dickinson
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2015
rating: 5
read at: 2015/11/09
date added: 2023/05/17
shelves: sword-and-laser, favorites
review:
Set in a richly worked-out alternate middle-ages featuring a imperialist power that colonizes, absorbs, modernizes, and 'corrects' weaker powers (for instance, torturing or putting to death those who, like the main character, are drawn to partners of the same sex), this novel asks: how far can someone de-soul them-self in an attempt to pretend to be part of the machine - a collaborator - as a long, long con in order to take revenge upon the conqueror from within?

Dickinson is equally skilled in world-building, moving and chilling character-study, devious courtly intrigue, and gripping flashes of action both personal and military. Sharply written, engrossing, fiercely intelligent, and devastating.
]]> <![CDATA[Hyperbole and a Half: Unfortunate Situations, Flawed Coping Mechanisms, Mayhem, and Other Things That Happened]]> 17571007
So I decided to just make a list of things that are in the book:

Pictures
Words
Stories about things that happened to me
Stories about things that happened to other people because of me
Eight billion dollars*
Stories about dogs
The secret to eternal happiness*

*These are lies. Perhaps I have underestimated my sneakiness!]]> 385 Allie Brosh 1451666187 Jlawrence 5 favorites 4.25 2013 Hyperbole and a Half: Unfortunate Situations, Flawed Coping Mechanisms, Mayhem, and Other Things That Happened
author: Allie Brosh
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2013
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2023/05/17
shelves: favorites
review:

]]> The Goldfinch 17333223
Aged thirteen, Theo Decker, son of a devoted mother and a reckless, largely absent father, survives an accident that otherwise tears his life apart. Alone and rudderless in New York, he is taken in by the family of a wealthy friend. He is tormented by an unbearable longing for his mother, and down the years clings to the thing that most reminds him of her: a small, strangely captivating painting that ultimately draws him into the criminal underworld. As he grows up, Theo learns to glide between the drawing rooms of the rich and the dusty antiques store where he works. He is alienated and in love - and his talisman, the painting, places him at the centre of a narrowing, ever more dangerous circle.

The Goldfinch is a haunted odyssey through present-day America and a drama of enthralling power. Combining unforgettably vivid characters and thrilling suspense, it is a beautiful, addictive triumph - a sweeping story of loss and obsession, of survival and self-invention, of the deepest mysteries of love, identity and fate.]]> 771 Donna Tartt 0316055433 Jlawrence 5 favorites 3.94 2013 The Goldfinch
author: Donna Tartt
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2013
rating: 5
read at: 2019/03/14
date added: 2023/05/17
shelves: favorites
review:

]]> The Sparrow (The Sparrow, #1) 334176 419 Mary Doria Russell 0449912558 Jlawrence 5 sword-and-laser, favorites 4.13 1996 The Sparrow (The Sparrow, #1)
author: Mary Doria Russell
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.13
book published: 1996
rating: 5
read at: 2015/01/25
date added: 2023/05/17
shelves: sword-and-laser, favorites
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Persepolis. The story of a childhood (Persepolis, #1)]]> 9516
Persepolis paints an unforgettable portrait of daily life in Iran and of the bewildering contradictions between home life and public life. Marjane’s child’s-eye view of dethroned emperors, state-sanctioned whippings, and heroes of the revolution allows us to learn as she does the history of this fascinating country and of her own extraordinary family. Intensely personal, profoundly political, and wholly original, Persepolis is at once a story of growing up and a reminder of the human cost of war and political repression. It shows how we carry on, with laughter and tears, in the face of absurdity. And, finally, it introduces us to an irresistible little girl with whom we cannot help but fall in love.]]> 153 Marjane Satrapi 037571457X Jlawrence 5 favorites 4.27 2003 Persepolis. The story of a childhood (Persepolis, #1)
author: Marjane Satrapi
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.27
book published: 2003
rating: 5
read at: 2015/03/05
date added: 2023/05/17
shelves: favorites
review:
Just as wonderful as the animated film based on it, this graphic novel is a funny, enlightening and moving autobiographical series of vignettes about one woman's childhood and adolescence in Iran, pre-, during- and post-Islamic revolution. What it makes it work so well is how expertly it captures mundane human foibles against a backdrop of harsh, complex and deadly political and cultural change. Don't think I've ever seen history lesson (that does not feel like a lesson), slice-of-life, and coming-of-age tale ever combined more inspiringly (and I need to grab parts #3-4 now!).
]]> The 13 Clocks 143126 Once upon a time, in a gloomy castle on a lonely hill, where there were thirteen clocks that wouldn t go, there lived a cold, aggressive Duke, and his niece, the Princess Saralinda. She was warm in every wind and weather, but he was always cold. His hands were as cold as his smile, and almost as cold as his heart. He wore gloves when he was asleep, and he wore gloves when he was awake, which made it difficult for him to pick up pins or coins or the kernels of nuts, or to tear the wings from nightingales.

So begins James Thurber s sublimely revamped fairy tale, The 13 Clocks, in which a wicked Duke who imagines he has killed time, and the Duke s beautiful niece, for whom time seems to have run out, both meet their match, courtesy of an enterprising and very handsome prince in disguise. Readers young and old will take pleasure in this tale of love forestalled but ultimately fulfilled, admiring its upstanding hero ( He yearned to find in a far land the princess of his dreams, singing as he went, and possibly slaying a dragon here and there ) and unapologetic villain ( We all have flaws, the Duke said. Mine is being wicked ), while wondering at the enigmatic Golux, the mysterious stranger whose unpredictable interventions speed the story to its necessarily happy end.]]> 128 James Thurber 0440405823 Jlawrence 5 favorites 3.98 1950 The 13 Clocks
author: James Thurber
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.98
book published: 1950
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2023/05/17
shelves: favorites
review:
Simply one of the best books of all time. Beware the Todal!
]]> MASQUERADE 1133587 31 Kit Williams 080523747X Jlawrence 5 art, fantasy, favorites
The book is absorbing enough just on the strength of the luminous paintings and the simple but evocative story that accompanies them, but the puzzle embedded throughout, while quite difficult (I never would have figured it out even as an adult) is quite elegant (all later printings include the solution in the back).

The search for and eventual finding of the hare was an international phenomenon for several years after the book was published in 1979, a fascinating story in its own right told in Quest for the Golden Hare.]]> 4.21 1979 MASQUERADE
author: Kit Williams
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.21
book published: 1979
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2023/05/17
shelves: art, fantasy, favorites
review:
One of my favorite books from childhood and still today. Kit Williams's paintings (amazing blendings of realistic detail and fantastic content) and words in this book form clues to the location of a buried treasure, a golden hare piece of jewlery wrought by Williams himself (the hare that is also the protagonist of the book's fairy tale-like story).

The book is absorbing enough just on the strength of the luminous paintings and the simple but evocative story that accompanies them, but the puzzle embedded throughout, while quite difficult (I never would have figured it out even as an adult) is quite elegant (all later printings include the solution in the back).

The search for and eventual finding of the hare was an international phenomenon for several years after the book was published in 1979, a fascinating story in its own right told in Quest for the Golden Hare.
]]> Dictionary of the Khazars 321566 338 Milorad Pavić 0679724613 Jlawrence 5 favorites 4.18 1983 Dictionary of the Khazars
author: Milorad Pavić
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.18
book published: 1983
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2023/05/17
shelves: favorites
review:
Fascinating combination of Borges-like fiction-delivered-in-a-non-fiction-form, enchanting puzzlebox to solve, judiciously used mysticism, and commentary on history and power. Beautiful imagery to boot.
]]> <![CDATA[Codex Seraphinianus. Ein Orbis Pictus des Universums der Phantasie.]]> 512662 Con allegato l'opuscolo "Decodex" che contiene scritti di più autori sull'opera di Luigi Serafini.]]> 365 Luigi Serafini 3791306510 Jlawrence 5 favorites
Outrageous surrealism combined with a clean, orderly structure that thus makes it more disturbing and intriguing than outright surrealism. Beautiful, mind-bending, and worth any price you have to pay for it.

Edit: 2016 re-read, for the new edition published in the US by Rizzoli New York with 19 new additional pages by Serafini.

First, I failed in my original review to convey the wry humor that goes along with Serafini's overflowing imagination: animate skeletons let surgeons sew new bodies over them and then judge the results with hand mirrors; tiny snakes become shoelaces; ; sneaky fish have adapted to have features that .

The new pages: it's a delight to see some new glimpses of the world, but I wish they had been integrated into the appropriate sections - part of the orderly structure of the original is that, even not understanding the script, its clearly divided up into sections on flora, fauna, chemistry, society, architecture, etc. Just clumping these new additions together at the very beginning ruins the encyclopedic feeling a bit.

More serious of an issue is that, despite this printing having high a quality binding/cover and high quality paper, the reproduction of the illustrations in this Rizzoli edition compared to the Franco Maria Ricci is lacking: in the Rizzoli, the drawings are a bit softer and the colors paler, making all illustrations flatter and duller in comparison - a great shame given the precision of Serafini's work.

So the Rizzoli edition: for content, I still rate it five stars, and am glad this book is available in print again, but for presentation I must dock a star: Rizzoli edition four stars, FMR edition five stars.]]> 4.43 1981 Codex Seraphinianus. Ein Orbis Pictus des Universums der Phantasie.
author: Luigi Serafini
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.43
book published: 1981
rating: 5
read at: 2016/12/17
date added: 2023/05/17
shelves: favorites
review:
A large, colorfully illustrated (with line drawings) encyclopedia of an imaginary land, written in an imaginary language (the numbering system for the pages has been decoded, but there's still debate over whether the script throughout the book is meaningful or not)

Outrageous surrealism combined with a clean, orderly structure that thus makes it more disturbing and intriguing than outright surrealism. Beautiful, mind-bending, and worth any price you have to pay for it.

Edit: 2016 re-read, for the new edition published in the US by Rizzoli New York with 19 new additional pages by Serafini.

First, I failed in my original review to convey the wry humor that goes along with Serafini's overflowing imagination: animate skeletons let surgeons sew new bodies over them and then judge the results with hand mirrors; tiny snakes become shoelaces; ; sneaky fish have adapted to have features that .

The new pages: it's a delight to see some new glimpses of the world, but I wish they had been integrated into the appropriate sections - part of the orderly structure of the original is that, even not understanding the script, its clearly divided up into sections on flora, fauna, chemistry, society, architecture, etc. Just clumping these new additions together at the very beginning ruins the encyclopedic feeling a bit.

More serious of an issue is that, despite this printing having high a quality binding/cover and high quality paper, the reproduction of the illustrations in this Rizzoli edition compared to the Franco Maria Ricci is lacking: in the Rizzoli, the drawings are a bit softer and the colors paler, making all illustrations flatter and duller in comparison - a great shame given the precision of Serafini's work.

So the Rizzoli edition: for content, I still rate it five stars, and am glad this book is available in print again, but for presentation I must dock a star: Rizzoli edition four stars, FMR edition five stars.
]]> <![CDATA[Labyrinths: Selected Stories & Other Writings]]> 17717
Labyrinths is a representative selection of Borges' writing, some forty pieces drawn from various books of his published over the years. The translations are by Harriet de Onis, Anthony Kerrigan, and others, including the editors, who have provided a biographical and critical introduction, as well as an extensive bibliography.]]> 260 Jorge Luis Borges 0811200124 Jlawrence 5 favorites 4.48 1962 Labyrinths: Selected Stories & Other Writings
author: Jorge Luis Borges
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.48
book published: 1962
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2023/05/17
shelves: favorites
review:

]]> <![CDATA[In the Night Garden (The Orphan's Tales, #1)]]> 202769
Every once in a great while a book comes along that reminds us of the magic spell that stories can cast over us—to dazzle, entertain, and enlighten. Welcome to the Arabian Nights for our time–a lush and fantastical epic guaranteed to spirit you away from the very first page...

Secreted away in a garden, a lonely girl spins stories to warm a curious peculiar feats and unspeakable fates that loop through each other and back again to meet in the tapestry of her voice. Inked on her eyelids, each twisting, tattooed tale is a piece in the puzzle of the girl’s own hidden history. And what tales she tells! Tales of shape-shifting witches and wild horsewomen, heron kings and beast princesses, snake gods, dog monks, and living stars—each story more strange and fantastic than the one that came before.

From ill-tempered 'mermaid' to fastidious Beast, nothing is ever quite what it seems in these ever-shifting tales—even, and especially, their teller. Adorned with illustrations by the legendary Michael Kaluta, Valente’s enchanting lyrical fantasy offers a breathtaking reinvention of the untold myths and dark fairy tales that shape our dreams. And just when you think you’ve come to the end, you realize the adventure has only begun�.]]> 483 Catherynne M. Valente 0553384031 Jlawrence 5 favorites
Valente is telling her own kind of fairy tales - dark, funny, beautiful, mutated - twining them around related themes, often inverting familiar fairy tale tropes, and managing to make seemingly disparate story threads fold back into each other in dazzling ways (the interconnections in the first half are especially tight - every story plugging into the other stories from multiple angles, forming a vast, luminous web). Intoxicating and inspiring. ]]> 4.02 2006 In the Night Garden (The Orphan's Tales, #1)
author: Catherynne M. Valente
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2006
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2023/05/17
shelves: favorites
review:
The first time I tried to read this, some years ago, I was intrigued by its structure of stories nested in stories nested in stories, and loved Valente's imagination, but the style rubbed me the wrong way, which kept me from getting fully into it. This time everything clicked, and I was completely sucked in.

Valente is telling her own kind of fairy tales - dark, funny, beautiful, mutated - twining them around related themes, often inverting familiar fairy tale tropes, and managing to make seemingly disparate story threads fold back into each other in dazzling ways (the interconnections in the first half are especially tight - every story plugging into the other stories from multiple angles, forming a vast, luminous web). Intoxicating and inspiring.
]]> Stranger Things Happen 66659
These eleven extraordinary stories are quirky, spooky, and smart. They all have happy endings. Every story contains a secret prize. Each story was written especially for you.

Stories from Stranger Things Happen have won the Nebula, Tiptree, and World Fantasy Award. Stranger Things Happen was a Salon Book of the Year, one of the Village Voice's 25 Favorite Books of 2001, and was nominated for the Firecracker Alternative Book Award.

Contents:
- Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose (1998)
- Water Off a Black Dog's Back (1995)
- The Specialist's Hat (1998)
- Flying Lessons (1995)
- Travels with the Snow Queen (1996/1997)
- Vanishing Act (1996)
- Survivor's Ball, or, The Donner Party (1998)
- Shoe and Marriage (2000)
- Most of My Friends Are Two-Thirds Water (2001)
- Louise's Ghost (2001)
- The Girl Detective (1999)

Cover painting by Shelley Jackson

]]> 266 Kelly Link 1931520003 Jlawrence 5 favorites
All are excellently written, often combining humor and a sense that things are wonderfully or malignantly off-kilter. There were only two that almost didn't work - "Louise's Ghost" which starts off with the overly-cute device of two best friends who are both named Louise, but builds into the longest and most affecting story; and "The Girl Detective" which rambles on almost completely formlessly but redeems and justifies this with its excellent ending.

Definitely going to seek out more Kelly Link.
]]> 3.86 2001 Stranger Things Happen
author: Kelly Link
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2001
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2023/05/17
shelves: favorites
review:
Short stories that achieve the best fusion of fairy tale and mundane modern life I've ever read. Some stories lay their supernatural cards on the table from the get-go, but the very best of them ("Water Off a Dog's Back", "The Specialist's Hat") create a delicious vertigo in which what's related could be supernatural or just in the imagination of the main character.

All are excellently written, often combining humor and a sense that things are wonderfully or malignantly off-kilter. There were only two that almost didn't work - "Louise's Ghost" which starts off with the overly-cute device of two best friends who are both named Louise, but builds into the longest and most affecting story; and "The Girl Detective" which rambles on almost completely formlessly but redeems and justifies this with its excellent ending.

Definitely going to seek out more Kelly Link.

]]> <![CDATA[Sword & Citadel (The Book of the New Sun, #3-4)]]> 40995 The Book of the New Sun is unanimously acclaimed as Gene Wolfe's most remarkable work, hailed as "a masterpiece of science fantasy comparable in importance to the major works of Tolkien and Lewis" by Publishers Weekly, and "one of the most ambitious works of speculative fiction in the twentieth century" by The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction. Sword & Citadel brings together the final two books of the tetralogy in one volume:

The Sword of the Lictor is the third volume in Wolfe's remarkable epic, chronicling the odyssey of the wandering pilgrim called Severian, driven by a powerful and unfathomable destiny, as he carries out a dark mission far from his home.

The Citadel of the Autarch brings The Book of the New Sun to its harrowing conclusion, as Severian clashes in a final reckoning with the dread Autarch, fulfilling an ancient prophecy that will forever alter the realm known as Urth.]]> 411 Gene Wolfe 0312890184 Jlawrence 5 4.35 1994 Sword & Citadel (The Book of the New Sun, #3-4)
author: Gene Wolfe
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.35
book published: 1994
rating: 5
read at: 2011/03/31
date added: 2023/05/17
shelves: re-reads, sword-and-laser, favorites
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Sandman, Vol. 2: The Doll's House]]> 92062 232 Neil Gaiman 0930289595 Jlawrence 5 favorites 4.33 1990 The Sandman, Vol. 2: The Doll's House
author: Neil Gaiman
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.33
book published: 1990
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2023/05/17
shelves: favorites
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Glory and the Dream: A Narrative History of America 1932-72]]> 19807
Masterfully compressing four crowded decades of our history, The Glory and the Dream relives the epic, significant, or just memorable events that befell the generation of Americans whose lives pivoted between the America before and the America after the Second World War. From the Great Depression through the second inauguration of Richard M. Nixon, Manchester breathes life into this great period of America's growth.]]> 1408 William Manchester 0553345893 Jlawrence 0 to-read 4.44 1974 The Glory and the Dream: A Narrative History of America 1932-72
author: William Manchester
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.44
book published: 1974
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/05/17
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Weird: A Compendium of Strange and Dark Stories]]> 12344319 The Weird, and its practitioners include some of the greatest names in twentieth and twenty-first century literature.

Exotic and esoteric, The Weird plunges you into dark domains and brings you face to face with surreal monstrosities. You won't find any elves or wizards here... but you will find the biggest, boldest, and downright most peculiar stories from the last hundred years bound together in the biggest Weird collection ever assembled.

The Weird features 110 stories by an all-star cast, from literary legends to international bestsellers to Booker Prize winners: including William Gibson, George R. R. Martin, Stephen King, Angela Carter, Kelly Link, Franz Kafka, China Miéville, Clive Barker, Haruki Murakami, M. R. James, Neil Gaiman, Mervyn Peake, and Michael Chabon.]]> 1126 Ann VanderMeer 1848876874 Jlawrence 0 to-read 4.29 2010 The Weird: A Compendium of Strange and Dark Stories
author: Ann VanderMeer
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.29
book published: 2010
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/05/17
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> State of Emergency 7702034 273 Dennis Guerrier 0434307904 Jlawrence 0 to-read 3.00 1969 State of Emergency
author: Dennis Guerrier
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.00
book published: 1969
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/05/17
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Roadside Picnic 331256
First published in 1972, Roadside Picnic is still widely regarded as one of the greatest science fiction novels, despite the fact that it has been out of print in the United States for almost thirty years.]]> 145 Arkady Strugatsky 0575070536 Jlawrence 4 science-fiction 4.16 1972 Roadside Picnic
author: Arkady Strugatsky
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.16
book published: 1972
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2023/04/08
shelves: science-fiction
review:

]]> <![CDATA[All Tomorrows: The Myriad Species and Mixed Fortunes of Man]]> 16143402 111 Nemo Ramjet Jlawrence 3 4.19 2006 All Tomorrows: The Myriad Species and Mixed Fortunes of Man
author: Nemo Ramjet
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.19
book published: 2006
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2023/04/08
shelves:
review:

]]> Dark Places 5886881
Since then, she has been drifting. But when she is contacted by a group who are convinced of Ben's innocence, Libby starts to ask questions she never dared to before. Was the voice she heard her brother's? Ben was a misfit in their small town, but was he capable of murder? Are there secrets to uncover at the family farm or is Libby deluding herself because she wants her brother back?

She begins to realise that everyone in her family had something to hide that day... especially Ben. Now, twenty-four years later, the truth is going to be even harder to find.

Who did massacre the Day family?]]> 424 Gillian Flynn 0307341569 Jlawrence 0 to-read 3.95 2009 Dark Places
author: Gillian Flynn
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2009
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/02/27
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Sharp Objects 18045891
Librarian's Note: this is an alternate cover edition - ISBN 10: 0307341550 (ISBN 13: 9780307341556)]]> 254 Gillian Flynn 0297851535 Jlawrence 0 to-read 4.05 2006 Sharp Objects
author: Gillian Flynn
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2006
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/02/27
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> ѲѵÔ 71689495 369 Gustave Flaubert Jlawrence 0 to-read 5.00 1862 ѲѵÔ
author: Gustave Flaubert
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 5.00
book published: 1862
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/01/07
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[A Culture of Fact: England, 1550�1720]]> 1714913 296 Barbara J. Shapiro 0801488494 Jlawrence 4
The new practices of prioritizing impartial judges and jury-members, as well the growing importance of first-hand witnesses and verifiable documents as evidence, created a 'culture of practice' of how best to establish the truth of a 'matter of fact', and then this culture spread to other disciplines, like travel reporting and news reporting, eventually becoming crucial to naturalists (especially the Royal Society) that began compiling the 'facts' of nature, and eventually 'fact' diffused into the broad culture, along the way losing its sense of a provisional statement to be proved and gaining our modern understanding of a statement already proven to be true.

It gets repetitive in parts, but this is always done for the sake of clarity, and there are many intriguing nuances (different approaches to history writing, arguments between naturalists about the relationship of facts to hypotheses and theory) and examples given along the way. One of my favorite explorations near the end looked at how 18th century novels began incorporating the language/methods of the by-then prevalent 'culture of fact' -- rhetorical proofs of the reliability of a fictional narrator, framing scenes as eye-witness accounts, tales formatted as official documents, etc. -- thereby re-introducing the blending of fact and fiction that this whole process had been weeding out of history writing, travel writing, etc.]]> 3.86 1999 A Culture of Fact: England, 1550–1720
author: Barbara J. Shapiro
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.86
book published: 1999
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2022/12/01
shelves:
review:
Academic work revealing the history behind our modern use of the English word 'fact', and how its origin was the legal domain instead of the scientific. Shapiro shows its roots in 16th century England's evolving legal practices: the phrase at that time was 'a matter of fact' -- a claim that could be proven true or false via the process of a legal trial, so at the end of a trial, you could have a 'false matter of fact' or a 'true matter of fact'.

The new practices of prioritizing impartial judges and jury-members, as well the growing importance of first-hand witnesses and verifiable documents as evidence, created a 'culture of practice' of how best to establish the truth of a 'matter of fact', and then this culture spread to other disciplines, like travel reporting and news reporting, eventually becoming crucial to naturalists (especially the Royal Society) that began compiling the 'facts' of nature, and eventually 'fact' diffused into the broad culture, along the way losing its sense of a provisional statement to be proved and gaining our modern understanding of a statement already proven to be true.

It gets repetitive in parts, but this is always done for the sake of clarity, and there are many intriguing nuances (different approaches to history writing, arguments between naturalists about the relationship of facts to hypotheses and theory) and examples given along the way. One of my favorite explorations near the end looked at how 18th century novels began incorporating the language/methods of the by-then prevalent 'culture of fact' -- rhetorical proofs of the reliability of a fictional narrator, framing scenes as eye-witness accounts, tales formatted as official documents, etc. -- thereby re-introducing the blending of fact and fiction that this whole process had been weeding out of history writing, travel writing, etc.
]]> Faust, First Part ,David Luke 52927552
This authoritative edition, which offers Peter Salm’s wonderfully readable translation as well as the original German on facing pages, brings us Faust in a vital, rhythmic American idiom that carefully preserves the grandeur, integrity, and poetic immediacy of Goethe’s words.]]> Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Jlawrence 4
Starting with Walter Arndt's translation in the Norton Critical Edition, but finding it a bit dry, I researched (aka googled) the most recommended English translations, and saw Walter Kaufmann and David Luke frequently championed, and sought them out. Kaufmann's introduction is magnificent and translation overall seems strong (especially his moving rendering of the Dedication). Though, in comparing, I was distracted by how much I liked David Luke's depiction of Mephistopheles's summoning and first conversation with Faust, and stuck with Luke for the rest of this read.

In all three translations, I found Goethe's take on the subject more compelling and the language, even in translation, more impressive than Marlowe's Doctor Faustus (which I read in preparation for this), though here Mephistopheles's character and the tragedy of Gretchen felt more compelling than Faust himself, at least in part one. I think, via the Gretchen plotline, part one feels somewhat self-contained and sufficient on its own, and leaves one with a fair amount to chew on theme-wise, but at some point I'll read Kaufmann's part one in full for comparison, and then continue on with Luke's translation of part two.]]> 3.97 1808 Faust, First Part ,David Luke
author: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.97
book published: 1808
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2022/12/01
shelves:
review:
I took a windy, patchwork path to reading Goethe's Faust, Part One.

Starting with Walter Arndt's translation in the Norton Critical Edition, but finding it a bit dry, I researched (aka googled) the most recommended English translations, and saw Walter Kaufmann and David Luke frequently championed, and sought them out. Kaufmann's introduction is magnificent and translation overall seems strong (especially his moving rendering of the Dedication). Though, in comparing, I was distracted by how much I liked David Luke's depiction of Mephistopheles's summoning and first conversation with Faust, and stuck with Luke for the rest of this read.

In all three translations, I found Goethe's take on the subject more compelling and the language, even in translation, more impressive than Marlowe's Doctor Faustus (which I read in preparation for this), though here Mephistopheles's character and the tragedy of Gretchen felt more compelling than Faust himself, at least in part one. I think, via the Gretchen plotline, part one feels somewhat self-contained and sufficient on its own, and leaves one with a fair amount to chew on theme-wise, but at some point I'll read Kaufmann's part one in full for comparison, and then continue on with Luke's translation of part two.
]]> Dr. Faustus 18525 64 Christopher Marlowe 0486282082 Jlawrence 2
In making his bargain with the devil, the dissatisfied scholar Faust declares all the astounding and human-limit-defying things he will do with bargain-granted powers, and then precedes do almost none of them while Marlowe strings together a bunch of incidents that barely seemed to connected to one another, including long detours with drunken tavern customers that are played for humor but are decidedly unfunny. This could be seen as ironic deflation of Faust's ambitions, but the play doesn't even seemed focused enough for that approach to come through strongly. And suddenly at the very end, for the damnation scene, it's as if Marlowe wakes up and decides he actually wants to write something in a committed tone at an operatic register. The damnation scene is indeed powerful and its language fine, but it seems so apart for the entire rest of the play.

If this work is the pinnacle of Marlowe's craft, the theory that he wrote some or all of Shakespeare's best work strike me as deeply puzzling, but as I said, I will give it another try some time.]]> 3.82 1588 Dr. Faustus
author: Christopher Marlowe
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.82
book published: 1588
rating: 2
read at:
date added: 2022/12/01
shelves:
review:
I will have to read this again at some point, because maybe I was just in a mood set against it and/or parts of its structure and intent flew over my head, but I was mostly amazed as how much of misshapen mess this foundational telling of the Faust myth seemed.

In making his bargain with the devil, the dissatisfied scholar Faust declares all the astounding and human-limit-defying things he will do with bargain-granted powers, and then precedes do almost none of them while Marlowe strings together a bunch of incidents that barely seemed to connected to one another, including long detours with drunken tavern customers that are played for humor but are decidedly unfunny. This could be seen as ironic deflation of Faust's ambitions, but the play doesn't even seemed focused enough for that approach to come through strongly. And suddenly at the very end, for the damnation scene, it's as if Marlowe wakes up and decides he actually wants to write something in a committed tone at an operatic register. The damnation scene is indeed powerful and its language fine, but it seems so apart for the entire rest of the play.

If this work is the pinnacle of Marlowe's craft, the theory that he wrote some or all of Shakespeare's best work strike me as deeply puzzling, but as I said, I will give it another try some time.
]]> The Making of Karateka 16282779 230 Jordan Mechner Jlawrence 3
Especially interesting: how his love of cinematic imagery informed how he approached the visual design and visual storytelling in Karateka; the laborious digital rotoscoping of hand-filmed-by-himself human movement for the characters in the game; getting to briefly meet some other Apple II game developer luminaries once he joined the software company Broderbund; and when he speaks to those developers, seeing maybe the first cycle in computer game history of creators lamenting that the freedom of creative game development is degrading into the trap of by-committee corporate products.... in 1984!]]> 4.14 2012 The Making of Karateka
author: Jordan Mechner
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.14
book published: 2012
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2022/12/01
shelves:
review:
This is the edited-to-remove-some-(personal, I assume)-things-but-otherwise-untouched diary of Jordan Mechner when he was a college student in the early '80s, banging away at assembly coding 8-bit Apple II games between college classes and being torn by his other great interest, movies and scriptwriting. As such, Mechner was only writing for himself - this is indeed not great writing. But it is is fun seeing how his breakthrough hit Karateka (and other simultaneously game projects) came to be through various fits and starts and technical hurdles, as well as the swirl of other interests rampaging in his head.

Especially interesting: how his love of cinematic imagery informed how he approached the visual design and visual storytelling in Karateka; the laborious digital rotoscoping of hand-filmed-by-himself human movement for the characters in the game; getting to briefly meet some other Apple II game developer luminaries once he joined the software company Broderbund; and when he speaks to those developers, seeing maybe the first cycle in computer game history of creators lamenting that the freedom of creative game development is degrading into the trap of by-committee corporate products.... in 1984!
]]> Pastoralia 14295
The stories in Pastoralia are set in a slightly skewed version of America, where elements of contemporary life have been merged, twisted, and amplified, casting their absurdity—and our humanity—in a startling new light. Whether he writes a gothic morality tale in which a male exotic dancer is haunted by his maiden aunt from beyond the grave, or about a self-help guru who tells his followers his mission is to discover who's been "crapping in your oatmeal," Saunders's stories are both indelibly strange and vividly real.]]> 188 George Saunders 0747553866 Jlawrence 0 to-read 4.10 2000 Pastoralia
author: George Saunders
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2000
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/07/27
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Ten Billion Days and One Hundred Billion Nights]]> 10307466
Ten billion days--that is how long it will take the philosopher Plato to determine the true systems of the world. One hundred billion nights--that is how far into the future he and Christ and Siddhartha will travel to witness the end of the world and also its fiery birth. Named the greatest Japanese science fiction novel of all time, Ten Billion Days and One Hundred Billion Nights is an epic eons in the making. Originally published in 1967, the novel was revised by the author in later years and republished in 1973.

“‘Ten Billion Days and One Hundred Billion Nights,� that's a lot of time, but Ryu Mitsuse covers all of it in under 300 pages, and the result is quite fabulous.� –Alan Cheuse, All Things Considered]]> 284 Ryu Mitsuse 1421539047 Jlawrence 3 science-fiction
Unfortunately, the second half of the novel goes over-the-top in a sloppy way, like a cosmically-minded science fiction anime that can't land all the ambitious setups it's not only introduced, but keeps piling on, complete with dense technobabble, gaping plot- and world-building holes, and increasingly ridiculous exposition-y dialogue delivered completely deadpan.

There's just too many ideas and implications here that don't have room to breathe. I think it could have worked if he either abandoned the serious tone and gone full goofy gonzo -- for instance, JESUS AND BUDDHA HAVE A MECH SUIT BATTLE! That should be crazy fun, but somehow isn't -- or this should have been much longer, or even split into a series of books, so the welter of ideas could be developed in a less rushed fashion.

Still an intriguing read despite all its flaws.

As an extra bonus there's an afterword by anime director Mamoru Oshii that's more revealing about Oshii than the book (specifically, Oshii's youthful involvement with and disillusionment with radical left-wing activism).

Book choice and review inspired by Jenny Colvin's to-read list.]]> 3.42 1967 Ten Billion Days and One Hundred Billion Nights
author: Ryu Mitsuse
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.42
book published: 1967
rating: 3
read at: 2022/07/27
date added: 2022/07/27
shelves: science-fiction
review:
This Japanese novel from 1967 starts as an intriguing alternate history tale -- we spend time with the first earth creature to ever crawl upon land (who is then experimented on by technologically advanced outsiders) and then fast forward millennia to accompany Plato as he encounters the descendants of technocologically-advanced Atlantis. How about throwing Gautama Buddha and Jesus of Nazareth into the mix? Throughout its first half, the book maintains its grip with various teases of how these threads will interrelate, and while characterization is flat, Mitsuse skillfully uses visual details to paint the various historical scenes surveyed (the initial section with the first amphibian is especially vivid writing).

Unfortunately, the second half of the novel goes over-the-top in a sloppy way, like a cosmically-minded science fiction anime that can't land all the ambitious setups it's not only introduced, but keeps piling on, complete with dense technobabble, gaping plot- and world-building holes, and increasingly ridiculous exposition-y dialogue delivered completely deadpan.

There's just too many ideas and implications here that don't have room to breathe. I think it could have worked if he either abandoned the serious tone and gone full goofy gonzo -- for instance, JESUS AND BUDDHA HAVE A MECH SUIT BATTLE! That should be crazy fun, but somehow isn't -- or this should have been much longer, or even split into a series of books, so the welter of ideas could be developed in a less rushed fashion.

Still an intriguing read despite all its flaws.

As an extra bonus there's an afterword by anime director Mamoru Oshii that's more revealing about Oshii than the book (specifically, Oshii's youthful involvement with and disillusionment with radical left-wing activism).

Book choice and review inspired by Jenny Colvin's to-read list.
]]> <![CDATA[The Elegant Universe: Superstrings, Hidden Dimensions, and the Quest for the Ultimate Theory]]> 8049273
Today, physicists and mathematicians throughout the world are feverishly working on one of the most ambitious theories ever proposed: superstring theory. String theory, as it is often called, is the key to the Unified Field Theory that eluded Einstein for more than thirty years. Finally, the century-old antagonism between the large and the small--General Relativity and Quantum Theory--is resolved. String theory proclaims that all of the wondrous happenings in the universe, from the frantic dancing of subatomic quarks to the majestic swirling of heavenly galaxies, are reflections of one grand physical principle and manifestations of one single entity: microscopically tiny vibrating loops of energy, a billionth of a billionth the size of an atom. In this brilliantly articulated and refreshingly clear book, Greene relates the scientific story and the human struggle behind twentieth-century physics' search for a theory of everything.

Through the masterful use of metaphor and analogy, The Elegant Universe makes some of the most sophisticated concepts ever contemplated viscerally accessible and thoroughly entertaining, bringing us closer than ever to understanding how the universe works.]]> 464 Brian Greene 039333810X Jlawrence 0 to-read 4.11 1999 The Elegant Universe: Superstrings, Hidden Dimensions, and the Quest for the Ultimate Theory
author: Brian Greene
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.11
book published: 1999
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/07/08
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Merchant and the Alchemist's Gate]]> 223379 60 Ted Chiang 1596061006 Jlawrence 4 fantasy, science-fiction
Review inspired by Jenny Colvin's to-read list.

]]> 4.39 2007 The Merchant and the Alchemist's Gate
author: Ted Chiang
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.39
book published: 2007
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2022/06/30
shelves: fantasy, science-fiction
review:
In this elegant novella set in the medieval Middle East, Ted Chiang uses One Thousand and One Nights-style storytelling -- three related short stories embedded in a frame story that takes over at the end -- to examine an elegantly imagined time travel paradox. The tales are told simply, without ornamentation, and they clearly resonate like good fables should, their themes lingering in the mind.

Review inspired by Jenny Colvin's to-read list.


]]> <![CDATA[When Gravity Fails (Marîd Audran, #1)]]> 132694
For a new kind of killer roams the streets of the Arab ghetto, a madman whose bootlegged personality cartridges range from a sinister James Bond to a sadistic disemboweler named Khan. And Marid Audrian has been made an offer he can’t refuse.

The 200-year-old “godfather� of the Budayeen’s underworld has enlisted Marid as his instrument of vengeance. But first Marid must undergo the most sophisticated of surgical implants before he dares to confront a killer who carries the power of every psychopath since the beginning of time.

Wry, savage, and unignorable, When Gravity Fails was hailed as a classic by Effinger’s fellow SF writers on its original publication in 1987, and the sequence of “Marid Audrian� novels it begins were the culmination of his career.]]> 288 George Alec Effinger 0765313588 Jlawrence 3 science-fiction
The setting is the strongest element. It'd take someone with more knowledge of modern and traditional Muslim culture/Middle Eastern urban life than me to truly judge, but it certainly seems like Effinger has done his research to create this environment. Characters display a range of devotion to Islam, from true believers to doubters like our narrator Marid, who nonetheless uses his knowledge of Islamic scripture to navigate tricky social rituals with those who have more power than him, and the intricacies of how Islamic law would interface with the sex work, crime and violence soaking the Budayeen is teased out.

A large number of characters are trans and have had sex-change operations, including Marid's romantic partner ("romance" might be stretching the definition given Marid's cynicism, however). Marid's first-person narration includes some misogynistic rambles and other retrogressive elements, but he is clearly an anti-hero (as he himself says, "If I examine myself closely enough, I find hints of every objectionable quality known to man"). Overall the trans characters are all treated as individual people and the book certainly seems progressive in this area for the 90s.

I realized that it's a bit more difficult for me to take a completely cynical, "I know everything about how this dark world works" noir protagonist when it's a young man like Madrid -- it can come off as affected and smug instead of hard-earned knowledge, so that was somewhat an issue of me despite Effinger's solid writing.

There were a few other things that kept me from getting totally into this. Plot-wise, Marid did very little of solving mysteries himself, he mostly seemed to be passively bumbling, which I think works better for an innocent drawn into a dark mess in a noir instead of for a detective protagonist. I felt like [spoilers removed].

Theme and character arc-wise, I wish more was done with "moddies" (personality mods) and "daddies" (knowledge). There was a very obvious set-up for Marid to have to deal with his resistance to ever using them, but [spoilers removed]. I did really like the very final twist for Marid, though.

So, lots of intriguing elements with some disappointments mixed in, but I am curious enough to probably try the second in the series.

Review inspired by Jenny Colvin's to-read list.]]> 3.92 1986 When Gravity Fails (Marîd Audran, #1)
author: George Alec Effinger
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.92
book published: 1986
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2022/06/26
shelves: science-fiction
review:
Cyberpunk noir set in the "Budayeen" - the seedy quarter of an unidentified future Middle Eastern city, where body modification and cybernetic enhancements, especially brain "wiring" that allows the chipping in of various knowledge and personality mods, is prevalent. Our narrator Madrid, who prides his independence both from cybernetics and fealty to any of the Budayeen's power players, gets sucked into trying to solve multiple murders, find a missing person and avoid getting murdered himself.

The setting is the strongest element. It'd take someone with more knowledge of modern and traditional Muslim culture/Middle Eastern urban life than me to truly judge, but it certainly seems like Effinger has done his research to create this environment. Characters display a range of devotion to Islam, from true believers to doubters like our narrator Marid, who nonetheless uses his knowledge of Islamic scripture to navigate tricky social rituals with those who have more power than him, and the intricacies of how Islamic law would interface with the sex work, crime and violence soaking the Budayeen is teased out.

A large number of characters are trans and have had sex-change operations, including Marid's romantic partner ("romance" might be stretching the definition given Marid's cynicism, however). Marid's first-person narration includes some misogynistic rambles and other retrogressive elements, but he is clearly an anti-hero (as he himself says, "If I examine myself closely enough, I find hints of every objectionable quality known to man"). Overall the trans characters are all treated as individual people and the book certainly seems progressive in this area for the 90s.

I realized that it's a bit more difficult for me to take a completely cynical, "I know everything about how this dark world works" noir protagonist when it's a young man like Madrid -- it can come off as affected and smug instead of hard-earned knowledge, so that was somewhat an issue of me despite Effinger's solid writing.

There were a few other things that kept me from getting totally into this. Plot-wise, Marid did very little of solving mysteries himself, he mostly seemed to be passively bumbling, which I think works better for an innocent drawn into a dark mess in a noir instead of for a detective protagonist. I felt like [spoilers removed].

Theme and character arc-wise, I wish more was done with "moddies" (personality mods) and "daddies" (knowledge). There was a very obvious set-up for Marid to have to deal with his resistance to ever using them, but [spoilers removed]. I did really like the very final twist for Marid, though.

So, lots of intriguing elements with some disappointments mixed in, but I am curious enough to probably try the second in the series.

Review inspired by Jenny Colvin's to-read list.
]]> Anthropica 51705424
This is a partial cast of Anthropica, a novel that puts Laszlow Katasztrófa’s beautiful vision of a universe without us to the test. Because even if Laszlow believes that he is merely an agent of fate, a cog in God’s inscrutable machine, he’s nevertheless the one driving this crazy machine. And once he has his team assembled, it turns out that he might—against all odds and his own expectations—actually have the tools to see his apocalyptic plan to fruition.]]> 493 David Hollander 1950122026 Jlawrence 0 to-read 4.46 2020 Anthropica
author: David Hollander
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.46
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/26
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[To Be or Not To Be: A Chooseable-Path Adventure]]> 17938417 To Be or Not To Be is a choose-your-own-path version of Hamlet by New York Times best-selling author Ryan North. Play as Hamlet, Ophelia, or King Hamlet--if you want to die on the first page and play as a ghost. It's pretty awesome! Readers can follow Yorick skull markers to stick closely to Shakespeare's plot, or go off-script and explore alternative possibilities filled with puzzles and humor.

Each ending in the book is accompanied by a full-color, full-page illustration by one of the 65 most excellent artists working today, so each rereading yields new surprises and rewards. Ryan's prose is, as always, colloquial and familiar but full of clever references, vivid imagination, and only the most choice of jokes. Inventive devices like a book-within-a-book (to mirror Hamlet's play-within-a-play) take full advantage of the gamebook medium and liven up the original story for even the most disinterested of Shakespeare readers!

To Be or Not to Be became a sensation when it launched: over 15,000 people backed the book in just one month, and it remains the number-one most funded publishing project ever on Kickstarter.com.

To be, or not to be: that is the adventure!]]> 768 Ryan North 0982853742 Jlawrence 4 choose-your-own-adventure
Now, I'm not always in the mood to be shout-narrated at by T-Rex while traveling through alternate Hamlet timelines, but when I am, this is a delight. North throws everything and the kitchen sink in this CYOA blender, there are many, many silly paths to explore, and it's lovingly illustrated by dozens of marvelous illustrator people to boot.

I've explored many paths so far and will come back for more. One of my favorite moments:

- North's framing device/conceit is that this CYOA book is the original form of Hamlet, which 14-century Shakespeare ripped off, so accordingly instead of a play-within-a-play to catch the king, we have a CYOA-within-the-CYOA written by 'Christina Marlowe' which you as Hamlet can tempt Claudius into reading and then switch to being Claudius and make choices in (and reactions to) Marlowe's CYOA (including screaming 'I'M NOT A MURDERER!!!' and running out of the room even before starting to read it).

Review inspired by Jenny Colvin's to-read list.]]> 4.08 2013 To Be or Not To Be: A Chooseable-Path Adventure
author: Ryan North
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.08
book published: 2013
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2022/06/09
shelves: choose-your-own-adventure
review:
If you're familiar with Ryan Norths' , know that this massive choose-your-own-adventure romp through Shakespeare's Hamlet allows you to wrench the standard plot way off the rails in myriad ways and while gleefully plot-wrenching you will be narrated at by North in the same glib, exclamatory style T-Rex uses in that comic.

Now, I'm not always in the mood to be shout-narrated at by T-Rex while traveling through alternate Hamlet timelines, but when I am, this is a delight. North throws everything and the kitchen sink in this CYOA blender, there are many, many silly paths to explore, and it's lovingly illustrated by dozens of marvelous illustrator people to boot.

I've explored many paths so far and will come back for more. One of my favorite moments:

- North's framing device/conceit is that this CYOA book is the original form of Hamlet, which 14-century Shakespeare ripped off, so accordingly instead of a play-within-a-play to catch the king, we have a CYOA-within-the-CYOA written by 'Christina Marlowe' which you as Hamlet can tempt Claudius into reading and then switch to being Claudius and make choices in (and reactions to) Marlowe's CYOA (including screaming 'I'M NOT A MURDERER!!!' and running out of the room even before starting to read it).

Review inspired by Jenny Colvin's to-read list.
]]> <![CDATA[Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead]]> 18545 126 Tom Stoppard 0802132758 Jlawrence 3 4.05 1967 Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead
author: Tom Stoppard
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.05
book published: 1967
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2022/06/09
shelves:
review:
Stoppard's absurdist, dark comedy meta-take on these doomed side characters from Hamlet has a brilliant beginning, brilliant end, and scattered bits of excellence throughout, but overall felt more clever than great.
]]> Quest for the Golden Hare 1176887 Masquerade. By the time the golden hare had been unearthed, it had led to an astonishing variety of dare-devil adventures and personal discoveries.

Bamber Gascoigne, chosen as the one impartial witness to the treasure's location and the solution to the mystery, subsequently wrote this book, which answers every question asked about the masquerade, including a step-by-step explanation of how the puzzle was conceived, and of the "perfect solution".]]> 224 Bamber Gascoigne 0224021168 Jlawrence 4 Masquerade contained, in its paintings, clues to the location of buried treasure, a hare of gold Williams had wrought himself. When Williams buried it, the author of this book, Bamber Gascoigne, was the official witness and the only other person present.

This book tells how Gascoigne got involved, his interactions with Kit, the tumultuous nature of the contest and its anticlimatic end, and especially the wide variety of searchers for the golden hare, whom he dubs Masqueraders, who submitted their theories of the solution to Masquerade's riddle to him and Kit.

I have a huge fondness for the book Masquerade, so I really enjoyed learning more about Williams and seeing the behind-the-scenes of how the book, puzzle and prize came together. But even outside of that, the phenomenon of the searchers and their wildly different approaches and theories proves fascinating.

It's hard to overstate what an international craze this was, the intensity and obsession of many of the searchers' approaches, and the complexity of their theories. A large portion of the book is taken up by the 'Case Histories' chapter wherein Gascoigne reprints solution submissions, which, as well as serving up many amusing submissions and escapades, also shows how vastly different mental edifices can be built on the same initial set of starting points, and how the pattern-seeking mind, gripped with a consuming idea, can make everything it finds fit into its initial assumptions.

The contest's disappointing denouement -- where the winner stumbled upon the location without understanding the actual puzzle, literally a day before a duo who had actually cracked the code located it themselves -- led many to believe this was yet another trick of Williams (yet another Masquerade!), and the contest was actually still on. ]]> 4.17 1983 Quest for the Golden Hare
author: Bamber Gascoigne
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.17
book published: 1983
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2022/06/09
shelves:
review:
Kit Williams's 1979 book Masquerade contained, in its paintings, clues to the location of buried treasure, a hare of gold Williams had wrought himself. When Williams buried it, the author of this book, Bamber Gascoigne, was the official witness and the only other person present.

This book tells how Gascoigne got involved, his interactions with Kit, the tumultuous nature of the contest and its anticlimatic end, and especially the wide variety of searchers for the golden hare, whom he dubs Masqueraders, who submitted their theories of the solution to Masquerade's riddle to him and Kit.

I have a huge fondness for the book Masquerade, so I really enjoyed learning more about Williams and seeing the behind-the-scenes of how the book, puzzle and prize came together. But even outside of that, the phenomenon of the searchers and their wildly different approaches and theories proves fascinating.

It's hard to overstate what an international craze this was, the intensity and obsession of many of the searchers' approaches, and the complexity of their theories. A large portion of the book is taken up by the 'Case Histories' chapter wherein Gascoigne reprints solution submissions, which, as well as serving up many amusing submissions and escapades, also shows how vastly different mental edifices can be built on the same initial set of starting points, and how the pattern-seeking mind, gripped with a consuming idea, can make everything it finds fit into its initial assumptions.

The contest's disappointing denouement -- where the winner stumbled upon the location without understanding the actual puzzle, literally a day before a duo who had actually cracked the code located it themselves -- led many to believe this was yet another trick of Williams (yet another Masquerade!), and the contest was actually still on.
]]> Moxyland 9268456
Moxyland crackles with bold and infectious ideas, connecting a ruthless corporate-apartheid government with video games, biotech attack dogs, slippery online identities, a township soccer school, shocking cellphones, addictive branding, and genetically modified art.

A frighteningly persuasive high-tech fable for South Africa.]]> 384 Lauren Beukes 0857660055 Jlawrence 0 to-read 3.30 2008 Moxyland
author: Lauren Beukes
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.30
book published: 2008
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/05
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The City Inside 58724607
Joey is a Reality Controller in near-future Delhi. Her job is to supervise the multimedia multi-reality livestreams of Indi, one of South Asia’s fastest rising online celebrities—who also happens to be her college ex. Joey’s job gives her considerable culture power, but she’s too caught up in day-to-day crisis handling to see this, or to figure out what she wants from her life.

Rudra is a recluse estranged from his wealthy and powerful family, now living in an impoverished immigrant neighborhood. When his father’s death pulls him back into his family’s orbit, an impulsive job offer from Joey becomes his only escape from the life he never wanted.

But as Joey and Rudra become enmeshed in multiple conspiracies, their lives start to spin out of control—complicated by dysfunctional relationships, corporate loyalty, and the never-ending pressures of surveillance capitalism. When a bigger picture begins to unfold, they must each decide how to do the right thing in a world where simply maintaining the status quo feels like an accomplishment. Ultimately, resistance will not—cannot—take the same shape for these two very different people.]]> 244 Samit Basu 1250827485 Jlawrence 0 to-read 3.20 2020 The City Inside
author: Samit Basu
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.20
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/05
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Senlin Ascends (The Books of Babel, #1)]]> 35271523
Soon after arriving for his honeymoon at the Tower, the mild-mannered headmaster of a small village school, Thomas Senlin, gets separated from his wife, Marya, in the overwhelming swarm of tourists, residents, and miscreants.

Senlin is determined to find Marya, but to do so he'll have to navigate madhouses, ballrooms, and burlesque theaters. He must survive betrayal, assassins, and the long guns of a flying fortress. But if he hopes to find his wife, he will have to do more than just endure.

This quiet man of letters must become a man of action.

The first book in the stunning and strange debut fantasy series that's receiving major praise from some of fantasy's biggest authors such as Mark Lawrence and Django Wexler.]]> 448 Josiah Bancroft 0316517917 Jlawrence 0 to-read 4.08 2013 Senlin Ascends (The Books of Babel, #1)
author: Josiah Bancroft
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 4.08
book published: 2013
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/04/21
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Karate Chop 17934654 Karate Chop, Dorthe Nors's acclaimed story collection, is the debut book in the collaboration between Graywolf Press and A Public Space. These fifteen compact stories are meticulously observed glimpses of everyday life that expose the ominous lurking under the ordinary. While his wife sleeps, a husband prowls the Internet, obsessed with female serial killers; a bureaucrat tries to reinvent himself, exposing goodness as artifice when he converts to Buddhism in search of power; a woman sits on the edge of the bed where her lover lies, attempting to locate a motive for his violence within her own self-doubt. Shifting between moments of violence (real and imagined) and mundane contemporary life, these stories encompass the complexity of human emotions, our capacity for cruelty as well as compassion. Not so much minimalist as stealthy, Karate Chop delivers its blows with an understatement that shows a master at work.]]> 104 Dorthe Nors 1555976654 Jlawrence 0 to-read 3.66 2008 Karate Chop
author: Dorthe Nors
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.66
book published: 2008
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/11/12
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Rivers of London (Rivers of London, #1)]]> 9317452 392 Ben Aaronovitch 0575097566 Jlawrence 0 to-read 3.83 2011 Rivers of London (Rivers of London, #1)
author: Ben Aaronovitch
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.83
book published: 2011
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/11/12
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Our Lady of Darkness 102267
Middle-aged San Francisco horror writer Franz Westen is rediscovering ordinary life following a long alcoholic binge. Then one day, peering at his apartment window from atop a nearby hill, he sees a pale brown thing lean out his window…and wave.

This encounter sends Westen on a quest through ancient books and modern streets, for the dark forces and paramental entities that thrive amidst the towering skyscrapers of modern urban life…and meanwhile, the entities are also looking for him.

A pioneering work of modern urban fantasy, Our Lady of Darkness is perhaps Fritz Leiber’s greatest novel.
]]> 183 Fritz Leiber 0441644171 Jlawrence 5 to-read 3.68 1977 Our Lady of Darkness
author: Fritz Leiber
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.68
book published: 1977
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2021/11/12
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Zero and the One 30842441 A gothic twist on the classic tale of innocents abroad, THE ZERO AND THE ONE is a meditation on the seductions of friendship and the power of dangerous ideas that registers the dark, psychological suspense of Patricia Highsmith's The Talented Mr. Ripley and the intellectual and philosophical intrigue of John Banville's The Book of Evidence.

A shy, bookish scholarship student from a working-class family, Owen Whiting has high hopes of what awaits him at Oxford, only to find himself adrift and out of place among the university's dim aristocrats and posh radicals. But his life takes a dramatic turn when he is assigned to the same philosophy tutorial as Zachary Foedern, a visiting student from New York City. Rich, brilliant, and charismatic, Zach takes Owen under his wing, introducing him to a world of experiences Owen has only ever read about.

From the quadrangles of Oxford to the seedy underbelly of Berlin, they practice what Zach preaches, daring each other to transgress the boundaries of convention and morality, until Zach proposes the greatest transgression of all: a suicide pact. But when Zach's plans go horribly awry, Owen is left to pick up the pieces in the sleek lofts and dingy dives of lower Manhattan. Now he must navigate the treacherous boundary between illusion and reality if he wants to understand his friend and preserve a hold on his once bright future.]]> 272 Ryan Ruby 1455565180 Jlawrence 0 to-read 3.26 2017 The Zero and the One
author: Ryan Ruby
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.26
book published: 2017
rating: 0
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date added: 2021/10/18
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Fake Accounts 45732027 A woman in a post-election tailspin discovers that her boyfriend is an anonymous online conspiracy theorist in this provocative and subversive debut novel that examines social media, sex, feminism, and fiction, the connection they've all promised, and the lies they help us tell.

On the eve of Donald Trump's inauguration, a young woman snoops through her boyfriend's phone and makes a startling discovery: he's an anonymous internet conspiracy theorist, and a popular one at that. Already fluent in internet fakery, irony, and outrage, she's not exactly shocked by the revelation. Actually, she's relieved—he was always a little distant—and she plots to end their floundering relationship while on a trip to the Women's March in DC. But this is only the first in a series of bizarre twists that expose a world whose truths are shaped by online lies.

Suddenly left with no reason to stay in New York and increasingly alienated from her friends and colleagues, our unnamed narrator flees to Berlin, embarking on her own cycles of manipulation in the deceptive spaces of her daily life, from dating apps to expat meetups, open-plan offices to bureaucratic waiting rooms. She begins to think she can't trust anyone--shouldn't the feeling be mutual?

Narrated with seductive confidence and subversive wit, Fake Accounts challenges the way current conversations about the self and community, delusions and gaslighting, and fiction and reality play out in the internet age.]]> 272 Lauren Oyler 1948226928 Jlawrence 0 to-read 2.83 2021 Fake Accounts
author: Lauren Oyler
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 2.83
book published: 2021
rating: 0
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date added: 2021/10/18
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Iceberg 20779034
The Iceberg is an unflinching, honest exploration of staring death in the face, finding solace in strange places, finding beauty and even joy in the experience of dying. Written with extraordinary narrative force and power, it is almost shocking in its rawness. Nothing is kept from the reader: the fury, the occasional spells of selfishness, the indignity of being trapped in a hopeless situation. It is a story of pain and sadness, but also an uplifting and life-affirming tale of great fortitude, courage, determination � and above all, love.]]> 294 Marion Coutts 1782393501 Jlawrence 0 to-read 3.93 2014 The Iceberg
author: Marion Coutts
name: Jlawrence
average rating: 3.93
book published: 2014
rating: 0
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date added: 2021/08/20
shelves: to-read
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