| |
|
The View from the Center of the Universe: Discovering Our Extraordinary Place in the Cosmos 38 reviews
Joel R. Primack, Nancy Ellen Abrams
Riverhead Hardcover, 2006
The View from the Center of the Universe
+ Keeping Up With the Universe
+ The View from the Center of the Universe
This is my second purchase of this book as I bought one to share. The video which comes with the book is also worthy to be shared.
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
Reading Like a Writer: A Guide for People Who Love Books and for Those Who Want to Write Them (P.S.)78 reviews
Francine Prose
Harper Perennial, 2007
Read Well to Write Well
+ Nothing Superflous
+ a very helpful guide to reading wisely
Author Francine Prose's latest non-fiction book Reading Like a Writer, a Guide for People who Love Books and for Those who Want to Write Them, brings to the study to literature exactly what the study of literature needs: literature. She reads a text for what it offers as a unique assemblage of ...
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
The One Percent Doctrine: Deep Inside America's Pursuit of Its Enemies Since 9/11134 reviews
Ron Suskind
Simon & Schuster, 2007
overall, very good book
I know this book has been out there for a couple of years, but I just read it a week or so ago.
I especially was intrigued by the author's argument the decision to invade Iraq was made in late 2001, if not before.
I suspect the invasion of Iraq would have occurred even if 9/11 had not ...
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
The Razor's Edge 140 reviews
W. Somerset Maugham
Vintage, 2003
Doesn't Cut Deep Enough
+ Full with the colors of the 1920's flamboyance
+ Amazon product
The Razor's Edge is one of Somerset Maugham's most beloved novels. It's the story of Larry Darrow, an aviator so damaged by the carnage of World War I that he refuses to jump on the capitalist carousel in post-war Chicago. Instead he devotes his life to searching out the true and the good. His ...
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
Terrorist: A Novel 144 reviews
John Updike
Ballantine Books, 2007
Important book- flaws are minor
The story here is well described by other reviewers. Mr Updike sets out to answer two questions that have haunted Americans since 9/11 i.e., why do they hate us and what makes someone become a terrorist. The answer to both questions is the same. Two words, the Koran. Hatred of infidels is ...
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
The Emperor's Children (Vintage) 242 reviews
Claire Messud
Vintage, 2007
The Vanities Before the Bonfire
+ Intelligent and sophisticated
The novel captures with perfect pitch the shallowness of American culture in the last blissful days before September 11. It's strength rests on terrifically drawn characters, flushed out in so many subtle and nuanced ways. I think Bootie may be my new hero. The irony is that he far more ...
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
Rant: An Oral Biography of Buster Casey121 reviews
Chuck Palahniuk
Doubleday, 2007
An Amazing Book!
+ Great
+ Thanks
+ Go Chuck Go!
+ Like I told you, I didn't really meet Rant Casey until after he was dead
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
Mayflower: A Story of Courage, Community, and War278 reviews
Nathaniel Philbrick
Penguin (Non-Classics), 2007
book review
+ A Good Read
+ A great, mythbusting yarn
+ Riveting Historical Novel of America's Early History
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
State of Denial: Bush at War, Part III315 reviews
Bob Woodward
Simon & Schuster, 2006
Woodward tells it like it is.
+ Straightforward blow-by-blow of starting the war in Iraq
+ Bureaucratic Politics
Bob Woodward once again shows his ablity as a writer. His book is not partisan and clearly states the background regardin Bush' decision to take the country to war. It is easy to read and quite informaive regardless of your political ideology. I would highly recommend it to those who don't feel ...
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
Snow135 reviews
Orhan Pamuk
Vintage, 2005
I love this book
+ An engaging listen
Although it was kind of hard to get into at first, it was well worth it. Orhan Pamuk really takes on modern day issues in this book, and it helps you understand that part of the world a little better.
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
Russian Debutante's Handbook85 reviews
Gary Shteyngart
Riverhead Trade, 2003
dazzling
+ Choppy, original, and, hilarious.
I am glad to see the term "picaresque" applied to this novel, for it truly belongs within that genre. But while the story bounds along, at times verging on the highly improbable, the language dazzles on every page - in every paragraph, in fact. The author, to whom English was (I imagine) a 2nd or ...
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
Divisadero74 reviews
Michael Ondaatje
Knopf, 2007
Superb poetic storytelling
+ Murky Parallels, Marvellous Prose
+ Misty but elegant
+ Enraptured by Ondaatje's style
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
Catfish and Mandala: A Two-Wheeled Voyage Through the Landscape and Memory of Vietnam113 reviews
Andrew X. Pham
Picador, 2000
Andrew's website is at www.andrewxpham.com, other info
+ A beautifully wrought return to one's complicated past
+ a random and beautiful encounter
+ . . arriving at the place where you started. . .and knowing it for the first time
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
The Zero: A Novel19 reviews
Jess Walter
Harper, 2006
A devastating novel
+ Makes you think!
Let me say first that this novel does not make sense in the way your average novel will. It is probably not as patriotic as anything else you've read that retells the story of 9/11. Or as sympathetic. But it is definitely the most compassionate. THE ZERO tells the story of Brian Remy, a cop who was ...
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
Poor People13 reviews
William T. Vollmann
Ecco, 2007
Subnormality
+ Poverty: The Deep Cuts
+ Part John McPhee, part Hunter S. Thompson
+ Hard to read? Hardly.
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
Absurdistan: A Novel106 reviews
Gary Shteyngart
Random House Trade Paperbacks, 2007
Slow start, finishes with a bang.
+ Another fascinating tale
+ Prophetic!
+ Not a book to leave around for your teenage sons to read
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
Black Swan Green: A Novel63 reviews
David Mitchell
Random House Trade Paperbacks, 2007
Survivors of Adolescence Unite!
+ Wonderful coming of age novel
+ Black Swan Succeeds
The characters in this book, from the narrator/protagonist 13-year-old Jason Taylor, to those who make the briefest of appearances, are so richly drawn, so multi-layered, and speak with such convincing dialogue, that the created world of the small English town of the title becomes as real as the ...
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
The Road (Oprah's Book Club)1607 reviews
Cormac McCarthy
Vintage Books, 2007
A Road To Treasure
You know who they are. Those people that get upset when stories are told that aren't a sugar coated version of the world, stories that seem like they were written by authors who truly believe that ignoring cold, hard reality is the best medicine.
Cormac McCarthy is not one of those authors. At ...
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
Girl With Curious Hair27 reviews
David Foster Wallace
W. W. Norton & Company, 1996
DFW, Fiction and DFW and Fiction
+ "John Billy" levitates !
+ Brilliant, funny, disturbing
Okay, so here's the deal w/ DFW: the guy is extremely intelligent. he is also overtly aware of his intelligence and displays it all over the place. this bothers people. some things to remember and know about DFW: he was a philo. major as an undergrad; his first book was an investigation of the ...
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
On Chesil Beach: A Novel215 reviews
Ian McEwan
Nan A. Talese, 2007
The Tragedy of Assumptions, Especially in Love
+ Don't Let Your Hubris Be Your Hamartia
+ True to Ian McEwan's form...a beautiful story
+ heartbreaking
|
|
|
|
|
|
