Family and Friends

Breaking!

Those of you who know about my skating probably thought this post was going to be different. In order to satisfy your blood-lust, I’ll tell you: the thumb still hurts. There! Are you happy now?!? No, the true purpose is to announce a friend’s new book, now available at Amazon. You already know from my hobbies that my judgement is gold, so go pick up a copy or three. AND, if you…
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Kitchen Sink

An act of betrayal

I can’t bring myself to read No Country For Old Men. I’ve tried picking it up three times now, but I can’t get through a handful of pages. It looks like a good book, and it comes highly recommended by a friend, but I just can’t do it. Maybe later, after a transitional book, but not now. I bought a few books before my Tallahassee trip, and No Country was the last one left.
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Kitchen Sink

The Liar's Diary

The Liar’s Diary is a book by Patry Francis, a New England author with cancer. In her case the disease has been particularly cruel; it threw her a curve at a time when most authors are out promoting their book – right now. Since she can’t get out to promote the book on her own, one of her friends organized a group of bloggers to do it for her. And so far it’s apparently…
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Kitchen Sink

Stoked

I was blog browsing this fine Friday evening, when I saw a link to Al Gore’s recent book at Amazon. It sparked a memory. A few months ago I got an email from Al encouraging me to check it out, but I was disappointed to find it wasn’t available in my preferred format: ebook. Curious, I wandered over to ereader.com this evening to see if my favorite tech savvy politician was now…
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Kitchen Sink

Clarification

I haven’t been particularly lazy this last month or so, and I’ve been doing just as much reading as ever, but one of the last books I tried reading was a terrible bore. I say this because a new book recently appeared in the recent reads portion of this site, and the length of time between updates has nothing to do with the book that was added (“Benighted,” by Kit…
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Kitchen Sink

The worst teaser ever

You would never read the ending of a book first, because it spoils the rest of the book knowing what happens. Now imagine you just read the first book in a series and there was a teaser chapter at the end for the second book. This book had such a chapter, and it was o.k., so I went ahead and bought the second book. I got about a third of the way through the second book and there was no sign of the…
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Kitchen Sink

Off balance: a belated review

Presumption number one: you pay attention to the books I read. Presumption number two: anyone is paying attention at all. My first impression of Harry Turtledove follows his naming strategy… he’s awfully repetitive. Have you ever read a book where the author continuously reminds you what the character’s motivations are? Chapter 1: “… Jack was uneasy, his acne proof of…
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