Tag Archives: book reviews

2018 Reading Re-cap: The Best of the Rest, Part I

Posted on February 16, 2019 by

“Acquiring even simple pieces of information physically alters the structure of our neurons”   writes John Medina in Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School (264 pages, paperback, published 2009) Maybe this is why I … Continue reading →

Posted in Books and Reading, Life, Music/Art/Literature/Culture | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

He Said, she Said: Memoirs and Biographies, Part I

Posted on February 2, 2019 by

“Hell is other people” said Sartre. Maybe so. But reading about them is an absolutely delicious pastime. I got up close and personal with some extraordinary folks via an even dozen biographies and memoirs in 2018. Here’s half of them: … Continue reading →

Posted in Books and Reading, Life | Tagged , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Friends don’t make friends read Faust (and other 2018 reading mishaps)

Posted on January 26, 2019 by

There we were, minding our own reading business, when out of the blue, our couples book club friend announced our next assignment: Faust by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. Yes, both volumes, I and II. (Insert Munch scream emoticon here) I … Continue reading →

Posted in Books and Reading, Life | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

2018 Reading Recap: books that made my heart beat faster.

Posted on January 19, 2019 by

I can be made perfectly happy by long books in which almost nothing happens. In general, the longer and the nothinger, the better. After all, there’s quite enough drama in the chicken yard to satisfy my need for suspense. But … Continue reading →

Posted in Books and Reading, Life | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 6 Comments

A different kind of travel: the 2018 book list.

Posted on January 12, 2019 by

Let’s put a bookmark in the river cruise for a bit – time to do the annual reading retrospective. To make it just a bit less jarring, we’ll start with four books from the 2018 reading list that echoed places we … Continue reading →

Posted in Books and Reading, Life | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Reading Recap: At Tens and Elevenses

Posted on February 17, 2018 by

I was going to entitle this the Top Ten, but I must have been at tens and elevenses that day. Because it turns out that it is actually ten plus one that crowd the tippy-top of my list. One so … Continue reading →

Posted in Books and Reading, Music/Art/Literature/Culture | Tagged , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Reading Recap: My Lucky 13

Posted on February 10, 2018 by

Oh, I am a jaded reader. Even time-honored classics don’t make my top ten these days. But after the way I savaged some people’s favorite books and then summarily dismissed others, this should surprise no one. I’m a slow reader and time … Continue reading →

Posted in Books and Reading, Music/Art/Literature/Culture | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment