The Secret History by Procopius
I like a good secret history. I learned about this book from various book lists and of course from Donna Tartt swiping the title. But I got my first real sense of it from the work of Susan Wise Bauer, specifically "The History of the Medieval World" which borrows heavily from this historian (both … [Read more]
The Original by Brandon Sanderson; Mary Robinette Kowal
A novella co-written by Sanderson and Kowal, and with every co-written book like this, especially when I know both authors' work to a certain degree, I spend a lot of time thinking about who must have written what. It's not like a lot of Brandon Sanderson works, but it's not quite what I know from … [Read more]
Blood in the Water: The Attica Prison Uprising of 1971 and Its Legacy by Heather Ann Thompson
This is a recent history of the Attica Prison uprising, some of its root causes, and decades-worth of aftermath. I wasn't alive for Attica, and so it was mostly a cultural meme in my lifetime, but specifically its use in the Sydney Lumet movie "Dog Day Afternoon" with Al Pacino calling out "Attica! … [Read more]
Behind the Scenes by Karelia Stetz-Waters
This was such a frustrating reading experience for me. I started out really engaged. I loved the tone, the characters were interesting, I loved the pugs and I wanted see how Rose and Ash would come together. By a third of the way through I was flagging and by the end I was frustrated. Rose is … [Read more]
Feel the Bern by Andrew Shaffer
CBR15 Passport Challenge: Books from different countries #1 When Crash, a new intern working for Bernie Sanders, accompanies her boss up to a small-town festival in Vermont, the last thing she expects is to discover a dead body - or that Bernie will insist on trying to solve the mystery. A few … [Read more]
Vinyl Resting Place by Olivia Blacke
Olivia Blacke’s Vinyl Resting Place is the first book in The Record Shop Mysteries, and also my first ever “cozy” mystery. If they’re all like this, I’m in! In Vinyl Resting Place, Juniper Jessup is looking for something new. And maybe, something familiar. After getting laid off from her cool … [Read more]
