At 766 pages, this book sort of fits my Read Loooong Books criteria for my CBR8. The main reason why I chose to read this again is that the third book in this stellar trilogy by Justin Cronin is coming out in May and I wanted to get back up to speed. Diving back into this book has been a great experience, which is kind of odd to say about a world where humanity is on the brink of extinction, but there it is. I […]
Simplicity was easier than precision
City on Fire is the second book in my quest this year to settle in and read loooooong works. I remember hearing about this 900+ page novel last fall when it came out, but didn’t really register much beyond “sprawling tale of NYC and the punk scene in the late 70’s” and the fact that this first-time author commanded a 2 million dollar advance. When I spied it on the first table at the bookstore a couple of weeks ago it was the heft of […]
Not that I’m an irresponsible or careless person, I’ve just got really bad judgement
Jo Nesbo is taking a break (perhaps forever) from the wildly popular Harry Hole crime novels. In this interim, he has produced The Son, a taut standalone thriller and two books in the so-called Blood on Snow trilogy. I read and reviewed Blood on Snow last year and was less than wowed by it, so I came to Midnight Sun with a fair amount of skepticism. Continuing in the loosely linked milieu of Oslo’s underworld in the 70’s, Jon is a fixer for the Fisherman. […]
The kiss he placed on the forehead of his drowsy wife was solemn and sincere
Man, that Madame Maigret is some kind of saint. They were all packed for their annual holiday in Alsace, where Madame could reconnect with family and spend the time making preserves and brandies. Then Maigret got a letter from a boyhood friend, beseeching him to help a young former student of his who was accused of murder. Just like that, the Alsace sojourn is cancelled as they schlep off to some crappy little fishing village on the coast of the Atlantic. The captain of the […]
See what courage sounds like
I usually sit down and bash out a review shortly after turning the last page, mindful that I harness the swirling thoughts and ideas I have about the latest book before they are lost to the ether (or one too many glasses of single malt scotch). Subtle and refined I’m not. So here I sit, staring at that blinking cursor, wondering if I can do this book justice with my customary slapdash manner. And then I decide that it will have to do, because whether […]
she decided to think about nothing but the present and not to give a fig about the future
1359 pages. 1359 pages!!! I don’t know what the frak I was thinking when I took this book on. Or rather, I do know what I was thinking and now I have come around to believe that this was some kind of book fever insanity. After CBR7’s breakneck pace and 230 reviews, I took a break and thought about what I wanted to do with my CBR8. Last years’ accomplishment went way beyond my original plan to simply step out of my comfort zone and […]
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