If my last book (The Fireman) surprised me with relevance to our current political climate when I was looking for escapism, this one had the exact opposite effect. I bought the book on remainder on the strength of Shriver’s work, having loved Double Fault, The Post-Birthday World, and of course, We Need to Talk About Kevin (thank god I read that one before getting pregnant). I didn’t so much as look at the back cover and had no clue as to the book’s subject matter, […]
We don’t need no water
I need to preface this by saying outright: I wasn’t disappointed by this book. But damn, if you’re looking for escapism from the current political climate (which I kind of was) this is not the story to read right now. Our hero Harper is our guide through the dawn of the probable extinction of man. A virus called dragonscale is causing people to spontaneously combust. A former school nurse volunteering at a hospital when skilled professionals become scarce, she makes an ally of the titular […]
Joe Hill is the Best Thing Stephen King Has Created
After reading the underwhelming Rooms, and with the real life horror of the inauguration yesterday, I needed a sure thing to scratch my supernatural itch. Enter Joe Hill. Ever since Locke and Key, I’ve been a fan, and this is from someone who read too much of his dad’s coke-fueled 80s novels to be charitably inclined toward the family. Joe Hill had to win me over at first, but there’s no true believer like a convert. 20th Century Ghosts didn’t disappoint; a collection of short […]
Room for improvement
Lauren Oliver’s Rooms was another book I picked up out of thriftiness; I am powerless before the charms of Barnes and Noble’s remainders table. That said, whereas my last review was for a dollar book, this was a whopping five, and even I need a hook to part me from a five spot. It looked literary but spooky, ghosts haunting a house, and I was in the mood for something Joe Hill-ish, but really it was the dust jacket blurb from Lev Grossman that sold […]
Prodigal Summer
I have a terrible habit that got me started on cannonball read. We can blame my father; he’s the sort of man to order the extra mega jumbo size when only a small is needed because “it was only a quarter more!” I don’t need a swimming pool sized Coca Cola, but I definitely ascribe to the philosophy that one can never have too many books, and I’m in a very nice city for thrifting. So, having just finished Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, I couldn’t resist […]
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