Two Vampire Cats by Jannie Ho
I have wanted to read Two Vampire Cats by Jannie Ho for about two weeks now. Or ever since I saw the advanced reader copy I found. It is a silly book about two vampire cats, a ghost and their town. For the adult reader there isn’t a lot of bite, but for kids it is worth the reading trip. This is for about ages 5 to young 8-9. It works as a read aloud or a first solo read with help, and the older […]
Art Club by Rashad Doucet
Art Club by Rashad Doucet is fun. It has a modern take on things, has a mostly diverse cast, and while we know the coming of age story, it is fresh. Best for ages 10 and up (younger can read, but I’m not sure the concepts would be okay for some. Content is fine). There were a few bumps (things solved too conveniently, a few cliches for the adult characters) but overall everything works well. The idea is how the adults in our main character’s […]
Trust by Hernan Diaz
Read as part of CBR14Bingo: Dough. The book involves a man who makes a lot of money (“dough”) off the stock market in the 20s and 30s and how stories revolve around him. I was excited to get this one given both the premise and reviews. I have a yen for these kinds of neo-Gatsby stories set in the early part of the 20th century that examine finance and/or gangsterism juxtaposed with the American Dream. Legs by William Kennedy qualifies for this label, as does Jennifer Egan’s Manhattan […]
Finance for the People: Getting a Grip on Your Finances by Paco De Leon
Does money stress you out? Were you born into a working class family? Finance for the People is for you! Paco De Leon has written a pragmatic yet empathetic book about how to take care of ourselves in this economy. De Leon talks about why people are weird about money, the stories we tell ourselves about money, and then she unveils her Pyramid of Financial Awesomeness. Chapters are based on each little section of the Pyramid. This makes for an easy-to-follow structure, and each chapter […]
Seduction: Sex, Lies, and Stardom in Howard Hughes's Hollywood by Karina Longworth
You’ve seen The Aviator, yes? If not, maybe you know that it’s about Howard Hughes? Yes- the Spruce Goose guy. Yes, the keep on failing upwards guy. Yes, the “keep your pee in jars” guy. We’ve all heard or seen at least a little bit about Howard Hughes. His reach was wide and heavy, and he swept away businesses, careers, and entire studios in his wake. Karina Longworth, author of Seduction and podcaster extraordinaire, covered Howard Hughes’s Hollywood during a whole season of her phenomenal podcast a […]
Money: The True Story of a Made-Up Thing by Jacob Goldstein
We Are All Monsters Here by Kelley Armstrong
Money: The True Story of a Made-Up Thing by Jacob Goldstein (4 stars) What, exactly, is money? How does it work? Why does it work? How did it develop? What I’ve always assumed, and what I think most people who think about it assume, is that money evolved from early barter economies. Instead of selling, for instance, crops for money, early farmers would exchange crops for things that they needed. So a farmer would have to find, say, a potter and exchange a bushel of […]
