Rate the last Book you read

The Terror by Dan Simmons

Wanted to read this before watching the series. I feel the book would have benefited from some serious editing - especially the long listings of who was alive and who was dead were really boring (and the updated lists were repeated multiple times during the book). There were interesting moments but narration was either skipping on fast-forward or dragging on meaningless detail. Despite of not being very good book it kind of raised my expectations for the series because the story is certainly there if only someone could tell it right. 3-/5

Excellent book

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I’m here only on Mondays, Wednesdays & Fridays. That’s why I’m here now.

Very interesting sad book about refugees who wash ashore (literally) on the island of Lampedusa, which is between the coast of Africa & Sicily. Fire at Sea is an excellent documentary on the same subject.

Annihilation by Jeff VanderMeer

I thought the movie was rather mediocre but decided to give the book a chance. As usual the book is very different from the film basically sharing only the basic idea of Area X. Book is also quite boring, just in a different way than the movie. Despite of this I'll continue to second part of the trilogy next.

2/5

Did not like this book. Yet another Marine memoir. Returned it for a refund.

Extremely interesting memoir from Jane Hawking, the former wife of Stephen Hawking. Lord, what this woman had to put up with until Stephen summarily left her for his nurse. A very strong woman who, many times, lived in unbearable circumstances whilst raising 3 children.

Authority by Jeff VanderMeer

Despite majority of reviews saying the opposite I actually liked this more than Annihilation. The first book was mostly pointless and meaningless wandering through Area X while the sequel was more about attempting to understand Area X. Lots of questions are still unanswered but Authority is an attempt at something coherent and resembles actual sci-fi unlike Annihilation that was closer to fantasy. Will continue to last book next.

3+/5

Readers are creaming themselves over this Italian anonymous author’s 4 volumes of Neapolitan memoirs. I hated the very 1st chapter of book 1 & returned it for a refund.

This was a good, short, read, but very repetitive. You can tell the author(s) didn't have alot of source information to draw from and I found the book reused alot of information/conclusions throughout several different chapters. But it's a book that needed to be written none the less. Right now, I picked up the "Godfather" of Mafia revisionist history, Joseph L. Albini's, Deconstructing Organized Crime: An Historical and Theoretical Study. I also usually read a fiction/history book at the same time, so I also picked up James Ellroy's White Jazz.

Terrific book.

Taking Flight
Michael Edmonds

I'm wanting to take a little more interest in birdwatching, and I thought this book would be an interesting look into the history behind it. The author spends the majority of the book elaborating on how ancient peoples used birds for symbolic and spiritual reasons. A lot different than I expected, which probably led to my dissatisfaction with it.

2/5

Hi there @chawhee. I may be able to recommend two books I have inadvertently acquired. I say inadvertently, because I recently took a private oath not to bring anymore books, magazines, brochures, etc. into my home to overload my quite overburdened bookshelves! Well I just broke that oath when a very earnest local environmental organization had a book sale to help support their efforts to save and maintain local natural areas. Sigh. How could I turn away? 🙄At any rate, I am a nature loving, tree hugger lol and have in the last couple of years become more interested in birds. Since I frequent the woodland paths and ponds near me, I always see and hear them. So two of these books that I have recently adopted may be of interest to you- they are older editions - but I'm sure you can find them online, or in the library.

1- The Life of Birds - David Attenborough. A thick tome I have just started skimming through; lots of info on behavior ( which I'm more interested in than just naming or counting species).

2- Birds -the Little Giudes series - consultant editor Joseph M. Forshaw- I'd give this a 5 out of 5 rating, even though it's similar to those pocketbook Audubon bird books. Too big to be a pocketbook, but small and handy enough to frequently consult. Has lots of interesting facts - for instance, insect eating birds are often foraging together, for efficiency and to thwart predators. Other birds are loners, except during breeding season.

Both books have an ample amount of good pictures. Enjoy!

PS - Typo - Birds is from the Little Guides series. Published by
Fog City Press
814 Montgomery Street
San Francisco, Ca. 94133 reprinted 2003

This is on muni to read list. I loved the movie and from what I hear about the book, it digs into a lot of what I loved in the movie.

I'm still reading the last book but I can say this: I don't agree with the decision to split the story into three books. First book is nothing more than extended introduction and last two books are just the main story split into half. As a part of the whole Annihilation works better than 2/5 I gave it. It's mandatory for the story but slightly too long.

Books are definitely better than the movie, in my opinion, unless something drastically stupid happens in the end. I though the film was like long Twilight Zone episode (which may be good thing for some).

My intro to Ketchum. Always wanted to read something from him but never did until now. This was good but I did have to put it down a couple of times. It's brutal/gut wrenching stuff.

Then finished this one pretty quick (I couldn't put it down) and it immediately jumps to one of my favorites:

Briefly, what is it about? I’m intrigued now.

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LOVED this book. Never read it before last year for some reason.

Wasn’t too bad, but went on & on. Got fatigued & decided to get a refund before my 7 days trial ended.

At it's core it's about a teenage girl and her younger sister who are sent to live with their divorced aunt and her sons after a car crash kills both of their parents. The aunt is all kinds of messed up, as are her kids, and eventually they (along with other neighborhood kids) begin to torture the older sister. Now, I don't want to give the impression that it's torture porn because it isn't. It cuts way deeper than that. It explores some of the same themes as The Lord of the Flies just much, much, much more disturbing. I'm a huge fan of horror and I've never read anything that gut punched me like this.

Get done with this one and you just want to read some Shel Silverstein for a week.

@hey Frederick, I loved the movie version of Lord of the Flies, but never read anything like this book you describe. Will Wiki Jack Ketchum & maybe add book to my amazon wishlist. Never heard of Shel Silverstein either.