Reading

Dune by Frank Herbert

/ ★★★★★, Reading, Science Fiction

★★★★★ | Science Fiction | Print | Own | StoryGraph | Goodreads 

Rereading one of the first books I was enthralled with as an adult is a trip. I remembered parts of it vividly, but there were huge gaps.

Herbert must have used the Pacific Northwest as his guide for Caladan, but when did he visit the desert? I could not help but compare Vashon and Arizona as Caladan and Arrakis.

Dune is a classic Hero’s Journey, which must have still seemed fresh in 1965.  So many parts of this book are still relevant.

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Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin

/ Literary Fiction, Reading

★★★★☆ | Literary Fiction | Digital | Own | StoryGraph | Goodreads 

This was a good book. I liked the characters and the storyline. The reasons Sam and Sadie found to be mad at the other were a little frustrating, but I think that’s ultimately the lesson they each needed to learn. The portrayal of grief and loss was really well done.

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The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov

/ Literary Fiction, Reading

★★★☆☆ | Literary Fiction | Print | Own | StoryGraph | Goodreads 

A strange, strange book.  So many Russian named-characters with small bit parts. So many references to Russian literature and culture that I failed to grasp. The story of the devil coming to Moscow to … what? Save the master who wrote a true story about Pontius Pilate? I am utterly confused.  I’m giving this book three stars, but only because at times the story turned interesting.  I still have no idea what this allegory represented.

Legends & Lattes by Travis Baldree

/ Fantasy, Reading

★★★★☆ | Fantasy | Digital | Borrow | StoryGraph | Goodreads 

I understand why this book is so often described as a cozy read.  It’s filled with nice, helpful characters who work together to make nice things – like a coffee shop with delicious baked goods. Yes, there are bad guys, but of course kindness prevails in the end.

Holly by Stephen King

/ Horror, Reading

★★★★☆ | Horror | Digital | Borrow | StoryGraph | Goodreads

My 14th Stephen King book in 2023 and his most recent.  The setting was some unnamed city in the Northeast, close to Philly maybe, during the second year of COVID-19.  A big theme here was the idiocy of anti-maskers and anti-vaxxers and Trump supporters.  While I agree with King on these three groups, it felt very preachy in a horror novel.  But, the story itself was good enough to look past this.  In this one, there was no supernatural element at all, just the pure evil of two elderly professors preying on young “livestock” to prolong their own lives. 

The Private Library by Reid Byers

/ ★★★★★, Books and Libraries, Reading

★★★★★ | Reading and Books | Print | Own | StoryGraph | Reid Byers Website | Readwise

Two Quotes:

Book-wrapt — that beneficient feeling of being wholly imbooked, beshelved, inlibriated, circumvolumed, peribibliated … it implies the traditional library wrapped in shelves of books, and the condition of rapt attention to a particular volume, and the rapture of of being transported to the wood beyond the world.

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