Reading

The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon by Stephen King

/ Horror, Reading

★★★☆☆ | Horror | Audio | Borrow | StoryGraph | Goodreads

Continuing my quest to read all of the books by Stephen King. I listened to this one to start and then finished it on Kindle. We follow the story of a lost nine-year-old through the forests of Maine and New Hampshire over the course of a week, using the innings of a baseball game as chapter markers.  Trisha McFarland is a diehard Red Sox fan and closer Tom Gordon is her favorite player.  You can tell King is going through a baseball phase as he uses this story to share is love for the game though this precocious little girl.

…

The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon by Stephen KingRead More »

I Am Homeless If This Is Not My Home by Lorrie Moore

/ Literary Fiction, Reading

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

What to make of this confusing, author-indulgent, stream-of-continual-banter-and-bullshit book? Not much.

There are two stories that intersect in the most obscure ways: grief, longing for loved ones, perhaps a connection to the conspiracy beliefs of our modern day unreliable narrator? And what in the hell were we supposed to make of Lily, our bizarre and self-absorbed ghost?

…

I Am Homeless If This Is Not My Home by Lorrie MooreRead More »

The Life of Greece by Will Durant

/ ★★★★★, History, Reading

★★★★★ | History | Print | Own | StoryGraph | Goodreads

I paused reading this history to read The Odyssey by Homer to give me a better insight to that classic’s role in Greek history.

My mind seems most interested in philosophy these days, so my notes and highlights below tend to center on that area of the book vs. historical events, of which there were many.

…

The Life of Greece by Will DurantRead More »

The Deep Blue Good-by by John D MacDonald

/ Reading, Spy-Detective

★★★★☆ | Spy-Detective | Digital | Borrow | StoryGraph | Goodreads

My first John D. MacDonald novel–this one with his famous protagonist Travis McGee. I liked the Florida boat setting and MacDonald’s frequent use of sharing his opinions on excess consumerism, “normal” 9 – 5 living, and the vagaries of human nature. The writing about women is so dated, but this was written in 1964. 

…

The Deep Blue Good-by by John D MacDonaldRead More »

The Rubber Band by Rex Stout

/ Reading, Spy-Detective

★★★☆☆ | Spy-Detective | Digital | Borrow | StoryGraph | Goodreads

The third installment of the Nero Wolfe mystery series.  A muscle man who’s quite a thinker himself is the protagonist in these books.  Wolfe is the enigma that we collectively marvel at for his brilliance and idiosyncrasies.  Reading this book after just finishing Storycraft by Jack Hart forced me to look at the joinery work and finishing of the plot and how it moved along.  One of the downsides of studying the craft of writing is that some of the enthralling magic of the story fades away as you better understand what the author is doing.

…

The Rubber Band by Rex StoutRead More »

Lisey’s Story by Stephen King

/ Horror, Reading

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

This is my sixth Stephen King book I’ve finished over the past month.

Lisey’s Story started slowly and was confusing at times with so many flashbacks (including flashbacks within flashbacks, which can’t be easy to pull off as a writer).  While there is a supernatural element, the book centers on rebounding from grief, in this case, the death of Lisey’s husband.

…

Lisey’s Story by Stephen KingRead More »

The Colorado Kid by Stephen King

/ Mystery-Suspense, Reading

★★★☆☆ | Mystery-Suspense | Audio | Borrow | StoryGraph | Goodreads

I listened to this on audiobook and was put off by the strong Maine accent of the narrator — too heavy to be understood at first — but it slowly grew on me.

This is one of Stephen King‘s Hard Case Crime books (Joyland and Later were the other two and I’ve read them both).  I’ve wanted to buy a slew of books of this mystery/crime series just to have on the shelf for when I need a quick read.  I still might.

Spoiler follows …

…

The Colorado Kid by Stephen KingRead More »

Night Shift by Stephen King

/ ★★★★★, Horror, Reading

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

An amazing collection of early short stories.  My favorite — because of the utter difficulty I had in reading it — was The Ledge. The story involves the protagonist having to climb over a balcony railing on the 43rd floor of a luxury apartment building onto a 5″ ledge that he must use (without handholds) to climb around the entire building.  Gusting winds and pecking pigeons make him stagger and sway, along with his antagonist who is there watching and taunting him.  Mr. King tapped directly into my singular fear. I had to stop reading at different times and remind myself that it was fiction. I am sure my blood pressure was spiking. I tried to close my eyes a few times, but it’s awful hard to read with your eyes closed.  What a storyteller!

…

Night Shift by Stephen KingRead More »

The Odyssey by Homer

/ ★★★★★, Epics and Poetry, Reading

★★★★★ | Ancient | Print | Own | StoryGraph | Goodreads

It was high time I reread this classic.  I found the story much more engaging that The Iliad — crafty Odysseus and his wily ways.  There are so many stories in this epic that are embedded in our literary subconscious — Circe, Calypso, the Sirens, the Cyclops, revenge against the suitors, etc. Because of its legacy, I can’t rate this any lower than a five.  And yet, I didn’t find myself rooting for Odysseus after all his hubris and, in particular, thinking of all the grieving fathers who lost sons during his exploits.  And what for?

…

The Odyssey by HomerRead More »

Elevation by Stephen King

/ Horror, Reading

★★★☆☆ | Horror | Audio | Borrow | StoryGraph | Goodreads

I’m not sure what to make of this Stephen King book.  Mr. King narrated the audiobook, and he did a fine job. The premise was interesting: the main protagonist mysteriously began to lose touch with Earth’s gravity.  Besides this supernatural twist, the book dealt with the poor treatment of a LGBTQ couple in a small Maine town.   There were some fine moments of paradigm-shifting moments among the characters in the novel as they embraced inclusion. I can’t quite figure out the meaning of the main character’s elevation in the end. 

Attention Span by Gloria Mark

/ Psychology, Reading

★★☆☆☆ | Psychology | Print | Own | StoryGraph | Goodreads

An entire book dedicated to the premise that our devices and social media are harmful to our concentration.  Two hundred pages of studies, yet hardly any advice on how to mitigate the effects.  The final chapter dealt in platitudes.  This was a waste of time. 

The Collapsing Empire by John Scalzi

/ Reading, Science Fiction

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

A breezy space opera with interesting science (space flow systems that enable long distance FLT travel) and fun characters. Lady Kiva is the space version of Beth from Yellowstone.  First of a series and I will probably read them all.

The Big Rock Candy Mountain by Wallace Stegner

/ ★★★★★, Literary Fiction, Reading

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

A bleak, bleak story that could have been written about my upbringing.  I am giving this book a five-star rating because of the writing and how perfectly Stegner captured the angst of living in the perpetual get-rich-quick ambition that plagues some people.

…

The Big Rock Candy Mountain by Wallace StegnerRead More »

Scroll to Top