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chan_fry's reviews
164 reviews
4.0
I’m sure that my 40-year fascination with the Star Wars stories influenced my score here, but I thought this set of books was better than average for Star Wars novels. Especially given the constraints under which the author had to labor — the timeline and galactic politics here was fairly well laid out before her, as were descriptions of most of the characters she had to deal with.
In fact, it was that last bit that took off the extra star for me; there were certainly times when the reader could tell the author was simply filling in gaps on a pre-existing story outline. Still, it’s enjoyable, well-written, and entirely ret-conned by Solo and Rogue One.
(I have published a longer review on my website.)
4.0
(3.8 of 5)
A well-written and logically constructed book, which sometimes suffers from needlessly complex prose, this book examines the history of anti-intellectualism in the United States and how it has come back into vogue once more. Since I read it just after finishing Al Gore’s similarly focused 2007 book The Assault On Reason, I couldn’t help but compare the two; this one is by far stronger and less-contradictory.
Like Gore, Jacoby asserts that modern technology (primarily the TV) bears much of the blame, though she builds a much stronger argument for it than Gore did. Personally, I think both are somewhat correct on this, yet also hesitant to blame us. There’s no question that TV, the internet, iPods, and so on were going to change the way we absorb information, enjoy pop culture, and communicate generally, but we (the collective “all of us” we) went into this knowingly, being made aware of the dangers and pitfalls, and we chose to be acquiescent. Maybe.
(I have published a longer review on my website.)
4.0
(4.4 of 5)
For a novelization of a screenplay, this is truly well done — it reads like a novel. Yet at the same time, it moves beat-for-beat, line-by-line with the film (which I watched again just after reading this). It helps that I already considered Rogue One to be the best of the Star Wars movies, for a variety of reasons mentioned in the longer review on my website.
5.0
At the time I read this, I was working at a newspaper in Seminole County, Okla., less than an hour’s drive from the events described in this (true crime) book; I knew a handful of the people involved, including multiple attorneys and investigators. I was amazed at the accuracy of Grisham’s descriptions of their personalities, the surrounding area, the courtrooms, etc.
The narrative itself was gripping, harrowing even, and I couldn’t put the book down. At I time when I regularly took weeks or months to finish a book, I whipped through this one in four days.
(In 2008, I published a longer review on my website.)
2.0
The upsides are the usual: fast-paced action, colorful and precise descriptions, and the ever-lovable Robert Langdon. The downsides are at times hilarious and other times cringe-worthy, like the multiple pages of PR for the Free Masons because part of the plot hinges on (spoiler) the whole country will fall apart if the public finds out certain leaders are Masons. This is absurd, considering it’s long been public knowledge how many presidents and congresspersons are Masons.
There’s more, which I covered in my longer review on my website.
4.0
I read this in The Best Of Elizabeth Bear (not Hieroglyph as shown in the cover image on Goodreads). It was brief and quick, and I suppose could be classified as a “thriller”. A psychopathic serial killer has been “rightminded” via chemicals and surgery, but then encounters a dangerous situation. Worth reading.
4.0
My actual rating is 3.36 — if I average individual ratings for 22 stories. A couple, I rated 5 stars, but most fell into the 2-4 range. I only gave one story 1 star. But somehow the book is more than the sum of its parts.
Jemisin is impressive in her ability to switch styles, jump from one genre to another, take up widely disparate viewpoints, and present deliciously interesting worlds. Two things about her writing stand out to me: (1) her descriptions of food — I felt I could taste the concoctions in L’Alchimista and Cuisine des Mémoires, something I rarely feel in fantasy/sci-fi. And (2) her descriptions of people — when she does describe appearances of people, it sometimes feels like a photograph. Also, of course, the wide variety of people she presents to the reader is outstanding.
(I have written a longer review on my website, which includes mini-reviews of each of the 22 stories.)
EDIT: Goodreads "merged" (without asking or telling me) a couple of short-story reviews into this review of an anthology. I have now edited this review to remove them.
4.0
This was a dense but informative book that compares and contrasts the 20th Century’s two most infamous dictators in every detail. (I wrote a longer review back in 2009.)
4.0
(4.4 of 5) My least favorite of the trilogy, but only by a hair; this was still very enjoyable. Likely, I'll write a longer review tomorrow.
EDIT: I did write a longer review if you’re interested. One thing I thought of as I was wrapping up was how it looked like Sawyer intended to extend this series. In this final book, several new threads were introduced that might have made compelling sequels.
4.0
This was quite the eye-opener when I read it in 2009, as I was almost entirely unaware of the Dutch contributions to the North American colonies. I enjoyed the descriptions and the wealth of information Shorto presented here. (And at the time I wrote a longer review.)