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robinwalter's Reviews (1.87k)

Germany: A Nation in Its Time: Before, During, and After Nationalism, 1500-2000

4.75

challenging informative reflective tense medium-paced

A very informative read. Densely packed, especially in the first half, with so many maps of the various incarnations of what would become Germany. The section on 1933-1945 managed to shock and stun even though the key elements were well-known, the sheer mass of statistics was horrific. The final sections, on Germany after 1945, were among the most informative for me.

Where the Crawdads Sing

Delia Owens

2.75

emotional slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Too long, way too long. Also, all the key plot developments were obvious from the beginning. I simply could not get into this book. There's an old Zydeco song I used to listen to a lot 30 years ago, "whatever boils your crawfish". THAT crawfish sang to me, this one did not.

How You Say It: Why You Talk the Way You Do--And What It Says about You

Katherine D Kinzler

4.0

A very interesting look at the role of language in forming social distinctions and biases, even from infancy. Overall, I enjoyed the book a lot, but did have a few issues with it:

1. A very US-centric approach. Understandable, but it would have been interesting to see similar data from other Anglophone countries, especially those less insular about BEING Anglophone.

2. Insisting on calling different Sinitic languages “dialects” of Chinese. The author acknowledges that many of these “dialects" are, quote, “mutually unintelligible”. If they are mutually unitelligible, they are different languages, not dialects.

Calling an L1 a “mother tongue”, and not just as a figure of speech, but literally, as the speech of a child's mother. In the section headed “Mother tongue”, the author repeatedly talks about the way babies react to the language their “mom speaks”. By no means every child hears their mother speak to them, for some children, the primary caregiver/language seeder might be a father.

Another interesting aside - she talks about how Hindi has 4 "d" sounds that English speakers tend to lump together as indistinguishable. Despite not starting to learn Hindi until I was in my late 30s, I had no trouble learning the difference between ड, ड़, ढ, and ढ़ . More significantly still, my very monolingual Anglophone wife was also quite easily able to hear the distinction between the aspirated and non aspirated versions.

Cybernetic Revolutionaries: Technology and Politics in Allende's Chile

Eden Medina

4.25

challenging informative medium-paced

This was a fascinating read. A really interesting look at a technology project I'd never heard of and an in depth analysis of the interaction between technology and politics. It is paerhaps particularly interesting to note how two of the leading figurs in the account ended up 'swapping places' on the political spectrum as a result of the directions their life journeys took subsequent to the project they effectively co-authored.

Bossypants

Tina Fey

4.25

challenging funny lighthearted reflective medium-paced

It's a trite aphorism, but Ms Fey is indeed seriously funny. Insightful, acerbic, unapologetic and so very, VERY funny. This book delivered exactly what was on the box.

About a Rogue

Caroline Linden

DID NOT FINISH: 4%

not my taste

Venezuela: What Everyone Needs to Know®

Miguel Tinker Salas

4.0

informative reflective medium-paced

A very helpful summary of the history of a couyntryI knew little about. The clear pro-Chavez bias in the concluding 20% was an informative counterbalance to contrary bias common in coverage of Chavez and Venezuela from the West