I scored a bunch of hardbacks at Half Price Books. Three Connellys and this Hillerman and some other stuff. I saved the Hillermna for our trip to Llano.
I have this to say, "He's back." Skeleton Man wasn't as strong as some of his earlier stuff, but this one is a solid Leaphorn story. It's worth a read.
*** The South Beach Diet, Arthur Agatston, 2003
The first 120 pages of this book have info on blood chemistry and why the diet works. The rest is meal plans and recipes. I've already read up on glucose and cholesterol, so the book didn't tell me much I didn't know already.
However, I gleaned two factoids from the book. Insulin doesn't just regulate blood sugar. It regulates fuel, which means it also regulates fat as well. The other is that the sugar in beer (amusingingly called maltose) has a higher glycemic index than fructose, the sugar found in sodas. Wine is the better choice, which I knew already, but I didn't know why.
This diet (Phase Three) is pretty much the way we should all eat. I was already doing most of what it recommended just based on my own research, but there were some good suggestions and recipies, so it was worth the read.
The Woman is on board, so we've been doing a lot of cooking together, which has been fun. And I learned how to cook an omlet. I don't flip it, though. I'm not a show off.
Three stars for those interested in fixing your blood chemistry, eating better and living longer. Four stars for everyone else. Ha!
**Property Management for Dummies, Robert Griswold, 2001
I have stumbled upon the opportunity to become a slumlord. I read this book to decide if I wanted to or not. If you're faced with such a decision, this is a good book to read. The second edition just came out, so I'm going to check it out. It has a CD with forms and stuff. Cool.
I skimmed two other books, but they didn't have much that wasn't in this one.
*** The Shape of Mercy, Susan Meissner, 2008
The cover looks like a romance novel. I was certain I wouldn't like it, but had committed to reading at least one chapter. Wow.
First, it's not a romance novel. Second, this is good writing. It reminds me a little of Sleep Toward Heaven in that it's about three women: a college girl and an old woman in present day Santa Barbara, and a girl accused of being a witch in seventeenth century Salem. Susan weaves these three stories together expertly.
If you're looking for something fresh, give The Shape of Mercy a shot.
**Murder on the Rocks, Karen MacInerney, 2006
I met Karen at a Texas Writer's League happy hour a few years back. Just now got around to reading her book. Don't tell her!
Murder on the Rocks is a nice little mystery, good for an evening by the fire. It's not my favorite type of story. There's more cooking and romance than I normally require from my murder mysteries, and not enough jerks and social misfits. But a lot of folks love these more domestic/romantic whodunts. You might be one of them!
** Lives of the Signers of the Declaration of Independence, B J Lossing, 1848
The last time I visited my mother, I skimmed the shelves of my dad's books to see if there was anything interesting. I grabbed this book. The format is good for bedside reading, since there are 3 to 5 page biographical sketches of the 56 men who signed the D of I. Very informative.
However, the book is a riot of Capitalization, Commas, and Rhetoric. Here are some samples.
He took a prominent part in the debates respecting the independence of the Colonies, and voted for, and signed that glorious Declaration of American disenthralment. Soon after this act was consummated, he returned home and was immediately appointed by governor Trumbull and the Council of Safety, to the command of a detachment of Connecticut militia.
His clear perception saw the end from the beginning, and those delusive hopes which the repeal of obnoxious acts held forth, had no power over Lewis Morris. Neither could they influence his patriotism, for he was a stranger to a vacillating, temporizing spirit. He refused office under the Colonial government, for his domestic ease and comfort were paramount to the ephemeral enjoyment of place.
In many places it reads like a cross between an object lesson and a letter of recommendation. Here's a representative sample:
The life of Mr. Hopkins exhibits a fine example of the rewards of honest, persevering industry. Although his early education was limited, yet he became a distinguished mathematician, and filled almost every public station in the gift of the people, with singular ability. He was a sincere and consistent Christian, and the impress of this profession was upon all his deeds.
Overall, it's slow going. On the other hand, what's the hurry?
*** The Year of Living Biblically, A. J. Jacobs, 2007
I heard about this from The Other Son when the book-geek gang was planning the itinerary for the 2007 Texas Book Festival. We planned to go, but the session was at 7 pm and after a day of traipsing around and listening to authors, it was down to me and The SpyMan, who wanted to ditch and get sushi instead. So we did.
Fast forward six months and I get an email from a dedicated fan of the FredBooks telling me I was quoted in the book. I got a copy and sure enough, she was right. However, the quote is from an essay I published on Teh Interwebs in the mid ninties under a pen name. (A free autographed copy of the FredBook of your choice to the first non-Kelly person to identify the quote and the page number it is on. Those who I've already told about it are disqualified, of course.)
This is a very clever book and worth the read. Here's the story behind the book. It's broken up into short sections numbered by the days of the year, which makes it the perfect bedside book because you can read as much or as little as you like and always find a stopping point when you get tired or someone says, "Are you going to keep that light on all night?" (The proper answer to that is, "Yes, actually.)
** The Mists of Avalon, Marion Zimmer Bradley, 1982
Two stars for the general populace. For Arthurian lore fans, three stars. I've read several books, or series, based on Arthur and Camelot. My favortie is Mary Stewart's Merlin series, starting with The Crystal Cave. I also enjoyed Steinbeck's The Acts of King Arthur and His Noble Nights, Lawhead's Pendragon cycle, and amazingly enough for someone with a confirmed antipathy toward poetry, Tennyson's Idylls of the King, which is in the top 10 books I've read. You really should give it a shot.
Anyway, I found Mists in a library sale. It had been a while since I'd read any Arthurian stuff. I stuck it in The Stack and it followed me around from Texas to South Carolina to Arizona to Colorado to Hawaii and back to Texas.
It's a big book. I rank books by the size of animal they can kill if you throw it. At 900+ pages, it's in the rat-killing class and a little daunting to pick up and read, especially when you're on the go a lot. You should get credit for 2 or 3 books if you read this one! But one day I realized that the size meant it would stay open by itself, which made it the perfect book to read while working out.
It passed The Elliptical Test, but it could have been edited down by 200-300 pages without losing much except weight. What makes this story interesting is that it is told from the perspective of the women involved in the legend. There is also lots of exploration of Christianity vs the pagan religion or no religion, which is interesting for the first 400 pages or so, but begins to wear after a while.
As Lincoln said, "People who like this sort of thing will find this the sort of thing they like." I liked it.
*** Demon: A Memoir, Tosca Lee, 2007
I heard some good stuff about this one, and it was a Christy finalist, so I picked it as my plane reading on my trip back from Orlando. Good choice.
Tosca can write, boy howdy. Funny thing is, I was about halfway through when I realized that this is what The Shack could have been if Young was actually a good writer. If he had bothered to actually create a real story instead of flimsy cardboard props to hang his polemic on.
The story resonated with me the same way that many of the favorite books of my youth did. There are two stories developing along side each other, both fascinating. At first the story of the demon was interesting, but as the book progressed I became more involved in the story of the narrator.
Tosca's powers of description are formidable and compelling. I felt like I was there when the earth was created and Lucifer made his appearance, and when it was re-created after the rebellion. Powerful stuff, Maynard.
Highly recommended. Check http://www.toscamoonlee.com/ for more info on the book and what Tosca is up to now.
** R. Holmes & Co., John Kendrick Bangs, 1906
As a kid I devoured the Sherlock Holmes stories by Arthur Conan Doyle, and read them again many years later. However, Doyle is dead and he left behind only 4 novels and 56 short stories about Holmes. It doesn't take long to exhaust the oeuvre, so one must look beyond the canon for fresh material. A skim of the reading lists from 1992, 1994 and 1995, will reveal that I have amassed a decent collection of extra-canonical works, some brilliant, some abysmal.
R. Holmes & Co ranks below the middle of that scale. It's clever and diverting, but has, from my perspective, some fatal flaws that keep it from rising out of the ratings basement.
A bit of history may be in order for those not familiar with the genre. The character of Raffles, the gentleman thief, was created by E. W. Hornung, who was the brother-in-law of Doyle in the 1890s, the same time Doyle was writing the Holmes stories. Raffles is the evil twin of Holmes, brilliant and urbane, but using his powers for ill-gotten gain rather than for good.
In 1905, Bangs evidently got the idea to create a mash up of Raffles and Holmes, creating Raffles Holmes, the son of Sherlock Holmes and Marjorie Raffles, the daughter of Arthur Raffles, the thief. The second story in the collection chronicles how this came to pass.
My biggest compliant about the stories is that the premise makes no sense. Raffles Holmes seeks out the narrator, Jenkins, to make a bundle by having Jenkins publish his exploits as Dr. Watson did for Holmes and Bunny Manders did for Raffles. However, R. Holmes does some decidedly questionable and sometimes illegal things in the stories. If you're going to be deceiving folks to make money, you can hardly then publish the stories and expect to get away with it or continue to do so in the future.
My second complaint is that the language is unnecessarily stilted, even more so than the originals it draws from.
R. Holmes & Co is available at the Gutenberg Project if you want to check it out for yourself.
