Bookwi.se – Page 136 – A few thoughts about books, kindles and Christianity

Most Read Book Reviews for May 2014

June 1, 2014 by Adam Shields

Below are the eight most read book reviews over the past month. I am very excited that three of the eight are from Bookwi.se Contributors. I very much appreciate that others are contributing reviews to Bookwi.se. Without them this blog would not be nearly as good.

Orange is the New Black by Piper Kerman (TV/Book Review)

June 1, 2014 by All Old Users

Orange Is the New Black is a memoir written by Piper Kerman that chronicles the year that she spent in a minimum-security prison. The book starts with Kerman describing her college years and the events that ended up landing her in prison and ends with her release from prison after serving twelve months of a fifteen-month sentence.

In the memoir, Kerman describes many of the unique people she meets and events she experiences in prison. I found it undeniably entertaining to read about the Russian cook, the Dominican bunkmate, the politically geared warden, and delinquent electric shop manager, among others. Listening to Kerman describe how her life became a series or routines and rules, some unspoken and others tentatively ignored, gave me a very intriguing insight into the life of someone who resides in prison.

Eat That Frog: 21 Great Ways to Stop Procrastinating by Brian Tracy

May 31, 2014 by Adam Shields

Reposting this review because Eat That Frog is the daily deal today and on sale for $0.99 for the audiobook at audible.com

Takeaway: Inefficiency at work often means taking away time from home.

Purchase Links: Paperback, Kindle Edition, Audible.com Audiobook

I am a procrastinator. I can procrastinate better than almost anything else I do. I think it is one of the reasons that I am a good reader, because reading is usually a means of procrastination for me. I am not sure when I picked up this book. I think it was free on audible at some point (probably 3 or 4 years ago).

I was looking for something short and it was the shortest of all of my unread audiobooks at only 2 and a 1/2 hours.

Tracy says at the begining, it is likely that very little in this book will be new inforamtion. The problem is that you have to actually put the infomation into practice before it makes a difference in your life. Clearly that is one of my issues.

He also said that not everything works for everyone and a large number of things will often prevent us from accomplishing anything. So I picked out three things and I have been trying to do them.

Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell

May 30, 2014 by All Old Users

Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell is a well-beloved book and seen as an integral part to American literature. The book is essentially a coming-of-age novel and one that tells mainly of survival. The rather lengthy novel begins with Scarlett O’Hara at the age of 15 and carries her through many trials and tribulations such as loss of love, war, death, poverty, hunger and sometimes simply bad luck. With the American Civil War and Reconstruction of the South as the backdrop, the novel appeals to wide audience as it contains themes of romance, drama, comedy, suspense, history and adventure.

I both read the novel and saw the movie for the first time when I was a young teenager. I have seen the movie a number of times since then (although not in over ten years) but I have not read the book since then. My initial thoughts are that the book was much better than I remembered and the movie was not quite as good as I remembered it being. Both the movie and the book are quite long and I have had this 48-hour book siting in my library for at least a year and a half and have only now gotten up the courage to tackle it. The movie is 4 hours long and includes an intermission. I remember that I went to see the movie with a friend who had never seen it before and during the intermission we walked out to the lobby and she said, “œWell, that was a great movie.” Both my mom and I just stared at her because we didn’t know how to tell her that there were two more hours to watch.

Land of the Blue Burqas by Kate McCord

May 29, 2014 by All Old Users

Kate McCord is the pseudonym of the author of In The Land of Blue Burqas, a memoir of her five years in Afghanistan. McCord chronicles her experiences detailing what it’s like for a foreigner, specifically a foreign woman to live and work for an NGO in Afghanistan. Her stories are enthralling and even a bit frightening. This book unlike anything I’ve read before; this is an incredibly comprehensive, insightful and relevant book on learning and understanding Afghan culture through Western eyes.

Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes

May 28, 2014 by Adam Shields

Reposting my 2013 review because Flowers for Algernon is today’s (May 28) Audible Deal of the Day. You can buy the audiobook for $3.95 (no membership required, use your Amazon login if you do not have an audible account.)
Summary: Classic young adult novel about a man that gains and then loses intelligence.

Several years ago I revisited a lot of the young adult literature that I loved as a child or teen. Revisiting those books helped to renew my interest in young adult literature. So now I regularly read 2 or 3 young adult novels a month.

I still occasionally go back and revisit novels that I have not read in 25 or 30 years. Flowers for Algernon was on sale at some point about a year ago and I picked it up. But after reading 10 pages or so, put it down.

I picked it up again and read it over the Memorial Day weekend. Originally I read Flowers for Algernon in either 7th or 8th grade english class.

Reading it again, I am somewhat surprised and wonder if I am properly gauging the age range for young adult literature.

In Flowers for Algernon, Charlie is developmentally disabled adult (as we now term it, but in the book he is frequently called retarded or other variants) is given some type of operation that makes him smart.

Great Expectations by Charles Dickens

May 23, 2014 by Adam Shields

Summary: A Classic novel about wanting what is not good for you.

For some reason that I can’t really explain, I always have felt I did not like Charles Dickens. But the only two books that I can remember reading of Dickens (Great Expectations and The Tale of Two Cities) I liked. Maybe it is like feeling like you do not like a food, but never actually trying it.

Like many classics, I was first exposed to Great Expectations as an abridged children’s book. I am pretty sure I read at least one additional abridgement in high school or college (not for school but pleasure) but I think this is the first time I have read the whole book.

With so many versions of the story in my head (I have seen at least one if not two of the movies in addition to probably two abridged versions), the basic story is not a surprise. Simon Vance (as always) did an admirable job narrating the audiobook. And like many classics, I think it could have easily been cut by at least a third without a problem. But according to Wikipedia, Dickens originally intended it to be twice as long, but his publisher restrained him. (Thank goodness).

Naughty in Nice by Rhys Bowen (Royal Spyness #5)

May 22, 2014 by Adam Shields

Summary: Georgie tries living on the wild side. Things do not go well.

Almost five years ago when I started the blog that eventually turned into Bookwi.se, I significantly reduced the number of series books that I read. Not because I do not like series books (although many series lose steam), but because it is hard to say much more about a series after you are several books into the series. It is also hard not to give away spoilers. And for review readers, these later books are not interesting to read about if you have not read the earlier books.

Naughty in Nice is the fifth book in the Her Royal Spyness series. And the series is progressing nicely. I want to keep reading them. The storylines keep allowing the characters to grow without violating what works in the books.

In the book, Georgie starts in London as normal. Except her Brother and Sister-in-Law are living with her in the London house and driving her nuts. They end up going to Nice (but not inviting Georgie because it is too expensive). And then they kick Georgie out of the London house to help justify the expense of their trip to Nice.

WARP: The Reluctant Assassin by Eoin Colfer

May 21, 2014 by Adam Shields

Summary: An orphan from 1898 and a disgraced teen FBI agent from the present team up to survive (and hopefully defeat) a time traveling homicidal maniac.

Eoin Colfer is best known for writing the very good Artemis Fowl series (as you can see on the covers of any book of his that is not Artemis Fowl).

I read and really enjoyed the whole Artemis Fowl series, but I was not a fan of his adult oriented thriller Plugged and Colfer’s attempt at writing a sixth novel in the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy series was reviewed very poorly.

So if The Reluctant Assassin was not free on audiobook through the YA Sync program (two free audiobooks given away each week during the summer to encourage teen reading), I probably would not have picked it up.

Riley is the apprentice (kidnapped slave might be a better description) of Albert Garrick, an assassin and magician in 1898 London. Garrick is a person that loves killing, but he needs a small audience. So Riley has been forced to become his apprentice and witness all of his killings.

The book opens with Riley attempting his first assassination. Riley cannot go through with it and Garrick is forced to kill the old man they were paid to kill. That old man happens to be a refugee from the present, who invented a time machine and is hiding out in 1898 to keep it from being misused.

Lord Peter Views the Body by Dorothy Sayers (Peter Wimsey Mysteries #4)

May 20, 2014 by Adam Shields

Summary: A series of short stories about Lord Peter Wimsey.

It has literally been months since I started reading Lord Peter Views the Body. I am not really a fan of short story collections. I am not sure what I do not like about them as a category. I was inspired to go back and finish this book after reading another in the Her Royal Spyness series. (It is a modern cozy mystery series that is set at the same time as Sayers’ older Lord Peter Wimsey series and occasionally pays homage to Sayers.)

But in this case the Wimsey short stories just did not seem to develop the Lord Peter character. They reminded me more of what I do not like about Sherlock Holmes. There was conjecture and coincidence, and he solved crimes but except for a couple, most of them just seemed fairly dull. The spark that was in the first two books just seemed to be missing.