Category Archives: Recommendations

Book Reviews, Book Talk, Recommendations, Upcoming Titles

2023 is Off to a Good Start

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Things are still a tad chilly, wet, and gray, but I’ve bagged a few great reads at the start of 2023.  Here are a few short reviews as I’d love the chance to chat with folks about any of these books.

River of the Gods by Candice Millard.

Jacket design by John Fontana

This book is a straight-up history of the search for the source of the Grey Nile portion of the Nile River. River of the Gods is one of those books I would never have picked up had it not been selected as a book club pick. In less skilled hands (which many history books suffer under), this would have been bone dry and b-o-r-I-n-g. Still, Millard did a masterful job weaving in the characters, the political and social climate of the times, and the expeditionary journeys. It was time well spent. I give it 3 out of 5 stars.

This Isn’t Going to End Well: the True Story of a Man I Thought I Knew by Daniel Wallace. 

Nothing I’ve read online about this book has done this one justice. Coming out in April 11, 2023, Wallace’s book is a unique first-hand account and dive into what it means when we find out those we love, learn from, and share life with, are flawed and have real struggles of their own. 

Cover design by Steve Godwin

Up front, Wallace shares that his brother-in-law William Nealy committed suicide. The rest of the book explores the lives, the stories, and the conditions that were to this tragic event. Much of This Isn’t Going to End Well is set in Birmingham, AL. Nealy was an artist, author, handyman, paddling instructor, and adrenaline junkie. He was a master of everything he attempted. Memoirs are pretty standard. People using primary source materials in writing about others is pretty standard. 

But, finding a memoir that tackles some of the most challenging topics, filled with the primary source material, plus having first-hand knowledge of the subject AND being in the skilled wordsmith-y hands of an author like Daniel Wallace is unheard of. 

This book is a fast read. It hits you in the head and the heart. Sometimes at the same time. Throughout this rollercoaster the book shows off some of Nealy’s more famous as well as lesser known comic illustrations.

This book is for you if you like Hollywood memoirs about larger-than-life folks. If you enjoyed Big Fish, this book is for you. This book is for you if you enjoy reading about creative people, art, and the creative process. If you now live in or lived in Birmingham, AL, in the 1980s-2000s, this book should be required reading. 

It’s my first 5-star read of 2023, and I can’t wait to be able to talk with other local folks about this book. 

Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin 

Zevin’s newest novel Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow was an entertaining read. The cover is excellent, and the story lives up to the hype. The story follows some college buddies who code a video game together and build a gaming company. Zevin (The Storied Life of AJ Fickry) creates some characters here that are so fun to follow. Their conversations are sincere, and with some much love and closeness, their losses feel natural to the reader as well. The whole story is dripping with techie talk and retro video game references. So all that was fun for someone my age. 

Cover design by John Gall

This book scratches the same itch as Michael Chabon’s The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, combined with the charm of Ernest Cline’s Ready Player One—lots of fun. It is definitely worth picking up. This is a 4 out of 5 stars read.

How about you? Have you read anything worth recommending lately?

Book Talk, Recommendations

WEEK FIVE: My NonFiction November 2019 WRAP

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Ok, so this post is obviously really late, but sickness and life got in the way (as they do) and I totally missed posting my Week 5 Recap for Nonfiction November last year (here is my Week 4, Week 3, and Week 2 contributions). But I did want to get this out there as these books (and even some new-to-me bloggers) are still tops on my “to buy and to-be-read” list. I plan on starting Gretchen McCulloch’s book this weekend.

So firing up the old blogging way back time machine. . . going back in 3. . . 2. . . 1. . .

The guiding post from the discussion’s host (Nov. 25 to 29):

“Rennie from What’s Nonfiction is here for a second year – New to My TBR : It’s been a month full of amazing nonfiction books! Which ones have made it onto your TBR? Be sure to link back to the original blogger who posted about that book!”

By far the one book I saw on sooooo many lists this year was Furiously Happy by Jenny Lawson. It’s one I’ve seen in bookstores (I mean how can you forget that cover), but never picked up. Just based on the frequency it was mentioned, it’s going in the pile. I mean you can’t get this many book bloggers on a Mr. Linky and be lead astray can you?

Moving on, these are the other books that piqued my interest over the past few weeks. I am looking forward to working though this list:

Thanks to all the bloggers that participated in Nonfiction November in 2019. It really is a highlight every year. Such a diverse and cool group of book bloggers talking about topics and books from all over the world. I hope you found some good reads for yourself this November.

Book Column, Book Talk, Bookshelf, Recommendations

Be the Expert: Books About Bookshelves

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It’s hard to believe how quickly this year’s Nonfiction November #nonficnov is blowing past as we’re already posting for Week Three. This week is hosted by Katie at Doing Dewey and carries the assignment of – Be The Expert/Ask the Expert/Become the Expert.

Here is the prompt:

You can either share 3 or more books on a single topic that you have read and can recommend (be the expert), you can put the call out for good nonfiction on a specific topic that you have been dying to read (ask the expert), or you can create your own list of books on a topic that you’d like to read (become the expert).

In the past, I’ve offered up titles for becoming an expert on book covers as well as good reads for becoming an expert on bookshops.

This week’s prompt is always my favorite topic each November. Not only do I enjoy taking a deep dive on whatever I’m doing or reading, this week gives us a glimpse at what else a fellow book blogger is into and thinks about. It’s really fun. In case you can’t tell: I like books. Keeping with that theme, here are three books I’d recommend to help you become an expert on bookshelves.

Three books all about bookshelves

Be An Expert on Bookshelves

Let’s start with the definitive book, on the subject, by Henry Petroski, The Book on the Bookshelf. This book, was published in 1999, and covers it all in a very accessible manner. Petroski is an engineer and it’s useful to see the changing construction of bookshelves and well as the cultural implications of the evolution of bookshelves through an engineer’s lens. There are some really fun and wacky illustrations in the book and is a great place to start.

Lydia Pyne’s 2016 essay-length book, simply titled Bookshelf, is the next book on the list. Pyne approaches the subject with a creative’s and historian’s perspective. So it dovetails nicely with Petroski’s book. In Pyne, you’ll find a kindred bookish spirit who helps explore what a bookshelf says about the owner as well as the impact bookshelves have when displayed for all to see. If you’ve ever been caught scanning a friend’s bookcase, trying to figure out what they like to read, this is a good book for you.

The third book is one of my absolute favorites. At Home with Books by Estelle Ellis, Caroline Seebohm and Christopher Sykes is a visual delight. This is a book you’ll want to leave open on the coffee table all the time. The photography is excellent and all of the interviews, short essays and sidebars deliver on the promise of the subtitle ”How Booklovers Live with and Care for Their Libraries”. Inside you’ll find houses crammed with books as well as million dollar lavish libraries. The bookshelves are all full, regardless of who owns them. You’ll meet book collectors that look for everything from fiction, to art books, to books on buildings and toys as well as poetry. It’s so much fun to see how these professional and hobbyist bibliophiles use their shelves and all the nooks and crannies they find to place bookshelves.

Those are the three I’d recommend for becoming an expert on bookshelves. Please, let me know if you know of any other good books on the topic of bookshelves or home libraries. I can never dive deep enough into a pile of books about books. Hope your Nonfiction November is going well.

Book Column, Book Talk, Recommendations

WEEK 2: BOOK PAIRING #NONFICNOV

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This week’s host for Nonfiction November 2019 is Sarah over at Sarah’s Book Shelves. This week all of the participants are are to offer a couple of books that dovetail nicely following Sarah’s directions: “It can be a ‘If you loved this book, read this!’ or just two titles that you think would go well together. Maybe it’s a historical novel and you’d like to get the real history by reading a nonfiction version of the story.”

The last time I participated in Nonfiction November I offered up a books-about-books pairing. For 2019, I’d like to pair up two books that talk about change. Specifically the fear of change while standing in the shadow of the rapidly evolving world of technology. It’s all moving so fast!

David Sax’s The Revenge of the Analog: Real Things and Why They Matter is a couple of years old and a very good read. While Sax never gets overly romantic over the things and ideas he covers, he does a good job of highlighting the benefits and uniqueness of vinyl recordings, paper, board games, etc. I recently heard a technologist say something along the lines of “… the better digital tools get at helping us, the more relevant and needed analog tools are.” It almost sounds like a contradiction, but it’s really about what it means to have a worthwhile experience and experience the world your body lives in. These are themes that Sax covers with humor, understanding and critically all at the same time. I highly recommend this book.

A wonderful counter balance to Sax’s book is Laurence Scott’s The Four-Dimensional Human: Ways of Being in the Digital World . This nonfiction book came out in 2015 and is a wonderful (almost philosophical) take on what it means to walk around with a computer in your pocket, with the ability to instantly be connected digitally to anyone on the planet. There’s a ton being thrown at us every day and it can be tough to navigate. Scott’s writing is beautiful and full of empathy and understanding as he shares some of his experiences with an “always on” lifestyle. I mean the technology is here, how do we learn to cope with it and keep it in check while using it to its fullest potential to better our world.

Where David Sax offers up a summary judgement in The Revenge of the Analog Laurence Scott offers a slower “we’re all in this together so let’s try to get it right because I don’t know either” take in The Four-Dimensional Human.

If you ever find yourself wondering or worrying about the phone, music, books, ebooks, Spotify, etc. I think you’d enjoy both of these books.

AND THE FICTION PARING FOR EITHER OF THOSE. . .

If fiction is what you’re in the mood for, then check out Tim Mason’s The Darwin Affair . I’ve been recommending it to friends that enjoy historical fiction. As a thriller/mystery it’s a fair read, but it all centers on the real world release of Charles Darwin’s On the Origin of Species and the effect it had on the world at the time. Talk about a world that was afraid of change and newly rapidly evolving ideas! It was crazy times, for sure.

AND AS A NONFICTION NOVEMBER BONUS FOCUSING ON BOOKS AND FEAR OF CULTURAL CHANGE. . .

If podcasts are your current jam, then I’d recommend listening to the Pessimists Archive episode titled The Novel. Click through to their page and check out a couple of the highlights from the show notes:

  • “Too Much Reading is Harmful” by Angelo Patri (1938)
  • Novel Reading: A Cause of Female Depravity, The Monthly Mirror, 1797
  • Thomas Jefferson worries about children reading novels

Can you imagine being scared of the affect “longer books” would have on society? Talk about crazy times!?

Happy Nonfiction November!