| Collected Stories by Graham Greene, 562 pages Steve Gadd 10 June 1995 | The Idiot by Fyodor Dostoyevsky, 597 pages Steve Gadd 25 June 1995 |
The Island of the Day Before by Umberto Eco, 513 pages Steve Gadd 01 February 1997 |
Little Women by Louisa May Alcott, 504 pages Steve Gadd 09 March 1998 Great book. A short-lived attempt to continue my goal of eliminating unread books from my shelf, bogged down by Northanger Abbey. |
Le Ton beau de Marot by Douglas R. Hofstadter, 598 pages Steve Gadd 21 May 1998 Another giant, sprawling masterpiece by the author of Gödel, Escher, Bach, this one focusing on the subtlties of translation. |
For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway, 507 pages Steve Gadd 30 June 1998 |
Nobel Prize Reader by various, 576 pages Steve Gadd 12 November 1998 Short story collection by Nobel winners. |
Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky, 532 pages Steve Gadd 09 December 1998 |
The Runaway Jury by John Grisham, 550 pages Jeff Gadd 21 May 1999 |
The RainMaker by John Grisham, 598 pages Jeff Gadd 10 June 1999 |
The Firm by John Grisham, 501 pages Jeff Gadd 26 June 1999 |
The Parsifal Mosaic by Robert Ludlum, 596 pages Jeff Gadd 24 July 1999 |
The Matarese Circle by Robert Ludlum, 590 pages Jeff Gadd 04 August 1999 |
The Night Is Large by Martin Gardner, 565 pages Steve Gadd 05 August 1999 This collection of essays written from 1938 to 1995 demonstrates the versatility of this author, perhaps best known as a purveyor of puzzles. |
Skeleton Crew by Stephen King, 557 pages Jeff Gadd 07 November 1999 |
Absolute Power by David Baldacci, 505 pages Jeff Gadd 19 November 1999 |
ThunderHead by D.P. & Lincoln Child, 533 pages Jeff Gadd 04 July 2000 |
THE COFFIN DANCER by Jeffery Deaver, 529 pages Jeff Gadd 24 October 2000 |
Degree of Guilt by Richard North Patterson, 531 pages Jeff Gadd 26 November 2000 |
Jude The Obscure by Thomas Hardy, 528 pages Erik Bauer 22 May 2001 This is a sad book with a great story and an ending that leaves a little to be desired. I've have never known a story in which the primary characters make so many bad decisions. |
The GREEN MILE by Stephen King, 533 pages Jeff Gadd 21 June 2001 |
Jubilee Trail by Gwen Bristow, 564 pages A Bennett 25 February 2002 Gwen Bristow knows more about California geography, geology, and history than anybody should really care to know. If the women of 1840 were given bracing cups of hard liquor to strengthen and their nerves them as often as was our heroine, is it is a miracle the territory was ever settled in the first place. Overall, a pale forerunner of Calico Palace, and much dustier. |
Hannibal by Thomas Harris, 541 pages Jeff Gadd 27 February 2002 Revenge is never bliss. |
Jubilee Trail by Gwen Bristow, 564 pages Julie Gephart 23 March 2002 Recipe for Jubilee Trail: Mix one society girl, one useless husband, and one impossibly hot blonde with 8 parts trail dust. Fold in equal measure of dry historical exposition. Bake under hot California sun until gold appears around the edges. |
Calico Palace by Gwen Bristow, 589 pages A Bennett 25 March 2002 'The roof--the roof--the roof is on FI-re!' A pyromaniac's dream, there are strong drinks all around for shaken women, kittens rescued from buring edifices, gambling, redheads, and San Francisco burning to the ground five times in less than a year. Oh, and the first half teaches us not only about the gold rush first-hand, but also about the dangers of both scurvy and marrying men named Ted Parks, who have, as they say, "no guts." |
Sophie's World by Jostein Gaarder, 513 pages Steve Gadd 04 May 2002 "Ladies and gentlemen, we're floating in space!" This would have been just a cute and clever novel about a Norwegian girl. Add an unpretentious history of philosophy and it's a European bestseller. A pleasant introduction or review of philosophy. |
Child of the Prophecy by Juliet Marillier, 528 pages Julie Gephart 28 May 2002 Give me some ancient Celtic lore and I'm happy every time. Third book in a trilogy. |
Resurrection by Leo Tolstoi, 568 pages James Donahue 12 June 2002 A juror discovers that the defendant is a women he seduced years earlier, an act which led to a life of prostitution and crime. He repents for the next five hundred pages, seeing the true nature of the penal system, the hypocritical Church, and his own depths of depravity. Tolstoi's last work, written to finance his religious group's emigration to America. Gone however is Tolstoi's ability to portray all views and all types, gone his wonderful metaphors and descriptions… |
Mothers in the Fatherland by Claudia Koonz, 554 pages James Donahue 21 July 2002 An excellent introduction to all things Nazi. Koonz focuses her attention on women and the Church, which gives her a brilliant window into the Nazi world of terror, domesticity, and guilt-by-silence-and-collusion. |
Divided Memory: The Nazi Past in the Two Germanies by Jeffery Herf, 527 pages James Donahue 21 July 2002 Herf compares the development of divergent paths of public memory and policy in East and West Germany from 1945-1990. He ably uses newly opened files from the Soviet Bloc to do so. Good analysis, but heavily biased toward the SPD party. |
Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco, 533 pages Steven Krise 17 August 2002 Umbilicus Mundi. Fez isn't in Tunisia, and the Assassins, anyway, were in Persia, but you can't split hairs when you live in the coils of Transcendental Time. If our hypothesis is correct...They hold for certain that they are in the light. |
The Origins of Totalitarianism by Hannah Arendt, 507 pages James Donahue 07 September 2002 A masterpiece which put the very word into our vocabulary. |
J. Clifford Nelson by The Lutherans in North America, 541 pages James Donahue 03 October 2002 Exactly what it sounds like, and as exactly as dry as it sounds like. |
Seeker's Mask by P. C. Hodgell, 526 pages Julie Gephart 08 October 2002 Fantasy book with a great setting and heroine but overly-complex plot. Lots of references to things from previous books in the series, which I haven't read. |
America's God: From Jonathan Edwards to Abraham Lincoln by Mark Noll, 568 pages James Donahue 17 October 2002 Noll's latest is a masterpiece. The book details how American Christianity became so unique, tracing its synthesis with republicanism and common-sense philosophy. His argumentation is solid, and his source base incredible. A vital book for anyone wishing to understand the cultural conditionings of their American church. |
Haunted America by Michael Norman & Beth Scott, 506 pages Jeff Gadd 17 November 2002 Small story's about ghost in people's home's,building's,and near other structures. Every state has a ghost story of some sort. Do you believe in ghost, Do I? These people do. I guess seeing is BELIEVING. |
Astronomy, The Evolving Universe by Michael Zeilik, 568 pages Steven Krise 14 December 2002 Surprisingly, Shannon's astronomy textbook at Cedarville. The astronomy prof must have been a guest lecturer to make use of a textbook that accepts current scientific knowledge on the topic. Anyway, this book took me easily the longest to read of all my books to date (probably 2 months). |
The Phenomenology of Spirit by G.W.F. Hegel, 592 pages James Donahue 16 December 2002 Been working all semester on this one. An entire class devoted to one book, and we didn't get all the way through it. Finished it up over Finals week. |
The Valley of Horses by Jean M. Auel, 502 pages Julie Gephart 20 December 2002 Second in Earth's Children series, and the fascination of the first book has been slightly dimmed. Early human woman is tossed out of her adopted Neanderthal clan and lives on her own for a few years with animal companions. |
Hot Springs by Stephen Hunter, 532 pages Mike Gadd 16 January 2003 If you read the Washington Post on Fridays you may be familiar with Mr. Hunter's work. He's one of their better movie critics. Who knew he was a really good "tough guy" story writer? The story takes place in the 1940's in Hot Springs, Arkansas. Gambling is illegal but casinos are starting to spring up along with all the related debauchery. Earl Swagger, ex-marine, national hero, is called upon to put the kibosh on all the fun. He carries his own demons that threaten to bring him down. Made for a good read. |
Sophie's Choice by William Styron, 562 pages Kristin Schrock 16 January 2003 Near the end of the novel the narrator (who, let's face it, is just William Styron) relates a sentence from his journal during the summer he knew Sophie: "Someday I will understand Auschwitz". But, of course, the narrator (and everyone else) will never understand Auschwitz. Instead, we get a compelling, haunting, story, with the right amount of distance and history to make it bearable. Styron is often pretentious (I hate him for my suffering during Lie Down in Darkness), and oddly chooses to dramatize a, what's the word, sex marathon after Sophie reveals her choice. And, as a book to read before going to bed, it doesn't make for good dreams, but it is a gripping novel. Recommended Vocabulary: pettifoggery (that's a made up word, I'm sure of it), scupperning, lacunae, satraps, adumbrated, mucilaginous, avoirdupois |
Thomas More by Richard Marius, 543 pages James Donahue 20 January 2003 A biography of a saint which aims to steer clear of hagiography and anti-hagiography. Well done. Highly readable. |
A Blood Dimmed Tide The Battle of the Bulge By the Men Who Fought It. by Gerald Astor, 513 pages Jeff Gadd 22 February 2003 The Battle of the Bulge is bad for the American's and German's soliders who fought in this part of the WWII. Great plots of using real soldiers stories from both sides and put them together in this book. Hard to tell who won this part of the war. My guess the winter storm won this battle against them. |
Haunted America by Michael Norman& Beth Scott, 506 pages Jeff Gadd 20 March 2003 A book of short stories of legendary ghost stories from across America and Canada. Very interesting if your into ghost. |
The Great Hunt by Robert Jordan, 577 pages Julie Gephart 13 April 2003 Free at last! I started this book at Christmas, and right now the only opinion I can muster is an overwhelming relief at finally being rid of it. |
The Bourne Identity by Robert Ludlum, 535 pages Steven Krise 03 May 2003 Despite the paucity of similarities between this book and the movie of the same name, I couldn't help picturing "Jason Bourne" as Matt Damon...good thing it wasn't Carrot Top that got the part for the movie. |
Angels & Demons by Dan Brown, 569 pages Mike Gadd 12 May 2003 Cool story about a scientist who discovers and collects antimatter in an attempt to prove that God and science are mutually supportive. He's murdered and the antimatter is stolen. It has the ability to vaporize 6 city blocks in every direction. It's hidden somewhere in the Vatican. The scientist's daughter and a religious specialist are sent to find it. One of the quicker reads of the year. |
Area 7 by Matthew Reilly, 507 pages Steven Krise 15 May 2003 Come here to stock up on your multi-syllabic-hypenated-descriptive-sounding-adjective-looking-word-like-things. Fairly good action sequences. Would be a much better movie. |
Nobody's Fool by Richard Russo, 549 pages Kristin Schrock 30 June 2003 My second omniscient narrator in a row. And I thought that had gone out of style. Our main character, however, is Sully and it's not quite as interesting when Russo decides to roam into the mind's of other characters. It's especially entertaining when you hear the gruff voice of Paul Newman talking to you (he played Sully in the movie). It was a good movie; it's an even better book. |
The Curse of Chalion by Lois McMaster Bujold, 502 pages Julie Gephart 05 July 2003 This book was foisted upon me by a co-worker, but it wasn’t too bad. A physically handicapped tutor finds himself in the middle of court politics and intrigue. |
Adam Bede by George Eliot, 592 pages James Donahue 15 August 2003 I am continually amazed at Eliot's talent, evident here even in her first novel, for conjuring up pastoral 19th-c England across class lines. In this work her theological acuity also shines through with her depiction the interactions between Dinah, a Methodist preacher. and Irwine, the Anglican vicar. A bit melodramatic, but I was into it. |
Plum Island by Nelson DeMille, 574 pages Mike Gadd 22 September 2003 A cop recovering from gunshot wounds on Long Island becomes involved in trying to solve the murder of 2 of his friends who work on Plum Island, a bio-research facility. |
Honor Among Enemies by David Weber, 538 pages Jeff Gadd 30 September 2003 About Lt. Honor Harrington. using a ship that looked like a merchant ship, that was turned into a battleship, but looked like a merchant ship still. She had to user her ship against pirates in a war in space. |
Augustine of Hippo by Peter Brown, 520 pages James Donahue 31 December 2003 This is the standard biography of Augie despite its age of over thirty years. Brown nicely goes through all the evidence in a masterpiece of biography, even if he's bit Anglican towards Augie's gruffer sides. |
A History of Twentieth-Century Russia by Robert Service, 589 pages James Donahue 07 January 2004 Despite the mundanest of titles, Service writes a fairly readable textbook that tells the facts and provides some anecdotes. Lack of pictures is somewhat damning however (as it would be for any history book). Boning up for my class this Spring. |
The Blue Nowhere by Jeffery Deaver, 505 pages Steven Krise 10 January 2004 Psychopathic cracker, Phate, is using his revolutionary backdoor software, Trapdoor, to gain access to his victim's lives in his Real World version of a deadly MUD game. Who the hell is Shawn, you'll wonder. |
Yankees in the Land of the Gods by Peter Booth Wiley, 542 pages James Donahue 26 February 2004 Really well-written history of the Oerry expedition that forcibly opened Japan to international trade. Wiley goes blow by blow with exquisite (and sometimes excruciating) detail through the story. Best part though is use of Jpse and Am sources so that you see both sides to every event. (First book read for comps; get ready for some Nippon-omania!) |
The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger, 518 pages Julie Gephart 05 March 2004 Very interesting story told in a style that is very grating to me, which I can only classify as “modern literature.” Henry has a chrono-displacement disorder that causes him to involuntarily slip short distances through time and space. He seems to be subconsciously drawn to meaningful people or places from his life, but he has no real control, arriving naked and confused, never knowing how long it will be before he’s pulled back to his own time. In a loop that would make Star Trek proud, he is the one who teaches his younger self the finer points of stealing and fighting, essential survival skills for someone who turns up naked. He relives the scene of his mother’s fatal car accident over and over, watching from every vantage point but never able to change anything. When he and Claire first meet real-time in their 20s, he has never seen her before, but she’s known him all her life. Once they fall in love, his older self will be a frequent visitor throughout her life, starting when she was a small child. Claire was pretty much a selfish whiny loser, although I don’t think the author felt that way. |
Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides, 529 pages Jaqi Ross 11 March 2004 "Expansive and radiantly generous... Deliriously American." -The New York Times Book Review |
Lenin's Tomb: The Last Days of the Soviet Empire by David Remnick, 542 pages James Donahue 24 March 2004 This wonderful account is written from the first-hand experience and incredible access of the Post reporter in Moscow from 1988-1992. Remnick, who is now editor of the New Yorker and was once the flirtatous boy in my advisor's college class, writes with an enviable touch for flair and poetic significance. Highly enjoyable |
Pale Horse Coming by Stephen Hunter, 540 pages Mike Gadd 16 May 2004 Excellent sequel to 'Hot Springs'. |
The Coffin Dancer by Jeffery Deaver, 532 pages Steven Krise 25 May 2004 Rhyme and Sachs catch the bad guy. I think I may have finally read too much Deaver since I can pick out which characters are going to be part of the twist almost as soon as they're introduced. It's always an enjoyable read regardless. |
Where Serpents Lie by T. Jefferson Parker, 576 pages Mike Gadd 04 June 2004 One of his earlier works that doesn't hold up to his current style. This one had too many slow points where the plot just didn't do anything. |
mistaken identity by Lisa Scottoline, 565 pages Steven Krise 23 June 2004 Is Connolly Bennie's twin or not? Is she dead now? |
Still Life with Crows by Douglas Preston / Lincoln Child, 565 pages Mike Gadd 28 July 2004 Somewhat of a sequel to 'Cabinet of Curiosities'. This one didn't have the story or the suspense of their previous books. The payoff wasn't even very good. A rare disappointment from these guys. |
Colonising Subjects: Metropole and Colony in the English Imagination by Catherine Hall, 513 pages James Donahue 15 August 2004 An intriguing look at Baptists, power politics, emancipation, racism, and empire all swirled together in the founding of Jamaica. Hall is one of the best living historians of empire, and her take on conservative Baptistry is quite insightful. |
Gulag: A History by Anne Applebaum, 586 pages James Donahue 08 October 2004 I can see why this book won a Pulitzer. No other historian has done so much to put in inside of the famed gulags (except for Solzhenitsyn). A remarkable (lack of) achievement given the literary profligency that surrounds its genocidal cousins. Applebaum begins and ends the book with a history of the camps' developments, but the real meat is in the middle: chapters that walk one through the Gulag process step by painful step |
Consciousness Explained by Daniel C Dennett, 511 pages Steven Krise 05 December 2004 Despite the pretentious title, the author did fairly well meeting his goal. "The phenomena of human consciousness have been explained in the preceding chapters in terms of the operations of a "virtual machine," a sort of evolved (and evolving) computer program that shapes the activities of the brain. There is no Cartesian Theater; there are just Multiple Drafts composed by processes of content fixation playing various semi-independent roles in the brain's larger economy of cntrolling a human body's journey through life. The astonishingly persistent conviction that there is a Cartesian Theater is the result of a variety of cognitive illusions that have now been exposed and explained. "Qualia" have been replaced by complex dispositional states of the brain, and the self (otherwise known as the Audience in the Cartesian Theater, the Central Meaner, or the Witness) turns out to be a valuable abstraction, a theorist's fiction rather than an internal observer or boss." |
The Mind's I by Douglas Hofstadter and Daniel Dennett (Eds.), 501 pages Steven Krise 07 January 2005 Collection of excerpts, essays, and philosophical circlejerks relating to the topics of the mind-brain interface, consciousness, subjectivity, AI, and personal identity. Highlights were the "Reflections" by DRH and DCD at the end of each selection and the stories by Stanislaw Lem and Robert Smullyan. |
It Must Have Been Something I Ate by Jeffrey Steingarten, 513 pages Tony Pisarenkov 23 January 2005 Even better than his previous collection (see my entry form last year), funnier, with more recipes, and slightly less science (although still with plenty of detailed explanations of exactly what chemical processes make dry-aged steaks superior to all other kinds). |
The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen, 568 pages Tony Pisarenkov 17 February 2005 Postmodern dysfunctional family novel par excellence, and so much more. Franzen is a brilliant social observer, and leaves no corner of our existence unturned. So emotinally vivid that it's difficult to read at times, but on balance, very powerful and well worth the effort. Thank you, Steve, for the gift. |
The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen, 566 pages Steve Gadd 16 March 2005 A powerful novel that manages to live up to its considerable hype. Franzen's knack for prose makes the character-driven story engrossing without needing much of a plot engine. |
Transfer of Power by Vince Flynn, 592 pages Mike Gadd 19 April 2005 Another nicely written political thriller. |
Victor Hugo by Graham Robb, 541 pages James Donahue 19 May 2005 Robb's biography of Hugo made me realize just what a central political and cultural figure Hugo truly was. Beyond writing the Romantic stories that have recently been canabalized by Disney and Andrew Lloyd Weber, Hugo was a dominant figure in the 1830, 1848, and 1870 revolutions, a major religious figure who founded his own Vietnamese cult, the greatest French Romantic poet and the first French modernist poet, and the impregnator of much of the Parisian jet-set. Robb always writes great literary biographies, with a sharp eye for detail and a refusal to get bogged down in recapsulating plots and literary mumbo-jumbo. |
Gentleman Spy: The Life of Allen Dulles by Peter Grose, 566 pages James Donahue 24 June 2005 Dulles, brother of the more famous John Foster, ran U.S. intelligence in occupied Europe during the second world war, and then launched the C.I.A. on its path towards meddling coups, high-tech spy planes, LSD experiments, and the infamous Bay of Pigs during the 1950s. The life is fascinating and the biography well-written, if you have the interest, but can too often dwell in the bureaucracy of ‘intelligence’ (always in quotes) for others. Not many social occasions or family giving a veneer of human interest for this lone soul. |
Deception Point by Dan Brown, 558 pages Mike Gadd 09 July 2005 Along with Digital Fortress, this one can be left on the shelf. A moderately good concept is left begging for some real life characters. There are some ridiculous plot changes and the big 'reveal' at the end couldn't have been worse. |
Karl Barth by Eberhard Busch, 500 pages James Donahue 17 July 2005 The standard bibliography for over thirty years, written by Barth's last secretary and based upon Barth's notes for his autobiography, but also written from inside a theological, European community whose references and names may only mean something to the historian. |
The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen, 568 pages Kristin Schrock 24 August 2005 Boo, Jonathan Franzen for your bloated novel and for your pretentious back flap photo. It's a multi-P.O.V. novel--but only two of the four are interesting--and even then we're distracted by seemingly non-sequitir plot interruptions (Lithuania and stocks?). And doesn't help that the book is riddled with sentences like this: "....did the extent of the correction she was undergoing reveal itself."--we have a title! Amazon.com Stats: 8th grade reading level, the word "corrections" is used 293 times (that's about once every two pages)! Back to the shelf, Franzen! |
The Triggerman's Dance by T. Jefferson Parker, 540 pages Mike Gadd 03 November 2005 Very slow to develop, but eventually pays off. Parker's books tend not to disappoint. |
Angels and Demons by Dan Brown, 569 pages Kristin Schrock 26 December 2005 This was recommended by a friend of mine. I loaned her Slaughterhouse Five and I got this one--not a fair trade. Clunky writing and an abundance of ellipses. Like this sentence: "The killer still remembered every word of that call..." which led directly to a flashback. Bleh. |
Lords of Discipline by Pat Conroy, 576 pages Micaela Larkin 01 January 2006 Decent read! |
Oh Pure and Radiant Heart by Lydia Millett, 506 pages Micaela Larkin 01 February 2006 "What if Robert Oppenheimer, Enrico Fermi and Leo Szilard, the primary physicists from the Manhattan Project, returned to contemporary America to survey their atomic legacy?" -- Amazing!!!! |
Harry Emerson Fosdick: Preacher, Pastor, Prophet (1985) by Robert Moats Miller, 570 pages James Donahue 26 February 2006 Fosdick was the most popular Baptist preacher of his age, and the lightening rod that sparked off the GARBC walk-out of the Northern Baptist Conference. Miller is a wonderful biographer, absorbed by his subject to the point of obsession, but as a result a questionable historian, all too often pulling miscellaneous (undocumented) quotes out of his ass to prove a point, focusing more on (undocumented) oral histories over the written word, and losing the bigger religious picture. |
Blankets by Craig Thompson, 582 pages Jonathan Misirian 01 March 2006 My skepticism vanished after reading but a few pages of this graphic novel. While comic-style literature has been relegated to kids and socially-awkward adults, Blankets elevates the art to a new level. I was unprepared for the combination of drawings and words, but was more then surprised at the power that a simple image conveyed… Thompson masterfully creates a compelling autobiography that deals with love and loss, faith and identity. |
The Survivor: Bill Clinton in the White House by John F. Harris, 504 pages Jonathan Misirian 03 March 2006 The Survivor: Bill Clinton in the White House Harris pulls together an insightful look into the character and personality that shaped Clinton’s 8 years in office. Both a sympathetic and unflattering Clinton emerges from the pages, which is probably the most accurate portrait of the man… His potential is only rivaled by his ability to self-destruct. A great read. |
Margot Asquith: An Autobiography (1906) by Margot Asquith, 541 pages James Donahue 20 March 2006 Margot, wife of the PM Asquith, socialite of socialites in fin-de-siecle Britain, sums up her life thusly: "A Lot of love-making, a little fame, and even more abuse." |
Blankets by Craig Thompson, 582 pages Brad Snyder 24 March 2006 I'm new to this particular art form. The drawings added a depth missing from most standard books, but the two-dimensional nature made them subtle enough to allow my imagination some room to operate and that film tends to retard. The story is that of Thompson's search for meaning, drawn from his parallel experiences with Christianity and teenage love. A thought-provoking and engaging story. Thanks to Jonathan for the recommendation. |
Data Structures Using Pascal by Aaron Tenebaum and Moshe Augenstein, 545 pages Steven Krise 20 April 2006 Revelation that data structures aren't so much about how data is physically stored but rather how it is accessed and manipulated. All the complex structures discussed in this book can use one or more arrays as the to physically store the data objects. |
The Satanic Verses by Salman Rushdie, 561 pages Tony Pisarenkov 23 April 2006 The famous novel, sprawling (perhaps a little too much so) and wonderfully cinematic. One of the very few books that I really wish someone would adapt to the screen, but in today's social and geo-political climate, what are the chances? Someone with a greater knowledge of both the Quaran and Indian culture would no doubt get many of the references and allegories that were lost on me. |
Genius by James Gleick, 560 pages Steve Gadd 26 April 2006 More sober than I remembered, this biography does not retell any of the funny anecdotes from the books that popularized the Feynman legend, either steering clear of them or pointing out the ways in which they were embellished. |
The Complete Stories by Flannery O'Connor, 572 pages Brad Snyder 14 June 2006 O'Connor's stories are captivating snapshots of real people, with all their haughtiness and conceit on full display. The endings are often sudden and violent, and yet there are also glimpses of redemption. Hauntingly beautiful. |
Germinal (1885) by Emile Zola, 532 pages James Donahue 02 August 2006 If you ever thought your life was bad. . . .Preparing to teach Western Civ this fall. |
Database Programming with Visual Basic .NET and ADO.NET - (Useless) Tips, (Pedantic) Tutorials, and (Shitty) Code by F Scott Barker, 524 pages Steven Krise 10 September 2006 If (IsTheSuck(oThisBook) = True) = True Then MsgBox "Yup, it sucks ass!", vbOkOnly+vbInformation rem the parenthetical adjectives were omitted from the cover of my copy of the book for some reason |
The Most Famous Man in America: The Biography of Henry Ward Beecher by Debby Applegate, 544 pages Micaela Larkin 12 December 2006 I enjoyed this biography of the most famous Beecher brother.... |
The Great War: American Front (1998) by Henry Turtledove, 562 pages James Donahue 18 December 2006 Turtledove remains my favorite paperback writer. This book contemplates what WWI would look like for a U.S. that had lost the Civil War. The South sides with France and Britain (who helped the CSA in the 1860s); the North sides with Germany. Trenches are dug in Virginia; poison gas is unveiled at Cincinnati; Canada can't afford to send troops to the Queen overseas. I never realized how rooted Wilson's thought was in the South until reading this book. As always, nicely done. |
Sick Puppy by Carl Hiaasen, 513 pages Brad Snyder 30 December 2006 Bizarre |
State of Denial (2006) by Bob Woodward, 560 pages Jonathan Misirian 11 January 2007 Masterful account of the failure of the Iraq war, voiced by the insiders themselves… Bush –who comes across as the intellectual light weight that he is, and Rumsfeld –the micromanager hawk -are shown as the main contributors to the failure in Iraq. The image of Bush and Cheney making fart jokes –during a White House meeting- while tens of thousands are dieing in the gulf –is one that sadly will not leave me anytime soon. |
The Great War: Breakthroughs (2000) by Harry Turtledove, 584 pages James Donahue 18 February 2007 Turtledove's trilogy grinds down to a halt. |
Wilson: The Road to the White House (1947) by Arthur Link, 528 pages James Donahue 05 March 2007 First part of a looong biography of Woodrow Wilson. Well written, but I now know more about New Jersey politics than I ever really wanted to know. |
Special Topics in Calamity Physics (2006) by Marisha Pessl, 514 pages Brad Snyder 07 March 2007 Story of a girl named Blue and her itinerant professor father. After moving three times a year every year since Kindergarten, after the death of her mother, they settle down in a North Carolina town for her senior year. There, she falls in with a group of students called bluebloods who hang out with the mysterious Hannah Schneider, a teacher who is found hanging from a tree in the woods, prompting Blue to search out the identity of the killer. The resulting discoveries lead her to more questions and a surprising ending. |
Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco, 533 pages Steven Krise 24 March 2007 Do you have the password? |
The Adventures of Augie March by Saul Bellow, 536 pages Tony Pisarenkov 29 March 2007 A sprawling bildungsroman full of great characters and some amazing prose. A major undertaking to be sure, but well worth it. |
Down the Highway: The Life of Bob Dylan by Howard Sounes, 527 pages Micaela Larkin 19 April 2007 Excellent biography of Dylan... |
The Camel Club by David Baldacci, 593 pages Steve Gadd 29 April 2007 A serviceable spy thriller, in which loose ends were avoided with increasingly implausible plot turns. |
Dostoevsky: The Miraculous Years, 1865 - 1871 (1995) by Joseph Frank, 501 pages James Donahue 22 May 2007 The 'miracle' for Frank here is that F-Dos actually manages to get his life on track. He finally founds a stable wife (half-Russian, half-Swedish), rediscovers his faith in the Russian Christ (after an encounter with Holbein's portrait of a dessicated Christ), stops gambling (after blowing lots of money in Baden-Baden), and manages to produce three masterpieces in a reltively short time (Crime and Punishment, Idiot, Devils) that finally turn his literary potential into a literary career. The downside of this to me, the reader, was reading a much less interesting biography, half of which was literary analysis of his major works. |
The Priest by Ralph McInerny, 563 pages Micaela Larkin 28 May 2007 1968 religious melodrama |
Labyrinth (2005) by Kate Mosse, 508 pages Jennifer Dear 28 May 2007 |
The Tiger Claw (2004) by Shauna Singh Baldwin, 567 pages Jennifer Dear 13 July 2007 The dust jacket says: "An extraordinary story of love and suspense." Jen says: "Books about the Holocaust always depress me a little." |
Wondrous Strange: The Art and Life of Glenn Gould by Kevin Bazzana, 528 pages Tony Pisarenkov 23 October 2007 Exactly what a great biography should be: revealing without being gossipy, admiring without being adulatory and, above all, tremendously engaging. |
The Gentle Civilizer of Nations (2001) by Martti Koskenniemi, 517 pages James Donahue 24 October 2007 An excellent history of international law. |
Rites of Peace: The Fall of Napoleon and the Congress of Vienna (2007) by Adam Zamoyski, 569 pages James Donahue 27 October 2007 "Perhaps the most striking aspect of the great charade known as the Congress of Vienna is the continuous interplay between the serious and the frivolous, an almost parasitical co-existence of activities which might appear to be mutually exclusive. The rattling of sabres and talk of blood mingled with the strains of the waltz and court gossip, and the most ridiculously trivial pursuits went hand in hand with impressive work." |
Evelyn Waugh: The Early Years, 1903-1939 (1986) by Martin Stannard, 504 pages James Donahue 30 December 2007 |
The Birth of the Modern World, 1780-1914 (2003) by C. E. Bayly, 536 pages James Donahue 12 February 2008 A very thought-provoking global history of the "long" nineteenth century, even perhaps worthy of toppling Hobsbawm's masterpiece. Two of the best aspects for me: making causal connections between Asia and North America, often with Europe moving back and forth between them; and his theory of "empires of religion" has sparked new lines of thought about the my own investigations into the internationalist and ecumenical movement. I need to think through this some more. |
Genius: The Life and Science of Richard Feynman by James Gleick, 531 pages Tony Pisarenkov 17 February 2008 Too heavy on the science for my taste, science of the kind that would have been lost on me even back in the day, when I was far more scientifically and mathematically minded than I am today. Still, definitely had its moments. Thank you, Steve, for the present, and I am sorry it took me two years to get to it! |
Fear and Loathing: On the Campaign Trail '72 by Hunter S Thompson, 505 pages Steven Krise 03 March 2008 He was reluctant to bet on the game [Super Bowl VII], even when I offered to take Miami with no points. A week earlier I'd been locked into the idea that the Redskins would win easily--but when Nixon came out for them and George Allen began televising his prayer meetings I decided any team with both God and Nixon on their side was fucked from the start. |
Mickelsson's Ghosts by John Gardner, 590 pages Steven Krise 06 April 2008 I thought it was a story of one man's slow descent to the bottom (ala Fight Club) but Gardner threw in some back to back murder mystery twists in the last 50 pages. |
The Naked and the Dead by Norman Mailer, 559 pages Tony Pisarenkov 27 April 2008 The mother of all war novels. Well worth the considerable effort. |
The Great Santini by Pat Conroy, 536 pages Kathleen 22 June 2008 Another great by legend Pat Conroy. |
Twilight (The Twilight Saga, Book 1) (2006) by Stephenie Meyer, 544 pages Brad Snyder 26 July 2008 Another recommendation from my daughter. While it is obviously intended for an adolescent and female audience, I found the story entertaining. Basic premise: Girl meets boy. Boy is a vampire. While obviously making dating complicated, since the boy wants to suck the girl’s blood, girl and vampire fall in love anyway, cool with their differences. Vampire and girl meet another coven of vampires who really want to suck the girl's blood. Adventure follows. |
Apocalypse Then: Prophecy and the Making of the Modern World (2008) by Arthur Williamson, 534 pages James Donahue 12 September 2008 |
Beijing Coma (2008) by Ma Jian, 586 pages James Donahue 29 October 2008 Dai Wei lies in a coma after the student protests of 1989 have been brutally shut down. The narrative combines what he observes now with his memories of his former life, allowing us to contrast the romantic dreams of his youthful friends with the compromised actualities of modern-day China. Highly recommended. |
The First Idea: How Symbols, Language, and Intelligence Evolved From Our Primate Ancestors to Modern Humans by Stanley I Greenspan, M.D. & Stuart G Shanker, D Ph, 504 pages Steven Krise 09 December 2008 The authors put forth a rather far reaching theory stating that higher cognitive functions (such as symbolic and abstract thought, language, theory of mind, and human cultural universals) are the products of a nurturing emotional developmental process called functional/emotional development. The substrate supporting this process has been evolving for several millions of years in social primates and ancient hominids to its apex in modern humans today. Since this process is basically a technology transmitted culturally, it is able to evolve more rapidly than strictly biological processes. "In other words, the fundamental dynamic operating in human history is neither biological nor material: It is the cultural transmission of caregiving practices that support the development of higher reflective capacities in individuals and in groups. Precisely because this is a cultural phenomenon, it is not predetermined and is highly vulnerable to regression." The latter half of the book is spent applying this theory to disorders such as autism, to group dynamics, sociology, economics, and history. |
Dark Sun: The Making of the Hydrogen Bomb by Richard Rhodes, 588 pages Steve Gadd 28 December 2008 |
Champlain's Dream: The European Founding of North America (2008) by David Hackett Fischer, 531 pages James Donahue 28 December 2008 Fischer ties together many things I had often wondered about: the comparative Native American policies of Spain, Britain and France; the connection between the French Wars of Religion and French settlements in the New World; and, finally, why the French appeared so lackadaisical about the New World. Fischer's writing is a good combination of scholarly and popular history, with good attention paid to archeology as well as the written sources. Only warning: Fischer is perhaps a bit too enamored with his subject. Did Champlain really represent a more moral road-not-taken for the European population of North America? |
The Last Templar by Raymond Khoury, 532 pages Steven Krise 08 January 2009 Starting with a dramatic robbery of a Templar rotary encoder from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, our heroes pursue the villains and eventually uncover the secret of the Templars - a Gnostic manuscript written in Aramaic by Jeshua of Nazareth, which "proves" that Jesus was just a man, not god. The hard-nosed agnostic archaeologist and the devout Catholic FBI agent eventually throw the manuscript into the ocean because they don't want to topple the Church or disillusion millions of Christians. The book had pleasant enough action sequences but the premise is so absurd I had a hard time enjoying it. There's already plenty of evidence available that Jesus, if he existed, was just a man and yet the Church and Christians continue believing without a problem. One more manuscript would not have any devastating effects. |
25 Surprising Marriages: Faith-Building Stories from the Lives of Famous Christians (1997) by William J. Petersen, 504 pages Brad Snyder 22 February 2009 Mini-biographies of Christian couples throughout history: Billy and Ruth Graham, Martin and Katie Luther, etc. |
Lenin's Tomb: The Last Days of the Soviet Empire by David Remnick, 588 pages Tony Pisarenkov 26 February 2009 An excellent account of the glasnost era and the eventual dissolution of the Soviet Union, including, crucially, a very good analysis of the history of the regime and the political and social forces that formed (and failed to form) modern Russia. Highly recommended. Thank you, Steve, for the present. More comments here |
Death on the Installment Plan by Louis-Ferdinand CĂ©line, 592 pages Tony Pisarenkov 05 July 2009 Had its moments, but on the whole -- definitely a slog. CĂ©line's Journey... was much better, and that's saying something. |