Christine

I really appreciate how she puts African-Americans at the center of abolitionism. I read it for use in the classroom, and I'm pausing at the moment. It's very long, and I haven't yet found sections I feel I need to use for class. I plan to tell them about the book. I'm marking it complete, but I actually have only read half so far.

Not my cup of tea. I thought the premise was intriguing, but it was too dark and creepy. I couldn't connect to the characters, and ended up skimming to the end. He does draw the sense of place and dystopia well.

I really enjoyed this. Like talking a walk with an extremely knowledgeable friend while she points out birds, recounts stories, and explains things that you're embarrassed not to have known you didn't know. I love birds, and now I understand them a tiny bit more. I definitely appreciate them more. The book is a bit dense, but her story telling returns again and again.

Other reviews here say it all, but I'll add that this short novel packs so much in. It's beautiful and poignant, taking me to my childhood, my young adulthood, and my present. Such a skilled writer! So insightful.

Lovely writing. Just way too slow for me. It's a sleepy sort of book. Recommended strongly by a friend.

Giving myself permission to put this one down for a while. I'm about half way through, and listening has been powerful. The book is brilliant – smart, moving, descriptive, funny, important. But there is a heaviness to Richard Powers because his messages are serious and urgent, and it's just too much for my sensitive self right now, in light of recent events. I will return to this sometime, hopefully soon.

Oh, Elizabeth Strout. Thank you for giving me a little escape when I really needed it. I love being in Crosby and Shirley Falls and NYC with these characters, listening to their honest and realistic dialog, and absorbing their wisdom about love, loss, friendship, and change. I listened to this one and highly recommend.

Because I enjoyed his Thursday Murder Club books so much – and the Happier in Hollywood podcast women chose this for their book club – I was eager to jump in to this new mystery. At first, I was disappointed not to find the cozy vibe of the retirement community, and it took a bit to warm to these characters, but I did. It was fun and funny, smart and engaging. I highly recommend if you want a take-me-away sort of mystery. (As usual, I listened to this.)

I flew through this audiobook, and it was fun, fresh, relevant for a woman of my age and place in life. I get the complaints that others made, and they are mostly fair. But it was still enjoyable and interesting. I appreciated the mother-daughter relationships she captured, as well as the somewhat idealized, but pleasant depiction of a mid-life marriage.

My least favorite so far. I agree with what others said.
Hope next one is better. I still love the characters and the escape into Canada.

Erik Larson has an effective formula, and readers of both popular and professional histories may find useful stories here. This was mostly review material for me, but I appreciated how he brings the history to light and to life.

This is a beautiful book with Amy Tan's lovely drawings. She is so talented! And the day by day diary entries about her bird visitors is charming, if a bit too detailed for a normal sit-down-and-read-this- whole-book – at least for me. I found myself jumping and skimming around, but found the details and images delightful. Perhaps if I had more patience ... which is what one needs to enjoy the fruits of backyard birding.

Backed by many large studies and full of charts and anecdotes, this book was compelling and fun to read. I will enjoy seeing what others have thought of it and what the critiques are. I found myself reading sentences or sections aloud to family nearby – anyone who would listen. It reinforced some things that I have noticed casually about other age groups, and drew a mostly accurate picture (I think) of my own generation.

I did know most of this from teaching experience and professional development efforts, but I appreciated how all the helpful information is pulled together here for students and instructors. I hope that those who need these tips and this knowledge will read and use it to improve learning, school, and teaching.

I feel like I was there with these three maddening and devoted anthropologists. As a few others mentioned, it conjured State of Wonder for me. It definitely made me want to learn more about Margaret Meade.

Exciting and steamy! This was a fun and smart fast-paced novel. I can't wait for her next book.

I have been a fan of WKK's stand-alone books, and many Louise Penny fans recommended this series for a similar vibe and entertainment. I see why! The story line and setting pulls you in. The characters are mostly quite likeable. The MN winter is compelling and exciting. I don't think it has the same level of sophistication as a LP mystery, but this is just the first one. I've already downloaded the next (listen). It's a healthy escape.
PS. OK, I started #2. The opening scene is grisly, but I persevered. Then, my Goodreads sources warned of more death to come, so I'm not continuing. Too bad. I guess I got the gist.

Another masterpiece. I agree with some of the others who complained that the secondary narrative started to overwhelm the first. I found it pretty stressful, but satisfied with the ending. Going to look at some Gregorian chant now.

This is an inspiring & meditative book – a blend of indigenous people history and story telling with modern ecology & botany. A student recommended it, and I plan to use the first part as I teach students about conflicts over land in the colonial period. I listened online to a talk she gave at Harvard with Richard Powers; this book does go well with OVERSTORY, which I also appreciated.

I can see why this is earning so many accolades. I recommend this action-packed book highly, but of course, be aware that some of the content is grim — as you would expect. I'm looking forward to my book club discussion ... with a few chapters of Huckleberry Finn to our study. I both listened to and read this novel. That was helpful because I felt vulnerable just listening. To be honest, I looked ahead for some of the storylines in the physical book.

Such a powerful novel, bringing me back to the 80s and a world I knew, but really didn't. The parallel stories are effective, if imperfect. I was affected deeply by Yale. And I appreciated the way we can feel the long lasting effects of a devastating disease and decade.

I'm grateful for the Goodreads community as I think about this book. I agree with many of the criticisms, but I think that the strong reactions indicate that it was thought provoking and powerful enough to generate smart responses. The author captures the 90s well, particularly the boarding school bubbles. But I did feel that the mystery and the political statements around MeToo competed with — rather than complimented — each other. Still, it's an impressive feat to explore both effectively, which she did. Having just finished her previous book about the AIDS crisis, I didn't enjoy the character development here nearly as much and found the protagonist kind of annoying. But I do recommend this book for anyone who enjoys a mystery kind of like Gone Girl, but with the historical setting as a character and also explicit social commentary about gender, abuse, and racial injustice

Thoroughly enjoyed this. Maybe her best book in the series so far. Just the kind of escape I want when I read one of her books.

This was a fun and easy, if predictable, read. It looks like it will be a young adult story, but when you get into it, you see the F bombs and one spicy sex scene. But it has the comforting feel of a YA book: witchcraft, misfit characters whom you love, a villain who must be vanquished, and the triumph of youthful optimism over age and rigidity I definitely enjoyed this. Some have described it as a hug of a book, and I agree.

This is powerful. A friend and colleague I respect and love said that this is perhaps the most important book that she has read in many years. I can see why. I put off reading it a bit because I thought it would be depressing. It is, of course, but Desmond is impressive in his ability to marshal countless studies and personal anecdotes to make his compelling and accessible argument. I often stress to students that it is easy to sit in judgement of those in the past, but there are many ways that we are making choices that will make future students sit in judgement of us. Desmond suggests that we become “poverty abolitionists,” and I'm reminded of how I tell my students how “out there” abolitionists seemed to most 19th century Americans. Desmond's discussion of corporate practices and government policy is damning, but he asks us (those of us likely to buy, borrow, or read this book) to consider and cease our complicity. The last chapter does offer recommendations. I'll be eager to see the reviews and responses to this book.