Mer Barr
Like some comic book series we know, a character is bumped off and the authors find an interesting [or well known] way to bring them back, to continue on. Glad to see it.
I'll rant again about how there needs to be a 'previously on The Dresden Files' section. This is too far in for me to read all the prior books to stay up on the references held in a book. BUT I'm not going to let this stop me from reading on.
This storyline is better than some of the other books in the series, not sure if it's me or the author that had a slump at some point that showed thru.
The author refers a lot to Ms. Walters' biography, which has me wondering what the author can contribute that Ms. Walters didn't already say in her memoir?
And I'm scratching my head as to why there is so much time spent on the father's biography when the subtitle only mentions his daughter. Does she feel they're that tied at the hip so to speak? I mean, it seems she was heavily involved in pulling him out of his own messes but does it justify this much of Ms. Walters' biography?
Otherwise, for those of us who didn't read the memoir, this book provides a lot of details of her personal life and thought processes that I wasn't aware of. Granted, I was still fairly young when I saw her on 60 Minutes and doing interviews with famous people, and not all that interested in knowing more about her, or reading about her in papers.
I'm not a big fan of novellas so not happy that I have to walk thru several 'books' to get the complete story. To its credit, in this instance it appears the series may have started out as a podcast, and is an independent publisher.
The plot is intriguing because it's the 'old' west in the future, as Stephen King's Darktower is. And the audio presentation has a similar feel to another podcast called 'Old Gods of Appalachia', which I like to listen to.
Gave up 21% of the way in the 1st time around as well as the 2nd.
Just too disjointed on the story, what was present, past, alternate reality, real, not real. I can't even tell if 'now' has even changed locations or if this is a 1-scene story; it all seems to occur in a recovery room.
What's with the eyes???
Growing up I knew just the name of 3 cultures from Central and/or South America, and that was it. Where they had lived and when, and details about them either didn't exist or I've forgotten them. This book does a great job of drilling into 1 of them, especially focusing on native sources.
It can get a bit overwhelming and drawn out but hang in there to the Epilogue and Appendix where the author goes into detail on the discovery of the sources of her information and how they relate to her story.
Her opening paragraph is up there with [book:The Gunslinger|43615]'s opening sentence on imagination- and attention- capture.
Incredibly detailed about all aspects related to the author's live and her studies: the history of the area she lived in, the communities, the people, the arts, and cultures involved. Sometimes I needed a bit of patience to get thru a section that didn't necessarily interest me but overall, well worth the read.
Downright gruesome, don't eat while listening! As usual for Michael Crichton's books, this is chock full of science facts weaved in with something sinister.
Due to the number of scientists involved, the story gets bogged down at the start, when each is being introduced along with their area of expertise. The storyline bogs down every now and again for the authors to dive into something going on at that moment. Thankfully it's usually short-lived and movement picks back up again.
- I'm not a fan of short books. I like the middle of the road sized, where there's some room to build out a storyline and characters.
- It's about stories of the region and as I'm not a native I'm confused as to whether the stories' characters are based on reality or made up [for some reason this is important to me, don't yet know why] and lost track of who was who and who was with who. I prefer not to get lost in the telling of a story.
- I had a hard time becoming attached to the stories or the characters both the book's and the stories'. See 2.
The plot moves along, not any side tracking or focusing on subjects that don't contribute to the story or bog the movement down.
It has characters that seem interesting, including some of the spirits that share the world with humans.
And the author does a great job of providing information to show the perspective has changed from one character to another; either by calling out the new character's name or starting a new chapter.
I liked this book better than its predecessor in the series, Into the Riverlands, because of its emphasis on the interactions of individuals and their memories. Riverlands was an emphasis on the local stories the cleric was collecting and less time spent on the group being travelled with.
In Mammoths I did have alot of confusion keeping track of who was talking when the word 'they' was being used. I interpreted this to be a community of individuals that refer to themselves as they/them, which means 'they' could mean the individual doing the speaking or could mean another person being spoken of, in the same sentence.
This confusion didn't detract from my enjoyment of the story or the characters.
Sadly I'm not finding the author's books funny anymore. :(
As I've found with the other books I've read recently, the switching back and forth without any visual or audible notice is really making it difficult to figure out which storyline I'm in at any given moment, which creates more frustration and no joy in the humor.
I'm not sure what the subject of this book is. If the issue was with President Trump's failure to do a proper handoff from President Obama, the author did a great job expressing this several time with alot of exposition. Was this lack of understanding of how to run a country supposed to have had some recommendations? Or other examples than just the start of his presidency? It lacks all of that.
If this was to give folks a sample of the Sammies, the author did an excellent job of picking some great examples and providing plenty of detail.
And I have no idea what the connection between the lack of handoff and the title of the book is.
This is a HUGE book so big I did a renewal of my library loan and still didn't finish it.
What I was able to learn about was how his childhood was a major impact on how he approached his personal and professional life. And to see how he was almost 2 separate men, with different outlooks on life for each of these.
It's amazing to learn just how much of what he created is and isn't still around.
The author [and narrator] does a great job of keeping this beast of a book lively and interesting. The story is pretty much linear but there are some overlaps due to the subject and number of others involved in Rockefeller's life.
Interesting perspective on the beginnings of World War 2 and then I ran out of time before I had to return the book. In the first couple chapters there are disconnects in the storyline. For example, at one point the author is talking about something going on when she was a small child and then immediately jumps to her father's youth. I didn't see the connection, or I missed it, if there was one.