Anca Segall

I really loved this book - and learned much that was surprising. So much for assumptions, threw a few out...

I have just finished reading/listening to The Pigeon Tunnel. There are other, better and longer reviews of the book itself, so I'll mention a few of the things that struck me after or during the read. Listening to his mesmerizing voice makes for such a personal, intimate experience—I highly recommend springing for the audiobook as well. I listened to some of it while reading the book, and other times just listened, as if I were sitting at a table sharing a drink, or more likely, at a nearby table in a pub, overhearing his conversation. His talent for story telling comes through just as much here as it does in his novels. One thing I wasn't prepared for is his talent for mimicking various accents (American, French, Russian and others). That shouldn't surprise us, given his talent for rendering dialog.

He is self-deprecating, sincere and funny, about himself and others in his long life. However, again not surprisingly, it's clear he has a drawn a curtain, a line beyond which we are not allowed into his life, whether to protect the innocent, the guilty, the unsuspecting, or most likely all of the above. He openly mentions difficulties in his first marriage but does not go into any details, and really why should he? But, perhaps in self defense or as an inherited trait, you the reader get the feeling that you will never truly penetrate below the top layer. It's such a rich layer, it's enough, and will have to be. Perhaps at some point we'll learn more from his sons in the future. Until then, I'm happy to read the origin stories behind some of the characters and stories that I love so very much.

I'll go back to reread this memoir—more slowly, savoring the language and art as much as the stories themselves—but it also very much makes me want to read Sisman's biography of him. Perhaps, despite the subject, Sisman may have managed to illuminate some of the corners a little more.

There isn't much I can add to other reviews - although it took me a bit to get into, soon I couldn't put it down. My only regret is that, despite several visits to Italy, I have not yet had a chance to visit Capri.

Insightful, eye-opening, revealing, fascinating. I gained newfound respect for some then-contemporary justices, in particular Sandra Day O'Connor, although at the end, the discussion of the Gore - Bush election decision was nearly shocking and very disappointing, as unworthy of an otherwise pretty laudable institution, in which most of the justices grow into something more than they started. Hopefully this will continue. I understood that the book is very much through Toobin's eyes, but he is quite even-handed and his research seemed impeccable.

Hmmm... i let this one sit for about a week after reading it. Murder mysteries is one of my favorites, but I would not recommend this one. It was a recommendation by a barista in a Barnes&Noble Starbucks, who said she loved it. It followed all the prescriptions of the genre, but was long on plot and short on depth and interest.
[Interrupt for a general announcement: this is the third time I type this review because I lost the first two. WTF, Goodreads?]
1) Protagonist detective is likable enough.
2) Other characters were fine but almost none was truly three-dimensional or had lives of their own, other than in the service of the plot.
3) Props to the author for strong women, a character trait sketched very superficially, and which made the lack of depth even more annoying.
4) The writing was smooth enough, to the point where I'm wondering if it was authored by a human or a Google DeepMind AI?
5) Most annoying was that each French phrase, clearly added for atmosphere, was translated into English, which was nearly obnoxious and interrupted the train of reading. If you're going to use French but not trust your readers to figure it out (most of these were no more than 5-word easy, obvious phrases), then don't bother.
So... no P.D. James here, nor even Agatha Christie or any of the other grand dames of crime.
I finished it because—inertia—and give it a solid meh.

Read and re-read it so many times between 10 and 12! In Romanian. Imagine my shock when I found out that May never spent any time in the US...

I'm a big Le Carré fan, and love nerding out on the lives of authors I love, so I was very excited for this biography. It is a fairly encyclopedic and relentlessly chronological dive into David Cornwell's life. I found it picked up steam after a few chapters (I started it in late 2020 then put it down for a while, and picked it up again in earnest about a month ago), especially once Sisman got into Cornwell's professional life – his recruitment into MI5 and onwards. Each novel Cornwell wrote was addressed on its own, which may be a bit over the top for some. I enjoyed the snippets of Cornwell's correspondence, the insights into his writing practice and how he searched for stories and characters, and to some extent his interactions with his publishers and agents, though Cornwell became peevish and demanding once he'd become well known. One of the highlights for me was his interaction and friendship with Alec Guinness, who played Smiley in the BBC series of Tinker, Taylor and Smiley's People- in my opinion, both masterpieces, and in the case of TTSS, superior to the more recent movie. Even Gary Oldman, as much as I love him, doesn't top Alec Guinness as Smiley. Other highlights are the bits about Graham Greene, another one of my author heroes, and
I would say this is not a book for casual readers of Le Carré, but for the die-hard fans, I found it fascinating and more intimate look into an author I will truly miss. The biography also reminded me of the Le Carré books I will want to re-read, as well as the few that I still need to read.

I really enjoyed these essays. Also, I recommend the one on hand-washing to every Microbiology class I teach.

I really enjoyed this book, and though it was not as absorbing as Neverwhere or The Graveyard Book, it was a rich and poignant story with characters drawn deftly and with subtlety.

Wonderful books! I wish my daughter could read Romanian. I read them repeatedly, obsessively even, and took them with me to the US when I came, among the very few books I was able to bring with me. They kept me company while I learned English and weathered the storms of puberty in a foreign country and strange new world.

An easy read for an easy summer day or a cold winter night when you don't feel like working too hard at your reading. It has both clichéd and heartwarming moments, fun for all the literary references which act as plot devices. It certainly puts reading front and center, and divides the world into the good (those who read) and everyone else. It has a #MeToo subplot that is critical to the main plot, but it was written in 2014 and it certainly does not tackle such hard issues (the consequences of a minor star author enjoying plucking the fruits of his minor fame, and the consequences he sows all around him). I admit it made me smile and chuckle out loud and cry—it definitely pulled my strings. I did not love the writing style, but it certainly did not drag. Another reader suggested it might be made into a Meg Ryan / Tom Hanks romcom á la Sleepless in Seattle, and I wholly agree - there's nothing wrong with indulging in the occasional cream-filled chocolate, is there?

Fair story, but plodding writing that took away from the enjoyment with nearly every sentence. Seriously? I got it for a few bucks on iBooks, but it wasn't worth the electrons.

Eye-opening.

Good, not great. It does, however, whet my appetite for more.

There are several great reviews of this biography already, so mine will be more of a personal note of why I found it compelling. I happened to see it in a used book store while traveling in Europe and it appealed. Who knows why? Yes, there's the mystique of SP & TH, but more than anything it was the fact that Malcolm was, if the title was any indication, going to address both of them equally. And, really, she did. I found the book fascinating and as compelling a read as any psychological thriller. And like others have said, as or more compelling for me was Malcolm's analysis of the writing of biographies and of biographers themselves as much as their subjects. Of course they can't not be influenced by their own background and lives, but Malcolm's book shows that without it being accusatory in any way. Above all, the book is humane—people are complicated, and forgetting that clearly obscures much that's interesting about anyone, much less about subjects of biographies. The book is extremely well written—lucid, without fluff, with much sympathy but no fawning. It was a model of biographies, and a gem.

Neverwhere is the second book I read by Neil Gaiman, after The Graveyard Book - after those two I am truly hooked. More recently I have added The Ocean at the End of the Road to these, and a couple of others. The writing is clean, sparse, and doesn't get in the way of his flights of imagination. For me, Gaiman straddles the thin line of the imagination of a child and that of an adult, appealing to both, transporting the adult back into the freer flights of fancy of the child while not treating his child audiences with condescension. Neverwhere was a moving and warm book, one that I would recommend to those who are feeling jaded and cynica, or depressed,l to bring you out of those doldrums with a fresh, charmed and charming look at the world.

I enjoyed the writing, the cultural and literary references, and the evocation of the times. I enjoyed the tension between the characters and the lack of their falling easily into cliched expectations. I appreciated the surprises. A very enjoyable, bitter-sweet, jazz-lilting read.

Required reading

There is nothing I could add, I'm certain, to the reviews of F 451 that have already been written. I only hope my daughter, and all our children, read it alongside Orwell. It is a book with a message that should be indelibly tattooed on our consciousness. Its minor imperfections are trivial compared to its strengths.

This one was really hard on the stomach.

I read this during my first trip to the Galapagos, and it was extremely interesting, particularly in the place and within sight of the finches of the story. Terrific. Made me want to collect samples, sequence everything, and figure how it all works.

Nothing like having a bucket of cold water thrown at your hero. My first Mac was an SE, wrote my PhD dissertation on it, and I've never managed to escape the Mac universe. Not that I expected all to be rosy in wonderland, nor am I big into hero worship, but I had a lot of admiration for Jobs. But wow, too bad he was such an ass. I started reading the book before the Foxconn revelations, and that REALLY disappointed me. But you can't take the marketing genius and vision away from the man, and it remains go be seen if his shoes can be filled. While reading this biography, I also started Wozniak, Steve Wozniak's autobiography - the contrast was enlightening and gave me a much better feel for the context in which the Mac was developed. And what a sweetheart! But it's clear Wozniak would not have put Apple on the map like Jobs did. Does the end justify the means?

Spare

This is a pretzel of a tale, told in spare, simple prose. I began to suspect the ending somewhere around the first library scene, but I felt no less suspense than before. PKD is impressive in how few brushstrokes he can use to build the ominous mood.