gerikatz
A quick and entertaining read, I plowed through it in a day mostly to get to the end so I could read something else. Fine for a vacation or a long flight.
I wish this book had been around when I was in my early 20s and thought I knew everything but I was actually an idiot about most of these topics. An approachable intro to social and racial justice, written with humor and love for the reader. I found the switching back and forth from fluffy (detailed direction on moisturizing your skin, for example) to heavy (white supremacy, misogyny) very jarring though. It felt like two different books merged together. Both would be good on their own, but the combination didn't flow too well. I adore Luvvie and I hope there are more books to come from her. She is a bright light in the darkness.
A sweet book, not great literature but a nice story for a vacation read. I could have done without the romanticization of the Nazi soldier with a heart of gold. If you're not part of the resistance to fascism, you are part of fascism. There were no good Nazis.
As a memoir, this was a touching and well-written book. As socio-economic commentary, it completely lacks an economic lens and barely touches on the role race plays in a person's ability to achieve the American Dream.
Through a 21st century lens, Thomas Seymour was a pedophile predator. At the very least he was a creep and a sex pest who assaulted the daughter of a king repeatedly. He groomed her, made his wife complicit in the abuse, and got away with it. The author did amazing work piecing together primary sources to tell this story and the broader story of Seymour's hamfisted attempts to gain power, but the epilogue diminishes that accomplishment. The final pages ignore Seymour's predatory nature and instead sound like a romance novel, lauding a man who refused to take no for an answer, considering his highest accomplishment the fact that he got closer to deflowering Elizabeth I than any other man.
Fun little exploration into everyday urban wilderness. The chapter on Ginko trees explained so much about the forest lining the streets of my neighborhood.
Meteorology isn't terribly exciting to me, so large portions of the first half of the book were a bit dry. But the second half was some of the most exciting non-fiction writing I've ever read.
Entertaining enough to read in a weekend. It's labeled a thriller, but I didn't find it terribly thrilling. Triggering for anyone who has lived through domestic abuse, emotional, sexual or physical.
I wanted to love this book as much as I did Erik Larson's others. But I found it harder to get through, with only the last quarter really capturing my interest. I had hoped he would offer some conclusions about the controversy around the sinking of the Lusitania (did the British intentionally leave the ship unprotected so it would get torpedoed, bringing the US into the war? What caused the second explosion?) but I don't feel like I know any more than I did before reading this book.
I've never been to Oklahoma and I didn't even know OKC had an NBA team, so I was skeptical about the book that so many people had gushed about. But Anderson's artful weaving of sports and history proved a dramatic, exciting and heartbreaking storytelling device. Brought me to tears more than once.
This was not a great masterpiece of literature, but a compelling and at times exciting story of women of the French resistance. If you power through the first 150-200 pages, the second half is worth it.
(I would give the second half of the book a 4, but the first half a 3. If I could give it a 3.5 I would, but I had to round down due to the silly romance novel aspects of the first half.)
This book was so well-written and crafted, which I appreciated, and I really wanted to like it. But it just felt like page after page of suffering and depression. The story just went from misery to different misery and didn't feel like there was any resolution at the end. I didn't care about most of the characters and actively disliked the others. I wanted to like this book a lot more than I actually did.
What a wild ride. I highly recommend the audio book (27 hours long; it's an investment, but would have taken me years to read the book with my eyeballs, so, worth it.)
I loved everything about this book. I felt an affinity for the writer, being roughly the same age and coming from a German Jewish background, so I eagerly gobbled up both the research she conducted, and her tale of the way the research affected her personally.
I've worked in and around politics for almost 20 years, and Ady Barkan is one of the most inspiring activists I've ever met. I had the great honor of meeting him in the summer of 2018 at a panel about Medicare for All hosted by Congressman Keith Ellison. Ady was still able to speak loudly and clearly, and made the case that universal healthcare is a necessity and our current broken system is an injustice. This man, ten years younger than I am, with a young family, was giving precious moments of his remaining years to the movement so that all Americans can survive and thrive, regardless of their net worth, religion, skin color or gender. He continues to amaze me every day. His memoir is beautifully written, includes behind the scenes details about grassroots victories (and defeats) and makes me grateful for the voice Ady has given to the progressive movement of the late 20-teens.
Beautifully written, with some really striking passages, but the “mystery” plot was predictable.
I am so conflicted about this book. I wanted to love it. It was absorbing and compelling but I wanted it to be over with about 100 pages left to go.
On one hand, this is a classic tale of grit and determination. An inspiring testament to the strength of the human spirit. On the other hand, it's yet another tale of an overconfident white man who dragged himself and an entire crew into a life threatening situation in order to feed his own ego.
My only criticisms are of 1) the love story with the museum librarian within the first 50 pages and 2) the big paternity reveal after a car crash. Both would have been perfect for a daytime soap-opera but were beneath the rest of this beautifully researched and written novel.
I found this book disappointing. If this is the first book about the Tudors you've ever read, you might find it worthwhile.