Christina
A great personal overview and introduction for a layperson into some of the most recognizable dishes in west African cuisine. I especially appreciated the author's personal context around the dishes- this recipe is for Sundays when there is time, this spice mix is unique to her family, etc. Very good, and recommended.
I especially appreciated the representation of the concerns of the protagonist, as far as the practicality of her speech with others.
I am a manga baby, so I haven't yet acclimated to a romantic lead just ruffling her hair all the time before they know each other.
By stating the completely obvious, yet.... lost... situations that constitute hanging out, the author emphasizes what has been taken from us by the attention or lack thereof of digital media. I come away from it wanting to make connections with people in real life, and while I'm still afraid of doing so, I'm going to extend myself a lot of grace in trying, thanks to this book.
In a word, anodyne. The necessity of this series to shoehorn in so many recipes means that the characters suffer, and no one more than the main character.
Had a couple good points about motivation, but got in the weeds a bit about bigger societal changes.
I read this in his voice.
Get you a man that talks about you the way Paul Hollywood talks about bread.
I loved this glimpse at a powerful woman of her day, using the power her society gave her to do as much to forward her own power, and that of her son, as she possibly could.
The Foley work was just a little too loud for me. Somehow, this just didn't do it for me.
This was a cozy mystery where everything was kind of ... Surface level, you know. Undemanding is a good word for it.
An excellent, graphic, thought provoking look at the pacific front of WWII from an American perspective.
Since I read Supernova in the East, I immediately went to this, the history of nuclear weaponry starting at atomic bombs. It's incredible how much human ego is wrapped up in discussing the usage of these weapons, in the beginning.
The best and most interesting part of this book is that it takes the most normal, ordinary situations and makes disaster look...inevitable.
About a man pushed to his absolute limit, and a boy who learns from his father how to deal with that. Who learns that violence and secrets are okay and even natural.
The writer does a great job of conveying our main character, Paul, as someone we think is open-minded or “woke” at first, while harbouring a terrible secret. And only the story and events told in his own voice, made to sound understandable or even normal, reveals to us, bit by bit, how not normal, how incomprehensible, some of his actions are. His voice, increasingly paranoid and mean-spirited, takes us on a journey into his mind and heart.
Well worth listening to, as well. This book does very well in audio format.
Honestly, I wanted this book to be more structural/ idea-spawning rather than inspirational.
I'm glad that Ryder got a lot out of his organizational method. I do not expect to find the meaning of life in a notebook that I keep. I expect it to reflect my life, in whatever way is best for me. That's it. I found the rest of the claims pretentious.
Supernatural superhero story that asks the reader about the nature of heroism and villainy. You see both moral sides of both the protagonist (who I'd call an anti-hero) and the antagonist (who is a hero-anti? I guess?). A very fun read, quick, and compelling. I immediately checked out Vengeful.
This book has given me a serious Jones for another tattoo, golden haired and eyed Circe with a lion and a loom
I don't know why I set this one down for so long. An excellent account of flawed men, doing the unthinkable, in the pursuit of money, at the expense of the environment around them. But, of course, they (mostly) didn't regard that.
It was a little saddening to hear the self-deprecation in this, along with all of his amazing stories. I get that self-deprecation was a shield against arrogance, but I think he went even to the other side, and his references to suicide were made awfully prescient in hindsight.
Not my very favorite Terry Pratchett (that honor belongs to any with DEATH), but close. Laugh out loud funny.
Not only should everyone read this book for the insight into history that they may or may not know (much in the style of “stuff you missed in history class,”), they should read it for the second layer, the meta one, that of how this flawed history is chosen and pruned from the author all the way down to the teacher level.
I liked a lot of the over-arching themes of this, but I gotta say that seeing it from Lyra's POV was great in that it sounded like her, and horrible in that I wanted more knowledge in the way this world worked.
And I listened to it via audiobook, so I may have missed it, but I never did find out about the Master's attempted poison of the dad. I mean, I get it by the end, but it was a thing that stuck in my mind the entire book, and never really got talked about again. I'm guessing the master was trying to poison him because of his intention to kill a child. I wanted more, I guess, is what I'm saying.
I've read a lot about Scientology, watched a lot of documentaries, but this book taught me a lot. I enjoyed the format, as well as the extensive sourcing.
I don't know if it's just me, but I think the stories in this series are starting to follow a kind of rote fill-in-the-blank kind of structure.
We begin: Dresden, [explain how he's a wizard/detective/wizardetective] whose life is a mess [insert comments about coke cans and stale pizza and Mister], is presented with a crappy case [insert blase description of supernatural thing here]. Dresden is not prepared for this [insert how he's sick, tired, meh], and now he's screwed unless he [insert supernatural deadly stakes here].
[insert Mandatory Murphy Time]
[insert deadly person with great boobs, described at length]
[insert some kind of sidekick to be a foil for Dresden]
[insert an existential crisis for Dresden putting people in danger. He does it anyway]
[insert Dresden reaching his limits and finding inner reserves over and over again]
[insert it's all cool back at home scene at the end. Cue Mister.]