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Weekly book post
Feb. 4th, 2013 12:08 pmThe "started but not finished pile" on the nightstand was three books high. I spent most of Sunday finishing those and watching a PBS series on the National Park system.
Quick note on the summaries for mysteries - I try to keep them spoilerfree in case someone wants to read them. I don't want to spoil plot twists.
A Fall from Grace by Robert Barnard. Charley and Felicity move to a new town. It has one of the more original motives for murder that I've read. The characters are expertly drawn. A good read.
Skeleton Dance by Aaron Elkins. Another Gideon Oliver mystery. This one has to do with Neanderthals, Cro-Magnons, and scientific shenanigans. I learned that cowboy bones show distinctive impact patterns. In an odd coincidence, a couple of sites mentioned in Bryson's book are integral to the plot here. Elkins does his homework.
Breaking Faith by Jo Bannister. Coming in in the middle of a series can be a crapshoot. It wasn't hard to figure out whodunnit here. The protagonist runs a commission agency. She finds a house for someone and there's a body in the garden. She's a little too Mary Sue - three guys in this one.
AIA Guide to Washington Architecture, 5th edition. A rare instance where reading the book was defeated by its awkward printing format. Only five inches wide and ten inches tall, so it couldn't be comfortably opened and text got lost in the crease. Too bad - I liked what I read. Some of the descriptions were very amusing. Another shortcoming was its lack of coverage of the eastern District areas.
A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson. He has an amazing breadth of knowledge and a very entertaining writing style. At almost 500 pages, it's not really short. He covers a lot of territory - geology, biology, taxonomy, paleontology, and more. Even though it's ten years old, the only chaper that's been overtaken by developments is oceanography. He does a good job tying together the threads of learning about the Earth.
Words That Work: It's Not What You Say, It's What People Hear by Frank Luntz. He's a pollster and Republican political guru, but what he has to say applies to anybody. His ten rules of effective language apply to plain language and effective communication. His analyses were pretty interesting.
Quick note on the summaries for mysteries - I try to keep them spoilerfree in case someone wants to read them. I don't want to spoil plot twists.
A Fall from Grace by Robert Barnard. Charley and Felicity move to a new town. It has one of the more original motives for murder that I've read. The characters are expertly drawn. A good read.
Skeleton Dance by Aaron Elkins. Another Gideon Oliver mystery. This one has to do with Neanderthals, Cro-Magnons, and scientific shenanigans. I learned that cowboy bones show distinctive impact patterns. In an odd coincidence, a couple of sites mentioned in Bryson's book are integral to the plot here. Elkins does his homework.
Breaking Faith by Jo Bannister. Coming in in the middle of a series can be a crapshoot. It wasn't hard to figure out whodunnit here. The protagonist runs a commission agency. She finds a house for someone and there's a body in the garden. She's a little too Mary Sue - three guys in this one.
AIA Guide to Washington Architecture, 5th edition. A rare instance where reading the book was defeated by its awkward printing format. Only five inches wide and ten inches tall, so it couldn't be comfortably opened and text got lost in the crease. Too bad - I liked what I read. Some of the descriptions were very amusing. Another shortcoming was its lack of coverage of the eastern District areas.
A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson. He has an amazing breadth of knowledge and a very entertaining writing style. At almost 500 pages, it's not really short. He covers a lot of territory - geology, biology, taxonomy, paleontology, and more. Even though it's ten years old, the only chaper that's been overtaken by developments is oceanography. He does a good job tying together the threads of learning about the Earth.
Words That Work: It's Not What You Say, It's What People Hear by Frank Luntz. He's a pollster and Republican political guru, but what he has to say applies to anybody. His ten rules of effective language apply to plain language and effective communication. His analyses were pretty interesting.
