Books I've Read
Books Listed by Author
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The Fencing Master
A teacher of fencing in the 1800's is confronted with a perplexing quandry. Good story, in the style of the author. Better (and shorter) than The Nautical Chart, I thought.
Read:
1/2002
The Nautical Chart
Search for a sunken treasure of emeralds. Lots of nautical lore. Reviewed in Booklist July 2001 pg. 1951.
Read:
12/2001
All Alone in the Universe
A teenage girl has relationship problems with her best friend. A excellent little book. Interesting reader comments on Amazon.com
Read:
1/2006
Execution Dock
Mystery takes place in London in the 1860s or so. Monk of the River Police chases after child (male)pornographer and probably (male) pedophile Jericho Phillips. Because while it is immoral to be a pedophile of females, it's illegal to be a pedophile of males.
Read:
8/2011
Population: 485
The author is a volunteer fireman in his hometown. Lots of interesting anecdotes, not so much philosophical stuff as Truck.
Words I Had To Look Up:
Elegiac (pg. 44 ) -- expressing sorrow often for something now past.
Otiose (pg. 116 ) -- 1. being at leisure; idle; indolent. 2. ineffective or futile. 3. superfluous or useless.
Plangent (pg. 176 ) -- Having an expressive and especially plaintive quality.
MIke Magnuson (pg. ) -- Author of Lummox.
Valsalvian reaction (pg. ) -- "When a person forcefully expires against a closed glottis, changes occur in intrathoracic pressure that dramatically affect venous return, cardiac output, arterial pressure, and heart rate. This forced expiratory effort is called a Valsalva maneuver." From Cardiovascular Physiology Concepts by Richard E. Klabunde, Ph.D.
Thurls (pg. ) -- The hip joint in cattle.
Read:
1/2009
Truck : A Love Story
Pretty philosophical story of the rebuilding of the author's International truck. Except that it is mostly NOT about that, it's about his love life, friends, gardening, cooking, and family. But it's about the truck, too.
Words I Had To Look Up:
Baudelaire (pg. 233) -- French poet/writer, symbol of literary decadence.
Derrida (pg. 242) -- French philosopher, founder of deconstruction. Died 2004.
Ameliorism (pg. 251) -- "Meliorism" is the belief that the world tends to improve and that humans can aid its betterment, so adding an "a" must make it the opposite.
Sequelae (pg. 254) -- A secondary result, sequel.
Smoked redhorse (pg. 273) -- A kind of fish.
Read:
1/2009
The Complete Idiots Guide To Geocaching
Very informative book about geocaching. Learned a couple of things, esp., there is a cache on the floor of the Atlantic Ocean. Cool!
Read:
6/2010
Gifts Of Blood
Finally bought this book. Seven stories from the Varkela series. My favorite has always been Leechcraft. Two other stories included, one of which is about a spider that lives in a lute.
Read:
5/2010Read:
5/2012
Flambards
Christina, an orphan, is sent to live with her uncle Russell and his boys at their country place, Flambards. Son Mark loves the hunt, William dreams of flying. Loved the Masterpiece Theater adaption, enjoyed the series when I read it years ago, and enjoy this coming-of-age tale again.
Read:
6/2011
Pennington's Last Term
"Penn" doesn't get on at school, except for music and sports. I enjoyed reading it, and the author's drawing, too.
Read:
12/2012
Life As We Knew It
Miranda, a teen-age girl in Pennsylvania, records the changes in her life when an asteroid-hit Moon changes its orbit. Gets pretty bleak, and the diary style wasn't very exciting for me. By page five I decided I was bored, but I read the WHOLE THING, and it was worth reading. Good survival advice in there, too.
Read:
2/2008
The Dead & The Gone
You can tell which sister is going to die, the noble, heroic, religious one. Poor Beth, you could see it coming, couldn't you? Oh, wait, wrong book. Alex is going to Catholic high school in New York when the asteroid hits the moon and knocks it a bit askew in this companion to Life As We Knew It. He tries to take care of his two sisters, but things just get worse and worse.
Read:
9/2010
This World We Live In
It's a year later, Miranda meets Alex and falls in love. Guess which sister dies now? Is there going to be a sequel?
Read:
9/2010
The Whale Hunters
Very nice pictures by the author illustrate this 51 page book which takes us through a whaling trip in the 1800s. Published in 1974, there is no mention of protests against whaling in the paragraph about contemporary hunts.
Read:
5/2013
The Last Book In The Universe
In a gritty future world several decades after a planetary earthquake a boy named Spaz tries to survive.
Read:
1/2009
The Young Man And The Sea
Skiff takes his skiff out to sea to harpoon a big tuna so he can get his alcoholic dad's boat repaired.
Read:
12/2012
Third Strike
With co-author William G. Tapply. J.W. Jackson and Brady Coyne investigate ferry strike violence and the murder of Brady's client.
Read:
8/2010
The 27 Ingredient Chili Con Carne Murders
Food and murder. This is great!! This one is based on the characters and a story created by Virginia Rich. Mrs. Rich created the Eugenia Potter series but passed away before writing this book.
Read:
3/1999
Leaving Time
Too many dead elephants.
Read:
7/2017
The Afterlife Diet
A rather confusing cast of characters, mostly fat, try to lose weight, or not, in heaven and here on earth. I found the hot dog description interesting, I might try tomatoes on a dog. Oh, did I mention the vampire parakeets?
Words I Had To Look Up:
Ophidiophobe (pg. 48) -- Fear of snakes.
Kakophaphiophobia ( pg. 80) -- Kakorraphiaphobia is the fear of failure. Typo?
Chalyatchkie stick (pg. 87) -- No definiton found.
Emmis about the whole geschichte (pg. 95) -- Can't find definion for "emmis", but
the rest is about the whole story/history.
Fraktur characters (pg. 153) -- A typeface from the 16th century with a broken or
fractured appearance.
Transmigrational (pg. 181) -- To pass from one body to another at death,
soul-wise.
Prepossessing (pg. 191) -- Creating a favorable impression.
Gemutlich (pg. 208) -- German, pleasant.
Shmendrick (pg. 214) -- A spelling variation, it is Yiddish for a stupid person.
Pneumatic blonde (pg. 147) -- Well, Anna Nicole Smith was one.
Objet trouvé (pg. 224) -- In French, a found object.
Chent (pg. 240) -- Silly me, it is a mispronounciation of chant!
Read:
9/2008
20 books displayed
[Palacio - Paretsky] [Paretsky - Parker] [Parker - Parker] [Parker - Patterson] [Patterson - Paulsen] [Paulsen - Penny] [Perez-Reverte - Pinkwater] [Piper - Poyer] [Poyer - Prager] [Pratchett - Pratchett] [Pratchett - Pronzini] [Pronzini - Pullman] [Pullman - Pynchon]