Books I've Read

Welcome, Visitor
Display statistics
Books by Author
Log In

Books Listed by Author

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z All

The Help

Stockett, Kathryn
Novel about 60s women in Mississippi and the women who work for them. Might make a good movie!

Words I Had To Look Up:

degustationary (pg. 214) -- The action or an instance of tasting especially in a series of small portions

Quote:

"Who are these Fedders, anyway?" Mother asks. "Where are their people from?" -- pg 324

Read:

2/2012

American Nomads

Stowell, Emily
A novelized biography of the author's family coming to America and eventually settling in Oregon. Vanity published, I guess, the printing was poorly done in the beginning, and there are some editing problems, but after getting past the Dutch ancestors (WHY do they keep using the same names for everyone??) I became engaged with the story, and even teared up a bit at points. Still looking for that Huntington family chart, though!

Read:

1/2019

The Water Wars

Stracher, Cameron
It is just one darn thing after another when Vera and brother Will go to rescue their friend Kai. I liked the first half of the book more than the second.

Read:

4/2013

A Girl Of The Limberlost

Stratton-Porter, Gene
Elora lives near a big swamp/forest in Indiana and collect moths First published in 1909, this 2013 eBook. Pretty much a classic.

Read:

1/2023

Freckles

Stratton-Porter, Gene
This book takes place before A Girl Of The Limberlost, and concerns Freckles and the Swamp Angel. Pretty good, if effusive.

Read:

1/2023

That's me all over, Mable

Streeter, Edward
Fun read of fictional letters to home from a soldier in the U.S. Army during World War I. A few objectionable racist terms appear, sadly. I read the Project Gutenberg e-book version.

Read:

7/2022

The Grays

Strieber, Whitley
A novel about UFOs. Didn't care for it. Check my blog entry for points of complaint.

Read:

8/2007

2 Guys Named Lenny

Stroke, Jack
A free e-book (short story) download about two guys, cousins, named Lenny (who appeared in another book that takes place before) who have acquired a large quantity of "E" and need to sell to...someone. Good story.

Read:

6/2022

Blockhouse Blues and the Elmore Beast

Stroke, Jack
Brains and Hammers get make dumb decisions and get caught up in the shenanigans of a crime bosses' daughter. Read the Kindle edition.

Read:

6/2022

Early Storm

Stroke, Jack
Amber is on the job as an assassin, but her past keeps interfering. A short story e-book download. Good story!

Read:

6/2022

Scam

Stroke, Jack
Some people try to steal some drug money, but it goes all wrong. I'd like to know what happened to all the characters!

Read:

5/2022

The Other Hotel

Stroke, Jack
Quite a number of people find their lives intertwining in not necessarily fun (but interesting!) ways at a decrepit hotel located in Melbourne.

Quote:

She was the female equivalent of a [family size] pack of Doritos. - p.177

Read:

9/2021

Read:

5/2022

The Other Hotel 2 Christmas

Stroke, Jack
I liked the first book so much I read it twice, then I bought the second book and several others by the author. I signed up for his emails and I got one that asked if I wanted to get free preview copies in return for a review. I don't think the author has seen how poorly I write!

Read:

5/2022

Glasshouse

Stross, Charles
A complicated future cybernistic world with replicators and all kinds of stuff. Robin is some sort of undercover espionage soldier. Took about 80 pages to get going. Good story. Some Prisoner references, some library stuff.

Words I Had To Look Up:

Verminous (pg. 21) -- Having to do with vermin. Obvious!

Auto-da-fe' (pg. 90) -- Act of faith.

Osmotically (pg.115) -- by means of osmosis . Another doh!

Apoptosis (pg. 115) -- A form of cell death.

Panopticon (pg. 131) -- A prison constucted so all prisoners can be seen at one time. I think I've looked this up before.

Sic transit gloria panopticon (pg. 168) --Thus passes the glory of the, well, panopticon!

Louche (pg. 240) -- Of questionable taste or morality; decadent.

Quote:

Be seeing you. (pg. 275)

Quote:

Neither Janis--nor I--is remotely qualified to be a real dark age librarian, with their esoteric mastery of catalogue systems and controlled information classification vocabularies, but we can run a small municipal lending library and reference section with a bit of scurrying around and a lot of patience. (pg. 127)

Read:

7/2008

Halting State

Stross, Charles
Crime in near-future Edinburgh. Lots of cybertalk, very Neal Stephensonish, but about two hundred pages shorter. On Amazon a commenter says the book is told in second person. I don't know if that is correct, but it certainly is written in a different-than-usual style.

Words I Had To Look Up:

Pre-prandial (pg. 271) -- Before meals.

Haptic (pg. 315) -- Tactile, sense of touch.

Read:

6/2008

Missile Gap

Stross, Charles
Earth is taken up and stuck on a big, flat disk. A really BIG, flat disk!

On page 86, if Lenin is one head, Stalin is another, and the big is third, who is the fourth head mentioned in the text. And I quote, "Gagarin brings his binoculars to focus on the fourth head." Not to mention that the illustration on the facing page shows three heads...

The book jackets says this is the "Signed, Lettered Edition" priced at 150 bucks. But I don't see any signing, nor lettering. Did the library get ripped off? Is this some scam edition?

Words I Had To Look Up:


Dirigiste (pg. 44) -- Directed by a central authority.
S Doradus (pg. 62) -- The brightest star in the Large Magellanic Cloud.
Gnomically (pg. 78) -- In a gnomic, didactic, or sententious manner. Yeah, cleared THAT up!
Fraught (pg.84) -- . "...boring and fraught." 1. Filled with a specified element or elements; charged: an incident fraught with danger; an evening fraught with high drama. 2. Marked by or causing distress; emotional. I think, it's #2.
Instantiations (pg. 96) -- A representation of an idea in the form of an instance of it

Read:

5/2008

Rule 34

Stross, Charles
I was afraid I had already read this, but it turned out I read a previous book. Edinburgh Detective Inspector Liz Kavanaugh runs a unit that specializes in finding criminals using the internet. I'm not quite sure how the book ended. I was not always able to decipher the author's mixture of computer jargon and Scottish accent.

Read:

3/2012

The Atrocity Archives

Stross, Charles
Bob Howard, UK investigator of the occult, goes to a lot of meetings in between saving the world incidents. Really hate the typeface used on chapter and sectional headings!

Read:

7/2020

The Clan Corporate

Stross, Charles
Book three in the The Merchant Princes series. Miriam gets in serious trouble, gets engaged for a few minutes, and is either a prisoner or on the run most of the book. Mike the DEA agent and former date of Miriam shows.

Read:

6/2009

Read:

6/2010

The Family Trade

Stross, Charles
A sort of parallel world corporate science fiction import-export story. Pretty good stuff.

Words I Had To Look Up:


Aeron chairs (pg. 13) -- Never heard of them until my son mentioned the other day, and here they are in this book!
Demesne (pg. 95) -- manorial land actually possessed by the lord and not held by tenants.
Plaited (pg. 153) -- A braid, especially of hair. Or in this case, complicated family relationships.
Orangery (pg. 203) -- A sheltered place, especially a greenhouse, used for the cultivation of orange trees in cool climates.

Quotes:


...discreetly holstered M-16s... (pg. 177) -- Big holster! But these were on horses, so maybe they are in scabbards.
...patented dumb-schoolgirl simper... (pg. 177) -- I just like that image.
...the locket from the chair around her neck...(pg. 202) -- I've heard of millstones around the neck, but a CHAIR?
...that a prince's wife wll not die of childbed fever... (pg. 127) -- semi-dup.
...some countess doesn't succumb to childbed fever... (pg. 247) -- semi-dup.

Read:

5/2008
20 books displayed
[Abadzis - Akers, pseud.] [Akers, pseud. - Anderson] [Anderson - Arngrim] [Arnow - Avi] [Avi - Baen Publishing Enterprises] [Baker - Barnard] [Barnard - Barnes] [Barnes - Barr] [Barr - Beanton] [Beanton - Beaton] [Beaton - Beaton] [Beaton - Bennett] [Benrey - Block] [Block - Block] [Block - Bosch] [Bosch - Breslin] [Brillant - Bryson] [Bryson - Bujold] [Bujold - Butler] [Buzzell - Card] [Card - Carr] [Carrere - Chambers] [Charles - Clancy] [Clancy - Coben] [Coben - Cole] [Coleman - Collins] [Collins - Connelly] [Connelly - Connelly] [Connelly - Cook] [Cooper - Cornwell] [Cornwell - Crais] [Crais - Crichton] [Crichton - Curry] [Curry - Cussler] [Cussler - Davis] [Dean - Dionne] [Disilverio - Dowd] [Dowell - Duncan] [Duncan - Elkins] [Elkins - Evanovich] [Evanovich - Fairstein] [Fairstein - Ferris] [Ferris - Flanagan] [Flanagan - Follett] [Ford - Fox] [Francis - Francis] [Francis - Francis] [Francis - Freedman] [Frey - Gantos] [Garcia - Gidwitz] [Gidwitz - Gores] [Gores - Granger] [Granger - Greenleaf] [Greenleaf - Grimes] [Grisham - Haddix] [Haddix - Hall] [Hall - Hallinan] [Hallinan - Hassman] [Haugaard - Heinlein] [Heinlein - Heller] [Heller - Hepler] [Herbert - Hess] [Hess - Hiaasen] [Hiaasen - Hobb] [Hobb - Hoose] [Hopkinson - Huff] [Huff - James] [Jemisin - Jones] [Jones - Kaminsky] [Kaminsky - Kellog] [Kellog - King] [King - Klise] [Klise - Kowal] [Kraft - Lampman] [Landry - Lawrence] [Lawrence - Lee] [Lee - Lescroart] [Lescroart - Linsdau] [Linville - Lowry] [Lowry - Lynch] [Lynch - Magnuson] [Maguire - Marshall] [Martin - Mass] [Mass - McBain] [McBain - McCrumb] [McCrumb - Mcmanus] [McNab - Mikaelsen] [Mikaelsen - Moon] [Moon - Morressy] [Morris - Myers] [Myers - Nimmo] [Niven - Novik] [Novik - O'Brian] [O'Brian - Oppel] [Oppenheim - Paretsky] [Paretsky - Parker] [Parker - Parker] [Parker - Patterson] [Patterson - Paulsen] [Pavesi - Perez-Reverte] [Perez-Reverte - Piper] [Piper - Poyer] [Poyer - Pratchett] [Pratchett - Pratchett] [Pratchett - Pronzini] [Pronzini - Pynchon] [Pynchon - Reeves] [Reeves - Ringo] [Ringo - Rohmer] [Roll - Rucka] [Rucka - Rylant] [Saberhage - Scalzi] [Scalzi - Schweikher] [Science Fiction DAW 30th Anniversary - Scottoline] [Scottoline - Shapero] [Sharenow - Silverberg] [Silverberg - Smith] [Smith - Spinelli] [Spinelli - Stead] [Stead - Stewart] [Stockett - Stross] [Stross - Tapply] [Tapply - Thurber] [Thuy - Turtledove] [Turtledove - Van Draanen] [Van Draanen - Veglahn] [Villasenor - Weber] [Weber - Wells] [Wells - Westerfeld] [Westerman - Westlake] [Westlake - Willis] [Willis - Wodehouse] [Wodehouse - Yates] [Yates - Zusak] 

:
: