Great read!

I loved it. Now I'm going to have to read all her books. I love her dry sense of humor. Julia is a wonderfully complex character.

Excellent book.

His first book "The Name of the Wind" is a truly wonderful tale of a young man, learning of the magic in the world through song, book, stone, and adventure. I suggest this read to anyone who enjoys a true fantasy novel. The only downside to this book is that they are being released very slowly so once you, as I am, are hooked on the series it will be quite some time before we will have the opportunity to finish it. A wonderful novel and an absolute must read for everyone. :)

I'd like to start with my favorite novel. I have three primarily fantastic novelists that I watch. Patrick Rothfuss, who is new to the author arena, is a particularly talented individual. He worked for ages getting his singularly gigantic novel complete. Once he did no publisher wanted it, but that was a foolish mistake. The issue wasn't that they didn't think it was good, the issue was that they thought it was too long for a first time novelist to publish such a large book of over 2000 pages. Finally Patrick got a publisher, one who knew better than others that every great piece of art has its place in the world. Patrick was forced unfortunately to split his one amazing book into three equally spectacular novels.

Some fascinating stuff on cat body language at the beginning, and what's probably good advice on introducing new cats to the household. Hopefully that won't be anything I need to think about for a while. Mostly the book made me thankful for all the cat problems we don't have -- litterbox issues, food issues, spraying, or cats who actively hate each other. We have two who are constantly at odds, but I see from reading this that it could be a lot worse, and I might as well just leave them to their skirmishes.

Cookie-cutter thriller with a side of extra-creepy. Workmanlike prose, sturdily written, but you ain't no Clarice Starling.

Atmospheric but keeps you at a distance. Strangely detached for a purportedly hot and heavy novel. I did enjoy it, but it didn't stick around in my psyche for long.

For Virago Modern Classics reading group.

This is my third Wolitzer. I've loved them all.

Beautiful little melancholy jewel of a book, with delicate, moody illustrations and a happy ending. I don't read a lot of YA/kids' books these days, so it was a nice change of pace. I forget how much I like pictures in a book, and that read-aloud quality -- I read some of it to the dog in bed last night, and she was appropriately transfixed.

A book which requires the reader have no distraction!
Another look @ Henry VIII and his Cromwell. The Tudors are back on TV and this won Man Booker!

One of the worst reads ever!

In my personal Top Five.

Of all time.

But I am fond of Indian literature.

And Anglo-Indian.

Hey -- who put a chapati on my desk?

I am a Mantel fan.

I loved this book -- it made my personal Top Ten that year, though it received a mixed reception on Readerville, IIRC.

It's a disturbing read, and I say that like it's a good thing.

Fordlandia succeeds especially well at examining the mythic Henry Ford and his grandiose plans for transforming the meaning of work -- and the lives of the working class, in America as well as in Brazil.

Fordlandia moves strongly, with great detail, through the 15 years or so that Ford maintained a personal interest in developing Fordlandia and nearby Belterra. War production in the US, and his own increasing infirmity -- as well as persistent failure to produce a viable rubber crop -- caused Ford to abandon his Brazilian venture finally.

The post-war period of Fordlandia, and its reversion to the Brazilian government, are only touched on lightly in the book; I'd have liked to learn more about its modern history and current state.

Luminous. That's the word that comes to mind in Dillard's prose. It shimmers off the page. Dazzles in the waves like a day at the beach. (Bring the sunblock.) A distilled and stark story of a long marriage, more of a meditation on love than of characters who actually live and breathe. The end satisfies the means, however, in the final chapters, where The Maytrees at long last have reconciled their lives together. You'll never a read a kinder, gentler death scene than Toby's passing. "Tomorrow is another day only up to a point."

A Therapist's Memoir of Madness. I picked up this book for a project I'm working on, and couldn't put it down. Astonishing. Unflinching. Six pained portraits of mental illness that read like a novel. With compassion for her patients, Slater brings to words the otherwise inaccessible states of schizophrenia, depression, catatonia, anxiety and bulimia. "We are one," she writes in her concluding sentences of the book, "As people we are always one."

I'm thinking Noir just might not be my thing, although maybe it's just hard to do without falling back on cliches. It was a bit of an uneven collection, with a lot of so-so pieces and a few really good ones. But the good ones gave me an idea of what's to like about the genre, and I'll be interested to try Boston Noir, which is up soon (doing a little cultural exchange program with a Bostonian friend).