What book are you reading, and what do you think of it?

[elsmere241]

This week I read Renegades: Born in the USA: Dreams, myths, music by Bruce Springsteen and Barack Obama.

[ZLoth]

Finished Inside Jobs: Tales from a Time of Quarantine. This is a short fiction book with three short stories. The first, "The Crimson Parrot", concerns three crooks who are trying to organize a big heist in the early days of Covid, but have extreme difficulty with the online meetings and their families. The second, "The Cape House", concerns two brothers who inherit their father's home and are living in it because of both Covid and what happened in their personal lives. The final one, "Stop Motion", concerns a young woman who is apartment bound, decides to take up some hobbies, and thinks that there was a murder with a neighbor across the street. All three are amusing and are pretty good.

I will be tacking Malaysia Airlines Flight 370: Why It Disappeared - and Why It's Only a Matter of Time Before This Happens Again while my mother and I started The Lion in the Living Room: How House Cats Tamed Us and Took Over the World

[ZLoth]

I've completed both Malaysia Airlines Flight 370: Why It Disappeared - and Why It's Only a Matter of Time Before This Happens Again which was quite interesting, and then Earthquake Storms: The Fascinating History and Volatile Future of the San Andreas Fault which is of particular interest to this former Californian. It was also rich with some of the history of geology as well as how it all tied into earthquakes.

Now, I'm listening to Artemis by Andy Weir. Meanwhile, my mother and I are close to completing The Lion in the Living Room: How House Cats Tamed Us and Took Over the World.

[ZLoth]

From Pottermore:

Every Easter egg in the new covers for Harry Potter: The Full-Cast Audio Editions

Today, Pottermore Publishing and Audible revealed all seven stunning cover designs for their groundbreaking audiobook series. With new art packed full of Easter eggs, familiar favourites and never-before-depicted scenes... here's every exciting detail we discovered.

With the promise of captivating performances from incredible actors, original music, real-world sound capture and so much more, the anticipation is building for the release of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone. While we (im)patiently wait for 4th November, the reveal of the new covers couldn't have come at a better time.

FULL ARTICLE HERE

This promises to be an interesting journey for me. While I am familiar with the Harry Potter universe, I haven't watched the movies or read/listened to the books. The only reason why I haven't can be related to real-world stuff happening.

[ZLoth]

I've completed Artemis by Andy Weir. Another fictional tale with some solid scientific basis behind it, including the theories about using low-gravity to develop products.

My mother and I also completed The Lion in the Living Room: How House Cats Tamed Us and Took Over the World which provided some history of cats and why they are a threat to the environment as well as some of the reasons why we love those critters. We are now listening to That Bear Ate My Pants: A Comedy Memoir... with Teeth and Claws! about a British guy named Tony James Slater who volunteers at a Ecudorian wildlife refuge and his resulting mis-adventures.

[ZLoth]

[Scott5114]

fbcdn.net image links expire.

[ZLoth]

I completed the book Films from the Future: The Technology and Morality of Sci-Fi Movies which looks at the following movies and provides analysis of the film as well as real-world implications that the films provide, moral questions, and the status of making the ideas in the film possible (as of 2018). These films include:

• Jurassic Park (1993)
• Never Let Me Go (2010)
• Minority Report (2002)
• Limitless (2011)
• Elysium (2013)
• Ghost in the Shell (1995)
• Ex Machina (2014)
• Transcendence (2014)
• The Man in the White Suit (1951)
• Inferno (2016)
• The Day After Tomorrow (2004)
• Contact (1997)

[ZLoth]

From NBC Ohio:

Library users outraged over reason some audiobooks not available on Libby

Audiobook lovers who use their library's Libby app on their devices to listen to recorded material might not realize why everything they may want to hear isn't available.

Recently, the Columbus Metropolitan Library highlighted in a social media video why users will not find certain audio offerings on Libby. The post has received more than 50,000 likes and hundreds of comments.

FULL ARTICLE HERE

Helpful Hint: Audible Exclusive

[ZLoth]

I completed Video Night: A Novel of Alien Horror. The description was a bit more interesting than the book itself, and I can back feeling a bit "Meh!" about it. Maybe because it takes place while I was in high school... not exactly a joyous time for me.

I am just starting The Round House which is set on an Indian reservation. What is grabbing my interest is the chapter tiles from a certain Science Fiction show airing at that time:

• Opening Credits
• Dedication
• 1988
• Lonely Among Us - Season 1, Episode 7
• Justice - Season 1, Episode 8
• Loud as a Whisper - Season 1, Episode 5
• The Naked Now - Season 1, Episode 3
• Datalore - Season 1, Episode 13
• Angel One - Season 1, Episode 14
• Hide and Q - Season 1, Episode 10
• The Big Good-bye - Season 1, Episode 12
• Skin of Evil - Season 1, Episode 23
• The Child - Season 2, Episode 1
• End Credits

[kurumi]

Natural Beauty, by Ling Ling Huang.

A classical pianist changes careers, joining a new-age cosmetics company with some nasty stuff behind the scenes.

It's a fun mix of SF, body horror, satire, and social commentary. There are plenty of disturbing scenes though. Constance Wu (Crazy Rich Asians) is working on a TV series.

[ZLoth]

I just finished The Round House. This story, set on a North Dakota reservation, is both a "coming of age" for the 13 year old protagonist Antone (Joe) Coutts as well as crime story as his mother was violently raped at the beginning of the book and his father, a tribal judge, investigating the crime. While I noted that the titles matched up Star Trek: The Next Generation season one and two titles, the book is extremely light on any Science Fiction references beyond what they thought of the (then) new show. The kids loved the warrior Worf!

The next audiobook is Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (Full-Cast Edition). While I am familiar with several parts of the Potterverse, I have not read the books or seen the movies, so I'm listening to this with a fresh perspective.

As for my mother and myself, we completed That Bear Ate My Pants!: Life and Near Death in an Ecuadorian Animal Refuge which is the true story of the mis-adventures of a self-admitted "idiot" from the United Kingdom who spent several months working and living at South American animal refuge.

We are now listening to the book Airport. What attracted us to the book is that it is one of my favorite (if yet flawed) movies. Since the original book was released in 1968, there are obvious differences between air travel in the late 1960s and now. As expected, some elements of the book was minimized and eliminated in favor of the main plot. Arthur Haley must have laughed all the way to the bank as he had no involvement in the three movie sequels beyond a note referencing his original novel.

[ZLoth]

Let me knock out a few thoughts of some books I recently completed... or rather, for this post, books that I've listened to with my mother.

The first was the book Airport which was initially released in 1968 and then later adapted to the 1970. I won't rehash the basic plot, but if you still haven't seen the movie, you can check your favorite streaming service. Despite it's flaws, either with the film itself or how aviation has changed since it was first released, it is still a favorite of mine, with George Kennedy as Joe Patroni being a favorite (minus the cigars). I haven't gotten to the other Arthur Hailey books yet so I don't know if it his standard structure, but for this book, Hailey apparently researched the operations of an actual airport and then applied a story to fit within that structure. As such, we see roles that were minimized or eliminated in the movie have more details. As an example, while in the movie, we are familiar with Mel Bakersfeld who is the airport manager, his social-climbing wife Cindy Bakersfield, and his brother-in-law Vernon Demerest, the nameless air traffic controller we see near the end of the film is actually Mel's Bakersfeld's troubled brother Keith who is contemplating suicide after the end of his shift. While flying has changed in the almost sixty years since this book was published, some of the challenges brought up in the book still exist today. I enjoyed the narriation of the book. Still, I would encourage reading the 2013 book The Skies Belong to Us: Love and Terror in the Golden Age of Hijacking as a companion book which also covered flying in that time period.

The second was A Christmas Carol as performed by Patrick Stewart. Now, I will say that there are two words that I dislike in an audiobook... "Virtual Voice" and "Abridged". However, for Star Trek's Patrick Stewart, I will make the rare exception since he has that voice and diction that makes even reading the ingredients label sound interesting. This recording is an adaption of his one-man Christmas show, and it is a worthwhile listen. Recommended.

[ZLoth]

Some books that I knocked out recently which I've been solo-listening...

First off, the first two Harry Potter full-cast recordings. I have completed them, but want to write a in-depth examination that is being posted to multiple forums.

The first book is Humble Pi: When Math Goes Wrong in the Real World by Matt Parker. This was a fun book to listen to with real-world examples of math gone wrong, either by having a off-by-one-error, rounding errors, errors between converting from Imperial units to metric, or some operational assumptions that didn't pan out in the real world, including inaccuracies that accumulated because the system wasn't restarted as regularly as it should have. This was a fun listen, although I was familiar with some of the examples he cited.

The second book was The Master of Disguise: My Secret Life in the CIA by Antonio J. Mendez. If the name doesn't seem familiar, then go watch the movie the movie Argo which covers the "Canadian Caper" that got several American embassy employees out of Iran in 1980. This autobiography was a good read which covers Tony Mendez's early life and career in the CIA from making forged documents to designing disguises to help get key assets out of tight situations. Though some details of the book remain classified, the stories are really good. I highly recommend this book.

The third book was NPR American Chronicles: Exploring Space. This is a three-and-a-half compilations of NPR reports concerning the space program, and goes up to around 2013 when the shuttle program is retired.

[ZLoth]

I finished listening to Alfred Hitchcock: A Brief Life by Peter Ackroyd. This book is of interest to me because of the familiarity of director's works. It was good to get some better insight into Hitch's early life and his beginnings in silent film. Of particular note is his decline after hitting "peak Hitchcock" in Psycho, and his decline as a director beginning with the failure of Marnie. There were some actions of the director which I found creepy, including his control over some of the new leading ladies.

[freebrickproductions]

PXL_20260119_232619134 by freebrickproductions, on Flickr
Just finished reading this book my parents got me for Christmas and I can honestly say it's a good one! The book covers the Southern Railway post-dieselization and contains quite a bit of neat information about the later years of the Southern as a result. The book gives an introduction going over the history of the Southern Railway up to the merger with the Norfolk & Western in 1982. After that, the book goes across the Southern Railway's system division by division, in order from the Eastern Division going south out of Washington, D.C., down across the southeast through the Georgia, Coastal, and Alabama Divisions, and back up to the Western Division to East St. Louis, IL. Each chapter covers a different division, with the first page giving a history and overview of that division, talking about what kinds of freight traffic, passenger trains, and signalling was present in that area, if any (in regards to the passenger trains and signalling). The pictures in it are nice, large and colorful, and range from the early-1950s to the late-1980s, with the captions of them giving info not just about the pictures themselves, but also more info about the operations on the divisions. Each chapter also contains a reasonably detailed map showing the lines each division covered. One detail I found kinda interesting was that the Southern's Appalachian Division was completely dark territory.
All in all, I can highly recommend picking-up a copy of this book if you can, and are interested in the later years of the Southern Railway. NGL, it's honestly made me tempted to go check-out some more of the more minor lines and branch lines that the Southern used to have here in the southeast.

[wxfree]

I've been reading the novelization of Debbie Does Dallas.  It's a literary masterpiece, a tour de force of plot progression, character development, and a profoundly insightful and nuanced understanding of human nature.  It's just as good as the movie.

[kphoger]

I've been reading the novelization of Debbie Does Dallas.  It's a literary masterpiece, a tour de force of plot progression, character development, and a profoundly insightful and nuanced understanding of human nature.  It's just as good as the movie.

[ZLoth]

My life took a sideways turn, so I haven't been able to listen as much as I could. The items that I completed listening to:

• Star Trek: Khan
• Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (Full Cast)
• Ghost, Volume 1: In the Smoke and Din (Dramatized Adaptation)
• Ghost, Volume 2: The White City Butcher (Dramatized Adaptation)

Right now, I'm currently listening to Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Full-Cast Edition). With the switch-up in voice actors for the students, books 4-7 might as well be called Harry Potter: The Teenage Years, so I'm getting used to the new voices.

My mother and I, meanwhile, are listening to the book Fight: Inside the Wildest Battle for the White House. My mother had purchased the hardback book and started it several times. I also had interest in the book, but waited for a sale to get the audiobook version. The soap opera begins with the June, 2024 debate. Because of the no politics policy, I can't really comment on the book other than to say... it will interest both sides of the political spectrum.

[kurumi]

Livesuit, by James S. A. Corey (the "Expanse" authors)

A novella that's part of a series I haven't read (but I did enjoy Leviathan Wakes etc.)

A nice little bit of SF/Horror that doesn't overstay its welcome and mostly sticks the landing.

[wxfree]

I'm about halfway through "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest."  I haven't read it before, or seen the movie, so I don't know the second half, but my foremost impression is about the big nurse, whose character description I'm familiar with.  I don't see her as the villainous character she's painted as.  You can't take the narration too literally, as the narrator is delusional (I enjoy that part of the book, trying to interpret words that were written in a different state of mind).  So far, she seems competent and capable and strong.  Women like that are very threatening to weak men.  Certainly the psychiatric system was unqualified and abusive in those days, and it may be that the nurse embodied that system and was equated with those failures.  You have to imagine what it would be like to be in that horrible place and not be crazy like the narrator.  I know of the acting of Louise Fletcher from when she played a space pope.  I hear the nurse's lines in her voice and project some parallels between the vocal inflections of the two characters.  I'll watch the movie after I finish the book.

[ZLoth]

I'm about halfway through "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest."  I haven't read it before, or seen the movie, so I don't know the second half, but my foremost impression is about the big nurse, whose character description I'm familiar with.(text deleted) I'll watch the movie after I finish the book.

Louise Fletcher, who portrayed Nurse Ratched, had parents who were both deaf. When she neared the end of her Best Actress Oscar acceptance speech, she finished with a unique touch (a first in American Sign Language): "For my mother and my father, I want to say thank you for teaching me to have a dream. You are seeing my dream come true. Thank you."

She would later appear in 19 episodes of the TV series Star Trek: Deep Space Nine as Vedek Winn / Kai Winn . This was a role she performed admirably as one of those people you like but really do hate.

[kphoger]

I raided the bookshelves this afternoon after work, decided to start reading Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austin.  I've never read anything like it before, although I've seen the movie a few times.  I only made it partway through the editor's introduction so far, though.

I have made zero progress since posting this.  Haven't picked it up since.  I do still intend to read the book, but I have nothing to report.

*sigh*

Hey, I finally read the first couple of chapters the other day, while I was waiting for a flat tire to be replaced.  So that's something.

[ZLoth]

I completed Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Full-Cast Edition). Oh, what a dark turn of events.

[vdeane]

I've been really enjoying the fanfiction Magic and the Machines.  From the summary:

Harry should have realised that Voldemort had some sort of plan. A way to try and ruin his life if he was ever defeated. Still, it was apparent that Voldemort did not truly understand the magic he'd used, or, perhaps, some other force had intervened to set in motion a sequence of events that would become the foundations of history. In any case, Harry was glad he had excellent company along for the journey.

Or, put more clearly, it's a crossover between Harry Potter and Battlestar Galactica where Harry and Ginny arrive on Caprica as Starbuck is retrieving the Arrow of Apollo and they join the fleet on the journey to Earth.  Meanwhile, Ron and Hermione are trying to figure out what Voldemort did so they can rescue Harry and Ginny while trying to figure out how to continue living their own lives.  It's really good and posts a new chapter once a week (this week's adapted "The Passage"), but the author finished writing so the risk of abandonment is minimal.