Favorites
J.R.R. Tolkien: The Hobbit – Performed by Andy Serkis
Like its magnificent sequel, The Hobbit is, I think, many things to many people: the first exposition of the universe that would become Middle-earth; prelude to The Lord of the Rings; a bite-sized visit to Middle-earth whenever you don’t feel up to the full blow of the War of the Ring(s); one of the most […]
Read More
Karen Wynn Fonstad: The Atlas of Tolkien’s Middle-Earth
Blurb: “Find your way through every part of J.R.R. Tolkien’s great creation, from the Middle-earth of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings to the undying lands of the West … The Atlas of Tolkien’s Middle-earth is an essential guide to the geography of Middle-earth, from its founding in the Elder Days – as […]
Read More
J.R.R. Tolkien: The Lord of the Rings – Performed by Andy Serkis
In another online community, we recently talked about the new Andy Serkis Lord of the Rings recordings. Well, it turns out that the pull of The Ring is still mighty strong, for however much it may have been destroyed in Mount Doom. I had barely gotten my hands on these audios and I found I […]
Read More
Ngaio Marsh: Death at the Bar
Well, as it turns out, I can’t leave well alone with just two books by Ngaio Marsh in a row, so here we go … As I revisited Overture to Death — the book immediately following Artists in Crime and Death in a White Tie — last year as part of the Appointment with Agatha […]
Read More
Ian Rankin: Knots and Crosses
Blurb: ‘And in Edinburgh of all places. I mean, you never think of that sort of thing happening in Edinburgh, do you …?’ ‘ That sort of thing’ is the brutal abduction and murder of two young girls. And now a third is missing, presumably gone to the same sad end. Detective Sergeant John Rebus, […]
Read More
Agatha Christie: Murder in Mesopotamia
Any fan of Agatha Christie’s knows that this is one of several novelizations of Christie’s own experience gained during the months and years she spent with her second husband Max Mallowan on his archeological expeditions to (today’s) Syria and Iraq: To what far-reaching extent this is true, though, only occurred to me when I read […]
Read More
Q1 / 2022 Reading Recap
Well, as it turned out 2022 began as 2021 had ended — all work and no play, albeit with the addition of a hospital detour to boot. (Nothing serious, just way more painful and, all told, protracted, than it had any right to be.) So I’m back to posting one summary post for the first […]
Read More
Virginia Woolf: Orlando
As I said elsewhere, given the fact that Virginia Woolf was a 2021 (M)DWS author in residence, too, as part of my exploration of the life and work of Vita Sackville-West’s life and work I decided to circle back to Woolf; or rather, to the link between the two writers, which far exceeds their almost […]
Read More
Vita Sackville-West: All Passion Spent
The lovely, understated and gently ironic story of a woman who has had to lead a life opposite to the one that she wanted to live — that of an artist — for over 60 years, and who is at last liberated from the forces of social and family convention by the death of her […]
Read More
Lindsey Davis: The Silver Pigs
Blurb: One fine day, A.D. 70, Sosia Camillina quite literally runs into Marcus Didius Falco on the steps of the Forum. It seems Sosia is on the run from a couple of street toughs, and after a quick and dirty rescue, P.I. Falco wants to know why. Falco finds out that Sosia, the niece of […]
Read More
Michael Jecks: The Butcher of St. Peter’s
Blurb: Exeter, 1323. A strange man is entering people’s houses at night, causing panic amongst householders. Although many had thought him harmless, now he seems to have committed murder. A man lies dead in his own home, slaughtered merely for trying to protect his children, and the folk of Exeter want this menace caught and […]
Read More
Agatha Christie: The ABC Murders
Blurb: There’s a serial killer on the loose, bent on working his way through the alphabet. And as a macabre calling card he leaves beside each victim’s corpe the ABC Railway Guide open at the name of the town where the murder has taken place. Having begun with Andover and Bexhill, there seems little chance […]
Read More
Agatha Christie: Come, Tell Me How You Live
Blurb: Agatha Christie’s personal memoirs about her travels to Syria and Iraq in the 1930s with her archaeologist husband Max Mallowan, where she worked on the digs and wrote some of her most evocative novels. Think you know Agatha Christie? Think again! To the world she was Agatha Christie, legendary author of bestselling whodunits. But […]
Read More
Neil Richards & Matthew Costello: Cherringham 1-3: Murder on Thames / Mystery at the Manor / Murder by Moonlight
Blurb: Cherringham is a series à la Charles Dickens, with a new mystery thriller released each month. Set in the sleepy English village of Cherringham, the detective series brings together an unlikely sleuthing duo: English web designer Sarah and American ex-cop Jack. Jack’s a retired ex-cop from New York, seeking the simple life in Cherringham. […]
Read More
Isabel Wilkerson: Caste
Blurb: The Pulitzer Prize–winning, bestselling author of The Warmth of Other Suns examines the unspoken caste system that has shaped America and shows how our lives today are still defined by a hierarchy of human divisions. “As we go about our daily lives, caste is the wordless usher in a darkened theater, flashlight cast down […]
Read More
William Kamkwamba, Bryan Mealer: The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind
Blurb: When William Kamkwamba was just 14 years old, his family told him that he must leave school and come home to work on the farm – they could no longer afford his fees. This is his story of how he found a way to make a difference, how he brought light to his family […]
Read More
Michael McGarrity: Tularosa
Blurb: Michael McGarrity packs his powerful mystery with Southwestern lore and breathtaking action. In a wicked conspiracy reaching across the Mexican border, Tularosa pits a jaded ex-cop against tight-lipped Army personnel, hired thugs, and smooth-talking outlaws. Forced into retirement by a crippling gunshot wound, Santa Fe policeman Kevin Kerney seeks solitude on a small New […]
Read More
Candace Robb: The Lady Chapel
Blurb: High summer, 1365-and York is glorious with pageantry for the Feast of Corpus Christi. But wool merchant Will Crounce, who acts in “The Last Judgement,” meets his maker all too soon, his throat slit in the shadow of the great cathedral. When Crounce’s severed hand is found in fellow-merchant Gilbert Ridley’s tavern lodging, the […]
Read More
Maurice Leblanc: Arsène Lupin
Arsène Lupin: Gentleman cambrioleur (Gentleman Thief) The suave adventures of a gentleman rogue—a French Thomas Crown created by Maurice Leblanc during the early twentieth century, Arsène Lupin is a witty confidence man and burglar, the Sherlock Holmes of crime. The poor and innocent have nothing to fear from him; often they profit from his […]
Read More
Zora Neale Hurston: Dust Tracks on a Road
Definitely the best book I read during the first week of the new year; the New Yorker pretty much nailed it when calling the book “warm, witty, imaginative” and adding “This is a rich and winning book.” I’d (finally) read Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God last year; having now read her autobiography, I recongnize […]
Read More