Category Archives: 9 + ratings
Dept. of Speculation
Dept. of Speculation by Jenny Offill 2014 / 180 pages rating: 9.5 / contemp fiction (experimental?) Contrary to some of what I’ve read about this book, it has a plot. Stuff does happen to interesting characters in chronological order and it … Continue reading →
On Such a Full Sea X2
On Such a Full Sea by Chang-rae Lee 2014/368 pages read by B. D. Wong 11h 8m rating: 9 / dystopian fiction (read and listened) I had to read this one again! It woudn’t let go of me. I kept … Continue reading →
The Gift of Rain
The Gift of Rain by Tan Twan Eng (Malaysian) 2007 / 432 pages Rating 9 / historical fiction 1/14/15 This book started out so incredibly good for me that I began writing little summaries – I find doing that keeps me … Continue reading →
Lila
Lila by Marilynne Robinson 2014 / 261 pages Rating 9.25 / contemp fiction This is the third of Robinson’s interconnected series which started with the book Gilead, the name of the small Iowa town of the setting. In that first book, John Ames is … Continue reading →
The Innovators:
The Innovators: How a Group of Inventors, Hackers, Geniuses and Geeks Created the Digital Revolution by Walter Isaacson 2014 / 560 pages Rating 9.25 / nonfiction – science Very interesting book on how the computer, as we know it, came to be … Continue reading →
All the Light We Cannot See
All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr *2014 / 531 pages (Kindle) *Read by Zach Appelman / 16h 2m Rating: 8 / historical fiction (WWII) (both listened and read) Opening Doerr’s second novel which one of my reading groups (BookiesToo) … Continue reading →
An Unnecessary Woman
An Unnecessary Woman by Rabih Alameddine 2014 / 306 pages read by Suzanne Toren 10h 28m rating 9+ / fiction – “A love letter to literature and its power to define who we are, the prodigiously gifted Rabih Alameddine has given us … Continue reading →
The Luminaries
The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton 2013 / 834 pages read by Mark Meadows 29h 14m rating – 9 / historical fiction >>>>NOTES>>>> I read this first right after it won the Man Booker Prize in 2013 and loved it. (The review … Continue reading →
The Narrow Road to the Deep North
The Narrow Road to the Deep North by Richard Flanagan 2014 /334 pages (Kindle) rating: 9.5 / historical fiction I was warned this is a hard book to read due to the violence. I’m allergic to graphic violence in war – … Continue reading →
Age of Ambition: Chasing Fortune, Truth and Faith in the New China
Age of Ambition: Chasing Fortune, Truth and Faith in the New China by Evan Osnos 2014 / 417 pages rating: 9 / nonfiction Remember the China of Mao as allied with Khrushchev’s USSR and total paranoid state control of peasants in massive poverty … Continue reading →
The Death of Ivan Ilyich
The Death of Ivan Ilyich by Leo Tolstoy 1886 / 62 pages (Kindle) rating 10 / Russian classic If you haven’t read this book please put it on your “to be read” list – somewhere near the top. If you have … Continue reading →
The Idea of Israel
The Idea of Israel: A Study in Power and Knowledge by Ilan Pappé 2014 / 313 pages (Kindle) rating: 9 – historiography/memoir (!) This is an amazing book! I decided to read it as an antidote to My Promised Land and it … Continue reading →
