Category: books

Hard Luck Hank: Prince of Suck

On By Rick McIn books, humourLeave a comment

This is book 3 in the series. It’s even funnier than the first two. Laugh out loud.

Hank is not very smart. Yet he skewers both economics and politics most effectively in this book.

Many love Hank. Yet the author is still self-published. You have to buy Steven Campbell books online. About 95% of his sales are eBook. Audio is better, in my opinion, as his reader is superb.

An increasingly crippled Hank struggles to keep the various factions of Belvaille in check after the collapse of the Colmarian Confederation.

Hank, as Supreme Kommilaire and Secretary of City, has several hundred police to try and maintain order among the millions of inhabitants on the space station while simultaneously preparing for Belvaille’s first ever election. He thinks it is an impossible task.

Every year the city, and even the galaxy, falls further into chaos as he himself succumbs to the debilitating effects of his mutation. With economic turmoil everywhere, a dirty election in the works, and the galaxy’s foremost assassin hunting him, Hank has to decide if he can save Belvaille. Or if it’s even worth saving.

Amazon

A Column of Fire by Ken Follett

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Follett has made me keen to read more historical fiction.

A Column of Fire is a 2017 novel by British author Ken Follett …

It is the third book in the Kingsbridge Series, and serves as a sequel to 1989’s The Pillars of the Earth and 2007’s World Without End. … 

Beginning in 1558, the story follows the romance between Ned Willard and Margery Fitzgerald over half a century. It commences at a time when Europe turns against Elizabethan England and the queen finds herself beset by plots to dethrone her.

He does write very convincing love stories. I’l give him that.

This was the weakest of the three books, I thought.

Still worth reading, but the endless intrigues between Catholics and Protestants lost me at some point.

The plot, covering 50 years, the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, was too ambitious. I preferred the more personal earlier novels.

So did reader Emily May.

Most people love the book, however. It was very positively reviewed, as well.

I did enjoy learning more about some historical events. The weird Gunpowder Plot of 1605 and Guy Fawkes.

Also, how Francis Drake outwitted the Spanish Armada.

Purity by Jonathan Franzen (2015)

On By Rick McIn books, TVLeave a comment

Depending on whom you ask, Franzen is either the premier living American writer or the last literary dinosaur: a pompous white male Luddite who gazes disdainfully down at us tweeting, Facebooking fools from his comfortable perch of astronomical sales and critical adulation. …

Guardian review – Purity by Jonathan Franzen review – dazzling, hilarious and problematic

Purity is one big and ambitious book. I was prepared not to like it. Prepared not to finish it.

I assumed every character would be educated and talented. Yet find ways to make themselves miserable.

And I was right.

But the plot got me hooked. It’s complex, interesting and entertaining. If you are up for a challenge, I do recommend Purity.

Purity by Jonathan Franzen

The multigenerational epic jumps back and forth across decades. Moves from Germany, to Bolivia, to several different locations in the USA.

I did care about some of the lead characters.

Purity (Pip) Tyler was quite convincing, I thought.

German Andreas Wolf runs a WikiLeaks-like site called the Sunlight Project. Daniel Craig will play him in the planned Showtime adaptation. Purity would make good TV, I think.

Journalist Leila Helou did not do much for me much as a character. But her story was fascinating.

Charles Blenheim,  Leila’s husband, a literary has-been, is not a lead character. But I did find him very entertaining.

Tom Aberant is the most important character, I’d say. An idealist who somehow got himself roped into an insane marriage. He’s the character I identify with most.

It’s only got a 3.6 / 5.0 rating on GoodReads. Critics like it better than do regular folks.

Of his 4 other books, the only other I’ve read is The Corrections. Purity is better IMHO.

Leonardo da Vinci: The Biography by Walter Isaacson

On By Rick McIn Art and beauty, books1 Comment

What do you know about Leonardo da Vinci?

  • he painted The Last Supper and Mona Lisa
  • he drew Vitruvian Man
  • he was left-handed
  • he wrote right to left on the page in mirror script
  • he was hundreds of years ahead of his time in some scientific disciplines

Mike Sissons, the young artist, was a fan. He was first to tell me those facts.

I loved Isaacson’s Steve Jobs biography. For me Leonardo was not as riveting as the Jobs book. But I still recommend it. Leonardo’s life story is very interesting and entertaining.

I was surprised to learn Leonardo finished very few projects over his long career. He died carrying Mona Lisa and other paintings around with him as he simply could never decided they were finished.

He was more interested in studying the tongue of the woodpecker than in working on his paintings.

At times he hated the paint brush. Studying nature to satisfy his own curiosity was more compelling, especially near the end of his life.

His last words:

The soup is getting cold. 

I bought the audio version but Kindle would be better. The book comes with 144 illustrations.

Blake Morrison review:

Flamboyant, illegitimate and self taught, he was unreliable and an unashamed self-publicist. He was also one of the most gifted and inventive men in history

Leonardo da Vinci: The Biography by Walter Isaacson review – unparalleled creative genius

 

Hard Luck Hank – comedy Science Fiction

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By Steven Campbell.

Warren gave me a copy of book 2 – Basketful of Crap

I finally got around to listening to the audio book read by the fantastic Liam Owen.

Haven’t laughed out loud so often at a book since A Walk in the Woods.

Eat suck, suckface.

Hank is a thug. He knows he’s a thug. He has no problem with that realization. In his view the galaxy has given him a gift: a mutation that allows him to withstand great deals of physical trauma. …

Screw The Galaxy (Hard Luck Hank #1)

I read book 1 second. And I’ll definitely continue on to book 3 …

Hard Luck Hank: Prince of Suck

Now a successful series, this was a kickstarter project at first for author Steven Campbell.

Click PLAY or watch a crappy preview on YouTube.

The Human Division by John Scalzi

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The Human Division is a science fiction novel by American writer John Scalzi, the fifth book set in the Old Man’s War universe.

I’m giving up on the series after book 5.

Though it’s still well written, this book was too scattered for me. It’s a compilation of 13 separate episodes.

I’ll wait on the movie version.

 

 

Lincoln in the Bardo – a review

On By Rick McIn books, product complaintsLeave a comment

This book is terrible.

It won the Man Booker Prize. All kinds of critics love it.

The audio version slightly better. But one hundred and sixty-six individual narrators (led by Nick Offerman & David Sedaris) still couldn’t make it either interesting or understandable.

The most popular review on GoodReads:

I really tried, but listening to this book is impossible. I want to appreciate the voices, the story, but I can’t get past the format. Like wading through footnotes. Is it possible to ignore the format when you READ it? About to throw in the towel and get a refund.

The most popular critical review on Amazon:

The style was original but tedious. The various voices, very truncated at times and others long …

I was comparing Dostoyevsky’s far superior and adventurous novella Bobok where the decaying corpses quarrel and grumble and a sharp and memorable view of Russian society emerges. This book is not memorable save for its unrelenting tedium.

George Saunders has long been accepted as one of the masters of the American short story.

In this, his first novel, the Lincoln trapped in the bardo is Willie, the cherished 11-year-old son of the great civil war president.

As his parents host a lavish state reception, their boy is upstairs in the throes of typhoid fever. Saunders quotes contemporary observers on the magnificence of the feast, trailing the terrible family tragedy that is unfolding. Sure enough, Willie dies and is taken to Oak Hill cemetery, where he is interred in a marble crypt. On at least two occasions – and this is the germ of historical fact from which Saunders has spun his extraordinary story – the president visits the crypt at night, where he sits over the body and mourns.

The cemetery is populated by a teeming horde of spirits – dead people who, for reasons that become an important part of the narrative …

NY Times review 

I switched to low brow Hard Luck Hank comedy SciFi books.

John Scalzi – Old Man’s War – books 3 & 4

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The Last Colony is a science fiction novel by American writer John Scalzi, the third set in his Old Man’s War universe. It was nominated for a 2008 Hugo Award in the Best Novel category.

Retired from his fighting days, John Perry is now village ombudsman for a human colony on distant Huckleberry. With his wife, former Special Forces warrior Jane Sagan, he farms several acres, adjudicates local disputes, and enjoys watching his adopted daughter grow up.

That is, until his and Jane’s past reaches out to bring them back into the game–as leaders of a new human colony, to be peopled by settlers from all the major human worlds …

GoodReads

Zoe’s Tale (Old Man’s War #4) is the same story as book 3 but told from the perspective of 15-year-old Zoe Boutin Perry.

I admire John Scalzi’s guts for moving from science fiction to young adult.

Any male author trying to be believable as a teen girl is up for challenge. I thought he pulled it off.

It reminded me of the great Robert J. Sawyer writing from the perspective of a 15-year-old girl in the WWW Trilogy.

Also Ender’s Shadow, the retelling of Ender’s Game from the perspective of Ender’s sidekick Bean.

I’ll continue on to book 5 – The Human Division.

In December 2017, it was announced that Netflix had acquired Old Man’s War and would develop it as an original film.

Mount Royal University library, Calgary

On By Rick McIn books, product endorsementsLeave a comment

I’m a library aficionado visiting many around the world every year. My own city — Calgary — has offered some of the crappiest.

The University of Calgary modernized long after I’d finished my degree. I’ve only been there a few times. And the new Calgary Downtown Library will not open until  November 2018.

Happily the library most walkable for me has just gone ultra-modern. I love it.

The Riddell Library and Learning Centre (RLLC)  opened Sept 7th, 2017.

From treadmill desks to cubbies for catnaps, everything a student needs to feel learning-ready will be available …

Soundproofed project rooms allow users to record, edit and manipulate sound and video to create podcasts, music and media-rich presentations.

Visitors can take a break from research or end the day in the café or fireplace lounge. Group-use rooms will increase from three to 34. The number of student stations (or seats) will nearly triple from 650 to 1,800.

Currently, the library’s holdings include twice as many eBooks as print, and its collection of eJournals outnumbers print journals by about 80 to one. Balancing the collections is a matter of establishing a long-term strategy, says Shepstone. …

THE LIBRARY REIMAGINED

External community members may book Group Rooms in-person at the Service Desk.

I grabbed this one with a view of the Taylor Centre for Performing Arts.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

Cool as it is, I actually prefer to work in an empty classroom. With blackboard for brainstorming. Most Universities lock them up when not in use, but MRU leaves them open.

Surprisingly every classroom still has an overhead projector. And they seem to be well used.

related – Rocky Ridge Library at Shane Homes YMCA opened January 15.