Category: books

14 – a novel by Peter Clines

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Recommended for teenage boys.

Though juvenile, this book kept me going.

14 coverThe story starts when Nate, a guy with no girl, a lousy job and not much ambition gets a tip on an apartment that seems too good to be true.

Before the ink on the lease is dry, Nate starts to notice some strange things about his new home.

His new neighbors clue him in to additional oddities, from doors that are permanently locked to hidden messages in the walls to rooms whose tenants all commit suicide. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg.

Nate and his new friends attempt to unlock the deeper secrets of the Kavach building, not knowing that the consequences of their actions could be catastrophic. …

Amazon review by Justin G.

Clines is very popular in this genre. I’m starting on his most recent book – The Fold.

It’s getting great reviews.

new Calgary Public Library

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Finally. I’ve been waiting all my life for this. 🙂

Providing approximately 240,000 sq ft of usable library space – 66% more than the existing downtown library – the NCL will be home to a physical collection of approximately 600,000 books, special programs and spaces for children and teens, a technology commons and laboratory for innovation, a centre that supports community integration and advancement through skills development, and much more. …

Q4 2018 – Construction Complete

CMLC

Click PLAY or watch it on Vimeo.

Rebus – Even Dogs in the Wild

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The Inspector Rebus books are a series of detective novels by the Scottish author Ian Rankin. The novels, centred on the title character Detective Inspector John Rebus, are mostly based in and around Edinburgh. …

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Ian Rankin’s 20th Rebus novel …

In Even Dogs in the Wild, Rebus is dragged out of retirement – again – to act in the semi-official capacity of consultant detective, assisting in the investigation of a shooting at the house of another retired geezer, long-time foe “Big Ger” Cafferty. …

Even Dogs in the Wild by Ian Rankin review – a satisfying return for Rebus

The rumpled detective is back in a twisty, darkly topical and immaculately executed tale of Edinburgh’s underbelly

Author Ian Rankin purchased back the TV rights. He wants the original actor who played Rebus, Ken Stott, to return in a new production.

‘Deep South’ – Paul Theroux

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… a leisurely, even languid book, reiterative and sometimes simply forgetful. We’re told twice why so many motels are owned by members of the Patel clan from Gujarat, and are twice offered some of Nelson Algren’s well-worn advice to travelers: “Never eat at a place called Mom’s, never play cards with a man called Doc.” …

GEOFFREY C. WARD review – Paul Theroux’s ‘Deep South’

I’ve read all of Paul Theroux’s travel books. He and Krakauer are terrific story tellers. My style of writers.

I’ve always wanted to know more about the U.S. South as well. From my few short visits to Georgia and Alabama, it’s clear my assumptions are mostly wrong.

This one is good. As usual. But he’s definitely mellowed. Sympathetic to Gundamentalists, in fact.

Paul Theroux is in a suspiciously good mood in “Deep South,” his 10th travel book. You begin to wonder if, in his relative old age — Mr. Theroux is 74 — this inimitably caustic novelist and nonfiction writer is mellowing.

“Deep South” recounts road trips taken in Mississippi, South Carolina, Arkansas and elsewhere below the Mason-Dixon line. …

Point the urbane and skeptical Mr. Theroux, who lives on Cape Cod and in Hawaii, in the direction of churches and gun shows (he visits many of each) and you might expect sulfurous ironies. Not in this book. …

NY Times – DWIGHT GARNER – Review: In ‘Deep South,’ Paul Theroux Takes an Eye-Opening Road Trip

Amazon – Deep South: Four Seasons on Back Roads 2015

Paul Theroux

related interview – Paul Theroux on ‘Deep South’

In Search of the Sacred in Modern India

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Nine Lives: in Search of the Sacred in Modern India is a 2009 travel book by William Dalrymple. …

…  the lives of nine Indians, a Buddhist monk, a Jain nun, a lady from a middle-class family in Calcutta, a prison warden from Kerala, an illiterate goat herd fromRajasthan, and a devadasi among others, as seen during his Indian travels. The book explores the lives of nine such people, each of whom represent a different religious path in nine chapters. …

The book was published by Bloomsbury to great acclaim, The Observer remarking that it “ranks with the very finest travel writing”. …

Pico Iyer, in TIME Magazine, praises the “powerful restraint and clarity” the book brings to “precisely the two subjects — India and faith — that cause most observers to fly off into cosmic vagueness or spleen. The result is a deeply respectful and sympathetic portrait.” …

It is extremely well written. An astonishing look at how normal people go to extremes of religious practice. The first story is of nuns who starve themselves to death as ritual.

Nine Lives

book review – Driving Over Lemons

On By Rick McIn books, product endorsements4 Comments

Last week I was hiking the white mountain villages called Las Alpujarras. I was reminded of this excellent book series.

repost from 2009 ___

Christopher ‘Chris’ Stewart (born in 1950), was the original drummer and a founding member of Genesis.

stewart_lemonsUnexpectedly, he has become a very successful author.

… Chris transports us to Las Alpujarras, an oddball region south of Granada, and into a series of misadventures with an engaging mix of peasant farmers and shepherds, New Age travellers and ex-pats. The hero of the piece, however, is the farm that he and Ana bought, El Valero – a patch of mountain studded with olive, almond and lemon groves, sited on the wrong side of a river, with no access road, water supply or electricity. Could life offer much better than that?

It is laugh out loud hilarious. I highly recommend it to everyone.

Driving Over Lemons: An Optimist in Andalucia

Chris was not really serious about becoming a musician and left the band in the summer of 1968. … After travelling and working throughout Europe, Stewart settled and bought a farm “El Valero” in the Alpujarras region of Andalusia, Spain where he lives and works with his wife Ana Exton and daughter Chloe. He came in last place for the position of local councillor in the 27 May 2007 local elections in Órgiva representing the Green Party, where he received 201 votes (roughly 8%).

He is now better known for his autobiographical books, Driving Over Lemons (1999) .. and the sequels, A Parrot In The Pepper Tree … and The Almond Blossom Appreciation Society (2006)

… The first two are also available as audiobooks … narrated by Stewart.

In Retrospect – Ellen Larson

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In Retrospect is a good old-fashioned whodunit set in a compelling post-apocalyptic future.

Former elite operative Merit Rafi suffered during her imprisonment at the end of a devastating war but the ultimate torment is being forced to investigate a murder she would gladly have committed herself.

In the year 3324 the Rasakans have attacked the technologically superior Oku. The war is a stalemate until the Oku commander General Zane abruptly surrenders. Merit a staunch member of the Oku resistance fights on but she and her comrades are soon captured. An uneasy peace ensues but the Rasakans conspire to gain control of the prized Oku time-travel technology.

When Zane is murdered the Rasakans exert control over Merit the last person on Earth capable of Forensic Retrospection.

IR_Cover_600

Click PLAY or watch Mike Sisson’s video trailer on YouTube.

About Mike Sissons

Kindle Download

Seveneves by Neal Stephenson

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Seveneves is a speculative fiction novel by Neal Stephenson, published in 2015. The story tells of the efforts to preserve human society in the wake of apocalyptic events on Earth, following the disintegration of the Moon.

The narrative jumps to 5000 years later. There are now 3 billion humans living in a ring around the Earth, and they have indeed formed into seven races, each one descended from and named after the Seven Eves who survived …

The orbiting races terraform Earth by crashing ice comets into it to replenish the oceans, and seed the planet with genetically created organisms based upon re-sequenced DNA data saved from the escape to orbit. Once a breathable atmosphere is recreated, and sufficient plant and animal species have been reseeded, some members of the orbiting races (“Sooners”) resettle the planet …

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This book is either a masterpiece. Or a sprawling mess.

I quit before the end. Too many characters. Too much detail. About as deep as a bird bath. 😦

Not recommended.

Vikram Seth – An Equal Music

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Seth Equal MusicI loved the poet’s sprawling novel A Suitable Boy. And his early travelogue From Heaven Lake: Travels Through Sinkiang and Tibet (1983).

But had not much interest in either the music nor love story in this tale.

An Equal Music (1999) is a novel by Vikram Seth.

The plot concerns Michael, a professional violinist, who never forgot his love for Julia, a pianist he met as a student in Vienna. They meet again after a decade, and conduct a secret affair, though she is married and has one child. Their musical careers are affected by this affair and the knowledge that Julia is going deaf. …

Seth together with Philippe Honoré marketed a double CD of the music mentioned in An Equal Music, performed by Honoré.

The book was especially well received by musical fans, who noted the accuracy of Seth’s descriptions of music. …

Amazon

NICHOLAS CHRISTOPHER – NY Times review