Book #220 of 2020: Beowulf: A New Translation by Maria Dahvana Headley Any new rendition of Beowulf is an achievement, but this modernized and feminist approach to the Old English epic is particularly exciting. Author Maria Dahvana Headley has retained the poetic structures of the original, with its internal rhymes, alliterations, and kennings, but she …
Continue reading “Book Review: Beowulf: A New Translation by Maria Dahvana Headley”
Book #219 of 2020: The Thirteen Problems by Agatha Christie (Miss Marple #2) This second Miss Marple book (published as The Tuesday Club Murders in the U.S.) is a fun collection of short mystery stories, presented in the loose framework of a group of friends trying to stump one another with puzzling cases each has …
Continue reading “Book Review: The Thirteen Problems by Agatha Christie”
Book #218 of 2020: Life As We Knew It by Susan Beth Pfeffer (Last Survivors #1) I already loved this novel when I first read it five years ago, and I’ve only grown more appreciative over time. The narrator is a realistically flawed teenager, alternately moody and intensely caring, and her slice-of-life diary entries document …
Continue reading “Book Review: Life As We Knew It by Susan Beth Pfeffer”
Book #217 of 2020: I Killed Zoe Spanos by Kit Frick I love the idea of a (loose) YA retelling of Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca, but the danger in that sort of project is that I’m probably not going to enjoy the new take as much as I do the original. Here, for instance, although …
Continue reading “Book Review: I Killed Zoe Spanos by Kit Frick”
TV #38 of 2020: The Office, season 2 There may be better individual seasons of television than this, but I can’t think of another program that improves so much from its first year to its second (except maybe The Office’s spiritual descendant Parks and Recreation). The tweaks to the cringe-humor formula inherited from this show’s …
Book #216 of 2020: Rogue Protocol by Martha Wells (The Murderbot Diaries #3) This novella is another fun outing with everyone’s favorite heavily-armed cybernetic introvert, but the events feel somewhat less significant for either the protagonist or the ongoing plot than the two previous installments. Even a filler adventure with Murderbot offers the usual delights …
Continue reading “Book Review: Rogue Protocol by Martha Wells”
Book #215 of 2020: Diana and the Island of No Return by Aisha Saeed (Wonder Woman Adventures #1) I suppose I’d recommend this new middle-grade series to tweens who love the Wonder Woman character already and are excited to see more of her childhood, but I haven’t gotten much out of the first volume myself. …
Continue reading “Book Review: Diana and the Island of No Return by Aisha Saeed”
Book #214 of 2020: The Animals at Lockwood Manor by Jane Healey This 2020 novel is an exquisite piece of mid-century historical fiction, rich in gothic atmosphere and consideration of women’s oppression within the family unit and the larger society. Our two heroines are the daughter of a wealthy household and the museum curator sent …
Continue reading “Book Review: The Animals at Lockwood Manor by Jane Healey”
TV #37 of 2020: The Good Wife, season 6 It was perhaps inevitable that The Good Wife would tumble from its near-perfect fifth year, but this following run is still a major disappointment. I actually don’t mind the first part of the season so much, although it’s very plot-driven compared to the program before, with …
Book #213 of 2020: Kind of a Big Deal by Shannon Hale A one-star rating feels perhaps too harsh for this title, which I didn’t exactly hate reading. But structurally it’s a mess that inelegantly transitions from one lackluster concept into another near the end, lowering my appreciation after I’d already spent most of the …
Continue reading “Book Review: Kind of a Big Deal by Shannon Hale”
The Lesser Joke: book reviews and more