Book #108 of 2018: The Radium Girls: The Dark Story of America’s Shining Women by Kate Moore A welcome spotlight on the factory workers who suffered radiation poisoning in the early 20th century, before modern workplace safety regulations were in place and before the dangers of working with radium were widely known. Author Kate Moore …
Author Archives: Joe Kessler
Book Review: Night of Cake & Puppets by Laini Taylor
Book #107 of 2018: Night of Cake & Puppets by Laini Taylor Laini Taylor is quickly becoming one of my favorite writers, thanks to the gorgeous emotional landscapes that her lyrical prose always ends up painting for me. In this short book, she uses that gift — and the help of actual illustrations from her …
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Book Review: The Door into Summer by Robert A. Heinlein
Book #106 of 2018: The Door into Summer by Robert A. Heinlein This 1957 sci-fi romp is fun, but it bears many problematic hallmarks of the genre fiction written by white men in that era. Minor setbacks are blithely compared to slavery and rape, female characters are treated patronizingly, and the 30-year-old protagonist kind of …
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Book Review: Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan
Book #105 of 2018: Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan I wanted to be drawn in by this novel about a secret society operating out of a used bookstore, but I ended up rather put off by the tech bro vibe of its protagonist. There’s a lot of casual sexism in how he and …
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Book Review: A Higher Loyalty by James Comey
Book #104 of 2018: A Higher Loyalty: Truth, Lies, and Leadership by James Comey Former FBI Director Jim Comey is a polarizing public figure, and it’s nearly impossible for a contemporary reader to set aside their preconceptions of him in reading this book. (He’s also a fellow graduate of my alma mater and someone with …
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Book Review: A Light That Never Goes Out: The Enduring Saga of the Smiths by Tony Fletcher
Book #103 of 2018: A Light That Never Goes Out: The Enduring Saga of the Smiths by Tony Fletcher I am probably not the ideal reader or reviewer for a book about The Smiths, a band with which I have little familiarity and no emotional attachment. (As a partial defense, they had already split up …
Book Review: Wolves of the Calla by Stephen King
Book #102 of 2018: Wolves of the Calla by Stephen King (The Dark Tower #5) The flashback-centric Wizard and Glass is my favorite novel in Stephen King’s epic Dark Tower sequence, but I’m willing to entertain arguments that this next book is its best. The setting has been firmly established at this point, and King …
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TV Review: Arrested Development: Fateful Consequences
TV #29 of 2018: Arrested Development: Fateful Consequences Just ahead of the new fifth season – which I haven’t seen yet – Netflix released this “remixed” version of Arrested Development season 4. The original version of the season, which came out in 2013, was built to work around the busy schedules of its actors, most …
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TV Review: New Girl, season 7
TV #28 of 2018: New Girl, season 7 From a storytelling perspective, season 6 of this sitcom wrapped things up just fine. There was no real need to bring back the series for a final abbreviated season (8 episodes, as compared to the 22+ of every previous season), but my hope was that doing so …
Book Review: An American Marriage by Tayari Jones
Book #101 of 2018: An American Marriage by Tayari Jones Much like the earlier Tayari Jones novel Silver Sparrow, this story ends somewhat abruptly and before I feel like the author has really said everything she could/should with its characters. But what we do get is a compelling and believable exploration of what might happen …
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The Lesser Joke: book reviews and more 