The Lesser Joke: book reviews and more

TV Review: Master of None, season 2

TV #32 of 2017:

Master of None, season 2

On balance, I think this season was about on par with the first one, which I really liked. Some things were even stronger here, such as that standout Thanksgiving episode about Denise, but the love story in this season never really hooked me. I think Francesca was written as too much of a cipher, so it was hard to really get invested in Dev’s feelings for her or to overcome my distaste for the way the two of them were flirting all season when one of the few things we do know about the woman is that she has a boyfriend/fiance. The storytelling went in some really surprising directions, though, and I definitely appreciate that.

★★★★☆

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TV Review: Star Trek: The Next Generation, season 2

TV #31 of 2017:

Star Trek: The Next Generation, season 2

Well, this is a step up from the rough edges of season 1, but it’s still a little uneven. As with the original series (and just, serialized fiction in general), TNG seems to be strongest when it focuses on character work and recurring worldbuilding, rather than throwaway people and places who are never mentioned again. At this point, though, those great qualities are mostly still just popping up for a few minutes at a time in otherwise forgettable episodes.

★★★☆☆

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TV Review: Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, season 3

TV #30 of 2017:

Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, season 3

It’s weird to say that this season felt less ambitious in its storytelling, since we got fairly major new developments like Kimmy going to college, but somehow it does seem like everyone’s character development has sort of stalled at this point. The show is still reliably funny, but I think it’s reached that comfortable sitcom place where a shakeup is needed to reach true greatness again.

★★★☆☆

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Book Review: Leonard: My Fifty-Year Friendship with a Remarkable Man by William Shatner with David Fisher

Book #176 of 2017:

Leonard: My Fifty-Year Friendship with a Remarkable Man by William Shatner with David Fisher

A touching tribute from William Shatner to his fellow Star Trek alumnus Leonard Nimoy after the Spock actor’s passing in 2015. It’s an inside look at how the two men’s friendship changed over time, and at how the Star Trek phenomenon enabled them to stay in one another’s lives through movie sequels and fan conventions long after most TV castmates would have fallen out of touch. (In one particularly revealing moment, Shatner contrasts his friendship with Nimoy to the one he later shared with James Spader; apparently Shatner felt very close to his Boston Legal costar while they were filming, but has barely spoken to him since their show went off the air in 2008.)

The author draws a lot of interesting parallels between himself and Nimoy, from their shared Jewish heritage to their sputtering acting careers in the time before Star Trek made them household names. It’s ultimately a personal account of one friend mourning another, and you don’t have to be a Trekkie yourself to be moved by this portrait of Leonard Nimoy from someone who knew him best.

★★★★☆

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Book Review: A Thousand Pieces of You by Claudia Gray

Book #175 of 2017:

A Thousand Pieces of You by Claudia Gray (Firebird #1)

The beginning of this book is pretty weak, with a revenge quest that’s hard for readers to care about when we don’t have any emotional connection to the characters yet and a whole lot of infodumping about the technology that enables travel between universes. I really wanted there to be a few chapters at the start to showcase the character relations before betrayal rips them apart and to actually present the events that drive the plot rather than simply having characters allude to those happenings after the fact.

This is a story that rewards readers for pushing through the early rough patches, though, and it develops into a rather creepy tale of sinister plots across parallel worlds, wrapped in a romance that’s only slightly bogged down by the requisite YA love triangle. The universe-hopping is reminiscent of stories like Dark Matter or the TV show Fringe, with the added wrinkle that characters essentially take over the body of their parallel lives, who then gradually reassert themselves over time. There are enough fresh ideas here that I’m glad I didn’t quit and I’m looking forward to reading the rest of the trilogy, but author Claudia Gray really could have used another draft or two of her opening.

★★★☆☆

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Book Review: Grim Tuesday by Garth Nix

Book #174 of 2017:

Grim Tuesday by Garth Nix (The Keys to the Kingdom #2)

This sequel felt like a formulaic retread of the first novel in the Keys to the Kingdom series, which was already a pretty generic fantasy adventure story. I’m still waiting for that Garth Nix magic that I love from his other books, but for some reason this series just isn’t clicking for me.

★★☆☆☆

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Book Review: Coming of Age in Mississippi by Anne Moody

Book #173 of 2017:

Coming of Age in Mississippi by Anne Moody

This book is the incredibly gripping memoir of a poor black woman who became an early leader in the Civil Rights Movement, published in 1968 when the author was not yet 30 years old. Those first decades of her life were packed with weighty events, however, and the author includes rich details that really bring the era to life. The first part of this book recounts Anne Moody’s childhood and her work as a maid – which reads like a true-life version of The Help, free from that fictional story’s unnecessary focus on white saviors – and the rest documents her time in college and her growing participation in the struggle for black equality.

This is a first-hand look at a turbulent moment in American history, and Moody’s descriptions of the violence and threats made against her during sit-ins and other protests form a powerful reminder of how hard those civil rights victories were to achieve. I’m both humbled and grateful for people like Anne Moody, and her personal narrative is so compelling I simply couldn’t put this book down.

★★★★★

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Book Review: Partners in Crime by Agatha Christie

Book #172 of 2017:

Partners in Crime by Agatha Christie (Tommy and Tuppence #2)

Tommy and Tuppence might be my favorite Agatha Christie characters, a pair of lovebirds and amateur detectives who are generally more interested in exchanging witty banter with one another than in solving the cases in front of them. (Nick and Nora Charles from The Thin Man are probably the easiest comparison, although Tommy and Tuppence’s first appearance predates them by over a decade.)

In this short story collection, the couple is tasked with running a shady detective agency while their friends at Scotland Yard round up the former owner’s accomplices, and they proceed to approach the cases that come in by imitating the idiosyncratic methods and mannerisms of famous literary detectives like Sherlock Holmes and even Christie’s more famous creation Hercule Poirot. Some of the humor doesn’t land as well if you aren’t familiar with the particular characters being aped, but there are still plenty of droll moments and some quality Christie puzzlers. There’s not much of a plot tying all the stories together, but Tommy and Tuppence are hilarious enough that it’s still a fun read.

★★★☆☆

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Book Review: Tarzan of the Apes by Edgar Rice Burroughs

Book #171 of 2017:

Tarzan of the Apes by Edgar Rice Burroughs (Tarzan #1)

If you can get past all the early-twentieth-century racism, this first Tarzan novel is a pretty fun adventure story. It’s complete pulp fiction with larger-than-life escapades and improbable developments, but sometimes that sort of romp is just what you need in a book. Unfortunately, the author’s prejudicial ideas of white nobility and black savagery make it really hard for a modern reader to just sit back and enjoy these capers for what they are.

★★★☆☆

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Book Review: They Thought They Were Free: The Germans 1933-45 by Milton Sanford Mayer

Book #170 of 2017:

They Thought They Were Free: The Germans 1933-45 by Milton Sanford Mayer

This 1954 book draws on interviews with German citizens to explore the typical actions and attitudes of everyday members of the Nazi party, with particular focus on why they were drawn to the movement and how they viewed their own roles within it. This focus on the popular enabling of Hitler’s program is critical for any understanding of how atrocities like the Holocaust were carried out in a purportedly democratic society, and it’s a chilling, timely reminder of the need for vigilance against passivity as similar discriminatory movements gain steam in our own country today.

★★★★☆

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