Book #62 of 2018: The Dry by Jane Harper (Aaron Falk #1) At this point, the damaged narrator who returns home in the wake of tragedy only to face small town politics and dark family secrets is pretty much a staple of the crime thriller genre. These stories can sometimes feel rote, but debut author …
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Movie Review: Hidden Figures (2016)
Movie #4 of 2018: Hidden Figures (2016) Great cast and soundtrack, in service of the little-known true story of the black female mathematicians at NASA during the 1960s space race. There are some plot elements that strike me as a bit oversimplified, especially having read the book that the script was based on, and some …
Book Review: Batman: Nightwalker by Marie Lu
Book #61 of 2018: Batman: Nightwalker by Marie Lu Batman’s origin story has been told and retold countless times, and this latest version struggles to justify its existence against that long history. The premise of an 18-year-old Bruce Wayne playing Silence of the Lambs with a femme fatale in Arkham Asylum is decent / original …
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Book Review: We Are the Ants by Shaun David Hutchinson
Book #60 of 2018: We Are the Ants by Shaun David Hutchinson A powerful story of a teenager struggling to go on in the aftermath of his boyfriend’s suicide. As in the similarly exemplary A Monster Calls, it’s possible to read the heightened elements of the novel — in this case, the aliens who abduct …
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Book Review: Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
Book #59 of 2018: Catch-22 by Joseph Heller I fell in love with this satirical novel back in high school, and I wish I could say it holds up just as well today. And on some levels, it absolutely does: it remains a brilliant skewering of military doublespeak and the absurdity of war, and author …
Book Review: Mad Ship by Robin Hobb
Book #58 of 2018: Mad Ship by Robin Hobb (Liveship Traders #2) Overall, I would say that this sequel is an improvement over the first Liveship Traders book. The plot moves a little more quickly, and there’s great character work turning the most insufferable figure from the previous story into a compelling protagonist. These features …
Book Review: Enrique’s Journey: The Story of a Boy’s Dangerous Odyssey to Reunite with His Mother by Sonia Nazario
Book #57 of 2018: Enrique’s Journey: The Story of a Boy’s Dangerous Odyssey to Reunite with His Mother by Sonia Nazario This true-life illegal immigration story is initially quite powerful, but it loses a lot of focus once its subject has successfully crossed the southern border into the United States. Before that, it’s a heartbreaking …
Book Review: Cinder by Marissa Meyer
Book #56 of 2018: Cinder by Marissa Meyer (The Lunar Chronicles #1) A sci-fi retelling of Snow White / Cinderella is a great story idea, but I’m a little underwhelmed at how author Marissa Meyer has exectued it here. The villains are pretty one-note, the love interest is whiny and entitled, and there are some …
TV Review: The Mindy Project, season 5
TV #13 of 2018: The Mindy Project, season 5 My previous criticisms of this show – namely its inconsistent characterization and plotting, heavy reliance on slapstick, revolving cast door, and frustrating politics – unfortunately apply to this penultimate season as well. (What better way to resolve a love triangle cliffhanger that ended the previous season …
Book Review: Jamrach’s Menagerie by Carol Birch
Book #55 of 2018: Jamrach’s Menagerie by Carol Birch The opening of this story about a boy working for a Victorian-era animal trader lulls a reader with Dickensian charm, but it all turns absolutely brutal by the end. After a pleasant start our urchin hero sails out of London in search of a Komodo dragon, …
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The Lesser Joke: book reviews and more 