Book Review: Hop into bed with the Book Babes

Posted by admin on 06.26.2009 at 6:47 am

As an avid reader and frequent list maker, I adore books about books (mmmm, Book Lust).  If you are looking for a reference for yourself or a gift for a well read friend, I suggest Between the Covers, The Book Babes’ Guide to a Woman’s Reading Pleasures.

Between the Covers, The Book Babes’ Guide to a Woman’s Reading Pleasures, will satisfy your reading urges in a most pleasing manner, providing well researched and well written recommendations for your every mood and need. Whether you want to “Make Peace with Mom,” “Save the Planet,” or “Get Involved” you’ll find a book that feels as if it had been hand picked for you. Halfway through the book, and over half a deck of post its later, I stopped marking each must read and decided to always keep this book nearby.

– Jozi Hall, BWB Aquisitions & Guest Reviewer

1 Comment » | Tagged Book Reviews, Between the Covers, Book Babes, Book Lust, Books about books, Guide to a Woman's Reading Pleasures, Jozi Hall

Book Review: MIDNIGHT IN THE GARDEN OF GOOD AND EVIL

Posted by admin on 05.13.2009 at 8:11 am

Before a recent trip to Savannah, Georgia, I was asked the same question each time I mentioned the city: “Have you read Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil?”  I wondered why so many people found this book to be synonymous with Savannah and decided I’d better check it out.

The author, John Berendt, explains how he came to Savannah on a whim in the 1980s and became fascinated with the city and people he met.  He recounts the decade-long murder trial of wealthy antique dealer Jim Williams, weaving the lives of his circle of friends and enemies into the storyline.  It’s easy to forget that the book is based on actual events as the eccentric characters blend with a suspenseful murder mystery and make it read like fiction.

Read more…

4 Comments » | Tagged Author Podcast, Book Reviews, book reviews, John Berendt, Kathryn Gosaynie, Mercer House, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, Savannah

Book Review: OUTLIERS by Malcolm Gladwell

Posted by admin on 03.02.2009 at 8:04 am

Natural talent:  We hear the phrase spoken often about composers like Mozart, computer programmers like Bill Joy, software geniuses like Bill Gates, and musical groups like the Beatles. We cannot all expect to be as successful as the Beatles or Mozart because we were not born with their natural talent. Or at least so go the musings from the peanut gallery of the less-than-successful.

In his latest book, Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell, bestselling author of The Tipping Point and Blink, shatters many popular notions about success and proves again why he is one of the most interesting, intelligent, and talented writers of our time. Gladwell’s book helps readers understand what an outlier is-a value, observation, event, etc. that is numerically distant from the rest of the data -and why outliers matter.

In Outliers we get what business books should really be like; part psychology book, part business book, part history book, part sociology book, and part anthropology book. You don’t have to worry about going cross-eyed from reading too many business buzz words or meaningless platitudes. Outliers is chock full of amazing, interesting, and educational lessons about opportunity, success, and failure. Read more…

2 Comments » | Tagged Book Reviews, Blink, Malcolm Gladwell, Outliers, R. Stephen Prather, The Tipping Point

Blink (my quick decision)

Posted by Chip on 02.11.2009 at 7:58 am

I am currently reading books.  I need to read a book.  I need to work on my fidelity with books.

One book, I currently see from time to time, is entitled Blink.  Blink examines the value of a quick decision.   One of the studies Blink discusses involves showing a group of people short clips of teachers giving a lecture (with no audio).  Another group is shown still photos of the same teachers from the clips.  Both groups are asked to rank the teaching ability of the teachers based on either the photo or the silent 30 second clip.

The results showed the ratings each teacher received based on photos and clips were remarkably similar to the ratings the same professors received from their full time students after a semester of teaching.   From what I have read so far, Blink supports the notion that a quick decision is often an educated decision.  Although I feel this study simply illustrates our species loyalty to superficial conclusions.

Some people have a natural fear of snakes and others have a natural fear of spiders.  These fears make sense considering the problems our
species has experienced over the centuries do to both species.  Perhaps these fears are based on the same instinctual knowledge that
allows us to make smart quick decisions.

The human brain is the product of years of learning things the only way us humans truly learn anything…the hard way.

I discovered my fear of electricity by touching an electric fence.  Twenty minutes later I discovered that it is impossible to touch a electric fence
twice.  My curiosity made me want to “make sure it was an electric fence” but my brain would not allow my hand to make contact.

Just as I learned not to touch the fence again perhaps the human race has learned from collective experience and perhaps there is something to that gut feeling that helps us make life’s quick decisions.  Although I have only read the fist 50 pages of Blink, I feel I am able to review the book with confidence using the “blink of an eye” decision making the book examines.

Have your say » | Tagged Book Reviews, Flabbergasted, Blink, chip boyes, Malcom Gladwell

Book Review: Twilight

Posted by Dana on 12.18.2008 at 12:01 pm

You’re either thinking to yourself…”Wow, she’s the last female on earth to read this book,” or “Are grown-ups really reading this stuff?” or maybe “Why didn’t she just go and see the movie?” All legitimate questions I assure you. Here are my answers (or maybe excuses). I got this one right off my teenage daughter’s bookshelf, (where I will also be going to get the rest of the series – now that I’m hooked). I’m a procrastinator by nature, so I think that’s why I waited until now to read it. Having heard about the book from not only my daughter, but two of my girlfriends, one in her 30s and the other over 50, I knew I had to see what the buzz was about. So there, that answers the “are grown-ups reading this?” question. I’m also kind of a stickler for reading the book before I see the movie, which I have not seen yet. So that answers that question.

Now you want to know if you should read it, right? You should. If for no other reason than to know what kids today are up to–not that they’re hanging out with vampires, but you know what I mean. The book is long, at almost 500 pages, but like Harry Potter it’s a fast read. I’m not saying this is the most literary book you’ll ever read but it is fun. Stephenie Meyer’s take on the vampires is a new slant with some good and some not so good. Her writing is very visual so you can really picture the characters and the locations. She also has a very good grasp on Bella the teenage girl that is the main character. The book is written in the first person and for the most part Bella is believable. She experiences the kind of devastating fully committed love in that special way teenagers do.

There is also a great baseball scene in the book that reminded me of the Quidditch matches in Harry Potter and that I am very much looking forward to seeing in the movie.

If you’re worried about it being gory or too much for your teenager or pre-teen, I wouldn’t worry about it. There’s very little violence in the book and surprisingly very little blood.

There’s some good set up in the story for book two, New Moon – so if you like this one, which I think you will, you’ll most likely have to read on.

5 Comments » | Tagged Book Reviews, harry potter, Stephenie Meyer, Twilight, Vampires

Inherit the Land

Posted by King on 12.15.2008 at 10:36 am

Inherit the Land, by Gene Stowe (non-fiction)

Last month marked a historic time in our nation as we elected our first black president. It was amazing to see the emotion on children’s faces truly filled with hope, that  anyone could become president someday.

As we celebrate this important moment in our history, it is important to remember the victories that occurred along this long road to breaking down racial barriers.

Gene Stowe’s Inherit the land tells of the south in the early 1900’s, when it was common place for white mobs to ignore the laws of the land and routinely beat and torture blacks. Yes, slavery was over, but white America was far from accepting blacks as their equals.

Stowe’s book tells of the Ross Sisters, white women who dared to be different, showing everyone love and compassion, regardless of skin color.  They  took a black family in with them and lived with them like  one family. When the last Ross sister passed away in 1920, they left their entire estate to the black family that had been living with them. This decision outraged the local community, and several of the Ross’ cousins came forth to file lawsuit against the will.

Amazingly enough, the will was upheld, showing that even in these dark times, there was hope for a brighter future.

Inherit the land is a great read, a good tribute to the heroes that have been fighting civil right battles in America years ago that helped pave the way to our historic election this year.

1 Comment » | Tagged Book Reviews, gene stowe, inherit the land

Book Review: Practical Demonkeeping

Posted by Dana on 11.03.2008 at 12:45 pm

Okay – we’re digging back to 1992 for this one. Some of you were still toddling around in your diapers, but I’ll try not to think about that.

I have heard so many great things about Christopher Moore over the years that I finally had to go check him out for myself. And where better to start than at the beginning. Practical Demonkeeping is Moore’s debut novel and I have to say I really enjoyed it. Not to use a phrase that could come back to haunt me, but I was totally sucked in.

The book has the pace and intricacy of a Carl Hiaasen mixed with a sort of sarcastic and silly demon world. Think Sick Puppy meets Buffy the Vampire Slayer except the heroes are not so attractive or nice or successful.

If you’re not drawn in by the premise, check out some of the characters – you’ve got a small time drug dealer called The Breeze, an obese police data expert called The Spider and sometimes the Nailgun, a demon named Catch who postpones his killing to enjoy the Magic Fingers of a motel room bed, Billy, a cross dressing hotel clerk who is sometimes called Roxanne and Gian Hen Gian the king of the Djinn.

And if that isn’t enough to get you reading, here’s my favorite quote from the book. When Travis, our hero, is asked what morality is, he replies, “It’s the difference between what is right and what you can rationalize.”

(If you like Christopher Moore, check back for an interview with him coming as his new release approaches in 2009!)

2 Comments » | Tagged Book Reviews, author interviews, christopher moore, practical demonkeeping

Book Review: Lila by Robert Pirsig

Posted by Jack on 10.28.2008 at 10:30 am

Everyone has a favorite cult book.  Maybe it’s Fight Club, maybe it’s Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, maybe it’s something else.  For me, it’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.  Robert Pirsig does an amazing job of exposing the less philosophy educated, but interested, in a whole new way of thinking about the world.  As a young man brought up in a Catholic household, his concept of “Quality” as the divine, in its way, was racy and delicious.

Fewer have read his effort: Lila: An Inquiry into Morals.  Lila delves deeper.  In the same way Atlas Shrugged was used as Ayn Rand’s soapbox after priming the pump with the superb “The Fountainhead,” Pirsig knows you’re bought in to an extent, so he’s going to dive in deep.  At one point he chirps “Metaphysics is a diner menu with 30,000 pages and no food” and thusly seems to wash his hands to the need for food in the text.  He weaves around a story down a river, as opposed to on a bike, with his own morality in his sights and that of other characters, be they real or created for the vehicle of the story.

Fundamentally, the problem with Lila becomes not that it fails to entertain; it is dense but appeals to the inquiring mind.  Rather it is that this text is a kind of basis for the same mysticism based new-age philosophies that become relative and in their relativity become dangerous.  Although Pirsig thankfully shies away from “The Cloud of Unknowing” concept in which any attempt to attach names to “the Divine” furthers us from understanding it, he still clings to the fact that connotation refracts the light of knowledge and thusly obfuscates the reality of experience.  Even in his oft-cited example about a hot stove and the “low quality experience” of sitting on it, he muddles something tangible and physical with conclusions much deeper than “that was uncomfortable” opting instead for the “dynamic” nature of realizing the issue andb amending it and the consequent “static” nature of writing into your mental code “do not sit on hot stove.”

Regardless, Pirsig’s writing is clean and anyone interested in the concepts will be satisfied not only by his execution, but by his elocution.  And besides this is the stuff that dorm common rooms were made for.

3 Comments » | Tagged Book Reviews, cult books, lila an inquiry into morals, robert pirsig, zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance

Book Review: Practicing by Glenn Kurtz

Posted by Jack on 10.27.2008 at 11:30 am

When we get entrenched in something that takes so much of our day, be it work, a significant other, or the curious amalgamation of the two in the form of our “craft” (be it writing, playing music, dancing or whatever), we often fail to see anything else.  As someone who went to school for classical guitar and English, I picked up Glenn Kurtz’s Practicing: A Musician’s Return to Music.  I figured “Hey, I lapsed from guitar too and need to return!  I like to write too!”  But even I, in my love of these simple joys have trouble at times delving into the indulgence of Kurtz’s writing.

His tacit statement of genius is part of the affect of the book.  I get that.  His descriptions of the music and practice are excellent, Read more…

Have your say » | Tagged Book Reviews, glenn kurtz, music, practicing

Book Review: Vince and Joy by Lisa Jewell

Posted by Dana on 10.22.2008 at 2:49 pm

I have always been a fan of Lisa Jewell, so I figured I couldn’t go wrong. Remember a few years back (okay more than a few) when Bridget Jones’s Diary hit the big time and we all wanted to read anything British? Well that’s when Lisa Jewell hit it big in the states

Ralph’s Party and Thirty Nothing were really great – and though Ms. Jewell is marketed as chick lit, her characters are very real and likable as well. I think it’s fair to say she got that label because chick lit was all the rage at the time. In fairness, her books should really just be considered contemporary fiction.

Vince & Joy is kind of like a British When Harry Met Sally except that instead of starting out friends, the pair in this story start out as lovers – each others first, in fact. Circumstances separate them and they go on to live their own very normal, very that-could-be-me lives. We experience them over a nearly twenty year period as they live their lives and bump into each other every several years along the way. The supporting cast is well thought out and interesting from the parents to the roommates to the transgender neighbor and the psychic cat.

1 Comment » | Tagged Book Reviews, Bridget Jones, british lit, dana barrett, Lisa Jewell, Vince & Joy, When Harry Met Sally