September 2024 – Looking For a Good Book

September 30, 2024

STAR TREK: PICARD’S ACADEMY–COMMIT NO MISTAKES – graphic novel

We look back at the Academy days of Jean-Luc Picard and see that he’s quite the loner, focused solely on doing well and getting ahead. But his instructor, Mr. Spock, informs him that getting to know the people on his team is important when making leadership decisions and orders Cadet Picard to attend a party Continue reading

GRAPHIC NOVEL, SF/FANTASY, Uncategorized

2 Stars, Book Reviews, Books, Graphic Novels, Reviews, SF/Fantasy, Star Trek

September 27, 2024

DOLL – Ed McBain

A woman, model Tina Sachs, is killed, brutally slashed to death while her young daughter sat in another room, quietly playing with her doll. In the squad room of the 87th Precinct, Steve Carella asks his lieutenant to assign Bert Kling to the case. Kling has been a bit belligerent since the loss of his fiancé. Continue reading

MYSTERY, Uncategorized

4 stars, Book Reviews, Books, Mystery, Reviews, Thriller

September 25, 2024

SHORES OF A NEW HORIZON – M. Darusha Wehm

The work of terraforming Mars has been a long and challenging process but just as the hopes of those living on the red planet reach an excited level as success looks to be within reach. But disaster looms as a contaminated ice asteroid threatens the planet’s water supply. Professor Zambrotta “Zammi” Kaspar is charged with Continue reading

SF/FANTASY, Uncategorized

3 Stars, Book Reviews, Books, Reviews, SF/Fantasy

September 23, 2024

DOUBLE EXPOSURE – Robert Sullivan

Timothy O’Sullivan was an American photographer in the 19th century. Some of his photos are among the most iconic of the American Civil War. After the war, O’Sullivan traveled to the American West, raising photography to an art form with his pictures of what was still considered to be unusual locations. His work had an Continue reading

NON-FICTION, Uncategorized

3 Stars, Book Reviews, Books, non-fiction, Photography, Reviews

September 20, 2024

THE FIEND – Margaret Millar

Margaret Millar’s The Fiend is a story of the mentally deranged individual, Charlie Gowen. There had been an incident in Charlie’s past, involving a child, which has made him the town pariah. Today, though, at least on the surface, he is more or less coping and the few people he does interact with consider him more or Continue reading

MYSTERY

4 stars, Book Reviews, Books, Mystery, Reviews, Thriller

September 18, 2024

SHAKESPEARE’S EAR – Tim Rayborn

I started to read this book on multiple occasions but would put it away barely getting past the Introduction each time. The problem? I really didn’t care for author Tim Rayborn’s ‘voice’. Rayborn makes little asides and and remarks that a middle school boy would find funny (generally sexually charged comments, like: The wonderfully named Continue reading

ENTERTAINMENT, NON-FICTION, Uncategorized

3 Stars, Book Reviews, Books, non-fiction, Reviews, Theatre

September 16, 2024

LIVING THE BEATLES LEGEND – Kenneth Womack

I have read a lot of Beatles-related books over the past dozen years that I’ve been writing this review blog but this is perhaps the most moving and the most insightful of all that I’ve read. Mal Evans was possibly closer to the Beatles than other individual, from their early days at The Cavern Club, Continue reading

ENTERTAINMENT, NON-FICTION, Uncategorized

5 Stars, Book Reviews, Books, non-fiction, Reviews

September 13, 2024

LAST DANGEROUS VISIONS – Harlan Ellison, editor

Is it possible to wait 50 years for one book? Yes. Fans of Harlan Ellison and/or his Dangerous Visions collections have been waiting for this particular book for just that long. Is it possible for a book that one has been waiting for for half a century to even come close to meeting fifty years’ Continue reading

SF/FANTASY, SHORT FICTION, Uncategorized

5 Stars, Book Reviews, Books, Reviews, SF/Fantasy, Short Fiction

September 11, 2024

THE DARK WIVES – Ann Cleeves

DI Vera Stanhope and her team are called to Rosebank Children’s Home to investigate the murder of Josh Woodburn. Josh was a student at university and a volunteer at the home. One of the residents – 14 year old Chloe Spencer – is missing. It doesn’t seem possible the two incidents aren’t connected, but Vera Continue reading

MYSTERY, Uncategorized

4 stars, Book Reviews, Books, Mystery, Reviews

September 9, 2024

ONE-ARMED JACK – Sarah Bax Horton

Jack the Ripper. The mystery, the legend, the search for his identity never lets up and every few years someone presents their case for uncovering the true identity of the Ripper. The latest in this long line of discoveries is Sarah Bax Horton’s One-Armed Jack: Uncovering the Real Jack the Ripper. Horton claims a bit of Continue reading

NON-FICTION, Uncategorized

3 Stars, Book Reviews, Books, non-fiction, Reviews

September 6, 2024

PILOBOLUS: A STORY OF DANCE AND LIFE – Robert Pranzatelli

I first became acquainted with the work of Pilobolus about 1980 when a theatre professor gave me a VHS tape of their performance on a local PBS station. To say that it was life-changing might be overstating it, but within a years time I had created my own ‘mime and dance’ company which performed locally Continue reading

ENTERTAINMENT, NON-FICTION, Uncategorized

5 Stars, Book Reviews, Books, Entertainment, non-fiction, Reviews, Theatre

September 4, 2024

BIRDING TO CHANGE THE WORLD – Trish O’Kane

I’m really torn on how to rate this book. There is some really great environmental, grassroots, activism here and author Trish O’Kane details the beginnings of her interest in bird watching and how it leads to the activism, but for me, there’s something missing in the connection. O’Kane starts us in Louisiana as she and Continue reading

NON-FICTION, Uncategorized

3 Stars, Birds, Book Reviews, Books, Environment, non-fiction, Reviews