by Barbara the Bibliophage | Jul 5, 2022 | RELAX: Memoir
Gloria Vanderbilt grew up with every financial advantage a child in the early 20th century could want. Yet she didn’t have loving parents—one was dead and the other distant. Perhaps, as a result, having a close relationship with her youngest son, Anderson Cooper,...
by Barbara the Bibliophage | Jul 3, 2022 | RELAX: Fantasy, Horror, Sci-Fi
Octavia Butler creates a fantastical story in Wild Seed, the first book of her Patternist series. The main characters are two immortals, living in Africa and America during the years leading up to the Civil War. Doro is a body-snatching, shape shifter who believes he...
by Barbara the Bibliophage | Jul 2, 2022 | RELAX: Mystery-Thriller
Upgrade is Blake Crouch’s latest thriller and it focuses on using genetics for good or evil. Main character Logan Ramsay experiences both in the course of the story. As the son of a famous geneticist, he was a tangential part of an apocalyptic genetic failure. As a...
by Barbara the Bibliophage | Jun 30, 2022 | LEARN: Everything Else
Adam Grant engaged my intellect and curiosity in his 2021 book, Think Again: The Power of Knowing What You Don’t Know. Plus, I immediately told friends and acquaintances about it. In fact, I didn’t wait until I finished the book. It’s timely and relevant to people’s...
by Barbara the Bibliophage | Jun 26, 2022 | RELAX: Mystery-Thriller
Sometimes mysteries are whodunit stories—relatively straightforward missing person or homicide with some thrilling moments and twisty endings. But I read two mysteries lately with just a little more. In both cases, the authors included relevant issues from our...
by Barbara the Bibliophage | Jun 24, 2022 | RELAX: Memoir
Elizabeth Alexander crafts an elegiac memoir and tribute to her late husband, Ficre Ghebreyesus, in The Light of the World. In many ways their marriage was typical. First, they had a meet-cute, then some dating and relocating, then wedding and kids. Still, the...
by Barbara the Bibliophage | Jun 18, 2022 | RELAX: Historical Fiction
The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt is many books wrapped up into one package. It’s a character study, coming-of-age, buddy story with a heist thrown in for good measure. And the reason I picked it is the aesthetic of dark academia, which is a hot trend in bookish circles...
by Barbara the Bibliophage | Jun 12, 2022 | RELAX: Other Relaxation
Elsewhere from Alexis Schaitkin is a melancholy, unsettling book. The setting is an imaginary town, high in the mountains. It’s so near the mountaintop that the clouds settle in there during the evenings. And some mornings, the townspeople wake up to a terrible event....
by Barbara the Bibliophage | Jun 5, 2022 | RELAX: Mystery-Thriller
Alan Drew creates a thoughtful mystery with multiple viewpoints in The Recruit. It’s set in 1987 and happens around a small city in Orange County, California. Drew uses a smart approach to his suspenseful story. He’s unafraid to confront the big issues of the day,...
by Barbara the Bibliophage | May 25, 2022 | LEARN: Chronic Illness
First, Meghan O’Rourke bares her soul about chronic illness in her 2022 book, The Invisible Kingdom: Reimagining Chronic Illness. And second, she analyzes how US medical care fails patients with difficult to diagnose chronic illnesses. This is two parts...
by Barbara the Bibliophage | May 22, 2022 | LEARN: Everything Else
Amanda Montell explores the unique ways cults use language to control their followers in her 2021 book Cultish: The Language of Fanaticism. As you’d expect, she includes the phenomenon of some well-known quasi-religious organizations like Scientology and Jim Jones’...
by Barbara the Bibliophage | May 19, 2022 | RELAX: Memoir
There’s nothing like sinking into a satisfying essay based memoir. Whether it’s following a cult survivor or a famous Hollywood star, slipping under another person’s skin is one of my favorite bookish pleasures. And sometimes memoirists step away from the simple...
by Barbara the Bibliophage | May 16, 2022 | RELAX: Fantasy, Horror, Sci-Fi, RELAX: Historical Fiction, RELAX: Mystery-Thriller
In A Rip Through Time, Kelley Armstrong creates Vancouver police detective Mallory Atkinson. Mallory is visiting her gravely ill grandmother in Edinburgh, Scotland. The year is 2019. Until one evening when Mallory goes jogging and unexpectedly finds herself waking up...
by Barbara the Bibliophage | May 10, 2022 | LEARN: Everything Else
I recently read a few books that examine our individual and collective fascination with genealogy. At our house, we talk often about our ancestors and what we know or don’t know. Our son decided yesterday to start filming his dad when these discussions happen. Because...
by Barbara the Bibliophage | May 5, 2022 | RESIST: Politics, RESIST: Social Justice
The essays in The 1619 Project, created and edited by Nikole Hannah-Jones and the New York Times Magazine, are more vital reading than ever. This week’s events at the Supreme Court have proven that. We’re watching the dismantling of privacy and human rights here in...
by Barbara the Bibliophage | May 1, 2022 | LEARN: Everything Else
I read Johann Hari’s new book, Stolen Focus: Why You Can’t Pay Attention—And How to Think Deeply Again, to improve my focus. I thought Hari would primarily provide specific, actionable strategies. While Stolen Focus does some of that, Hari predominately offers deeper...
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