5.30.2013

 

Memory

by K.J. Parker, 572 pgs, paperback
Series: The Scavenger Trilogy Book Three
Overall Grade: A

In this final installment of the Scavenger trilogy, Ciartan/Poldarn stumbles from coal-burning to bell-casting. All the various people he's encountered are slowly revealed to him and how they fit into his past and present. As expected of Parker there are machinations afoot and now we finally get to see how it all fits together.

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# posted by Cptn. Suz @ 12:50 AM

5.28.2013

 

Path of Beasts

by Lian Tanner, 337 pgs, hardcover
Series: Keepers trilogy #3
Official Website
Overall Grade: B-

Goldie, Toadspit & Bonnie have made the return voyage back to Jewel after the events of book 2, only to find the city quavering under the rule of a returned Fugleman, who has hired mercenaries to keep martial law. The children must do something, along with their new allies Mouse, his mice and the Cat, to once-again free Jewel from the clutches of the Fugleman before the Museum of Dunt releases all its horrors upon the citizens.

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# posted by Cptn. Suz @ 3:01 AM

5.22.2013

 

The Death-Ray

by Daniel Clowes, 41pgs, hardcover
Overall Grade: C

Grown-up Andy tells us the story of his teenage years when he was living with his grandparents, both his parents are dead and he has only one friend. When he discovers that he has superpowers under certain conditions. When he built a death-ray that only works for him.

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# posted by Cptn. Suz @ 1:44 AM

5.20.2013

 

Star Trek Into Darkness

PG-13, 132 minutes
Official Site | IMDb
Series: Star Trek; Star Trek reboot 'verse movie 2
Overall Grade: A


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# posted by Cptn. Suz @ 2:18 PM
 

City of Lies

by Lian Tanner, 278 pgs, hardcover
Series: Keepers trilogy #2
Overall Grade: B-


Goldie Roth has been reunited with her parents, who are still unwell from their imprisonment, and is torn about whether to stay with them or to accept her calling as a Keeper of the Museum of Dunt. Unfortuately before she can decide, Toadspit's sister Bonnie is kidnapped and both Toadspit and Goldie stowaway on the kidnappers boat. Toadspit reveals himself to protect Bonnie, so when they arrive in the city of Spoke, Goldie is alone in trying to track down and free her friends in the foreign town.

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# posted by Cptn. Suz @ 2:12 PM

5.16.2013

 

The Black Count

by Tom Reiss, 330 pgs, hardcover
Overall Grade: A

Did you know that the writer Alexander Dumas' father was a count? Or an esteemed and successful general in the French Revolution? Or served with Napoleon in Egypt? Or that he grew up in what would become Haiti? Or that he was black? If not, then you, like me, have been subjected to the whitewashing of European history. Reiss will enlighten you to the biography of this extraordinary Frenchman who really deserves to be famous in his own right, and not just because his life served as inspiration for his son's fictional Count of Monte Cristo.

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# posted by Cptn. Suz @ 1:47 AM

5.15.2013

 

The Colossus of Rhodes

by Caroline Lawrence, 173 pgs, hardcover
Series: The Roman Mysteries book 9
Official Website
Overall Grade: B+

This mystery takes place during a sea voyage, as Flavia & company sail with her father from their home in Ostia to the island of Rhodes, following up on the child-abduction ring they had previously fought against. There's a lot of nice details that all tie together at the end of this one. The only unappealing feature being Flavia's budding interest in men, which I and her friends could all do without.

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# posted by Cptn. Suz @ 6:50 PM

5.12.2013

 

The Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life

by Richard J. Herrnstein & Charles Murray, 575 pgs (excluding appendices & notes), paperback
Overall Grade: A

The result of long-term research into many, many social science studies, Herrnstein and Murray present their findings on the distribution of intelligence within the American population and among the various categorizations that population can be broken into (by race, education, socio-economic class).

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# posted by Cptn. Suz @ 10:46 PM
 

You Are Not a Gadget

by Jaron Lanier, 192 pgs, hardcover
Overall Grade: B

Worth reading for those that know a fair bit about computers and the internet. Lanier makes his case that certain ways that computer interfaces and software have developed have become "locked-in" and define the very way we think and interact with computers. Furthermore, though those designs were picked to fit one expediency or another, some of them reduce their users to less than human parts in their functioning. Lanier calls us to be wary of treating people like gadgets and of the uncreative, trollish stupor that's becoming prevalent on the internet.

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# posted by Cptn. Suz @ 10:33 PM
 

Iron Man 3


PG-13, 130 minutes
Official Site | IMDB
Series: Iron Man; Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU)
Overall Grade: A

The first post-Avengers installment in the MCU finds Tony Stark struggling with PTSD after almost dying in the Avengers. Events from 13 years ago resurface in the form of two individuals from a New Years' Eve party he once attended, one slept with and one he slighted. The latter is now an enemy/rival hiding behind the face of a terrorist attacking the U.S.

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# posted by Cptn. Suz @ 10:21 PM

5.04.2013

 

Go the F*ck to Sleep

by Adam Mansbach, illustrated by Ricardo Cortés, hardcover, 29 pgs
Overall Grade: B+

A bedtime story for parents about trying to get kids to go to sleep.

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# posted by Cptn. Suz @ 7:58 PM

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