As soon as I finished reading Dewey: The Small-Town Library Cat Who Touched the World, I immediately jumped into the sequel (a good sign, I think!). And in the introduction I came across the following quote, which really represented the first book to me: “People appreciate Spencer, Iowa. They like our cornfields and architecture and they also like what we represent: simplicity, old-fashioned hard work, but also creativity, commitment, and love.” Read more »
As a new blogger, I unfortunately discovered the many fun reading challenges other book-bloggers are running shortly after the new year. This meant most sign-ups were over. In a way, this was a good thing, since it kept me from adding anything else to an already pretty ambitious project! However, I think the community aspect of completing a challenge together could be fun. Fortunately, I discovered Maphead’s Book Blog which led me to two Non-Fiction challenges with ongoing sign-ups 😀
I will now be participating in (appropriately) the Dewey Decimal Challenge hosted by The Introverted Reader at the Master level (goal: 16-20 non-fiction books) as well as the Non-Fiction Non-Memoir Challenge hosted by My Book Retreat at the Master’s Degree level (goal: 25 non-fiction, non-memoir books). Although I hope that won’t be a challenge, since that would mean my semester had suddenly gotten a lot busier, I’m really not signing up for the extra goal. So far, the most rewarding part of blogging has been the interactions with other bloggers and readers, which I look forward to expanding through these challenges. Happy reading!
Non-Project Non-Fiction
My on-the-side non-fiction reading this week included two books by Malcolm Gladwell, Blink and The Tipping Point. Blink was well-written and accessible. The author shares many engaging anecdotes to facilitate his discussion of when our split-second decisions serve us well and when they go wrong. It’s not the most scientific book I’ve read (with less transparent support for the points the author makes than Click, for example) but does cite many scientific studies for those who care to delve more deeply into any specific claim. Read more »
Classes started today and neither of my classes seem too difficult. Hopefully this means good things for my ability to continue blogging throughout the semester! This evening I had time finish Click, my 006 book, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Like the author, I have to admit that I love data. And this book describes a data-miner’s dream. The author has information about the searches made and websites visited by 10 million users (!) and has demographic information for about a quarter of them. Read more »
This week visiting the boy was awesome, with lots of time off together and one of our best dates ever at the revolving Sundial restaurant at the top of the Westin in Atlanta (so awesome!). Unfortunately, the boy also had a lot of work to do. Fortunately, this left me lots of time to work on my blog and read some 006 books on blogging, which I’ll be reviewing here 🙂 Read more »
The Art of Deception is written by a hacker (or, as he calls himself, a “social engineer”) and describes the ways in which hackers can exploit human nature to bypass security measures. The book was hyped as being “like reading the climaxes of a dozen complex thrillers”, but I don’t think it lived up that hype. Although I found it interesting to read about the clever ways hackers go about getting very classified information, it wasn’t exactly edge-of-your-seat reading. Read more »
Welcome to the new year everyone! I’m currently visiting my boyfriend in sunny Atlanta, so I’m mostly postponing my resolution setting to when I won’t be wasting precious time with him 🙂 However, I am planning on doing a 52 week photography project where I take a picture a week all year. To do that, I will be starting a new section on the blog, Photography Friday, where I will post each week’s picture. I will also be participating in the Cannonball Read challenge to read and review books ( blog available here). This will require me to do more detailed reviews than I’ve been doing so far. Feel free to share your own resolutions in the comments! Read more »
Current Fiction Readings
This week I’ve finally (after waiting a whole day :-P) gotten to read the rest of the published books in the Raine Benares series. Although the plot in each book is pretty unique, the second and third books did seem a lot like the first. One common complaint which I share is that the author reuses words and phrases from book to book. It’s not unreasonable for the author to recap parts of earlier books, but most other authors are able to do this without directly quoting the previous books. The direct quotes gave me an unpleasant feeling of deja vu which pulled me out of the current action a little bit. In the first book, I enjoyed all the flirting. I thought it was enough to give the books a little sex appeal, but not enough I’d be uncomfortable if my mom looked over my shoulder. But by the third book or so all the almost having sex was beginning to feel kind of ridiculous – it was obvious it was going to happen, but it never did! The fourth book was one of my favorites, both because something (no spoilers, I promise!) does happen in terms of sex and some of the bad guys begin to get what’s coming to them. This made for a very satisfying read. The fifth book was also much more action packed in terms of fighting the bad guys and in Raine’s sex life. I really liked these last two and can’t wait for the new book this year!
Non-Project Non-Fiction
None this week. Surprisingly, I’ve actually had less time to read at home than I did my last week at school, so I haven’t done a whole lot of extra non-fiction reading!
Summary
Armed and Magical (book 2) and The Trouble with Demons (book 3) – 4 stars – new engaging plots, but largely similar to the first book in tone, style and wording.
Bewitched and Betrayed (book 4) and Con and Conjure (book 5) – 5 stars – I really enjoyed these two! Much more satisfyingly action-packed than the previous two books.
My books came in! I also stopped by the non-fiction section and picked up some books for the challenge:
005 – The Art of Deception – one of the very few books in this section I’d want to read all the way through, as most are tutorials for computer programs and programming. This book is written by a hacker and describes the “most serious security weakness – human nature”. Supposedly like reading a mystery novel.
006 – Click – this section includes books on “special computer methods”, mostly stuff on artificial intelligence. Click describes the results of data-mining the information we share online, but seems less dry than that description makes it sounds. Reminds me a little of Freakonomics – both authors search through seemingly unconnected data for conclusions about human nature.
This week Bookends will just be two books, since I spent most (10 hours!) of Thursday driving to my parents’ house for the holidays. Next time I must get some audio books, because otherwise I’ll spend the whole time wishing reading while driving was a viable option! Anyway, I hope everyone enjoys these reviews and has a wonderful holiday 🙂 Read more »
