SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome Mary Beard I added  SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome  to my "Read" list 11-Oct-2020. That was shortly after I began using Goodreads seriously, and before I started reviewing all my books in detail. Thus although I have a five-star rating, probably given while the book was still fresh in memory, it is no longer that, and I am scrambling a bit to remember why I liked it so much. I do remember that what pleased me most about it was that  Mary Beard  tells us carefully what we know, and how we know what we know. It is my position -- I have gotten into arguments over this -- that you don't actually know anything unless you know how you know it. Now, the brutal fact of the matter is that we don't actually know all that much about the history of the Roman Republic. Much of what we think we know comes from a small number of often sketchy and not-all-that reliable sources. For instance, the writings of Cicero (a politician) loom large. Also, for...

  Cleopatra: A Life Stacy Schiff I picked up this book after reading  Gibbs 's  Charlie Thorne and the Curse of Cleopatra . In his acknowledgements,  Gibbs  writes, "Then I read Cleopatra: A Life, by Stacy Schiff, which is certainly one of the best biographies ever written." I can't agree.  Schiff  has an agenda. She wants us to know that Cleopatra was a remarkable and admirable woman whose history has been written by her enemies, most of them men eager to sexualize her. Consequently she is unfairly represented in history and popular culture.  Schiff 's mission is to set the record straight. As polemic,  Cleopatra: A Life  is effective. I am completely convinced by  Schiff 's arguments. As biography, it is not so great. When I finished  Cleopatra  I gave it a three-star rating based on how I felt at the end. I was glad to get there.  Cleopatra  is long and tedious, but informative. But then I asked myself the fat...

The Holographic Universe Leonard Susskind, James Lindesay I enjoyed this quite a lot. The ideas from which  The Holographic Universe  begin come from the observation that the amount of information you can fit into a black hole depends on the square of its radius, rather than the cube. That is, the information content of a black hole is proportional not to its volume, which would have been the obvious guess, but to its surface area. This leads to the hypothesis that all the information on the state of a black hole is carried on its surface, not in its interior. From there we get to the idea (supported by some other physical theory) that every event horizon has this property: that the information is not contained within it, but on its surface. Noting that the boundary of the observable universe is, from our point of view, an event horizon, this leads to the idea of the Holographic Universe, and to an estimate of the total information content of the universe. It's a huge number, ...

  Anne of Green Gables LM Montgomery I read  Anne of Green Gables  not when I was a kid, but somewhat late in life. It is possible that my sister subtly discouraged my interest when we were kids.  In our home we generally upheld the principle "Books are for everyone." In practice, this meant that no one in the house owned a book. You were expected to lend it to anyone who wanted it. My sister was not 100% behind this idea, and since she owned the Anne of Green Gables series, she might not have been entirely thrilled with my reading them.   I somehow picked up the idea that Anne was a high-falutin society dame, and my interest consequently was muted. Eventually I realized that books as popular as these are must have something to recommend them, and having become a confirmed reader of so-called childrens' books, I tackled them after grad school. Well, they're good, obviously. And just as obviously, Anne is no high-falutin society dame, but an appealing young ...

  Rolling in the Deep Mira Grant ** spoiler alert ** Although I have marked this review as a spoiler, it will not be if you have already read  Into the Drowning Deep , because  Rolling in the Deep  is already spoiled for you. Likewise, if you have read  Rolling ,  Into  is spoiled for you. If, like me, you're going to waste your time by reading both books, I would advise you to read  Into  first, because it is the better of the two books and you might as well read the best book unspoiled. Why do I say this? Well, let's see. In both books mockumentary company Imagine Entertainment sends a ship full of scientists, entertainers, and crew to hang out at the Mariana Trench and look for mermaids. In both books, they indeed find mermaid-like animals. The mermaids are voracious fast-moving things with mouths full of scary teeth that like to bite human faces off. In both cases the mermaid-things come aboard and swarm the ship, killing humans and takin...

Sword of Honor Trilogy Evelyn Waugh I read these novels eleven years ago (06-Aug-2011). I barely remember them now. What I do remember is a sense of disappointment. Having heard Evelyn Waugh's name forever, and having heard him praised as one of the most humorous English authors, I was expecting more. It was fun, not a waste of time to read, But it was only a little fun. I see other reviewers compare him to  PG Wodehouse . Not even close, in my opinion! Amazon review Goodreads review

Mr. and Mrs. Bunny — Detectives Extraordinaire! Polly Horvath, Sophie Blackall (Illustrator) I read this ten years ago (24-Jul-2012) and barely remember it now. The main thing that sticks in my memory is Mrs Bunny's clumsy but still somehow effective tricks to get her husband, Mr Bunny, to do what she wants. Amazon review Goodreads review

Charlie Thorne and the Curse of Cleopatra Stuart Gibbs Charlie Thorne and the Curse of Cleopatra  came into being because  Stuart Gibbs  read  Stacy Schiff 's  biography of Cleopatra  (which I added to my to-read list this morning). Judging by the publisher's blurb and reviews,  Schiff  wrote her biography with an agenda. Everyone has heard of Cleopatra, but what we think we know about her comes mostly from her portrayal in works of fiction written by men.  Schiff  points out that men have historically sought to minimize the accomplishments of great women, and sets out to correct the misportrayal of Cleopatra. Gibbs  was completely sold. In his Acknowledgements, he writes, "Then I read  Cleopatra: A Life , by  Stacy Schiff , which is certainly one of the best biographies ever written." Now, the general formula of a  Charlie Thorne  book is, we pretend that some great historical figure hid away a secret of great p...

Into the Drowning Deep Mira Grant Mira Grant  is, as we all know, one of  Seanan McGuire 's pen names.  McGuire  is an author I like a great deal, and when I like an author a lot, I often react by trying to read everything they have published (viz:  Jane Austen ,  Patricia Briggs ). So I have undertaken the project of reading everything  McGuire  has published. This is a big job, because she's prolific. Also, she publishes under at least three different names that I know of ( Seanan McGuire ,  Mira Grant ,  A. Deborah Baker ). I'm currently working my way through the  Mira Grant  oeuvre. I started with her  Parasitology series , which was dreadful: one to two stars. I then moved on to the  Newsflesh series , which was ever-so-slightly better: two to three stars. At this point I was beginning to suspect that  Mira Grant  was somehow  McGuire 's toxic waste dump. I wondered if I should abandon the project...

When You Reach Me Rebecca Stead I read this ten years ago (26-Jul-2012) -- I routinely read Newbery medal winners. I don't remember a lot about it now, except  that it's a time-travel story , and the shocking ending. (I'm sure a whole army of you are now rising up to proudly claim, "I saw it coming light-years away!" Well, *I* didn't.) I should re-read it, see how well it holds up without the surprise ending. Amazon review Goodreads review  

Moment 09 -- Foxes for Christmas Ben Aaronovitch Unlike many of  Ben Aaronovitch 's moments, this one is actually a story, albeit a very brief one. It has a beginning, a middle, and an end, and even one or two morals. We begin with Violet Portchester in her cabin in the Chilterns. She is in dire straits, It seemed that her prospects were bleak but often when things are at their most desperate they become progressively worse leading to a spiral of despair that ends in inevitable destruction. But then her home is invaded by our familiar parliament of talking foxes, and some mutual rescues take place. Read it  here .

Charlie Thorne and the Lost City Stuart Gibbs As  Charlie Thorne and the Last Equation  ended, twelve-year-old supergenius Charlie Thorne had found Einstein's Pandora equation, which apparently will allow folks to make nuclear weapons in the garage. Einstein, not trusting mankind with this sort of power, had hidden the secret away behind a series of hidden messages with coded clues. The final message, the one containing the equation, was destroyed when Charlie found it, but not before she could glimpse and memorize it. Charlie, having no more faith in humanity than Einstein, is keeping Pandora secret. Charlie managed at the end of  The Last Equation  to barely escape from a fire, which she allowed everyone to believe had killed her. Her brother CIA agent Dante Garcia and his partner Milana Moon know that Charlie is likely to have escaped. Any number of intelligence agencies now know that Pandora exists. Thus Charlie's brain is the sole repository of the most valuable...

  Harriet the Spy Louise Fitzhugh ** spoiler alert **  I read this many years ago after my New York City aunt, who always knew about the hot new books gave it to my sister. I LOVED it (So did my sister.) Harriet was brilliant, as was Ole Golly. As is usual for a book I read so long ago, I mainly remember certain specific scenes. For instance, I remember Harriet, who saw herself as a future writer, spying on a writer who lived nearby. This writer lived alone and had a large number of cats. While Harriet was watching, he came home from grocery shopping, fed his cats, and ate some yogurt. This caused Harriet to question her career choices: She reckoned she could learn to eat yogurt, but wasn't sure she could endure all those cats. Although when I read it I was close to Harriet in age, I knew immediately that this was flawed logic  Louise Fitzhugh  had put in for comic effect. The story is mainly about Harriet learning how unfair the world is. Harriet, to teach herself t...

  Feedback Mira Grant ** Warning, spoilers for  Feed ,  Deadline ,  Blackout , and  Rise  follow ** Feedback  is book four in  Mira Grant  (AKA  Seanan McGuire )'s  Newsflesh series . First question: do you have to read the previous Newsflesh books before reading  Feedback ? Well, there are two answers to that question: 1. Yes, you have to. The Newsflesh world-building is not complete enough in  Feedback  for it to make sense without the previous books. 2. No, you should not. Reading  Feed ,  Deadline , and  Blackout  will make it impossible to enjoy  Feedback . These answers seem contradictory, but they are not. What it comes down to is that there is no strategy that will make it possible to enjoy reading  Feedback . It's only fair that I tell you where I'm coming from. I read  Feedback  as part of my project of reading everything  McGuire  has published. While I love...

  The Body of an American The Pogues Watching  "Dead Soldiers", the third episode of the third season of The Wire, reminded me of this Pogues song.

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Harry Potter, #4) JK Rowling ** spoiler alert ** I read  Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire  eleven years ago today. It wasn't the first time -- I also read it back around 2000, when it first came out. Indeed, I believe I bought the book in hardback, something I almost never do, in order to get it as early as possible. I'm not sure why I was re-reading it in 2011 -- perhaps I did a series re-read in preparation for one of the movies.   I remember my first thought on seeing  Goblet of Fire  was, "Wow! That is a thick book!" This was, of course, a Harbinger Of Things To Come and also too The New Normal:  Order of the Phoenix  was even longer, and the subsequent two were close to  Goblet of Fire  in length. Is "long" good? Well, it depends on the book. There are some books you just want to reach the end of, and there are some you wish would go on forever.  Goblet of Fire  is closer to the second cl...