Tag Archives: book

Obama Zombies by Jason Mattera

Well, it’s not much of a secret what my political views are if I read a book subtitled “How the Liberal Machine Brainwashed My Generation.”

So, if you are already offended by the title no pressure to read the rest.

Of course it may make you feel slightly better to know I don’t recommend it.

On second thought I agreed with all the content, just not the delivery, so perhaps that’s not a positive for you after all.

Oh well, strike me from the Christmas card list if you must but here goes my little review…

This was book full of interesting comments and facts delivered in a completely obnoxious way.  It had  information on how the Obama campaign was run and the excellent job they did at attracting the youth vote, stuff that I was only vaguely aware of from this rock I live under. Unfortunately the author presents it in a yelly (yes I know this isn’t a word but I like it anyway), sarcastic, rude sort of way.  It’s one thing to read a quote or a comment and hear Mattera’s rebuttal of it, in fact much of that was well done and even amusing. Unfortunately then he would start “yelling” in the book as if he were talking to that person. I’m not a big fan of being yelled at as if I agree with the “Obama Zombies,” it was a complete turn off. For instance a section titled  “Piss Off a Liberal: Get a Job, Make Money, and Be Happy” had me laughing out loud until I read: “We need rick folks, idiots! Who the hell do you think cuts your paycheck?”  That pretty much sealed the deal for me,  thanks Jason, have a nice day, and next time you write a book try not to yell at the people reading it who agree with you!

Would I recommend it? No, there’s got to be better sources for the same information.

The Geography of Bliss by Eric Weiner

The cover of the book says “One Grump’s Search for the Happiest Places in the World.”

Good thing too, it was the grumpiness that made the book.  This grumpy author travels to ten countries and shares what he learns  in chapters with titles like:

“Switzerland – Happiness Is Boredom”

“Iceland – Happiness Is Failure”

and

“Moldova – Happiness Is Somewhere Else”

Had this book been written by some positive thinking, sickly sweet personality, the world is a wonderful place and I’m a wonderful person,  ( yes Eat, Pray Love, I’m thinking of you) it would have been a total failure. Fortunately Eric Weiner is an unhappy grump, (his words not mine) and so what could have been a nauseating topic turns out to be amusing and informative.

Would I recommend it? Yes. It’s also full of interesting facts. Did you know the smiley face was invented in 1963 to cheer up workers at an insurance company? 🙂

Trout, Trout, Trout! (A Fish Chant) by April Pulley Sayre

This week I checked this book out from the library just so I could write about it…

.. and read it to Ivy 20 million times, becuase she likes it…

…which is fine by me, I sort of love it.

The key to this book is the little comment in parenthesis it is “A Fish Chant.” When you go find this book and bring it home, you can’t just read it. Nope, it won’t work, you won’t love it, your kid will think it’s lame.  You have to find the rhythm of the words and chant it.  If that sounds ridiculous please keep in mind that I can’t clap along with a beat, but I can read this book with a bit of a rhythm to it, so therefore, you can too. Then when you do chant it, you’ll also love it, accidentally memorize it, and then have fish names like “Sockeye Salmon, Arctic Char, Mooneye, Walleye, Gar, Gar, Gar!” rolling around in your head too. Which will turn out to be a good thing, becuase you’ll be able to “read” the book while cooking, cleaning, changing diapers or driving. Then your kid will also start to memorize it and help with the “Gar, Gar, Gar!’s. And then if you’d like to know what exactly these crazy fish are that you have been chanting about all day, you can look it up in the back of the book where they have a little blurb on each fish.

Or at least that’s how it happened here!

Would I recommend it? It’s a must!

Tippeary by Frank Delaney

Recently I said that I loved historical fiction because it’s, “a painless form of accidental learning ” which I think is true.  Except for when it isn’t.

Set during the time of the Irish war for independence Tippeary had so much promise, the first page was totally intriguing…

…187 pages later I thought to myself ooohhhh, now it’s getting good.

Three Signs You May Be Reading A Boring Book:

1) You lose it under your bed for a few days because you forgot you were reading it.

2) You put the book down when the main character is being held at gun point and forgot what was happening before you pick it back up.

3) You put the book down when arsonists are lighting their fires.

Really to be fair, it wasn’t boring, there was a guerrilla war going on after all, it was just that I hated all the characters.

Would I recommend it? No, the last third of the book was good, but not good enough to make up for the first two thirds!

The Unusual Suspects & The Problem Child by Michael Buckley

The next two books in the Sisters Grimm series were much like the first.  They were fun, playful quirky sort of books, and now that I’ve read three of them I feel my “research” is finished.

Would I recommend them? I will be recommending them to my daughters, if I can remember they exist when the girls are finally old enough to read them!

The Tenth Gift by Jane Johnson

More historical fiction……I love it!

I find it to be a painless form of accidental learning where I often retain information better than completely non-fiction sources.

Like all the best historical fiction it includes a part in the back that says what is fact and what isn’t, important when used as an accidental learning source!

Then of course there was the actual substance of the book, involving two different times (current and past, love that) two different countries (culture comparisons, always good) and a willful woman in a time when that was not encouraged (gotta love that).

Oh, and pirates, they always make life more…”interesting.”

Would I recommend it? Yes, it dealt with a small part of  history I’d never heard of before.

The Farfarers by Farley Mowat

After finally finishing this book my only overwhelming feeling is…

HA!

Perhaps final conquest isn’t the best of reviews…

Parts of the book I found completely fascinating and surprisingly, for lack of a better term, relevant. I’d have thought that a book about the first Europeans that may have made it to North America (predating the Norse) and the why’s and hows of how they got here would be information that would be filed away in my brain as interesting but mostly useless and ultimately forgotten.  As it has turned out I’ve found relate-able material  in all sorts of areas since I started reading it. After all when you span Scandinavia to Newfoundland from 5000 bc to the 1400’s that’s a lot of history and  a lot land covered, I guess it’s bound to come up somewhere!

On the down side the book has a tendency to be a bit of a dry history book at times. Contrasting this was a fictional account following a group of people, the Farfarers, as Mowat takes you through the times. I expected this part to be much better than it was,  and it turned out that that was my least favorite part of the book.  As more of a glimpse of what life was like than an actual story line  I found it just to be annoying. Also it had a tendency to be ridiculously graphically violent for no apparent reason. I never need to read descriptions about heads being chopped in two, ever.

Would I recommend it? Not for the average evening read but if you’ve any interest in this part of history or even seafaring history in general, it’s an interesting worthwhile read. However I would not recommend you leave it in your child’s room and read it while nursing her to sleep, this will cause it to be read in snippets over a ridiculously long period of time so that when you finish it all you’ll have to say is…

HA!

The Once and Future King by T. H. White

I might have been living in a box but I had no idea this was the legend of King Arthur.

No idea that it was actually four books in one.

No idea the first one was The Sword In The Stone.

But now I do!

I liked it.

It was far funnier than I thought it would be and had far more philosophical ponderings at the edges than I expected.

When it comes down to it :

Would I recommend it? Yup, it’s Arthurian legend, it’s a classic, gotta read it!.

The Fairy-Tale Detectives by Michael Buckley

Book one of The Sisters Grimm, totally my kind of a book. A young adult fantasy book where fairy tale creatures, or “everafters” as they are called in the book, are everywhere and not quite what you remember from the stories, there is a Great Dane and Prince Charming is sort of a cad.  I think young adult fiction is my own personal book candy. Quick to read, sweet, fun and slightly addictive. I’m off to order the next one from the library, and if anyone asks it’s research for recommend books for when my girls are older, yeah that’s it, research…

Would I recommend it? Yes, although I suspect an actual young adult would find it more enjoyable. Of course if you are also an adult doing research of your own I’d pick it up!