This is an ideal summer book--it reads like an adventure novel and is packed with fascinating information about the people, history, geography, and insects involved. Millard doesn't mess around when it comes to her research, either. According to the book's endnotes, as part of her preparation for the book, Millard traveled to the Brazilian rainforest herself to interview a reclusive tribe that the expedition probably encountered. The information she gleaned from her research is woven nicely into the main narrative, offering useful tidbits at just the right moments. After reading this book, I had a full arsenal of anecdotes and trivia that would be ideal to share at a dinner party, if I went to dinner parties, or ever left my house. This book is suspenseful, riveting, and well researched.
Everyday I Read the Books
Tuesday, June 8, 2010
The River of Doubt
This is an ideal summer book--it reads like an adventure novel and is packed with fascinating information about the people, history, geography, and insects involved. Millard doesn't mess around when it comes to her research, either. According to the book's endnotes, as part of her preparation for the book, Millard traveled to the Brazilian rainforest herself to interview a reclusive tribe that the expedition probably encountered. The information she gleaned from her research is woven nicely into the main narrative, offering useful tidbits at just the right moments. After reading this book, I had a full arsenal of anecdotes and trivia that would be ideal to share at a dinner party, if I went to dinner parties, or ever left my house. This book is suspenseful, riveting, and well researched.
Monday, May 24, 2010
Talent Is Overrated
Friday, May 14, 2010
The Grifters
The thing I liked most about this book was that it devotes most of its energy to developing the characters. Not much happens, plot-wise, for much of the book, especially considering the fact that the three main characters are all con artists at the end of their ropes. The novel catches Roy Dillon at a crossroads. He's been a very successful small-time con artist and now has to decide whether to go straight or move on to bigger cons. That decision is complicated by the arrival of his long-estranged mother, and his stomach injury. Although all of the characters are pretty repugnant, they're not entirely unsympathetic. Very small glimmers of humanity show through their cruel, ruthless actions.
Unfortunately, the book overall feels sloppy. An entire novel's worth of action is unconvincingly packed into the last thirty pages or so. There's also an incongruous subplot involving Roy's seduction of an innocent nurse that seems significant for the first half of the book and then all but disappears. If you're interested in Thompson's work, I would recommend the much more consistent (and very, very disturbing) The Killer Inside Me (although be warned, it's a book that's unpleasant in just about every way imaginable).
What the Dog Saw
The book is divided into three sections. The first features profiles of various minor geniuses, like Ron Popeil of infomercial fame. I thought this was the weakest section of the book. In each of the articles, it seems like Gladwell would rather be writing about the theories connected to these people than the people themselves. All of the people he profiles seem like they should be fascinating, but come across as only mildly interesting.
The second section focuses on miscellaneous theories. A few of these were quite good--the essay on plagiarism, one on homelessness, one about the way we process intelligence. But a few of them felt underdeveloped--Gladwell caught my attention and left me wanting more, like in an article on the difference between panicking and choking.
The third section is devoted to theories on how we evaluate people. Again, this section had some terrific articles, and some so-so ones.
Even though I thought this collection was a little uneven, and possibly a little long, it did what all of Gladwell's books tend to do--pulled me into issues I didn't think I had any interest in and made me question, and often agree with, the surprising claims that Gladwell makes.
Thursday, May 6, 2010
Made to Stick
Saturday, May 1, 2010
The Lonely Polygamist
Monday, April 19, 2010
Ransom by David Malouf
To recap the episode from the Illiad: the Greeks have been laying siege to