Review: Forty Years a Forester

Forty Years a Forester by Elers Koch
My rating: 4 of 5 stars



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Review: Bless Me, Ultima

Bless Me, Ultima by Rudolfo Anaya
My rating: 0 of 5 stars



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Review: Shred Sisters

Shred Sisters by Betsy Lerner
My rating: 4 of 5 stars



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Review: Hum

Hum by Helen Phillips
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Book rating: 3.5

While this book takes place in a not so distant future, it speaks to today and where we might be headed. At the center of the story is May Webb, who we first encounter getting paid for a micro-plastic surgery that will alter her face in such a small way that will evade facial recognition. She and her family desperately need this money.

This future is populated by robots called Hum. They are helpful, do many things, such as the robot conducting the facial surgery. May splurges with the money to take her family on a vacation to stay in the botanical garden for a few nights. Something she feels she desperately needs, nature, a forest. We also sense May wants to find a deeper connection to her two kids, and hopes to get that with this vacation and to ensure that she takes their “bunnies” away from them. (This becomes a major plot point later.) These bunnies are devices attached to children wrists that seem like they are like phones. In this future people are very attached to their phones, much like today.

The writing was good, and found that the kids are very well portrayed. Maybe one of the better portrayals of children I’ve read in a while.

This book tries to address several topics some more subtly than others, such as rich being able to afford to turn off the constant bombardment of advertising; or how mothers are being taken to account for their children’s welfare more than fathers. There were other topics raised but not fully addressed, which leaves these open hanging issues…such as that facial surgery. This glossing over key elements of the book detracted from the overall quality of the book.

I listened to the audiobook, which was well done. For myself I felt this was a better way to read the book, but may not be for everyone. If you do like audiobooks, this may be the way to go for you.


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Review: Ambrose Bierce and the Ace of Shoots

Ambrose Bierce and the Ace of Shoots by Oakley Hall
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Book rating 3.5 stars

Having read quite a bit of Ambrose Bierce’s The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary this title seemed interesting to me. Some years ago, I picked it up at deeply discounted used book sale at my local bookstore, that it was practically free. As my usual method, didn’t know what to expect with this book.

First off, it’s a series of titles and this one is not the first, it’s the fifth. So the main characters are perhaps more developed in earlier books of the series. I expected Ambrose Bierce to be the main character, but he wasn’t. Not sure if it’s that way in the series, or just this book. Instead the narrator is Tom Redmond, a journalist for the newspaper Examiner in San Francisco. Bierce also writes for the newspaper a column called "Prattle". They are friends, Bierce does come up in the story, but he’s more of a side-kick in this book. Of course, this is a fictional Bierce modeled from the real person.

Both are sometimes detectives and for this book they are summoned to a case of a murder. During a parade for the Colonel Studely Wild West Show the colonel himself is shot dead. High on the list of suspects is Oswald “Oz” Bird, train robber and recently out of jail for the shootings in Hungry Valley. His ex-wife Dora Pratt is the Ace of Shoots in the Wild West Show and Studley had taken her under his wing. Bird doesn’t consider the divorce to be valid and so has a vendetta against Studley.
The writing was good. The book has a historical feel as this takes place in 1892. Really liked how each chapter began with an entry out of the Devil’s Dictionary.

While the book was enjoyable enough, it wasn’t something I was floored by and want to search other the other books in the series.

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Review: Ambrose Bierce and the Ace of Shoots

Ambrose Bierce and the Ace of Shoots by Oakley Hall
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Book rating 3.5 stars

Having read quite a bit of Ambrose Bierce’s The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary this title seemed interesting to me. Some years ago, I picked it up at deeply discounted used book sale at my local bookstore, that it was practically free. As my usual method, didn’t know what to expect with this book.

First off, it’s a series of titles and this one is not the first, it’s the fifth. So the main characters are perhaps more developed in earlier books of the series. I expected Ambrose Bierce to be the main character, but he wasn’t. Not sure if it’s that way in the series, or just this book. Instead the narrator is Tom Redmond, a journalist for the newspaper Examiner in San Francisco. Bierce also writes for the newspaper a column called Prattle. They are friends, Bierce does come up in the story, but he’s more of a side-kick in this book. Of course, this is a fictional Bierce modeled from the real person.

Both are sometimes detectives and for this book they are summoned to a case of a murder. During a parade for the Colonel Studely Wild West Show the colonel himself is shot dead. High on the list of suspects is Oswald “Oz” Bird, train robber and recently out of jail for the shootings in Hungry Valley. His ex-wife Dora Pratt is the Ace of Shoots in the Wild West Show and Studley had taken her under his wing. Bird doesn’t consider the divorce to be valid and so has a vendetta against Studley.
The writing was good. The book has a historical feel as this takes place in 1892. Really liked how each chapter began with an entry out of the Devil’s Dictionary.

While the book was enjoyable enough, it wasn’t something I was floored by and want to search other the other books in the series.

View all my reviews

Review: Ambrose Bierce and the Ace of Shoots

Ambrose Bierce and the Ace of Shoots by Oakley Hall
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Book rating 3.5 stars

Having read most of Ambrose Bierce’s The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary this title seemed interesting to me. Some years ago, I picked it up at deeply discounted used book sale at my local bookstore, that it was practically free. As my usual method, didn’t know what to expect with this book.

First off, it’s a series of titles and this one is not the first, it’s the fifth. So the main characters are perhaps more developed in earlier books of the series. I expected Ambrose Bierce to be the main character, but he wasn’t. Not sure if it’s that way in the series, or just this book. Instead the narrator is Tom Redmond, a journalist for the newspaper Examiner in San Francisco. Bierce also writes for the newspaper a column called Prattle. They are friends, Bierce does come up in the story, but he’s more of a side-kick in this book. Of course, this is a fictional Bierce modeled from the real person.

Both are sometimes detectives and for this book they are summoned to a case of a murder. During a parade for the Colonel Studely Wild West Show the colonel himself is shot dead. High on the list of suspects is Oswald “Oz” Bird, train robber and recently out of jail for the shootings in Hungry Valley. His ex-wife Dora Pratt is the Ace of Shoots in the Wild West Show and Studley had taken her under his wing. Bird doesn’t consider the divorce to be valid and so has a vendetta against Studley.
The writing was good. The book has a historical feel as this takes place in 1892. Really liked how each chapter began with an entry out of the Devil’s Dictionary.

While the book was enjoyable enough, it wasn’t something I was floored by and want to search other the other books in the series.


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Review: Ambrose Bierce and the Ace of Shoots

Ambrose Bierce and the Ace of Shoots by Oakley Hall
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Book rating 3.5 stars

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Review: Hum

Hum by Helen Phillips
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Book rating: 3.5

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Review: Hum

Hum by Helen Phillips
My rating: 3 of 5 stars



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