Review 553: Possessed by Shadows

Possessed by Shadows: A Novel by Donigan Merritt
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Not entirely sure how I came across this book. Goodreads has only one other review and that’s from the author, so technical no reviews, although there are some ratings. In any case, I did read this slightly short book.

This novel is told in two narratives, two halves of a married couple – Tom and Molly. Molly was just diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor. She is still young, mid-thirties and doesn’t want to spend her last days with treatments and hospital visits when it won’t extend her life much anyway. She wants to spend her final days doing what she’s always done, which is climbing. Her narrative is what she wrote about her life, starting not really from the beginning, but sometime as a teenager.

The other side, Tom’s narrative begins with the diagnosis in 1989 and continues forward, so we do have a split with the timeline. They decide to return to Czechoslovakia, to the Tatra Mountains. There they meet up with Tom’s good friend Štefan Borák. Molly’s good friend Saŝa was from a village near Prague, although died a while back in a climbing accident.

Climbing was in the center of the book. In fact there was a glossary in the back to define the various climbing terms, although it seemed to me that the terms were self-explanatory. In Molly’s portion went into explaining how different rocks or routes were named.

This book cannot be called a light read with so much death in the book, with a youngish person facing their own eventual death, plus her good friend, along with her father she was very close to growing up. Yet, it was marginally interesting. Maybe if I was into climbing the book would have worked for me better.

Review 550: You & a Bike & a Road

You & a Bike & a Road by Eleanor Davis
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Taken from her journal, Eleanor Davis gives us a memoir of her biking trip from her parent’s home in Tucson, Arizona to her husband and home in Athens, Georgia. Her dad built the bike for her and she thought to bike home would be easier than shipping it. Also, her mood lately is only good while being on her bike.

This is a sparsely drawn book, without too many words either, but conveys ample meaning. Can’t help but root for her, and not just to finish this biking cross-country trip on her own terms.

She encounters aggressive border patrol and amazing wonderful strangers that looks out for her and help her, even when she never asked.

I don’t read many graphic art books, but after reading this one, I do want to include more of these types of books. And of course, more of Eleanor Davis, maybe her artist husband too.

Review 361: Alone on the Wall

Alone on the Wall by Alex Honnold
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

This is a book about climbing for other climbers. I'm not, and there was so much technical climbing language and jargon it was difficult to really grasp some of these feats. Not sure if the book was for the mainstream or not.

The layout of the book was awkward, with two writers one being Honnold in the first person the other with David Roberts adding in more info or context, although most the time it was just odd. But of the two I like his presentation better as Honnold was deep with the jargon.

Alex Honnold is the guy who was featured in the film Free Solo, which okay I understand that term now, meaning climbing alone without any ropes or hardness, nothing. Maybe I'll watch the film now, maybe.

Review 275: Zachary’s Horses

Zachary’s Horses by Stan Krumm
My rating: 4 of 5 stars



A western! I got into the story. Somewhat fun.

It's (nearly) the wild west, but more subdued as this is Victoria, Vancouver Island soon to be part of Canada. The book has a western feel, the main character Zachary is hiding out from the law with a new name, but he didn't do what he's been accused of. Now he's married to a Chinese woman and run The Celestial hotel. The main focus of the book is a big horse race that Zachary is peripherally involved in, and his son's governess with her mysterious background.

This is book 2 in a series, and did not read the first. It may have improved enjoyment having read the first, but I don't feel like I missed anything terribly important without it.

Review 135: Tear Me Apart

Tear Me Apart by J.T. Ellison
My rating: 2 of 5 stars


When picking up this book I didn't expect much, but got even less than that. It was good for a quick read, but it was very predictable. Some of the relationships didn't seem all that real to me, it was off. The book was also much longer than it needed to be, some of the details were just not needed and so many pages could have been taken out. The end of the book talked about how this book took a long time to write, was rewritten many times, and I'm sure this version is a much improved one, but it needed more work.

I probably should have ditched this book, not finished, but decided to stick it out to the end. You never know with this genre if there's some weird twist at the end, or something that makes it all worth it. Not really here. There's an attempt at a twist, but wasn't surprising and wasn't all that much anyway.


I received a free copy of this book at a library conference. I was not required to write a review, but felt like it and, of course, the above opinions are my own.

Review 129: The Adventurer's Son

The Adventurer's Son by Roman Dial
My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This was a book that you want to keep reading to find out what happens. The first half of the book describes the author's life, what he was like as a teenager, then meeting his wife. Roman Dial is an extreme adventure seeker and a biologist. Their first child is a boy, Cody Roman Dial, who is taken along crazy wild adventure trips with his Dad at a very young age. He grows up with the adventure and biology, so when he becomes a young adult he is well versed in wilderness adventures.

On an extended solo trip through South America Cody, who started going by Roman to take after his Dad as a young child, he ends up in Costa Rico. At this point Cody Roman didn't have a cell phone, never took to social media like facebook and didn't have a GPS unit. However he did keep in touch with his family with frequent emails. So when two weeks go by without hearing from Cody they know something is wrong.

The second half of the book is about trying to find Cody and what happened.
A good read.

March 12, 2020 – Started Reading

March 13, 2020 –

page 38

 10.33% "starting out well, the author is a thrill seeker climbing mountains, glaciers, and other wild outdoor adventures."

March 16, 2020 –

page 125

 33.97%

March 18, 2020 –

page 226

 61.41%

March 19, 2020 –

page 261

 70.92% "surprisingly working from home means less listening time. going slower on this book than I'd like, which is a captivating read."

March 20, 2020 –

page 271

 73.64%

March 21, 2020 –

page 319

 86.68%

March 23, 2020 – Finished Reading

Review 50: In Oceans Deep: Courage, Innovation, and Adventure Beneath the Waves

In Oceans Deep: Courage, Innovation, and Adventure Beneath the Waves by Bill Streever
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This was a well written book mainly about diving to the deepest depths of the ocean. It begins with one of the deepest dives any human has accomplished, down to the bottom of the the Challenger Deep, in the Mariana Trench at just over 35,700 feet deep, in 1960. The mission was done by the US Navy the one time and would not repeated. Missions like this then ceased..

The book covers the how this dive and other deep dives are accomplished, without getting very technical. Streever interviews one of the men on this dive, Don Walsh, and also other people who work in the diving industry. Streever himself used to work as a diver for an oil company then went back to school and became a writer. A large part of the book talks, not of his work in his earlier days, but instead of his experience as a free diver. Where the goal is to get as deep as possible on one breath. Ironically this is usually accomplished by exhaling as you sink instead of holding your breath.

Streever covers submarines, submersibles, ROVs, robots, scuba diving, different gasses that people breath at great depths, and of course the problems that are associated with being deep in the oceans. We also get the history of how it was figured out to combat decompression sickness, known as the bends. It all written in an engaging way, which made it absorbing and informative. We also learn briefly about the few attempts to have a colony on the ocean floor.

So why not a full five star rating if I enjoyed the book, and like the writing so well? A couple of minor aspects reduced it for me, one being something like what I did right here, where the author talks about the book writing process in the book. It was somewhat awkward, near the end of the book where he discusses how he shifted the ending and writing. The other part was there wasn't enough about how to help fix the problems that affect the oceans now. Streever reluctantly mentions conservation and the environmental damage being done. It seems an important aspect when the book is all about the ocean. It is doubtful that just by having people aware of the ocean, by being in it, will suddenly have them changing their ways. It hasn't worked on land so why would it happen if more people start diving?

Regardless of those points, I would highly recommend this book for anyone who likes a little history, with narratives and a bit of science and technology thrown in.


Thanks to Little, Brown and Company and NetGalley for an uncorrected electronic advance review copy of this book.