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Reviewed Runner's World The Runner's Body: How the Latest Exercise Science Can Help You Run Stronger, Longer, and Faster

Inspirational reading..?

Rated Inside The West Wing: An Unauthorized Look at Television's Smartest Show 6/10

Rated Peace Talks 8/10

It's been some 5 years since the last Harry Dresden novel and I was sure Butcher had decided to quit. At least that's what I thought. It wouldn't have surprised me considering the last 3 books felt a bit directionless after the series-altering "Changes" (12). I think in my review of "Skin Game" (15) or "Side Jobs" (15.5?), I said something about it's what happens when a series introduces Cousin Oliver. Not to mention it's hard to continually escalate the Big Bads and going to Hell and back. Or Hades, I guess. Tartarus? Anyway, I was left a bit disappointed after my first read of that last book and when I decided to re-read the entire series in lead up to "Peace Talks," I was left pretty much with the same feeling.<br/><br/>I think it was good that Butcher seems to have decided to take a break on The Dresden Files and leave it fallow for years. He's come back with an all new Big Bad rising from the depths and most of this novel is spent with Harry playing politics. Whaaaat? Yes, for once Harry is trying the diplomatic route. Gone is the Harry of kicking in the door and setting a building on fire to get out the innocent. I guess he's leaving that for the young kids these days. Among all the fighting-without-fighting with the White Council/Wardens, White Court, and the Fae, he also has to think about his family and, as he says at one point, having to go back home to someone now. By his side, though, despite all the hell she's gone through and getting completely beat up in "Skin Game," is Murphy. She insists on staying by his side come hell or high water (often both at the same time) and this newly mature Dresden has learned that he also can't tell her what to do, less than ever and no matter how terrifying that is, if that's what she chooses to do.<br/><br/>For the most part, though, "Peace Talks" works as a preamble, if you will. It's the set up of the apocalypse to come. The thought I had was that this novel is as though "Cold Days" and "Skin Game" had a baby, a lot of politics with something of a crazy heist at the end. Most of what I got out of it was that Harry has a finger in too many pies and often that means that a lot of friends and family and past allies don't know what to make of him. Is Dresden trustworthy? Who does he really work for now? The one thing I miss in this new Harry (which I realized near the end of this book) was the fun of his smartassery. It took me a while to realize it was largely absent and it wasn't long after that Harry himself said something to the effect of him having learned to just keep it shut. Which on one hand is great for maturity, but on the other hand that attitude is one of the big reasons I've always loved this series. The quips and thumbing the nose in the face of ugly odds was fun. I hope it comes back soon.<br/><br/>Some main plot points I'm putting here to remind myself about the story, so don't click through or continue reading if you don't want to <spoiler>see spoilers.<br/><br/>All the heavy hitters decide to converge on Chicago to get together for peace talks with the constantly attacking Fomor. Or so everyone is lead to believe. As I mentioned, the Wardens and the White Council don't trust Harry what with him being Mab's enforcer now and he's about to be on the outs with them soon. Thomas has for some unknown reason been sent in to kill the Svartalves' king. Conveniently, Thomas has been beaten to a pulp, including his mouth, so he has nothing enlightening to say at all about what the hell was his motivation. Other than a threat to Justine, of course, who to top things off is somehow now pregnant with his kid. Of course Harry isn't going to let Thomas get executed for the attempt and that means getting in bed, figuratively, with Lara Raith, to try and save him. Which they do. Sort of. He ends up in some sort of suspended animation thanks to the "hospitality" of Demonreach island. In the meantime, McCoy loses his control while trying to stop him from his utter hatred and distrust of vampires to the point where he mortally attacks Harry. That is, if that Harry hadn't been an amazing glamour courtesy of Molly used to feint while he and the escape boat got away. I still want to know what exactly is McCoy's beef with the vampires other than generalized centuries of cold/hot war with them. And that's not even getting into the apocalypse set up with the Titan goddess, Ethniu, that's yet to come in the following book(s)</spoiler>.

Wants to read Golden Hill: A Novel of Old New York

Wants to read The Z Word

Wants to read Hild

Wants to read Orbital

Rated Work Like a Monk: A Buddhist Guide to Embracing What Matters 4/10

Rated Persuasion 10/10

the ability to accurately narrate a character’s interior justification at face value and yet still convey the gap between it and the real world is a kind of magic trick, and to also make it funny, a little miracle

Wants to read On Bullshit

Rated Sleepless Nights 6/10

Not really my thing, I guess - a sort of flown lyrical amalgamation of remembrances that don’t really hang together.

Rated Velvet Was the Night 8/10

A clever and compelling thriller set against the backdrop of political repression in 1970s Mexico.

Rated Epidemia ultra 10/10

Wants to read Ring Shout

Rated Flash Forward: An Illustrated Guide to Possible (and Not So Possible) Tomorrows 8/10

cleverly executed and thought-provoking.

Rated A More Beautiful and Terrible History: The Uses and Misuses of Civil Rights History 10/10

An important book; an excellent and scathing look at the fable version of US civil rights history and a reality check about the real version - a story of radical vision, long-ranging organizing, incomplete victories, brutal nationwide opposition, youth mobilization, true disruption, and, critically, hope. An extension of Theoharis’ terrific Rosa Parks biography. If I had one critique it’s that it can be a little rhetorically repetitive, but the point is so vital that it’s worth restating: the civil rights movement is not an inevitable and complete victory by a few noble heroes, it’s an unfinished mass movement. Would love to see an update someday that adds a chapter on the George Floyd protests and the “anti-woke” racist backlash.

Rated World Within a Song: Music That Changed My Life and Life That Changed My Music 8/10

This is fun - breezy and modest, building on Tweedy’s skill as a storyteller and passionate fandom about music. Like a conversation with a friend in a bar when a good one comes on the radio.

Rated A Closed and Common Orbit 10/10

Brilliant plotting. I think I was three quarters of the way through it, maybe farther before the great big penny dropped. Not a surprise coming from Becky Chambers: this is a wonderful space opera about friendship, family and love.

Rated Somewhere Toward Freedom: Sherman's March and the Story of America's Largest Emancipation 10/10

Rated Cold Magic 10/10

Rated T. rex and the Crater of Doom 8/10

A brief and fun work of popular science that’s partly about its subject matter - the discovery of the impact that killed the dinosaurs - and partly about the process of science generally, showing the long, unsteady process of collaboration across countries and disciplines that led to the solution of one of the great mysteries. I very much remember “what happened to the dinosaurs?” as a live and possibly unsolvable problem when I was a kid and it’s remarkable that we learned the answer during my lifetime.

Finished reading How to Live: Or A Life of Montaigne in One Question and Twenty Attempts at an Answer

Reading Katabasis

Rated Automatic Noodle 8/10

Very SF SF, and fun. I had a problem keeping the cast of robots in my head (which one is the octopus and how does that work again?) but that might just be because my head is really old.

Wants to read Parable of the Talents