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Rated One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This 10/10

<div>"It is a hallmark of failing societies, I’ve learned, this requirement that one always be in possession of a valid reason to exist," Omar El Akkad writes. Later in the book, he adds, "Much like the insidious foreign plot, the notion that people simply aren’t prepared for democracy is a fundamental rhetorical tool of failing regimes."<br><br>If you want to understand how the world largely works, look at how we talk about the horrors of Palestine, the occupation and destruction, and look at the parallels between that treatment and what we're expected to stomach in our own country. When you wonder why tf Greta Thurnberg has shifted her focus, it's because she understands it's all connected.<br><br>"Many people’s governments are cruel, many people’s governments are indifferent. It’s this relentless parachuting of virtue. It’s these speeches and statements of eloquently stated concern for human rights and freedom and the demand that those who abuse human rights or withhold freedom be held to account. And it’s the way every ideal turns vaporous the moment it threatens to move beyond the confines of the speeches and statements, the moment it threatens even the most frivolous parcel of self-interest."<br><br>Much has been written about this book, and much will continue to be by people much smarter than me, but let me be another person who says, if you haven't already read One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This, please do.&nbsp;<br><br>"When the time comes to assign blame, most of those to blame will be long gone. There will always be feigned shock at how bad things really were, how we couldn’t have possibly known. There will be those who say it was all the work of a few bad actors, people who misled the rest of us well-meaning folks. Anything to avoid contending with the possibility that all this killing wasn’t the result of a system abused, but a system functioning exactly as intended."<br><br>So what are you going to do right now? How will you withhold your participation in this system? How will you lessen the damage? Your lawn signs will never be enough.<br><br></div>

Wants to read Death Will Have Your Eyes

Rated Doctor Who: Prisoner of the Sun 6/10

Wants to read Whiskey & Ribbons

Wants to read Soft Split

Rated The Race for Paris 8/10

It feels weird to say I think I'd LOVE this as a mini series, but as a book I just really liked it. I like that the three main characters are more or less in a romantic relationship with another, though it all manifests in different ways. Would recommend.

Wants to read Fruit of the Drunken Tree

Rated Midnight Picnic 8/10

How our living selves affect the afterlife has been, and will continue to be, a matter of debate. In literature alone, countless stories have explored the stages of death, of grieving, and that of otherworldly retribution. In <i>Midnight Picnic</i>, Nick Antosca leaves religion out of the discussion and instead explores feelings of abandonment, anger and regret.<br><br>This is no great story of redemption, nor is it one of God and ghosts. If anything, it’s about making peace with the living self before everything is gone. With Autumn and Halloween approaching, it might just be the essential book to usher in the season. It’s certainly worth a look.<br><br>(Full review can be found on <a href="http://glorifiedloveletters.blogspot.com/2010/09/midnight-picnic-by-nick-antosca.html">Glorified Love Letters</a>.)

Rated The Transit of Venus 8/10

<div>4 stars is honestly more than my level of enjoyment while reading, but the actual writing was so good, I do not want to rank it any lower. Sometimes you're just not in the mood for a certain type of book, and that's fine. No shade to Shirley Hazzard — her ability to craft an image or sharply define a complicated feeling is great. Another time, I would have very much loved a sumptuous immersion in the lives of these two sisters, but instead I finished with mere respect. ymmv!</div>

Rated Doctor Who: Trail of the White Worm 6/10

Not a bad Part 1! It also reminded me of that bonkers Peter Capaldi movie, The Lair of the White Worm, which deals with the same creature. I'm not wild about the Doctor referring to Leela as "Savage" as a nickname, however "primitive" her origins. It's unnecessary.

Wants to read Before Watchmen: Ozymandias/Crimson Corsair

Rated Homie 10/10

<div>Love, lust, loneliness, and longing. Friendship, family, fear. All the good, hard, exultant stuff is here.</div>

Rated Plotting and Writing Suspense Fiction 8/10

<div>Higher rated as a fan of Patricia Highsmith's work, since it's interesting to see some of her thinking that went into different short stories and novels, as well as her thoughts on some of the different adaptations of her work.<br><br>As a craft book, there are some good, useful bits, but also a lot of time spent on publishing norms during the time this was written (or was during the time she was shopping around different work). Some may not find that satisfying, but I enjoyed it for biographical context purposes.</div>

Rated Doctor Who: The Zygon Who Fell to Earth 8/10

The Zygons aren't necessarily my favorite (I get stressed out by the dramatic irony of their body-snatching, but that's me), but this was a good story. The Eighth Doctor is a romantic in many cases, but there are bits (like at the end of this story) that reveal some of his icier, "I know best" traits.

Rated One Hundred Apocalypses and Other Apocalypses 8/10

Rated Doctor Who: Inferno 6/10

Enjoyable enough to read with my son, but I think the TV episode version is a bit more brisk and to the point. And oh man does Terrance Dicks love his adverbs. I'm not an adverb hater, but wow... she said astonishedly (ha).

Rated Doctor Who: Excelis Rising 7/10

<div>Very much the middle bit of the Excelis story, but still a good installment. I definitely want to keep going with it, and the Sixth Doctor is always a fun listen.</div>

Wants to read The Encyclopedia of Trouble and Spaciousness

Rated The Pioneer Woman Cooks: Recipes from an Accidental Country Girl 6/10

Anyone who picked up this cookbook and expected a straightforward, recipes-only affair must not be all that familiar with the internet presence that is Pioneer Woman.<br><br>Each of her recipes have step-by-step photos documenting the process, which can be tremendously helpful for beginning cooks. Drummond takes all the photos herself, and it has been fun to watch the evolution of her photography reading her site over the years. She’s the first one to admit she’s no photography expert, but she’s no slouch either. Her photos use natural light well, and though not a professional “food stylist,” her dishes always look fantastic. If the success marker of a cookbook is making the reader hungry, then she’s done her job.<br><br>While I enjoyed her asides about daily life, I do wish that more of the material had not already been published on the blog. This is a small complaint, sure, but regular readers will not find a wealth of new material. However, the cookbook would make an excellent introduction for someone not familiar with her work — and it is only an introduction. At around 240 pages, she doesn’t offer an overflow of recipes, but the ones she does offer define her cooking style well.<br><br>The main reason why I wanted to buy the book was so I could have easy access to her recipes that I always mean to make, but never get around to printing. The Marlboro Man sandwich, pico de gallo, onion strings, pizza crust, and chicken fried steak — I hate to have to look things up on my laptop all the time. (This where the iPad users get all smug, but I’m a dino who is just not there yet, all right?)<br><br>(The full review for this book can be found on <a href="http://glorifiedloveletters.blogspot.com/2011/03/pioneer-woman-cooks-by-ree-drummond.html">Glorified Love Letters</a>.)

Rated The Picture of Dorian Gray 8/10

I enjoyed this adaptation a lot. I must admit that I haven't read the original (though how can one not be familiar with the gist of the story, at this point in time?), but I always meant to read it, so I figured this was a way in. Worth it.

Rated Paperback Crush: The Totally Radical History of '80s and '90s Teen Fiction 10/10

<div>PAPERBACK CRUSH by Gabrielle Moss is a funny, nostalgic look at the many, many varieties of tween/YA paperback series that were released in the '80s and '90s. Moss keeps it moving with basic overviews and cultural trends happening during the books' publication, but she does take the time to point out which series had regressive views, as well as those that hold up pretty well today. Interspersed with her research and analysis are interviews with some of the writers who gave us these books.<br><br>I am 41 years old, which means I am exactly the right age for PAPERBACK CRUSH. So many of these series I remembered from friends' bedrooms or the school library or the many afternoons I spent in Hastings or Waldenbooks. My elementary and middle school days were filled with Babysitters Club (Team Claudia), Sweet Valley Twins AND High (Team Jessica), R.L. Stine, and my fav at the time, Christopher Pike. I wanted drama! Fashion! Travel! Evil twins! Psychotic breaks! Past lives! Goddesses and ghosts! These books provided all that and more as fast as I could gobble them up. In my school's Apple IIE computer lab, I even wrote a 20+ page story with many of these elements, took the time to print a few copies on the slow dot matrix printers, and distributed the copies to friends. Ah, the early '90s: when 10-yr-old you could get away with using school resources to write a "book" about murderin' and everyone said, "It's great that you're so creative!"<br><br>I wish I still had many of these paperbacks, but most of them were donated to my elementary school library once I was in high school. I hope the lil weirdos just a bit younger than me enjoyed the books as much as I did.</div>

Wants to read Maple: 100 Sweet and Savory Recipes Featuring Pure Maple Syrup

Rated The Antidote 10/10

<div>Karen Russell is such a great writer. I love how she writes semi-feral girl characters, especially. Asphodel/"Dell" is definitely one of those characters, clinging to her basketball team's possible success as one consistency in her life. Still, I loved all the perspectives in this novel, all these people trying to survive the Great Depression and the aftermath of Black Sunday, a gigantic dust storm that obliterated farms in the American West. This is a story about secrets, the environment, colonization, and so much more. I can see why the library has a berzillion people in the holds queue waiting for their turn to read.<br><br>CW: for animal cruelty at the beginning though. This does have plot relevance, but be forewarned.</div>

Wants to read Electric Eden: Unearthing Britain's Visionary Music

Rated Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law 7/10

<div>I don't know if I liked this one as much as the other two of hers that I've read. The first half was more interesting than the second, and her light tone is a little incongruous with some of the subject matter. Still, I learned something!</div>