Rated If a Lion Could Talk 8/10
It took me all of the first half to really get into it, but I ended up enjoying this a lot.
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Rated Life of Pi 10/10
Rated The Complete Johnny Nemo 6/10
Not really for me, but there were a few funny bits, especially the bizarro Bing Crosby story.
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Finished reading Green Shadows: Vinjeru's Awakening
Today is Thomas Mann’s #birthday.
His novel Doctor Faustus feels strikingly modern: it is not just a novel about the past. It is a warning.
Mann shows how a gifted person — and even an entire country — can be seduced by evil and lose their soul.
#ThomasMann #books #DoctorFaustus #reading @bookstodon #bookstodon #today #onthisday #Mann #Faustus #novel #book #booksky #BookTok #bookstagram #readingcommunity
Rated Guards! Guards! 9/10
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Rated A Field Guide to Awkward Silences 6/10
Has its moments, but kind of disappointing because I really like her Post columns. As a book, it aims by turns to be charming and clever and poignant and wise but it doesn't quite hit as high as it aims.
Finished reading Cibola Burn
Rated Doctor Who: The Drowned World 10/10
Sara Kingdom - the non-companion companion that has appeared in more episodes than some "actual" companions. I accidentally listened to this before its predecessor, Home Truths, but this is still great on its own. (Though now listening to Home Truths explains some things.) Jean Marsh's impression of the First Doctor's voice is a funny (but that's half the point), but it ends on an excellent cliffhanger. Onward.
The digital rights of my round-Australia rail book Heading South have recently reverted to me, so now I can make some decent royalties from ebook sales!
That's of no interest to you, however - you just want to know if it's a good read. To that I say yes! Here's the blurb:
"Freelance travel writer and Lonely Planet guidebook contributor Tim Richards decides to shake up his life by taking an epic rail journey across Australia. Jumping aboard iconic trains like the Indian Pacific, Overland and Spirit of Queensland, he covers over 7,000 kilometres, from the tropics to the desert and from big cities to ghost towns. Tim’s journey is one of classic travel highs and lows: floods, cancellations, extraordinary landscapes and forays into personal and public histories – as well as the steady joy of random strangers encountered along the way."
You can find out more and buy the ebook at the following links:
Kindle AU: https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B0H25VSGR3
Kobo: https://www.kobo.com/au/en/ebook/heading-south-9
Apple Books: https://books.apple.com/au/book/heading-south/id6770431038
Google Books: https://play.google.com/store/books/details?id=5CDaEQAAQBAJ
Enjoy!
#Australia #train #trains #rail #book #books #travel @bookstodon@a.gup.pe @bookstodon
Rated Piranesi 10/10
<div>I knew almost nothing about this book, other than "People say it's good," and it is! And I suggest going in with very little knowledge. Let the House reveal itself to you. Beautiful, amazing work.</div>
Rated On the Hippie Trail: Istanbul to Kathmandu and the Making of a Travel Writer 8/10
<div>People who are already familiar with Rick Steves will get something out of this, but those new to him might not realize how he has changed since he was 23 and on this first big unfamiliar trip. I appreciate that he says in his intro that he didn't want to edit out the ways he was ignorant (judgement about people's way of living, or exoticizing other elements of the trip in a way that I imagine the subjects would not appreciate, etc.), but already you can see where he was headed in life. Travel does indeed broaden your perspective!<br><br>It's also funny, knowing that Rick Steves is an ardent advocate for full marijuana legalization, reading the moment he tried hash for the first time.<br><br>It's worth listening to the audiobook, but I'll have to go to his site to see the photos.</div>
Rated Gasoline Heart 10/10
A very real, short book of poetry celebrating the messy, the loud, the queer, the black, the up and down mechanics of survival. Enjoyed this and regret taking too long to read it.
Reading Daisy Darker
Finished reading Tiamat's Wrath
Finished reading Saevus Corax Captures the Castle
Rated A Confederacy of Dumptys: Portraits of American Scoundrels in Verse 8/10
What a fun book about our national embarassments! I've seen Lithgow promoting the two previous books in this series, but they were highly particular to the last presidency's time period. I went ahead and got this one because it covers a wider range of governmental criminals. Lithgow's word choices were great with an expansive vocabulary. And who doesn't love reading history to a Seussian cadence?? Most of these characters I already knew, but still an enjoyable new way to read about them in short verse. The last long poem about January 6 really ended the slim volume strongly, though!
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In about three weeks, I'll launch my new novella, about an old woman with social anxiety who finds herself organising the defence of a decentralised nation when colonisers invade to steal the tech that makes her village a #solarpunk utopia. It is available for pre-order in all major stores (I think), but you can also get it from my small press, and there is a sample chapter available.
https://www.ododopress.com/novellas/the-blossoming-of-the-big-tree/
Wants to read Tudor England: A History
Finished reading The Saint of Bright Doors