August 2025

A Vigorous Pull. From Canoeing in Kanuckia

 

A strange month with a lot of good reading but also with several rejects. Some of the rejects had to do with poor blurbs and others with timing. For example, when I requested the Ruth Ware book I was in the mood for it but by the time I got it my mood had changed.  

 

The "word 'last' in the title" prompt continues with a couple of good ones, a "meh," and a dud.

 

Read in August (listed in a hodge-podge order):

  

Fiction:

City of Night Birds by Kim, Juhea 

Excellent! Ballet dancer in St Petersburg, Russia

Universality by Brown, Natasha

Sharp look at class, race, media, etc. in the UK

The Listeners by Stiefvater, Maggie 

Loved this story of enemy diplomats and the W.Va  luxury resort that housed them in early 1942. 

My Other Heart by Strenner, Emma Nanami

Two Asian/American girls spend the summer between high school and college searching for their identities. Good story, well written. 

Sister Europe by Zink, Nell

Two middle-aged men, a woman of a certain age and her standard poodle, two teen girls (one of them trans), and a handsome young Arab prince who identifies Swiss are wandering together through nighttime Berlin. Why are these people even together? And why is an off-duty plainclothes vice cop following them? Apparently they have nothing better to do. I enjoyed this road trip on foot from a boring award event to a glass house by way of an underground club and a Burger King.

A Lesser Light by Geye, Peter 

A light house on Lake Superior in 1910. A really, really good novel. 

 

Love Forms by Adam, Claire  Almost DNF because the simplistic writing seemed somewhere between Middle Grade and YA.  However the final couple of chapters were quite powerful so I finished it and gave it three stars. But I also checked another book of hers that I decided not to read.

The Big Finish by Fossey, Brooke 

An OK feel good story set in a small Texas assisted living facility. Somewhat stereotypical characters and a cover that is really misleading. There is no road trip on a motorcycle except for a very short one. Other short trips (in a van) to Walmart, a mall, and a cremains scattering.

Dead of Summer by Maxwell, Jessa 

Darker and not as good as Maxwell's The golden Spoon. The villains were a bit overdrawn, but I liked that the "good" characters were all flawed in some way. The whole NDA thing was a poor device.

Off the Books by Frazier, Soma Mei Sheng 
Supposedly a road trip but the narrative got lost in too many digressions about what happened in the past. Chinese Americans trying to rescue a Chinese child.

Cheesecake by Kurlansky, Mark
Too many characters, not much plot. He's better at nonfiction.

The Greatest Possible Good by Brooks, Ben

I was bored. I Skimmed. I wasn't at all invested. Blah. 

 

Show Don't Tell by Sittenfeld, Curtis   

There is something really wrong with a short story when you find yourself skimming. This is a collection of a dozen such stories. Yawn.

Contents: Show don't tell - The marriage clock - White women LOL - The richest babysitter in the world - Creative differences -    Follow-up - The tomorrow box - A for alone - The patron saints of middle age - Giraffe and flamingo - The hug - Lost but not forgotten.

 

Room on the Sea: Three Novellas by Aciman, André 

Of the three novellas, I enjoyed The Gentleman from Peru the most. Room on the Sea was ok but seemed old-fashioned and stilted. I did not care for the first person direct address narrative used in Mariana. I guess it's supposed to be an imaginary letter to a former lover but it is so tedious. There is also an interesting Postface which explains the source material for Mariana (and, perhaps, the reason for the narrative voice).

 

The Last Illusion of Paige White by McCausland, Vanessa 

Really good. An Instagram influencer mysteriously dies. Her childhood friend searches for the truth. Set in Australia. 

Last Night Was Fun by James, Holly 

Rom-com, enemies>friends>lovers with You've Got Mail overtones. A pleasant read.

Lloyd McNeil’s Last Ride by Leitch, Will  

A guy who views himself as a decent cop is diagnosed with terminal cancer. He tries, for insurance purposes, to die in the line of duty. He fails. Not quite a three star read. Also not a road trip.

 

From Project Gutenberg:

The Black-Eyed Puppy by Pyle, Katharine (1923)

I do enjoy dog stories. This one from 1923 is cute but has its period problems. One of the black dogs has a name would not be acceptable in a childrens book today.. The performing dogs are treated humanely which may have been a whitewash of what really happened behind the scenes in animal training at the time.

Graceful would jump right over me.

From my shelves:

Amanat: Women’s Writing from Kazakhstan selected and translated by Zaure Batayeva and Shelley Fairweather-Vega ; with contributions by Sam Breazeale and Gabriel Moguire 

Contents: Juliet / Zhumagul Solty - An awkward conversation / Zhumagul Solty - Aslan's bride / Nadezhda Chernova - Orphan / Ayagul Mantay - Hunger excerpt from The Nanny) / Aigul Kemelbayeva - Propiska / Raushan Baiguzhayeva - The beskempir / Zira Naurzbayeva - The rival / Zira Naurzbayeva - Amanat / Oral Arukenova - Procedures within / Oral Arukenova - A woman over fifty / Lilya Kalaus - How men think / Lilya Kalaus - The stairwell / Lilya Kalaus - Operato drama / Lilya Kalaus - Black snow of December / Asel Omar = The French beret / Asel Omar - 18+ / Aya Omirtai - Poet / Madina Omarova - Once upon an autumn evening / Madina Omarova - Excerpt from School / Zaure Batayeva - Excerpt from The anthropologists / Zaure Batayeva - The lighter / Olga Mark - My eleusinian mysteries / Zira Naurzbayeva.

I have been reading and enjoying this a bit at a time for nearly a year. 

 

Nonfiction: 

from public libraries; 

King of Kings: The Iranian Revolution—A Story of Hubris, Delusion and Catastrophic Miscalculation by Anderson, Scott 

Shudder.... 

The Sprawl: Reconsidering the Weird American Suburbs by Jason Diamond

Too many personal and pop culture digressions in what could have been an interesting book. No index.

 

from my shelves: 

Unvarnished: Autobiographical Sketches by Emily Carr by Carr, Emily; edited by Bridge, Kathryn

 

From Gutenberg: 

Canoeing in Kanuckia; or, Haps and mishaps afloat and ashore of the statesman, the editor, the artist, and the scribbler. Recorded by the commodore and the cook (C[harles]. L[edyard]. Norton and J[ohn]. Habberton) New York, G.P. Putnam's sons, 1878.

A little too Vigorous.

Online: 

 “Slow Children Crossing.” Fun with Misplaced Modifiers! by Hume, Virginia 

Content Warning: There are a few clips and quotes referencing D----d T----p

The Strunk and White Takedown: Why America’s Favorite Style Guide Doesn’t Teach Good Style by Sara Levine

I'm amazed the S&W is still used.

Decades of Deco: A new city-spanning festival celebrates 100 Years of Art Deco in Miami Beach and Mumbai by Ivan Shaw

After looking at the Art Deco spread, I spent a good bit of time exploring its source publication The World of Interiors . Some good stuff there.

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DNF (didn't get to far with these - less than 10%):

Pan by Clune, Michael 

It is well written but I don't want to read coming of age with panic attacks.

O Beautiful by Yun, Jung

Lame. She's going to write a free-lance article on the North Dakota oil boom? She can't even handle an obnoxious male seatmate. How's she going to be around oil men? I don't want to know.

She Doesn't Have a Clue by Moke, Jenny Elder 

Mystery set on an island at a wedding with former lovers forced to share a room. yeah, sure... 

Last Seen Alive by Douglas, Claire
One of the "last prompt books" that didn't make the cut. A boring thriller? 

  

Checked out; decided not to read: 

Flesh by Szalay, David 

The Woman in Suite 11 (Lo Blacklock, #2) by Ware, Ruth

A Burning by Majumdar, Megha

Golden Child by Adam, Claire     

Hazel Says No by Berger Gross, Jessica