What have you read recently? 2009 -2020

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This is a new author for me: Val McDermid Broken Ground
I enjoyed it. This is book 5 in the author's Karen Pirie series: https://smile.amazon.com/Broken-Ground-Karen-Pirie-Book-ebook/dp/B07KNDC2SQ/ref=sr_1_6?dchild=1&keywords=broken+ground&qid=1599098211&sr=8-6

Six feet under in a Highland peat bog lies Alice Somerville’s inheritance, buried by her grandfather at the end of World War II. But when Alice finally uncovers it, she finds an unwanted surprise—a body with a bullet hole between the eyes. Meanwhile, DCI Karen Pirie is dealing not only with this cold case but with a domestic violence case, and as as she gets closer to the truth, it becomes clear that not everyone shares her desire for justice. Or even the idea of what justice is.
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Then I read book 2 in the series, A Darker Domain. That was good too.

Now I am reading book 1 in the series, The Distant Echo.

I recommend reading them in order instead of what I have done. :facepalm:
 
Just got done reading the 5 Penn Cage novels by Greg Isles. The first books were great but it got a little monotonous in the last few books. All in all a good series.
 
I really enjoyed "The Library Book" by Susan Orlean. It is centered around the Los Angeles Central Library fire in 1986, but like most of Orlean's nonfiction, it's about a lot of other things too. They made a movie ("Adaptation") from her book "The Orchid Thief", this would make a good one too.
 
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I just finished American Dirt by Jeanine Cummins. Absolutely superb. Probably the best novel I've read in the past 2 or 3 years. It's a harrowing tale of a Mexican woman and her 8 year old son who are forced to flee their home.

I read 2 non-fiction books by Bill Buford, Heat: An Amateur's Adventures as Kitchen Slave, Line Cook, Pasta-Maker, and Apprentice to a Dante-Quoting Butcher in Tuscany published back in 2007, and Dirt: Adventures in Lyon as a Chef in Training, Father, and Sleuth Looking for the Secret of French Cooking, published this year. Both are good, but I enjoyed Dirt more.

I also read the first book in a new mystery series, Death in Provence by Serena Kent (a pseudonym for a British husband & wife writing couple). I thoroughly enjoyed it, so I already got the next book in the series from the library.
 
The Invisible Man by H.G. Wells. I’ve had the free Wisehouse version on my Kindle for a while but hadn’t gotten around to reading it.

My only prior exposure to the story was the 1930s movie with Claude Rains, probably a weekend morning showing on TV when I was a kid. All I remember was how he “looked”. The book was interesting and Griffin (the Man) seems visibly bizarre and weird.
 
"Colossus" by B. Jack Copeland and Others. It's an account of British codebreakers breaking German cipher machines during WWII. The story was made into the 2014 movie The Imitation Game with Benedict Cumberbatch even though the movie was based on another book.
 
I'm 15% through "Blockchain Bubble or Revolution: The Present and Future of Blockchain and Cryptocurrencies Kindle Edition by Neel Mehta"

"There are few technologies as divisive as blockchain. Expert opinions range from it being "a scam" to "most important invention since the internet." It's hard to tell who's right. Authored by 3 Product Managers from Google, Microsoft, and Facebook, Bubble or Revolution cuts through the hype and offers a balanced, accurate assessment and analysis of blockchain technology.

The book begins by demystifying the history of blockchain and how it works; dives into economic, political, and social challenges and opportunities around blockchain using an applied case study approach and featuring insights from exclusive interviews with nearly one hundred tech industry leaders."

The technical explanations are sometimes a challenge, but I'll finish up in the coming weeks.
 
"The Winner" by David Baldacci.

This is an early Baldacci thriller concerning a spunky twenty year old white trash woman with an eight month old baby that is given the opportunity by a criminal mastermind to a guaranteed win of the upcoming $100 million lottery with the mastermind taking a healthy cut off her millions. Complications ensue and shortly after winning the lottery the woman is on the run, leaving the USA for ten years. After ten years she figures she's safe and returns to the states but her desired anonymity is broken and soon she is being tracked by the police, the FBI, an investigative reporter, and the mastermind behind the lottery scam. Can she stay out of jail, protect her child, and escape death?

Fast paced novel full of twists and turns. It's kind of long but the pace never flags.
 
A student reminded me that I hadn't yet read 'When Breath Becomes Air'. Sad story, thought provoking.
 
Blitz - Couldn't put it down. Quick read.
 
I hope readers will tell us a bit about the nature of the book they read. Why did you like it? Just a title is not enough to inform us.
 
A couple of books I read recently that I really liked were:

"in Outliers, we’ve seen that extraordinary achievement is less about talent than it is about opportunity."

Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell. Very interesting book about how a lot of the things we take for granted (e.g., the best athletes rise to the top because they have the best skills) aren't necessarily so. I don't know if I totally agree with his theories, but they sure are interesting and I find myself still thinking about the book weeks after I finished it.

"Who would have imagined,” he said, “when you were sentenced to life in the Metropol all those years ago, that you had just become the luckiest man in all of Russia."

I bought A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles for the DW based on my daughter-in-law's recommendation. I ended up reading it myself and loved it.

The book is a series of vignettes from the life of a Russian noble who is "exiled" by the Communists to spend the rest of his life living in a luxury hotel in Moscow. The author creates rich characters and scenes that draw you in and grab hold of you.
 
rjsob58 said:
Murderbot Diaries by Martha Wells. Read 1st two, both short (150p) but fun and different. Also read The Cloud Roads by her as well. Have the next volume (The Serpent Sea), but haven't started it yet.
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Just finished the third novella in the Murderbot series. Good stuff, especially if you like anti-social, self aware androids built to kill that don't really like their jobs.

Pretty well written and well plotted (to the point that the author will have the robot say "well, obviously a human would do the incorrect and stupid course of action at this juncture and I am here to stop them getting themselves killed"

Smart space opera, in other words.
 
Inspired by a series of TV shows on The History Channel, I am reading the book, "How the States Got Their Shapes," by Mark Stein. As the title suggests, it is a book about how the boundaries of every U.S. state were formed. It's a pretty fascinating look at history, as many of the state boundaries were formed in unusual ways, from wars to treaties to rivers to political power to surveyor error!
 
Koogie said:
Just finished the third novella in the Murderbot series. Good stuff, especially if you like anti-social, self aware androids built to kill that don't really like their jobs.

Pretty well written and well plotted (to the point that the author will have the robot say "well, obviously a human would do the incorrect and stupid course of action at this juncture and I am here to stop them getting themselves killed"

Smart space opera, in other words.
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I read the first two ("All Systems Red" and "Artificial Condition").

Very fun and fast reads. My only complaint is that sometimes the author cuts some scenes short. In particular, the climatic scene in "All Systems Red" was so sparse that I'm still a bit confused as to what happened.
 
scrabbler1 said:
Inspired by a series of TV shows on The History Channel, I am reading the book, "How the States Got Their Shapes," by Mark Stein. As the title suggests, it is a book about how the boundaries of every U.S. state were formed. It's a pretty fascinating look at history, as many of the state boundaries were formed in unusual ways, from wars to treaties to rivers to political power to surveyor error!
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I like the tv series. I should get the book. Thanks!
 
This was one of Ann Cleeve's best Vera Stanholpe books, The Darkest Evening:
https://smile.amazon.com/Darkest-Evening-Vera-Stanhope-Novel-ebook/dp/B084CVTNNB/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2UFEWFZ1KBS05&dchild=1&keywords=darkest+evening+cleeves&qid=1603578331&sprefix=darkest+%2Caps%2C225&sr=8-1

On the first snowy night of winter, Detective Inspector Vera Stanhope sets off for her home in the hills. Though the road is familiar, she misses a turning and soon becomes lost and disorientated. A car has skidded off the narrow road in front of her, its door left open, and she stops to help. There is no driver to be seen, so Vera assumes that the owner has gone to find help. But a cry calls her back: a toddler is strapped in the back seat.

Vera takes the child and, driving on, she arrives at a place she knows well. Brockburn is a large, grand house in the wilds of Northumberland, now a little shabby and run down. It’s also where her father, Hector, grew up. Inside, there’s a party in full swing: music, Christmas lights and laughter. Outside, unbeknownst to the revelers, a woman lies dead in the snow.

As the blizzard traps the group deep in the freezing Northumberland countryside, Brockburn begins to give up its secrets, and as Vera digs deeper into her investigation, she also begins to uncover her family’s complicated past.
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Peter Mayle's last book on Provence: My Twenty Five Years in Provence (2018).

It is also Peter Mayle's last book, as he died in Jan 2018 before the book was in print. He was 78.

Mayle opened the book by reminiscing about a visit to Provence in the late 1980s. On the drive from Côte d'Azur back to England, they made a stop in Gordes, a town I also happened to visit a few years ago. Back at the time of Mayle's visit, there was not even a motel in town, and he went to the closest larger town of Cavaillon for the night, where he obliviously rented a room in a local brothel with rooms rented by the hours, and where the short-term guests kept him awake all night!

Upon returning to England, he and his wife made a decision to sell their home and to relocate to Provence the next summer. Mayle was not even 50 when he made this move.

The rest of the book contained some anecdotes about his house buying experience, and then about his life experiences in his new adopted hometown. If a reader enjoys his earlier books, this one is along the same vein about the relaxed life among the quirky Provençaux.
 
Just finished Erik Larson’s “In the Garden of Beasts” about the American Ambassador to Germany and his family’s experiences in Berlin during the first two chaotic years as the Nazi’s came to power. It’s chilling to learn how narcissistic demagogues slowly spun the country into a totalitarian police state leveraging white xenophobia and their perceived victimization.
 
Peter Mayle. Toujours Provence, 1991.

I checked out the above book from the library and read it a 2nd time. The difference between this time and the 1st is that I have been to Provence a couple of times, and can relate a bit better to Mayle's description of life in this idyllic place.

And this time, I found myself dropping the book several times to reach for my laptop to bring up Google Map, which did not exist then. Ah yes, the Café du Progrès in his village of Ménerbes is still there. Same with the restaurant Hiély on Rue de la République in Avignon. After 30 years, the chefs may not be the same, nor the proprietors, but the places are still there.

I found a few places I did not know of, and would pay a visit when I get a chance to travel to the region again. For example, the Roman theater in the town of Orange is still in use, and in fact was the venue for a Paravotti concert that Mayle attended.
 
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I just re-read that one too. Since I can't actually travel, it's the next best thing
NW-Bound said:
Peter Mayle. Toujours Provence, 1991.

I checked out the above book from the library and read it a 2nd time. The difference between this time and the 1st is that I have been to Provence a couple of times, and can relate a bit better to Mayle's description of life in this idyllic place.

And this time, I found myself dropping the book several times to reach for my laptop to bring up Google Map, which did not exist then. Ah yes, the Café du Progrès in his village of Ménerbes is still there. Same with the restaurant Hiély on Rue de la République in Avignon. After 30 years, the chefs may not be the same, nor the proprietors, but the places are still there.

I found a few places I did not know of, and would pay a visit when I get a chance to travel to the region again. For example, the Roman theater in the town of Orange is still in use, and in fact was the venue for a Paravotti concert that Mayle attended.
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