What have you read recently? 2009 -2020

[Badger]

I wish my library would keep a record of my books but they don't. The Library Association changed their recommendations after 911 because the government went overboard in policing readers' choice of literature. I'm surprised your library keeps the records. My understanding is that most don't keep a record after books are checked back in. Maybe Overdrive follows different procedures? Or Amazon, if you check out Kindle versions?

If my library (maybe it's Overdrive) didn't have this "history" available I also have a list of authors and their books gleaned from their websites that I put on my "Notes" app on my phone. I put an asterisk after each title once they have been read.


Cheers!

 

[Badger]

I thought I was the only one that keeps the better ones in reserve, reading them like it was a treat after slogging through the more pedestrian ones.

I started with Cussler when I listened to a "books on tape" copy. I found a few 1st editions in excellent condition and started a collection. It has been inexpensive fun and the majority I bought new as they were published. I keep them all with their dust covers protected and unread. A couple were signed that my wife gave me as gifts. Then I bought paperbacks for $.50 at the flea markets to read. The collection isn't really worth anything but it has been a fun collection. A number of years ago I collected old brown cover Hardy Boys books with the orange liners from pre WWII editions until they changed the covers to blue. I would find them in antique stores for about $1-$3. I think there is over 50 in that series. Another inexpensive collection that isn't worth anything but they were fun to search for like a scavenger hunt and fun to read the stories again after 60+ years. Time to pass them on if I can find anyone still interested in the old books.



Cheers!

 

[Lsbcal]

With all the news on the epidemiology front recently I bought a Dummies series book on Microbiology. But that didn't quite do the trick although it's a decent reference.

So I've been going through the Khan Academy Biology sequence. This is a mix of electronic blackboard lectures and reading plus some quizzes. For a retired EE who never took a biology course this is just the ticket. Lots of discussion about the microbiology of cells. Much of this material would not have been known even if I had taken a college level course back in the my past.

Link: https://www.khanacademy.org/science/biology

 

[kcowan]

When I read the judge released Mary Trump's "To Much and Never Enough," I clicked over to the library to put a hold on it and discovered that I was quick enough to download a copy immediately. I won't give a review since any review would end up political and would undoubtedly cause the demise of this timeless, very worthwhile thread. But, having read the intro and a bit of the first chapter, I will report that I was pleasantly surprised at the quality of the writing. It is quite readable, as we say, and the subject is certainly interesting.

Her interview with George S was lengthy and insightful. Here is a review from the Atlantic:
https://www.theatlantic.com/culture...rump-donald-trump-and-american-psyche/614251/

 

[harley]

I'm surprised your library keeps the records. My understanding is that most don't keep a record after books are checked back in.

Everybody keeps records, no matter what they say.

Seven 'no log' VPN providers accused of leaking – yup, you guessed it – 1.2TB of user logs onto the internet

 

[6miths]

Listening to Thomas Piketty's 'Capital and Ideology'.

 

[Lsbcal]

Broken Ground was a good one and is the 5th book in Val McDermid's Karen Pirie series: https://smile.amazon.com/Broken-Ground-Karen-Pirie-Book-ebook/dp/B07KNDC2SQ/ref=sr_1_1?crid=6CJBYV09LXN5&dchild=1&keywords=broken+ground&qid=1595634779&sprefix=broken+gr%2Caps%2C220&sr=8-1
I am going to read more by this author.

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.

 

[SpinDoctorTX]

I'm re-reading the entire 2001- 3001 AC Clark Series. Always good. Just before lockdown I'd finished re-reading The Stand. Hmmmmm...

 

[kcowan]

Joined NetGalley and completed my first pre-release book review, The IPO Playbook.

Just completed my second pre-release book, The Black Veil.

I don't want to give away the plots but when I discover how to link the reviews, I will do it here.

The IPO Playbook
The Black Veil

 

[John Galt III]

I wish my library would keep a record of my books but they don't. The Library Association changed their recommendations after 911 because the government went overboard in policing readers' choice of literature. I'm surprised your library keeps the records. My understanding is that most don't keep a record after books are checked back in. Maybe Overdrive follows different procedures? Or Amazon, if you check out Kindle versions?

I once asked my library clerk if she could see if I had already checked out a certain DVD and she said nope, they don't keep a record of what you have checked out. I'm OK with that.

 

[scrabbler1]

I just finished "Watergate Girl," by Jill Wine-Banks. Wine-Banks was part of the Special Prosecutor's team which obtained convictions of most of the people involved with the Watergate break-in and subsequent cover-up back in the early to mid-1970s. She was in her early 30s at the time and faced considerable sexism as a woman lawyer.


She turned her Watergate success into an impressive career, from the General Counsel for the U.S. Army to a partner at a major Chicago law firm to the president of the American Bar Association. She has also been a legal issues commentator on TV.


Great book!

 

[harley]

I once asked my library clerk if she could see if I had already checked out a certain DVD and she said nope, they don't keep a record of what you have checked out. I'm OK with that.

I'm OK with it too. Actually, more than OK. But I doubt it. Just because the librarian doesn't know what to look for doesn't mean it's not there. Do they have a backup plan in case they lose everything? I suspect so, otherwise they'd lose track of all the books currently in use. Do they go through and wipe out the backups on a daily/regular basis? Do their servers logs get wiped daily?

I suspect not. Just because they say they don't have the records, or even don't know they have the records doesn't mean much. I'm not picking on the libraries, because they at least try to do the right thing. But it's like deleting your browser history. If you think that means it's gone from your computer, I've got a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you. That's why data breaches are so easy and common. The data gets written places nobody knows about or protects, and the hackers find it. I strongly suspect the NSA knows what you've been reading. Whether you or they care is another issue, but digital privacy is a rare and unlikely thing.

 

[Nemo2]

Just started this one...The Outsider....chronological vignettes of Forsyth's life...enjoying it.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/24875398-the-outsider

By Frederick Forsyth The Day of the Jackal....The Odessa File...The Dogs of War

For more than forty years, Frederick Forsyth has been writing extraordinary real-world novels of intrigue, from the groundbreaking The Day of the Jackal to the prescient The Kill List. Whether writing about the murky world of arms dealers, the shadowy Nazi underground movement, or the intricacies of worldwide drug cartels, every plot has been chillingly plausible because every detail has been minutely researched.

But what most people don’t know is that some of his greatest stories of intrigue have been in his own life.

He was the RAF’s youngest pilot at the age of nineteen, barely escaped the wrath of an arms dealer in Hamburg, got strafed by a MiG during the Nigerian civil war, landed during a bloody coup in Guinea-Bissau (and was accused of helping fund a 1973 coup in Equatorial Guinea). The Stasi arrested him, the Israelis feted him, the IRA threatened him, and a certain attractive Czech secret police agent—well, her actions were a bit more intimate. And that’s just for starters.
It is a memoir like no other—and a book of pure delight.

 

[mckittri2000]

Just got done reading "The Quiet Game". It's a thriller set in Mississippi. It's a long book was was extremely easy to read.

 

[cat4ever]

https://www.amazon.com/s?k=how+the+...efix=how+the+scot,aps,165&ref=nb_sb_ss_i_1_12

Excellent book, and I rarely read. Amazing how we keep fighting the same battles and history keeps repeating with the same mistakes.

 

[CoolRich59]

Everybody keeps records, no matter what they say.

Seven 'no log' VPN providers accused of leaking – yup, you guessed it – 1.2TB of user logs onto the internet

Great thread topic on its own. When I was looking into VPN providers, I was stunned at how many had been “outed” for turning over their user data to the local gov.

 

[kcowan]

Just finished Mary Trump's tell all. Too Much and Never Enough.

If anything, it tends to make me sympathetic to Trump. His performance in electioneering and in office is consistent with his upbringing.

Mary does dwell on her father and how her grandfather made him what he was. She seems bitter that they were eliminated from grandpa's will but that is not without precedent.

The banks evaluated grandpa's net worth at $1 billion when he died. Trump had received several 100 million when he was alive.

 

[Extra Medium]

The last Jack Reacher novel from Lee Child: great writing, as usual.

Before that, all 5 books of The Song of Ice and Fire (so far) from JRR Martin. Amazing. It was how I spent my 6-week COVID furlough. I had thought I wouldn’t read them until I retired (I’m a slow reader, and they’re collectively 5,000+ pages), but I got a mini-retirement and went for it!

Have since binged every episode of the HBO show, too.

 

[Nemo2]

The last Jack Reacher novel from Lee Child

Is he not writing them any more?

 

[gamboolman]

Do recommend this one and others by the Author. Fun monster killing book.

 

[gcgang]

Breath.

Interesting examination of breathing techniques.

Makes case against mouth breathing, despite human evolution on how nose breathing is more difficult than in the past.

Finds similarities in breathing frequencies (5.5 per minute) during prayer, meditation, etc.

Anecdotal evidence of how breathing techniques have helped with various illnesses.

Talks about how to improve breathing efficiency.

Favorite - samurai would have a feather held under their nose. If it moved, they weren’t hired.

 

[Walt34]

An Edge in the Kitchen, by Chad Ward. If you're really, really serious about kitchen knives and keeping them sharp this is worth reading. Not that I'm an expert about knives, but this guy seems credible and emphasizes that you don't need to spend a mint to get good quality kitchen knives or to keep them sharp, so that part I liked. He tells you what to look for, discusses types of steels (both what the knives are made of and the sharpening kind) handles, Rockwell hardness, and other stuff like that.

An omission is that he didn't discuss wet wheel grinding at all, which has worked well for me for decades, but perhaps true knife enthusiasts don't use wet wheels.

 

[braumeister]

An omission is that he didn't discuss wet wheel grinding at all, which has worked well for me for decades, but perhaps true knife enthusiasts don't use wet wheels.

Looks interesting.
I've always heard that knife makers use abrasive belt sharpeners, so that's what I do when I want to get my knives in top condition. This is the one I use:
https://www.amazon.com/Work-Sharp-Knife-Sharpener-Onion/dp/B07CW4T6RS

Not the quickest or easiest, but it can put an awesome edge on any knife.

 

[Walt34]

I've always heard that knife makers use abrasive belt sharpeners, so that's what I do when I want to get my knives in top condition. This is the one I use:
https://www.amazon.com/Work-Sharp-Knife-Sharpener-Onion/dp/B07CW4T6RS

Not the quickest or easiest, but it can put an awesome edge on any knife.

I've read very good things about that sharpener.

In a fit of extreme frustration over failed knife sharpening systems 20+ years ago I bought a Tormek Supergrind 2000 wet wheel grinder with a bunch of attachments, including of course the knife sharpener. It's pricey though and only hard-core sharpening fanatics will spend that kind of money. They don't make the Supergrind 2000 anymore, the link is to the current model most like it.

 

[zinger1457]

In a fit of extreme frustration over failed knife sharpening systems 20+ years ago I bought a Tormek Supergrind 2000 wet wheel grinder with a bunch of attachments, including of course the knife sharpener. It's pricey though and only hard-core sharpening fanatics will spend that kind of money. They don't make the Supergrind 2000 anymore, the link is to the current model most like it.

The Tormek sharpener is a very popular sharpener among woodworkers for chisels, planer/jointer blades and the like. Too pricey for my woodworking needs, I just use a wet stone set and do it by hand.