Steve Gross

Standard murder mystery with some interesting math/logic byways.

Extremely detailed and footnoted biography of famous 20th century halakhist. Not sure why he deserves such attention as he seemed to be on the wrong side of most issues.

pleasant biography of a genius that deserves to be much better known

Decent thriller until the silly ending.

Excellent history of TR's two years on the NYC Police Commission, which led to Assistant Secretary of the Navy which led to VP which led to President. Very detailed portrait of the police and crime in NYC 100 years ago. Like most books these days, it's too long.

My first graphic novel and much more involving than I would have thought. Ambitious effort but ultimately too dark to be enjoyable. Too many characters, too many plotlines, too much intercutting and time-shifting, but interesting.

The Life and Crimes of Mickey Cohen, an LA gangster of the Bugsy Siegel era. Workmanlike biography but Cohen, all in all, is not a very interesting person.

Standard entry in the Gabriel Allon series, which goes like this: some kind of crisis happens, usually in the Vatican. Gabriel is drawn in, against his will. He assembles his team. During the effort to defeat the first crisis, a much bigger one ensues. Ari Shamron appears. Eli Lavon appears. Chiara is extremely beautiful but otherwise serves no purpose. Gabriel defeats plot #2. As an afterthought, plot #1 is taken care of.

Clear explanations of some beautiful ideas in computer science

better than average thriller set in southern Africa.

not at all user friendly as it could have been

Bernard Lewis is the doyen of Middle East scholars. I expected him to have had a more exciting life, visiting and studying Middle East countries and offering sage advice. Unfortunately, not much of either in this autobiography.

Workmanlike, not very exciting thriller that centers on Masada, about which you will learn a lot.

much the same as the others.

Eye-opening and funny at the same time.

My first Russian novel. I don't see what all the fuss is about. I thought this book was overlong, talky and bathetic. It also hasn't aged all that well. On the plus side, the audiobook narration by Frederick Davison was excellent.

Entertaining if you like magic but the author does a heck of a lot of padding. It would have been a more interesting book if he just stuck to magic.

Lousy. The good characters are all good, the bad characters are all bad, the author assumes that the readers know all the characters from previous books. Lat of the Ike Schwartz mysteries.

Above average, intelligent thriller.

Not a very well-written book. The author keeps promising dramatic secrets and never delivers. He is also endlessly fascinated that he can interview people who have memories from 1947. Much better, and with photos, is Crown of Aleppo: The Mystery of the Oldest Hebrew Bible Codex by Hayim Tawil.

Hilarious!

Bill Bryson can't write a bad sentence. This is another typical Bryson book - chock full of fascinating information, people and history. Highly recommended.

This really should have been a long paper because by the end of the book, I felt that the author had said the same thing about three times. Read the first third or the Chats at the end and you're good. Some startling information though.

Charles Murray does his usual magnificent job in amassing and interpreting social science data to draw some somber conclusions about what's happening to America and what the future may hold. Lots and lots to think about. Highly Recommended!

Interesting meditation on the Godfather movies, being Italian in America and the author's personal story.