Mer Barr

A quick read. Try the audiobook as the narrators do a fantastic job of fleshing out the personalities of each letter writer.

The novella spans several important decades of big changes including the impact of war and post-war to Londoners and the growth of women storytellers.

I loved the summary, however the implementation is something I didn't care to pursue for very long. This is a young adult book that's too written for an age too young for my taste. I also struggled with the writing style that I put down to a cultural difference between the author's and my own.

A perfect book for the current state of the US' space exploration because Artemis is about taking existing technologies and testing specific technologies to meet a specific, over-arching, goal.

In hindsight I was aware of this phase of the US' space exploration, however as the author points out at the beginning, this program has been overshadowed by its successor program, which could not have happened without it, because there wasn't any wow-factor for the average person to understand. And I was among the crowd in forgetting about it and only remembering the "one giant step."

Although this book is written recently, it's incredibly dated regarding inclusion of those who are not white, male and in the 20-60s. There's no mention of the 13 women that went through the same physical and mental testing that the Mercury candidates did, nor does it mention the minority women of "Hidden Figures" that made up the staff that made getting to outer space happen.

If I remember correctly, the author was a member of the white male group who wouldn't have even thought about these people, at that time. Had he written this book back in the 80s or 90s, I would understand not mentioning these hidden individuals, but this is a recent book. Was the author not aware of them? If he was aware, why not even a brief mention of their part in this history?

The concept is humorous but it wears thin very quickly when listening to it. And the amount of cursing and references to personal body parts is more than I care to listen to, either. I don't mind some, just not seemingly every third word.

Thank goodness my expectations were set correctly when I saw that this was a recent book (written when the author was no longer doing novel-length stories) and the audio was only 1 hour long. Otherwise I would have been miffed when it ended waaaaay too soon.

An interesting mashup of known themes, with only a tiny bit of the author's creative imagination.

I didn't want to spend much time on this subject so I borrowed the authors tv series on dvd. I couldn't follow his logic at all and it is definitely outdated because it was the same exclusive white European male perspective I grew up on. I didn't spend much time on this one.

Like listening to a baseball game on the radio, except this was a dungeon master giving the play by play to a quest. Intriguing concept but not that interesting to me after a while.

Very good book for someone who's not a scientist. Linear storytelling, lots of personal stories including the mysterious Walter Reed of Walter Reed Hospital that the US Presidents were taken to for health-related issues when I was young.

A book for geeks. A set of scientific papers, all on the subject of the Deepwater Horizon explosion and oil spill; each paper looking at the catastrophe from the viewpoint of different areas of specialization. Who knew there were people that study risk processes and analysis? Alot of the material is very dry and can go over one's head, but I found each perspective interesting and insightful.

The only drawback is these papers were written while the remediation and cleanup was still underway, so alot of the papers couldn't speak to the long-range impacts. Hopefully someone went back to the authors for followup papers at the 10 year anniversary.

Too much worldbuilding and chitchatting to draw me in. I prefer a plot that moves along.

This book assumes you remember all details from Grey Sister, which makes my reading it, rather frustrating and a bit lost. It's been too long ago and all details are no longer in short-term memory or quickly recoverable from long-term.

I might pick this up again if I plan to reread Grey Sister.

I love Tim Curry for his unique characters, one of which folks may not be aware of is the voice of a master assassin in the audiobook of one of Brian Herbert and Kevin J Anderson's Dune prequels. The assassin has a physical description of petite, prissy, and has a stammer. (Reminds me of Zorro's alter ego.) Mr. Curry did a great job of portraying this persona, including the stammer!

I love that he curses, is honest if he didn't get on well with people and doesn't try to degrade people. He also doesn't do the "juicy details" business.

It makes sense then, that he would do his own narration work. Be aware that his voice has been impacted by his stroke and needs a bit of concentration at the beginning until your ear becomes accustomed to his current voice.

Story / Plot 5 of 5 - The story has 2 main storylines that I found confusing at first, probably because I must've missed an audible queue that there were 2 initial people. Once I figured that out, I enjoyed trying to guess how they were connected; my guess wasn't the winner. and there were 2 different objects which also added a bit to the confusion and eventually was clarified.

Character / People 5 of 5 - The important primary and secondary characters are well fleshed out with the history of several added to along the way, preventing a slowdown in the plot.

Setting / Worldbuilding 4 of 5 - There's not alot of historical or global worldbuilding, which is good for not slowing down the plot. As I'm fairly familiar with ancient Egypt, and the King Tut exhibit, I was able to follow along with the topics, references and terms. This may be a frustration point if someone's new to Egyptian archeology history.

Language / Style 3 of 5 - not an emphasis or integral part of this book, however the author does a great job with writing skills.

Story / Plot 3 of 5 - Although the storyline moves along at the pace of the river barge on the Seine, I get the sense that the story is only there to give some background movement for the characters.

Character / People 5 of 5 - I love books about the interactions between quirky characters. How people meet and grow into a family of choice; people who care about and support each other. And I enjoy seeing them experience their growth, maturity, and challenges.

Setting / Worldbuilding 2 of 5 - There is description of the surroundings but because the story is based on a time in our reality, not much building of how things work, is required. Just enough to place the characters in a time and place and provide the changing scenery.

Language / Style 3 of 5 - Not poetic, doesn't consist of difficult words, but they are incredibly rich in description, I can see the cats, feel the movement of the barge down the river, feel the bump as the barge is landed for the night, etc. It contributes to the enjoyment of the book.

Story / Plot 4 of 5 - Continuing from where the prior book left off, thankfully. I"m not fond of books in the same universe with a new set of characters. The reason why is revealed fairly early because it allows you to follow a timeline but the who done it is left to the fourth quarter, leaving some sense of satisfaction to the mystery reveal element, if that's what you like. It also wraps up on a reasonable timeframe, has good closure to the storyline, and doesn't shut down the series leaving a bit of anticipation for the next in the series..

Character / People 5 of 5 - As this is #5 in the series there's not much additional depth to the book 1 characters, which is great! These are people I find interesting. It's been awhile since I read the previous book, so not sure if this one does / doesn't introduce new characters.

Setting / World Building 2.5 of 5 - There are two worlds to this series, the geographic world and the spy business world. The geographic is definitely not an emphasis. There is a bit more of this world's spy arena introduced as well as a bit of a character's world.

Language / Style Words 4 of 5 - It's the choice of words chosen to describe the characters and world that give this series the gritty, realistic, ordinary (if rundown) scenery and feel to this world. Much like Le Carré's George Smiley series, not Ian Fleming's James Bond series.

I'd stopped reading the series because the previous two books were pretty depressing and I assumed the rest of the series would continue the downward spiral. However, that's not the case with this book.

Story 5 of 5 - the story is well written, suspenseful, the pace is quick without any slowdown due to rabbit holes.

Character 5 of 5 - many of the characters from the previous books are here, the new characters are well fleshed out and although there are alot of characters in this book, their names and characters are distinct enough that you don't confuse one for another.

Setting 5 of 5 - the story's world is based on real world events, giving the story additional topics and themes to contemplate.

Language 3 of 5 - although the story is well written without excess word baggage or words that require a masters degree to understand, the emphasis is clearly the other doors.

I'm not sure what I expected, but there was something about the book that did not end up peaking my interest, I was not sad to return the book unfinished when the loan period was up.

The title captures your interest, the summary as well because it's a topic and presentation that I've never seen before, the tone is light-hearted, and the level of information provided is exceptional considering the author has neatly bundled complex topics into one or two pages to give a reader unfamiliar with the topic, enough information to distinguish this topic from other, simiilar topics.

Maybe it was the attempt at presenting the various topics as part of a travel guidebook fell short of the mark. But given the topics presented, I don't see how it could be presented in any way closer to a guidebook than it is already.

Two storylines that sloooowly creep closer to each other until you get almost to the end, so nicely done! Same good quality as the previous books.

A nice mix of personal experience, facts and science and definitely a unique perspective, in a book, on death and dying.

Some of the subject matter is best not read while eating or just not read at all.

Wow! This one gave me nightmares because I've heard of this thing in ants and after hearing about so many viruses jumping from animal to man, it seems so plausible.

The author has done a great job of making this world real in my mind. The plot moves along and the beginning is especially great in how the world building is slowly introduced, leaving you with some questions about what this is all about yet not pausing too long to stall out the interest. You're caught up not long into the storyline and able to focus on the action... and horror.

Lots of complexity and parallel stories that keep the answers, for me, unclear til almost the end. And the end wrapped up nicely. Not too fast, not too slow.

I'm always hesitant when I start the second book in a series because they either aren't about the characters I came to love in book one or it may be the same characters but the storyline is lacking in some quality that the first book had. This book is neither.

The references to the nursery rhymes of the 50 to 70s remind me alot of Ready Player One where you have to have lived in the era to understand the references. Here you have that requirement but this is not really about homage but about creatively tweaking those childhood stories.

It has plenty of complexity to keep the murder mystery good to the very end AND you have many of the same characters from book one.

I thought the storyline sounded interesting but not sure what the 5 or 6 chapters at the start are all about. They're all just quotes from books that usually would be at the start of a chapter only, but in here they're the entire chapter. I eventually found some chapters that seemed to be about Willie Lincoln but I couldn't get interested by that point.

Maybe this makes sense in textual format?

This is a 3-strikes book for me.

It's hard for me to become interested in a book that doesn't continue the story of the characters from the prior book in a series. This book starts out confusing because the main character's name sounds similar to a character introduced towards the end of the first book, but there are no references I recognized to that prior character. And the story just wasn't capturing my imagination as a stand-alone or new storyline in the same universe.

Sorry Anne and Jody Lynn.

Story 2 of 5 - this book is not a page-turner and it's not exactly action packed but it's also not cerebrally slow either.

Character 5 of 5 - the unique characters and species in this universe are definitely a focal point. The coming together of a group of individuals that normally would not have met, and the creation of a group that has each others' backs is a story I like to read.

Setting 2 of 5 - there is some world-building related to the different species of the universe and their planets but it's not where the emphasis is.

Language 2 of 5 - the choice of words and writing style is not an emphasis of this book.