Tag: 2024

Final Appeal

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Scottoline, Lisa. Final Appeal. Harper Collins, 2004.

Reason read: Scottoline was born in the month of July and since I have been reading her other mysteries lately, I thought I would throw this one on the pile. Read in honor of Scottoline’s birth month.

Grace Rossi is a law clerk, assigned to a death penalty case and in way over her head. Even though she isn’t one hundred percent qualified, Judge Armen Gregorian believes in her and wants her to work with him on a high-profile death penalty appeal case…until the judge winds up dead. Grace must act like a cop, sniffing out the truth because the little clues are not adding up to a supposed suicide. Plus, there is her truth to face. It must be said that she was in love with the deceased and she had sex with him the night before he died. He said he loved her. She is convinced he was murdered.
Final Appeal has all the hallmarks of a thriller: Grace Rossi’s case is controversial and full of racial tension, sexual rejection, silencing the witness, and clandestine love affairs. Truth be told, I thought the death penalty case would have more to do with the mystery of the judge’s death until Scottoline throws in the possibility the judge was crooked.
I could have done without the subplot of of Grace’s memory of child abuse. I disliked that she was quick to accuse each of her parents. she even went so far as to question her child about inappropriate touching. It was completely unnecessary and didn’t add anything to the overall storyline.
My only complaint is that Scottoline has a writing tic that becomes more and more noticeable with every chapter. She uses the simile “like a…fill-in-the-blank” technique a lot. Examples: like a bouquet, like a skinny…, like a black-eyed Susan, like a thirsty…, like a traffic…You get the point. I could go on and on. There were so many similes I lost count.

Natalie Merchant connection: you know that if there is the slightest connection to Miss Merchant, I am going to make it. In the penultimate line of the 10,000 Maniacs song, Natalie sings “Who will read my final right and hear my last appeal?”

Book trivia: Final Appeal won an Edgar Award.

Playlist: C+C Music Factory’s “Everybody Dance Now”.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Big Ten Country: the Literary Midwest – Pennsylvania” (p 31).

Cremation Vacation

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Wiseman, Todd Alan. Cremation Vacation. Self Published, 2023.

Reason read: it is a long story why I read this story. Here is the whole thing from engine to caboose. My friend passed away a year ago October. Her daughter, who is also a really good friend (another long story), had her remains cremated. The daughter has yet to do anything with the ashes. Her initial thought was to honor her mother’s wishes and have her remains scattered somewhere on the Maine property that has been in the family for ages and ages. However, there are people renting the house on said property. You can’t exactly ask them to vacate the house for a few hours in order to have a memorial in the front yard. So, the ashes currently sit in Colorado. They have been there for over a year. On a recent call with the daughter I suggested spreading her mother’s ashes far and wide. Mom was a fearless traveler. She was a model in France, a part-time citizen of Mexico. She loved adventure. Why not make a vacation out of spreading her ashes? Go to Paris and Cozumel. Spend time in San Francisco and Washington D.C. Why the hell not? I had no idea Wiseman wrote a book about this exact same idea until a coworker presented me with the book. It was an Early Review for LibraryThing – one I did not request.

The premise of Cremation Vacation is clever if not a little predictable. In a nutshell: the brother of a scam artist passes away. The deceased leaved the scammer his business. However, to collect the rights to this business, he must spread his brother’s ashes across the world. Over the course of time the scammer learns to be a more sensitive human being. The end.
Confessional: I wish that Wiseman had partnered with someone to read the dialogue. Like reading a script, he could have seen how awkward some of the conversations turned out. For example, Trish. She repeats words frequently (died three times in a row, requirements three times in a row, trip six times in a row). She sounded robotic and fake.

Playlist: Billy Joel, “Phantom Three Oh Nine”, Amy Winehouse, Bee Gees’ “Staying Alive”, “Car Wash”, Lionel Ritchie’s “Truly”, Elvis Presley, Queen’s “Fat Bottomed Girls”, Miranda Lambert’s “Mama’s Broken Heart”, and Dean Martin’s “Aint That a Kick in the Head”.

City of Gold

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Krane, Jim. City of Gold: Dubai and the Dream of Capitalism. St. Martin’s Press, 2009.

Reason read: the city of Dubai, along with other United Arab Emirates countries celebrate their independence on December 2nd every year.

Dubai: One of the seven United Arab Emirates. Also, one of the most sought-after destination of the 2000s. Where did this illustrious city come from? In a barren landscape with no national monuments of natural beauty, why do people flock to Dubai? The creators of this exclusive city got lucky, very lucky. Sharjah, a neighboring city was tracking to be larger with more shipping capabilities but Mother Nature stepped in and created a sand storm that completely sealed off Sharjah’s port for a decade. Further luck would have it, Dubai was open for business and, rather than go bankrupt, Sharjah’s wealthy business merchants moved their business to Dubai. And so begins the city’s illustrious beginnings.
Dubai is a city of miracles. When such a metropolis is built in a barren landscape, how does it sustain without natural resources? Every creature comfort had to be artificially produced – water, air conditioning, food. But is Dubai a city of smoke and mirrors? Was it built too fast to sustain its reputation?
Something to keep in mind is that City of Gold was written almost 15 years ago. I am sure a great deal has changed in the meantime. My burning question is Dubai still a city boasting of ethnic tolerance? Do they still have peaceful transitions of power that not even the United States could rival? At the time of writing Dubai citizenship was impossible to obtain, even if you were born and raised there. You need to be part of the male bloodline from Emirati men. It is all about the Arab heritage.

As an aside, I think I would love to eat at the Burj Al Arab restaurant with its aquariums. It sounds interesting. Also, it is a misconception that you cannot drink alcohol in Dubai. They have very specific rules regarding alcohol consumption but it is legal!

Another aside. Was the character of Aldous Snow based on DJ Ravan?
One last aside, I want to ask Krane what American high school has bubbling fountains and strutting peacocks on their grounds? I went to a private boarding school and we didn’t have either.

Author fact: Ten years after publishing City of Gold Krane wrote Energy Kingdoms. I am not reading it for the Challenge, but I have to wonder if Pearl would put it on her list if she were to write a new list today?

Book trivia: there is an interesting section of black and white photographs: Dubai in the 1950s, several key historical figures, Burj Dubai, an auto show, a curious 250-car pileup, and of course, Burj Al-Arab.

Playlist: Mick Jagger, Bo Diddley, Rolling Stones, Black Sabbath’s “Iron Man”, “Georgia on My Mind”, Kylie Minogue, La Toya Jackson, DJ Ravan, and Mary McGregor’s “Torn Between Two Lovers”.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “A Mention of the Middle East” (p 142).

To Live Or to Perish Forever

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Schmidle, Nicholas. To Live Or to Perish Forever: Two Tumultuous Years in Pakistan. Henry Holt and Company, 2010.

Reason read: Pakistan’s first female prime minister was assassinated in December 2007. Read in her memory. Interestingly enough, at the end of To Live or To Perish Forever, Schmidle gives a play by play of the events leading up to Benazir Bhutto’s death.

Schmidle was a mere twenty-nine years old when he and his wife, Rikki, fled Pakistan. His story, To Live or to Perish Forever opens with their rushed evacuation out of the country.
There is a stereotype surrounding reporters. Everyone knows reporters are brazen. Reporters are hungry to scoop the competition. Reporters will stop at nothing to get a good story. Schmidle alludes to this when describing interviews with outlawed Islamic militant groups or his relationship with pro-Taliban leaders. Schmidle implies this when he writes about Daniel Pearl, a reporter murdered just four year prior to Schmidle’s own story. He hints of it when he is allowed back into Pakistan just eight short months after his exile from the country.
I cannot imagine why anyone would want to put themselves willingly in an area dangerous enough to require a guard; especially an Islamabad town where you know the phones are being tapped and people are being kidnapped and murdered almost every single day. The idea that if you do not like you current political leader, you can just oust him by taking to the streets in violent protest. Schmidle’s courage to tell a terroristic story is to be commended.

Line I liked, “Stay in Pakistan long enough and you immediately become paranoid” (p 138). This sentence makes me paranoid because I do not know when “long enough” becomes “immediate.” Sounds like a trick to me.

Book trivia: the title of the book comes from a 1933 pamphlet written by Rahmat Ali.

Author fact: Schmidle has a website but it is not kept up to date. If you are curious, you can visit it here.

Book trivia: To Live Or to Perish Forever has a small smattering of black and white photographs throughout the text.

Playlist: Ravi Shankar, George Harrison, and “Que Sera, Sera”.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Sojourns in South Asia – Pakistan” (p 215).

System of the World

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Stephenson, Neal. System of the World: Vol III of the Baroque Cycle. HarperCollins, 2004.

Reason read: to finish the series started in honor of Stephenson’s birth month in October.

The System of the World can be called a historical novel. It is epistolary in nature, satirical, and a roman flueve all in one. Before we dig into the plot, a little book trivia. Stephenson was nice enough to remind us of the story thus far (from Quicksilver and The Confusion).
Back to the plot: We begin with Book Six: Solomon’s Gold. Daniel Waterhouse, founder of the institute we know today as MIT, has been sent back to London to resolve a feud between Gottfried Leibniz and Isaac Newton. The two brainiacs are squabbling over the invention of calculus. To utter anything about calculus, much less pinpoint who invented it, is to commit a grand faux pas of epic proportions. Jack Shaftoe is back as Jack the Coiner. Historically, the Whigs and Tories are about to face off. The irreconcilable dispute between science and religion rages (very reminiscent of “Inherit the Wind” by Lawrence and Lee). There are moments of sly humor that you might miss if you are not careful. My favorite: one of Mr. Threader’s spiels is the equivalent of the legal fine print on a contract.

Line I liked, “Daniel felt something very strange was happening to his face: he was smiling” (p 165).

Author fact: not to stereotype bald heads and beards but pictures of Stephenson on the internet make me think he would make a great bad guy in an action film.

Book trivia: System of the World bears the same title as a book of Isaac Newton’s. Another piece of trivia: System of the World won a Locus Award.

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “Neal Stephenson: Too Good To Miss” (p 214).

Vampire Lestat

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Rice, Anne. Vampire Lestat. Ballantine Books, 1985.

Reason read: to finish the series started in November in honor of Interview with the Vampire‘s movie release.

In her second book of the Chronicle of the Vampire series, Rice takes us back to the beginning of Vampire Lestat’s life. Readers first meet him towards the end of her bestseller, Interview with the Vampire. This time Vampire Lestat guides the audience deeper into what it means to be a vampire. He shares what happens to him physically (hair and nails don’t grow any longer than at the point of immortality but if either hair or nails are cut, they will grow back to that prescribed length), as well as what happens to a vampire mentally. To be immortal takes a toll. To no longer walk among humans is a sacrifice. To constantly be on the hunt for fresh blood is a chore. Lestat makes interesting choices. He invites his mother to become a vampire, but holds best friend Nicholas at bay.
Rice is really clever to include Interview with the Vampire in Vampire Lestat as a pack of lies.
Confessional: Lestat is a whiny brat in the beginning of the novel. I was sick of his crying until he became a vampire. I was also growing weary of the Dark Gift, the Devil’s Road, the Children of Darkness, and the amplified amounts of whispering and weeping. It was like reading a horror soap opera full of dramatic sighs and posturing.

Best line, “The world around me had become my lover and my teacher” (p 329).

Author fact: There are a total of eight books in the Chronicles of the Vampires series, I am not reading any except the first two.

Book trivia: Vampire Lestat was never made into a movie.

Playlist: Bach’s Art of the Fugue, and Mozart.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror” (p 213).

Case-Book

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Doyle, Arthur Conan. The Complete Sherlock Holmes: The Case Book of Sherlock Holmes. Doubleday & Company, 1922.

Reason read: to complete the series started a long, long time ago in honor of Doyle’s birth month.

The best stories come to life when the personality of Sherlock Holmes gets to shine through his investigative brilliance. It is in Case-Book that readers are reminded that Sherlock is his most human self when he relaxes in a Turkish bath.

As an aside, Sherlock reminded me of Nero Wolfe in The League of Frightened Men when he refused to help Colonel Damery.

The stories:

  • Adventure of the Illustrious Client – Baron Gruner is known as the Austrian murderer who supposedly killed his wife. Will he kill his latest fiancé? Why is the woman dead set (pun intended) on marrying this man?
  • Adventure of the Blanched Soldier – crime is not always at the root of a case for Holmes. This time a man hides his pale face for a completely different reason.
  • Adventure of the Mazarin Stone – the theft of a missing crown jewel.
  • Adventure of the Three Gables – a tale of what one person will do to keep their reputation clean.
  • Adventure of the Sussex Vampire – a mother is accused of being a vampire.
  • Adventure of the Three Garridebs – a weird scam so that a villain could acquire a counterfeiter’s printing press.
  • The Problem of Thor Bridge – a woman is found dead. Could the murderer have been her husband’s younger and more beautiful mistress?
  • Adventure of the Creeping Man – what would make a respected professor act like a monkey?
  • Adventure of the Lion’s Mane – Did a man kill his friend over a woman?
  • Adventure of the Veiled Lodger – What happens when a murder plot goes horribly wrong.
  • Adventure of Shoscombe Old Place – how far would a man go to hide his sister’s demise?
  • Adventure of the Retired Colourman – A man experiences the ultimate betrayal…or did he?

BookLust Twist: this will be the last time that will I say this does not come from Book Lust in the chapter called “I Love a Mystery” (p 123). The Case-Book of Sherlock Holmes is not listed.

Ultimate Guide to Rapport

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Ernsund, Stig. The Ultimate Guide to Rapport: How to Enhance Your Communications and Relationships with Anyone, Anytime, Anywhere. Self Published, 2024.

Reason read: as a member of the Early Review Program for LibraryThing I get to review all sorts of interesting books.

Whole books have been written on the subject of the evolutionary importance of human connection. It has been proven that newborn babies thrive when held and talked to while neglected or ignored children become sickly and even perish. The foundation for the saying, “it takes a village to raise a child” is bonding which enables the community to work together.
The Ultimate Guide to Rapport is a concise twenty-nine pages of how to build a connection when it is “extra useful” or necessary. It promises to deliver the following: a definition of rapport, the theories, neuroscience and psychology of rapport, methods for building forms or levels of rapport, the value of rapport, an strong argument for rapport supported by theories and explanations and examples of added value of rapport. While I do not necessarily think it is the “ultimate” guide to rapport, it is packed with useful information.

Author fact: Stig Ernsund is a Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) Master Practitioner.

Book trivia: Ernsund’s introduction ends with a gentle sales pitch on life coaching and communication counseling.

Carringtons of Helston

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MacDonald, Malcolm. The Carringtons of Helston. St. Martin’s Press, 1997.

Reason read: so…this is a weird one, so hang on. I am reading The Carringtons of Helston because it takes place in Cornwall. Every December 23rd the townspeople of Mousehole, Cornwall, celebrate a festival called Tom Bawcock’s Eve. Bawcock was a 16th century fisherman who was rumored to have saved the town of Mousehole from starvation by going fishing during a storm. His boat was small but his courage was mighty and he caught more than enough fish to save the entire village. There you have it.

This takes place right before World War I in Cornwall, England. To give you an idea – tomatoes have just been deemed nonpoisonous. It is a society where people dance around topics in a valiant effort to not say what they really mean to say – all for the sake of politics, politeness, or both. The cat and mouse games people play are humorous during this era especially when each party takes a turn being the cat. But, don’t be fooled by the prim and proper society of Helston, Cornwall! MacDonald makes sure to include very real human desires and jealousies of all his main characters. Leah, the Carrington daughter, is a young woman with modern thoughts. Old enough to be a spinster, she wants friends with benefits. She doesn’t want the marriage, just the intimacy with a good man. A good dose of humor is peppered throughout the story. Housemaids are saucy. Gentlemen are not above acting the fool on occasion. Characters are so well drawn I could see this being a PBS or BBC show (something a little spicier than Downton Abbey).

Lines I liked, “Of course, any old building must have been a silent witness to the whole gambit of human activities and emotions” (p 35).

Author fact: The Carringtons of Helston is the only MacDonald book I am reading for the challenge. He wrote many others.

Book trivia: The language and mannerisms of The Carringtons of Helston characters is so modern I kept forgetting what era the story took place.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Cornwall’s Charms” (p 71)

Everywhere That Mary Went

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Scottoline, Lisa. Everywhere That Mary Went. Narrated by Teri Schnaubelt. HarperAudio, 2016.

Reason read: Pennsylvania became a state in the month of December. Everywhere That Mary Went takes place in Philadelphia.

Mary DiNunzio has a problem. She is pretty sure she is being stalked by a stranger. Weird hang ups on her office and home phones, strange notes left at her desk, and a mysterious black car constantly following her all contribute to her growing sense of paranoia. As if these troubling events are not enough, Mary will not report them for fear of tarnishing her chances for a promotion at her law office. She’s up for partner. Meanwhile, she is still grieving the loss of her husband less than a year ago and she has hardly anyone to confide in. Her twin sister joined a convent, her personal assistant has troubles of his own (it is the 1990s and AIDS is running rampant) and her best friend disapproves of Mary’s new boyfriend, a fellow lawyer at the same firm. Mary’s life is a mess. When violence escalates Mary is forced to take action. Her life may very well be on the line.

Author fact: Scottoline used her experiences as a lawyer to start the Rosato & Associates series.

Book trivia: Everywhere That Mary Went is the first book in the Rosato & Associates series. I am reading two others, Mistaken Identity and Killer Smile. A fourth book, Final Appeal, is a stand-alone mystery.

Playlist: “HM Pinafore”, Prince, Madonna, and George Michael’s “Father Figure.”

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “Big Ten Country: The Literary Midwest” (p 25).

Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man

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Joyce, James. The Portable James Joyce: A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. Viking Press, 1981.

Reason read: James Joyce was born on February 2nd. He and I share the same birth date. I also needed a book for the 2024 Portland Public Library Reading Challenge in the category of a book someone you know did not like. Portrait was an easy choice. Not many people like Joyce.

Stephen Dedalus, being James Joyce’s alter ego, is a study in personal and spiritual growth. The subtext is one of sexual awakening; a coming of age, if you will. Stephen navigates life with contradictory moments of trepidation and vigor. He believes that in order to be a great artist one needs to suffer for the art. A self imposed exile and abandonment of family is critical for success. Not unlike Joyce’s own journey to becoming an accomplished author.
The trick to reading A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man is to not take every sentence as gospel. Every detail is not going to be on some final exam. Read Joyce like you are on an acid trip. Tiptoe across the run-on sentences and uber microscopic details and you will be just fine. If it helps, Joyce was experimenting with different ways to write literature. They didn’t always make sense.

Lines I liked, “He wanted to meet in the real world the unsubstantial image which his soul so constantly beheld” (p 77), “Pride and hope and desire like crushed herbs in his heart sent up vapours of maddening incense before the eyes of his mind” (p 335).

Author fact: Joyce’s full name was James Augustine Aloysius Joyce.

Book trivia: The Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man was adapted into a film in 1977.

Playlist: “Lily of Kilarney”, “O, Twine Me a Bower”, “Bluest Eyes and Golden Hair”, and “The Groves of Blarney”.

Nancy said: Pearl called Joyce an influence on all other Irish writers.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapters called “Irish Fiction” (p 125) and “100 Good Reads, Decade By Decade: 1910s (p 175).

Would You Rather?

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Tooker, Michelle. Would You Rather?: True Crime Edition. Michelle Tooker, 2024.

Reason read: every now and again I get to review interesting books as part of LibraryThing’s Early Review program. This is one such book.

Would You Rather? True Crime Edition boasts of “1,000 thought-provoking questions and conversation starters on serial killers, mysteries, crimes, supernatural activities and more” and is the “ultimate true crime gift.” All that is true…for the right audience. Tooker knows a great deal about serial killers, unsolved crimes, and unexplained mysteries. Like more than the average person. There were many people (both criminals and victims) I had never heard of before. Some of the Would You Rather questions I couldn’t answer because I didn’t know the case. Thanks to Tooker, I am going to do down a rabbit hole of television shows, documentaries, and true-crime nonfiction to bring myself up to speed!

Book trivia: the illustrations are interesting, a ski mask, dead body…

One Year Without Sugar

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Hamn, Matthew. One Year Without Sugar: Unlocking the Secrets to Weight Loss. Self Published, 2024.

Reason read: as a member of the Early Review Program for LibraryThing, I review interesting books.

I have to be honest. I don’t know if I would buy this book if I discovered it and happen to flip through it in a bookstore. The photographs and daily diet journal are somewhat repetitious. I couldn’t identify some of the foods and a couple of the photographs were blurry. If you are not familiar with the wild fit program you will not lose the overall context, but the knowledge would be a nice frame of reference.
Confessional: I am still not finished reading One Year Without Sugar. So far my favorite parts are when Hamn includes interesting facts about himself. In this way he connects with his readers very well. For example, he is sheep herder who goes into the mountains for two to three days at a time and he gained a bit of weight after giving up cigarettes. (That makes total sense because smoking is such an oral activity! As a hand to mouth activity putting food in one’s mouth is a natural substitution for smoking.) I appreciate his personal narrative and his motivation more than the journal of what he ate. His journey is an inspiration! Confessional: I did learn a little bit. For example, the fifty-six different names for sugar. If I ever want to cut out even twenty-five percent of the sugar I consume I now know what to look for in the list of ingredients.

Rubber Band

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Stout, Rex. Rubber Band. Bantam Books, 1986.

Reason read: to continue the series started last month. Also, Rex Stout was born in December.

The immediate mystery in Rubber Band is that $30,000 has gone missing from a Vice President Muir’s desk drawer. He is convinced he knows who took it. Anthony D. Perry, President of Seaboard Products Corporation, takes offense to the accusation because the alleged culprit, Miss Fox, is his alleged mistress. The secondary mystery involves a group known as the Rubber Band. They are owed money for freeing a man destines for hanging. George Rowley killed a man but escaped punishment due to a seemingly cooked up story about an inheritance. He bribed his way to escape then conveniently never paid the group who freed him. Miss Fox is involved in both cases.
Here are the things I appreciate about the Wolfe series: Rex Stout pays homage to Arthur Conan Doyle by having a picture of Sherlock Holmes over Archie’s desk and the consistencies – Archie, who has lived with Nero for eight years, will always go on and on about Wolfe’s weight. Nero’s time with his beloved 10,000 orchids never varies (9am – 11am and 4pm – 6pm), nor will he alter this schedule for anyone or anything.

The one thing I didn’t appreciate about Stout’s writing. I was constantly considering the time of Stout’s writing. Archie is a little sexist referring to women as “little girls” and using other disparaging remarks.

Line I laughed at, “…she had the kind of voice that makes you want to observe it in the flesh” (p 10).

As an aside, I want to create an Archie Dictionary. Has anyone already done this? Here are some words I would include: bird=guy, bean=brain, pink=kill, faded=retreated, lamped=observed and brass=courage.

Author fact: Rex Stout was born in Noblesville, Indiana in 1886. As an aside, I am reading forty-two more Nero Wolfe mysteries. Hopefully, I will be able to find 42 more facts about his creator. Sigh. [As an aside, according to the back page of Rubber Band Rex Stout wrote 72 Nero Wolfe mysteries by the time he died. I am not reading the thirty short stories.]

Book trivia: the front cover of my copy of Rubber Band is humorous. Rex Stout is “the grand master of detection” and Nero Wolfe, complete with a portly silhouette, is “the world’s most brilliant detective.”

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Rex Stout: Too Good To Miss” (p 227).

Empire Express

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Bain, David Howard. Empire Express: Building the First Transcontinental Railroad. Penguin, 2000.

Reason read: November is Train Month.

Bain used an extraordinary list of sources for his epic history of the birth of the transcontinental railroad. Everything from autobiographies, essays, letters, biographies, trial transcripts, historical pamphlets, pioneer atlases, private papers, railroad reports, manuscripts, government documents, and periodicals…just to name a few sources. Not quite doorstop heft, Empire Express is an impressive true life, detail-dense, historical adventure, just shy of 800 pages. It covers thirty years of savvy entrepreneurship and brilliant engineering. He describes how Robert Mills proposed something resembling a steam train in 1819 while Asa Whitney was a firm believer in the 2,400 mile railway. The end of the Civil War brought a hunger to connect the East with the wild western plains. The Rocky Mountains proved to be a formidable obstacle so military topographical engineers sent out expeditions to solve the problem. These were the days of gold rush frenzies. By 1842 imaginations fused with innovation and the iron rails began to span the country. Bain included details of a buffalo hunt gone awry and white men wanting to witness a fight between “the hostiles” as if it is was a farcical Broadway musical. [Sometimes history is just ridiculous.] There was even a first hand description of a scalping. [As an aside, who in their right mind would tan a scalp and then put it on display in the public library in the children’s section?]

Author fact: Bain is from my home away from home state of New Jersey.

Book trivia: the series of black and white photographs in Empire Express are as beautiful as they are awe inspiring.

Setlist: “Waiting for the Wagon”.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Riding the Rails: Railroad History” (p 200). Also included in More Book Lust in the chapter called “The Beckoning Road” (p 19). I would argue that this book does not belong in this section at all.