Tag: ebook

Anti-Inflammatory Diet for Beginners

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Eden Nora. Anti-Inflammatory Diet for Beginners: a 21-Day Reset with Easy 5-iIngredient Recipes, 20 Minute Meals, Weekly Plans, and Grocery Lists to Soothe Inflammation, Restore Health and Boost Energy. KnowHowLeaf Publishing, 2025.

Reason read: this is a pick from the Early Review Program by LibraryThing.

There are three phases to the three week anti-inflammatory journey: calming the fire, heal the gut, and boost energy.
Things to know:

  • There are twenty-four pages of what I call revving the engine before you actually get to put the book in gear.
  • There are another forty-one pages of coasting before the reset plan is really explained.
  • The pages are padded with a great deal of repetition which I find to be typical in books that are shorter than two hundred and fifty pages. For example, kale is mentioned thirty-nine times: what belongs on your plate, what can go in a smoothie, menu swaps, fridge essentials, freezer essentials, what to prioritize, shopping list for week one, listed in the menus, shopping list for week two, hero food, week three shopping list, the recipes, and the shopping lists for all three weeks. A mention about the shopping list: there is no big list for all three weeks. If you wanted to get all of your shopping done for the entire program you are going to have to combine the week one, two and three lists.
  • You are encouraged to keep a diary while going through the process.
  • The e-book comes with free video bonuses which I did not bother with because, admittedly, I was confused by the promise of inspiration and monetization.

Book trivia: while the author thanks healthcare professionals and nutrition experts, it is hard to tell how much they were consulted during the writing of this book.

As an aside, I was not a fan of having to give my email address in order to download the book. Full confessional: I gave them a fake.

One last confessional – I am going to try this three-week diet to see if it makes a difference. Hopefully, I will remember to update this review with the results.
UPDATE: I have decided NOT to do this diet because even the shopping lists are too complicated. For starters, there are two versions of the week 1 shopping list (The shopping list on page 52 does not have the same ingredients as the one on page 167 and vice versa, for example). There are twenty differences between the two lists. Then I couldn’t find the recipe for the very first meal (Cinnamon Chia Pudding). There is a chia seed with coconut recipe and one for chia seeds with blueberries. Neither recipe calls for cinnamon as a main ingredient.

Kansal Clunker

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Kansal, Neil and Ruchin Kansal. Kansal Clunker: the Car That Rebuilt Us. Koehler Books, 2025.

Reason read: Being a member of the Early Review Program with LibraryThing I get to review cool books. This is one such book.

Prepare to be thoroughly entertained by Neil Kansal and his father, Ruchin. Sharing perspectives on a singular adventure, they have written a charming book about driving across the country in what they call the Kansal Clunker, a rebuilt 1998 Acura Integra with 159,068 miles. What started as a desire to learn how to drive a car with a manual transmission in 2020 turned into an epic road trip. Stopping at interesting sights along the way filled out an adventure of a lifetime. From Connecticut to Colorado, this was a chance for sixteen year old Neil to get to know his father as a person and vise versa.
I thought the maps, memories, photographs, and family comments were a nice touch.

Natalie connection: the family relocated to Newtown, Connecticut. Natalie has performed in support of Ben’s Lighthouse a few times now. I will be attending the benefit this November.

Playlist: “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star,” “Happy Birthday,” Garth Brooks, Blake Shelton, Kane Brown, and “Itsy-bitsy Spider.”

Author facts: Ruchin design Cinemark theaters and Neil was a principal cellist of the University Orchestra.

Book trivia: you can learn more about the Kansal adventure via their website and Instagram site.

Behind Closed Doors

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Silversmith, E.S. Behind Closed Doors: Memoirs of an American Call Girl. BCD Memoir, 2025.

Reason read: as a member of the Early Review Program for LibraryThing, I get to read interesting books. This is one of them.

Every so often I review a book that has me in a dilemma. Does Silversmith want me to cheer her on as a call girl or does she want me to grimace and shudder alongside her in shamed sympathy? Can I shrug off her story with indifference and say that the lifestyle was one hundred percent her choice? Silversmith’s stories are mostly about dangerous, dirty, and unhealthy situations she had put herself in for the sake of making a more than decent living. There are a sea of contradictions within the pages of Behind Closed Doors. I didn’t get the sense she was backed into a corner of desperation where the only dark hope of escape was being a call girl other than by the urgings of a domineering boyfriend. Yet, at another time when she is completely alone and unsure how to pay her rent she resorts to prostitution. It is true sex workers of any ilk run the dangerous risk of being infected with an STD or life threatening disease. Pregnancy or sterilization can occur if one is not careful. Beyond the threat of violence or death there is the unspoken reality of the erosion of mental health. Even worse, it is a known fact that serial killers target sex workers. The perception is these women are all alone, despite having husbands, boyfriends, and even children. Silversmith is aware of the statistics and although she calls her services “high end” she spends a fair amount of time in rundown, sketchy trailers and motels. Maybe that is why there was a fair amount of sighing, frowning, shuddering and mace and taser gripping in her stories. Luckily for her, as she says, she has a “flexible moral compass.” She is able to peel back the curtain and resolve some logistical curiosities like rules of engagement, payment options, and prescribed duration of service.

Observations: I wanted to know the end of the story about the time she couldn’t perform due to an extraordinarily heavy period but she stole the group’s booking fee anyway. Or the time her agency practiced robbery by leaving clients “high and dry” by pulling the fire alarm as a diversion.

As an aside, I envy Silversmith’s keen eyesight. From across the street, in the dark, and through a car window she could see that a client was sporting dandruff.

Music: Misfits, the Ramones, and Bob Marley.

No Place Like Nome

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Engelhard, Michael. No Place Like Nome: the Bering Strait Seen Through Its Most Storied City. Corax Books, 2025.

Reason read: As a member of the Early Review Program for LibraryThing, I occasionally read interesting books. This one was fantastic!

Engelhard spent a “three year stint” in Nome, Alaska and took the time to write about his experiences. Confessional: I enjoy books that are well organized. No Place Like Nome is separated into four logical parts: first, geography of the place, then the characters and personalities within the place, the business and art of Nome, and finally, journeys around the region.
Engelhard is informative without resorting to didactic explanations. Linguistics (the use of the word Eskimo for example), anthropology, short biographies (Sally Carrighar, Edward Sherriff Curtis, James Kivitauraq Moses, Father Bernhard Rosecrans Hubbard, Roald Amundsen, and Lynn Cox), the importance of whales to the Nome culture (confessional: I did not know their bones were used as construction material), the history of jade, the advent of bicycles. The photography was amazing. My favorite was the one of Serum-Run racer Leonard Seppala.
What seem barbaric and strange in our culture is commonplace in the far reaches of civilizations like Greenland, Siberia and Alaska like hunting practices and diet.
Because I read this an an ebook, it would have been great to have footnotes that jumped to the corresponding image or text.

As an aside – was it a typo when Hrdlicka was later called “Hard Liquor”?

Personal complaint – here is a description that bugged me, “nude mermaid on a floe’s edge with her feet dangling in the water.” Hello? Does anyone remember Ariel? Mermaids have tails, not feet.

Author fact: Michael Engelhard won the National Outdoor Book Award for Arctic Traverse. The photo Engelhard used for Nome shows him drinking what looks like to be a beer. I’m dying to know what kind it is.

Book trivia: No Place Like Nome will be published in September 2025.

Setlist: Jefferson Airplane’s “White Rabbit,” “Julia Ward Howe’s “Battle Hymn of the Republic,” Paganini, “Float Coat” (to encourage water safety), and Madonna.

I Thought I Had You Forever

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Gary’s Mum. I Thought I Had You Forever. Publish Nation, 2025.

Reason read: As a member of the Early Review Program for LibraryThing, I often read books that grab my heart and do not let go. This is one such book.

Gary’s mum lost her son when he was just thirty years old. While on vacation in Portugal Gary went to sleep one night and never woke up. For the first fifty pages of I Thought I Had You Forever Gary’s mum does a great deal of soul searching. There is a brief and didactic interlude (about ten pages) about various religions: Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism, Spiritualism, and Atheist.
I have always compared grief to fire. You cannot control grief just as you cannot control a fire that has burned out of control. Both are unpredictable and ever-changing. Just when you think you have grief (or fire) licked, something will trigger a flare up and the fight starts all over again. Grief can be a rollercoaster of up and down emotions. Grief can leave you drifting without purpose. Grief is the rudder, always determining your course of healing. Grief is searching. Where did you go? Where are you now?
Confessional: I am not a mother. I do not know the pain of losing a child in any capacity, yet I Thought I Had You Forever kept me up at night. We all grieve differently. Gary’s mum lost her ability to enjoy music for nearly five years while I clung to every note and melody and lyric to keep my missing alive. Gary’s mum didn’t listen to music for four years while I couldn’t play mine loud enough.

The lesson learned is grief is grief is grief is grief. It does not matter what the relationship. Losing someone is hard.

Author fact: Gary’s mum wrote I Thought I Had You Forever “from one mother to another.”

Music: “Buffalo Soldier,” John Lennon, Jimi Hendrix, and David Bowie.

Carrying the Tiger

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Stewart, Tony. Carrying the Tiger: a Memoir: Living with Cancer, Dying with Grace, Finding Joy While Grieving. West End Books, 2025.

Reason read: As a member of the Early Review Program for LibraryThing, I occasionally hit upon poignant books that stay with me long after I have read the last word. This is one such book.

Just by the title of the book, you know the subject matter is going to be hard to read. The subtitle “Dying with Grace” pretty much tells you that someone does not survive cancer. And so, almost begrudgingly, you steel yourself for a tough time of it. Tough time, it most certainly was. At times I found myself asking why I was so affected. I don’t know Tony or Lynn at all. Except, the more I read, I felt like I did. Tony’s words were so intimate and honest. Even beyond the unfathomable sadness, quite unexpectedly I ended up laughing, getting angry, and caring. Chapter by chapter, page by page – laughing, getting angry, crying, and caring. Over and over again. Full confessional: I had to read this in fits and starts. Sitting with Stewart’s words for long periods of time was difficult for me to do. I’m still not 100% finished.
Carrying A Tiger starts on a Sunday in September in 2014. Lynn had been feeling ill on and off for two months and on this particular Sunday she learned why. This was the first time the couple learned something was terribly and terminally wrong. For the next six years Stewart (and his wife) bravely shared every part of the couple’s journey through cancer. The intimacy through words is astounding.

As an aside, the title of the book comes from Tai Chi. There is a gesture of scooping low as if to collect a tiger to put him as far away as possible. The further away, the more he is perceived to be small and of little consequence. I have to wonder if Tai Chi is a common prescription for cancer patients. My OM had a bunch of videos found in her collection after her death from a brain tumor and my coworker mentioned Tai Chi while she was going through chemo.
As another aside, I had an ah-ha moment while reading Carrying the Tiger. Tony wrote about “…downplaying painful details” so that friends would not abandon them. Maybe that is what happened with J. Maybe when I shared the awful month when OM died it was TMI and so they ghosted me. I said too much.
As a third aside, Tony’s description of “Covid-19 times” brought back memories. When he described people banging on pots and pans to honor the healthcare workers I remembered my drummer friend who religiously drummed every night at 7pm from his Brooklyn window.

Author fact: Tony Stewart is not a writer by trade. He began his foray into a relationship with words when he kept a journal on CaringBridge.org. The words did not stop just because Lynn was no longer with him. The words became this book.

Book trivia: I was surprised to see color photographs. How lovely.

As an aside, I am a fan of anyone who quotes e.e. cummings.

Confessional: I need to know if Stewart has seen “After Life” written by and starring Ricky Gervais?

Housekeeper’s Secret

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Schnakenburg, Sandra. The Housekeeper’s Secret: a Memoir. She Writes Press, 2024.

Reason read: as a member of the Early Review Program for LibraryThing, I often get to read interesting books. This was one book I inhaled.

Sandra Schnakenburg has always been good with numbers so it seemed like a natural fit for her to become an accountant, but an author? That seems a little farfetched until you learn that her childhood housekeeper of thirty years had a dying wish for Schnakenburg to tell her life story. Then when you read the stories Schnakenburg has to tell about her housekeeper and friend, Lee Metoyer, it all makes sense. This is an important story that needs to be told for many reasons. Lee’s life was as incredible as it was tragic. However, Schnakenburg’s own upbringing is just as compelling. Hers is a story worth telling, too. She grew up in an affluent neighborhood in an extravagant house with five siblings. This was a household where someone had to feed the koi that lived in the pond under the grand staircase. Someone had to iron the bedroom linen. Someone had to line up seven different breakfast juices so that the man of the house could take his pick. The list goes on. Hidden behind the curtain of Schnakenburg’s perfect childhood hides abuse, corruption, and fear. The Housekeeper’s Secret is a story of survival and triumph on multiple levels.
Confessional: sometimes I noticed little inconsistencies. In Housekeeper’s Secret Schnakenburg’s timeline becomes a little skewed. She was six years old when her father took the family to Disneyland, but in the previous chapter she is seven. [Schnakenburg also gets Disneyland confused with Disneyworld. I do, too.] In another scene Metoyer’s cup is empty but she takes a sip of coffee.

Quote of a quote to quote: “There is always that one summer that changes you” -Beth Merlin. Amen to that. I was 23. I experienced the first summer romance of my life and then my father died.

Music: Elvis, “Happy Birthday”, “Take Me Out to the Ball Game”, Glenn Miller’s “When That Man is Dead and Gone”, “We Are Family”, and “Paper Doll” by the Mills Brothers.

Goodbye to a River

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Graves, John. Goodbye to a River: a Narrative. Alfred A. Knopf, 1960.

Reason read: June is National River Cleanup month. What better way to honor the event than by reading a book about a little known river called the Brazos?

The premise behind Goodbye to a River sounds like something I would do. When John Graves found out the state of Texas was going to dam parts of the Brazos River he decided to take a three week journey on the river of his childhood to say goodbye. Portions of the Brazos clearly reflected Graves’s childhood memories. Other times he reflects on the history, myths and legends of the region. At times he becomes philosophical, thinking of “Saint” Henry David Thoreau and “Prince” Ernest Hemingway, but more often he recounts tales of violence and racism: scalpings, hangings, raps, and murders indicative of the Comanche history of the region. He mentions Charles Goodnight from time to time. Occasionally, he interacts with locals he meets along the way, but most of the time he is alone with a dog he calls the passenger. My favorite parts was when Graves remembered the exact same trees he used to climb and the same beaches he used to build campfires on.
Did you know that October is the best month for traveling the Brazos for the weather is at its most pleasant?

As an aside, I would like to hear a canyon wren singing in harmony with her desert landscape.

Lines I loved, “You are not in a hurry there; you learned long since not to be” (p 3), “The silent air of ruin is fragile” (p 44), “Heights have that kind of humor” (p 126), and “One can get pretty literary on islands” (p 168).

Confessional: when I said Goodbye to a River reminded me of myself, here is what I meant. I was supposed to be paid off from the job I had had for over twenty years. Knowing the end was near, I spent four weeks saying goodbye to every corner that meant something to me.
As another aside, I am watching Only Murders in the Building (yes, I know it has been out for a while). Brazos makes me think of Steve Martin’s character.
As yet another aside, the mention of Alma-Tadema paintings reminded of Natalie’s interpretation of his daughter’s poem, “If No One Ever Married Me.”

Author fact: Graves taught “off and on” at Columbia and spent time wandering and writing (according to his biography).

Book trivia: the children’s version of Goodbye to a River was illustrated by Russell Waterhouse.

Playlist: “Annie Laurie”, Frank Sinatra, Ricky Nelson, “The Good Old Rebel”, “Beulah Land”, “Drink to Me Only”, “Flow Gently, Sweet Afton”, and “Rambling Wreck”.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “A River of Words” (p 201).

Safest Family on the Block

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Brick, Jason. The Safest Family on the Block: 101 Tips, Tricks, Hacks, and Habits to Protect Your Family. YMAA Publication Center, 2025.

The first thing that struck me about Safest is the number of introductions in addition to the preface and foreword. There is an introduction for every chapter (all ten of them) as well as an introduction to the book by Larry Hagner, a foreword by Andy Murphy
Jason Brick has consulted a plethora of people for how to keep his family safe: a parenting coach, author, registered nurse, Federal Air Marshall, several CEOs and presidents of companies, a safety influencer, fire safety captain, army sniper, mental health clinician, babywearing expert; even a SWAT team crisis negotiator and a US Secret Service agent. There are twenty experts testifying to the validity of Brick’s information.
It all started when he became a dad for the first time and the advent of COVID.
Each chapter of Safest is barely longer than two pages so despite it being jampacked with information, it is surprisingly short. Brick will teach you how to stay safe in a myriad of different situations: fire and accident, automobiles, school, online, sex, relationships, communication, travel and crime. He debunks popular myths like stranger danger and has a special chapter on school bullying and your child’s online life.
Favorite portion of the book: the Golden Rules Action Plan, a checklist of things to do for a safe environment at the end of every chapter.

Favorite quote, “Even if your action isn’t optimal, it will still be better than doing nothing.” Amen to that.

Author fact: you could call Jason Brick a jack of all trades. He is a writer (obviously), a safety expert (duh), but he also is a traveler and a martial artist.

Book trivia: Safest was born out of a “show” with one hundred episodes.

Two Years Before the Mast

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Dana, Jr., Richard Henry. Two Years Before the Mast: a Personal Narrative of Life at Sea. Fearon Publishers, 1971.

Reason read: June is Celebrate Oceans Month. Maybe that is a made up reason to read about the ocean, but I’m going with it because it is a good time to sail.

Two Years Before the Mast is the true story of Richard Henry Dana’s two years spent at sea first, on the brig “Pilgrim,” bound for California via coastal South America. Using his journal to write Two Years Before the Mast, one has to remember this is August 14th, 1834. Time before canals and motorized vessels. California was not part of the United States. In 1934, California was part of Mexico. As a Harvard student, bound for a career in law, Dana had to take a hiatus from his studies when an illness affected his eyesight. Doctors recommended some time away from the books to allow his eyes to rest. The brig “Pilgrim” is in the business of transporting animal hides and furs. Once on the “Pilgrim,” Dana quickly learned about life on the ocean on the fly: getting over seasickness, learning to push through fatigue, finding his sea legs. Once settled into a life at sea, Dana then had to desensitize himself to a tyrannical captain who flogged sailors ruthlessly and without provocation, long days of continuous work, and making the most of shore leave.
This is a great account of life at sea as well as in ports. As an aside, I had to laugh when Dana’s vessel could not get over a sandbar at low tide due to the unusually heavy load they were carrying. They had to wait until low tide in order to be released from the channel.

Lines I liked: said of San Francisco – “If California ever becomes a prosperous country, this bay will be the centre of its prosperity” (p 194).

Confessional: I have spent most of my life on the ocean so when Dana described dolphins swimming just a few feet below the surface of the water I could picture every color.

Author fact: Dana was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Book trivia: Two Years Before the Mast was illustrated by Dennis Dierks and my copy provided a biographical sketch by Dana’s grandson, H.W.L. Dana.

Playlist: “O Pescator”, “Onda”, “All in the Downs”, “Poor Tom Bowline”, “The Bay of Biscay”, “List, Ye Landsmen”, “Heave, to the Girls”, “Nancy O!”, “Jack Crosstree”, “Cheerily Men”, “All in the Downs”, “Poor Tom Bowline”, “The Bay of Biscay”, and “List, Ye Landsmen”.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “See the Sea” (p 201).

After Life

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Ellis, Rhian. After Life. Amazon Encore, 2000.

Reason read: After Life takes place in New York, a city rich in culture. The Puerto Rican Day Parade also takes place in New York in the month of June.

I am the type of person who tries to look at a situation from every angle before making a judgment about it, good or bad. I want to walk around it, peer under it, climb over it and look down from above; I want to make sure I haven’t missed a single detail. So when Naomi Ash says “First I had to get his body into the boat” in the very first line of After Life I did not immediately assume she intentionally murdered her boyfriend, Peter Morton. Nowhere does she say as much on page one. Maybe Peter Morton had an accident, like falling off the roof or a fatal health episode, like a heart attack. And maybe, just maybe, since Naomi Ash lives in such a remote area she needed to illegally dispose of his body. Thinking a little darker – maybe Peter and Naomi fought and things went horribly sideways. Or maybe his death was a suicide, but he made it look like murder because he wanted to frame her. In the first two hundred pages of After Life the reader cannot be sure of anything at all. For two hundred pages Naomi slowly navigates the story of her childhood, her teenage years, how she became a medium, and her current life in the community of Train Line. She carefully parses out the details of everything but Peter Morton’s death. The mystery of what happened to her boyfriend stays tightly under wraps for a good portion of the book.
But the story is worth the wait. In the meantime Ellis writes with an other-worldly aura that keeps the reader entertained. She moves through language with languid grace, like slow moving water. Take for example, the way Ellis describes a voice falling flat in a deep snow-covered landscape. She is correct. If you have ever stood in a winter white landscape you know if the snow is deep enough it has a way of making sound plummet into an eerie depth of alien silence.
The plot of Ellis’s short book is simple. Naomi Ash, following in her mother’s footsteps, is a medium. She lives and practices her craft in a community called Train Line in the fictional town of Wallamee, in upstate New York. She has let readers know that she continues to carry the secret of disposing of the body of her boyfriend, Peter Morton. The secret has laid buried, just like Peter, for a decade. Like all skeletons, in the closet or otherwise, they eventually resurface and when Peter’s bones are discovered, the whole town buzzes with the mystery. Meanwhile, coincidentally, Naomi’s mother’s trade is growing stale and people are tiring of her. Her radio show is about to be canceled. What better way to jump start a failing career than to solve the mystery of the bones?

Confessional: as the hostilities towards Naomi grow I found myself becoming more and more anxious for her. First the child she babysits in the afternoons starts to turn on her, then Officer Peterson takes a curious dislike to her.

As an aside, when I first saw the title I immediately thought of Ricky Gervais and his show of the same name. They are not the same.
As another aside, the harvesting of grapes made me think of my wedding. All of the wine came from the Finger Lakes region of Upstate New York.

Lines I immediately identified with, “My mother’s good moods could be more bewildering than her bad ones” (p 64), and “You could life up one of her lies and find a truth beneath it, and then find beneath that truth another lie, and spend your whole life pulling away layers and never get to the bottom of it” (p 122), and one more, “Mothers and daughters are put on Earth to tear each others hearts out” (p 249). Enough about mothers. Here is another good quote completely unrelated to mothers, “…but opening my mouth on that subject would gain me no friends” (p 96).

Author fact: After Life is Rhian Ellis’s first and only novel.

Book trivia: the version of After Life that I picked up was a Nancy Pearl Presents a Book Lust Rediscovery. She wrote the introduction to this edition. Confession: I had never heard of Book Lust Rediscovery and wonder how many other books are republished as such.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “First Lines to Remember” (p 86).

Simplest Ways to Develop Consistency and Healthy Habits That Last

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Yung-Abu, Samson. The Simplest Ways to Develop Consistency and Healthy Habits That Last: Healthy Growth is Achieved Through Consistent Flow. Publish Nation, 2025.

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

Simplest Ways to Develop Consistency and Healthy Habits That Last is, by phone, a 425 page book divided into two parts. Part one is an examination of what it means to be consistent. Part two delves into cultivating healthy habits or breaking unhealthy habits while focusing primarily on exercise. The entire book is jam packed with good advice and common sense (be smart about your goals) as well as some oddball tips: sleep in your gym clothes, keep your dumbbells in the kitchen). It is also an autobiography of Yung-Abu’s fitness routines and goals.
I found the narrative to be verbose. Each element is described in several different ways. Take the subject of making exercise fun, for example. Yung-Abu states that fun is a key ingredient; fun is essential; you need to incorporate a touch of fun; fun transforms everything; you need to incorporate fun into the process; provide fun; make exercise fun-focused. The word fun was mentioned a few more time in the section, but you get the point.
Once I became comfortable with the wordiness of Simplest Ways to Develop Consistency…I started to appreciate the nuggets of knowledge. I found the connection between consistency and respect to be interesting. I also loved the idea of figuring out a workout sequence – which exercises flowed easily with others.
A fair amount of Yung-Abi’s information could be seen as common sense. Healthy habits are widely known to impact overall health and cognitive brain function. Not ever exercise book will give you an anatomical breakdown of the brain, though.

Head scratcher moment – Yung-Abu said microwaves are “fundamental to keeping us in the flow of not starving.” Weird way to put it, but what concerned me more was that Simplest Ways to Develop Consistency is supposed to be a book about healthy habits. In my opinion, cooking by microwave is not healthy, never mind fundamental. Some of the sentence structures and phrasings seemed off. It indicated that English is not Yung-Abi’s dominant language or that there was some AI assistance.

My personal connection to consistency is through Tommy Rivs. He is constantly talking about making small deposits in the bank of health. If you practice consistency you will see results.

Author fact: Yung-Abu has a law background.

Imagine If…

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Vale, Lucien. Imagine If…Tupac Did Not Go To Vegas. Shattered Mythos Press, 2025.

Reason read: I am a member of the Early Review program for LibraryThing. I occasionally get to review interesting books and this was one of them.

The one thing to keep in mind when reading Lucien Vale’s Imagine If series is that it is pure fiction. You are imagining an alternate ending to a well-known story. Everyone knows Tupac was murdered in Las Vegas. Vale is simply flipping the script and imagining a scenario where Pac would decide against that fateful trip. Vale cleverly finds a real life story and imagines an alternate ending. I don’t really care if the events in New York City mirror fact or not. The whole idea is to ask what if? and to be entertained. The action of Imagine If is tightly wound and fast paced. It reads like a movie with exaggerated dialogue full of gangster lingo and drama. If entertainment was Vale’s goal, he succeeded.

Confessional: one of my favorite movies is Sliding Doors starring Gwyneth Paltrow. It is the story of Helen’s two very different lives: the life she would lead if she had caught the train going home and the alternate where she misses it.

Author fact: Lucien Vale has also written an “Imagine” book about Bruce Lee.

Book trivia: Imagine If… is a very short 77 pages long.

Stagehand

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Aretsky, David H. Stagehand: a Backstage Pass to My Life Stories. BookBaby, 2024.

Reason read: as a member of the Early Review Program for LibraryThing I occasionally get to review pretty interesting books. This is one of them (set to be published on April 4th, 2025).

Shame on me for judging a book by it’s title. I seriously thought this would be a peek behind the stage curtain of a career in music. No-name songwriters or big time musicians, I did not care which. Aretsky did not need to kiss and tell or name names (although for a bunch of stories, he does). I just wanted to hear about a life in the music industry from backstage. I know someone in the industry so I know how hard it is. In truth, there are a few chapters here and there about his career in entertainment, more towards the end, but for the most part, Stagehand is one man’s lament over losing the love of his life. Aretsky has been in the entertainment industry for over forty years, but it is about the eighteen year relationship with his Ex that he really wants to talk about. In truth, the stories are great. Aretsky is a natural storyteller, but the timeline is chaotic and the stories pinball around the various chapters. 1982 snuggles up to 2001 then jumps to 2019 and back to the 1990s again. It was hard to follow at times. In addition to the stories bouncing from decade to decade, they go from roommate to roommate, relationship to relationship, exotic adventure to exotic adventure. At various times I wanted to draw a timeline, just so I could make sense of what Aretsky wanted to say about his life thus far. My takeaways were: he enjoys going to the gym and staying physical fit; he has a myriad of female friends, and he moved around a lot in his younger years. And then there was the Ex…

Confessional: when David said he could write a book about his time with “Larry” I thought to myself that is the book I thought Stagehand would be. He mentioned wanting to write another book. My only advice would be to organize the stories a little more.

Setlist: As to be expected, there is a great deal of music mentioned! AC/DC, Alabama, Annie Lennox, Art Garfunkel, B-52s, “Back to the Cave”, Bad Religion, Beach Boys, Beastie Boys, “Beauty and the Beast”, “Beauty School Dropout”, Bette Midler, Billy Idol, Billy Joel, Blue Oyster Cult, Bobby Brown, Bonnie Raitt, “Breaking Up is Hard to Do”, Bret Michaels, Brian Wilson, Bruce Springsteen, Captain & Tennille, Celine Dion, “Chances Are”, Cheap Trick, Cher, Chaka Khan, Chicago, Chick Corea, Chubby Checker, “Chuck E.’s in Love”, Clint Black, Cole Porter, “Cryin'”, the Crystals’ “Da Do Ron Ron”, Crystal Gayle, Dale Kristien, Darlene Love, Devo, Dionne Warwick, “Do You Know the Way to San Jose?”, Dolly Parton, Donna Summer, “Don’t Be Cruel”, Dred Zeppelin, Edgar Winter, Elton John, Elvis Presley, Eminem, Emmy Lou Harris, Eric Burdon & the Animals, Eurythmics’ “Let’s Go”, “When Tomorrow Comes”, and “Missionary Man”, “Every Rose Has Its Thorn”, “Everything Your Heart Desires”, “Forever in My Life”, Foreigner, Four Italian Tenors, Frank Sinatra, Frankie Avalon, GBH, Gene Simmons, “Sugar Magnolia” by the Grateful Dead, “Girls and Boys”, Gladys Knight, Guns N’ Roses, GWAR, Hall & Oates, Hank Ballard and the Midnighters’ “the Twist”, “Housequake”, Harry Belafonte, “He Has a Headlock on My Heart”, “Heaven Knows”, “I Want to Take You Higher”, “I Say a Little Prayer”, Iggy Pop, “I’ll Take You There”, Itzhak Perlman, “Irresistible Bitch”, “I’ve Got You Under My Skin”, Jackie Evancho, Jerry Lee Lewis’ “Great Balls of Fire”, , Joan Jett, Jody Watley, John Entwistle, Johnny Cash, Johnny Mathis, Judy Garland, Kiss, “Last Time I Felt Like This”, “Love and Happiness”, Lea Salonga, Led Zeppelin, Linda Ronstadt, Lita Ford’s “Close My eyes Forever”, “Love Will Keep Us Together”, Madame X, Mariachi La Reyna de Los Angeles, Mariachi Sol de Mexico, Megadeth, Melissa Manchester, the Mentors”, Merle Haggard, Metallica, Michael Jackson, Mick Jagger, Miles Davis, “Misty”, “Mother Popcorn”, Motorhead, Mr. Big, “My Prerogative”, Natalie Cole, Neil Sedaka, New Edition, “O Sole Mio”, Oleta Adams, “On the Edge of a Broken Heart”, “Only Women Bleed”, “Out of Touch”, Ozzy Osbourne, Pat Travers, Paul Anka, Pebo Bryson, Peter, Paul and Mary, Phantom, Rocker & Slick’s “Men Without Shame”, “Piece of Me”, the Plasmatics, Poison, the Police’s “Roxanne”, Preservation Hall Jazz Band”, Prince, Quiet Riot, the Ramones, Randy Newman, Randy Rhoads, Ratt, the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Regina Bell, Rickie Lee Jones, Robert Plant, the Ramones, Robin Trower, the Rolling Stones, Ronnie James Dio, Rubin Studdard, the Runaways, Sam Kinison, Sammy Davis Jr., “Santa Claus is Coming to Town”, Sebastian Bach, Sex Pistols, “Sex of It”, “Shake for the Sheik”, Sheila E., “Ship of Fools”, Skid Row, Slayer, Smokey Robinson, Social Distortion, “Star-Spangled Banner”, Stevie Wonder, Stryper, “Sweet Thing”, “Tall Cool One”, Temptations, “That’s What Friends are For”, Tom Jones, Tony Bennett, Tony Orlando, the Troggs’ “Wild Thing”, the Tubes, UFO, Vixen, Warrant, Was (Not Was)’s “Are You Okay?”, Wayne Newton, White Snake, Whitney Houston, the Who, “Whole New World”, “Wild, Wild West”, Winger, Wynonna, Wynton Marsalis, Yanni, and Ziggy Marley.

As an aside, my apologies to GNR. In Stagehand the name of the band was spelled “Guns and Roses.” Their name must have gone through some kind of autocorrect.

Jemez Mountains

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Swetnam, Thomas W. The Jemez Mountains: a Cultural and Natural History. University of New Mexico Press, 2025.

Reason read: As a member of the Early Review Program for LibraryThing I get to review really cool books. This is one of them. I chose this book because I have long been fascinated with the Southwest. My sister has big dreams of settling in Taos, New Mexico. Me, I am not so sure.

There is a lot of love and respect in the pages of Jemez Mountains. It is abundantly clear that Swetnam cares deeply for the culture, history, and natural beauty of the region. He will take you to the hot springs that rival Saratoga’s. He will describe the first automobile in Jemez Springs. He will spend a lot of time at the Soda Dam. There are stories of bears, hippies, and abusive priests. He will give you a historical and scientific perspective of land use through the ages with photographs to illustrate each point. He has a serious concern about climate change and the damage it has already done to the region. There is a great deal of information packed in each essay so it was a relief when Swetnam explained that the essays of Jemez Mountains need not be read in sequential order.
As an aside, I felt a huge connection to Jemez Mountains not only because of my previously disclosed love of the Southwest, but because I uncovered other commonalities with the narrative. Swetnam matched photographs taken at the turn of the century with current ones. My hometown did something similar to illustrate how little it has changed in the last one hundred or so years. Swetnam refers to this matching of photographs as “then and now.” Inspired by the photography of my hometown, I put together an art show at my college with old photographs overlaid with current photographs and I called the project “Then and Now.”

Disclaimer: I make comments based on the assumption that special features to a book, like the same photographs, maps, or illustrations will be in the final published copy. That being said, the cover to Jemez Mountains is gorgeous. Swetnam has mentioned that there are more than one hundred photographs, maps, and drawings. My favorite photograph was of a Mack truck coming through one of the Guadalupe Box tunnels. It is impressive.

Book trivia: Jemez Mountains is set to be published in April 2025.

Author fact: Swetnam is a retired University of Arizona professor.

Small music: “O Fair New Mexico”