The 12 pound (and growing) fave puppy watching THB blog
2020 Grand Totals:
Highly Recommended: Non-fiction - 22 Fiction - 14 = 36
Recommended: Non-fiction - 18 Fiction - 23 = 41
Neutral: Non-fiction - 14 Fiction - 13 = 27 (flipping Sahara Stories to NF)
Not Recommended: Non-fiction - 5 Fiction - 17 = 22
Total: Non-fiction - 59 Fiction - 67 = 126
Something Else : 15 total
Total books | Non-Fiction/ Fiction | Top Picks NF/F | Recommend NF/F | Neutral NF/F | Something Else | Not Reco’d NF/F | |
2020 | 126 | 59/67 | 22/14 | 18/23 | 14/13 | 15 total no books | 5/17 |
2019 | 91 | 49/42 | 18 total 10/8 | 30 Total 17/13 | 25 total 14/11 | 1 total 1/0 | 17 Total 7/10 |
2018 | 91 | 44/47 | 15 total 8/7 | 34 Total 18/16 | 19 total 10/9 | 2 total 1/1 | 21 Total 9/12 |
2017 | 107 | 48/59 | 12 Total 8/4 | 45 Total 21/24 | 29 Total 14/15 | 0 (no books) | 21 Total 5/16 |
2016 | 100 | 50/50 | 14 Total 13/1 | 42 Total 23/19 | 19 Total 13/7 | 4 Total (+5) 2/2 | 20 Total 4/16 |
2015 | 84 | 47/37 | 14 Total 8/6 | 36 Total 22/14 | 11 Total 5/6 | 4 Total 3/1 | 19 Total 9/10 |
2014 | 95 | 48/46 | 8 (+2) Total 4/4 | 36 Total 22/14 | 29 Total 12/17 | 2 Total 2/0 | 18 Total 6/11 |
2013 | 91 | 46/45 | 12 Total 5.5/6.5 | 42 Total 24/18 | 21 Total 12/9 | 3 Total 1.5/1.5 | 13 Total 3/10 |
2012 | 77 | 36/41 | 8 Total 4/4 | 26 Total 9/17 | 29 Total 19/15 | 3 Total all N-F | 11 Total 6/5 |
2011 | 53 | 22/31 | 10 Total 4/6 | 25 Total 13/12 | 11 Total 5/6 | - | 7 Total All Fiction |
Intro, severely cut and modified slightly (in bold)
. At a certain point this year (around April), THB became almost afraid to start a novel, fearing it would be too “light or fluffy” given the demons ravishing the landscape in 2020. Maybe so...and it showed in the Not Recommended category: Non-fiction 5, Fiction SEVENTEEN
Grand totals at bottom
Not Recommended - and highly likely not finished (22):
In order of order read; first just titles and authors, then in same order with highly arbitrary descriptions. Non-fiction - 5, Fiction - 17
- The Mysterious Affair at Olivetti; IBM, the CIA, and the Cold War Conspiracy to Shut Down Production of the World's First Desktop Computer, Meryle Secrest
- Marilou is Everywhere, Sarah Elaine Smith (novel)
- Celestial Bodies, Jokha Alharthi (paperback, novel, translated, pub'd in English in 2019, pub'd in Omani in 2010)
- Topics of Conversation, Miranda Popkey (novel)
- The Cactus League, Emily Nemens (novel, hardback)
- Burn Out, the Endgame for Fossil Fuels, Dieter Helm
- Saint X, Alexis Schaitkin (novel, hardback)
- This Land is Our Land, an Immigrant’s Manifesto, Suketu Mehta (hardback)
- Damascus, Richard Beard (novel, hardback, pub’d 1998)
- Interior Chinatown, Charles Yu (novel, hardback)
- The Vanishing Half, Brit Bennett (novel)
- Family Life, Akhil Sharma (novel)
- Lilac and Flag, John Berger (novel, used hardback, pub'd 1990)
- Pizza Girl, Jean Kyoung Frazier (novel, hardback)
- Crooked Hallelujah, Kelli Jo Ford (novel, hardback)
- His Only Wife, Peace Adzo Medie (novel, hardback)
- Grown Ups, Emma Jane Unsworth (novel, hardback)
- Yellow Bird, Oil, Murder and a Woman’s Search for Justice in Indian Country, Sierra Crane Murdoch
- The Demon In the Machine, How Hidden Webs of Information Are Solving the Mystery of Life, Paul Davies (hardback)
- Jack, Marilynne Robinson (novel, hardback)
Inland, Tea Obreht (novel): way too much talking to ghosts, talking nonsense to each other, faux dismay, séances, and on and on. It is a bit too much for satire for THB’s taste (it is a satire, right?).
Marilou is Everywhere, Sarah Elaine Smith (novel): coming of age story of a 14 year-old girl whose mother has abandoned her and her two older brothers in a very poor section of Pennsylvania. THB abandons the book halfway through when the drunken mother (a hoarder with dementia) of a missing girl starts to take over the story.
Celestial Bodies, Jokha Alharthi (paperback, novel, translated, pub'd in English in 2019, pub'd in Omani in 2010): devolved from too many characters in medium length chapters to vignettes of too many characters in 2 page or less about one or two episodes across too many time jumps.
Topics of Conversation, Miranda Popkey (novel): THB made it 80% of the way through, thinking maybe okay, not great, then the narrator goes full-blown alcoholic and THB says goodbye.
The Cactus League, Emily Nemens (novel, hardback): THB heads home in the bottom of the fifth, it's spring training and anyone of interest has already been sent to the minors.
Burn Out, the Endgame for Fossil Fuels, Dieter Helm: THB burned out before making it all the way through. Somehow, in the near future, new technology is going to save the world from climate change and the US is ideally positioned to make the transition and even own a chunk of the revenues. Direct quote: climate change with get solved. But in the process much else will be better. THB replies: Califonia Dreamin...better for whom?
Saint X, Alexis Schaitkin (novel, hardback): Older sister is murdered on a Caribbean island, younger sister 18 years later tries to unravel who did it. Two serious flaws: 100 pages too long; the narrator starts talking about the way things happened with no knowledge of the actual events.
This Land is Our Land, an Immigrant’s Manifesto, Suketu Mehta (hardback): Beware the manifesto, it is likely to be an anecdotal diatribe.
Damascus, Richard Beard (novel, hardback, pub’d 1998): direct quote from Acknowledgements: All except twelve of the nouns in Damascus can also be found in the The Times(London) of November 1, 1993. THB: It’s a gimmick book. Much better was his more recent book on a brother’s drowning, The Day that Went Missing (from 2019).
Interior Chinatown, Charles Yu (novel, hardback): there’s a very short book hiding inside the tv show script within a tv show script. THB couldn’t find the book.
A Burning, Megha Majumdar (novel): so light a read that THB puffed and it blew away. Set in modern day India, full of shallow emotions.
The Vanishing Half, Brit Bennett (novel): very light-skinned southern twin girls are separated in their teens (one leaves without saying goodbye), skip 20 years to the next generation going to college at UCLA. THB couldn’t connect with the characters and didn’t want to go through a sex change.
Family Life, Akhil Sharma (novel): A family immigrates from India to Queens and the older brother has a serious accident in a pool and is brain-damaged. Narrated by the younger brother in very basic ways. THB can’t get engaged.
Lilac and Flag, John Berger (novel, used hardback, pub'd 1990): the third of the Into Their Labours trilogy, focused on the life of dirt poor small time crooks living on the fringes of a city, descended from peasants. Not near as good as Pig Earth and not even up to the level of Once in Europa.
Pizza Girl, Jean Kyoung Frazier (novel, hardback): another pregnant 18 year- old coming of age story with an aimless narrator. Short, vacuous, and THB couldn’t finish it.
Crooked Hallelujah, Kelli Jo Ford (novel, hardback): 80% through the book, it fell into the Neutral category, then went completely off the tracks; e.g., new characters as narrators, silly asides, no plot line…stuff like that.
His Only Wife, Peace Adzo Medie (novel, hardback): THB may not have given this one enough attention and may come back to it after the election. Unfortunately, it starts in an African village with “the old ways” being met by the new world, a rather trite and typical beginning for novels based in African villages.
Grown Ups, Emma Jane Unsworth (novel, hardback): the modern, snarky, neurotic 35 year-old narrator is a columnist for a feminist e-magazine. For over half the book she is relating her life up to the recent break-up with a famous photographer who dumps her after 7 years for another on-line publicity hound. Then, her mother comes to live with her and maudlin totally replaces snarky, and book becomes unreadable.
Yellow Bird, Oil, Murder and a Woman’s Search for
Justice in Indian Country, Sierra Crane
Murdoch: Really, the biography of Lissa, the searcher for the body and murderers
of an oil field driver in North Dakota. And the search goes on…and on…and
on…and on…and the repetition of details of not-that-interesting people
continues, and continues, and continues.
The Demon In the Machine, How Hidden Webs of Information Are Solving the Mystery of Life, Paul Davies (hardback): THB is familiar with many of the scientists and mathematicians and illustrations in this book, and yet he couldn’t connect the dots and make it to the end of this self-referential jargon book, thus the mystery of life remains a mystery to THB. Same with a more famous book, A Brief History of Time. THB only made it through 2 chapters…and now out: A Briefer History of Time (TRUE!!).
Jack, Marilynne Robinson (novel, hardback): THB really liked Gilead, then a few years later Home and thought it okay, and the string has run out with Jack. Too much simplistic dialogue that doesn’t have much meaning beyond long philosophical ruminations on “how did we get here” and “here” isn’t as interesting as it used to be.
Grand Totals:
Highly Recommended: Non-fiction - 22 Fiction - 14
Recommended: Non-fiction - 18 Fiction - 23 = 41
Neutral: Non-fiction - 14 Fiction - 13 = 27 (flipping Sahara Stories to NF)
Not Recommended: Non-fiction - 5 Fiction - 17 = 22
Total: Non-fiction - 59 Fiction - 67 = 126
Something Else : 15 total
|
|
Total books |
Non-Fiction/ Fiction |
Top Picks NF/F |
Recommend NF/F |
Neutral NF/F |
Something Else |
Not Reco’d NF/F |
|
2020 |
126 |
59/67 |
22/14 |
18/23 |
14/13 |
15 total no books |
5/17 |
|
2019 |
91 |
49/42 |
18 total 10/8 |
30 Total 17/13 |
25 total 14/11 |
1 total 1/0 |
17 Total 7/10 |
|
2018 |
91 |
44/47 |
15 total 8/7 |
34 Total 18/16 |
19 total 10/9 |
2 total 1/1 |
21 Total 9/12 |
|
2017 |
107 |
48/59 |
12 Total 8/4 |
45 Total 21/24 |
29 Total 14/15 |
0 (no
books) |
21 Total 5/16 |
|
2016 |
100 |
50/50 |
14 Total 13/1 |
42 Total 23/19 |
19 Total 13/7 |
4 Total (+5) 2/2 |
20 Total 4/16 |
|
2015 |
84 |
47/37 |
14 Total 8/6 |
36 Total 22/14 |
11 Total 5/6 |
4 Total 3/1 |
19 Total 9/10 |
|
2014 |
95 |
48/46 |
8 (+2)
Total 4/4 |
36 Total
22/14 |
29 Total
12/17 |
2
Total 2/0 |
18 Total 6/11 |
|
2013 |
91 |
46/45 |
12 Total 5.5/6.5 |
42 Total
24/18 |
21 Total 12/9 |
3 Total
1.5/1.5 |
13 Total 3/10 |
|
2012 |
77 |
36/41 |
8 Total 4/4 |
26 Total 9/17 |
29 Total
19/15 |
3 Total all N-F |
11 Total 6/5 |
|
2011 |
53 |
22/31 |
10 Total 4/6 |
25 Total 13/12 |
11 Total 5/6 |
- |
7 Total All Fiction |
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