"When I do not want to say things in real life I often say them here." — Mimi Smartypants
Unsolicited opinions on books, movies, TV shows, consumer products
I’ve been catching up on my reading. No, strike that, there’re be no catching up in my lifetime. I add new books to the pile as fast as I finish the ones already there. The library sent an email alert this morning: an American history text I ordered is in. I don’t normally read textbooks, […]
You Can’t Read That! is a periodic post featuring banned book reviews and news roundups. YCRT! Banned Book Links Texas ministers will protect teens from demonic “reading” habit Ten books read in school that will change your life as an adult Why The Giver is one of the most banned books in America Eleven quotes […]
“And so it went, sand piling up to the heavens and homes sinking toward hell.” — Hugh Howey, Sand Omnibus Sand Omnibus Hugh Howey I looked at the different ways readers categorized this book, and one label I didn’t see was Young Adult. That surprises me. Sand has many of the elements of YA fiction: teenaged protagonists, coming-of-age subplots, […]
You Can’t Read That! is a periodic post featuring banned book reviews and news roundups. Brunswick County NC school officials, in the wake of yet another parental challenge to Sherman Alexie’s young adult novel The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, have decided the book will stay on the shelves of a middle school. One parent, though, […]
“I hesitated for just a moment. Some part of me wanted to see the creature, after having heard it for so many days. Was it the remnants of the scientist in me, trying to regroup, trying to apply logic when all that mattered was survival? If so, it was a very small part. I ran.” […]
I always feel bad when I don’t finish a book, especially when it’s kind of an assignment, as in the book club selection I gave up on last week. Book club selections are by majority rule; sometimes I’m in the minority and the book is one I wouldn’t have read on my own. Other members don’t seem […]
In that instant they felt an overwhelming sense of pride and accomplishment. Though they had failed dismally even to come close to the expedition’s original objective, they knew now that somehow they had done much, much more than ever they set out to do. — Alfred Lansing, Endurance: Shackleton’s Incredible Voyage Endurance: Shackleton’s Incredible Voyage Alfred […]
I saw a commercial for implantable contact lenses on TV last night. If “implantable” means what I think it means, what does “contact” mean? Contacting the inner surface of your eye, looking out? Why not just “implantable lenses”? Sort of a Six Million Dollar Man kind of thing, or am I thinking of The Terminator? The thought […]