"The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter." —Mark Twain
Unsolicited opinions on books, movies, TV shows, consumer products
It was pitch black when I got up to pee this morning. Good, I thought, I can crawl back into bed for a while. But it turned out I’d already had my sleep-in: the bathroom clock radio said 6:45, 15 minutes later than I normally wake up. Damn it, shouldn’t the days be getting longer again […]
“Unstuck her in time, day-sleeping in her bedroom. How old was she? Seven, seventeen, twenty-seven? Dusk or dawn? Couldn’t tell by the light outside. Checked her phone. Evening. The house silent, her mother probably asleep. Out through the smell of her grandfather’s fifty years of National Geographic, shelved in the hall.” — William Gibson, The Peripheral The […]
You Can’t Read That! is a periodic post featuring banned book reviews and news. YCRT! News I mentioned this Arizona story in a previous YCRT! post. Conservative school board members and parents in Gilbert, a Phoenix-area suburb, decided to cut (literally, with scissors) pages mentioning abortion from an AP biology textbook. In the November elections the conservative […]
“There’s a link between bigotry and bad spelling.” — David Mitchell, The Bone Clocks Invitation to a Beheading Vladimir Nabokov If you’re the type who worries about “spoilers” and won’t read a book if you know how it’s going to end, you can skip this review (p.s. when I think of people like you, I picture […]
You Can’t Read That! is a periodic post featuring banned book reviews and news roundups. YCRT! Mini-Rant In my previous YCRT! post I ranted about a dangerous idea gaining momentum in conservative and religious circles: requiring schools or publishers to put advisory ratings or content alerts on books that might be assigned to elementary and secondary school students. As […]
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, […]