en-US Thu, 29 Aug 2024 11:02:43 -0700 60 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg 54479 252 Jules Verne 014044906X Kate 4 3.95 1872
author: Jules Verne
name: Kate
average rating: 3.95
book published: 1872
rating: 4
read at: 2017/07/06
date added: 2024/08/29
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]]> 32307358 This an alternate cover for B01LY7FD0D

Robert Langdon, Harvard professor of symbology and religious iconology, arrives at the ultramodern Guggenheim Museum Bilbao to attend a major announcement--the unveiling of a discovery that "will change the face of science forever." The evening's host is Edmond Kirsch, a forty-year-old billionaire and futurist whose dazzling high-tech inventions and audacious predictions have made him a renowned global figure. Kirsch, who was one of Langdon's first students at Harvard two decades earlier, is about to reveal an astonishing breakthrough . . . one that will answer two of the fundamental questions of human existence.

As the event begins, Langdon and several hundred guests find themselves captivated by an utterly original presentation, which Langdon realizes will be far more controversial than he ever imagined. But the meticulously orchestrated evening suddenly erupts into chaos, and Kirsch's precious discovery teeters on the brink of being lost forever. Reeling and facing an imminent threat, Langdon is forced into a desperate bid to escape Bilbao. With him is Ambra Vidal, the elegant museum director who worked with Kirsch to stage the provocative event. Together they flee to Barcelona on a perilous quest to locate a cryptic password that will unlock Kirsch's secret.

Navigating the dark corridors of hidden history and extreme religion, Langdon and Vidal must evade a tormented enemy whose all-knowing power seems to emanate from Spain's Royal Palace itself . . . and who will stop at nothing to silence Edmond Kirsch. On a trail marked by modern art and enigmatic symbols, Langdon and Vidal uncover clues that ultimately bring them face-to-face with Kirsch's shocking discovery . . . and the breathtaking truth that has long eluded us. Origin is stunningly inventive--Dan Brown's most brilliant and entertaining novel to date]]> 482 Dan Brown Kate 4 3.87 2017
author: Dan Brown
name: Kate
average rating: 3.87
book published: 2017
rating: 4
read at: 2018/07/24
date added: 2024/04/25
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]]> 52656911
The bride � The plus one � The best man � The wedding planner � The bridesmaid � The body

On an island off the coast of Ireland, guests gather to celebrate two people joining their lives together as one. The groom: handsome and charming, a rising television star. The bride: smart and ambitious, a magazine publisher. It’s a wedding for a magazine, or for a celebrity: the designer dress, the remote location, the luxe party favors, the boutique whiskey. The cell phone service may be spotty and the waves may be rough, but every detail has been expertly planned and will be expertly executed.

But perfection is for plans, and people are all too human. As the champagne is popped and the festivities begin, resentments and petty jealousies begin to mingle with the reminiscences and well wishes. The groomsmen begin the drinking game from their school days. The bridesmaid not-so-accidentally ruins her dress. The bride’s oldest (male) friend gives an uncomfortably caring toast.

And then someone turns up dead. Who didn’t wish the happy couple well? And perhaps more important, why?]]> 319 Lucy Foley Kate 3 3.82 2020
author: Lucy Foley
name: Kate
average rating: 3.82
book published: 2020
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2023/03/16
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]]> 1654487 Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, Through the Looking-Glass, Sylvie and Bruno, Sylvie and Bruno Concluded, "The Hunting of the Snark," and Lewis' poetry, phantasmagoria, stories, miscellany, and "acrostics, inscriptions, and other verse."

The following have also never appeared in print except in their original editions: "Resident Women Students," "Some Popular Fallacies about Vivisection," "Lawn Tennis Tournaments," "Rules for Court Circular," "Croquet Castles," "Mischmasch," "Doublets," "A Postal Problem," "The Alphabet-Cipher," and "Introduction to The Lost Plum Cake."]]> 1165 Lewis Carroll 076077448X Kate 0 to-read 4.41 1982
author: Lewis Carroll
name: Kate
average rating: 4.41
book published: 1982
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/05/12
shelves: to-read
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]]> 27484368 The Flying Phaeton

"The Flying Phaeton" is historical fiction that follows Nicholas Throckmorton from adolescence to maturity. His youthful innocence is destroyed by family tragedy and as the years pass, personal revenge transcends criminal violence and transforms to international comeuppance.
Lives are left to rust in junkyards ... relationships are ground to mulch ... and loves are recycled as the Air Corps Captain leaves a trail of memories across the globe.
Nicholas pilots through an arid marriage and climbs away from a dying love affair in the Roaring 20s before he levels off to lusty one-night stands, harsh revenge and personal reflection in the Dirty 30s. The world becomes engulfed in war and his turbulent flight through life then detours to Indochina and the Southwest Pacific as he navigates around steamy relationships, an emotional love affair and self realization during the Fighting 40s.
As World War II comes to an end, a changing world presents personal and professional challenges for the fighter pilot. Studying the view from the cockpit, Nick finds someone approaching from an unfamiliar horizon at ten o'clock high, and quickly learns that he cannot clearly see life's runway if he continues to focus on his stormy past.
This is book #5 of the Throckmorton Family Novels. Although it can be enjoyed as a stand-alone story, the familial quirks, quandries and questions of the previous four are clarified within the pages of "The Flying Phaeton".]]> 292 Edward R. Hackemer 1518707858 Kate 0 to-read 4.50
author: Edward R. Hackemer
name: Kate
average rating: 4.50
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/11/28
shelves: to-read
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]]> 20402983 224 Eileen Riley 1909653225 Kate 2 3.32 2013
author: Eileen Riley
name: Kate
average rating: 3.32
book published: 2013
rating: 2
read at: 2018/02/21
date added: 2021/10/09
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]]> 52198084 An intimate portrait of the life of Jackie O�

Few of us can claim to be the authors of our fate. Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy knows no other choice. With the eyes of the world watching, Jackie uses her effortless charm and keen intelligence to carve a place for herself among the men of history and weave a fairy tale for the American people, embodying a senator’s wife, a devoted mother, a First Lady—a queen in her own right.

But all reigns must come to an end. Once JFK travels to Dallas and the clock ticks down those thousand days of magic in Camelot, Jackie is forced to pick up the ruined fragments of her life and forge herself into a new identity that is all her own, that of an American legend.]]> 448 Stephanie Marie Thornton 0451490924 Kate 5 to-read 4.15 2020
author: Stephanie Marie Thornton
name: Kate
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2020
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2021/06/26
shelves: to-read
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]]> 40640862
Alice may be the president's daughter, but she's nobody's darling. As bold as her signature color Alice Blue, the gum-chewing, cigarette-smoking, poker-playing First Daughter discovers that the only way for a woman to stand out in Washington is to make waves--oceans of them. With the canny sophistication of the savviest politician on the Hill, Alice uses her celebrity to her advantage, testing the limits of her power and the seductive thrill of political entanglements.

But Washington, DC is rife with heartaches and betrayals, and when Alice falls hard for a smooth-talking congressman it will take everything this rebel has to emerge triumphant and claim her place as an American icon. As Alice soldiers through the devastation of two world wars and brazens out a cutting feud with her famous Roosevelt cousins, it's no wonder everyone in the capital refers to her as the Other Washington Monument--and Alice intends to outlast them all.]]> 448 Stephanie Marie Thornton 0451490908 Kate 5
I felt like I was sitting across from Alice herself having tea as she told me stories of her remarkable life.

I laughed, I sat in shock, and I cried.

Fantastic read! ]]> 3.98 2019
author: Stephanie Marie Thornton
name: Kate
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2019
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2021/06/26
shelves:
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This was a perfect tribute to the other Washington Monument.

I felt like I was sitting across from Alice herself having tea as she told me stories of her remarkable life.

I laughed, I sat in shock, and I cried.

Fantastic read!
]]> 56355640 A Novel of an American Spy

A thrilling tale of love, loyalty, and espionage, based on the incredible true story of Elizabeth Bentley, a Cold War double agent spying for the Russians and the United States, from USA Today bestselling author Stephanie Marie Thornton.

1963: Reeling from the death of her mother and President Kennedy's assassination, Catherine Gray shows up on Elizabeth Bentley's doorstep demanding answers to the shocking mystery just uncovered about her family. What she doesn't expect is for Bentley to ensnare her in her own story of becoming a controversial World War II spy and Cold War informer...

Recruited by the American Communist Party to spy on fascists at the outbreak of World War II, a young Bentley--code name Clever Girl--finds she has an unexpected gift for espionage. But after falling desperately in love with her handler, Jacob Golos, Elizabeth makes another unexpected discovery when she learns her lover is actually a Russian spy. Together, they will build the largest Soviet spy network in America and Elizabeth will become its uncrowned Red Spy Queen. However, once the war ends and the U.S. and U.S.S.R. become embroiled in the Cold War, it is Elizabeth who will dangerously clash with the NKVD, the brutal Soviet espionage agency.

As Catherine listens to Elizabeth's harrowing tale, she empathizes with her, that is, until she uncovers startling revelations that link the two women's lives in shocking ways. Faced with the idea that her entire existence is based on a lie, Catherine realizes there can be many sides to the truth. And only Elizabeth Bentley can tell her what that truth really is.]]> 416 Stephanie Marie Thornton 0593198409 Kate 0 to-read 3.72 2021
author: Stephanie Marie Thornton
name: Kate
average rating: 3.72
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/06/19
shelves: to-read
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]]> 26895161 Return of the Jedi and The Force Awakens, the never-before-told story that began with Star Wars: Aftermath continues in this thrilling novel, the second book of Chuck Wendig s New York Times bestselling trilogy.

"It is a dark time for the Empire. . . ."

The Emperor is dead, and the remnants of his former Empire are in retreat. As the New Republic fights to restore a lasting peace to the galaxy, some dare to imagine new beginnings and new destinies. For Han Solo, that means settling his last outstanding debt, by helping Chewbacca liberate the Wookiee's homeworld of Kashyyyk.

Meanwhile, Norra Wexley and her band of Imperial hunters pursue Grand Admiral Rae Sloane and the Empire's remaining leadership across the galaxy. Even as more and more officers are brought to justice, Sloane continues to elude the New Republic, and Norra fears Sloane may be searching for a means to save the crumbling Empire from oblivion. But the hunt for Sloane is cut short when Norra receives an urgent request from Princess Leia Organa. The attempt to liberate Kashyyyk has carried Han Solo, Chewbacca, and a band of smugglers into an ambush resulting in Chewie's capture and Han's disappearance.

Breaking away from their official mission and racing toward the Millennium Falcon's last known location, Norra and her crew prepare for any challenge that stands between them and their missing comrades. But they can't anticipate the true depth of the danger that awaits them or the ruthlessness of the enemy drawing them into his crosshairs.]]> 430 Chuck Wendig 1101966939 Kate 4 3.71 2016
author: Chuck Wendig
name: Kate
average rating: 3.71
book published: 2016
rating: 4
read at: 2021/04/26
date added: 2021/06/13
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]]> 50892433
When an off-site company retreat meant to promote mindfulness and collaboration goes utterly wrong when an avalanche hits, the corporate food chain becomes irrelevant and survival trumps togetherness. Come Monday morning, how many members short will the team be?

The #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Turn of the Key and In a Dark Dark Wood returns with another suspenseful thriller set on a snow-covered mountain.]]> 372 Ruth Ware Kate 5 3.70 2020
author: Ruth Ware
name: Kate
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2020
rating: 5
read at: 2021/04/30
date added: 2021/06/13
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]]> 41556894 A FRAGILE PEACE. AN APOCRYPHAL WARNING. CHAOS WAITING IN THE HEART OF THE STORM.

With his dying words, H—Jacob Portman’s final connection to his grandfather Abe’s secret life� entrusts Jacob with a mission: Deliver newly con­tacted peculiar Noor Pradesh to an operative known only as V. Noor is being hunted. She is the subject of an ancient prophecy, one that foretells a looming apocalypse. Save Noor—Save the future of all peculiardom.

With only a few bewildering clues to follow, Jacob must figure out how to find V, the most enigmatic, and most powerful, of Abe’s former associates. But V is in hiding and she never, ever, wants to be found.

With enemies behind him and the unknown ahead, Jacob Portman’s story continues as he takes a brave leap forward into The Conference of the Birds.]]> 400 Ransom Riggs Kate 4 4.08 2020
author: Ransom Riggs
name: Kate
average rating: 4.08
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2021/05/02
date added: 2021/06/13
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]]> 50088631 The heartrending story of a midcentury American family with twelve children, six of them diagnosed with schizophrenia, that became science's great hope in the quest to understand the disease.

Don and Mimi Galvin seemed to be living the American dream. After World War II, Don's work with the Air Force brought them to Colorado, where their twelve children perfectly spanned the baby boom: the oldest born in 1945, the youngest in 1965. In those years, there was an established script for a family like the Galvins—aspiration, hard work, upward mobility, domestic harmony—and they worked hard to play their parts. But behind the scenes was a different story: psychological breakdown, sudden shocking violence, hidden abuse. By the mid-1970s, six of the ten Galvin boys, one after another, were diagnosed as schizophrenic. How could all this happen to one family?

What took place inside the house on Hidden Valley Road was so extraordinary that the Galvins became one of the first families to be studied by the National Institute of Mental Health. Their story offers a shadow history of the science of schizophrenia, from the era of institutionalization, lobotomy, and the schizophrenogenic mother to the search for genetic markers for the disease, always amid profound disagreements about the nature of the illness itself. And unbeknownst to the Galvins, samples of their DNA informed decades of genetic research that continues today, offering paths to treatment, prediction, and even eradication of the disease for future generations.

With clarity and compassion, bestselling and award-winning author Robert Kolker uncovers one family's unforgettable legacy of suffering, love, and hope.]]> 377 Robert Kolker 038554376X Kate 4 4.13 2020
author: Robert Kolker
name: Kate
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2021/05/03
date added: 2021/06/13
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]]> 30213123
The Battle of Endor shattered the Empire, scattering its remaining forces across the galaxy. But the months following the Rebellion’s victory have not been easy. The fledgling New Republic has suffered a devastating attack from the Imperial remnant, forcing the new democracy to escalate its hunt for the hidden enemy.

For her role in the deadly ambush, Grand Admiral Rae Sloane is the most wanted Imperial war criminal—and one-time rebel pilot Norra Wexley, back in service at Leia’s urgent request, is leading the hunt. But more than just loyalty to the New Republic drives Norra forward: Her husband was turned into a murderous pawn in Sloane’s assassination plot, and now she wants vengeance as much as justice.

Sloane, too, is on a furious quest: pursuing the treacherous Gallius Rax to the barren planet Jakku. As the true mastermind behind the Empire’s devastating attack, Rax has led the Empire to its defining moment. The cunning strategist has gathered the powerful remnants of the Empire’s war machine, preparing to execute the late Emperor Palpatine’s final plan. As the Imperial fleet orbits Jakku, an armada of Republic fighters closes in to finish what began at Endor. Norra and her crew soar into the heart of an apocalyptic clash that will leave land and sky alike scorched. And the future of the galaxy will finally be decided.]]> 423 Chuck Wendig 1101966963 Kate 4 3.79 2017
author: Chuck Wendig
name: Kate
average rating: 3.79
book published: 2017
rating: 4
read at: 2021/04/09
date added: 2021/06/13
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]]> 53138081 Texas, 1934. Millions are out of work and a drought has broken the Great Plains. Farmers are fighting to keep their land and their livelihoods as the crops are failing, the water is drying up, and dust threatens to bury them all. One of the darkest periods of the Great Depression, the Dust Bowl era, has arrived with a vengeance.

In this uncertain and dangerous time, Elsa Martinelli—like so many of her neighbors—must make an agonizing choice: fight for the land she loves or go west, to California, in search of a better life. The Four Winds is an indelible portrait of America and the American Dream, as seen through the eyes of one indomitable woman whose courage and sacrifice will come to define a generation.

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Nightingale and The Great Alone comes an epic novel of love and heroism and hope, set against the backdrop of one of America’s most defining eras—the Great Depression.

Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9781250178602]]> 464 Kristin Hannah 1250178606 Kate 4 4.27 2021
author: Kristin Hannah
name: Kate
average rating: 4.27
book published: 2021
rating: 4
read at: 2021/05/10
date added: 2021/06/13
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]]> 50623864
Thus begins the extraordinary life of Addie LaRue, and a dazzling adventure that will play out across centuries and continents, across history and art, as a young woman learns how far she will go to leave her mark on the world.

But everything changes when, after nearly 300 years, Addie stumbles across a young man in a hidden bookstore and he remembers her name.]]> 448 Victoria E. Schwab 0765387565 Kate 4 4.16 2020
author: Victoria E. Schwab
name: Kate
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2021/05/12
date added: 2021/06/13
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]]> 17553897 Nominated for the 2015 Arthur Ellis Award for Best Novel

When murder stalks a family over Christmas, Kala Stonechild trusts her intuition to get results.

It’s a week before Christmas when wealthy businessman Tom Underwood disappears into thin air � with more than enough people wanting him dead.

New police recruit Kala Stonechild, who has left her northern Ontario detachment to join a specialized Ottawa crime unit, is tasked with returning Underwood home in time for the holidays. Stonechild, who is from a First Nations reserve, is a lone wolf who is used to surviving on her wits. Her new boss, Detective Jacques Rouleau, has his hands full controlling her, his team, and an investigation that keeps threatening to go off track.

Old betrayals and complicated family relationships brutally collide when love turns to hate and murder stalks a family.]]> 400 Brenda Chapman 1459708024 Kate 3 3.52 2014
author: Brenda Chapman
name: Kate
average rating: 3.52
book published: 2014
rating: 3
read at: 2021/05/14
date added: 2021/06/13
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]]> 6186357 There are alternate cover editions for this ASIN here and here.

If you ain’t scared, you ain’t human.

When Thomas wakes up in the lift, the only thing he can remember is his name. He’s surrounded by strangers—boys whose memories are also gone.

Nice to meet ya, shank. Welcome to the Glade.

Outside the towering stone walls that surround the Glade is a limitless, ever-changing maze. It’s the only way out—and no one’s ever made it through alive.

Everything is going to change.

Then a girl arrives. The first girl ever. And the message she delivers is terrifying.

Remember. Survive. Run.]]> 384 James Dashner 0385737947 Kate 4 4.05 2009
author: James Dashner
name: Kate
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2009
rating: 4
read at: 2021/05/16
date added: 2021/06/13
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]]> 12262741 An alternative cover edition for this ISBN can be found here

At twenty-two, Cheryl Strayed thought she had lost everything. In the wake of her mother’s death, her family scattered and her own marriage was soon destroyed. Four years later, with nothing more to lose, she made the most impulsive decision of her life. With no experience or training, driven only by blind will, she would hike more than a thousand miles of the Pacific Crest Trail from the Mojave Desert through California and Oregon to Washington State � and she would do it alone.

Told with suspense and style, sparkling with warmth and humor, Wild powerfully captures the terrors and pleasures of one young woman forging ahead against all odds on a journey that maddened, strengthened, and ultimately healed her.]]> 336 Cheryl Strayed 0307592731 Kate 4 4.06 2012
author: Cheryl Strayed
name: Kate
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2012
rating: 4
read at: 2021/05/29
date added: 2021/06/13
shelves:
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Pleasantly surprised about some of it, i thought it was going to be just about walking.
]]> 50093704 Where do you see yourself in five years?

When Type-A Manhattan lawyer Dannie Kohan is asked this question at the most important interview of her career, she has a meticulously crafted answer at the ready. Later, after nailing her interview and accepting her boyfriend's marriage proposal, Dannie goes to sleep knowing she is right on track to achieve her five-year plan.

But when she wakes up, she’s suddenly in a different apartment, with a different ring on her finger, and beside a very different man. The television news is on in the background, and she can just make out the scrolling date. It’s the same night—December 15—but 2025, five years in the future.

After a very intense, shocking hour, Dannie wakes again, at the brink of midnight, back in 2020. She can’t shake what has happened. It certainly felt much more than merely a dream, but she isn’t the kind of person who believes in visions. That nonsense is only charming coming from free-spirited types, like her lifelong best friend, Bella. Determined to ignore the odd experience, she files it away in the back of her mind.

That is, until four-and-a-half years later, when by chance Dannie meets the very same man from her long-ago vision.

Brimming with joy and heartbreak, In Five Years is an unforgettable love story that reminds us of the power of loyalty, friendship, and the unpredictable nature of destiny.]]> 272 Rebecca Serle 1982137444 Kate 3 3.74 2020
author: Rebecca Serle
name: Kate
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2020
rating: 3
read at: 2021/06/08
date added: 2021/06/13
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cool idea... kinda wanted more
]]> 52661162
Then a local boy appeals to him for help. His brother is missing, and no one in the village, least of all the police, seems to care. And once again, Cal feels that restless itch.

Something is wrong in this community, and he must find out what, even if it brings trouble to his door.]]> 451 Tana French 073522465X Kate 3 3.70 2020
author: Tana French
name: Kate
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2020
rating: 3
read at: 2021/04/10
date added: 2021/04/17
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]]> 43822820 here.

Soon after her twenty-fifth birthday, Libby Jones returns home from work to find the letter she’s been waiting for her entire life. She rips it open with one driving thought: I am finally going to know who I am.

She soon learns not only the identity of her birth parents, but also that she is the sole inheritor of their abandoned mansion on the banks of the Thames in London’s fashionable Chelsea neighborhood, worth millions. Everything in Libby’s life is about to change. But what she can’t possibly know is that others have been waiting for this day as well—and she is on a collision course to meet them.

Twenty-five years ago, police were called to 16 Cheyne Walk with reports of a baby crying. When they arrived, they found a healthy ten-month-old happily cooing in her crib in the bedroom. Downstairs in the kitchen lay three dead bodies, all dressed in black, next to a hastily scrawled note. And the four other children reported to live at Cheyne Walk were gone.

The can’t-look-away story of three entangled families living in a house with the darkest of secrets.]]> 352 Lisa Jewell 1501190105 Kate 2 3.93 2019
author: Lisa Jewell
name: Kate
average rating: 3.93
book published: 2019
rating: 2
read at: 2021/04/07
date added: 2021/04/17
shelves:
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]]> 50265329
Dawn, miraculously, survives the crash, but so do all the doubts that have suddenly been raised. She has led a good life. Back in Boston, there is her husband, Brian, her beloved daughter, and her work as a death doula, where she helps ease the transition between life and death for patients in hospice.

But somewhere in Egypt is Wyatt Armstrong, who works as an archaeologist unearthing ancient burial sites, a job she once studied for, but was forced to abandon when life suddenly intervened. And now, when it seems that fate is offering her second chances, she is not as sure of the choice she once made.

After the crash landing, the airline ensures the survivors are seen by a doctor, then offers transportation wherever they want to go. The obvious option for Dawn is to continue down the path she is on and go home to her family. The other is to return to the archaeological site she left years before, reconnect with Wyatt and their unresolved history, and maybe even complete her research on The Book of Two Ways--the first known map of the afterlife.

As the story unfolds, Dawn's two possible futures unspool side by side, as do the secrets and doubts long buried beside them. Dawn must confront the questions she's never truly asked: What does a life well-lived look like? When we leave this earth, what do we leave behind? Do we make choices...or do our choices make us? And who would you be, if you hadn't turned out to be the person you are right now?]]> 416 Jodi Picoult 198481835X Kate 3 3.61 2020
author: Jodi Picoult
name: Kate
average rating: 3.61
book published: 2020
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2021/04/05
shelves:
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]]> 26082916 An unexpected quest. Two worlds at stake. Are you ready?

Days after winning Oasis founder James Halliday's contest, Wade Watts makes a discovery that changes everything.

Hidden within Halliday's vaults, waiting for his heir to find, lies a technological advancement that will once again change the world and make the Oasis a thousand times more wondrous—and addictive—than even Wade dreamed possible.

With it comes a new riddle, and a new quest—a last Easter egg from Halliday, hinting at a mysterious prize.

And an unexpected, impossibly powerful, and dangerous new rival awaits, one who'll kill millions to get what he wants.

Wade's life and the future of the Oasis are again at stake, but this time the fate of humanity also hangs in the balance.

Lovingly nostalgic and wildly original as only Ernest Cline could conceive it, Ready Player Two takes us on another imaginative, fun, action-packed adventure through his beloved virtual universe, and jolts us thrillingly into the future once again.]]> 370 Ernest Cline 1524761338 Kate 3 3.39 2020
author: Ernest Cline
name: Kate
average rating: 3.39
book published: 2020
rating: 3
read at: 2021/03/23
date added: 2021/03/31
shelves:
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]]> 46205677
Gen Z changes everything. Today’s businesses are not built to sell and market the way Gen Z shops and buys, or to recruit and employ Gen Z the way they find and keep jobs. Leaders need answers now as gen Z is the fastest growing generation of employees and the most important group of consumer trendsetters.Ěý

The companies that quickly and comprehensively adapt to Gen Z thinking will be the winners for the next twenty years. Those that don’t will be the losers or become extinct.Ěý Zconomy is the comprehensive survival guide on how leaders must understand and embrace Generation Z.Ěý

Researched and written by Dr. Denise Villa and Jason Dorsey from The Center for Generational Kinetics, the insights in Zconomy are based on their extensive research, they’ve led more than 60 generational studies, and their work with more than 500 companies around the world.

In Zconomy, Dr. Villa and Dorsey Who is Gen Z? What do employers, marketers, and sales leaders need to know? And, most importantly, what should leaders do now?

This is the critical moment for leaders to understand and adapt to Gen Z or become irrelevant. Gen Z is already reshaping the world of business and this change is only going to accelerate. Zconomy is the definitive manual that will prepare any executive, manager, entrepreneur, HR or marketing professional to successfully unlock the powerful potential of this emerging generation at this pivotal time.ĚýĚý]]> 281 Jason Dorsey 0062970305 Kate 4 3.66 2020
author: Jason Dorsey
name: Kate
average rating: 3.66
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2021/03/20
date added: 2021/03/20
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]]> 68210 Housekeeping, Marilynne Robinson returns with an intimate tale of three generations, from the Civil War to the 20th century: a story about fathers and sons and the spiritual battles that still rage at America's heart. In the words of Kirkus, it is a novel "as big as a nation, as quiet as thought, and moving as prayer. Matchless and towering." GILEAD tells the story of America and will break your heart.]]> 247 Marilynne Robinson 031242440X Kate 3 3.84 2004
author: Marilynne Robinson
name: Kate
average rating: 3.84
book published: 2004
rating: 3
read at: 2021/03/04
date added: 2021/03/07
shelves:
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]]> 36809135
But Kya is not what they say. A born naturalist with just one day of school, she takes life's lessons from the land, learning the real ways of the world from the dishonest signals of fireflies. But while she has the skills to live in solitude forever, the time comes when she yearns to be touched and loved. Drawn to two young men from town, who are each intrigued by her wild beauty, Kya opens herself to a new and startling world—until the unthinkable happens.

In Where the Crawdads Sing, Owens juxtaposes an exquisite ode to the natural world against a profound coming of age story and haunting mystery. Thought-provoking, wise, and deeply moving, Owens’s debut novel reminds us that we are forever shaped by the child within us, while also subject to the beautiful and violent secrets that nature keeps.

The story asks how isolation influences the behavior of a young woman, who like all of us, has the genetic propensity to belong to a group. The clues to the mystery are brushed into the lush habitat and natural histories of its wild creatures.]]> 384 Delia Owens 0735219117 Kate 3 4.35 2018
author: Delia Owens
name: Kate
average rating: 4.35
book published: 2018
rating: 3
read at: 2021/03/03
date added: 2021/03/07
shelves:
review:

]]> 4069 Man's Search for Meaning has become one of the most influential books in America; it continues to inspire us all to find significance in the very act of living.]]> 165 Viktor E. Frankl 080701429X Kate 4 4.38 1946
author: Viktor E. Frankl
name: Kate
average rating: 4.38
book published: 1946
rating: 4
read at: 2021/02/20
date added: 2021/03/07
shelves:
review:

]]> 46007673 509 Tana French 0735224641 Kate 4 3.55 2018
author: Tana French
name: Kate
average rating: 3.55
book published: 2018
rating: 4
read at: 2020/08/15
date added: 2021/03/07
shelves:
review:

]]> 45754981 From the award-winning author of Station Eleven, an exhilarating novel set at the glittering intersection of two seemingly disparate events–a massive Ponzi scheme collapse and the mysterious disappearance of a woman from a ship at sea.

Vincent is a bartender at the Hotel Caiette, a five-star lodging on the northernmost tip of Vancouver Island. On the night she meets Jonathan Alkaitis, a hooded figure scrawls a message on the lobby’s glass wall: Why don’t you swallow broken glass. High above Manhattan, a greater crime is committed: Alkaitis is running an international Ponzi scheme, moving imaginary sums of money through clients� accounts. When the financial empire collapses, it obliterates countless fortunes and devastates lives. Vincent, who had been posing as Jonathan’s wife, walks away into the night. Years later, a victim of the fraud is hired to investigate a strange occurrence: a woman has seemingly vanished from the deck of a container ship between ports of call.

In this captivating story of crisis and survival, Emily St. John Mandel takes readers through often hidden landscapes: campgrounds for the near-homeless, underground electronica clubs, the business of international shipping, service in luxury hotels, and life in a federal prison. Rife with unexpected beauty, The Glass Hotel is a captivating portrait of greed and guilt, love and delusion, ghosts and unintended consequences, and the infinite ways we search for meaning in our lives.]]> 307 Emily St. John Mandel 0525521143 Kate 3 3.66 2020
author: Emily St. John Mandel
name: Kate
average rating: 3.66
book published: 2020
rating: 3
read at: 2021/02/15
date added: 2021/02/16
shelves:
review:

]]> 40538657 9781501154850

Set on the Korean island of Jeju, The Island of Sea Women follows Mi-ja and Young-sook, two girls from very different backgrounds, as they begin working in the sea with their village’s all-female diving collective. Over many decades—through the Japanese colonialism of the 1930s and 1940s, World War II, the Korean War, and the era of cellphones and wet suits for the women divers—Mi-ja and Young-sook develop the closest of bonds. Nevertheless, their differences are impossible to ignore: Mi-ja is the daughter of a Japanese collaborator, forever marking her, and Young-sook was born into a long line of haenyeo and will inherit her mother’s position leading the divers. After hundreds of dives and years of friendship, forces outside their control will push their relationship to the breaking point.

This beautiful, thoughtful novel illuminates a unique and unforgettable culture, one where the women are in charge, engaging in dangerous physical work, and the men take care of the children. A classic Lisa See story—one of women’s friendships and the larger forces that shape them�The Island of Sea Women introduces readers to the fierce female divers of Jeju Island and the dramatic history that shaped their lives.]]> 374 Lisa See Kate 4 4.29 2019
author: Lisa See
name: Kate
average rating: 4.29
book published: 2019
rating: 4
read at: 2021/02/11
date added: 2021/02/11
shelves:
review:

]]> 43834909 Two sisters travel the same streets, though their lives couldn't be more different. Then, one of them goes missing.

In a Philadelphia neighborhood rocked by the opioid crisis, two once-inseparable sisters find themselves at odds. One, Kacey, lives on the streets in the vise of addiction. The other, Mickey, walks those same blocks on her police beat. They don't speak anymore, but Mickey never stops worrying about her sibling.

Then Kacey disappears, suddenly, at the same time that a mysterious string of murders begins in Mickey's district, and Mickey becomes dangerously obsessed with finding the culprit--and her sister--before it's too late.

Alternating its present-day mystery with the story of the sisters' childhood and adolescence, Long Bright River is at once heart-pounding and heart-wrenching: a gripping suspense novel that is also a moving story of sisters, addiction, and the formidable ties that persist between place, family, and fate.]]> 482 Liz Moore 0525540679 Kate 3 4.03 2020
author: Liz Moore
name: Kate
average rating: 4.03
book published: 2020
rating: 3
read at: 2021/01/31
date added: 2021/02/04
shelves:
review:

]]> 53387955
“Rapinoe's 'signature pose'Ěýfrom the 2019 FIFA Women's World Cup is synonymous to the feeling we got when finishing this book:Ěýheart full, arms wide and ready to takeĚýup space in this world.”â€� USA Today Ěý
Ěý
Megan Rapinoe, Olympic gold medalist and two-time Women's World Cup champion, reveals for the first time her life both on and off the field. Guided by her personal journey into social justice, brimming with humor, humanity, and joy, she urges all of us to ask ourselves, What will you do with your one life?

Only four years old when she kicked her first soccer ball, Megan Rapinoe developed a love � and clear talent � for the game at a young age. But it was her parents who taught her that winning was much less important than how she lived her life. From childhood on, Rapinoe always did what she could to stand up for what was right—even if it meant going up against people who disagreed.

InĚý One Life , Megan Rapinoe invites readers on a remarkable journey, looking back on both her victories and her failures, and pulls back the curtain on events we know only from the headlines. After the 2011 World Cup, discouraged by how few athletes were open about their sexuality, Rapinoe decided to come out publicly as gay and use her platform to advocate for marriage equality. Recognizing the power she had to bring attention to critical issues, in 2016 she took a knee during the national anthem in solidarity with former NFL player Colin Kaepernick to protest racial injustice and police brutality—the first high-profile white athlete to do so. The backlash was immediate, but it couldn’t compare to the overwhelming support. Rapinoe became a force of change.Ěý

Here for the first time, Rapinoe reflects upon some of the most pivotal moments in her life and career â€� from her realization in college that she was gay, through the disputes with soccer coaches and officials over her decision to kneel, to the first time she met her now-fiancĂ© WNBA champion Sue Bird, and up through suing the US Soccer Federation over gender discrimination and equal pay. Throughout, Rapinoe makes clear the obligation we all have to speak up, and the impact each of us can have on our communities. Deeply personal and inspiring,Ěý One LifeĚý reveals that real, concrete change lies within all of us, and asks: If we all have the same resource—this one precious life, made up of the decisions we make every day—what are you going to do?Ěý
Ěý
" One Life Ěýmakes it clear that Rapinoe’s greatest accomplishments may ultimately come away from the soccer pitch. She’s a new kind of American hero."â€� San Francisco Chronicle Ěý]]> 224 Megan Rapinoe 1984881167 Kate 4 4.19 2020
author: Megan Rapinoe
name: Kate
average rating: 4.19
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2021/02/04
date added: 2021/02/04
shelves:
review:

]]> 10874177 It's one thing to learn to curtsy properly. It's quite another to learn to curtsy and throw a knife at the same time. Welcome to Finishing School.

Fourteen-year-old Sophronia is a great trial to her poor mother. Sophronia is more interested in dismantling clocks and climbing trees than proper manners--and the family can only hope that company never sees her atrocious curtsy. Mrs. Temminnick is desperate for her daughter to become a proper lady. So she enrolls Sophronia in Mademoiselle Geraldine's Finishing Academy for Young Ladies of Quality.

But Sophronia soon realizes the school is not quite what her mother might have hoped. At Mademoiselle Geraldine's, young ladies learn to finish...everything. Certainly, they learn the fine arts of dance, dress, and etiquette, but they also learn to deal out death, diversion, and espionage--in the politest possible ways, of course. Sophronia and her friends are in for a rousing first year's education.]]> 307 Gail Carriger 031619008X Kate 3 3.82 2013
author: Gail Carriger
name: Kate
average rating: 3.82
book published: 2013
rating: 3
read at: 2021/01/27
date added: 2021/01/28
shelves:
review:
A friend suggested this to me or else I probably would not have thought to read it. It was pretty good and entertaining. Its an interesting mix of YA, classic British style literature, and Sci-Fi.
]]> 27209239 Witness the birth of the Resistance

When the Rebellion defeated the Empire in the skies above Endor, Leia Organa believed it was the beginning to a lasting peace. But after decades of vicious infighting and partisan gridlock in the New Republic Senate, that hope seems like a distant memory.

Now a respected senator, Leia must grapple with the dangers that threaten to cripple the fledgling democracy—from both within and without. Underworld kingpins, treacherous politicians, and Imperial loyalists are sowing chaos in the galaxy. Desperate to take action, senators are calling for the election of a First Senator. It is their hope that this influential post will bring strong leadership to a divided galaxy.

As the daughter of Darth Vader, Leia faces with distrust the prospect of any one person holding such a powerful position—even when supporters suggest Leia herself for the job. But a new enemy may make this path Leia’s only option. For at the edges of the galaxy, a mysterious threat is growing...]]> 13 Claudia Gray 0451486080 Kate 0 4.07 2016
author: Claudia Gray
name: Kate
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2016
rating: 0
read at: 2018/09/30
date added: 2021/01/18
shelves:
review:

]]> 76865
The Challenge
Built to Last, the defining management study of the nineties, showed how great companies triumph over time and how long-term sustained performance can be engineered into the DNA of an enterprise from the very beginning.

But what about the company that is not born with great DNA? How can good companies, mediocre companies, even bad companies achieve enduring greatness?

The Study
For years, this question preyed on the mind of Jim Collins. Are there companies that defy gravity and convert long-term mediocrity or worse into long-term superiority? And if so, what are the universal distinguishing characteristics that cause a company to go from good to great?

The Standards
Using tough benchmarks, Collins and his research team identified a set of elite companies that made the leap to great results and sustained those results for at least fifteen years. How great? After the leap, the good-to-great companies generated cumulative stock returns that beat the general stock market by an average of seven times in fifteen years, better than twice the results delivered by a composite index of the world's greatest companies, including Coca-Cola, Intel, General Electric, and Merck.

The Comparisons
The research team contrasted the good-to-great companies with a carefully selected set of comparison companies that failed to make the leap from good to great. What was different? Why did one set of companies become truly great performers while the other set remained only good?

The Findings
The findings of the Good to Great study will surprise many readers and shed light on virtually every area of management strategy and practice. The findings include:
Level 5 Leaders: The research team was shocked to discover the type of leadership required to achieve greatness.

The Hedgehog Concept (Simplicity within the Three Circles): To go from good to great requires transcending the curse of competence.

A Culture of Discipline: When you combine a culture of discipline with an ethic of entrepreneurship, you get the magical alchemy of great results. Technology Accelerators: Good-to-great companies think differently about the role of technology.

The Flywheel and the Doom Loop: Those who launch radical change programs and wrenching restructurings will almost certainly fail to make the leap.]]> 300 Jim Collins 0066620996 Kate 3 4.12 2001
author: Jim Collins
name: Kate
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2001
rating: 3
read at: 2021/01/18
date added: 2021/01/18
shelves:
review:
This was basically an academic paper turned into a book. There were a couple of nuggets in there that I wrote down that will stick with me.
]]> 20824870 14 Stephanie Marie Thornton Kate 5 5.00 2011
author: Stephanie Marie Thornton
name: Kate
average rating: 5.00
book published: 2011
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:

]]> 27834600
Sometimes the only thing to fear…is yourself.

When reclusive writer Leonora is invited to the English countryside for a weekend away, she reluctantly agrees to make the trip. But as the first night falls, revelations unfold among friends old and new, an unnerving memory shatters Leonora’s reserve, and a haunting realization creeps in: the party is not alone in the woods.]]> 352 Ruth Ware 1501112333 Kate 5 3.76 2015
author: Ruth Ware
name: Kate
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2015
rating: 5
read at: 2019/01/01
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:

]]> 34928122
Well, sort of. Life on Artemis, the first and only city on the moon, is tough if you're not a rich tourist or an eccentric billionaire. So smuggling in the occasional harmless bit of contraband barely counts, right? Not when you've got debts to pay and your job as a porter barely covers the rent.

Everything changes when Jazz sees the chance to commit the perfect crime, with a reward too lucrative to turn down. But pulling off the impossible is just the start of her problems, as she learns that she's stepped square into a conspiracy for control of Artemis itself—and that now, her only chance at survival lies in a gambit even riskier than the first.]]> 305 Andy Weir 0553448129 Kate 4 3.66 2017
author: Andy Weir
name: Kate
average rating: 3.66
book published: 2017
rating: 4
read at: 2018/01/01
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:

]]> 30267929
As one sibling is forced into exile, another attempts to flee the continent, while others struggle to escape certain death, either by working grueling hours on empty stomachs in the factories of the ghetto or by hiding as gentiles in plain sight. Driven by an unwavering will to survive and by the fear that they may never see one another again, the Kurcs must rely on hope, ingenuity, and inner strength to persevere.

An extraordinary, propulsive novel, We Were the Lucky Ones demonstrates how in the face of the twentieth century’s darkest moment, the human spirit can endure and even thrive.]]> 403 Georgia Hunter 0399563083 Kate 4 4.39 2017
author: Georgia Hunter
name: Kate
average rating: 4.39
book published: 2017
rating: 4
read at: 2019/01/01
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:

]]> 22551730
On May 1, 1915, a luxury ocean liner as richly appointed as an English country house sailed out of New York, bound for Liverpool, carrying a record number of children and infants. The passengers were anxious. Germany had declared the seas around Britain to be a war zone, and for months, its U-boats had brought terror to the North Atlantic. But the Lusitania was one of the era's great transatlantic "Greyhounds" and her captain, William Thomas Turner, placed tremendous faith in the gentlemanly strictures of warfare that for a century had kept civilian ships safe from attack. He knew, moreover, that his ship - the fastest then in service - could outrun any threat.

Germany, however, was determined to change the rules of the game, and Walther Schwieger, the captain of Unterseeboot-20, was happy to oblige. Meanwhile, an ultra-secret British intelligence unit tracked Schwieger's U-boat, but told no one. As U-20 and the Lusitania made their way toward Liverpool, an array of forces both grand and achingly small - hubris, a chance fog, a closely guarded secret, and more--all converged to produce one of the great disasters of history.

It is a story that many of us think we know but don't, and Erik Larson tells it thrillingly, switching between hunter and hunted while painting a larger portrait of America at the height of the Progressive Era. Full of glamour, mystery, and real-life suspense, Dead Wake brings to life a cast of evocative characters, from famed Boston bookseller Charles Lauriat to pioneering female architect Theodate Pope Riddle to President Wilson, a man lost to grief, dreading the widening war but also captivated by the prospect of new love. Gripping and important, Dead Wake captures the sheer drama and emotional power of a disaster that helped place America on the road to war.]]> 430 Erik Larson 0307408868 Kate 4 4.10 2015
author: Erik Larson
name: Kate
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2015
rating: 4
read at: 2019/01/01
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:

]]> 32766443
Vying with Jocks, Nerds, Mutants, and Multi-Dimensioners to find his mate, Gork encounters an unforgettable cast of friends and foes, including Dr. Terrible, the mad scientist; Fribby, a robot dragon obsessed with death; and Metheldra, a healer specializing in acupuncture with swords. But finally it is Gork's biggest perceived weakness, his huge heart, that will guide him through his epic quest and help him reach his ultimate destination: planet Earth.]]> 380 Gabe Hudson 0375413960 Kate 5
I liked the book and story idea]]> 2.81 2017
author: Gabe Hudson
name: Kate
average rating: 2.81
book published: 2017
rating: 5
read at: 2019/01/01
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:
I posted that I read this on my Instagram and the author interacted with me. It was cool.

I liked the book and story idea
]]> 52292127
People say Beartown is finished. A tiny community nestled deep in the forest, it is slowly losing ground to the ever encroaching trees. But down by the lake stands an old ice rink, built generations ago by the working men who founded this town. And in that ice rink is the reason people in Beartown believe tomorrow will be better than today. Their junior ice hockey team is about to compete in the national semi-finals, and they actually have a shot at winning. All the hopes and dreams of this place now rest on the shoulders of a handful of teenage boys.

Being responsible for the hopes of an entire town is a heavy burden, and the semi-final match is the catalyst for a violent act that will leave a young girl traumatized and a town in turmoil. Accusations are made and, like ripples on a pond, they travel through all of Beartown, leaving no resident unaffected.

Beartown explores the hopes that bring a small community together, the secrets that tear it apart, and the courage it takes for an individual to go against the grain. In this story of a small forest town, Fredrik Backman has found the entire world.]]> 432 Fredrik Backman Kate 4
]]> 4.24 2016
author: Fredrik Backman
name: Kate
average rating: 4.24
book published: 2016
rating: 4
read at: 2020/12/01
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:
I would rate this at 4.5


]]> 249747 Artemis Fowl is a riveting, magical adventure.]]> 396 Eoin Colfer Kate 3 3.86 2001
author: Eoin Colfer
name: Kate
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2001
rating: 3
read at: 2020/12/01
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:

]]> 15823480 Anna Karenina provides a vast panorama of contemporary life in Russia and of humanity in general. In it Tolstoy uses his intense imaginative insight to create some of the most memorable characters in all of literature. Anna is a sophisticated woman who abandons her empty existence as the wife of Karenin and turns to Count Vronsky to fulfil her passionate nature - with tragic consequences. Levin is a reflection of Tolstoy himself, often expressing the author's own views and convictions.

Throughout, Tolstoy points no moral, merely inviting us not to judge but to watch. As Rosemary Edmonds comments, 'He leaves the shifting patterns of the kaleidoscope to bring home the meaning of the brooding words following the title, 'Vengeance is mine, and I will repay.]]> 964 Leo Tolstoy 0345803922 Kate 4 I finally read this!<br /> 4.11 1878
author: Leo Tolstoy
name: Kate
average rating: 4.11
book published: 1878
rating: 4
read at: 2020/12/01
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:
I finally read this!

]]> 18693763
Lydia is the favourite child of Marilyn and James Lee; a girl who inherited her mother's bright blue eyes and her father's jet-black hair. Her parents are determined that Lydia will fulfill the dreams they were unable to pursue - in Marilyn's case that her daughter become a doctor rather than a homemaker, in James's case that Lydia be popular at school, a girl with a busy social life and the centre of every party. But Lydia is under pressures that have nothing to do with growing up in 1970s small town Ohio. Her father is an American born of first-generation Chinese immigrants, and his ethnicity, and hers, make them conspicuous in any setting.

When Lydia's body is found in the local lake, James is consumed by guilt and sets out on a reckless path that may destroy his marriage. Marilyn, devastated and vengeful, is determined to make someone accountable, no matter what the cost. Lydia's older brother, Nathan, is convinced that local bad boy Jack is somehow involved. But it's the youngest in the family - Hannah - who observes far more than anyone realises and who may be the only one who knows what really happened.

Everything I Never Told You is a gripping page-turner, about secrets, love, longing, lies and race.

Librarian's note: There is an Alternate Cover Edition for this edition of this book here.]]> 297 Celeste Ng 159420571X Kate 3 3.81 2014
author: Celeste Ng
name: Kate
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2014
rating: 3
read at: 2020/12/01
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:

]]> 52454426
But the journals of resident Kate Holland, recovered from the town’s bloody wreckage, capture a tale too harrowing—and too earth-shattering in its implications—to be forgotten.

In these pages, Max Brooks brings Kate’s extraordinary account to light for the first time, faithfully reproducing her words alongside his own extensive investigations into the massacre and the legendary beasts behind it.

Kate’s is a tale of unexpected strength and resilience, of humanity’s defiance in the face of a terrible predator’s gaze, and inevitably, of savagery and death.

Yet it is also far more than that.

Because if what Kate Holland saw in those days is real, then we must accept the impossible. We must accept that the creature known as Bigfoot walks among us—and that it is a beast of terrible strength and ferocity.

Part survival narrative, part bloody horror tale, part scientific journey into the boundaries between truth and fiction, this is a Bigfoot story as only Max Brooks could chronicle it—and like none you’ve ever read before.]]> 286 Max Brooks 1984826786 Kate 4 3.87 2020
author: Max Brooks
name: Kate
average rating: 3.87
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2020/12/01
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:
This was better than I thought it would be.
]]> 9634967
In the months leading up to this, sporadic glitches are noticed by a handful of unconnected humans—a single mother disconcerted by her daughter's menacing "smart" toys, a lonely Japanese bachelor who is victimized by his domestic robot companion, an isolated U.S. soldier who witnesses a "pacification unit" go haywire—but most are unaware of the growing rebellion until it is too late.

When the Robot War ignites—at a moment known later as Zero Hour—humankind will be both decimated and, possibly, for the first time in history, united. Robopocalypse is a brilliantly conceived action-filled epic, a terrifying story with heart-stopping implications for the real technology all around us ... and an entertaining and engaging thriller unlike anything else written in years.]]> 368 Daniel H. Wilson 0385533853 Kate 4 3.70 2011
author: Daniel H. Wilson
name: Kate
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2011
rating: 4
read at: 2020/11/01
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:

]]> 51211417
Flash forward ten years. A true-crime docuseries reassembles the jurors, with particular focus on Maya, now a defense attorney herself. When one of the jurors is found dead in Maya's hotel room, all evidence points to her as the killer. Now, she must prove her own innocence--by getting to the bottom of a case that is far from closed.

As the present-day murder investigation weaves together with the story of what really happened during their deliberation, told by each of the jurors in turn, the secrets they have all been keeping threaten to come out--with drastic consequences for all involved.

From the Academy Award-winning screenwriter of The Imitation Game and bestselling author of The Last Days of Night : a jury on a murder trial is deadlocked when a young woman manages to turn the tide to acquit; now, a decade later, she must face the consequences when a fellow juror is killed and she is the prime suspect. ]]> 336 Graham Moore 039959177X Kate 4 3.83 2020
author: Graham Moore
name: Kate
average rating: 3.83
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2020/11/01
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:

]]> 13206828
Their best hope lies with Cress, a girl imprisoned on a satellite since childhood who's only ever had her netscreens as company. All that screen time has made Cress an excellent hacker. Unfortunately, she's just received orders from Levana to track down Cinder and her handsome accomplice.

When a daring rescue of Cress goes awry, the group is separated. Cress finally has her freedom, but it comes at a higher price. Meanwhile, Queen Levana will let nothing prevent her marriage to Emperor Kai. Cress, Scarlet, and Cinder may not have signed up to save the world, but they may be the only hope the world has.]]> 552 Marissa Meyer 0312642970 Kate 4 this series is a fun read 4.40 2014
author: Marissa Meyer
name: Kate
average rating: 4.40
book published: 2014
rating: 4
read at: 2020/11/01
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:
this series is a fun read
]]> 43575115 From the New York Times bestselling author of The Night Circus, a timeless love story set in a secret underground world—a place of pirates, painters, lovers, liars, and ships that sail upon a starless sea.

Zachary Ezra Rawlins is a graduate student in Vermont when he discovers a mysterious book hidden in the stacks. As he turns the pages, entranced by tales of lovelorn prisoners, key collectors, and nameless acolytes, he reads something strange: a story from his own childhood. Bewildered by this inexplicable book and desperate to make sense of how his own life came to be recorded, Zachary uncovers a series of clues—a bee, a key, and a sword—that lead him to a masquerade party in New York, to a secret club, and through a doorway to an ancient library hidden far below the surface of the earth. What Zachary finds in this curious place is more than just a buried home for books and their guardians—it is a place of lost cities and seas, lovers who pass notes under doors and across time, and of stories whispered by the dead. Zachary learns of those who have sacrificed much to protect this realm, relinquishing their sight and their tongues to preserve this archive, and also of those who are intent on its destruction. Together with Mirabel, a fierce, pink-haired protector of the place, and Dorian, a handsome, barefoot man with shifting alliances, Zachary travels the twisting tunnels, darkened stairwells, crowded ballrooms, and sweetly soaked shores of this magical world, discovering his purpose—in both the mysterious book and in his own life.]]> 498 Erin Morgenstern 038554121X Kate 3 more like 3.5 stars 3.82 2019
author: Erin Morgenstern
name: Kate
average rating: 3.82
book published: 2019
rating: 3
read at: 2020/11/01
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:
more like 3.5 stars
]]> 39927096 You are a failed novelist about to turn fifty. A wedding invitation arrives in the mail: your boyfriend of the past nine years now engaged to someone else. You can’t say yes--it would all be too awkward--and you can’t say no--it would look like defeat. On your desk are a series of half-baked literary invitations you’ve received from around the world.

QUESTION: How do you arrange to skip town?

ANSWER: You accept them all.

If you are Arthur Less.

Thus begins an around-the-world-in-eighty-days fantasia that will take Arthur Less to Mexico, Italy, Germany, Morocco, India and Japan and put thousands of miles between him and the problems he refuses to face. What could possibly go wrong?

Well: Arthur will almost fall in love in Paris, almost fall to his death in Berlin, barely escape to a Moroccan ski chalet from a Sahara sandstorm, accidentally book himself as the (only) writer-in-residence at a Christian Retreat Center in Southern India, and arrive in Japan too late for the cherry blossoms. In between: science fiction fans, crazed academics, emergency rooms, starlets, doctors, exes and, on a desert island in the Arabian Sea, the last person on Earth he wants to see. Somewhere in there: he will turn fifty. The second phase of life, as he thinks of it, falling behind him like the second phase of a rocket. There will be his first love. And there will be his last.

A love story, a satire of the American abroad, a rumination on time and the human heart, by an author The New York Times has hailed as “inspired, lyrical,� “elegiac,� “ingenious,� as well as “too sappy by half,� Less shows a writer at the peak of his talents raising the curtain on our shared human comedy.]]> 273 Andrew Sean Greer Kate 2 I thought it would be funnier 3.61 2017
author: Andrew Sean Greer
name: Kate
average rating: 3.61
book published: 2017
rating: 2
read at: 2020/11/01
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:
I thought it would be funnier
]]> 41057294
A year later, they’re both studying at Trinity College in Dublin. Marianne has found her feet in a new social world while Connell hangs at the sidelines, shy and uncertain. Throughout their years in college, Marianne and Connell circle one another, straying toward other people and possibilities but always magnetically, irresistibly drawn back together. Then, as she veers into self-destruction and he begins to search for meaning elsewhere, each must confront how far they are willing to go to save the other.

Sally Rooney brings her brilliant psychological acuity and perfectly spare prose to a story that explores the subtleties of class, the electricity of first love, and the complex entanglements of family and friendship.]]> 273 Sally Rooney 1984822179 Kate 2 More like a 2.5 3.81 2018
author: Sally Rooney
name: Kate
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2018
rating: 2
read at: 2020/10/01
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:
More like a 2.5
]]> 40597810 Everyone knows DAISY JONES & THE SIX, but nobody knows the reason behind their split at the absolute height of their popularity . . . until now.

Daisy is a girl coming of age in L.A. in the late sixties, sneaking into clubs on the Sunset Strip, sleeping with rock stars, and dreaming of singing at the Whisky a Go Go. The sex and drugs are thrilling, but it’s the rock ’n� roll she loves most. By the time she’s twenty, her voice is getting noticed, and she has the kind of heedless beauty that makes people do crazy things.

Also getting noticed is The Six, a band led by the brooding Billy Dunne. On the eve of their first tour, his girlfriend Camila finds out she’s pregnant, and with the pressure of impending fatherhood and fame, Billy goes a little wild on the road.

Daisy and Billy cross paths when a producer realizes that the key to supercharged success is to put the two together. What happens next will become the stuff of legend.

The making of that legend is chronicled in this riveting and unforgettable novel, written as an oral history of one of the biggest bands of the seventies. Taylor Jenkins Reid is a talented writer who takes her work to a new level with Daisy Jones & The Six, brilliantly capturing a place and time in an utterly distinctive voice.]]> 368 Taylor Jenkins Reid 1524798622 Kate 4 4.20 2019
author: Taylor Jenkins Reid
name: Kate
average rating: 4.20
book published: 2019
rating: 4
read at: 2020/10/01
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:

]]> 51933429
On an island off the coast of Ireland, guests gather to celebrate two people joining their lives together as one. The groom: handsome and charming, a rising television star. The bride: smart and ambitious, a magazine publisher. It’s a wedding for a magazine, or for a celebrity: the designer dress, the remote location, the luxe party favors, the boutique whiskey. The cell phone service may be spotty and the waves may be rough, but every detail has been expertly planned and will be expertly executed.

But perfection is for plans, and people are all too human. As the champagne is popped and the festivities begin, resentments and petty jealousies begin to mingle with the reminiscences and well wishes. The groomsmen begin the drinking game from their school days. The bridesmaid not-so-accidentally ruins her dress. The bride’s oldest (male) friend gives an uncomfortably caring toast.

And then someone turns up dead. Who didn’t wish the happy couple well? And perhaps more important, why?]]> 330 Lucy Foley Kate 3 3.64 2020
author: Lucy Foley
name: Kate
average rating: 3.64
book published: 2020
rating: 3
read at: 2020/10/01
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:

]]> 38746485
In her memoir, a work of deep reflection and mesmerizing storytelling, Michelle Obama invites readers into her world, chronicling the experiences that have shaped her—from her childhood on the South Side of Chicago to her years as an executive balancing the demands of motherhood and work, to her time spent at the world’s most famous address. With unerring honesty and lively wit, she describes her triumphs and her disappointments, both public and private, telling her full story as she has lived it—in her own words and on her own terms. Warm, wise, and revelatory, Becoming is the deeply personal reckoning of a woman of soul and substance who has steadily defied expectations—and whose story inspires us to do the same.]]> 426 Michelle Obama 1524763136 Kate 5 4.42 2018
author: Michelle Obama
name: Kate
average rating: 4.42
book published: 2018
rating: 5
read at: 2020/10/01
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:
Loved her honesty in the storytelling
]]> 31869155 From the founding editor of The Wall Street Journal's sports section comes a bold new theory of leadership drawn from the elite captains who inspired their teams to achieve extraordinary success.

Named one of the best business books of the year by CNBC, strategy+business, Forbes, and SI.com

The secret to winning is not what you think it is.
It's not the coach. It's not the star.
It's not money. It's not a strategy.
It's something else entirely.

Several years ago, Sam Walker set out to answer one of the most hotly debated questions in sports: What are the greatest teams of all time? He devised a formula, then applied it to thousands of teams from leagues all over the world, from the NBA to the English Premier League to Olympic field hockey. When he was done, he had a list of the sixteen most dominant teams in history. At that point, he became obsessed with another, more complicated question: What did these freak teams have in common?

As Walker dug into their stories, a pattern emerged: Each team had the same type of captain--a singular leader with an unconventional skill set who drove it to achieve sustained, historic greatness.

Fueled by a lifetime of sports spectating, twenty years of reporting, and a decade of painstaking research, The Captain Class tells the surprising story of what makes teams exceptional. Drawing on original interviews with athletes from two dozen countries, as well as general managers, coaches, executives, and others skilled at building teams, Walker identifies the seven core qualities of this Captain Class--from extreme doggedness and emotional control to a knack for nonverbal communication to tactical aggression and the courage to stand apart.

Told through riveting accounts of some of the most pressure-soaked moments in sports history--from Bill Russell's legendary "Coleman Play" in the 1957 NBA Finals to Barcelona's "Figo Game" against Real Madrid in 2000--The Captain Class doesn't just bring these events to life; it presents a fresh, counterintuitive take on leadership that can be applied to a wide spectrum of competitive disciplines.

The men and women who make up the Captain Class were never the most skilled athletes, nor were they gifted orators or paragons of sportsmanship. They were often role players who were allergic to the spotlight. In short, the seven attributes they shared challenge your assumptions of what inspired leadership looks like.]]> 352 Sam Walker 0812997190 Kate 3 3.98 2016
author: Sam Walker
name: Kate
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2016
rating: 3
read at: 2020/09/01
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:

]]> 27213329
Why do some people succeed and others fail? Sharing new insights from her landmark research on grit, Angela Duckworth explains why talent is hardly a guarantor of success. Rather, other factors can be even more crucial such as identifying our passions and following through on our commitments.

Drawing on her own powerful story as the daughter of a scientist who frequently bemoaned her lack of smarts, Duckworth describes her winding path through teaching, business consulting, and neuroscience, which led to the hypothesis that what really drives success is not genius, but a special blend of passion and long-term perseverance. As a professor at the University of Pennsylvania, Duckworth created her own character lab and set out to test her theory.

Here, she takes readers into the field to visit teachers working in some of the toughest schools, cadets struggling through their first days at West Point, and young finalists in the National Spelling Bee. She also mines fascinating insights from history and shows what can be gleaned from modern experiments in peak performance. Finally, she shares what she's learned from interviewing dozens of high achievers; from JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon to the cartoon editor of The New Yorker to Seattle Seahawks Coach Pete Carroll.

Winningly personal, insightful, and even life-changing, Grit is a book about what goes through your head when you fall down, and how that not talent or luck makes all the difference.]]> 277 Angela Duckworth 1443442313 Kate 4 4.07 2016
author: Angela Duckworth
name: Kate
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2016
rating: 4
read at: 2020/09/01
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:

]]> 39280445 Could ten days at a health resort really change you forever?

These nine perfect strangers are about to find out...

Nine people gather at a remote health resort. Some are here to lose weight, some are here to get a reboot on life, some are here for reasons they can’t even admit to themselves. Amidst all of the luxury and pampering, the mindfulness and meditation, they know these ten days might involve some real work. But none of them could imagine just how challenging the next ten days are going to be.

Frances Welty, the formerly best-selling romantic novelist, arrives at Tranquillum House nursing a bad back, a broken heart, and an exquisitely painful paper cut. She’s immediately intrigued by her fellow guests. Most of them don’t look to be in need of a health resort at all. But the person that intrigues her most is the strange and charismatic owner/director of Tranquillum House. Could this person really have the answers Frances didn’t even know she was seeking? Should Frances put aside her doubts and immerse herself in everything Tranquillum House has to offer—or should she run while she still can?

It’s not long before every guest at Tranquillum House is asking exactly the same question.

Combining all of the hallmarks that have made Liane Moriarty's writing a go-to for anyone looking for wickedly smart, page-turning fiction that will make you laugh and gasp, Nine Perfect Strangers once again shows why she is a master of her craft.]]> 453 Liane Moriarty 1250069823 Kate 3 I liked it. ]]> 3.53 2018
author: Liane Moriarty
name: Kate
average rating: 3.53
book published: 2018
rating: 3
read at: 2020/09/01
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:
More of a 3.5 stars.
I liked it.
]]> 397483
Burnham's challenge was immense. In a short period of time, he was forced to overcome the death of his partner and numerous other obstacles to construct the famous "White City" around which the fair was built. His efforts to complete the project, and the fair's incredible success, are skillfully related along with entertaining appearances by such notables as Buffalo Bill Cody, Susan B. Anthony, and Thomas Edison.

The activities of the sinister Dr. Holmes, who is believed to be responsible for scores of murders around the time of the fair, are equally remarkable. He devised and erected the World's Fair Hotel, complete with crematorium and gas chamber, near the fairgrounds and used the event as well as his own charismatic personality to lure victims.

Combining the stories of an architect and a killer in one book, mostly in alternating chapters, seems like an odd choice but it works. The magical appeal and horrifying dark side of 19th-century Chicago are both revealed through Larson's skillful writing. - John Moe]]> 464 Erik Larson 0609608444 Kate 4 4.02 2003
author: Erik Larson
name: Kate
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2003
rating: 4
read at: 2020/09/01
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:
I didn't know any of this before reading, really interesting.
]]> 32718027
But when Nahri accidentally summons an equally sly, darkly mysterious djinn warrior to her side during one of her cons, she’s forced to accept that the magical world she thought only existed in childhood stories is real. For the warrior tells her a new tale: across hot, windswept sands teeming with creatures of fire, and rivers where the mythical marid sleep; past ruins of once-magnificent human metropolises, and mountains where the circling hawks are not what they seem, lies Daevabad, the legendary city of brass, a city to which Nahri is irrevocably bound.

In that city, behind gilded brass walls laced with enchantments, behind the six gates of the six djinn tribes, old resentments are simmering. And when Nahri decides to enter this world, she learns that true power is fierce and brutal. That magic cannot shield her from the dangerous web of court politics. That even the cleverest of schemes can have deadly consequences.

After all, there is a reason they say be careful what you wish for...]]> 532 S.A. Chakraborty 0062678108 Kate 4 4.12 2017
author: S.A. Chakraborty
name: Kate
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2017
rating: 4
read at: 2020/09/01
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:

]]> 13206760
Halfway around the world, Scarlet Benoit's grandmother is missing. It turns out there are many things Scarlet doesn't know about her grandmother, or the grave danger she has lived in her whole life. When Scarlet encounters Wolf, a street fighter who may have information as to her grandmother's whereabouts, she is loath to trust this stranger, but is inexplicably drawn to him, and he to her. As Scarlet and Wolf unravel one mystery, they encounter another when they meet Cinder. Now, all of them must stay one step ahead of the vicious Lunar Queen Levana.

The adventure continues in this fresh fairytale retelling that combines elements of Cinderella and Little Red Riding Hood.]]> 454 Marissa Meyer 0312642962 Kate 4 4.24 2013
author: Marissa Meyer
name: Kate
average rating: 4.24
book published: 2013
rating: 4
read at: 2020/08/01
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:
This is a fun series to read.
]]> 38390751 Do you know how to play the game you're in?

In finite games, like football or chess, the players are known, the rules are fixed, and the endpoint is clear. The winners and losers are easily identified.

In infinite games, like business or politics or life itself, the players come and go, the rules are changeable, and there is no defined endpoint. There are no winners or losers in an infinite game; there is only ahead and behind.

The more I started to understand the difference between finite and infinite games, the more I began to see infinite games all around us. I started to see that many of the struggles that organizations face exist simply because their leaders were playing with a finite mindset in an infinite game. These organizations tend to lag behind in innovation, discretionary effort, morale and ultimately performance.

The leaders who embrace an infinite mindset, in stark contrast, build stronger, more innovative, more inspiring organizations. Their people trust each other and their leaders. They have the resilience to thrive in an ever-changing world, while their competitors fall by the wayside. Ultimately, they are the ones who lead the rest of us into the future.

Any worthwhile undertaking starts with Why - the purpose, cause or belief that inspires us to do what we do and inspires others to join us. Good leaders know how to build Circles of Safety that promote trust and cooperation throughout their organizations. But that's not enough to help us chart a course through the unpredictable, often chaotic landscape of today's marketplace.

I now believe that the ability to adopt an infinite mindset is a prerequisite for any leader who aspires to leave their organization in better shape than they found it.]]> 251 Simon Sinek 073521350X Kate 1 It was terrible.
The idea is okay but the execution was flawed. There were several mistakes and problems with the research.
]]> 4.15 2017
author: Simon Sinek
name: Kate
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2017
rating: 1
read at: 2020/08/29
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:
Had to read this for work.
It was terrible.
The idea is okay but the execution was flawed. There were several mistakes and problems with the research.

]]> 45897523 Big Oil and Gas Versus Democracy—Winner Take All

Rachel Maddow’sĚýBlowoutĚýoffers a dark, serpentine, riveting tour of the unimaginably lucrative and corrupt oil-and-gas industry. With her trademark black humor, Maddow takes us on a switchback journey around the globe—from Oklahoma City to Siberia to Equatorial Guinea—exposing the greed and incompetence of Big Oil and Gas. She shows how Russia’s rich reserves of crude have, paradoxically, stunted its growth, forcing Putin to maintain his power by spreading Russia's rot into its rivals, its neighbors, the United States, and the West’s most important alliances. Chevron, BP, and a host of other industry players get their star turn, but ExxonMobil and the deceptively well-behaved Rex Tillerson emerge as two of the past century's most consequential corporate villains. The oil-and-gas industry has weakened democracies in developed and developing countries, fouled oceans and rivers, and propped up authoritarian thieves and killers. But being outraged at it is, according to Maddow, “like being indignant when a lion takes down and eats a gazelle. You can't really blame the lion. It's in her nature.â€�

This book is a clarion call to contain the to stop subsidizing the wealthiest industry on earth, to fight for transparency, and to check the influence of predatory oil executives and their enablers. The stakes have never been higher. As Maddow writes, “Democracy either wins this one or disappears.”]]> 400 Rachel Maddow 0525575499 Kate 4 4.34 2019
author: Rachel Maddow
name: Kate
average rating: 4.34
book published: 2019
rating: 4
read at: 2020/08/29
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:

]]> 13206900
When Winter develops feelings for the handsome palace guard, Jacin, she fears the evil Queen will crush their romance before it has a chance to begin.

But there are stirrings against the Queen across the land. Together with the cyborg mechanic, Cinder, and her allies, Winter might even find the power to launch a revolution and win a war that's been raging for far too long.

Can Cinder, Scarlet, Cress, and Winter claim their happily ever afters by defeating Levana once and for all?]]> 827 Marissa Meyer 0312642989 Kate 3 4.42 2015
author: Marissa Meyer
name: Kate
average rating: 4.42
book published: 2015
rating: 3
read at: 2021/01/13
date added: 2021/01/16
shelves:
review:
Books like this (YA / sci-fi) are my guilty pleasure. I really liked book 1 and had to finish the story. All four books are pretty good.
]]> 51187948
On Winston Churchill's first day as prime minister, Hitler invaded Holland and Belgium. Poland and Czechoslovakia had already fallen, and the Dunkirk evacuation was just two weeks away. For the next twelve months, Hitler would wage a relentless bombing campaign, killing 45,000 Britons. It was up to Churchill to hold the country together and persuade President Franklin Roosevelt that Britain was a worthy ally-and willing to fight to the end.

In The Splendid and the Vile, Erik Larson shows, in cinematic detail, how Churchill taught the British people "the art of being fearless." It is a story of political brinkmanship, but it's also an intimate domestic drama set against the backdrop of Churchill's prime-ministerial country home, Chequers; his wartime retreat, Ditchley, where he and his entourage go when the moon is brightest and the bombing threat is highest; and of course 10 Downing Street in London.

Drawing on diaries, original archival documents, and once-secret intelligence reports-some released only recently-Larson provides a new lens on London's darkest year through the day-to-day experience of Churchill and his wife, Clementine; their youngest daughter, Mary, who chafes against her parents' wartime protectiveness; their son, Randolph, and his beautiful, unhappy wife, Pamela; Pamela's illicit lover, a dashing American emissary; and the cadre of close advisers who comprised Churchill's "Secret Circle," including his lovestruck private secretary, John Colville; newspaper baron Lord Beaverbrook; and the Rasputin-like Frederick Lindemann.

The Splendid and the Vile takes readers out of today's political dysfunction and back to a time of true leadership, when-in the face of unrelenting horror-Churchill's eloquence, courage, and perseverance bound a country, and a family, together."--]]> 546 Erik Larson 038534872X Kate 4 Erik Larson books are always good to read.]]> 4.30 2020
author: Erik Larson
name: Kate
average rating: 4.30
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2021/01/04
date added: 2021/01/04
shelves:
review:
Interesting and informative.
Erik Larson books are always good to read.
]]> 17377791 Dinosaurs, saber-toothed tigers and fierce Neanderthals inhabit the mysterious continent of Caspak in this classic lost world adventure, perfect for fans of Jurassic Park

1916. It’s wartime and an American ship has just been torpedoed. Flung into the open seas, Bowen Tyler is rescued and taken captive aboard an enemy submarine. With him held prisoner alongside fellow survivor, the beautiful Lys la Rue, the submarine enters unchartered seas. On the horizon, land is spotted—a mysterious island, previously undiscovered. Cautiously, crew and prisoners alike disembark to explore the strange new continent. Surrounded by primeval jungle, they are soon to discover life here has stood still for millions of years, with Neanderthals and dinosaurs still roaming. Taking charge immediately, Tyler sets up camp and brokers a tentative pact between prisoners and crew for them to work together. But Tyler’s new life will be a constant fight for survival. Peace between the factions in his camp will crumble, the Neanderthals will attack, and the dinosaurs are getting closer. And finally when Lys La Rue is kidnapped, Tyler knows he must leave the safety of camp and battle to save her, while ever getting closer to unraveling the secrets of the incredible continent of Caspak. This is a classic lost world novel, full of adventure, war, and intrigue, from a master of the genre.]]> 148 Edgar Rice Burroughs Kate 3 3.75 1918
author: Edgar Rice Burroughs
name: Kate
average rating: 3.75
book published: 1918
rating: 3
read at: 2016/01/01
date added: 2019/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> 25893693
On the eve of a fateful war, New York socialite Caroline Ferriday has her hands full with her post at the French consulate and a new love on the horizon. But Caroline’s world is forever changed when Hitler’s army invades Poland in September 1939—and then sets its sights on France.

An ocean away from Caroline, Kasia Kuzmerick, a Polish teenager, senses her carefree youth disappearing as she sinks deeper into her role as courier for the underground resistance movement. In a tense atmosphere of watchful eyes and suspect neighbors, one false move can have dire consequences.

For ambitious young German doctor, Herta Oberheuser, an ad for a government medical position seems her ticket out of a desolate life. But, once hired, she finds herself trapped in a male-dominated realm of Nazi secrets and power.

The lives of these three women are set on a collision course when the unthinkable happens and Kasia is sent to Ravensbrück, the notorious female-only Nazi concentration camp. The tragedy and triumph of their stories cross continents—from New York to Paris, and Germany to Poland—capturing the indomitable pull of compassion to bring justice to those whom history has forgotten.

In Lilac Girls, Martha Hall Kelly has crafted a remarkable novel of unsung women and their quest for love, happiness, and second chances. It is a story that will keep readers bonded with the characters, searching for the truth, until the final pages.]]> 487 Martha Hall Kelly 1101883073 Kate 5 4.27 2016
author: Martha Hall Kelly
name: Kate
average rating: 4.27
book published: 2016
rating: 5
read at: 2019/01/01
date added: 2019/01/04
shelves:
review:

]]> 18366539 330 Christopher John Boyce 0991534204 Kate 3 3.84 2013
author: Christopher John Boyce
name: Kate
average rating: 3.84
book published: 2013
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2018/12/29
shelves:
review:

]]> 38657386
In Leadership, Goodwin draws upon the four presidents she has studied most closely—Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Lyndon B. Johnson (in civil rights)—to show how they recognized leadership qualities within themselves and were recognized as leaders by others. By looking back to their first entries into public life, we encounter them at a time when their paths were filled with confusion, fear, and hope.

Leadership tells the story of how they all collided with dramatic reversals that disrupted their lives and threatened to shatter forever their ambitions. Nonetheless, they all emerged fitted to confront the contours and dilemmas of their times.

No common pattern describes the trajectory of leadership. Although set apart in background, abilities, and temperament, these men shared a fierce ambition and a deep-seated resilience that enabled them to surmount uncommon hardships. At their best, all four were guided by a sense of moral purpose. At moments of great challenge, they were able to summon their talents to enlarge the opportunities and lives of others.]]> 473 Doris Kearns Goodwin Kate 0 to-read 4.38 2018
author: Doris Kearns Goodwin
name: Kate
average rating: 4.38
book published: 2018
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2018/12/14
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 27161178
Moving from World War II through NASA’s golden age, touching on the civil rights era, the Space Race, the Cold War, and the women’s rights movement, Hidden Figures interweaves a rich history of mankind’s greatest adventure with the intimate stories of five courageous women whose work forever changed the world.]]> 346 Margot Lee Shetterly 006236359X Kate 3 3.95 2016
author: Margot Lee Shetterly
name: Kate
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2016
rating: 3
read at: 2016/01/01
date added: 2018/12/11
shelves:
review:

]]> 6424171 An alternate cover edition can be found here.

An astonishing technique for recovering and cloning dinosaur DNA has been discovered. Now humankind’s most thrilling fantasies have come true. Creatures extinct for eons roam Jurassic Park with their awesome presence and profound mystery, and all the world can visit them—for a price. Until something goes wrong. . . .--back cover]]> 416 Michael Crichton 0345370775 Kate 5 favorites 4.25 1990
author: Michael Crichton
name: Kate
average rating: 4.25
book published: 1990
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2018/12/07
shelves: favorites
review:

]]> 40293 402 Orson Scott Card 0812508645 Kate 0 to-read 3.97 1996
author: Orson Scott Card
name: Kate
average rating: 3.97
book published: 1996
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2018/11/05
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 15814913 Islands, Oceans, and Dreams is a true story of a man who, at the age of 33, began dreaming of voyaging with his wife to the South Pacific. He wasn't an adventurer or daring by nature, but he bought a boat and began learning the ways of the sea. Twenty years later, racked with the pain of divorce and still aching to live out his dream, he set off alone for Tahiti. After reaching French Polynesia, he continued cruising for seven years and wound up solo sailing around the world. Islands, Oceans, and Dreams takes the listener on that voyage.

From turquoise lagoons to pirates, with plenty of adventure in between, this is a must-read for any sailor or armchair traveler who loves stories of the sea.

Michael Salvaneschi has more than 30 years of experience sailing California’s offshore Islands. His two voyages to Mexico, his two-year stint as a commercial swordfisherman and his seven-year solo voyage around the world have taught him much about seamanship. As a guest speaker at yacht clubs, sailing societies, and service groups, Michael tells his stories and shares his experiences as a solo sailor.]]> 19 Michael Salvaneschi Kate 3 3.63
author: Michael Salvaneschi
name: Kate
average rating: 3.63
book published:
rating: 3
read at: 2018/09/16
date added: 2018/09/17
shelves:
review:

]]> 22674105 Kevin Kwan, bestselling author of Crazy Rich Asians, is back with a wickedly funny new novel of social climbing, secret e-mails, art-world scandal, lovesick billionaires, and the outrageous story of what happens when Rachel Chu, engaged to marry Asia's most eligible bachelor, discovers her birthfather.

On the eve of her wedding to Nicholas Young, heir to one of the greatest fortunes in Asia, Rachel should be over the moon. She has a flawless Asscher-cut diamond from JAR, a wedding dress she loves more than anything found in the salons of Paris, and a fiance willing to sacrifice his entire inheritance in order to marry her. But Rachel still mourns the fact that her birthfather, a man she never knew, won't be able to walk her down the aisle. Until: a shocking revelation draws Rachel into a world of Shanghai splendor beyond anything she has ever imagined. Here we meet Carlton, a Ferrari-crashing bad boy known for Prince Harry-like antics; Colette, a celebrity girlfriend chased by fevered paparazzi; and the man Rachel has spent her entire life waiting to meet: her father. Meanwhile, Singapore's It Girl, Astrid Leong, is shocked to discover that there is a downside to having a newly minted tech billionaire husband. A romp through Asia's most exclusive clubs, auction houses, and estates, China Rich Girlfriend brings us into the elite circles of Mainland China, introducing a captivating cast of characters, and offering an inside glimpse at what it's like to be gloriously, crazily, China-rich.]]> 378 Kevin Kwan 0385539088 Kate 3 3.80 2015
author: Kevin Kwan
name: Kate
average rating: 3.80
book published: 2015
rating: 3
read at: 2018/09/02
date added: 2018/09/02
shelves:
review:

]]> 32620335
Along with Church and his team of Harvard scientists, a world-famous conservationist and a genius Russian scientist plan to turn a tract of the Siberian tundra into Pleistocene Park, populating the permafrost with ancient herbivores as a hedge against an environmental ticking time bomb.]]> 304 Ben Mezrich 1501135554 Kate 3 3.49 2017
author: Ben Mezrich
name: Kate
average rating: 3.49
book published: 2017
rating: 3
read at: 2018/08/27
date added: 2018/08/27
shelves:
review:

]]> 11275323
Moist von Lipwig is not a man who enjoys hard work - as master of the Post Office, the Mint and the Royal Bank his input is, of course, vital... but largely dependent on words, which are fortunately not very heavy and don't always need greasing. However, he does enjoy being alive, which makes a new job offer from Vetinari hard to refuse...

Steam is rising over Discworld, driven by Mister Simnel, the man wi' t'flat cap and sliding rule who has an interesting arrangement with the sine and cosine. Moist will have to grapple with gallons of grease, goblins, a fat controller with a history of throwing employees down the stairs and some very angry dwarfs if he's going to stop it all going off the rails...]]> 377 Terry Pratchett 0857522272 Kate 2 3.97 2013
author: Terry Pratchett
name: Kate
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2013
rating: 2
read at: 2018/08/25
date added: 2018/08/27
shelves:
review:

]]> 25733983
Lab Girl is a book about work, love, and the mountains that can be moved when those two things come together. It is told through Jahren’s stories: about her childhood in rural Minnesota with an uncompromising mother and a father who encouraged hours of play in his classroom’s labs; about how she found a sanctuary in science, and learned to perform lab work done “with both the heart and the hands�; and about the inevitable disappointments, but also the triumphs and exhilarating discoveries, of scientific work.

Yet at the core of this book is the story of a relationship Jahren forged with a brilliant, wounded man named Bill, who becomes her lab partner and best friend. Their sometimes rogue adventures in science take them from the Midwest across the United States and back again, over the Atlantic to the ever-light skies of the North Pole and to tropical Hawaii, where she and her lab currently make their home.]]> 290 Hope Jahren 1101874937 Kate 3 3.95 2016
author: Hope Jahren
name: Kate
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2016
rating: 3
read at: 2018/07/18
date added: 2018/08/18
shelves:
review:

]]> 17402605 An alternate cover edition exists here.

Nicholas Flamel was born in Paris on 28 September 1330. Nearly seven hundred years later, he is acknowledged as the greatest Alchemyst of his day. It is said that he discovered the secret of eternal life. The records show that he died in 1418. But his tomb is empty and Nicholas Flamel lives. The secret of eternal life is hidden within the book he protects—the Book of Abraham the Mage. It's the most powerful book that has ever existed. In the wrong hands, it will destroy the world. And that's exactly what Dr. John Dee plans to do when he steals it. Humankind won't know what's happening until it's too late. And if the prophecy is right, Sophie and Josh Newman are the only ones with the power to save the world as we know it. Sometimes legends are true. And Sophie and Josh Newman are about to find themselves in the middle of the greatest legend of all time.]]> 390 Michael Scott 0552562521 Kate 4 Why isn't this a movie yet??? 3.90 2007
author: Michael Scott
name: Kate
average rating: 3.90
book published: 2007
rating: 4
read at: 2018/08/16
date added: 2018/08/16
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Why isn't this a movie yet???
]]> 33574273 It was a dark and stormy night.

Out of this wild night, a strange visitor comes to the Murry house and beckons Meg, her brother Charles Wallace, and their friend Calvin O'Keefe on a most dangerous and extraordinary adventure—one that will threaten their lives and our universe.

Winner of the 1963 Newbery Medal, A Wrinkle in Time is the first book in Madeleine L'Engle's classic Time Quintet.]]> 218 Madeleine L'Engle 1250153271 Kate 3 3.91 1962
author: Madeleine L'Engle
name: Kate
average rating: 3.91
book published: 1962
rating: 3
read at: 2018/08/10
date added: 2018/08/13
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]]> 9969571 Librarian's note: An alternate cover edition can be found here

IN THE YEAR 2044, reality is an ugly place. The only time teenage Wade Watts really feels alive is when he's jacked into the virtual utopia known as the OASIS. Wade's devoted his life to studying the puzzles hidden within this world's digital confines, puzzles that are based on their creator's obsession with the pop culture of decades past and that promise massive power and fortune to whoever can unlock them.

But when Wade stumbles upon the first clue, he finds himself beset by players willing to kill to take this ultimate prize. The race is on, and if Wade's going to survive, he'll have to win—and confront the real world he's always been so desperate to escape.]]> 480 Ernest Cline 030788743X Kate 4 4.21 2011
author: Ernest Cline
name: Kate
average rating: 4.21
book published: 2011
rating: 4
read at: 2018/08/07
date added: 2018/08/08
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]]> 18498569
"There is nothing hidden that will not be revealed . . ."

On a brisk autumn day in 1686, eighteen-year-old Nella Oortman arrives in Amsterdam to begin a new life as the wife of illustrious merchant trader Johannes Brandt. But her new home, while splendorous, is not welcoming. Johannes is kind yet distant, always locked in his study or at his warehouse office--leaving Nella alone with his sister, the sharp-tongued and forbidding Marin.

But Nella's world changes when Johannes presents her with an extraordinary wedding gift: a cabinet-sized replica of their home. To furnish her gift, Nella engages the services of a miniaturist--an elusive and enigmatic artist whose tiny creations mirror their real-life counterparts in eerie and unexpected ways . . .

Johannes' gift helps Nella to pierce the closed world of the Brandt household. But as she uncovers its unusual secrets, she begins to understand--and fear--the escalating dangers that await them all. In this repressively pious society where gold is worshipped second only to God, to be different is a threat to the moral fabric of society, and not even a man as rich as Johannes is safe. Only one person seems to see the fate that awaits them. Is the miniaturist the key to their salvation . . . or the architect of their destruction?

Enchanting, beautiful, and exquisitely suspenseful, The Miniaturist is a magnificent story of love and obsession, betrayal and retribution, appearance and truth.]]> 400 Jessie Burton 0062306812 Kate 3 3.59 2014
author: Jessie Burton
name: Kate
average rating: 3.59
book published: 2014
rating: 3
read at: 2018/07/30
date added: 2018/07/30
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]]> 34150849
Called "disgraceful," "third-rate," and "not nice" by Donald Trump, NBC News correspondent Katy Tur reported on—and took flak from—the most captivating and volatile presidential candidate in American history.

Tur lived out of a suitcase for a year and a half, following Trump around the country, powered by packets of peanut butter and kept clean with dry shampoo. She visited forty states with the candidate, made more than 3,800 live television reports, listened to endless loops of Elton John’s "Tiny Dancer"—a Trump rally playlist staple.

From day 1 to day 500, Tur documented Trump’s inconsistencies, fact-checked his falsities, and called him out on his lies. In return, Trump repeatedly singled out Tur. He tried to charm her, intimidate her, and shame her. At one point, he got a crowd so riled up against her, Secret Service agents had to walk her to her car.

None of it worked. Facts are stubborn. So was Tur. She was part of the first women-led politics team in the history of network news. The Boys on the Bus became the Girls on the Plane--but the circus remained. Through all the long nights, wild scoops, naked chauvinism, dodgy staffers, and fevered debates, no one had a better view than Tur.

Unbelievable is her darkly comic, fascinatingly bizarre, and often scary story of how America sent a former reality show host to the White House. It’s also the story of what it was like for Tur to be there as it happened, inside a no-rules world where reporters were spat on, demeaned, and discredited. Tur was a foreign correspondent who came home to her most foreign story of all.

FROM THE RECIPIENT OF THEĚý 2017 Walter Cronkite Award for Excellence in Journalism]]> Katy Tur 0062694855 Kate 4 3.87 2017
author: Katy Tur
name: Kate
average rating: 3.87
book published: 2017
rating: 4
read at: 2018/07/22
date added: 2018/07/22
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]]> 13376
At his coming-of-age party, Matteo Alacrán asks El Patrón's bodyguard, "How old am I?...I know I don't have a birthday like humans, but I was born."

"You were harvested," Tam Lin reminds him. "You were grown in that poor cow for nine months and then you were cut out of her."

To most people around him, Matt is not a boy, but a beast. A room full of chicken litter with roaches for friends and old chicken bones for toys is considered good enough for him. But for El Patrón, lord of a country called Opium—a strip of poppy fields lying between the U.S. and what was once called Mexico—Matt is a guarantee of eternal life. El Patrón loves Matt as he loves himself for Matt is himself. They share identical DNA.]]> 380 Nancy Farmer 0689852231 Kate 3 4.08 2002
author: Nancy Farmer
name: Kate
average rating: 4.08
book published: 2002
rating: 3
read at: 2018/07/19
date added: 2018/07/19
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]]> 29100224 If the biblical plagues of Egypt truly happened—could they happen again—on a global scale?

Two years after vanishing into the Sudanese desert, the leader of a British archeological expedition, Professor Harold McCabe, comes stumbling out of the sands, frantic and delirious, but he dies before he can tell his story. The mystery deepens when an autopsy uncovers a bizarre corruption: someone had begun to mummify the professor’s body—while he was still alive.

His strange remains are returned to London for further study, when alarming news arrives from Egypt. The medical team who had performed the man’s autopsy has fallen ill with an unknown disease, one that is quickly spreading throughout Cairo. Fearing the worst, a colleague of the professor reaches out to a longtime friend: Painter Crowe, the director of Sigma Force.Ěý The call is urgent, for Professor McCabe had vanished into the desert while searching for proof of the ten plagues of Moses. As the pandemic grows, a disturbing question arises.Ěý

Are those plagues starting again?

Before Director Crowe can investigate, a mysterious group of assassins leaves behind a fiery wake of destruction and death, erasing all evidence. With the professor’s body incinerated, his home firebombed, Sigma Force must turn to the archaeologist’s only daughter, Jane McCabe, for help. While sifting through what’s left of her father’s work, she discovers a puzzling connection tying the current threat to a shocking historical mystery, one involving the travels of Mark Twain, the genius of Nikola Tesla, and the adventures of famous explorer Henry Morgan Stanley.Ěý

To unravel a secret going back millennia, Director Crowe and Commander Grayson Pierce will be thrust to opposite sides of the globe. One will search for the truth, traveling from the plague-ridden streets of Cairo to a vast ancient tomb buried under the burning sands of the Sudan; the other will struggle to stop a mad genius locked within a remote Arctic engineering complex, risking the lives of all those he holds dear.Ěý

As the global crisis grows ever larger, Sigma Force will confront a threat born of the ancient past and made real by the latest science—a danger that will unleash a cascading series of plagues, culminating in a scourge that could kill all of the world’s children . . . decimating humankind forever.]]> 425 James Rollins 0062381687 Kate 2 3.99 2016
author: James Rollins
name: Kate
average rating: 3.99
book published: 2016
rating: 2
read at: 2018/07/15
date added: 2018/07/18
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]]> 33574161
That tornado was the first of many strange events that seem to follow Weylyn from town to town, although he doesn’t like to take credit. As amazing as these powers may appear, they tend to manifest themselves at inopportune times and places. From freak storms to trees that appear to grow over night, Weylyn’s unique abilities are a curiosity at best and at worst, a danger to himself and the woman he loves. But Mary doesn’t care. Since Weylyn saved her from an angry wolf on her eleventh birthday, she’s known that a relationship with him isn’t without its risks, but as anyone who’s met Weylyn will tell you, once he wanders into your life, you’ll wish he’d never leave.

Beasts of Extraordinary Circumstance tells the story of Weylyn Grey’s life from the perspectives of the people who knew him, loved him, and even a few who thought he was just plain weird. Although he doesn’t stay in any of their lives for long, he leaves each of them with a story to tell. Stories about a boy who lives with wolves, great storms that evaporate into thin air, fireflies that make phosphorescent honey, and a house filled with spider webs and the strange man who inhabits it.

There is one story, however, that Weylyn wishes he could change: his own. But first he has to muster enough courage to knock on Mary’s front door.

In this warm debut novel, Ruth Emmie Lang teaches us about adventure and love in a beautifully written story full of nature and wonder.]]> 346 Ruth Emmie Lang 1250112044 Kate 4 4.17 2017
author: Ruth Emmie Lang
name: Kate
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2017
rating: 4
read at: 2018/07/07
date added: 2018/07/07
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]]> 31451193 A guide to the role of solitude in good leadership, including profiles of historical and contemporary figures who have used solitude to lead with courage, creativity, and strength.

Throughout history, leaders have used solitude as a matter of course. Eisenhower wrote memoranda to himself during World War II as a way to think through complex problems. Martin Luther King found moral courage while sitting alone at his kitchen table one night during the Montgomery bus boycott. Jane Goodall used her intuition in the jungles of Central Africa while learning how to approach chimps. Solitude is a state of mind, a space where you can focus on your own thoughts without distraction, with a power to bring mind and soul together in clear-eyed conviction. Like a great wave that saturates everything in its path, however, handheld devices and other media now leave us awash with the thoughts of others. We are losing solitude without even realizing it.

To find solitude today, a leader must make a conscious effort. This book explains why the effort is worthwhile and how to make it. Through gripping historical accounts and firsthand interviews with a wide range of contemporary leaders, Raymond Kethledge (a federal court of appeals judge) and Michael Erwin (a West Pointer and three-tour combat veteran) show how solitude can enhance clarity, spur creativity, sustain emotional balance, and generate the moral courage necessary to overcome adversity and criticism. Anyone who leads anyone-including oneself-can benefit from solitude. With a foreword by Jim Collins (author of the bestseller Good to Great), Lead Yourself First is a rallying cry to reclaim solitude-and all the benefits, both practical and sublime, that come with it.]]> 240 Raymond M. Kethledge 1632866315 Kate 0 to-read 3.73
author: Raymond M. Kethledge
name: Kate
average rating: 3.73
book published:
rating: 0
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date added: 2018/07/03
shelves: to-read
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]]> 20697413
Once inside, Nigel discovers that humans are not the only life-forms to have been sucked into the Void, where the laws of physics are subtly different and mental powers indistinguishable from magic are commonplace. The humans trapped there are afflicted by an alien species of biological mimics—the Fallers—that are intelligent but merciless killers.

Yet these same aliens may hold the key to destroying the threat of the Void forever—if Nigel can uncover their secrets. As the Fallers� relentless attacks continue, and the fragile human society splinters into civil war, Nigel must uncover the secrets of the Fallers—before he is killed by the very people he has come to save.]]> 640 Peter F. Hamilton 0345547195 Kate 3 4.18 2014
author: Peter F. Hamilton
name: Kate
average rating: 4.18
book published: 2014
rating: 3
read at: 2018/07/01
date added: 2018/07/03
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]]> 18143977
In a mining town in Germany, Werner Pfennig, an orphan, grows up with his younger sister, enchanted by a crude radio they find that brings them news and stories from places they have never seen or imagined. Werner becomes an expert at building and fixing these crucial new instruments and is enlisted to use his talent to track down the resistance. Deftly interweaving the lives of Marie-Laure and Werner, Doerr illuminates the ways, against all odds, people try to be good to one another.

From the highly acclaimed, multiple award-winning Anthony Doerr, the stunningly beautiful instant New York Times bestseller about a blind French girl and a German boy whose paths collide in occupied France as both try to survive the devastation of World War II.

An alternate cover for this ISBN can be found here]]> 544 Anthony Doerr 1476746583 Kate 3 4.31 2014
author: Anthony Doerr
name: Kate
average rating: 4.31
book published: 2014
rating: 3
read at: 2018/06/18
date added: 2018/06/20
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]]> 17470674
Guy Montag is a fireman. His job is to burn books, which are forbidden, being the source of all discord and unhappiness. Even so, Montag is unhappy; there is discord in his marriage. Are books hidden in his house? The Mechanical Hound of the Fire Department, armed with a lethal hypodermic, escorted by helicopters, is ready to track down those dissidents who defy society to preserve and read books.

The classic dystopian novel of a post-literate future, Fahrenheit 451 stands alongside Orwell’s 1984 and Huxley’s Brave New World as a prophetic account of Western civilization’s enslavement by the media, drugs and conformity.

Bradbury’s powerful and poetic prose combines with uncanny insight into the potential of technology to create a novel which, decades on from first publication, still has the power to dazzle and shock.

--back cover]]> 227 Ray Bradbury 0007491565 Kate 0 4.01 1953
author: Ray Bradbury
name: Kate
average rating: 4.01
book published: 1953
rating: 0
read at: 2018/01/01
date added: 2018/06/09
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]]> 32283423 333 Omar El Akkad Kate 0 3.78 2017
author: Omar El Akkad
name: Kate
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2017
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2018/06/09
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]]> 26114130 Everfair, the brilliant Neo-Victorian alternate-history novel from acclaimed short-story writer Nisi Shawl, potently explores the question of what might have come of Belgium's disastrous colonization of the Congo if the native populations had adopted steam technology as their own.

In Shawl's eloquently explored vision, told by a multiplicity of voices that have historically been silenced—Africans, Europeans, East Asians, and African Americans in complex relationships with one another—Fabian socialists from Great Britian join forces with African American missionaries to purchase land from the Belgian Congo's "owner," King Leopold II. This land, named Everfair, is set aside as a safe haven, an imaginary Utopia for native populations of the Congo as well as former slaves returning from America and other places where African natives and their descendants were being mistreated. The work of keeping this land their own is near impossible, and tragedy is unavoidable. Yet the citizens of Everfair are determined, and even try their hand at the rewarding tasks of governance, invention...and romance.

Everfair is not only a beautiful book, but an inspiring and educational one that will give the reader new insight into an often ignored period of history. Shawl's speculative masterpiece thereby reframes the notorious atrocities of Leopold's reign into a marvelous and exciting exploration of the possibilities inherent in a turn of history.]]> 381 Nisi Shawl 076533805X Kate 2 3.15 2016
author: Nisi Shawl
name: Kate
average rating: 3.15
book published: 2016
rating: 2
read at: 2018/06/06
date added: 2018/06/06
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]]> 27171845 Seinfeld—the cultural sensation that changed television and bled into the real world, altering the lives of everyone it touched.

Comedians Larry David and Jerry Seinfeld never thought anyone would watch their silly little sitcom about a New York comedian sitting around talking to his friends. NBC executives didn’t think anyone would watch either, but they bought it anyway, hiding it away in the TV dead zone of summer. But against all odds, viewers began to watch, first a few and then many, until nine years later nearly forty million Americans were tuning in weekly.

In Seinfeldia, acclaimed TV historian and entertainment writer Jennifer Keishin Armstrong celebrates the creators and fans of this American television phenomenon, bringing readers behind-the-scenes of the show while it was on the air and into the world of devotees for whom it never stopped being relevant, a world where the Soup Nazi still spends his days saying “No soup for you!�, Joe Davola gets questioned every day about his sanity, Kenny Kramer makes his living giving tours of New York sights from the show, and fans dress up in Jerry’s famous puffy shirt, dance like Elaine, and imagine plotlines for Seinfeld if it were still on TV.]]> 307 Jennifer Keishin Armstrong 1476756104 Kate 4 3.69 2016
author: Jennifer Keishin Armstrong
name: Kate
average rating: 3.69
book published: 2016
rating: 4
read at: 2018/05/25
date added: 2018/05/26
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]]> 18869970 349 Daphne du Maurier 0316252964 Kate 3 4.02 1951
author: Daphne du Maurier
name: Kate
average rating: 4.02
book published: 1951
rating: 3
read at: 2018/05/19
date added: 2018/05/19
shelves:
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]]> 28363975 Reading The Tao of Bill Murray is like spending time with Bill, but probably safer. Danny Rubin, screenwriter of Groundhog Day.
This collection of the most epic, hilarious, and strange Bill Murray stories, many of which have never before been reported, spotlights the star's extraordinary ability to infuse the everyday with surprise, absurdity, and wonder.
No one will ever believe you.
New York Times bestselling author Gavin Edwards, like the rest of us, has always been fascinated with Bill Murray in particular the beloved actor's adventures off-screen, which rival his filmography for sheer entertainment value. Edwards traveled to the places where Murray has lived, worked, and partied, in search of the most outrageous and hilarious Bill Murray stories from the past four decades, many of which have never before been reported. Bill once paid a child five dollars to ride his bike into a swimming pool. The star convinced Harvard's JV women's basketball team to play with him in a private game of hoops. Many of these surreal encounters ended with Bill whispering, No one will ever believe you into a stranger's ear. But The Tao of Bill Murray is more than just a collection of wacky anecdotes. This volume puts the actor's public clowning into a larger context, as Edwards distills Murray's unique way of being into a set of guiding principles. A sideways mix of comedy and philosophy, full of photo bombs, late-night party crashes, and movie-set antics, this is the perfect book for anyone who calls themselves a Bill Murray fan which is to say, everyone.
Praise for The Tao of Bill Murray
When confronted by life's challenges and opportunities, we should all be asking ourselves, What would Bill Murray do? This book actually has the answers. Jay Duplass, writer, director, actor, fan of Bill Murray
[Gavin Edwards] captures Murray's enigmatic, comic genius. The Washington Post

Rib-tickling. Newsday

If you are among the multitudes who have a Bill Murray story (viz: I was in the airport bar, and who sat down next to me but Bill Murray? ), The Tao of Bill Murray will speak to you. Elle
Murray is an endless delight, and his knack for bons mots and non sequiturs will keep readers laughing before revealing an unexpectedly poignant vision for happiness. . . . A fun and revealing look behind the charm and mythos of Bill Murray that will only strengthen his legend. Kirkus Reviews
This book is bursting with anecdotes that underline Murray's unconventional and fun-loving life. . . . Murray's fans are sure to savor [it] and walk away with a deeper appreciation of the actor and his work. Publishers Weekly(starred review)
I just can't fathom how anyone could not like the man. He lives as much as possible by his own rules; this is a guy who doesn't buy round-trip airline tickets because he prefers to make decisions on the fly. That old question of the three people you'd most like to have dinner with? I'd pick Bill Murray and leave the other two chairs empty just to see who he pulls over to join us. . . . You will love The Tao of Bill Murray. Period. GeekDad
A hilarious read occasionally heartwarming, sometimes head-scratching. . . . Sure to please Murray fans. Library Journal"]]> 354 Gavin Edwards 0812998707 Kate 4 3.54 2016
author: Gavin Edwards
name: Kate
average rating: 3.54
book published: 2016
rating: 4
read at: 2018/05/11
date added: 2018/05/11
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]]> 5297
In this celebrated work Wilde forged a devastating portrait of the effects of evil and debauchery on a young aesthete in late-19th-century England. Combining elements of the Gothic horror novel and decadent French fiction, the book centers on a striking premise: As Dorian Gray sinks into a life of crime and gross sensuality, his body retains perfect youth and vigor while his recently painted portrait grows day by day into a hideous record of evil, which he must keep hidden from the world. For over a century, this mesmerizing tale of horror and suspense has enjoyed wide popularity. It ranks as one of Wilde's most important creations and among the classic achievements of its kind.]]> 272 Oscar Wilde Kate 4 4.13 1890
author: Oscar Wilde
name: Kate
average rating: 4.13
book published: 1890
rating: 4
read at: 2018/05/04
date added: 2018/05/04
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]]> 2175 329 Gustave Flaubert 0192840398 Kate 2 3.70 1856
author: Gustave Flaubert
name: Kate
average rating: 3.70
book published: 1856
rating: 2
read at: 2018/05/02
date added: 2018/05/04
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]]> 27384094
But one teenage girl, Six, has a device that could change everything. Her Q-comp, a computer onto which the memories of her murdered family have been downloaded, contains information that could save humankind.

Six is unaware of the power she holds, but the ruling hu-bots are not. Forced to flee from those sent to kill her, can Six discover the secret that could save her life, and the future of the human race?]]> 0 James Patterson 1786140047 Kate 2 3.04 2017
author: James Patterson
name: Kate
average rating: 3.04
book published: 2017
rating: 2
read at: 2018/04/25
date added: 2018/04/28
shelves:
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]]> 8048410 Ěý
But until she was 25 she never learned to swim.
Ěý
Not because she wouldn't have loved to, but because when she was a little girl in Birmingham, Alabama, Commissioner of Public Safety Bull Connor decided he'd rather shut down the city's pools than give black citizens access.
Ěý
Throughout the 1950's, Birmingham's black middle class largely succeeded in insulating their children from the most corrosive effects of racism, providing multiple support systems to ensure the next generation would live better than the last.Ěý But by 1963, when Rice was applying herself to her fourth grader's lessons, the situation had grown intolerable.Ěý Birmingham was an environment where blacks were expected to keep their head down and do what they were told -- or face violent consequences. That spring two bombs exploded in Rice’s neighborhood amid a series of chilling Klu Klux Klan attacks.Ěý Months later, four young girls lost their lives in a particularly vicious bombing.
Ěý
So how was Rice able to achieve what she ultimately did?
Ěý
Her father, John, a minister and educator, instilled a love of sports and politics.Ěý Her mother, a teacher, developed Condoleezza’s passion for piano and exposed her to the fine arts.Ěý From both, Rice learned the value of faith in the face of hardship and the importance of giving back to the community.Ěý Her parentsâ€� fierce unwillingness to set limits propelled her to the venerable halls of Stanford University, where she quickly rose through the ranks to become the university’s second-in-command.Ěý An expert in Soviet and Eastern European Affairs, she played a leading role in U.S. policy as the Iron Curtain fell and the Soviet Union disintegrated.Ěý Less than a decade later, at the apex of the hotly contested 2000 presidential election, she received the exciting news â€� just shortly before her father’s death â€� that she would go on to the White House as the first female National Security Advisor.Ěý
Ěý
As comfortable describing lighthearted family moments as she is recalling the poignancy of her mother’s cancer battle and the heady challenge of going toe-to-toe with Soviet leaders, Rice holds nothing back in this remarkably candid telling. This is the story of Condoleezza Rice that has never been told, not that of an ultra-accomplished world leader, but of a little girl � and a young woman -- trying to find her place in a sometimes hostile world and of two exceptional parents, and an extended family and community, that made all the difference.]]> 333 Condoleezza Rice 0307587878 Kate 4 4.04 2010
author: Condoleezza Rice
name: Kate
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2010
rating: 4
read at: 2018/04/22
date added: 2018/04/22
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]]> 4381 158 Ray Bradbury 0307347974 Kate 3 3.96 1953
author: Ray Bradbury
name: Kate
average rating: 3.96
book published: 1953
rating: 3
read at: 2018/04/18
date added: 2018/04/18
shelves:
review:

]]>