Travis Burnham's Blog

Every year I set out to read 100 books. I barely squeaked over the finish line this year because I was trying to focus on quality *and* quantity, and put some longer books into the mix (Pillars of the Earth, Emperor of All Maladies, Outlander, 11/22/63, etc.)

Top Twelve of 2024

All Systems Red (Murderbot #1) - Martha Wells 

Poverty, by America - Matthew Desmond

The Pillars of the Earth - Ken Follett

An Immense World - Ed Yong

Someone You Can Build a Nest In - John Wiswell

Outlander - Diana Gabaldon

Poor...

As a writer, I feel the "other half" of the craft, reading, is also important. I set out to read 100 books a year and (huzzah!) achieved that goal this year. I also have an account over on goodreads. Here's the top 15 books of 2023, followed by the complete list of the 100+ books I read this year: 

***Travis Top 15 of 2023***

Small Things Like These - Claire Keegan

Gathering Moss - Robin Wall Kimmerer 

Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries - Heather Fawcett

Radical Remission - Kelly A. Turner

Remarka...

Every I try to read 100 books. This year I crossed the finish line with a couple days to spare. 

January 2022

City of Thieves - David Benioff

The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat - Oliver Sacks

Private Lives - Noël Coward (play)

Blithe Spirit - Noël Coward (play)

The Incredible Winston Browne - Sean Dietrich

The Hobbit, or There and Back Again - J. R. R. Tolkien

The Hating Game - Sally Thorne

Bullshit Jobs - David Graeber 

Elemental Haiku - Mary Soon Lee (poetry)

February 2022

Crenshaw - Katherine Applega...

In Homer's epic Greek poem, The Odyssey, Odysseus is lost in his travels at war and at sea for the better part of twenty years, enduring setback after setback on his journey home. He battles strange and violent creatures, endures storms and shipwrecks, loses his entire crew and generally endures every insult to body and mind one can survive.

In Ulysses we follow the path of our main protagonists through Dublin (moonlighting as the trials and travails that Odysseus followed in The Odyssey) with Le...

[4.0 / 5.0] 

Our ability to read out this sequence of our own genome has the makings of a philosophical paradox. Can an intelligent being comprehend the instructions to make itself? —John Sulston
So for me this book is a 3-star book and a 5-star book rolled into one. I'll settle on the difference at 4.0 stars.

If you're looking for a book that is a page-turner, with buckets and buckets of action and some sciencey goodness mixed in, this story is definitely for you. It's exciting! And it's clear tha...

[4.5 / 5.0] A slender volume that contains Millay's "Renascence", which was her first grand step into the limelight. There's definitely some lovely verse contained within.  
She ponders all the big stuff--mortality, love, how to live a best life. From "The Suicide"
Ah, Life, I would have been a pleasant thing To have about the house when I was grown If thou hadst left my little joys alone!
And there are many a dark metaphor, such as referring to grief as an 'incorporeal bulk', that really hit their m...

 [3.5 / 5.0]

A light-hearted comedy, Noël Coward's 'Blithe Spirit' has some good laughs, as well as clever and creative premise. Though the dialogue is amusing at some turns, funny at the next, some (not all) of it still feels dated.  The beleaguered husband and the demanding wife trope feels very 1940s.

Some of the insights on relationships still ring true, however, and some of the jokes still land.

 

[4.5 / 5.0]

Yeah. This book has earned the praise.

It really captures, in a vacuum tube, the sense of optimism, innocence and can-do attitude of 1950s America. Of course that was only one version of the 1950s--there was also 'Rebel Without a Cause' and 'The Wild One'--but Dietrich has captured the innocent version. 'Winston Browne' is by no means all sweetness and light and apple pie, but Moab, Florida is a beautiful place to visit.

5.0 / 5.0

Fuuuuuck.

This book is soooo good. 

In 'The Hustler', Walter Tevis introduces you to 'Fast' Eddie Felson, a small time pool shark (though Eddie himself dislikes the term) and gifted pool player. And he really thinks he's all that and a bag of chips, and probably a couple other bags of chips. 

But I'll be damned if you don't learn to love him, even though he's kind of an asshole. But you know, he's an honest asshole that never pretends to be anything else. And there's some redemption in him...

 5.0 / 5.0

If I can, I usually enjoy reading the book before watching the movie or series that the book is based on. A book is often considered a collaboration between the writer and the reader, whereas a movie/series, I feel, often involves a bit more leading. I read the novel first because I enjoy forming my own images and meanings before I see someone else's interpretation of those same images. 

'The Queen's Gambit' is an excellent novel. First and foremost it's a character study on genius, add...