Kaiti > Recent Status Updates

I'm enjoying Fisk and Michael working together but against each other at the same time. Five books in is a good time to refresh the dynamic a bit!

It's only been minor in the background for the last couple books but I can tell something is up with Markham and I need to know what it is!

Also the dry humourous tone isn't really doing it for me here. But that's more of a personal preference than a quality issue I think.

I've been listening to this audiobook for a week or so and it's so far been interesting but I automatically deduct points from any historical nonfiction that uncritically uses "the dark ages" to refer to medieval Europe. I had profs in undergrad in 2010 telling me why that term is no longer used by credible historians. Why is it in books published in 2017 (and later!)???

A lot of reviews have said that it's hard to remember who all the characters are and they are CORRECT.

I am really enjoying this though. But I can't remember all the nuances of how everyone is connected or anything 😭

Reread (audiobook listen) to prepare for the sequel finally coming out later this year!

This is interesting but, as is common in microhistories focusing on one thing used across vast times and spaces, I find myself disagreeing with how this is organized!

The 3 main options for organizing a book like this are generally chronological, geographical, or thematic. This book went for thematic, and I understand why, but I would love it if this were more chronological instead.

The first part on stone tools is making me remember my undergrad prehistoric archaeology course and that prof's utter passion for the wonder that is the acheulean handaxe.

This is fun!

Crocodilopolis is a fantastic name for a city and we definitely need to bring that back somewhere.

"We have been encouraged to see the history of Africa as a passive participant in European or Mediterranean history, rather than a part of a dynamic exchange of cultures and stories. [...] Much of the African continent [...] is ignored or even discarded, unless it plays a part in the story of either Rome or Greece."👌👌👌

"Official law is not always reflected in social reality." (In the context of "just because a law said soldiers couldn't marry doesn't mean they weren't having relationships and kids anyways")

This book is very insightful in the shortcomings of previous histories that touch on the regions and periods it explores!

This is so interesting!

👌 the introduction spending a significant amount of time getting into how the edges of a society are defined by what people in that society consider to be the centre, how Greek and Roman sources have been emphasized to the detriment of others, and how studying interactions between rulers tells us nothing about how average citizens of different cultures interacted. So good!

Audiobook listen!

One page later and just because one municipal archivist asked, the archive started analyzing human remains found years ago? Within a day? Who is paying for that?!?

I don't think the author did a single page of reading about how archives and other heritage professions work. And I was impressed with the research that I felt went into the first half of this!

Now I question the quality of the rest of the research too.

Matthew why are you giving an artifact, even unaccessioned, to a random member of the public? The CRA will revoke your institution's charitable status if you get caught doing that, Matthew. The fact it was not accessioned doesn't mean you can give it to whoever, even if you believe her to be the proper heir to it???????? What is going on.