Abby Tamkin > Recent Status Updates

Have to return to the library - it's been languishing.

I've had this in my kindle for a long time but finally reading it - and it's so good. Sometimes in a lovely way, sometimes in an aching way, sometimes in a trainwreck-cant-look-away way. But writing is great - I am unsurprised this won the Pulitzer.

Listened to half before it returned to Libby. Excellent companion reading: Reading while Black. Some hope to accompany the hard (esp for this white girl) history in this book.
Edit Sept 2023: listening to Sho Baraka, The Narrative. Excellent companion to this conversation (The first song is called "Forward, 1619"!)

Picked up again for Lent

Christian "eschatology [had been] replaced by systems of salvation and ethics"
And the enlightenment's eschatology of human progress supplanted "the Bible's picture of the coming kingdom."

4/14 hours

How am I supposed to read this book? Page by page? Or the core text of the book, then come back and read the notes? Where do all the loose pages come in? I need instructions! Ahhhh

Got to go back to the library

Made progress (Part 16/27) , audiobook expired.

I started this on December 15, 2014 and listened to about an hour, but I started over on July 12.

I'm kind of disappointed. It feels very scattered, like he's trying to cover too much. Also, there are no endnotes /citations etc, just a "works consulted" list at the end of the book. What is up with that?

I waited too long to start, my audio book expired. Got to wait a few weeks to get it again.

Had to go back to the library :-( I've reordered it already!

Not super impressed so far. It reads like a kids book, but it doesn't seem like it's really supposed to be. And it doesn't move fast enough for its simplicity to be excusable. Dialogue is clunky.
World history seems interesting, and magic system has potential.

I've kind of stalled on this. I think I'm like 40%. I know this book was pivotal in its day, but it's confusing now: should I be depressed because all the birds are dying? Are they still dying? Pesticide use has surely changed. Enough? And I'm not a huge fan of Carson's writing style. Pretty dry.

I'm actually making progress on this. (9 out of 58 part on the audio book now..... ) Unfortunately, the reader sounds like he's taking down his nose at you and is bored. I love the central story of Les Mis, but there is sooooo much extra detail. Some of this I enjoy and think is insightful or adds depth to the story, but some is just boring, especially when my reader says it.

Read through the end of chapter 4, but had to return it to the library. Excellent so far.

Rereading in preparation for the new prequel.