T > Recent Status Updates

I’m on page 2, and I’m delighted! Hope it can sustain the good beginning.

A positive, likable book. Basic and encouraging, geared toward first-time explorers — whether gay or straight — of the topic. No one can “turn” another person gay. No one can “turn” another person straight. Or any other dot or dash on the continuum. Give the book to your open-minded and close-minded peeps alike, and may it spark important conversations.

DNF. Over 2 hours in an audiobook AND 14 more hours left AND I have it bumped up to 2x listening speed AND I can hardly wait to move on to another book: it’s time to throw in the towel. Not a match for this reader.

DNF at 20%. Doesn’t holds a candle to the first book. All talk, no action.

This book is going in the DNF bin. The careful character development has become tedious in its dull perfection.

Cooool.

I can’t take another second of this audiobook. The writing is trite, trite, trite, and the choice to have the author read her own book for the audio is just wrong. MacMillan Audio, what were you thinking? Could this book be saved by only experiencing it in print, or by hiring a qualified person to voice it? Maybe. But I doubt it.

40’s-Hollywood-film-noir-space-opera-in-the-jungle. Human foibles hilariously magnified times ten.

Lovely novel based on the life of Henry James. The audiobook is very good. I am putting it back on the shelf now and might pick it up again in the future.

I enjoyed the first half of this book but lost my momentum for it. Seems an original approach, but I think there were a few too many characters and times to keep track of, so that by the time they started linking up, the threads were lost too me. I suggest reading each chapter as a short story, knowing that they tie together later, instead of reaching for the links right away.

This is a work of fiction, nothing more. At 52%, we're at a solid 2.0 stars (="I don't like it but I will finish/have finished it"). I could do without the explicit forays into the bathroom experience and sex. If there's that many words to spare, there may not be much of a story going on. The writing is solid, good dialogue, but seems a cheap marketing ploy to say it's inspired at all by real political figures.

This is a work of fiction, nothing more. At 52%, we're at a solid 2.0 stars (="I don't like it but I will finish/have finished it"). I could do without the explicit forays into the bathroom experience and sex. If there's that many words to spare, there may not be much of a story going on. The writing is solid, good dialogue, but seems a cheap marketing ploy to say it's inspired at all by real political figures.

28% in, so far 2.25 stars. As the country song goes, "I need a little less talk and a lot more action." Enough with the technical details of photography -- I want more about the ribbons of molten metal and other exciting geek-outs. And Saturn! Cripes, let's go, already! Ok, back to the book now.
Read this instead: Seveneves by Neal Stephenson

17% in. So far, a bit of a slog. Lovely words, beautiful sentences, but the story hasn't grabbed me yet. The structure so far is painfully self-conscious ("Hey, look at me! I'm a novel! And I'm short stories! I'm a series of vignettes! Love me!") and detracts from the book.

Philosophy? Art? Literature? A five star beginning. I'm rapt.