I'm reading No Bone Unturned, which is a hagiography biography, sort of, of Doug Owsley, a forensic anthropologist at the Smithsonian. It's fairly well-written, in an engaging journalistic style, but the endless fawning over Owsley make me grind my teeth.
It also annoys me when the writer gives an exact transcription of a conversation that happened several years before he started writing the book. How could this possibly be accurate?
The big issue in the book is the legal battle over the disposition of Kennewick Man, who was discovered on federal land in 1995 or so. The writer really does spend a lot of time hammering away at the government and the tribes, and making the scientists look perfectly sensible and wise. I know from experience that neither the legal issues nor the science were quite as simple as he's making them out to be.
Although it was fun to see a woman I used to work with show up in the book.
All that said, interesting book so far. Just not perfect.
Yup, Ayelet Waldman. We're doing a literary festival together in December. Ayelet is also my source for kosher grocery locations, when Nilly is here. She writes the Mommy Track mysteries, which are very good fun; her crossover book is called "Daughter's Keeper" and is very powerful.
Her husband, besides being one of my favourite writers on planet Earth, is also brilliant. And a cutehead. Kavelier and Klay turns me into jello, every single time.
I just finished
The Murder Room,
PD James' latest Dalgliesh mystery, and was frankly underwhelmed. The reviews I'd seen made it sound like she was back in top form, but I don't agree. Or perhaps she is and I'm just not enjoying these books as much anymore.
Her younger characters are not particularly believable in how they talk or think. And the
sooper sekrit sex club
plot element made me yawn. How many times have I seen that in mysteries?
But, as usual, her settings are marvelous - London and the (fictional) Dupayne Museum are beautifully done. And the tidbits of information about famous murder cases of the 30's made me want to go out and read more about those.
Oh, while I'm at it, one more gripe. In this book Adam Dalgliesh is all gooey over
a professor named Emma
whom he met in the last book,
Death in Holy Orders.
What I want to know is whatever happened to Cordelia, the female PI she wrote a few books about? I loved that character & there were hints that she & Dalgliesh were attracted to each other... but she seems to have disappeared completely. Humph.
I found
The Godfather
in our work lunchroom/library so I picked it up. I'm actually quite engrossed in it. And it's quite porny, right at the beginning!
And it's quite porny, right at the beginning!
I read it in jr. high. And learned quite a bit. There's also a passage in the middle that's very -- educational.
I've never seen the movie version of
The Godfather.
Is it as porny?
Not as I recall. There is violence-porn, i.e. gratuitous and excessively arty, but I don't remember very much in the way of sex.
No, but I still love it. "Never ask me about my business, Kay. This one time you can ask me about my affairs."(Weird...second time I quoted that this week...freaky even for me.)
I read another Kate Shugak mystery this past week and Crusie's Crazy For You.
I feel I am doomed to not love any more of the Crusie books. I think my favourites (Welcome to Temptation, Faking It, and Fast Women) were my early reads.
I have now picked up Alice Hoffman's Local Girls, but am not really in it yet.
