My Books of 2019

My Books of 2019

 

This summary lists all twenty-nine books I read in the past year. One book of this group was “put aside” after starting it, although that occurred after nearly 250 pages. Another dropped because I just ran out of interest in a blizzard of arcane facts. I’m a bit OCD about completing a book once started, and unlike many (some? most?) people, I’m reluctant to give up on a book, especially one that’s part of my book club, where there will be a discussion about it.

 

At any rate, here is my list, with my rating (one star is worst, five stars best) and a rough comparison with the average rating on GoodReads by others. Incidentally, you can find great ratings/comments/chit-chat at this wonderful web-site, and (very important to me) have a permanent (and free) record of all your reading going back as far as you wish.  If you’re like me, it’s hard at times to recall if you have read a particular book; to be able to go back and check out my review and/or rating is convenient and important.

 

https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/8814018

 

So here goes:

 

Overall, I rated six books higher than the average, thirteen books lower, nine books more or less the same, and did not rate one book. So I appear to be a tiny bit less enthusiastic than the average reader, but not to an extreme extent.

 

Five Star (5*) Books

 

  • Astrophysics for People in a Hurry, by Neil deGrasse Tyson. Just a great read, with humor and information, and only a few parts that were hard to understand (can you say Theory of Relativity?)
  • The Man Who Knew Infinity: A Life of the Genius Ramanujan, by Robert Kanigel. A most interesting biography of the brief life of a rural kid from India, who did not complete college, who becomes a Cambridge Don and one of the most brilliant mathematicians in the world.
  • Educated, by Tara Westover. A story of a girl, part of a Fundamentalist LDS (Mormon) family headed by a very rigid father and compliant mother in the Middle-of-Nowhere, Idaho, who completes her long and difficult transition with a PhD at Cambridge University and looks back at her family in an objective way.
  • Plato and a Platypus Walk into a Bar: Understanding Philosophy Through Jokes, by Thomas Cathcart. A wonderful read.
  • The Book Thief, by Marcus Zusak. The only work of fiction on my five-star list. I had to start this one a second time as it is complex and with an unusual narrator. Worth the effort for sure.

 

Four-Star (4*) Books

 

  • Upheaval: Turning Points for Nations in Crisis, by Jared Diamond. My “take” on Diamond’s book was more positive than many others; some panned it. However a close look at six different countries and how they had managed major challenges was riveting for me.
  • God Save Texas: A Journey Into the Soul of the Lone Star State, by Lawrence Wright. A delightful romp through Texas, with its quirks and history brought to life by a very capable observer.
  • The Hare with Amber Eyes, by Edmund de Waal. The story of a very wealthy Jewish family which became embroiled in European anti-Semitic movements and World Wars. Bitterly revealing.
  • The God of Small Things, by Arundhati Roy. This was a hard book for me; I stopped and started it at least twice. The story is complex, with complex Indian names and culture, but definitely worth the effort.
  • Rabbit, Run, by John Updike. Classic “Updikian” approach, with brilliant prose set with a character who simply bounces through life with decisions made almost by the rule of “the least resistance.” It works.
  • Kentucky Straight: Stories, by Chris Offutt. Growing up in downtrodden Eastern Kentucky for a while, with the lore of “fast horses, beautiful women (or do I have the order wrong?), and great Bourbon,” anchored in the central, Bluegrass portion of the state, I’m a sucker for all things Offutt, and these are great short stories, mostly set in my ol’ stompin’ grounds.
  • Rising Tide: The Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 and How it Changed America, by John M. Barry. This is wonderful history, set in the Mississippi Delta Country, with old and powerful families. The geography is interwoven into the lore of the ante-bellum South, with the power of great land ownership as well as the rock-hard tradition of racial bias.
  • Born a Crime: Stories From a South African Childhood, by Trevor Noah. This uplifting and incisive autobiography is a refreshing story of the current TV personality’s amazing journey.
  • The Human Stain (The American Trilogy, #3), by Phillip Roth. Roth’s story of a man passing as one race when he is another, mostly. Hard to follow at times, but brilliant.
  • Agnostic: A Spirited Manifesto, by Lesley Hazleton. This book should be required reading in colleges, for both religious and non-religious students who want to understand the argument against Faith-based belief. Brilliant and informed.

 

 Three-Star (3*) Books

 

  • The Tiger’s Wife, by Te’a Obreht. A debut fiction set in the post-breakup of Tito’s Yugoslavia, as a young MD seeks to understand local lore and mystic beliefs. The plot is a bit over the edge for me, but very creative. It helps to understand some historical facts about the Balkans and Serbia.
  • Hag-Seed, by Margaret Atwood. This modern telling of “The Tempest” is brilliant. But many complex things have to break just right for Ms. Atwood’s tale to be believable.
  • In Pieces, by Sally Field. If you don’t consider Ms. Fields a brilliant actress and an amazing human being after reading her autobiography, then I just don’t know what you need. Painful and revealing. Well done.
  • Have Mercy! By Wolfman Jack. OK, one of my fun reads to learn about The Wolfman, who entertained me late at night during my teenage (and later) years on AM radio, skipping in from strange and somewhat forbidding places.   
  • Travels with My Donkey: One Man and His Ass on a Pilgrimage to Santiago, by Tim Moore. A fascinating story of a man who decided to ride/walk his donkey on the 500 mile pilgrimage across northern Spain. Moore is a British travel writer looking for a book to write; it works, but becomes a bit of a slog in both the physical trek and reading sense.
  • A Small Porch: Sabbath Poems 2014 and 2015, by Wendell Berry. Reading a book of poetry by an almost recluse from Northern Kentucky fit into my “all things Kentucky” year, I suppose. Berry is a refreshing antidote to modernity.
  • The Little Paris Bookshop, by Nina George. A love story to France, most of all, this story is hard to follow with changes of time and place. Set in a whimsical boat-bookstore, the protagonist decides to set loose from its mooring in Paris and explore the canals and rivers of southern France in order to search for happiness and someone special. Somehow it all works. Enjoy!
  • Thanks a Lot, Mr. Kibblewhite: My Story, by Roger Daltrey. An inside story, written without a ghost writer, by the front man of The Who, one of the greatest rock bands. Daltrey focuses on Pete Townsend and himself, and their relationship of creative contributions and competition.
  • Been So Long, by Jorma Kaukonen. This autobiography of the lead guitarist of Jefferson Airplane was hard to resist. Kaukonen covers both the Airplane, and his later band. An equally interesting part is his rediscovery of his family’s Finnish and Jewish roots.
  • Shut Up and Listen!: Hard Business Truths that Will Help You Succeed, by Tilman Fertitta. The title says it all.

 

Two-Star (2*) Books

 

  • Exit West, by Mohsin Hamid. I’m not comfortable with people simply “passing through a door” and then starting over in other countries, etc. Too far-fetched for me. An okay plot, just okay, of people on the move.

 

One-Star (1*) Books

 

  • Fall, or Dodge in Hell, by Neal Stephenson. Not sure how to comment other than I gave up after about a quarter way through his thick tome as the plot skittered from a nuclear explosion in Utah to a fundamentalist evangelical “Amerastan” in the U.S. Midwest, and nothing at all made any sense to me up to that point. I lacked the fortitude to read on.
  • Charlie Siringo’s West: An Interpretative Biography, by Howard R. Lamar. I ran out of interest, as the book was a slog with too many dense facts on a subject just not that compelling to me.

 

Not-Rated (NR*) Books

 

  • Tom Swift and His Electric Runabout, by Victor Appleton. A friend loaned me his book, a reprint of an early, but prescient story about electric cars. An Interesting look back at the early dawn of the American automobile industry.

 

Comments are welcome and will be published, pro and con without the writer's identity. Make your comments below, or send to me via email at n3bb@mindspring.com

 

Enjoy life; it's the only one we will get.

 

Jim George

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* Check out my books and blogs on my author website:

 

www.authorjkgeorge.com

 

Please recommend them to your friends. Also, recall that I’ll travel to any book club or radio club within two hours of Austin to discuss either of the books and answer any questions. Any and all comments are welcome either by email to my return address, n3bb@mindspring.com, or to the website in the comments section after any blog.

 

* Reunion is available in stock at Tamarack on the West Virginia Turnpike as well as at amazon.com and other Internet retail locations. It’s under consideration for a movie, and a screenplay now is under active development!

 

*Contact Sport is in stock in hardcover print format at any of the thirteen HRO (Ham Radio Outlet) stores nationwide as well as at DX-Engineering and the American Radio Relay League. In addition, many Barnes and Noble stores nationwide carry it in stock, and they, as well as Book People in Austin or any independent bookstore, can order it. You can buy direct at my website’s link for a personalized copy.

 

*Both books now are available in Print, eBook, and Audio Book formats at all major Internet retailers.

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