Mount TBR 2019 discussion

1. A Great Deliverance This barely made the TBR pile, as I picked it up when it went on sale during the end of December. But since it is the first in the series, I needed to start here.
I enjoyed the writing, and I would never have guessed the author is not British. I appreciate that in this first volume there are hints at backstory that makes one interested in reading on in the series to find out more about the characters. As to the mystery, I figuered out some things not long before the reveal, but several others not so much. The one thing I didn't enjoy was the nastiness of the crime, although I am aware that such things are real. But a cozy this is not. If anything turns me off the series, it will be that and some of the language used. One detail in the wrap-up of a sub-plot I found to be a little too tidy, but I won't say what so as not to give a spoiler!

2. Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky
Tchaikovsky did a fantastic job of imagining how a group of sentient spiders would live. Sometimes sci-fi authors write of alien cultures that ust look a bit different physically, but mostly act and think as humans do. Although spiders are not alien creatures, Tchaicovsky managed to imagine a quite different society, a different path for the development of technology, and ultimately a different solution to a very real and seemingly insurmountable problem. At the same time, he manages to comment on our society..overtly in the human chapters and through a different perspective in the spider chapters. My one complaint is the language. There were way too many f-bombs.

3, Peveril of the Peak by Sir Walter Scott
I had heard of the Popish plot, but if I once knew it was all a tempest in a teapot, I had forgotten. This was one of Scott's better works, I thought. There was a Romeo and Juliet aspect to the plot, although the feud was a little less intense. There were secret passages, people who weren't what they seemed to be, a noble-minded hero and a fair and upright maiden, a proud queen, a corrupt nobleman under a permissive king, and a history lesson on the days after the restoration of the English monarchy. One thing I appreciated was Scott's ability to let the reader know of the attempts and plots against the heroine's virtue without going into graphic detail. It can be done! As an aside, I was pleased to hear that my admiration of Scott as an author is shared by Professor Timothy Shute of the Modern Scholar courses.

4. Fail-Safe by Eugene Burdick
In some ways, this was a good companion read for Children of Time. In both books I came to a point about 85% through where I thought "there is no way this can end well." In both books a...compromise? is made that avoids the abolute worst. The jury in my head is still out regarding how positive of negative the results of the alternate solution is in Children of Time...I'm waiting for the sequel. In this book, there is no good possible outcome, but something is done to avoid the greatest damage.
Although the technology is somewhat dated, I feel the writing has held up well over the years. I expected it to be suspenseful, but I didn't expect to find such true characters and so many well-turned phrases. I also appreciated the fact that although the Soviets were the enemy, the author did not demonize them. And the message of the book is still applicable today.
I did feel a little sad in reading about the president. He is never named in the book, but he is obviously based on JFK and the author obviously held him in high esteem. The publication date was October 22, 1962 which would put it after the Bay of Pigs invasion of April 17, 1961 and before JFK's assassination on November 22, 1963.

5. Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison
CONTAINS POSSIBLE MILD SPOILERS
Erasmus said, "The summit of happiness is reached when a person is ready to be what he is." If this is true, the un-named protagonist of Ellison's Invisible Man may be on the brink of finally being happy. Yet he almost seems to come to an absurdist point of view. He is willing to go out into the world again, but he does not hold out much hope of things changing or of his becoming "visible."
One problem is that the narrator does not always seem to know himself or realize his own potential. In his protest against the repossession, he gives a very "I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him" type of speech, but does not seem to mean to be speaking ironically. At Clifton's funeral, something similar happens.
The narrator also seems to be rather passive throughout the book, and consequently buffeted about by many people and circumstances.
I believe the author has a point about forcing everyone to be the same not being the solution. I also think a great part of the value of the book is its portrayal of racial tensions in both North and South in that era and also the tension between those who did not see eye to eye on how to improve things and ease that tension.

6. The Hangman's Daughter
The language and crude references to sexuality made this a rougher read (or rather, listen, as I did this one on Audible) than my customary fare. But it didn't seem gratuitous; rather, it seemed realistic for the place and period of the work.
My respects to the author, however, for succeeding in making a hangman a sympathetic character. I was fascinated to read the afterward and find out about the author's family history, which explains why he wrote about a hangman.
The research seemed well-done, the mystery was interesting, and the book mentioned coffee as a relatively new drink that one character had managed to discover and quickly become addicted to. Plus I already own the next book, so I will continue this series.

7. The Last Librarian by Brandt Legg
This has been my least favorite so far this year. I lost interest at about 89%, but having gotten that far, I went ahead and finished. Although there were sections that were interesting, I didn't think it was that great overall. The author owes a debt to Fahrenheit 451, which he freely acknowledges, but several years ago I read an Indy book, The Book by M. Clifford, that also explored the idea of electronic books being altered. Perhaps that is one reason I didn't find this book to be "all that."

8. Ender in Exile
This book had sat on my shelf for quite a while--about 15 years. After discovering Ender's Game I read both of the series that followed through on what happened afterwards. Although I enjoyed them both, I found the Speaker for the Dead trilogy more profound and more to my taste than the more politically oriented Shadow series. I think I expected Ender in Exile to be more like the later. But rather it was a fascinating study of how true it is that "you can´t go home again". It explores feeling guilty vs, taking responsibility for one's actions. It explores family and sacrifice. It explores leadership and strategy. I loved the book.
I did have one bad moment though, when I recognized the events in a chapter and was afraid I had already read the book and just forgotten most of it. But I investigated and that chapter had been printed as a short story in a collection called Alien Encounters.

9. Guardians of the Galaxy, Volume 1: Cosmic Avengers
If I still had the comic books I owned in my youth, they would be worth something! I am just now picking up the occasional comic book again from those available to read free through Amazon Prime. I had borrowed this one sometime last year and just hadn't gotten around to it.
The graphics were great! The story was different from the movie in many points, but then again, aren't they all?

10. Let's Roll!: Ordinary People, Extraordinary Courage by Lisa Beamer
I used to live about an hour away from the crash site of Flight 93, and even though I live out of the country now, I think I have been to the site three times. The first time there wasn't much there at all, and the last time I went there was a small museum. I was given this book by a friend who had already read it, but just never got around to reading it, probably because I read much more fiction than non-fiction.
I'm glad I read it. After the initial "scene" of receiving the news of Flight 93 going down, I thought the flashback through family history could have been compacted. At times I thought it could have been told better, but I think probably the co-author wanted Lisa's voice to come through, and that's the way she told the story. The second half of the book produced tears and a renewed sense of faith in God, plus a hope that if I ever find myself in a similar situation, I can act in as courageous a manner. All in all, the book was a worthy read for the story it told, not for the writing style. But it was worthy.

11. Payment in Blood The mystery was good, and the muddying of the waters through other things that people were trying to keep hidden kept me guessing. The recurring characters are interesting and likable even with all their flaws, but I find the romantic entanglements of some of them rather lacking in morals.

I've been reading, but I have a lot of catching up to do on the reporting.
12. Frayed This book begins the Dark Trench Shadow series, related to the Dark Trench Saga series. It had been a while since I read the Dark Trench Saga, but once I was back in, I was back in. I like the way Nietz explores what the world could look like were it predominately Muslim. The book also explores the ideas of free will and control, and of personal responsibility, And it does all this in a science fiction venue that captures my interest.

13. Full Dark House I listened to Ten Second Staircase a few years ago and liked it enough that I started collecting other volumes in the series as they came on sale. Had this been the first one I had read, I am not sure I would have been quite so keen. There was more language and crude forms of expression than I remembered. The basic plat was okay, but not riveting. However, as many authors hit their stride a few books into the series, I will not yet despair. Although some elements of the plot were predictable, the red herring was pretty well done. And the friendship angle was good.

14. Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore I am not sure quite what I expected from this book, but I liked it even more than I thought I would. It seems a grown-up version of a type of book that I enjoyed as a child. The characters were interesting, the narrative voice was well-done and made the reader feel like a confidant of the narrator, and the plot moved well.

15. The Handmaid's Tale Given the subject matter, I really didn't think I would like this book. But my daughter had enjoyed what she had seen of the series and wanted to read the book, and it is on plenty of recommended reading lists, so I decided I would read it also. To my surprise, I liked it. I thought the subject matter was almost as tastfully handled as it could be. The flashbacks really made one sympathize with the main character. I had also feared more of an attack on Christianity, but after reading I feel that if there was any attack, it was only against a corrupt misinterpretation of Christianity. And I thought it realistic that there is ALWAYS a black market for what cannot be legally obtained. All in all, I can see why it is so well-known a book. I found it to be well written and it kept me turning the pages to find out what was going to happen (as well as what had happened in the past through the flashbacks).

16. Sketchy Behavior by Erynn Mangum The summer my dad died, I read a series of books (it was a trilogy at that point) that was not in one of my usual genres...this was flat-out chic lit, which I usually avoid like the plague. (My excuse is that it had a lot of coffee and desserts in it, and I love coffee and many desserts). I enjoyed them immensly, and several months later I picked up this book by the same author. I was a little bit ambivalent about reading it, though. I wondered if I had enjoyed the other books for themselves, or if it was only that they were just the light and funny type of reading I needed at that moment to offset the seriousness of my dad's illness. Happily, I found that I enjoyed this book perhaps even a bit more. It is written for a younger audience, although it is a more serious story, as it involves a dangerous criminal pursuing our protaganist. It is still funny in places, though. Now that I know it wasn't just a fluke that I liked Erynn Mangum's work, I'm looking forward to reading some of her other books that I have picked up over the years.

17. Crazy Stories, Sane God: Lessons from the Most Unexpected Places in the Bible by John Alan Turner

There was not a whole lot here that I didn't already know, but I read it at an opportune moment, when deciding what steps to take with a coworker who has a lot of good in him but always seems to be getting into problems.

The author goes chronologically through the Bible, looking at the stories of imperfect people used by a grace-giving God. He does this in a conversational style. However, there were one or two spots where he should have checked his facts a little better. But only one or two. It was a quick and interesting read, and a good read for those of us who at times tend to strictness and need a dose of mercy to take some of the starch out.

18. Hawk's Flight by Carol Chase

It took me a little bit to get into the story. At first it seemed to have a lot of cliched tropes, but it ended up being better than I expected. I came to care about the characters. But the most interesting thing was the religious aspect. None of the specific religions we know are mentioned overtly, bt there is a true religion and a cheap but dangerous substitute religion. The true religion is similar to an Old Testament understanding of God (there is no savior-figure, although one could perhaps argue for the Holy Spirit manifesting himself in the story a time or two). The false religion seems a cross between Islam and occultism. Yet for all the thinly veiled religious references, the author chose to use what is nowadays mild profanity, although at the time of writing some of it would have been considered pretty strong. At any rate, it is now off my TBR list but NOT in the get-rid-of pile

19. The Pawn by Steven James Okay, it was good in some ways, and I will probably continue with the series as I have picked many up on sale, but it was very much in the style of Criminal Minds or other TV shows of that ilk. It was also a little more graphic in violence and creepy in describing what the criminal was thinking than I expected, although not beyond what I can handle. And, really! I won't say what it is for the sake of spoilers, but one of the choices the protagonist makes is just plain dumb given the type of case he was working. There was one plot device that, while it was not entirely original, did work well for the book.

20. This Dark Endeavor by Kenneth Oppel I picked this up because I enjoyed the author's Airborn series, and because I have read Frankenstein several times. This was good--although definitely a "dark" endeavor. Because of this and the manner in which Victor's attraction to Elizabeth is described, I would not recommend it to younger teens. But it is well written, and although the author takes some liberties with the original story, he is much more true to it than not.

21. This Doesn't Happen In The Movies by Renee Pawlish. I liked Reed Ferguson, the main character, and enjoyed the movie/detective fiction references. It is definitely a cozy or light mystery, but it was a pleasant read. There was more language than I expected, but no sex scenes and not much more violence than a Hardy Boys mystery. I've picked up several in the series very cheaply or for free, so I will probably keep on reading, but I don't know that I'll make the effort to pick up any missing volumes.

22. Bad Girls of the Bible: And What We Can Learn from Them by Liz Curtis Higgs Again, not a lot here that I didn't already know. The author has a breezy, conversational style of writing, and thought questions are included. I sometimes was not 100% on board with her take on particular aspects of a few of the characters mentioned, but I did find her division of the women into "bad to the bone", "bad for a season, but not forever", and "bad for a moment" interesting.

23. this is an interesting take on the Cinderella story, where Cinder(ella) is a cyborg and lives in Asia. There are enough similarities to the fairytale to know what is being alluded to, but the plot is also original. I was not expecting a cliff-hanger ending, but now realize I am going to have to read all four books to find out how it ends. (Well, okay, I suspect some things, but want to see the manner in which everything is resolved.) It does get a bit teeny-bopper chic lit in places, but all in all it was an enjoyable read.

24. Fellowship of Fear I had picked up one Gideon Oliver mystery before and liked it, so I have been collectin titles in the series as they have gone on sale over the past years and finally decided to start with book one. I enjoyed it, although less than the first one I read. Undoubtedly the author improved as the series progressed. I was not expecting to have to skip a few paragrahs because of unwanted details (and pre-marital, at that), but unfortunately I did. That aside, it was a good book.

25. Seaward Sorry, but it is not up to the level of the Dark is Rising series. I might have enjoyed it in my youth, but it doesn't quite live up to C.S. Lewis's definition of good children's literature: “No book is really worth reading at the age of ten which is not equally – and often far more – worth reading at the age of fifty and beyond.”

26, Agatha Christie: An Autobiography I could almost imagine my maternal grandmother recounting some of the incidents Christie mentions, even though she was one generation and a continent removed. This autobiography rambles a bit, but is never boring. There were a few insights to be gleaned, also, as she would occasionally wax philosophical. Her books are mentioned, but are really not on center stage. Notably absent was any mention of her disappearance. All in all, it was an enjoyable read.

27. A bit repetitive and a bit dated. The basic idea is that we need more Christians actively involved in all areas of culture. We should also focus more on supporting and producing good things than boycotting bad ones. Some areas, such as Christian filmmaking, have improved since the book was published. Some others have not, though. It is an interesting read to contrast with another book I am reading, that will probably be the last one on the hike up this mountain, which claims the medium is the message and takes a rather low view of even Christianized popular culture. But more on that in my final review.

28. Two things on my bucket list are to read all of Agatha Christie's mysteries and all the Nero Wolfe mysteries in publication order. But I'm not binge-reading them, I am just throwing them in here and there. This entry was very good, as usual. I don't think I had ever read this one before, as I surely would have remembered the introduction of Lily Rowan. And it is one of the books in which Nero Wolfe actually leaves the house.

29. Very interesting. I knew nothing about the program for getting books into the hands of American soldiers in WWII. I appreciated how the author contrasted the distribution of books to US troops with the burning of books by Hitler and his associates. I also appreciated the irony when some officials tried at one point (nearing election time) to surpress any political content in the books being distributed. I was surprised both by the fact that I had not read that many of the titles distributed, and also that A Tree Grows in Brooklyn was one of the most popular titles. (It is a great book; I was just somewhat surprised that soldiers enjoyed it so much).

30, Murder Past Due This was a pleasant read. I enjoyed the mystery, and guessed incorrectly at first. I liked the cat. I liked the main character, Charlie Harris, well enough, but somehow he just felt a little bit off, a little un-real. I can't really put my finger on why, and that is something that definitely may improve in future volumes. I have few more books in the series on hand, and it was good enough that I will hopefully eventually read them.

31, House I did not go into this book with great expectations. I had read that it was not the best by a long shot in either author's canon. And it wasn't. There was a lot of running around and a lot of yelling, and some stereotypically creepy people. But besides just generally not keeping my attention that well and seeming somewhat disjointed, there were some things in the ending that did not gel for me theologically (yes, I know--it's fiction, but still!). But to comment on them would be to move into spoiler territory. Monster by Frank Peretti is one of the few books that kept me reading all night as an adult, and although I like what I have read by Ted Dekkar less, his other works are better than this. Of his books I have liked Immanuel's Veins the best so far. In short, if you are going to read anything by these authors, look elsewhere, and only pick up this one if you are a completionist.

Getting close!

32. Besides being a great mystery, as usual, this book gives us some brief but fascinating glimpses of Nero Wolfe's not nearly so sedentary former life.

33. I like his Sector General books better, but this was an interesting parallel between two societies that developed in isolation, with all the problems that can involve, These cultures eventually meet, as well as regaining contact with the parent culture of one of the groups. It took me a while to get in at the beginning, and the final resolution seemed a little abrupt, perhaps, but I'm still glad I read it.

34. This is a good mystery story, but even more it is an exploration of relationships--in almost all the characters. Many deceive themselves about their relationships, or try to fake the relationships they think they should have rather than working on forming a relationship that can fit with reality. And most of these relational problems have an effect on the crime and its solution. I felt this book was more unified in theme between the mystery itself and the ongoing lives of the continuing characters than any of the previous volumens.

35. This is another book on Christianity and Culture. The previous book I read, All God's Children and Blue Suede Shoes: Christians and Popular CultureRoaring Lambs, encourged Christians to produce works in all areas of popular culture to influence it to the good. This book is rather elitist, and sees no redemption for popular culture because the author considers the medium itself to be flawed in some ways. For one thing, he states that images cannot express moral values, even though many images in popular culture are not mere images but also include dialogue. I don't think I agree. After all, don't we claim that a picture is worth a thousand words? I am currently reading . It is more descriptive than prescriptive, at least up to the point I have read, and probably does reference fine arts more than popular culture, but the author definitely believes that images can reflect and communicate values. All in all, it has been interesting to compare different perspectives.

36. My last book of the challenge! This book was very good. I had read a previous book by this author and found it wanting a little bit in editing and style. This, however, was very well done. It is well researched historical fiction about the persecution of the Waldensians in the Piedmont area in the 1600s by military forces put into action by the Inquisition. It is now off my TBR pile, but it is not one that I will be removing from my shelves.

I have finally reached the top!