Books Read
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Secondhand Souls
Secondhand Souls by Christopher Moore Published: 2015 Series: Grim Reaper #2 Length: 335 pages This is the sequel to Moore’s A Dirty job, which is a fantastic book about a beta male finding himself in the role of a Death Merchant, tasked with retrieving and protecting the souls of the dead. I read it nearly a decade ago, so it took me a little while to figure out what as going on in this sequel. I really should have glanced at a synopsis before starting, because I apparently blocked out the last quarter of that book. This lead to some happy, if unintentional, surprises, but Moore does take some time…
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The Metamorphosis
The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka Published: 1915 Translated by: Susan Bernofsky (from German) Narrated by: Edoardo Ballerini Length: 02:08 (128 pages) I actually read this over the Christmas holiday, which I admit is not the best time to read a novel about a man turned insect ruining his family’s life, but I managed to enjoyed this despite the incompatible festivities. This was my first time reading Kafka, and I really didn’t know what to expect. I was mainly excited about now being able to use the term ‘Kafkaesque’ with some legitimacy, but I was happy to find I enjoyed his writing as well. As with any translation, it’s hard to…
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Red Rising
Red Rising by Pierce Brown Published: 2014 Narrated by: Tim Gerard Reynolds Series: Red Rising #1 Length: 16:12 (401 pages) I went into this knowing absolutely nothing. The sequel to this, Golden Son, won the Goodreads award for science fiction novel of 2015, so I thought I should check the series out. Those Goodreads awards are a little silly, because the people voting haven’t read all of the novels nominated, but it at least meant that it was enjoyed by a lot of readers. I’m glad I did pick this up, because it turned out to be my favourite novel of the last year (or at least one of them…I…
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The Best of Robert Service
The Best of Robert Service by Robert W. Service Published: 1976 (poems originally published somewhere between 1907 – 1956) Length: 126 pages I started reading this nearly two and a half years ago, just after my dad passed away, because The Cremation of Sam McGee was a poem he used to recite in his youth at his Masonic meetings. I really enjoyed that one, but then put it on my shelf after only reading half the poems in the book, forgetting about it entirely. It wasn’t until recently when I happened to notice the bookmark in it that I remembered never having actually finished it. Robert Service was born in…
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Daemon
Daemon by Daniel Suarez Published: 2006 Narrated by: Jeff Gurner Series: Daemon #1 Length: 15:57 (632 pages) I’ve been getting more and more into science fiction these last few years, and I had a craving for a technological thriller of the computer security variety. I usually have a backlog in my head for every genre, taken from book blogs or interviews or just natural progressions from what I recently read, but I couldn’t think of what to pick up for this. Daemon seemed to be at the top of many random Reddit recommendation threads, though, so I decided to grab the audio book. A billionaire computer game designer passes away,…
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Stephen Fry in America
Stephen Fry in America by Stephen Fry Published: 2008 Length: 316 pages I love travelogues, and I love Stephen Fry, but I wasn’t in love with this book. I started off quite bored, and eventually did grow to enjoy it, but I think I went in with incorrect expectations. This is an account of Stephen Fry’s trip around America to visit all 50 states, during which he also filmed a six-part television series for the BBC under the same name. I haven’t seen the series, and I can’t say I’m itching to go find it after reading this. He starts his trip in New England, heads down to the south,…
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Without Feathers
Without Feathers by Woody Allen Published: 1975 Length: 224 pages This has been on my shelf for years now, and I’m so glad I finally picked it up. I love Woody Allen’s humour, but sometimes I need a little push to pick up short story and essay collections. Thankfully this was on my TBR Pile Challenge list this year. This is a very random book. There are essays, two single-act plays, excerpts from fictional journals, and alternative histories. You never know what you’re going to get as you start each piece, which makes for an exciting read. Even the title, a take on Emily Dickinson’s poem “‘Hope’ is the thing…
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A House of Pomegranates
A House of Pomegranates by Oscar Wilde Published: 1891 Length: 162 pages This is Oscar Wilde’s second collection of fairy tales. The particular edition that I have is a 2011 recreation of the 1914 edition, which includes the original colourful illustrations by Scottish illustrator Jessie Marion King throughout the book. I bought this new and mine smells weirdly strong of glue, which is a odd note to start a review with, but seriously. It was distracting. This contains four stories: The Young King The Birthday of the Infanta The Fisherman and his Soul The Star-Child I really didn’t like the first story, The Young King, and I was worried the…
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The Magician’s Nephew
The Magician’s Nephew by C.S. Lewis Published: 1955 Narrated by: Kenneth Branagh Series: The Chronicles of Narnia #6 (#1 in Chronological order) Length: 03:57 I’m actually not sure how many of the Narnia books I read when I was a kid. I had a collection that I stole from my sister, and I think I read through most of them, but I remember so little from any of them. If only I had been writing down my thoughts on books back then. Oh, the insights I would have now. I imagine I’d mainly be comparing them with The Hardy Boys and punctuating my thoughts with ‘psych!’ and ‘not!’. So really,…
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In a Sunburned Country
In a Sunburned Country by Bill Bryson Published: 2000 Length: 319 pages This is Bill Bryson’s Australian travelogue, called Down Under outside of Canada and the US, and it details two back-to-back trips to the country. He begins by travelling across Australia by train, from Sydney to Perth, and then recounts his time in the southeastern cities of the country. He then returns with a friend of his to visit the Great Barrier Reef, Alice Springs in the north and then down to Uluru, which I guess is a very impressive rock. The people are immensely likable— cheerful, extrovert, quick-witted, and unfailingly obliging. Their cities are safe and clean and…