Devoured this in 3.5 hours last week. 21 yo woman learns how to act to get men to give her money for her looks & for sex. Held off on posting bc it seemed wrong in Epstein climate. But it could be viewed as a behind-the-scenes tale of how readily rich men will pay for ego inflation & sex. /

I am betting that the intersection of the Epstein files set and the Sarajevo civilian safari set is not zero. www.yahoo.com/news/article...

With a title like that, how could I resist? She is a young chef looking for potential wealthy clients--and a virgin in a red dress. He is a race-car driving playboy w emerald eyes who is strangely captivated by her, dammit. She does not remove her mask but she discards all else. /

Not my fave J Trollope. Stacey gets fired the same day ber husband gets a big promotion. One of her friends--Melissa, Gaby, or Beth, very hard to tell them apart--recommended the husband for the promotion & didn't tell Stacey. Apparently this was Quel Betrayal, but it seems like [shrug] to me /

Another library find: The Executioner's Song on DVD. Watched this for the Tommy Lee Jones, for the 1970s stuff, to be reminded what actually happened. Taut plot, moves inexorably, media are vultures, Tommy & Rosanna Arquette are excellent. Bonus fact: the priest who gives him his last rites /

Not as good as Girl on the Train, which totally sucked me in. This has multiple POVs, each read by a different actor (one person voiced 2 parts). Felt manipulative. One person would feel spooked by someone else, to make you think that could be the suspect. Final chapter was the best.

Apparently lots of people do not know this. To defeat a lie, do this: 1. Start with the truth. The first frame gets the advantage. 2. Indicate the lie. Avoid amplifying the specific language if possible. 3. Return to the truth. Always repeat truths more than lies.

A Tolstoy thing I did not know existed! Found this in the library. Written at the end of his life, is a moral fable with the Sermon on the Mount at its center--literally. Leo still packs a punch, and he calls out hypocrisy like no one else. Plot follows a forged coupon, all the lives it touches

Top 15 banned books of 2025 = top 15 must-reads www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/rcn...

September sunset

Another one I finished in less than a day. I got hooked reading about a guy in 2022 who finds out he has cancer & climbs unto the freezer case in the grocery store. He does not share his news w his daughter. Then it jumps back to 1982 to Dawn, who it turns out is his wife, meeting a woman Hazel /

Woman's husband apparently drowned--you know what that means--and finds out he left her in a world of debt w a daughter. She goes back home to TN with syrupy daughter, finds perfect job, man, etc. Amazing how boring a novel gets once you know she's going to get every single thing she wants.

Macabre, gripping, can't stop thinking about it. Sheriff/undertaker/pastor in small-town Friendship, WI in late 1800s faces impossible choices during a diphtheria epidemic. Is it heroic or tragic to keep doing his duty as all is falling apart? Oh, and here comes a wildfire. Oh, and here's more

I finished this book a couple days ago, and I miss it. I miss the people in it. Very tall Dylan MacRae has lived in London w his mother & g'mother until recently when they both died. He has to close up the indie cinema they've run bc it's broke. He goes to Scotland, aiming

"Older adults" = ages 50 to 80. 29% feel socially isolated. I, for one, feel like I am slowly starving to death. whyy.org/articles/old...

Today I read a thing and I cannot un-know it. Fascism has always been part of how the US works bc fascism is, by nature, part of colonialism. Non-white people's experiences of the US have always been of living among fascism.

Can we please skip the part where our country slaughters millions of people for stupid hateful reasons, and go directly to the part where we overthrow the dictator and write better laws that ensure this never happens again? That'd be great, thanks.

I. LOVED. this. I read it in a day & a half. The librarian told me when I checked it out that it's her favorite book of the year and I know why. Normally I say what happens, but I don't want to give you any spoilers. It's sincere, hilarious, wise, goofy, introspective, real. READ IT.

Perry Mason knew right from wrong. Why didn't we get that part of the nostalgic past?

This is wonderful. Heartbreaking and wonderful. William Stoner grows up on a hard farm, goes to college to learn more about ag, but in his English class is stunned to life by a sonnet. He gives up ag to study lit, and from there, you get his whole life, including some harsh disappointments

I struggled with this one. I hesitate to say that because Saint Jane, right? But dang. There were four people named Charles (Musgrove, his son Charles, Hayter, & Smith). Several different Captains. New people kept showing up & flirting w Wentworth or else having no dialogue, just a name /1

Accounts with only Reposts, no actual posts of their own: are these bots or spammy accounts? Should I block them?

Children's book illustrator Mort Lear has died. His assistant Tommy (Tomasina, female) has to deal w his stuff, including a tale he told about his childhood, which suggested he was the victim of a pedophile. He was not, but what actually did happen? All the characters' lives are so fully imagined,

Watching The Twilight Zone. The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street. It's like watching the frickin news.

Sometimes you need a no-doubt-about it Good vs Evil story. This isn't a masterpiece. Nearly every sentence is its own paragraph. Which gets annoying. I still don't really get what a "tether" is. But it got to me. I felt like I was in the fight for Good vs Evil too. Which is pretty important rn.

Near future dystopia. Sara Hussein is in a detention center for women who Might commit a crime. Every action, online & in person, is watched, recorded, scored. Dreams are also recorded. If you dream of hurting someone, that ups your number. Sara is not sure what pushed her number over the limit.

Tiffy, whose ex just broke up w her, needs a place to live. Apt available, guy works nights. He sleeps days, she gets nights. Slow at first bc they rarely interact. B story of the guy's brother in jail more interesting. Then they start leaving notes to each other, her lawyer friend helps his bro,

Re-read, & I have seen the movie w Emma Thompson & loved it. Even so, big chunks of this I had forgotten/misread/etc. When I got to the account of Willoughby's misdeeds, I was shocked & appalled. I went around saying Scoundrel! for about 30 mins afterwards. Must admit, better plot than Emma.

Before I return to my usual posts about books, first this: All the books, and all the poems, all the music, and all the artwork, all the holy texts have been telling us the same things FOR CENTURIES: War is bad. Welcome the stranger. Love your neighbor. Who is your neighbor? Every human. /1

What an education for me. I mis-remembered, misunderstood, or overlooked much of this when I first read it in college. Emma is kind of a snob, then she pretends for a while that she isn't. One chapter has to be told in Mr. Knightley's POV bc Emma understands so little. Like her, I misread much.

PSA TO THE MEDICAL COMMUNITY: stop describing gynecological procedures where you stick things into a person's vagina, cervix, or uterus as "minimally invasive." It is invasive and disturbing as hell. The longer you're in there, the deeper you go, the more upsetting it gets. Please acknowledge this.

Implausibilities, plot holes, questions, and yet I did not much care. I steamed through this in a night & a half. Love story meets survival at sea on a houseboat with a guy who's a chef w knives & alcohol. Add an injured seagull & a dash of family secrets.

Go Make Your Art. It's good for you, It's good for us. If you doubt, watch this. youtu.be/2XZ9z6OewR0?...

A tough one. The Kid, a skinny white guy w very little going for him, gets addicted to porn & gets busted for going to meet a 14 yo girl bc she talked w him. A virgin & convicted sex offender, he has to wear an ankle monitor & live 2500 ft from kids, which in his FLA town, is under a highway. /

Nyla, a young native woman from Northern Canada, is neglected by her alcoholic mother, & so doesn't really get consequences. Her fascination w fire keeps getting her in trouble. After prison for arson, she's sent to do community svc with a northern tribe & goes through an unusual healing. Fast read.

I don't love a lot of books of poetry, but I love this one. More and more every time I pick it up. Collins writes about being Black, living in Chicago, being Black, living in Boston, having a daughter, riding the train, coping with depression, being real when people don't want you to be.

The Grandmother, 6 year-old Sophia, & Papa spend their summers on this island in the Gulf of Finland. 22 vignettes tell of moments when the Grandmother and Sophia create a Venice for ants, plant bulbs, row to another island, have adventures. Brief, delightful, fleeting, like summer, or life.

Finished this in less than 24 hours. 3 women get stood up on Valentine's Day by the same guy. But he's decent, apologetic, caring. So they each try to make it work. One is a jet-setting life coach, one is a tree surgeon, one is a shy volunteer in a charity shop. 3/4 in, the trick is revealed.

Pink-loving outgoing Izzy and scowly muscular Brazilian Lucas work at the same beloved, decrepit hotel and hate each other. But compete with & secretly love each other. To raise money, Izzy & Lucas compete to find owners of lost wedding rings, & it gets steamy. Some unusual details, clever dialogue.

Delightful. Devoured this. By-the-book caseworker Linus is sent to inspect an orphanage for magical youth as usual. But these youths are extra-classified, the man who runs the orphanage is exceptional, and Linus gets attached. Love for all children is paramount. Differences embraced, bigotry routed.

Scoop, by Evelyn Waugh, 1937. Satire of British press, lots of mistaken identities. Wm. Boot hired in error to cover a non-existent war in Africa, but then a coup does happen. Cryptic press cables, a Swede on absinthe w a motorcycle, a mysterious unflappable gay man. Racial slurs.

Are there any groups for people who love Fellini's 8-1/2? Because I saw it for the first time recently & have fallen in love & surely there must be scads of people who gather to talk about how great was such & such shot, and how wonderful is such & such moment. For hours.

Re-read. First read in undergrad. I was ashamed to admit I didn't get much & now I know why. Assumes knowledge of customs, history, etc no longer common. I had to look up a lot of things. Once I did, aces. Then, The Dead. One of the finest pieces of writing in the English language. No question.

Yesterday

As always, @chriswarcraft.bsky.social is a real one.

Here. Listen. Loud. It helps. youtu.be/qbmWs6Jf5dc?...

Took the day off work today bc it's 7 years today since my mom died, and I stayed in bed & finished reading this. Very Kate Brady of me. Now I know why it was banned. Told by Baba & Kate, back & forth. Affairs, abortion try, gyn exam, maybe suicide. Baba is keen, swift, racist, tender, made me cry.