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#BookReview: The Next Great Migration by Sonia Shah

Interesting and Applicable. This is a truly remarkable work that traces the sociological and biological impetuses for and restrictions on migration at levels from the individual through the species. Shah does a superb job of combining history and science to make her case, and even impeaches at least a few organizations currently in the headlines along the way – even while clearly having no way of knowing that she was doing so, as the book was written before they became so prominent more recently. Spanning from the guy that developed the modern taxonomic system through late breaking issues with the Trump Presidency, Shah shows a true depth to her research and builds a largely compelling case. Very much recommended.

This review of The Next Great Migration by Sonia Shah was originally written on April 10, 2020.

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Featured New Release of the Week: Valentine by Elizabeth Wetmore

This week we’re looking at a dark yet realistic book from a debut author. This week, we’re looking at Valentine by Elizabeth Wetmore.

This book starts in the aftermath of a brutal rape of a 14yo Mexican girl outside Odessa, Texas… and never really gets any lighter than that. So if you’re looking for a light, breezy read… this isn’t going to be something you want right now.

Instead, this book offers the perspectives of several different women in Odessa over the next several months – the victim, the first woman she stumbles across when looking for help, a young girl, and an elderly former teacher form the backbone of the story, with a few dalliances with a yuppie soccer mom (before that was actually a term), the young girl’s mother, and another high school dropout young mother. Combined, the perspectives do a great job of giving the overall picture of West Texas in the era – through female eyes, at least. Yet as some forshadowing in the middle of the book indicates, there are no real winners here – part of the reason I say this book never really gets any lighter.

Overall a great effort from any writer, debut or not, and while I hope this author provides some hint of light in her next book… I am indeed interested to see what she does next. Very much recommended.

As always, the Goodreads/ Amazon review:
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#BookReview: Sanctum by David Wood

More Mystery But Some Solid Action Too. This book is a short prequel of sorts to Woods’s Crowley books – that alludes to far more possibility of prequels even earlier in the timeline. It is more mystery, with a lot of sneaking around finding clues, with the occasional grenade tossed or bone broken or trial by combat… but given its setting, it very much works. If you ever wanted to imagine what it would be like to unleash Jack Reacher into Hogwarts… this is your kind of book. 😉 Very much recommended.

This review of Sanctum by David Wood was originally written on April 5, 2020.

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#BookReview: The Deal Breakers by Maggie Dallen

Shorter and More Intense Than Book 1. This is book 2 in a new novella trilogy Dallen has created in the world of a previous book. Tall Dark and Nerdy. And while this book is roughly 15 pages shorter than the first one, you really do need to read the first one first, as it handles most of the overall trilogy setup heavy lifting. Very good in its own right, this one switches tropes from fake dating to best friends to lovers. Very much recommended.

This review of The Deal Breakers by Maggie Dallen was originally written on April 4, 2020.

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#BookReview: The Love Fakers by Maggie Dallen

Short and Intense. This is a quick read at just over 100 pages, solid “fake dating” HS romance set in the world of Tall, Dark, and Nerdy and spinning off a new short trilogy where a group of kids try to prove the Love Quiz app is bogus. Here, we get the setup and the first couple – the couple that the app should never match, but that the experiment tries to force the app to match. Short and fun in a Hallmark Movie kind of way, this is an excellent quick distraction from the “real” world. Very much recommended.

This review of The Love Fakers by Maggie Dallen was originally written on April 4, 2020.

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#BookReview: My One True Cowboy by Soraya Lane

One True Love. Finally. In this conclusion to the River Ranch series, everything finally comes to a head for the one remaining sibling who isn’t yet attached. Admittedly I picked up this series halfway in, with the previous book, but here Lane does an excellent job of continuing the feel of the series (as I know it anyway) while also wrapping up long running storylines and giving everyone the HEA or coda they deserve. Truly excellent work, and very much recommended.

This review of My One True Cowboy by Soraya Lane was originally written on March 31, 2020.

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Featured New Release of the Week: The Sum of the People by Andrew Whitby

This week we’re looking at a history of the origins and current uses of the census – at the very time the United States Census officially begins. This week, we’re looking at The Sum of Us The People by Andrew Whitby.

I don’t exactly hide the fact that despite reading quite a few books, at heart I’m a numbers and computing guy. And few things get more numeric than efforts to count literally billions of people around the world in the span of just a year or two – the very subject of this book, and efforts that officially began a couple of months ago when this post (and the book it is about) are published. (I sit here writing this post on New Year’s Day 2020, having made this book the first book I read in the year the Census begins in the US.)

And y’all, Whitby does a seemingly excellent job of taking a complex and complicated subject like the modern realities of counting people – particularly when such counts can lead to shifts in power – and boiling it down so that anyone, even those without the mathematical foundations Whitby and I share a portion of, can understand what is happening, why, and why both are important. He states early on that a primary goal is writing a book that can be understood by most anyone, and to me it seems he has done an exemplary job of this.

I might nitpick about his discussions of the beginnings of computing and even the mathematics of statistics as its own field of study (among others), but neither does my own cursory knowledge of those areas allow me to outright refute them. So while I tend to think that he *may* have overstated his case in believing that these things came about due to a need to count people, I cannot be positive of this and his arguments are well documented and worthy of critical examination. (And here, he has provided nearly 25% of this text in notes and bibliography – generally a sign of a very thoroughly researched and presented discussion, in my experience.)

Truly a fascinating book, and one anyone remotely interested in the how or why of a census should read. Very much recommended.

As always, the Amazon/ Goodreads review:
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#BookReview: The Politics Industry by Katherine Gehl

Just Another Dogmatic Diatribe. With a title and premise like this, I truly had high hopes for this book. I should learn to not have such high hopes for such books, given that they almost always are utter disappointments, and this one is no exception to that generality. It raises some good points, particularly as they relate to ballot access and the nature of the duopoly system of government we have in the US. But beyond that this truly is just another dogmatic diatribe, this one from self-professed “moderates” that are actually anything but. It ends with an “altar call” urging *you* to act and donate your money, even as the authors sit back comfortably writing books and being “activists” rather than actually putting their own names on the ballot to try to achieve their stated goals. They want *you* to take the heat in running for office… even as they don’t have the guts. So take it from someone who *has* run for office, twice. Read this book, as it genuinely does have a couple of good ideas. But read it with a boulder of salt, because the authors aren’t brave enough to get in the fire themselves, and it is only within the fire that you truly see your ideas in action. Recommended.

This review of The Politics Industry by Katherine Gehl was originally written on March 26, 2020.

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#BookReview: My Know-It-All Nemesis by Maggie Dallen

Nemesis Mine. This is a short yet heavier-than-many standard Maggie Dallen “Hallmarkie” high school romance. There’s still some laughter, but particularly in its final pages it really starts landing some haymakers that are not really typical of Dallen at all. Still, when you need something to dive into a rich, well developed “fake” world to escape the “real” one with all of its issues right now… this is a solid distraction for a couple of hours or so. Very much recommended.

This review of My Know-It-All Nemesis by Maggie Dallen was originally written on March 23, 2020.

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#BookReview: Those Who Wander by Vivian Ho

“Not All Those Who Wander Are Lost” … But Some Are. Ho does an excellent job of focusing on one particular tale – of a trio of homeless kids in the Bay Area convicted of a pair of murders – while exploring young adult homelessness generally quite well. Maybe it was because the version I read was the Audible, but there didn’t seem to be many citations throughout the book, and indeed Ho waxes poetic and goes into editorial mode quite often – a bit too much, for my own personal tastes, particularly when making various claims that really do need supporting evidence to be provided. (Checking the text based version of the book I also have, I do in fact see that the notes/ bibliography is a bit too sparse for my thinking.) Which is ultimately what dropped this a star for me. Other than the sparse bibliography and a too much editorializing, this truly was a beautifully written book that highlights an oft-overlooked circumstance and does a stupendous job showing these people as the humans they are – warts and all. Very much recommended.

This review of Those Who Wander by Vivian Ho was originally written on March 25, 2020.