#BookReview: Lost At Sea by Joe Kloc

Interesting Expose Of A Particular Community, Suffers From Problems Typical Of Its Form. As an almost anthropological examination of a particular culture that arose over decades in a very specific region of California – the roughly six square mile region known as Richardson’s Bay, an offshoot of San Francisco Bay – this text is a pirate’s treasure trove. Specifically, as it examines the “unhoused” people who have claimed homes among the derelict and otherwise vessels floating in the bay, the so-called “anchor-outs”, it truly does a phenomenal job detailing the history of how the culture arose, a lot of the features of the specific culture, and even a lot of both the key historical figures of it and at least some of its living practitioners.

As a *journalistic* piece… it may fly in today’s “lived experience” version of “journalism”, where objectivity and distance from subject are defenestrated in favor of being “up close” and “real”… but it still would have been enhanced by being a more old school journalistic type text, at least to my mind.

Instead what we get here is almost an action, thriller, and memoir mashup wherein the author inserts his own views into the text, but the story itself becomes one of a community’s fight for its right to survive and the dastardly developers and government officials seeking to eradicate it from history once and for all.

Which for a narrative, works well. For what is supposed to be a nonfiction work… maybe doesn’t work as well.

The star deduction comes in from the dearth of bibliography, which is likely due to not much written work existing about this particular group or its history, but still, there is quite a bit here that *could* have been documented more thoroughly, if even detailing newspaper or other media reports about various events over the years.

Very much recommended.

This review of Lost At Sea by Joe Kloc was originally written on March 17, 2025.

#BookReview: A New Leash On Life by Patricia Sands

A Moving Ending. Yet again packing quite a bit of story into such scant page count, this is a great ending to this series that gives an epilogue of our dog breeder Leslie’s adventures while also telling a compelling story of life after your long time husband has been diagnosed with dementia. It *also* manages to spend the most time out of the United States than any other book, and only Collar Me Crazy, book 2 of the series, spends more time outside of Dragonfly Cove itself.

And yet the tale here is still absolutely centered around Dragonfly Cove and this most recent litter of puppies from Leslie. Here, Chance gets his time to star as the central puppy of the story – and yes, once again (as is so often in this series) he tends to steal the scene most times he’s around.

Again using an elderly main character (as the previous book, Teacher’s Pet did), this tale does a remarkable job of showing both blood and found family and how they all come together. Truly a great tale in a small package, and yet again more evidence of how page count doesn’t give any indication of just how good a story is, with this one clocking in just over 150 pages.

Very much recommended.

This review of A New Leash On Life by Patricia Sands was originally written on January 1, 2024.

#BookReview: Teacher’s Pet by David Johnson

Best In Series For Making You Want To Explore The Author’s Other Works. With some of the other books in this series, the authors do a great job of referencing their other books, maybe even bringing in a character or two – or at least someone connected to them who can reference them in-story – to entice the reader of this series to explore their other books. It is very well done within the stories they are telling and doesn’t feel forced at all, just a casual “hey, there’s other stuff out there that may warrant exploration, if you’re into these characters” type of vibe.

Yeah… Johnson doesn’t go that route. He’s far more in your face about it – without being in your face about it at all. Instead, he brings in one of his major characters from some of his other work and gets you invested in this character’s story even within the context of the story he is telling here as part of Dragonfly Cove… and then tells you in the author’s note at the end “Oh yeah, if you want to see what actually happens with that character, well, this character just so happens to be the titular character in these other books I wrote”.

And yet the story here itself is at least as powerful as the one with that other character, here using a retiree set in her ways as our main character and telling a compelling story of an old “get off my lawn” curmudgeon (literally, in a couple of cases, telling people to leave her yard) who has very distinct thoughts about how things should be done learning to live again in a new situation. And, maybe, through the love and dedication of her puppy… maybe she just might fall in love again?

There are several subplots to this story that all show the complexities of elder life in various forms, which I know many readers are desperate for these days as seeming so few books deal in main characters of this particular age bracket – despite it being among the larger sets of the American population at the moment.

By far the longest book of this series at nearly 300 pages, this is also one of the most complex-yet-easy-to-read stories in the series as well.

Very much recommended.

This review of Teacher’s Pet by David Johnson was originally written on January 1, 2024.

#BookReview: Coming Home To Heel by Jodi Allen Brice

More Evidence That Strong Stories Don’t Need High Page Counts. This entire series is testament to this, but this book in particular *really* is. There’s a lot going on here – grief from a somewhat recent loss of a mother and an even more recent loss of a marriage + the son is estranged due to how the marriage broke apart *and* a potential new romance already on the horizon… all of this in not quite 17o pages! And it all works incredibly well!

Indeed, this tale in particular is arguably at its strongest when Nora is using her newfound strength -yes, thanks in part to new puppy Charlie – to handle her divorce and her son’s issues around it.

Truly an excellent and short book, again, this entire series really is great for those who love dogs and who are at least somewhat interested in the women’s fiction/ romance genres who may be looking to start their 2025 reading strong- this will easily get you 9 books potentially on January 1, as I write most of these reviews, if you put an effort in. (Ok, so at that point you’re reading around 1100 pages in a day – which *is* daunting. But 150 ish pages/ day spread out over a couple of weeks? Nearly anyone can find that kind of time. :D)

Very much recommended.

This review of Coming Home To Heel by Jodi Allen Brice was originally written on January 1, 2025.

#BookReview: Loyal & True by Ev Bishop

Crushing Grief Helped By Puppy Love. While the previous two books in this series – Hearts Unleashed and Back In The Pack – both dealt with grief, this is the first book that *really* makes you *feel* its power. Here, our main character starts out just a short period of time after tragically losing her much more vibrant sister… and now has to figure out how to achieve the dreams they were supposed to achieve together, alone.

Enter the power of Puppy Love.

When Leo maintains her commitment to pick up both of the dogs she and her sister were supposed to get from local dog breeder Leslie, suddenly she *has* to get out of bed – puppies aren’t so great about feeding themselves, and if you leave them cooped up in your bedroom with you… it is going to get very messy and stinky very rapidly.

Thus, just going through the motions of keeping her dogs fed and walked gets Leo moving more than she’d have liked… and begins her healing process.

Along the way Leo encounters more people in the community and with more interaction comes more healing… in its own time and manner.

Ultimately this is one of the more gray books of the series, but very powerful in its own right – particularly for those who are also experiencing such crushing grief. And hey, that’s the power of puppies, right there. 😉

Very much recommended.

This review of Loyal & True by Ev Bishop was originally written on January 1, 2024.

#BookReview: Back In The Pack by Barbara Hinske

Dog And Kid Damn Near Steal The Show. I’m not normally one to enjoy books where kids play outsized roles or steal scenes, but Hinske here absolutely makes it work to help elevate the adult storyline of a widower and father just trying to re-establish his life and help his daughter heal after the tragic loss of his wife/ her mother before the events of this tale. The interplay with both the overall Dragonfly Cove series/ community and specifically Marsha from Hearts Unleashed, the book immediately prior to this one in series order, is particularly well done, and here we actually get to see a pivotal scene from that book play out again here from a different perspective, which is always interesting. That two different authors were involved only shows just how skilled and talented both are as storytellers – and, likely, that both shared a strong editor as well. 😀

Yet another quick read at around 150 ish pages, Hinske too manages to pack quite a bit of story in such a small package. Really this entire series is a great boost for those looking to start their 2025 reading strong, particularly if you also happen to be a dog lover.

Very much recommended.

This review of Back In The Pack by Barbara Hinske was originally written on January 1, 2025.

#BookReview: Polarized By Degrees by Matt Grossman and David A. Hopkins

Solid – And Solidly Dense – Examination Of The Topic. You know those jokes about the Christmas fruitcakes that are so dense you could use them as an anvil or even the cornerstone of a house? This… is damn near that dense. So be prepared for that up front, and it is a solid examination of political and even, to a lesser extent, religious polarization in the US over the last 60 years or so – with more emphasis on the last 40 years or so, when the authors claim that the “Diploma Divide” began explaining ever more of the results of elections.

Well documented at roughly 33% of the overall text, there isn’t anything particularly “explosive” here, but there *is* a lot of detailed discussion of what has occurred and why the authors’ research says it happened. One of the few books of its type where the authors are explicit in *not* making policy recommendations, instead taking an attitude of “this is the data we have, this is what we believe it shows, do with it as you will”. Which is actually refreshing – the authors note that they are academics working in academia, and even if they have worked with campaigns off and on at times, they are not politicians or political operators, and thus their expertise isn’t campaigns or campaign strategy – their expertise is in asking questions, gathering data, and analyzing that data.

Overall, while the outcomes are those we all know, Grossman and Hopkins add more data to the discussion – which is never a bad thing – and thus help aid in our overall understanding of what we have seen, giving us a more complete picture of the events as we know them.

Recommended.

This review of Polarized By Degrees by Matt Grossman and David A. Hopkins was originally written on August 30, 2024.

#BookReview: Our Tribal Future by David R. Samson

Contempt Is The Dissolver Of Unions. Yes, that is a particularly memorable line from the book – and a warning. Here, Samson discusses the history, biology, and sociology of our “Tribe Drive” – ongoing and apparently bleeding edge research in all three fields – and shows how it has brought us to where we are… and how we can better utilize it to achieve a more peaceable and prosperous future for all. Yes, some of this book is a touch… out there… for some, such as Samson’s admitting to basing some of his thinking of this topic on his use of psychedelic mushrooms, peyote, and similar compounds. And yes, there are things here that partisans left and right will likely complain about – some legitimately, some less so. And yes, in ultimately recommending a form of at minimum confederation of federated governments – if not outright anarchism, which he discusses without ever using the term, yet never precludes that the groups he discusses could become official “governments” – perhaps Samson is even a touch idealistic. And yet, the documentation is solid at around 20% of the text (not counting footnote discussions at the end of each chapter, which may bump that to around 22-25% of the text). Further, the book lays bare in scientific terms that which I’ve largely understood and have been advocating at various points for the last 15 years or so, through my own active political activism days and into my efforts to promote reading and literacy now.

Overall an intriguing, thought out book and one that adds greatly to the overall conversation around groups, governments, coalitions, and politics, and thus one that anyone who seeks to truly understand and use these concepts truly needs to read and understand. Very much recommended.

This review of Our Tribal Future by David R. Samson was originally written on April 1, 2023.

#BookReview: Collective Illusions by Todd Rose

Interesting Ideas Marred By Author’s Dogma. This is one of those books that presents a lot of interesting ideas, and indeed Part I in particular, where Rose is describing the problem and how it works, is quite remarkable. Yet even through this section, there are elements of Rose’s partisan blinders (though also some refreshingly positive signs). For one, Rose, while spending an entire book speaking to the ills of conformity, repeatedly appeals to conformity to claim that “the science is settled” on “climate” “science”. Ummm… Yet in the positive column, it is exceedingly rare for someone of Rose’s political persuasion to cite the libertarian-based Cato Institute, and Rose actually cites this very organization within this text. It is really in the final third of the book though where Rose’s political blinders become most obvious, often citing things in support of his overall narrative seemingly not noticing that doing so fails Occam’s Razor – there are far simpler, and therefore more likely correct, answers to some of these things (such as the rise in violent crime during the 2020 COVID lockdowns). Still, Rose actually does present quite a bit here that is absolutely worthy of consideration and discussion, even if he is off at times in certain areas. Very much recommended.

This review of Collective Illusions by Todd Rose was originally written on October 31, 2021.