This book is a novel (and sort of a fairy tale) about someone drawn back into his family history in Georgia after escaping from the country with his father and brother during the civil war following the breakaway from the USSR.

For the author, I felt like the book served as a memorial for their life in Georgia, their memories and the people that they left behind. Sometimes I read a book and I feel like the author was seeking catharsis – this was one of those cases.

For myself, the book was a good chance to revisit Tbilisi and the parts of the city we visited. It gave the city a deeper historical context, and it was fun to read about places that we had walked through ourselves. I enjoyed some of the characters – one taxi driver kept giving out great insults – while others were a little grating.

The author’s style was a little different – voices of characters that lived on in the narrator’s head, backfilling information over and over again – these decisions felt a little gimmicky to me.

The story itself was just a bit too perfect – key characters appear at precisely the right time: the villain, the hitchhiker, the soldier in Ossetia. I guess that was why I felt it more of a fairy tale than a novel – but if you can suspend the disbelief maybe you’ll enjoy the story.

The end turned unexpectedly violent – which caught me off guard – but this book is the story of a violent revolution and violence (and hope) between people. I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised.

Next I am reading The Mermaids Singing by Val McDermid.

There is no question that American culture is a car culture. And if everyone needs a car to get around, they also need some parking when they arrive where they are going. This book delves (deeply) into how parking has influenced the way homes and cities are designed, and wonders aloud if it isn’t the right time to do something better.

There are some great quotes in this book. The first one that caught my eye was explaining the parking rules in various cities in America, and how they are often incomprehensible even to the locals, and representative of the self-interested clusterfuck that is American parking policy.

Reading about this policy and how it came about was pretty interesting. I think the target of this book is the people involved with parking policies or town/city design, rather than the average Joe. But it is eye-opening how decisions made so long ago have had such a lasting (negative) impact.

The book was written recently, so the influence of the COVID pandemic is included here, and this reveals the positive changes that the pandemic brought – and gave me a little hope.

As for me the book helped me realize how lucky I am to live in a place where I don’t really need a car, and could certainly live without it.

Sometimes this book went a little too far into historical details and I felt occasionally like the writer was having so much fun telling his stories that he lost sight of how the reader might be feeling about it. The full title of the book is “Paved Paradise: How Parking Explains The World”, but the second part of the title wasn’t really delivered. The book explains a lot about America, but I thought there might be a bit more on how other countries/cities around the world deal with the automobile.

Next I am reading Hard by a Great Forest by Leo Vardiashvili.

This was a story that was hard to hear. Obviously the writer has some phenomenal talent and there was so much beauty in the descriptions of her grief.

The book relates the before and the after for a woman who married her husband only to lose him to an unexpected and unclear death while he was out running.

I guess what I got from this story is that grief runs much deeper than anyone expects, and that although people deal with it in different ways nobody knows what you are supposed to do with it. Even living and moving on are not necessarily the obvious course. The stages of grief that are often discussed are not even related to something like this – they were designed for something completely different.

Sometimes I felt a little voyeuristic while reading this – isn’t this a private journey? Am I reading about grief for entertainment? Or just to know more?

The product of that grief is the beautiful writing and imagery of this book, and I’m not sure how I feel about that. I hope that the author can channel her abilities into more writing in the future, and I wonder if it will be possible to write about other things as well as she did with this.

Next I am reading Paved Paradise by Henry Grabar.

I enjoyed reading this short story collection, some scary, some thought-provoking, and some a little too simple for my taste. But that’s the beauty of this format: like a box of candy you take what you like and leave the rest for others.

One thing I really liked was a story that had a character that last appeared way back in an older book. I read Cujo back in junior high school, and it was an odd feeling to have that same character (a much older version) appear in this book.

The stories have quite a bit of variation – there are thoughts on talent, belief, fate, and even a few aliens thrown in there too. Sometimes the main characters tended to blend together – most of them are old guys (much like the author, I suppose) and I would have liked more diverse personalities.

But if you like the author’s writing, this book continues in the same style. It was a satisfying read.

Next I am reading Here After by Amy Lin.

Since we’ll be in Stockholm in a few months I thought I should read this book which is set there. I’ve seen this book on the shelves since forever so I guess it is about time to read it anyway.

Translated for Swedish (I guess) the story relates to the emergence of two characters who end up working together. One of them falls in love, another one doesn’t seem to notice. I liked both the main characters and their chemistry is really what made me like this book.

In addition the setting of the story was interesting, and I was marking off places to visit on Google maps as I read. The plot involves a long-ago disappearance – and there are some surprises hidden among a very large family of suspects.

Despite at first seeming to be a locked room mystery, the story branches out and we learn more about even some of the minor characters. I enjoyed this sort of divergence, even though I’ve criticized other novels for the same thing. I guess that done right it can be engrossing rather than a time waste.

The technology and the scenes involving it have aged a bit poorly I think. The author tends to overemphasize some details (to lend credibility?) but we don’t really need to know the brand name of the modem or how many megabytes the disk drive is. Is it a cultural thing? Not sure.

Also the idea of what a hacker does or can do is pretty oversimplified, and in this book it is sort of like a magic “do-whatever-you-want” card that can be played any time. Again, this might be related to the age of the book.

So I enjoyed the story and I’m wondering if I should see the movie or not. My next book is You Like it Darker by Stephen King.

There was moment in time between my work in the wine industry and working in bookstores while I waited to ship off to Japan. It was a time for me to test out working in a different industry that was growing quickly in the Silicon Valley not far from where I was living.

I’ve always been interested in technology, although less on the gadget side and more on the internet and PC side, and so I sort of fell into designing websites and eventually convincing some companies to hire me to do it professionally.

This book starts with the author’s career in journalism and how she saw the burgeoning tech industry as something with a future, and how she transitioned from old to new and followed the ups and downs right up close. Although I came to it later than she did, it was really interesting to read about the chronicles of those early days of Web 1.0. I remember working in companies and being amazed at how much money was being thrown around. The author of this book focuses on what all that money can do to leaders in tech.

I didn’t know the writer who is apparently one of the big names in rise of Silicon Valley tech scene – which speaks to how tangential my involvement was. She writes with a very sharp wit and is really funny. Speaking truth to power and not knuckling under takes a lot of commitment and resolve – it is good to see that she has deep wells of both.

It did feel sometimes like this book was a way for her to say “I told you so” about various people and developments, and it grew a little wearisome sometimes. She seems to have a fan base and sometimes it was like she was pitching raw meat to her followers. I think people who know this writer well will enjoy the book more.

But I enjoyed the book overall and the insight into the industry over time, and the leaders who have come and gone.

Next I am reading The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson.

This is the second book I’ve read by this author, having enjoyed the first book of his new series I thought I should check out some of his older stuff while I wait for new material.

This fantasy book introduces a new world with interesting magic systems – with clearly defined rules. The writing style and magic systems remind me a lot of Brandon Sanderson’s. One difference is that this series seems to be aimed more at adults – there is swearing, sex, slavery and savagery.

The characters in this book are written well – they are interesting and have things going happening on a deeper level. One of my favorite elements of the story was the characters’ ability to converse with inanimate objects – and to convince them to change the instructions that they have. These parts were pretty hilarious.

The only downsides I found were that the world described here is pretty small, actually. I hoped for a sense of what everyone else who lives in this city was doing. What’s beyond this city and the horizon? Also the magical system is sometimes over-explained, and although the author is trying hard to make sure that things are done fairly I would be inclined to just trust that the physics of this magical situation are on the up and up.

So this was a pretty good fantasy book with some surprises and I’ll probably continue the series down the line.

Next I am reading Burn Book by Kara Swisher.

Thrills? Check. Fast-paced? Check. Checking in with characters from previous novels and the requisite visit to Italy? Check.

Despite all these, I still had some reservations after finishing this book, a sort of sequel to The Firm which may have been the first book I read by John Grisham. I’ve really enjoyed his books over the years, and this one was similarly enjoyable.

There is a lot of international intrigue here. Visits to Morocco, Libya, Italy, London. There is a tense countdown as our heroes rush to try to save a hostage’s life. And there are mysterious people watching their movements as well.

Despite the book ending with a resolution to the main story, I was left wondering how this mysterious group kept tabs on the situation. How did they know about their histories from the first book?

Certainly it is possible that these things will be answered in a future book, but I felt like if that were the case then there’d be some indications near the end of this book.

Still, if you don’t mind knowing the other side of the story I’m sure you’ll enjoy this book.

Next I am reading Foundryside by Robert Jackson Bennett.

I was putting the pluses and minuses of this book together and after five minuses I had come up with only one plus – giant carnivorous chickens.

There are more pluses, however. I liked this book’s approach of commenting on the current capitalism/environmental balance and how it might tip too far in the wrong direction. I liked how it portrayed the culty vibe of the residents of this “company town” and how many people tend to go along with things because it is in (what they think are) their best interests.

But the recurring theme in this book is that you should listen to your wife/mother. The main character is sort of a super mom who takes on the challenge of keeping her family together during this very unique situation. The men in the family are drinking the Kool-aid while only the wife and daughter smell a rat.

The way the author relates the events is sort of simple, and things are pretty predictable. She even gives us a big foreshadowing of the aforementioned giant carnivorous chickens early on.

A lot of this could be edited down to a shorter book that still accomplishes the same goals – maybe less telling about things and show us more from the characters’ actions.

Next I am reading The Exchange by John Grisham.

Not an especially impressive sequel, in the end it delivers what I was hoping for. I just wish you didn’t have to read two thirds of the way through the book to get to it.

I like that the author went ambitious here, and tried to show more of the world than what we saw in the previous book. There are some new characters introduced, we even meet God, and we learn more about their motivations and what is happening in the world. The storyline is pretty unusual, which could be good or bad – I’m not exactly sure.

A large portion of the book is written in the second person, which starts to feel a little gimmicky after a while. Many of the characters speak like teenagers (even though they are thousands of years old). There are some big mysteries and shared initials and hidden identities and sometimes it felt like we’d need a PowerPoint presentation to untangle it all.

But finally it felt like the author pulled it off at the end, averting disaster. Maybe I was hoping for safer choices, but I suppose the author’s job is to push boundaries and try new things. That mission was – in the end – accomplished.

Next I am reading A Better World by Sarah Langan.

This spy novel was written by the same guy who did the writing for the movie Spy Game with Robert Redford and Brad Pitt. I really enjoyed the movie, and this book serves as a prequel for what we saw play out during the movie.

Although the book does contain a few surprises and provides some detailed backstory for the events of the movie, the writing style and some other issues kept me from really enjoying it.

Most of the book is filled with characters explaining the past, and relating episodes to other characters. You have character #1 explaining a conversation between character #3 and #4 to character #2, with plenty of pithy comments interspersed. These dialogs were confusing to read, especially with the author’s habit of making in-sentence diversions to show how clever the speaker is.

I thought there were few likable characters in this book. Most were showing how clever they were or measuring their dicks against each other with drinking contests and smartass comments. The majority of the main events are related after the fact, and so the events we actually witness are just a couple of guys drinking whiskey and talking, which is boring even in real life.

Apparently there are two more books in the series, but I don’t think I’ll be reading them.

Next I am reading Harrow the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir – the second book in the series of Space Necromancer Lesbians. Hopefully it will be as good as the previous book in the series.

This was a beautifully written book – dominated by a character who we never meet and see only through other people’s memories and impressions. The story is remarkably suspenseful, and kept me turning those pages.

Written in the 1930’s, it feels fresh and not dated at all. The book captures the lifestyle of British aristocrats and shows how much stock people put into appearances and (outward) behavior.

The first two chapters drop us into the story through the main character’s memories, and so there is definitely some confusion at first. Once I finished the book I went back and re-read it, and it made a lot more sense. But it is important to persevere and get through the beginning stages in order to get caught up in it.

I was really impressed with the writing style of the author. She takes her time and adds little descriptors to minor elements of the scene, drawing us in without overdoing the tension. The ending was harrowing, and I wasn’t surprised later to find that the book was adapted into a Hitchcock movie (that won an Academy Award!)

I’m glad I stumbled on this book – one of the better reads of the year for me.

Next I am reading Muir’s Gambit by Michael Frost Beckner.

This book was a well-researched look at a con man who managed to keep a long con going for most of his life – fooling greedy people who hoped to make a profit on an imaginary stash of gold that was supposedly spirited out of Ghana. The story was incredibly complex – layers and layers of lies and all of it exacerbated by the formidable power of greed.

I can’t imagine how much work went into the research for this book – from the 1950’s to the 2000’s. There are a lot of reasons why many people wouldn’t want this stuff coming out, and even if only half of the stories in this non-fiction book are true, it is still a pretty incredible tale.

In this book we also learn about this particular scam and others that prey on people’s greed. I had no idea they had been around so long (since Sir Francis Drake’s time) and that there were so effective. People stayed in the scam long after they should have known better. After being promised a hundred-fold return in a few months they were still throwing money in ten years later with no return in sight.

This was an educational book for me. There is some insight into other cultish leaders that are selling lies these days, especially when we wonder how people could ever fall for this stuff. Plenty of people did – and have been falling for it for hundreds of years.

It was particularly interesting to go back and watch some of the YouTube clips of 60 minutes and other news stories about this scam. Just watching the raw greed on everyone’s face was pretty eye-opening.

Next I am reading Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier.

A very unique reading experience – following the progression of the changes in the main character’s intelligence. At first it felt like a bit of a gimmick, but finally I could understand why the writer did it as it brought forth a lot of emotion as we could start to predict the curve.

This book contains a lot of thoughts on intelligence and its role in personality and what makes a person. The way the story progresses allows the reader to make their own judgements rather than listening to someone preaching an idea.

I did feel like the book was a little dated, and there is a sort of odd preoccupation with sex that was eventually resolved in a weird way. But I can imagine that in its time the book was pretty groundbreaking. But I’m glad I read this (literally) thought-provoking book.

Next I am reading Anansi’s Gold by Yepoka Yeebo.

I am always curious about cuisines from other countries, and we are mixing it up on the weekends and trying new dishes and flavor combinations to see what we like. Every time we travel we try new dishes, and so it is a struggle to manage our pantry with so many different ingredients.

This book puts together some of those ingredients and introduces them to an American audience. I think it is pretty easy to get these things (especially using the web) and there are plenty of recipes in the book to try these (perhaps) new ingredients out.

I like the idea behind the book and we already had most of these ingredients already, or else local substitutes that play the same role. The real value of this book to me was trying out some non-traditional ways to use them, and so I was happy to get some new ideas from the book.

I haven’t cooked any of these recipes yet but just having looked them over it seems like they are aiming to really hit the tastebuds hard with bold flavors, which seems to be popular in the USA these days (e.g. Flavortown). So if you’re considering this cookbook be prepared for it.

Over the next few months I’ll try to work in the recipes and see how they turn out. Next I am reading Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes.