It's Been 1000 Years & Two Sentence Book Reviews

I haven't dropped a book review here for over two months, so I have a lot of catching up to do.  But it's okay - I'll make it quick!  Working through 1000 Places to See Before You Die consumed much of my reading time, so the list isn't as long as it could be...  (worth it!)

The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett
Wow, this was a great book that has really stuck with me and deserves the hype it has gotten.  It's about race and sisterhood and so much more.

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Dolores Claiborne by Stephen King
Our book club picked this as a not-too-scary Halloween read.  Dolores is a quirky and fascinating character who tells her disturbing and occasionally funny story without hardly taking a breath.

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The Big Door Prize by M.O. Walsh
I loved this odd and maybe a little predictable tale about normal small town life interrupted by a random teller-of-destinies machine.  The ending had me scratching my head a bit, but the characters were all a lot of fun.  

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W.C. Fields:  His Follies and Fortunes by Robert Lewis Taylor
Another book club pick - a biography of a total oddball ornery comedian.  Fell in line really well with my recent reading of Judd Apatow's interviews with various comedians - I love learning about how they all approach their craft (and kinda wish this biography had been a five page interview in Apatow's book, but- he was a little too dead for that to work.)

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Anxious People by Fredrik Backman
I'll read anything Backman wants to write, and wondered if maybe I'd be a little over his tendency to write like he was writing quotes for people to put on t-shirts and in greeting cards (and to type out with typewriter font for social media use <so much this>).  Alas, instead I fell in love with his twisty fun cheesy bank robbery gone wrong tale.  

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Actress by Anne Enright
Even as I was reading it, I knew I would retain next to nothing about it.  Lady has an eccentric and famous mom and then some other stuff happens and she tries to find out who her dad is and then a little more happens and that's the book.  

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1,000 Places to See Before You Die by Patricia Schultz
I spent many weeks during our global pandemic working my way through this massive book that highlights all of the amazing spots on this planet.  Then I wrote Jeff an e-mail outlining all of the various places I had noted that we NEED TO GO, so we're gonna be busy once we're allowed to leave our house again.

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Greenlights by Matthew McConaughey
I finished this book a few days ago and have been spending all of my time since then trying to decide if Matthew is pretty awesome and insightful or actually a frustrating and entitled narcissistic actor who decided his musings in his Lincoln commercials are so interesting that he should bless us all with a book full of them.  Either way, I did really like it, although I read the whole stupid thing in his voice (in my head, not out loud...usually).

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Up Next:  Just started a majorly hyped book - so far, so good!