Author Archives: smellincoffee

Unknown's avatar

About smellincoffee

Citizen, librarian, reader with a boundless wonder for the world and a curiosity about all the beings inside it.

How To Stay Married

Posted on February 28, 2024 by smellincoffee

On an ordinary day, a book called How to Stay Married would have never broached my radar, given the dismal marriage prospects of eccentric librarians, but as it happened one of my favorite authors mentioned Harrison Scott Key last week … Continue reading →

Posted in Religion and Philosophy, Reviews, Society and Culture | Tagged , , , | 2 Comments

Selections from “How to Stay Married”

Posted on February 27, 2024 by smellincoffee

Harrison Scott Key’s How to Stay Married will, presumably, make the year’s top ten list for me, despite the fact that the closest I’ve come to being married is being confused with someone’s fiance. It’s the story of a marriage, … Continue reading →

Posted in quotations | Tagged , , | 5 Comments

Live, from New York — It’s SATURDAY NIGHT!

Posted on February 27, 2024 by smellincoffee

At the end of 2022, a friend of mine discovered that his former roommate had left a boxed set of SNL’s first five seasons — or at least, season two of the same. He was a teenager when SNL first … Continue reading →

Posted in history, Reviews | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Top Ten Tuesday

Posted on February 27, 2024 by smellincoffee

Today’s treble-T is covers with things found in nature, so off to the science shelves I go. Et voila! Time for Tuesday teases! I have changed the names of many characters in this book, because most of those people own … Continue reading →

Posted in General | Tagged , | 10 Comments

Lovers and Other Strangers

Posted on February 24, 2024 by smellincoffee

Perhaps twenty years ago now, while looking for modded content for The Sims*, a painting to place in game caught my eye. It was of a man and woman at a train station, the man in a somber grey suit … Continue reading →

Posted in Reviews | Tagged , | 2 Comments

The World’s Largest Man

Posted on February 24, 2024 by smellincoffee

When Harrison Scott Key was young, his father opted to uproot the family from Memphis and moved to an old farmstead out in the country – -the reason being, a boy needed to grow up outdoors doing things. Harrison did … Continue reading →

Posted in Reviews | Tagged , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Neo Cab

Posted on February 23, 2024 by smellincoffee

This is going to be an unusual review, because Neo Cab isn’t a book. It’s a visual novel that people experience as a video game, a novel set in a dystopia that touches on so many topics — corporatocracy, the … Continue reading →

Posted in Reviews | Tagged , , , | 4 Comments

The Royal Society

Posted on February 22, 2024 by smellincoffee

Over ten years ago I devoured a history of science series by Ray Spangenburg and Diane Kit Moser that played a large part establishing my basic adult understanding of science. While reading it, I was particularly fascinated by the role … Continue reading →

Posted in history, Reviews, science | Tagged , , , | 2 Comments

In the Company of Trees

Posted on February 21, 2024 by smellincoffee

In the Company of Trees is a little volume of photos and reflections on trees, a pleasant mixture of science and cultural writing peppered with arboreal quotes — though not, curiously, the classic “I think that I shall never see … Continue reading →

Posted in Reviews, science | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

The Littlest Library

Posted on February 21, 2024 by smellincoffee

Such is my mood for cozy village novels featuring libraries and bookstores that I read this even knowing it was a romance. And I liked it. Granted, it’s set in a cozy rural village in Devon and features a librarian, … Continue reading →

Posted in Reviews | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment