Category Archives: Reviews

Book reviews, as well as Reads to Reels

The Lost History of Christianity

Posted on November 9, 2015 by smellincoffee

The Lost History of Christianity: The Thousand Year Golden Age of the Church in the Middle East, Africa, and Asia — And How It Died© 2008 Philip Jenkins315 pages For the first millennium of the church’s history, Europe was less … Continue reading →

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One Year After

Posted on November 9, 2015 by smellincoffee

One Year After© 2015 William Forstchen304 pages It’s been two years since an EMP blast reduced most of the United States to medieval conditions. After cars and the electrical grid failed, everything went to hell — complete with hordes of … Continue reading →

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V for Vendetta

Posted on November 4, 2015 by smellincoffee

V for Vendetta© 1988 Alan Moore and David Lloyd300 pages Remember, remember the Fifth of November.  The Britain of 1998 is a nation that has lost its spirit,. After nuclear war and crop failures, widespread disorder was quelled only by … Continue reading →

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A War, a Challenge, and a Goal

Posted on November 2, 2015 by smellincoffee

I’ve been on a World War 2 kick recently, and have now connected it with the remains of the 2015 Reading Challenge. An Army at Dawn, the first in a nonfiction trilogy about the liberation of Europe from Nazi oppression, … Continue reading →

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Images of America: Selma

Posted on October 31, 2015 by smellincoffee

Images of America: Selma © 2014 Sharon Jackson 168 pages When I heard that the Images of America series had commissioned a book on Selma, I stood midway between excitement and dread. The series offers a pictoral recounting of small-town America, … Continue reading →

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Battle of Britain

Posted on October 28, 2015 by smellincoffee

Battle of Britain© 1980 Len Deighton224 pages “When I told them that Britain would fight on alone, whatever [the French] did, their generals told their  prime minister and his divided cabinet, ‘In three weeks England will have its neck wrung … Continue reading →

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The Seven Deadly Sins

Posted on October 27, 2015 by smellincoffee

The Seven Deadly Sins: A Tomistic Guide to Vanquishing Vice and Sin © 2015 Kevin Vost 224 pages In the first centuries of the Christian epoch, devotees retreated into the desert wastes to flee temptation. Even away from the cry … Continue reading →

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Hitler’s Undercover War

Posted on October 25, 2015 by smellincoffee

Hitler’s Undercover War: The Nazi Espionage Invasion of the U.S.A.© 1989 William  Breuer358 pages Wars are not confined to battlefields, even when the fields of conflict are as wide-open as the open oceans and the very sky itself, as they … Continue reading →

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Downtown

Posted on October 24, 2015 by smellincoffee

Downtown: Its Rise and Fall (1880 – 1950)© 2001 Robert Fogelson544 pages Just listen to the music of the traffic in the city!Linger on the sidewalk where the neon signs are pretty — how can you lose? The lights are much brighter … Continue reading →

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Napoleon’s Buttons

Posted on October 24, 2015 by smellincoffee

Napoleon’s Buttons384 pages© 2003 Penny LeCouter Napeolon’s Buttons is microhistory in the truest sense of the world, a mix of science and history that not only dwells on the historical impact of various substances (cotton, sugar, chloroflourocarbons, silk), but examines … Continue reading →

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