Category Archives: Reviews

Book reviews, as well as Reads to Reels

Thank You For Smoking

Posted on August 14, 2014 by smellincoffee

Thank You for Smoking© 1994 Christopher Buckley272 pages Nick Naylor may be one of the most hated men in America, because his job is to serve as the legal guardian and advocate of Big Tobacco –and he is very, very … Continue reading →

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Tending the Epicurean Garden

Posted on August 8, 2014 by smellincoffee

Tending the Epicurean Garden© 2014 Hiram Crespo185 pages Stoicism is not the only Greco-Roman school of practical philosophy experiencing a revival these days. Epicureanism, long reduced to a synonym for food-and-wine-snobs,  has found an audience within the increasingly secularized west, … Continue reading →

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The Men Who Lost America

Posted on August 7, 2014 by smellincoffee

The Men Who Lost America: British Leadership, the American Revolution, and the Fate of an Empire© Andrew Jackson O’Shaughnessy480 pages The Men Who Lost America is a rare history of the American Revolution, one which follows not the revolutionaries, but their … Continue reading →

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This week: war, war, war

Posted on July 28, 2014 by smellincoffee

This past week has been a quiet one, as I’ve been devotedly reading through Castles of Steel, an 800+ page history of the naval war between Britain and Germany during World War I.  I’m just starting Jutland, and after that … Continue reading →

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Fighting Traffic

Posted on July 22, 2014 by smellincoffee

Fighting Traffic: The Dawn of the Motor Age in the American City© 2008 Peter Norton396 pages Stroll into the middle of any American city today, and provided you are not in Detroit, odds are better than not you will be … Continue reading →

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This week: Huck Finn and a world at war

Posted on July 21, 2014 by smellincoffee

Without intending to, this past week I read two science fiction novels that both concerned human genetic engineering, neither featuring it in a positive light. I read The Rise and Fall of Khan Noonien Singh after watching “Space Seed”,  The Wrath … Continue reading →

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Rise and Fall of KHAAAAAAAAAN! Volume I

Posted on July 20, 2014 by smellincoffee

Star Trek Eugenic Wars: the Rise and Fall of Khan Noonien Singh, Volume I© 2001 Greg Cox520 pages Ah, how well I remember the 1990s — neon colored plastic pants, frizzy hair, and that gang of genetically engineered supermen starting … Continue reading →

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Allegiant

Posted on July 19, 2014 by smellincoffee

Allegiant© 2013 Veronica Roth544 pages  “Sure as I know anything I know this, they will try again. Maybe on another world, maybe on this very ground swept clean. A year from now, ten, they’ll swing back to the belief that … Continue reading →

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The Small Mart Revolution

Posted on July 16, 2014 by smellincoffee

The Small-Mart Revolution: How Local Businesses Are Beating the Global Competition© 2007 Michael Shuman285 pages Independence has long ceased to be the American credo, supplanted by another: efficiency. Throughout the 20th century, small businesses supporting towns and families were devoured … Continue reading →

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This week at the library; Huck Finn and the British crown

Posted on July 14, 2014 by smellincoffee

            Try as  I might,  none of the French-related books I investigated this week struck my interest, so for the first time since starting the tradition,  my Bastille Day reading is a nonstarter. C’est la vie. … Continue reading →

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