Category Archives: Reviews

Book reviews, as well as Reads to Reels

A reading from "Confederates in the Attic"

Posted on March 31, 2014 by smellincoffee

Awakening the next morning in a $27 room at Salisbury’s EconLodge, I recognized the appeal of dwelling on the South’s past rather than its present. Stepping from my room into the motel parking lot, I gazed out a low-slung horseshoe … Continue reading →

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I’ll Take My Stand

Posted on March 29, 2014 by smellincoffee

I’ll Take My Stand: The South and the Agrarian Tradition © 1930 various authors. 410 pages  “There was a land of Cavaliers and Cotton Fields called The Old South…Here in this pretty world Gallantry took its last bow…Here was the … Continue reading →

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The Long Loneliness

Posted on March 28, 2014 by smellincoffee

The Long Loneliness© 1952 Dorothy Day288 pages (Harper Collins, 2009(             Dorothy Day came of age amid the Great War, a child of struggling parents whose labors to make ends meet stayed with her even after they had achieved some … Continue reading →

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The Body Electric

Posted on March 26, 2014 by smellincoffee

Star Trek Cold Equations, Book Three: The Body Electric© 2013 David Mack352 pages Bad news. There’s a planet-sized machine with a companion black hole ominously named “Abaddon” using artificial wormholes to suck entire star systems into its maw.  Worse news: … Continue reading →

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This week at the library: astronauts, cities, and very serious business

Posted on March 24, 2014 by smellincoffee

Dear readers: On last Sunday I raided my university library and got lost on a hike (sometimes the fork less traveled by takes you to an 18-hole golf course where you wander lost for hours until emerging in a subdivision), … Continue reading →

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The Simple Living Guide

Posted on March 23, 2014 by smellincoffee

The Simple Living Guide: A Sourcebook for Less Stressful, More Joyful Living© 1997 Janet Luhrs444 pages Life distracts easily and passes by without being noticed. The Simple Living Guide is written as an antidote, one which both prompts people to … Continue reading →

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The Call of the Mall

Posted on March 21, 2014 by smellincoffee

Call of the Mall: the Geography of Shopping© 2005 Paco Underbill240 pages Paco Underhill wants to take a little walk with you through the local mall, to see it with his eyes- the eyes of  a “retail anthropologist” and marketing … Continue reading →

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Sycamore Row

Posted on March 20, 2014 by smellincoffee

Sycamore Row© 2013 John Grisham 464 pages  I have been less than impressed with John Grisham’s books in recent years; The Racketeer made me suspect Grisham or his publishers were merely milking the success of his name.  Sycamore Row, however, … Continue reading →

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The Redneck Manifesto

Posted on March 17, 2014 by smellincoffee

The Redneck Manifesto: How Hicks, Hillbillies, and White Trash Became Amerca’s Scapegoats© 1998 Jim Goad272 pages Rednecks of the world, unite! You have nothing to lose but your bills.   Jim Goad’s The Redneck Manifesto is a raucous mixture of southern … Continue reading →

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Daily Life in Anglo-Saxon England

Posted on March 13, 2014 by smellincoffee

Daily Life in Anglo-Saxon England© 2008 Sally Crawford224 pages             Who were the Anglo-Saxons? For a people conquered in 1066, their culture seems strangely dominant;  the land the Normans conquered remains England, not Greater Normandy, and Norman French is only … Continue reading →

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