Bibliophilia
Of the making of books there is no end.
Overmuch study maketh men mad.
If you're curious about my approach to "reviews," you might want to read this. If you're curious about me, I have a Website, and a blog about things Medieval and Celtic. I read a lot. I suppose you could say I am a professional reader; I have a Ph.D. in English from UCLA, with an emphasis on things Celtic, and literature before 1832. I serve as Webmaster and Managing Editor for The Green Man Review and volunteer as an Admin for Absolute Write.
My most recent books are about doing stuff with the iPad. Most of the books I review here are books I purchased, a family member purchased, or that I borrowed from a library. When a publisher or author provides a book or an e-arc or an ARC, I will state that in the review. I am not paid to review the books on this site. (I do occasionally serve as an outside reviewer for scholarly books being considered for publication by academic or scholarly presses).
I like ebooks. I like making ebooks. I like reading ebooks. I object, violently, to text dumps and poorly made ebooks, and will so note in reviews of books that have been badly produced by a publisher who thinks exporting a file from InDesign is all it takes. In general, I am not soliciting books for review. Please do not send me review books as attachments without conferring with me first, since your attachment will be automatically deleted by my server. I am no longer willing to review self-published books, unless you're an author I've previously reviewed, or you are publishing a backlist of previously commercially published books. You can contact me here.
If you purchase something after following an affiliate link on this site, I will receive a percentage of the price. This is my FTC disclosure, in case you wondered. In other words, I'm a mercenary hack.
Interrupted Music: The Making of Tolkien's Mythology
Flieger is one of the best of the Tolkien scholars, one who loves and understands story, appreciates Tolien as a teller of tales and a scholar. She has a keen understanding of myth and a fine scholarly understanding without the unfortunate tendency to be pedantic.
You can find my complete review here.
Just a heads-up that this isn't the end of the story. It stops at a reasonable point, but It's Not Over yet.
First, I like this book, enough to want more. Second, it's the first volume of a trilogy, and the ending is somewhat abrupt, even frustrating. But it's worth reading, and I think, worth waiting for the rest.
Some lovely world building, and interesting characterization in the main character.
Once again, as with Sunshine and Doeskin, this isn't a book "like" Ms. McKinley's previous books; it's a thing of its own.
I finally have gotten around to reading this much recommended book. I like it. It's done a difficult thing; making the various "Cinderella" tales (http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/type0510a.html) new. It's also rather subtle.
This one's a keeper for me. And I'll be looking for more by Lo.
The pre 1800 stuff is . . . Well, not accurate. I wouldn't recommend this book to anyone.
A reasonable survey, best read as a companion to one of the standard texts about the Celts in a Greco-Roman/Classical context.
I’d recommend this book for someone new to Lion, someone who likes practical hands-on learning rather more theoretical approaches, and someone who wants to do more with Lion than they’ve been doing. The section on Interacting From A Distance alone is worth the price of admission, even for a long time user. McNulty offers clear instructions, and a genuine awareness of how ordinary people use Macs. Nicely done.Full review here.
This is an anthology of SF/F/Spec Fic/Horror from the members of Absolute Write, especially the forums. There are familiar names here—Alma Alexander, and Suzanne Palmer, both of whom are familiar to SF/F fans. But the new names here are well-worth reading. I'm not going to list them all—but I will mention some of my favorites. Candace Petrik's "Gus" is downright chilling. I've read it several times, and it's a little more disturbing-in-a-good-way each time.
Fatihah Iman's "Daughter of the Void" deals with cross-cultural issues in a era of space travel, and space-going families in a marvelous, thoughtful way, in a tale that's pure story. Clinton Lawrence in "The Winter Camp" takes an old fey trope and renders it rich and strange. I loved Deleyan Lee's "Alchemy of A Murder," an Urban Fantasy tale with a rich well-thought out world, that, while the story is complete in itself has me wanting a lot more.
The cover illustration by Alessandra Kelley is lovely, with a lot of interesting details, and the ten black-and-white illustrations by other artists, including Puss in Boots, Shannon Tarvin, and Marina Lostetter are evocative.
This is a anthology of writers and illustrators whole work I'll be following.
Take Control of Using Lion is well-written, with easy to understand step by step directions and explanations. I honestly can’t imagine anyone using Mac OS X Lion who wouldn’t find Take Control of Using Lion exceedingly helpful; I say this as someone who has been using a Mac daily since 1989. Matt Neuberg has written a book useful to both the diehard cultists like me, and the new users, both of whom can find what they need easily and quickly.You can find my detailed review here.
Take Control of Using Lion is well-written, with easy to understand step by step directions and explanations. I honestly can’t imagine anyone using Mac OS X Lion who wouldn’t find Take Control of Using Lion exceedingly helpful; I say this as someone who has been using a Mac daily since 1989. Matt Neuberg has written a book useful to both the diehard cultists like me, and the new users, both of whom can find what they need easily and quickly.You can find my detailed review here.
Joe Kissell’s book is hands down the best guide I’ve seen to upgrading to Lion. He takes you through the questions you need to answer before upgrading, downloading the installer and backing up, as well as the install process itself. Take Control of Upgrading Lion covers how to determine if your hardware is ready for the Lion upgrade, if you’re Rosetta dependency-free, even how to purge your drive of duplicates and archaic leftovers from previous versions of OS X. Perhaps most importantly, Kissell includes an especially helpful section on the initial configuration steps you need to take once you’ve done a basic OS X Lion install.Read the rest of my review here.
Joe Kissell’s book is hands down the best guide I’ve seen to upgrading to Lion. He takes you through the questions you need to answer before upgrading, downloading the installer and backing up, as well as the install process itself. Take Control of Upgrading Lion covers how to determine if your hardware is ready for the Lion upgrade, if you’re Rosetta dependency-free, even how to purge your drive of duplicates and archaic leftovers from previous versions of OS X. Perhaps most importantly, Kissell includes an especially helpful section on the initial configuration steps you need to take once you’ve done a basic OS X Lion install.Read the rest of my review here.
Take Control for TextExpander is one of the most useful and easy to follow Take Control books I’ve read. The documentation and help for TextExpander is adequate, but not stellar. This book combines practical and theoretical information, and is so easy to navigate to find exactly what you want, that it made TextExpander far more useful to me far more rapidly than I expected. I’ve been using TextExpander for about a month now, daily, and I’ve gone back to this book a handful of times to find out how to do something, and each time, I’ve found just the information I needed in seconds.See my full review here.
Take Control for TextExpander is one of the most useful and easy to follow Take Control books I’ve read. The documentation and help for TextExpander is adequate, but not stellar. This book combines practical and theoretical information, and is so easy to navigate to find exactly what you want, that it made TextExpander far more useful to me far more rapidly than I expected. I’ve been using TextExpander for about a month now, daily, and I’ve gone back to this book a handful of times to find out how to do something, and each time, I’ve found just the information I needed in seconds.See my full review here.
