Reviews of the books I've read

Virgil Flowers, Book 6

Okay, this Virgil Flowers book is not a mystery at all. From the first paragraph, we have the villains' names and their actions. We don't know exactly why they are doing what they are doing, but we know who they are and what they are doing. So, no mystery with a big reveal at the end about the bad things, just one giant action scene.

Eh, that accurately describes it, one long car chase.

Which isn't a bad thing. I remember reading Gerald's Game years ago and thinking, "Okay, King is a good author if he's able to make the story of a woman hand-cuffed to a bed for two days an interesting story." I had a similar reaction here, in that, okay, it's a 6 hour car chase by Virgil Flowers of three relatively dim-witted small-town teenagers (with a note in the book that half the population is dumber than average, which isn't necessarily true unless there is an evenly mirrored distribution of intelligence about a reflection point at the average, which there isn't, and also a discussion way off point here, but the note is in the book. Now, if we were talking median instead of average...), and, yet, it is still interesting.

Best to read that previous sentence without the content between the parentheses.

So, yeah, we have a 400 page car chase and a crap tonne of murders. Not the usual one maybe two (okay, four) that seem to be in every Flowers book. We start off with five and it gets worse from there. Of course the book's back cover tells us this, which is why, after someone has already recommended a book to me, I don't read the two sentence summaries on book jackets. Too often, they ruin the book.

And back to this book. Hey, Flowers isn't perfect. He doesn't always win. He's good, a statistical anomaly to be sure, but even he both makes mistakes and fails. We finally see this in this book.

There is a bit of a mystery in the book. I enjoyed it, and managed to read it starting at 11pm last night until 4am. No idea why I kept reading and wasn't tired. Was a fun ride.

Recommended. The whole series is recommended so far.

Virgil Flowers, Book 5

Once again, no intention of reading a book today, much less a book in its entirety, but travelling to devObjective today meant I had time on my hands, so I spent it reading (I know, shock). It helps to have the first seven books of the series in some variation of paper form. I have to say I'm rather glad I have a physical copy of these book instead of just digital. While I appreciate the digital format for convenience, I do so love the experience of reading books in physical form.

This Virgil Flowers book had a lot of death in it, though less than the previous one, and a lot of explosions. And, at the risk of giving away the ending, not a lot of sex. I found this last part to be somewhat of a relief, to be honest, since, well, Reacher had a different woman in every book and at what point do you just roll your eyes and think, "Really? Just how many STDs DO you have?"

Anyway, the book. The plot was great. I really liked the reveal in this one, as it had a number of clues but not enough that you the reader, nor Flowers the hero, realized what was going on until pretty much the end. Enough redirection that you knew something was up, but not enough to give up reading. The humour in this one was good, still with the quick wit, which I enjoyed. I like how Sandford is portraying the religious angst of a preacher's son who believes in a god that doesn't particularly care about the day-to-day of his believers, and really like a number of the biblical references included in the books. I've looked up a number of the quotes, reading them in the KJV translation, and thought about them. Completely fascinating, when they are taken 2000 years and who knows how many translations later.

So, as with the Virgil Flowers series so far, I enjoyed this book and recommend the series so far.

Speaking of, I have books 2-5 in physical form, already read, if anyone wants them to read.

This book took me FOREVER to finish. And by "forever" I mean over six months to actually read. I did not enjoy this book, and had to slog through it to actually finish it. "Why bother finishing it?" you may ask. I certainly asked myself that question a number of times. While I can say I didn't enjoy this book, I didn't hate it either. It sits squarely in the "meh" category of books.

Which is somewhat surprising to me, as I did enjoy We Are All Completely Fine, also by Daryl Gregory. That book I enjoyed enough that I might read Harrison Harrison after I've whittled my current to-read stack down below 20 books. This one, wow, I could not get through. Eventually, I put it on 2x speed on audiobook and just walked on the treadmill until I was done with it.

I liked the idea of the zombies existing rationally after the fever of the turn has happened, a central plot point of this book. I liked the idea of a zombie baby being able to grow into an adult. The length of the story and the just plain naiveté of Stony just grated on my nerves.

And I really did not like the ending.

I don't recommend this book unless you're a Gregory fan and want to read all of the books he's written. In that case, yeah, go ahead. Otherwise, skip this one.

Okay, I read this one again, since the first reading was before I knew what things were and why I was doing things and oh, god, what have I gotten myself into? Helps to have development under your belt for these things.

This book was recommended to me as the book to learn Rails development. It has two main sections: a hands-on let's-build-a-rails-app section, and a here-are-the-explanations section. The first is designed to guide you through building an application with Rails, the second to explain what the hell just happened and how all the parts fit together. The book builds a slight e-commerce platform: a store's product display / catalog, administration section, shopping cart, checkout and user authentication. The example is great, I definitely liked that it wasn't a blog or a twitter client.

The book is good and it works. It is not the book for new developers, however. It uses a lot of words and concepts without explaining them, assuming the reader knows what they mean. And this is okay. The book is for a developer who is learning Rails. It does that well.

Time-wise, if you're going to read the book and do the exercises (say, a new employer is giving you a chance to come up to speed with Rails, or the first couple weeks of work to learn), give yourself 2 work weeks to go through it. You can do it faster (you can always do things faster), but doing the exercises and typing things in and playing around with things relevant-to but not part-of the lessons is what makes learning better. So, yeah, play around, poke around, learn something outside the lesson for greater good.

That all said ("that" being, yes, I, too, recommend this book for developers learning Rails, not new developers), if you're learning Rails, it's not my first recommendation. As someone who does not like learning from videos, and much prefers the written word, I have to say my first recommendation is The Pragmatic Studio's Rails series for beginners learning how to develop Rails applications. The cost difference is significant, though, so it might not be feasible for the solo developer. For a company that wants developers coming through, the video series is worth the investment, and can be done in about two work weeks.

Virgil Flowers, Book 2

Moving right along with the Virgil Flowers series, I have to say that I am tickled I'm back up to 10 books a month by finishing this one. So far, both of the fuckin' Flowers books (a reference made inside the books) have been about 410-ish pages long, making them about a 5.5 hour read for me. Lounging around on vacation, these are just about right. And, I can get them from the condo association's library for free. Win!

What I am liking about these books so far, other than the fast-paced, amusing dialog, is the fact that Flowers isn't right the first time. He makes mistakes (OMG, unlike other cops) and he takes a wrong turn, and he guesses. Okay, fine, the author has written him to be human instead of super-human. The man needs to sleep, the man needs to pee. It's great.

This particular book had a few cases where I thought, "If the character finds these things weird, why doesn't he suspect this person?" And you know what? Hindsight is often clearer than live-sight, and we're the reader so OF COURSE we know what's going on. Except it isn't always clearer, and we don't always know what's going on, and the good guy doesn't always win. One could say in real life, the good guy rarely wins, it's the victor who just claims to be the good guy and writes history.

I enjoyed this book, ripped through it fast enough, even though the mystery was a little thin with some obvious plot holes. If I were giving stars, which I'm not, this one would be 4 of 5, and I would definitely say, keep reading.

On this vacation of mine, I (unsurprisingly) have goals. One of the ones I added was, "Read a book or two." Ten days, yeah, I should be able to finish one or two books.

Well, this is the second of two books I read on the first day of my vacation, while I was still travelling out here. Go fig. I can't even read "right" on a vacation.

That all said, this is a quick read. It starts out (appropriately) confusingly, 5 people attending a group therapy. They all have severe trauma in their past, of different flavours, their stories revealed as the plot progresses. No one wants to talk about their past, but eventually they all start talking, become a group, and begin to tell their tales. I have to say that, while the Amazon / back cover summary is nominally complete, it gives away more of the characters than it should. Don't read said summaries. The plot is much better that way.

As said, it is a quick read. I enjoyed this book. Only after reading it did I realize the author of this book is the author of Raising Stony Mayhall, which is an odd juxtaposition. I'm finding RSM terribly boring and difficult to finish. In contrast, this one was fast, engaging and interesting. Another "Go fig."

I have this book if you'd like to borrow it. I'll happily loan it out, if you bring it back. It has a nice twist at the end.

I'm not sure who recommended this book to me, likely Andy or Kris. The basic premise is that in a not-too-distant future (like, really not too distant, the world is pretty much shit, and humans interact in a virtual world, pretty much hermitting except for, well, not much. The creator of the virtual world technology dies, and leaves the inheritance of his vast fortune to the first person to find an easter egg hidden in that virtual world. The biggest issue with the easter egg hunt is the stunning size and complexity of the virtual world created.

The book is full of 1980s trivia, including more references to early gaming culture than I have seen in a long, long, long time.

It was a great, if somewhat awkward at times, read.

And as Andy says, "Was there ever a greater decade than the 80s?" The answer is, of course, "No."

Recommended.

Okay, I found this book a bit hard to read. Not because the words or phrases are complicated or awkward; they aren't, it's an easy read, word- and style-wise. No, it was difficult because apparently I've been doing relationships all wrong. Well, primary relationships, anyway. At least according to this book.

Okay, maybe not ALL wrong. I'd been doing a lot correctly, tidbits and habits picked up over the years. The big things, though, those I'd been doing poorly. The one I smiled biggest at the recognition of doing well with is launchings and landings: a kiss good morning, a kiss good night, a kiss hello, a kiss goodbye. I've done will with seeking out the Boy when I return from our being apart, which goes with the kiss hello. That is my favorite habit.

The book has ten guiding principles, with ideas like the Couple Bubble, becoming expert managers of our partners, loving is up close so look your partner in the eye frequently (like all the time), and learning to fight fairly and never with a goal to win, but to understand better (well, fuck, where have I heard that one before). I've done some of them correctly, but failed miserably at the rest.

The book describes people's tendencies in relationships to be Anchors (securely attached, comfortable with who they are and the relationship), Islands (insecurely avoidant), and Waves (insecurely ambivalent). Having read Attached a couple years ago when it was spinning through the web development spheres, I recognized the different attachment styles. I've most definitely become an Island, though I hadn't really thought I had. This quote hit me in the gut, though:

People who are islands often confuse independence and autonomy with their adaptation to neglect.

I'm still mulling it over.

The happy examples in the book are great, as happy examples should be. The two-anchor couple sounds like bliss. Part of me suspects, however, that so much of that bliss sounds like choosing the right person in the beginning, and being lucky enough to be with someone not obsessed with the typical American cultural values, by which I mean youth over the wisdom of experience and the growth (read "aging") that comes with it, money over experiences, gratitude over consumption. Being with someone who is secure with who they are, able to be vulnerable, and willing to bring stability to the chaos of the Island or Wave, seems to be the way to a happy relationship for an Island, Wave or Anchor. Not really sure how someone manages to become an Anchor, though. And that's the kicker.

I recommend this book for anyone in a relationship. I'll likely read this one again. I expect to learn again in the next reading.

Walt Longmire, Book 9

Okay, I was somewhat excited to be reading a Walt Longmire book that didn't start off with some murder investigation. I mean, there are only so many deaths you can have in a small county before everyone, and I mean EVERYONE, notices and gets the fuck out of there. Okay, yes, some of the books were about escaped convicts, but even that resulted in a lot of death. And one particular story had only a stolen horse.

This one, the main plot premise doesn't involve the investigation into a death. Hot damn.

Once again, Johnson doesn't disappoint with a fast paced modern day, small down, western mystery. The clues were a little too obvious in this book as to what was going on, which, of course, leads the reader to think, COME ON, DON'T BE DUMB, at the characters. Of course, in Johnson style, Longmire has figured out what's going on, and it just playing along until the right time to expose his knowledge.

I really wish I would learn the art of playing along.

I enjoyed this book. I'm nearing the end of the written Longmire books, as there are only two left. I guess I'll have to wait for Johnson to write more. At least he doesn't write at GRRM pace. Gah, would suck.