Okay, so this book is in my stack of quick-reads-when-on-vacation books, one that I can leave where ever I am, and not worry too much about it, since I don't think I'd want to bring it home.

Aaaaaaaand, I was pretty much right.

The book is a spy novel, written in the end of the eighties during that Cold War stuff. I can always believe there will be some twist at the end with these spy books, which makes reading them somewhat odd because I'm always wondering who is the bad guy and when will he reveal himself, and not, say, enjoying the book.

This one got me with the whole "guy loves girl he just met" thing. Ugh. Yes, hormones and emotions, but a disappointed-in-life, heavy-drinker, life-sucks kind of guy being unable to shake this one? Come on, that's the definition of a tragic life.

Anyway, yeah, glad to have left it. Glad to leave it behind. It's fine if you like spy novels from the eighties. This one at least had books in it.

The Dresden Files, book 8

The trick about writing book reviews is to do them immediately after reading the book, so that the book is still fresh in your mind, the parts you like, the parts you didn't like, the parts you want to read again and again and again.

This isn't one of my favorite Dresden books (those are Dead Beat, Changes, and Skin Game, in that order). This one was, however, an enjoyable read. Yeah, we know Molly can be annoying, she's written fairly well as the angsty teenager going through changes and being defiant. And I see how the introduction of her into the inners of Dresden's world can be.

I found the reference to the Parable of the Talents to be frustrating. It goes:

“Three men were given money by their lord in the amount of fifteen, ten, and five silver talents. The man with fifteen invested the money, worked hard, and returned thirty talents to his lord. The man with ten did the same, and returned twenty talents. The lord was most pleased. But the third man was lazy. He buried his five talents in the ground, and when he returned them to the lord, expecting to be rewarded for keeping them safe, his lord was angry. He had not given the lazy man the money to be hidden away. He’d given it to the man so that he could use it and make his lands better, stronger, and ...

The third man RETURNED the funds. He didn't lose any. No, he didn't gain any, but he didn't lose it either. So he didn't make a rich man richer, he didn't make the rich man any poorer. I swear this is exactly the kind of sermon that people in power use to abuse the people under them: hey, YOU need to work harder to make ME more powerful. I dislike that story a lot.

This book, however, I liked, it's a Dresden book. Keep reading.

Okay, this was Jonathan Tropper's first novel. I am uncertain why I decided not to read it when I was on my Tropper kick, but I didn't, which meant I could read it this month.

The story is cute. Tropper's style is pretty apparent early on with this book. I'm glad this book had enough success that he was able to keep writing, as I liked his later books, too. That five people could be best friends in college and manage to keep the best friend status through all of the subsequent years I find to be the most fictional of this fiction, but I'd like to believe it could happen.

I enjoyed the book, and would recommend it to anyone on a Tropper kick. If you want only one Tropper book, make it the Book of Joe. If you want a quick, light, delightful read, this is a good one.

To know him was to know a man of absolute contentment, a loving husband and father, a great friend, a Godfearing man whose ample intelligence did not serve to complicate him, as it does so many people.
Page 171

"You all accuse me of living in the past, but the truth is I’m thirty years old and I’m still counting on the future to bail me out. And that’s a crock. You can spend years working toward something and get killed before you reach it, so what’s the point?”
Page 173

I was scared shitless of reality. That it might be something other than this.
Page 196

Chuck always employed the Socratic method of viewing television shows. He didn’t seem able to enjoy himself without his pointless commentary.
Page 208