Tag: Harvard

Books

Book 657: Pride and Prejudice and Mistletoe – Melissa de la Cruz

Geoff W

Book cover for "Pride and Prejudice and Mistletoe"Once again, the dangers of allowing me loose online or in a library result in me reading a random book I found while looking for something else specifically. Don’t get me wrong, I would’ve read this eventually—it’s a Jane Austen fan fiction/retelling/spinoff with reverse genders set at Christmas.

Honestly, I wasn’t even aware Pride and Prejudice and Mistletoe existed, but since I found it on Overdrive I’ve found out that they made a Hallmark movie of it and you KNOW I will be watching that this coming curl up inside because it’s cold outside and watch questionable movies season.

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ARC, Books

Book 600: Shortest Way Home – Pete Buttigieg

Geoff W

Damnit. Now I want to move to South Bend, Indiana—well, maybe only a bit. I love my “mid-sized” Boston and “quaint” Cambridge, liberal East Coast elitist state a bit too much, to really consider it. I reached out to the publisher for a copy of this book after Mayor Pete announced his exploratory run for U.S. President.*

As the first openly gay (married, veteran) person considering a run for this office, of course I wanted to read it. I wanted to know why he felt he could go from being the mayor of small Midwest city to running the United States; I wanted to know his coming out story (it’s what binds us gays [broadly LGBTQ+] together); and I wanted to see what his vision was for the future. Did I get all of this? Not quite. Was it worth reading? Definitely.

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Books

Book 525: Origin (Robert Langdon #5) – Dan Brown

Geoff W

I’m not sure if this has pulled me out of my reading slump, but I did read it. When I got the notification from the library for this I was surprised. I had completely forgotten that I’d requested this.

I wasn’t exactly chomping at the bit to read this, but I figured why not? Brown might not be the most high brow of authors, but the man knows how to write a page turner (mostly). I still remember reading The Da Vinci Code it’s year of publication and quickly seeking out Angels and Demons and Deception Point. Ever since then I’ve made a habit of reading his books as they’re released. I enjoyed both The Lost Symbol and Inferno, and this one probably falls somewhere with those two. The wonder and awe as the action in Da Vinci Code unfolded just wasn’t there in the follow ups.

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Books

Book 452: A Discovery of Witches (All Souls Trilogy #1) – Deborah Harkness

Geoff W

Harkness, Deborah - A Discovery of Witches (All Souls Trilogy #1)I probably would have read this book closer to its release, but unfortunately it’s part of a trilogy (this followed by (Shadow of Night and  The Book of Life) and I didn’t want to read the books as they came out so I waited to read it. I really wanted to read it a lot sooner because a lot of my blogger friends who really enjoyed it. That being said, I’m a little grumpy as I’ve just found out that Harkness will continue writing in this universe with the release of The Serpent’s Mirror next year. So bah.

If I had to break this down into a one sentence review it would be: Harry Potter meets Twilight for adults. That’s definitely a bit reductionist, but as I was reading that’s what I kept thinking. It wasn’t as much of a compulsive read as either of those series, but A Discovery of Witches definitely stands on its own.

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Books

Book 400: The Dante Club – Matthew Pearl

Geoff W

Pearl, Matthew - The Dante ClubAnd another TBR bites the dust! This book has been hanging out on my bookshelves since December of 2012 when I picked it up at one of my favorite used bookstores, Edward McKay, back in NC. More importantly, it is the 26th book from my TBR shelves this year. How awesome is that? That’s more than 1/3 of all the books I’ve read this year and I am incredibly happy and proud of that number.

I don’t know why I put off reading The Dante Club for so long. Maybe it was in some sort of effort to actually read all of Dante’s Divine Comedy before I read it, but that obviously hasn’t happened. The other thing that has left me wondering since I finished it , and honestly since I started it, is I can’t quite put my finger on why I didn’t enjoy this book as much as I feel I should have.

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