Life in the Balance by Thomas Graboy

Life in the Balance is the devastating memoir of a cardiologist with a particularly nasty form of Parkinson’s. He describes his initial denial that anything is awry and the progressive worsening of his condition, which slowly takes away his mental abilities in addition to his physical abilities. For someone who was particularly happy and proud to [...]

The Dominant Animal by Paul and Anne Erlich

The Dominant Animal describes how we humans are abusing the planet as we grow ever more sophisticated and greedy. If you want to get really depressed about where we are going, this book is for you. The authors do attempt to give solutions, which are basically for us in the rich world to somehow give up [...]

The Good Thief by Hannah Tinti

What an odd book! The Good Thief is a Dickens-like novel written by a contemporary author. Set in New England during colonial times, it describes the fantastic life of Ren, an orphan missing a hand who is growing up in a Catholic orphanage and is claimed unexpectedly by a man who says he’s his brother but [...]

The Enemy Within by John Demos

The Enemy Within is a survey of witch hunting in the Western world, including the famous Salem witch trials but also drawing parallels with McCarthyism and even the preschool abuse trials of the 80s. It’s written by a Yale university professor who is clearly an expert on the topic, so there’s lots of good information, but [...]

Marrying Anita by Anita Jain

Anita, the author, is having difficulties finding a husband in New York city, having been unable to find one in London where she used to live as a carefree and cosmopolitan journalist. Considering that her quest involves going out to party and drink heavily with men who are married or have girlfriends in other cities, [...]

A Family Daugher by Maile Meloy

Why would I pick up the sequel of a book I did not like (Liars and Saints)? Simply because I had borrowed both books at once and felt dutiful to finish all the books in the basket. I suppose that the book is not completely terrible if I did manage to finish it.
I liked A [...]

Liars and Saints by Maile Meloy

Liars and Saints appears to be an acclaimed novel – but I thought it read like a not-so-great soap opera, with so many unlikely adventures my eyes started to roll midway through the book. The first (big) twist works fine: a very Catholic mother sends her pregnant teenage daughter off to France and then raises the baby [...]

Hurry Down Sunshine by Michael Greenberg

Hurry Down Sunshine is another terrifying book for parents, a la Beautiful Boy, but this time with a daughter who is diagnosed with psychosis and potentially a bipolar disorder, shut into a psychiatric hospital, drugged until her personality seemingly disappears, but recovers to go back to high school, where the book ends. (The epilogue hints at [...]

Cigarettes Tara Parker-Pope

Cigarettes tells the story of of cigarette manufactureres in America in much more accessible manner than The Cigarette Century reviewed recently. It turns out that 200 pages is enough to tell the story while avoiding the more tedious discussions. (I’ll admit it: I’m no historian.)
The author makes a powerful argument of the financial aspects of the [...]

The Cigarette Century by Allan M. Brandt

The Cigarette Century is a big tome (over 500 pages) that describes the success of cigarettes in the US and abroad. Written by a history professor, it’s carefully researched and annotated and, well, a little dull for me.
It follows the industry’s legendary success at marketing and selling a product which was never a necessity and is now [...]