Lab Girl

'After a pause he closed his eyes and asked, "Am I a tiger yet?"

I looked him up and down slowly, and then answered, "No."

"Why not?" he asked.

"Because it takes a long time," I answered.

"Why does it take a long time?" he pursued.

"Why? I don't know," I admitted, then added, "It takes a long time to turn into what you're supposed to be."'

Hope Jahren

Lab Girl

This book was so many things. It is a fantastic memoir of a woman who is so many things. It is a wonderful piece of writing on science and the way plants work and how we perceive them in our world. It is a magnificent examination of a relationship. It is funny, sometimes darkly hilarious and sometimes hopefully bright. If anyone only reads one book a year (which is a rather silly thing to do, books are awesome and everyone should read at least two) they should read this one. And I am sorry I am telling you about it now instead of in April when it comes out...so, pre-order your copies or reserve them at the library. Because this book is the bee's knees.

It is so hard to pin down exactly what I loved so much about this book. I don't know if it was finally reading a memoir of a woman who didn't stop doing what she loved cause she had a kid (why can't we have our cake and eat it too?), or the fact that she is so unapologetically passionate for science, and specifically plant science (if you missed kindergarten, trees are really important). I don't know if it was the honest critique of the way science funding is doled out in America, or the way Americans feel about curiosity driven research. "America may say that it values science, but it sure as hell doesn't want to pay for it." Maybe its how eloquently she writes, the grace with which she describes the natural world, and the humor she uses to explain how she feels about it. Maybe its the wonderful relationship she has with her lab partner that is so fantastically platonic, with no pressure to have something more, and how they see each other as they are. Maybe its the way she put word to how sexism has made me feel doing things that I love all my life, defining it as "the cumulative weight of constantly being told that you can't possibly be what you are." That thing that has often made me feel inadequate when I am more than qualified. Maybe its all of these things.

And for this book, I would like to thank her. This book meant so much to me. It made me feel that I am not alone in feeling the ways that I sometimes feel. It made me feel that its OK that I'm uncertain, OK that I'm not where I thought I'd be or that I don't have all the answers because things take time. 

And to everyone else: I highly recommend this book. It is truly on a different level.

Three-Body Problem

Let me list what this book is, and has, and does, so wonderfully. Not only is it good science fiction. But its science-y science fiction, with really physics, and principles that have been tested and proven in the real world. It is set in China, and not just China in modern day but peoples revolution China. Its well written, it conveys complicated abstract ideas beautifully, and it accomplishes all this translated from Chinese (it even has foot notes to explain historical nuance and puns that exist in Chinese and not in English). This book was fantastic. Liu Cixin is truly a writer to be reckoned with, and I cannot wait to read the next books in the series.

Set against the political backdrop of the peoples revolution in China and the prosecution of scientist and intellectuals, the story follows the life of a scientist who is involved in a top secret research project looking for extraterrestrial life, a physicist working on nanotechnology, and a cult that worships a lord that demands the killing of scientists.

This book was fantastic. I loved it. I think this was honestly one of the best science fiction books I've ever read, and I highly recommend it to everyone.

Gold Fame Citrus

Hey Everyone!

This one was published in the Durango Herald on 1/22/16, you can read the original review here .

I loved this book. It was a fantastic story, well written, and had amazing characters. Check it out!

SPQR

"Ancient Rome is important. To ignore the Romans is not just to turn a blind eye to the distant past. Rome still helps to define the way we understand our world and think about ourselves, from high theory to low comedy. After 2,000 years it continues to underpin western culture and politics, what we write and how we see the world, and our place in it."

Mary Beard

SPQR

Rome. By 63 BCE the city was made up of more than a million inhabitants, sprawling on the banks of the Tiber. It has captured our imaginations, from the assassination of Julius Caesar to Commodus' battles in the gladiatorial arena (the movie, it turns out, isn't to far off). Marcus Aurelius is still taught in schools and the fact that we still are responsible for the sidewalk in front of our house are remnants of this time.

But how did Rome become a large and powerful state? Mary Beard examines the rise of Rome from a small town in central Italy to an extravagant empire that stretched from Spain to Syria over the course of of a millennium. In doing this, she changes our historical perspective, instead of examining the lives of the great men (and in the case of Rome, they were all men) she looks at how the Romans themselves were effected by the lives of these great men: what they thought of republic and empire, how they responded to terrorism and revolution, how their thoughts on freedom and slavery changed. She also examines the stories often overlooked in traditional history, those of women, slaves, conspirators, and those on the losing side. The effect is marvelous.

Beard is extremely readable. She breaks down the history of Rome into several important events, looking at the large, overarching trends rather than the complicated events. This gives a unique and extremely interesting view of Roman history, examining the big shifts in thinking, the large changes in politics, looking at how stable society as a whole was during different times. 

This book was phenomenal. A well researched, well written history of a place that still greatly effects the way we think about things and the way we govern ourselves today. A fantastic read that I highly recommend to anyone who has been to Italy (I definitely wish that I had read this book before I went), would like to go to Italy, or who has ever uttered the word "republic."      

Our Only World

"So far as I can see, the future has no narrative. The future does not exist until it has become past. To a very limited extent, prediction has worked. The sun, so far, has set and risen as we have expected it to do. And the world, I suppose, will predictably end, but all of its predicted deadline, so far, have been wrong."

Wendell Berry

Our Only World

Climate change is, in my opinion, the toughest challenge humanity will ever have to face. Part of the trouble stems from a slew of 'deniers,' refusing to acknowledge that there is a problem at all. The other difficulty comes from how complex the issue actually is. From greenhouse gasses, to energy production, rising sea levels, and thawing permafrost. There are so many different facets, so many things leading into the problem, and we must try to find a solution to every single part of the equation. 

In Our Only World, Wendell Berry examines how we use the land we have for production of food and timber, and has come to the conclusion that this method of production is unsustainable. In this collection of ten essays, he looks in depth into how we cannot sacrifice land health for production, and how we might remedy that, and reasons why we should support local farmers, who are more likely to take care of their land year after year. 

I thought that this collection was fantastic. It is so often that the climate change problem is written of as a "find that one big solution" problem, and its not. Not only must we find cleaner ways of producing energy and ways of making our energy system more efficient, we must find ways to use less (make your car last 20 years instead of buying a new one every 5), not only must we find ways to capture the methane emissions of cows, we must have less cows (eat less meat, outside wrote a great article on it). It is a fantastic solution, one that may not always jib with the consumer society that we live in. It will be difficult. But the consequences are to dire for us to balk at the challenge. As Dumbledore once said, "we must choose between what is easy, and what is right."

Pilgrim at Tinker Creek

"I'm getting used to this planet and to this curious human culture which is as cheerfully enthusiastic as it is cheerfully cruel."

"It has always been a happy thought to me that the creek runs on all night, new every minute, whether I wish it or know it or care, as a closed book on a shelf continues to whisper to itself its own inexhaustible tale."

Annie Dillard

Pilgrim at Tinker Creek

Pilgrim at Tinker Creek is a beautiful collection of observations that Annie Dillard makes about her home near Tinker Creek in Virginia over the course of the year. Starting at the end of winter, she describes her experiences of the place and how her observations shaped her world view, and how her world view shaped her observations and interactions with the other inhabitants at Tinker Creek.

I really liked this book. The way Dillard describes everything is fantastic. She has an incredibly unique way of describing her world. She asks questions and challenges the assumptions she has routinely, trying to reconcile the beauty and order that she finds in nature, with the harshness and seeming randomness that she also finds. She often describes this struggle using scientific knowledge that she has gained from books, and frames it against a backdrop of religious text. I really liked the scientific inquiry that she brought in, though her arguments and religious references sometimes seemed forced.

Her prose is phenomenal, the way she phrases things is beautifully blunt, whether talking about where she finds home or how unique having an interior skeleton is among most of the animal kingdom.

"The general rile in nature is that live things are soft within and rigid without. We vertebrates are living dangerously, and we vertebrates are positively piteous, like so many peeled trees."

She does a fantastic job making her statements about the way the world is intensely personal, which is a feat when so many pit us against nature: we are separated by clothes we've made and shelters we've built. She breaks down this barrier and makes the connections clear, all the while not discounting the differences between all living things.

This was a great read. I highly recommend it.

 

New Blog, To Kill a Mockingbird, and Being Published

Really exciting news everyone!

First: I've been published! It's a review in the Durango Herald of the kids book the Star Bright Factory. I can now be a for real professional writer!

This might lead to a bit of a lag in post on this project, just because if I read a book and want to get it published I can't have it published online, Though things will get posted once they are in print or the pitch has been denied.

Second: New Blog!!!! It's the We Read Drinks project, where we read books and drink drinks. Books that I haven't read yet still count for this project. The first one we read is To Kill a Mockingbird. Which is awesome, check out the review at we read drinks!

Happy New Year!!!!

Happy New Year!

As we slide from 2015 into 2016, I would like to participate in the tradition of reflection, and it comes to you like Aristotle's soul: in three parts.

First, I would like to apologize for only four posts in the month of December. Throughout the winter I work two jobs: one as a bookseller at a small, independent bookstore and the other as a rental tech at our local ski area. December is super busy at both, so I have mostly been working and sleeping. I promise over the coming months to read more and do better.

I would also like to look back at the books I have read in the past year, talk about my favorites and the ones I think are the most important. In the past year I have read 104 books, 80 of which are included in this project (twenty left, and four months to read them in). A mixture of fiction, and non-fiction (I've failed in the reading of a romance), I would like to give you two different lists: the 7 most important books I've read, and my 7 favorites.

The most important books I've read this year are:

1. Black Earth by Timothy Snyder
2. The World and Me by Ta-Nahesi Coates
3. 6th Extinction by Elizabeth Kolbert
4. All the Wild that Remains by David Gessner
5. Missoula by Jon Krakauer
6. On Immunity by Eula Biss
7. End of Night by Paul Bogard

My favorite books that I've read this year are:

7. War of the Encyclopaedists by Christopher Robinson and Gavin Kovite
6. Water Knife by Paulo Bacigualupi
5. Martian by Andy Weir
4.All the Wild that Remains by David Gessner
3.Frankenstein by Mary Shelly
2. Fates and Furies by Lauren Geoff
1. Black Sun by Edward Abbey

These are all fantastic and I highly recommend them.

Lastly, I would like to talk about what I am hoping to achieve in 2016. I'm planning on completing the Year in 100 books project. There are four months and 20 books left, and I am greatly looking forward to reading these books. I've really enjoyed this project and hope that I will be able to work on more projects like this in the future.

This year I will also be working on my first joint project. Andi (writer of the Survival of the Twenties), Arielle, and myself will be reading all of the books, and drinking all of the drinks in Tim Federle's book Tequila Mockingbird and writing about them. Check it out at We Read Drinks. Were hoping to have our first post out in the next couple of weeks.

I hope that everyone has had a wonderful New Years, and I hope that everyone will have a great year filled with wonderful books!