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Most time travel stories involve the travel of individuals, a few have groups. In this book, huge fragments of the world travel in time, allowing primitive Celt to meet up with Victorian and modern inhabitants of south-eastern England. This first book in a series leaves many questions unanswered.

Among those questions are whether this can ever be un-done. Most time travel has some handwaving about how the travelers accomplish the feat - here that must expand to the entire world. How did this "chrono-event" keep everybody in the same geographical place, considering a rotating and orbiting planet whose sun is part of a rotating and orbiting galaxy, etc.? Perhaps some of this will be answered in future books.

Author Dana Fredsti is a self-described B-movie actress, and co-writes with her husband David Fitzgerald. Their characters were interesting, with the tale told from multiple viewpoints. I wanted to see a section from Alex's viewpoint, and obviously one from "Merlin", but perhaps that will also have to wait for a subsequent book. The main villain of this tale is a caricature, unfortunately. The specific story here comes to a conclusion, but the world story definitely doesn't. I'll probably dig into the next book when I can track it down.

Solid review that covers Tom's life in and out of baseball. Lovingly describes the Met years, leaves underexplained some negative aspects of this franchise legend.

The early years were well covered, including his famous split rookie card with Bill Denehy. A later "rookie stars" card had Seaver and Nolan Ryan - a lucky draw for the Mets. Probably the best aspect of this section was Tom's personal drive to win and move beyond the earlier paradigm of "lovable losers".

I enjoyed reading about his later years, standing up for the players, and his move into wine growing in California. Each of these pieces were a little sparse - the strikes, lock-outs and free agency, the later franchise appearances, and the wine competitions. Small controversies with the press or over salary are completely glossed over. The ending of the book was very quick

In the end, Tom Seaver was a great pitcher and decent human being - this book captures him well.

Self-proclaimed redneck points out why a class of voters are so easily misled. Short version - the fundamentalist church and a lack of education are the main problem, covering for lying politicians. An inability to see consequences is the main result.

I found the book educational and at times eye-opening: I was completely surprised (and depressed) by connecting a lack of concern for the environment to a firm belief in the rapture and the end of this world. Inherent distrust in anyone who isn't "their guy" is also concerning.

Can any of this be overcome? The author believes education could work, but doesn't dig into details. Much of public education has been co-opted over the last century, and it is always first to lose funding. While he may be right, I think new approaches are necessary.

The book isn't "hilarious" as promised on the dust jacket. Howard Zinn's quote is closer to the mark - "The account of his revisit to his Virginia roots is sobering, poignant, and instructive." For a book written in 2007, this is still mighty relevant.

An important book on mass incarceration that describes the problem well, extrapolates reasons that cover part of the cause, and is slightly out of date - which the author acknowledges in her introduction to the 10th anniversary edition.

It is true that America was founded by white males who likely intended the vote to be controlled by landed gentry. It may be true that they were against women and people of color ever having any rights - or it may be that the concept was just outside of their experience. Regardless of this, the constitution has adapted somewhat, even if the supreme court has been shown to lag behind.

It is true that the white males of the south were solidly behind slavery, fighting a war to keep that right. It may be true that this was an extension of keeping the black man down so the poor white man had something - or it may be that the main focus was more economic than racist initially. The related dehumanization of slaves, and later immigrants and criminals, was required to justify the mistreatment. That leads directly to the subject of this book.

The author spends a lot of effort connecting this history to racism, which may or may not have helped her cause. The history is important, but it doesn't reveal a better way to change the flawed system we have today. She also spent a lot of effort showing how time and time again the supreme court didn't help (or help enough). It appears to me that expecting the highest court in the land to interpret the constitution the way we commonly do is a fool's errand. I wanted to see more on changing the laws at the state and federal level, even amending the constitution where necessary. The laws we have today are "colorblind" and authorities cannot mention race as a reason - but that only covers the "by law" approach.

This book did an excellent job of pointing out the racism "in fact", if not by law. THIS is where things need to change. Time and time again I read about "discretion", which opens the door for "discrimination". Police officers have the discretion to choose who they stop and frisk. Prosecutors have the discretion to choose which charges to apply to a given detainee. Police departments have the discretion to handle crime quotas by targeting smaller (and non-violent) criminals instead of going after harder targets. This alone is why there are more black and brown people in the extended criminal justice system than whites, regardless of the seriousness of crimes committed.

Finally, the book touches on disenfranchisement of felons and the "business" of incarceration (and parole). These two facts are the largest reason why major change will be very difficult at the federal level when resisted by a political party that would like to remove the right to vote from as many as possible. In my opinion, some courage could be used to apply this at a state level. For instance, a state with legal marijuana should reprieve from prison all those who are only in for possession of what is now a legal substance. That reprieve should have no parole and a complete removal of any felony from the records. For those opposed, remember that these are not violent criminals, the supposed most important reason to crack down on crime. This first step legislation at a state level could go a long ways towards a federal solution.

So yes, a good book, it got me thinking. Some flaws, detailed above, lead me to say this is not a 5 star book, but well worth reading. A subsequent (and current) book on the topic is needed.

Fairly quick read, and the last in the series by this New York author. Young-adult, subtly touching on themes of honesty and work ethic.

More of a "shared universe" than a series, each of the books is about something happening inside the game from Rasmussem corporation. Considering the length of time between books, the author has done an excellent job of focusing on the experience instead of the individual tech.

Nearly all of the characters are female, from the main company representative down to the main character trying to save her sister. Male characters make up 1) the lawyer 2) the boyfriend, and arguably 3) the game AI. The main conflict is between the main character's sister and her best female friend.

In the previous books, the game was part of the conflict; here the game is merely the vehicle. The ending is fairly sudden and too brief to cover some larger themes introduced. Ultimately I liked this a little less than [b:Heir Apparent|213652|Heir Apparent (Rasmussem Corporation, #2)|Vivian Vande Velde|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1378760495l/213652.SX50.jpg|1032171]. I would like to check out more of the authors books, and have my eye on [b:The Book of Mordred|589767|The Book of Mordred|Vivian Vande Velde|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1348979612l/589767.SY75.jpg|2805].

Young adult true Bildungsroman (lost child becoming an adult). Some caricatures and a lot of fantasy creatures in this smallish world. A few technical quibbles, but looking forward to reading another in the series.

A decade back there was a TV series called Grimm, a police procedural with fairy tales come to life. The main focus of the show was were beasts good and bad, much like this book. For me, it got to a point when you wondered "are there any normal folks, or is Portland entirely made up of creatures?" This book felt like that. How do the mundane humans fit into this society? Not well under the evil werelion and wererat overlords, clearly. The main character ends up being their hero, and I suspect in future books, these mundane folk will be a liability to him.

Technically, many chapters ended in a spoiler. The point of view shifted abruptly at times, primarily when the protagonist was unconscious or locked-up. The author used these shifts to tell more of the story. I would have preferred either an omniscient narrator or keep entirely to the knowledge of the main character - this hybrid felt clumsy. Hoping this will get better with as the series goes along. While the full story isn't finished, the plot of this novel comes to a conclusion, which is a major plus. 3½ stars for this solid beginning.

This second James Bond book by Anthony Horowitz acts is a prequel to Casino Royale, showing Bond receiving his Double O number. It also has solid characters, villains, and travel situations. In short, it checks all the boxes.

This somewhat younger Bond makes some deadly mistakes, and the consequences of those are a big part of the narrative. His inexperience is commented on by the Bond girl, Sixtine, whose back story would also make for a great secret agent novel. There are two main villains here, and one of them (a brash elder American) spurs the unbelievable plot. My favorite parts of the book were the well-described settings and the recent history of a World War - this is Bond set in the same time frame as Fleming first imagined him.

Horowitz discussed the material provided by the estate which made up a portion of his first 007 novel. None of that was directly related to this book, though I can see Fleming noting the specific details of Bond's origin. The author's website notes that he is writing a third novel, set right after the death of Scaramanga in the timeline, to be published in 2022. Looking forward to it!

The authors teach a course on this topic, and this book felt like a textbook in some ways - with chapters identifiable as classes. Contains humor and anecdotes, but only the last two chapters feel up to par.

The second to last chapter is a summary of the previous classes, er, chapters. If you are at all curious about the topic, start there (or maybe jump there after the intro). The last chapter comes back to the title itself, calling out bullshit when you see it. The focus here is calling it out the right way - getting your facts straight, utilizing humor or a gentle touch when possible, and pointing out your friends gaffs in private instead of in public. Good advice all.

I've heard good things about the professor and the writing, and was perhaps too eager to read this book. It wasn't quite what I expected, and I can't say for certain that is all on me.

Very complete history of WWII across the oceans and seas, including considerations of two front wars, subsea and air power. Plenty of maps and photos supplement a text that is not at all dry.

This book delivers a ton of evidence but doesn't completely answer the oft-asked questions - is air power sufficient? Were battleships worthless - or all ships, as Hitler came to believe? While not explicitly called out, this book does an excellent job of showing how technology improvements were also a key concern in the naval war.

Added this to my reading list when it was released in 2018, not disappointed. Lives up to the hype received on the back cover. Took me some time to read it, and thanks to a liberal covid renewal policy at the library. Will acquire a copy for my reference shelf - and looking forward to reading more from this excellent author.

A novel released in 1987 that expanded on an April Fools article from 1985, this baseball novel works in more than a few real-life athletes, performers and writers - including the author. Light summer reading, this holds up well.

I did not read the original article, and was not a particular fan of the Mets when this book came out. Several Mets appear in the narrative of course, and the story closes with a hint that the Mets might make it to the World Series in 1986. Since this coda was written in late '86 or early '87, it's not exactly divination...

Told mostly from the perspective of a writer, the characters are kind of flat. The situations are interesting, though, with a hint of mystery and, at the close of the book, a chapter of crime action. I read this over a hot weekend, and it was worth the time spent.