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after all these books, i think im out

Revisado: 07-02-24

theres more than enough alt right "end of america," the system is broken, our leaders are hopelessly corrupt, conspiracy chatter on foxnews and tiktok, i dont need it hammered into my fiction from a former navy seal pretending to be tapped into the national security complex 20 years later.

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james mcbride and dominic hoffman are the best there is

Revisado: 09-13-23

deacon king kong, his previous book, was a hysterical, lyrical and free-flowing masterpiece. the heaven and earth grocery store is at least its equal, although probably less overtly funny. it is beautiful beyond belief, propulsive, and filled with long jazzy, matter of fact sentences bursting with the lives of their inhabitants. there are moments of hilarity and veracity, snippets of dialogue and complex chain reactions that all bear the unmistakable ring of truth and understanding. they are everywhere, from start to finish. and then somehow, one thing leads to another, the wires cross and cross again, and then it all coalesces into an almost unbearably affecting resolution that radiates beauty and pain and sadness and relief and the futility of it all and in all that, there is some small hint of justice, however faint. i hope james mcbride lives for 100 years and writes a book every year. he is something else altogether.

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incredible filling out of the ideas and characters of book one

Revisado: 01-31-23

im hoping, as i start book three now, that its as good as one and two. two has a lot of history and departs from the more or less modern day timeline of events for large and deeply enjoyable segments. the story of tibor and thedodir ferenczy is as good and rich and folklorish as any vampire backstory ive read. i never heard of these booms or brian lumley until very recently, but these first two books are absolutely world class. or maybe theyre just right up my alley. either way, they are amazing. the narrator is wonderful too, all in all, a revelation.

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a poetic, powerful study of the genuises behind quantum mechanics

Revisado: 12-28-22

this was as powerful as any fiction novel, while also chock full of deep insights, real personal stories of madness and human drama ripped from the lives of many of this centuries most talented and gifted thinkers. and i thought genius artists led crazy lives. they are nothing compared to the lives of grothendieck, heisenberg, and many others. this is the interconnected story of how one scientific/mathematical innovation led to another--often with staggeringly bad consequences for those individuals who were driven to madness on the path to making such breakthroughs and on humanity at large. stirring and powerful storytelling from the worlds of science/math/quantum... a must read. unlike anything else ive read this year or really any year.

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when youre audiobooked out...

Revisado: 11-14-22

sometimes these short audio theatre things are just the thing. action/horror/supernatural is my particular go-to genre and i have deeply enjoyed fishpriest w ethan hawke, impact winter (about vampires) and this one which feels like a re-contexting of the same basic demi-gorgon creatures from stranger things. but i mean that in a good way. like i said, if you just dont wanna start another 8-30 hr audiobook but you want something, these things are great. this one was just what the doctor ordered for a rainy sunday doing chores around the house. thanks audible.

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if you like buehlman or between two fires...

Revisado: 11-13-22

... know this.

1. buehlman wrote the foreward here, thats all.
2. this collection really makes you realize just how good "between two fires" really was/is.
3. a few of the stories are actually really good. the first couple, in particular. and brian evenson's stand out. but whoever narrated the chapter that audible has indexed as chapter six should never be allowed to read this kind of work again. its just... hard pass. but hey, its an anthology and you cant win em all.
4. lastly, the whole experience--while occasionally, nay often--enjoyable, kinda just makes me wish i was reading "between two fires" for the first time again. and yes, i know thats like the fourth reference ive made to B2F but it really is that good. it is to medieval horror what lord of the rings is to fantasy. read it and tell me im wrong.

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esto le resultó útil a 5 personas

incredible, a real nonfiction masterpiece

Revisado: 08-12-22

each chapter reads like a little thriller, all culminating in, and then ending rather abruptly after, the events of 9/11. also, its worth nothing, the facts of the book presented herein constitute yet another damning condemnation of the CIA and its clandestine sources, methods, practices and objectives. the author all but blames 9/11 on the CIA's repeated negligence and unwillingness to cooperate with the sharply contrasted and dogged efforts of the few at the FBI who were actually trying to do something. great book though. and i wasnt even all that interested in the back story of how al qaeda came to be. but this was as good or better than any fictional espionage thriller you'll ever read. but its all true. i guess thats why it won the pulitzer.

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absolutely stellar narration perfectly matched to the material (which is also shockingly good)

Revisado: 07-11-22

somebody is not doing their job well, for a book this good, this interesting and unexpected, this original--all amplified by a narrator performance that is not only ideally matched, but is a sustained masterclass in character acting--to not come up more readily in more searches than it does. i found this through the jaberwocky site and had i not been there looking for something else, i wonder if i ever wouldve found it at all. i do prob 50-60 a year, and id def put this in my top 10 for the year. its a dark alternative history wrapped in a hard-boiled, very noir-style mystery delivering lots of action, some mayhem and a very satisfying literate style that is more than interesting, its moving. get this one if you like alt history, crime, politics (esp pre ww2 european politics). i bet you'll love it as much as i did. sleeper audiobook of the year? id say yes but read it and tell me what you think.

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esto le resultó útil a 5 personas

an ideal audiobook experience

Revisado: 03-31-22

ive always been into kennedy, the 60s, vietnam, the 68 election, etc--but never nixon. never watergate. just wasnt interested. this book reads like a novel constructed of journal entries. its a thriller and a tragedy. and you know what strikes me most, is that nixon was a bad guy--but he was wasnt bad enough to do what he wouldve had to do--and couldve done--to get away with it. compared to the bad guys today, nixon is a boy scout. he couldve stopped the investigation. he couldve burned the tapes. he couldve fired dean, erlichmann and haldeman much sooner. he couldve done a lot of things but he didnt because, in the end, he wasnt that bad. for his time, sure, he was a bad guy. but for our time, in a world of donald trump, devin nunes, roger stone, paul manafort, vladimir putin, mitch mcconnell, roger ailes, tucker carlson... as i said, compared to those guys, nixon was a boy scout. the beautiful thing about this book is that it uses the actual nixon tapes, so you can hear him talking to kissinger, to his aides, to everyone... and what you hear is a guy worrying about how his people will make ends meet once he fires them. you hear a guy who feels tremendous guilt. a guy who puts on a brave and loving face for his daughter. a guy who, when facing the choice to go further and block or render impossible the investigation into his misdeeds, decides not to. this is a guy who loved america, who believed in what he was doing for our country, a guy who was deeply loyal to his own people and yes a guy who made some mistakes. honestly, g gordon liddy, howard hunt and john dean screwed him. hard. and like so many great men before him, caught in a web of his own making, nixon is tragically late in realizing how serious the trouble really is. not only did i learn a lot about watergate, i grew fond of richard nixon--much less so, the cast of sycophants around him. but nixon? absolutely. he is a sympathetic guy. a father, a brilliant foreign policy guy, and yes, a patriot. im glad he had a full state burial with all five living presidents attending his funeral in 94. he deserved it. unlike the criminals running our country today, he actually loved and cared about this country. these republicans today only care about getting on fox news and getting rich. thats it. and to do that, they get more and more extreme and less connected to reality. with these schmucks in charge we're really screwed. if only we could go back to a time when this countrys worst problem was a third-rate burglary into the dnc hq and a bungled coverup. look around today and youll, like me, be longing for the good old days of honest men like richard nixon and the good old days of watergate.

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esto le resultó útil a 4 personas

the best epic trilogy ever?

Revisado: 08-20-21

laugh now but read it.

i know, you're thinking tolkien, martin, feist, sanderson... just read it.

obviously, start at the beginning with "the blade itself"

stone cold masterpiece.

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