dllh's reviews
707 reviews

Kilkenny by Louis L'Amour

4.0

I hadn't read a proper Western since I was very young (if we discount Blood Meridian, which I just reread), and honestly I hadn't read many even then. I had read one or two Lamour books many years ago. I liked this one -- it's a simple story familiar from many other sorts of stories and even modern-day TV (what kind of character is Kilkenny ultimately if not an old-school Macguyver or Reacher?).

Model Home by Rivers Solomon

4.0

I feel like I'm being a little generous with my rating. I liked the book and like Solomon's work overall, but I found some of the interactions between people to be repetitive and uninteresting. It's a neat take on a "horror" story becoming a true horror story.

Goliath: A Novel by Tochi Onyebuchi

4.0

Goliath grabbed me right away and never let go. The story was good, and the prose style captivated me and felt somehow almost new, not quite like any style I recall reading before (in a good way).

Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir

4.0

I read this one aloud to my wife and son. I had heard a lot of hype about the book and didn't really know what to expect. I really enjoyed it overall. The relationship between Grace and the friend he meets was really neat to see unfold, and their shared discoveries were fun to follow. Weir escalates and escalates, and it works well overall. The science he writes about is believable, and the cataclysmic event and its agent were compelling. My only real complaint was that the characters are pretty universally annoying.

Silver Sparrow by Tayari Jones

4.0

What an interesting story! I was immediately captivated. Jones writes really lovely prose, and I felt very invested in the characters. I liked the first half(ish) of the book more than I liked the switch of point of view later.

Death of the Author by Nnedi Okorafor

4.0

I didn't fully appreciate the book immediately after I read it, but I've found it sticking with me in satisfying ways. Some of things I initially took as seeming careless were likely a product of the book's big twist. I was also iffy on the twist at first, but I've come around and think now that it's pretty clever. I like Okorafor's work pretty consistently.

The Dictionary People: The Unsung Heroes Who Created the Oxford English Dictionary by Sarah Ogilvie

3.0

This was fine and at times very interesting, but it was a little tedious at times too. Overall, I'm glad I read it 

The Patron Saint of Liars by Ann Patchett

3.0

This one would pair interestingly with Lauren Groff's Matrix. This is not high adventure or anything, but it really held my attention, with memorable characters and a sort of brooding calm.

Appalachian Elegy: Poetry and Place by bell hooks

3.0

It's a weird gripe, but the short lines in this collection bugged me to the point of distraction.

The Gaa and the War of Independence by Tim Pat Coogan

4.0

This could have been pretty dry, but it was a fairly compelling account.