The Book Worm's Library

Reviewed by: Kate_Spader. Date of writing: Genre: Fantasy This immortal Roger Zhelyazny is perhaps the most difficult writer in my life. His books are given to me with great difficulty, but at the same time I can’t stop nibbling this cactus, re-reading them again and again. But it is absolutely inexhaustible – bit by bit, in each of the readings, my weak brain is aware of yet another facet of each of these unrealistically deep works. “This Immortal” is the most “read” and beloved work of Zhelyazny, a wonderful story of a charming personality – and, at the same time, of an endless universe. Zhelyazny does not give his reader odds; in his texts there are surprisingly few supports and clues. You simply find yourself in a certain world – real and therefore complex, and find yourself in the midst of political intricacies, a web of personal relationships and strange conventions, trying to put at least some kind of connected picture in your head like a serial amnesia patient. And having built a diagram of this world (which will still turn upside down), in hindsight you understand that the beginning of the narrative was completely logical and that everything you…

Reviewed by: gagarin. Date written: January 30, 2012. Genre: Thriller, Filmed American psycho: So the situation is that I consider myself a movie lover. And, of course, such a classic movie as “American Psycho” was viewed by me and later purchased on DVD. Honestly, I am very fond of various “little things” and the first impression of any work of art, whether it be a picture, a book or a film, I can compose for myself only one detail or nuance. For the specified film, it was a scene with business cards in a restaurant (who watched will understand). I am writing all this in order to explain two points. The first is what was the message to read the work; the second is why I really liked this book. If the film is called excellent, then the book should be described as excellent. The book really surpasses the film not only in ideological or substantive content of the plot, but also in the quality of “little things” and visual images. And I mentioned the “visual images” as a feature of the book in vain, because from the first pages you understand how cinematically it is written and how hard…

Astrovian woman. Cosmic MowgliAlways with great interest in novels, the events of which occur in the distant future. It is interesting to compare their philistine fantasies with the flight of thoughts of those whose vocation is literary activity. The novel of Nick Gorky “Astrovite. Space Mowgli ”is part of a science fiction trilogy and is obviously intended for a readership of twelve years or older. All actions and events unfold after 2250, when earthlings can afford to live not only on the Moon and Mars, but also on asteroids. The essential detail is that the aliens are not mentioned on the pages of the novel. The book came to readers in 2008, when interest in the world of science fiction was constantly supported by the release of new works by popular and little-known authors. On the pages of his blog, Nick Gorkavy reports: “My book of the“ julvern ”type has come out – or an educational book for teenagers. Parents interested in the intellectual development of their children, remember – in a fierce war for the minds of adolescents, every shell counts. And I’m on your side. “ The author does not hide the fact that the book was written…

The Union of Jewish Policemen I would like to start my review with praise – this is one of the most interesting books that I read recently. And at the same time, one of the most controversial. First of all, it is very difficult to determine its genre: despite the fact that in 2008 the Union of Jewish Policemen received the Hugo Prize, awarded for the best science fiction, it can hardly be attributed to this genre with a clear conscience. Most likely, this is a black detective story, because it’s not without reason that the book begins classically: a corpse of a man, a chess player under the name Emmanuel Lasker, was discovered in a hotel room. Nevertheless, almost immediately it becomes clear that the novel is based on the principle of an alternative story – it turns out that US President Franklin Roosevelt opened the doors of his country to Jews fleeing countries captured by Hitler. True, they had to settle in Alaska, leased to them, but this, nevertheless, significantly reduced the number of Holocaust victims. As a result, the state of Israel is absent on the Earth’s map (it was formed, but was defeated in the Arab-Israeli…

The Unbearable Lightness of Being “Jokes are bad with metaphors. Even from a single metaphor, love can be born. ” In general, reading a book that is famous and its name has already been imposed on its teeth is a disastrous matter. And when I first took up the “Unbearable Lightness of Being”, already celebrated at that time, I experienced a natural disappointment. Firstly, the poetry of the title has already drawn in my head certain vague outlines that the real book for some reason did not want to match. Secondly – and I realized this only now, after repeated reading – I was still too small. I think that I will be right in assuming that readers leaving comments about the meaninglessness of the novel simply have not accumulated enough everyday experience. After all, a person likes stories that describe himself in some way. But to understand the heroes of Kundera – Tomasz and Teresa, Fritz and Sabina – and only a person can sympathize with them, who, though not at all like in this story, but experienced love, separation, betrayal … Unlike many famous works of modern classics, amazingly pretentious forms, “The Unbearable Lightness of Being” is a…

About the Book: In the ruthless arena of King Henry VIII’s court, only one man dares to gamble his life to win the king’s favor and ascend to the heights of political power England in the 1520s is a heartbeat from disaster. If the king dies without a male heir, the country could be destroyed by civil war. Henry VIII wants to annul his marriage of twenty years, and marry Anne Boleyn. The pope and most of Europe opposes him. The quest for the king’s freedom destroys his adviser, the brilliant Cardinal Wolsey, and leaves a power vacuum. Into this impasse steps Thomas Cromwell. Cromwell is a wholly original man, a charmer and a bully, both idealist and opportunist, astute in reading people and a demon of energy: he is also a consummate politician, hardened by his personal losses, implacable in his ambition. But Henry is volatile: one day tender, one day murderous. Cromwell helps him break the opposition, but what will be the price of his triumph? In inimitable style, Hilary Mantel presents a picture of a half-made society on the cusp of change, where individuals fight or embrace their fate with passion and courage. With a vast array…

About the Book: The title character of this haunting historical novel is Carrie McGavock, whose farmhouse was commandeered as a Confederate field hospital before the tragic battle at Franklin, Tennessee, in November 1864. That day, 9,000 soldiers perished. This tragic event turned McGavock into “the widow of the South.” She spent the rest of her life mourning those lost, eventually reburying nearly 1,500 of them on her property. Robert Hicks’s first historical novel captures the life-altering force that war exerts even on noncombatants. Book Review:  ★★★★★★ This is a book that I found very surprising! Usually I avoid Civil War era books, and stories. I find that the subject is so much popular tripe, and the stories become cliche, and disappointing. However, this story proved to be an exception to the rule.  It is based on an unusual point of view — a woman, Carrie McGavock, whose home was commandeered as an army hospital, because it was at the site of one of the last battles of the war, the battle of Franklin, Tennessee. The story does more than break the saga of this war down to them against us, the North against the South.  Rather, this story takes a very…

About the Book: For Sabrina and Daphne Grimm, life has not been a fairy tale. After the mysterious disappearance of their parents, the sisters are sent to live with their grandmother–a woman they believed was dead! Granny Relda reveals that the girls have two famous ancestors, the Brothers Grimm, whose classic book of fairy tales is actually a collection of case files of magical mischief. Now the girls must take on the family responsibility of being fairy tale detectives. Book Review: ★★★★★★ What a fun read — for children and adults alike! I try to keep as wide a variety of types of books as possible for this blog, because I know that there are as many different tastes in books, and there are books themselves. And since I started, the area I have always been weak in is the books geared to younger generational audiences. And yet, I consider these more than just important. The world we live in is losing interest in reading. With the advent of television, the internet, video games, movies, videos — it is simply information overload — and the real importance of reading is being lost. And unfortunately — if it isn’t something that…

About the Book: “Towner Whitney, the self-confessed unreliable narrator of The Lace Reader, hails from a family of Salem women who can read the future in the patterns in lace, and who have guarded a history of secrets going back generations, but the disappearance of two women brings Towner home to Salem and the truth about the death of her twin sister to light.” The Lace Reader is a tale that spirals into a world of secrets, confused identities, lies, and half-truths in which the reader quickly finds it’s nearly impossible to separate fact from fiction, but as Towner Whitney points out early on in the novel, “There are no accidents.” Book Review: ★★★★★★ This is a book that I have actually picked up, and started no less than ten times. And the strange part is I never got past the first three paragraphs, before putting it down, and moving on to something else. And the crazy part is, once I actually picked it up, and started to read it in earnest — I fell in love with the book! This book is all about perception. The duality of images, and how the actual image and the interpretation of those…

About the Book: You have never met a main character quite like Dr. Max Aue. This brilliant middle-class entrepreneur is deeply cultured, well read in philosophy and literature, a connoisseur of fine music. He is also a merciless assassin, a cold-blooded merchant of death, and a secret survivor of the Nazi genocide machine. Jonathan Littell’s epic, 992-page The Kindly Ones places Dr. Aue in front of us as a fictional but completely plausible creation of modern culture. This novel, written in French by an American author, won the Prix Goncourt, France’s most prestigious literary award. Book Review: ★★★★★★ I love to read about World War II, and particularly about the Nazi’s and the Holocaust. So when I picked this book up, I was really looking forward to a great new story, in this area. Boy, what a disappointment. I can’t say if this was a result of just a poor story all the way around, or if it was a really bad translation, because I know this book had really good reviews in its native language of French. For starters the simple construction of the writing really gave me a hard time. There were paragraphs in this book that literally…