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A different view of Bunker Hill
About a year ago, Paul O’Connor acquired an audio version of a history of Bunker Hill and the origins of the American Revolution, and then promptly forgot it. Recently he found the book, began to listen – and found there was a lot to learn about that history. Reviewed by Paul T. O’Connor BUNKER HILL:…
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Mixed results
By Linda C. Brinson I didn’t read Sara Gruen’s 2006 novel Water for Elephants, but I heard high praise for it from a number of people. Back then, I was editing and writing for a newspaper’s weekly book-review page, and I rarely had the luxury of reading a book that someone else was going to…
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A liberal arts education, plus survival skills
Paul O’Connor finds that frequent digressions make this book all the more rewarding. Reviewed by Paul T. O’Connor NATURAL BORN HEROES: HOW A DARING BAND OF MISFITS MASTERED THE LOST SECRETS OF STRENGTH AND ENDURANCE. By Christopher McDougall. Random House Audio. 16 hours. $45. Read by Nicholas Guy Smith. Also available in hardcover from Knopf.…
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Appearances and disappearances
Take an ambitious, needy girl, throw in a few naive young men, add a plot for an improbable heist plus adventures on two continents, and you’ve got an impressive first novel. Reviewed by Linda C. Brinson UNBECOMING. By Rebecca Scherm. Read by Catherine Taber. Penguin Audio. 13 ½ hours; 11 CDs. $45. Also available in…
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Flavia crosses the pond
Reviewed by Linda C. Brinson AS CHIMNEY SWEEPERS COME TO DUST. By Alan Bradley. Read by Jayne Entwistle. Random House Audio. 11 hours; 9 CDs. $41. Also available in print from Delacorte Press. 392 pages. $25. What a relief! Or, as Flavia would shout, “Yaroo!” When I reached the end last year of The Dead…
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Big coal, big problems
A few years ago, I flew as a passenger in a small private plane over a mountaintop-removal coal mine in West Virginia. The image of that huge, ugly wound on what had been a beautiful wilderness still haunts me. Most people will never see the ravages of modern strip-mining up close, but John Grisham’s new…
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Where angels watch
Here’s the latest in a long-running crime-novel series. Don’t worry if you missed out on the earlier books. You can always go back and enjoy them, too. Reviewed by Linda C. Brinson DEATH ANGEL. By Linda Fairstein. Read by Barbara Rosenblat. Penguin Audio. 11 CDs, 12½ hours. Also available in hardcover from Dutton. Alex Cooper,…
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Small packages – when less is more
So many of the audio books I “read” go on and on. That can be good if you want to get hooked into a book that will be with you for a while, say on a long road trip. But it’s refreshing to encounter a couple of novels that are more understated. Each of these…
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Beware the wild New Jersey Chihuahuas
What fun! Reviewed by Linda C. Brinson TOP SECRET TWENTY-ONE. By Janet Evanovich. Read by Lorelei King. Random House Audio. 6 hours; 5 CDs. $32. How many wacky adventures can Stephanie Plum get into? How many cars can be destroyed? How often can her apartment be trashed? How long will her relationship with Joe Morelli…
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Disaster, public and private
If you haven’t discovered the books of Chris Bohjalian, you need to. I first encountered his work in Secrets of Eden (December, 2009), which impressed me a great deal. Since then, I’ve been equally impressed by The Sandcastle Girls and The Light in the Ruins (both of which are reviewed here). The man has written…