Reading Update

Here are the first four books I've finished in 2023.

Book #1 of 2023 was something I found at the grocery store. I'm trying not to buy paper books any more, after the traumatic experience I just had of getting rid of a couple of thousand. Books are heavy, hard to move, gather dust. Nobody wants them when you're done with them. Instead I try to download and borrow. But I just can't stop looking at all the books everywhere I go. Here in Uganda there are odd collections on the street, in second hand stores, and even in the grocery store. I wonder why those particular books. There are a lot of business titles, self-help books, a few novels. This one has an obvious connection to the country. It's called Ivory, Apes & Peacocks: Animals, Adventure and Discovery in the Wild Places of Africa, by Alan Root. Root was a wildlife photographer who moved to Kenya as a child when his dad got a job at a meat-packing plant producing "bully beef" for Britain after World War II. He spent his life in this region of the world exploring and making movies. This fascinating book tells the story of all of it. Here's a quote: "The great documentary maker Robert Flaherty once said, 'All art is a kind of exploring. To discover and reveal is the way every artist sets about his business.' This is particularly true of wildlife filming, when every new project means learning to see all over again, to pick up the clues and signs that lead to an understanding of this new and different territory. Today it means googling the subject and getting buried under a mass of information; back then it meant looking, listening and finding out for yourself."

Book #2 was The Inheritance Games, by Jennifer Lynn Barnes. This is clearly destined to become a movie. It's a fun, puzzle-filled romp. I enjoyed it and have the second one on hold at the library.

Book #3 was The Queen's Choice, by Cayla Kluver. It's a story of succession in the fairy world, mystery, and quest. This time the second one isn't as easy to come by, because the library doesn't have it. Grr.

Book #4 was Sea of Tranquility, by Emily St. John Mandel. I've had this one on hold at the library for a really long time, probably almost since the moment it first came out last April. I finally got to read it. It's a very quick read, mind-bending and full of time travel and pandemic. It's the kind of book you want to reread as soon as you're done, to figure out all the connections again. I recommend it if you're into the kind of books this author writes.