It’s the only thing I’ve read by Sanders that I didn’t like at all.
If you like short stories (or just the reading and/or writing process at all), I highly recommend A Swim in a Pond in the Rain.
1 Like
Mrs banedoodle is a Laxness fan. And yes, I have read Lincoln in the Bardo. Loved it.
Saunders’ Tenth of December short story collection was very good.
1 Like
Just finished: Cheated by Andy Martino.
Sue me I enjoyed it. And unless those events are some sort of trigger for you I’d even recommend it. Did the cheating continue into 2019 as Martino contends? I have no clue but I certainly didn’t feel in reading the book that Martino was engaging in any type of hatchet job.
There were some interesting portraits. Though it’s not in the book’s acknowledgments Martino obviously interviewed Brandon Taubman. And perhaps because of it Martino presents a more nuanced picture of Taubman. Not enough to change anyone’s mind that his firing was more than well-deserved but it does make what he said to Footer, et al all the more shocking.
A couple of ex Astros managers show up in the book. Bo Porter, who was AJ Hinch’s 3rd base coach with the Diamondbacks, comes across as one giant horse’s ass. Terry Collins was another obvious if again unacknowledged interviewee. He is a good friend of Carlos Beltran. Since (presumably) Martino couldn’t get Beltran to sit for an interview he picks Collins’ brain to find out what Carlos was thinking.
Just started: Forget the Alamo by Stanford, et al.
In honor of Banned Book Week. Yes I know it’s still 8 months away but there are so many books being banned these days I felt like I needed to start now to get through them all. I’m only about 3 chapters in but Alamo has been excellent so far.
Is that the book where they make a case to cancel the Alamo?
Not a whole lot on the Alamo thus far other than Phil Collins got snookered into buying a bunch of fake Alamo memorabilia and that Ozzy Osbourne peed on its walls.
The argument in the book so far is that Anglo Texans felt oppressed by the Mexican government because it wouldn’t allow them to treat others in the most shitty way possible. Most particularly in regards to slavery.
If you like Texas history, Big Wonderful Thing is a fantastic book.
2 Likes
Yes, it is. Anything by Harrigan is.
2 Likes
I enjoyed Three Roads to the Alamo by William Davis.
1 Like
The Texas legislature prohibits critical race theory. Please comply with legislative mandates.
3 Likes
I’ll have to check that out. Gates of the Alamo (historical fiction) by the same author as Big Wonderful Thing is a great book as well.
1 Like
What blows me away about the controversy surrounding that book is that this is not new knowledge.
It’s not new knowledge but it’s not generally accepted knowledge either. At least not by the general public. And of course Trump on Wheels and all the other Trumpians quickly weaponized it.
1 Like
Well if the Trumpians weaponized it, it must be a fucking great book because those people are all shit-for-brains dumb. I didn’t think they read books. It seems to me the book has an agenda and a slant. That’s fine. Nothing wrong with expressing an opinion. And I have no problem with myth busting. I have no problem with correcting historical errors.
The Three Roads to the Alamo, an extremely well researched and documented accounting, destroys Bowie’s character. And it exposes all the faults with Travis and Crockett as well. But it lacks any kind of slant or agenda. It’s a big book, with a lot of words and very few pictures, close to 800 pages, a few hundred of which are super boring notes–so I’m sure no Trumpians would bother to read it even if they were able.
1 Like
H.W. Brands’ “Texian Iliad” is an excellent history of colonial Texas and the revolution.
The concepts mentioned above are there, and have all been there in other histories.
The provocative title of this recent book is a gimmick that some right wingers fell for, cried about, and thus fed the publicity machine better than any book tour could have.
3 Likes
This.
Don’t judge a book by it’s cov…um…title.
Exactly right. Those are not new concepts. I have read Texian Iliad. Great book but not Brands.
I found Texian Illiad - A Military History of the Texas Revolution by a Stephen L Hardin, 1994 UT Press. Might that be the book?
Lone Star Nation by Brands looks to be of a similar vein.
1 Like
That is it.