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Recent Posts
- On Randall K. Wilson’s “A Place Called Yellowstone”: Award-Winning History of Yellowstone National Park
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- More Alone than “Alone”: On Adam Shoalts’s “Vanished Beyond the Map: The Mystery of Lost Explorer Hubert Darrell” (2025)
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- “The Wiggle Room”: A Short Story
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Tag Archives: Book Reviewing
On What We Learn from Birds, as "The Bird Saviors" Appears in Paperback Next Month
So in yesterday’s New York Times there’s a good piece about what birds can tell us about climate, here. I’m definitely a birder, though I prefer the term “birdist,” and have my own style in BirdWorld: I don’t join herds … Continue reading
Sandra Cisneros in Person, Complete With Reboso, as in Her Novel "Caramelo"
So I’ve been swamped with end-of-the-semester work lately, with no time to stop and think or write, but this week at Penn State we’ve had Sandra Cisneros as a Writer-in-Residence, and she’s been fantastic—gracious, kind, and inspiring. On Monday night … Continue reading
Posted in books, The West
Tagged Book Reviewing, Fiction Writing, Good Fiction, Santa Fe, The West
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Brace Yourself for Weird Weather: On Reading "The Year Without Summer" in the Year Without a Spring
So one of the reasons books like William and Nicholas Klingaman’s The Year Without Summer: 1816 have much resonance at the moment is that scientists are warning we’re at the cusp of a period of chaotic and unpredictable weather, due … Continue reading
Posted in books, Climate Change, The West, Weird Weather
Tagged Book Reviewing, Climate Change, Drought, The West, Water Crisis
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"The Year Without Summer: 1816 and the Volcano That Darkened the World and Changed History" by William K. Klingaman and Nicholas P. Klingaman
So I’m reading William K. Klingaman and Nicholas P. Klingaman’s The Year Without Summer: 1816 and the Volcano That Darkened the World and Changed History (published just last month), which is billed as similar to Simon Winchester’s outstanding Krakatoa: The Day … Continue reading
Review of Jim Crace's "Harvest"
So my review of Jim Crace’s new novel, Harvest, appeared Sunday in the Dallas Morning News, here. I liked the book, mainly for its style more than its subject or story, which was taken to task in an interesting review … Continue reading
Posted in books, Uncategorized, writing
Tagged Book Reviewing, Fiction Writing, Good Fiction
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On Reading T.R. Fehrenbach's "Comanches: The Destruction of a People" and Jared Diamond's "The World Until Yesterday": A World Without Laws
So while teaching Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian recently, I learned he’d been inspired by T.R. Fehrenbach’s Comanches: The Destruction of a People (1975), so I picked it up. Suffice to say it was a gripping read, as I had a … Continue reading
Posted in books/film, Cormac McCarthy, The West, Uncategorized
Tagged Book Reviewing, Cormac McCarthy, Good Fiction, The Bird Saviors, The West
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Good Review of "The Bird Saviors" in the San Francisco Book Review, and Eerie Similarities to Alex Prud'homme's "The Ripple Effect" in Recent L.A. Tourist's Death Case
So I’ve been too busy reading/teaching to blog lately, juggling about four books at a time and finishing all of them (more on that later), but had a nice surprise to be told about a good review of The Bird … Continue reading
Posted in books, Climate Change, The West
Tagged Book Reviewing, Climate Change, Drought, The Bird Saviors, The West, Water Crisis
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Life Imitating Art, But Softly: Russian Meteor a Mini-Version of the Fireball That Ends Civilization in Cormac McCarthy's "The Road"
So I’ve been teaching Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian (1985) for the last two weeks, although the more I know about the novel, the more I’m struck that it needs an entire semester to cover thoroughly—though if I did that, I … Continue reading
Posted in books/film, Climate Change, Cormac McCarthy, The West
Tagged Book Reviewing, Climate Change, Cormac McCarthy, Good Fiction, The West, Wildfires
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Review of "The Bird Saviors" in the High Country News, and a Literary Find in Cormac McCarthy's "Blood Meridian"
So there’s a nice review of The Bird Saviors in the High Country News (not to be confused with High Times, which is a fuzzy horse of a different color), a great journal about the West, here. I’ve been too … Continue reading
Posted in books/film, Cormac McCarthy, The West
Tagged Book Reviewing, Cormac McCarthy, Good Fiction, The Bird Saviors, The West
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Review of Jared Diamond's "The World Until Yesterday" in the Dallas Morning News
So after a flu relapse that made me resemble one of those dudes on The Walking Dead, I’m struggling to maintain an upright position, and get back on with the business of the Living. Last Sunday I had a review … Continue reading