{"id":2435,"date":"2022-08-31T19:59:00","date_gmt":"2022-08-31T19:59:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.salticid.com\/bookblog\/?p=2435"},"modified":"2025-11-06T18:05:27","modified_gmt":"2025-11-06T23:05:27","slug":"august-2022-books-read","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.salticid.com\/bookblog\/2022\/08\/august-2022-books-read\/","title":{"rendered":"August 2022 books read"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><em>Hot Money<\/em> &#8211; Dick Francis, 1989. Re-read but maybe only for the second time as I think I got it towards the end of my first Francis deep dive. He&#8217;s shrinking on me as I age, but I went on to:<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>Longshot<\/em> &#8211; Dick Francis, 1991. This one is still a winner. The relationship between survival writer John Kendall and the family he accidentally falls into is charming, and the plot is good.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.salticid.com\/bookblog\/2022\/08\/detransition-baby-torrey-peters-2021\/\" data-type=\"post\" data-id=\"2525\">Detransition, Baby<\/a><\/em> &#8211; Torrey Peters, 2021.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.salticid.com\/bookblog\/2022\/08\/summer-world-a-season-of-bounty-bernd-heinrich-2009\/\" data-type=\"post\" data-id=\"2533\">Summer World: A Season of Bounty<\/a><\/em> &#8211; Bernd Heinrich, 2009.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>Le c\u00f4t\u00e9 de Guermantes<\/em> &#8211; Marcel Proust, 1920-1921. Quotes pulled, TBD.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.salticid.com\/bookblog\/2022\/08\/zen-and-the-art-of-motorcycle-maintenance-an-inquiry-into-values-robert-pirsig-1974\/\" data-type=\"post\" data-id=\"2540\">Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry into Values<\/a><\/em> &#8211; Robert M. Pirsig, 1974.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>Over Sea, Under Stone<\/em> &#8211; Susan Cooper, 1965. <a href=\"https:\/\/annabookbel.net\/the-dark-is-rising-sequence-over-sea-under-stone#comment-132034\">Re-read<\/a> for Annabookbel&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/annabookbel.net\/tag\/tdirs22\">#TDiRS22<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>The Stand<\/em> &#8211; Stephen King, 1978. Umpteenth comfort re-read of the original edition, as I think the updated\/uncut version is worse in many ways. But I notice the racism of the original sticks out more each time, and I wonder to what extent he fixed that in the 1990 edition. (I read it once, but that was more than 20 years ago &#8211; I agree with the GoodReads reviewer who calls it &#8220;probably the single greatest argument for a good editor in publishing history.&#8221;)<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>Ex Libris<\/em> &#8211; Matt Madden, 2021. Intriguing meta graphic novel.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>The Secret to Superhuman Strength<\/em> &#8211; Alison Bechdel, 2021. Much better than <em>Are You My Mother?<\/em> &#8211; equally pretentious, but it worked for me and I very much identified with Bechdel&#8217;s love for workout gear and athletic fads.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>When Breath Becomes Air<\/em> &#8211; Paul Kalanithi, 2016. I heard a lot about this touching memoir when it came out and finally got around to reading it &#8211; it is very good.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>Wild Boy: My Life in Duran Duran<\/em> &#8211; Andy Taylor, 2008. Unfortunately not very well-written or interesting, especially compared to <em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.salticid.com\/bookblog\/2020\/08\/august-2020-books-read\/\">In the Pleasure Groove<\/a><\/em>, but that one had a co-writer (Tom Sykes). If AT had a ghost for this, they didn&#8217;t do a very good job. He doesn&#8217;t seem very self-aware or to have thought about what readers would want to know. Nonetheless I&#8217;m a big enough Duran Duran fan that I&#8217;m glad I read it. And <a href=\"http:\/\/morganrichter.net\/blog\/duranalysis-john-taylor-pleasure-groove-versus-andy-taylor-wild-boy\/\">this comparison<\/a> is making me change my mind a bit &#8211; perhaps AT has more good bits scattered in there, hidden in the thicket of cliches&#8230;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>Mistress Masham&#8217;s Repose<\/em> &#8211; T. H. White, 1946. Another many-times comfort re-read. I shared the especially funny bits with Jonathan so I&#8217;ve <a href=\"https:\/\/www.salticid.com\/bookblog\/2022\/08\/mistress-mashams-repose-t-h-white-1946-the-funny-bits\/\" data-type=\"post\" data-id=\"2500\">compiled them<\/a>. <\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>The Talented Mr. Ripley<\/em> &#8211; Patricia Highsmith, 1955. I finally read this after watching <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Purple_Noon\"><em>Purple Noon<\/em><\/a> with the Far Out Film group (I also saw the <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/The_Talented_Mr._Ripley_(film)\">1999 film<\/a> early on) and liked it OK &#8211; not my favorite genre and so dark, but I can see why it&#8217;s a classic of its kind.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">And a short story: &#8220;Cold Clews,&#8221; one of<a href=\"https:\/\/www.salticid.com\/bookblog\/2018\/10\/the-case-of-the-comical-commonplace-collection-guest-post-by-jonathan-caws-elwitt-founder-of-the-della-street-irregulars\/\" data-type=\"post\" data-id=\"726\"> Erle Stanley Gardner<\/a>&#8216;s stories featuring Lester Leith, recommended by Jonathan. Leith is a con man who simultaneously solves thefts and gets the goods for himself by incredibly baroque con jobs, and this was the wackiest one in the collection Jonathan read. I see this format is described as &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/gadetection.pbworks.com\/w\/page\/7929912\/Amazing%20Adventures%20of%20Lester%20Leith\">puzzle plots<\/a>.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>And a short story: &#8220;Cold Clews,&#8221; one of Erle Stanley Gardner&#8216;s stories featuring Lester Leith, recommended by Jonathan. Leith is a con man who simultaneously solves thefts and gets the goods for himself by incredibly baroque con jobs, and this was the wackiest one in the collection Jonathan read. I see this format is described [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2435","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-monthly-lists"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.salticid.com\/bookblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2435","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.salticid.com\/bookblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.salticid.com\/bookblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.salticid.com\/bookblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.salticid.com\/bookblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2435"}],"version-history":[{"count":30,"href":"https:\/\/www.salticid.com\/bookblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2435\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4853,"href":"https:\/\/www.salticid.com\/bookblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2435\/revisions\/4853"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.salticid.com\/bookblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2435"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.salticid.com\/bookblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2435"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.salticid.com\/bookblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2435"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}