Review: The River

The River by Peter Heller
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I really enjoyed Heller’s “The Dog Stars”. I found the end-of-the-world story compelling and the writing and characters memorable. When I saw this one pop up on the library’s Overdrive service, I hoped that Heller could maintain the depth of writing despite not having that creepy end-of-worlder storyline. I think he succeeded. But what surprised me was that the storyline, while about canoeing in the wilds of Canada, covered characters and a story somewhat similar to “The Dog Stars”. The canoeists are mostly alone, and dealing with life and death situations requiring quick thinking and the use of deadly force. A study of character. The story can at points get too involved. But the book is quite short, and the ending was shorter, and quite a bit different, than I expected.

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Review: The Couple's Retirement Puzzle: 10 Must-Have Conversations for Creating an Amazing New Life Together

The Couple's Retirement Puzzle: 10 Must-Have Conversations for Creating an Amazing New Life Together by Roberta K. Taylor
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I've read a lot of retirement how-to books over the past few years. I'm always looking for things to think about that I might have missed. This was not one of the few books to provide entirely new insights. However, I did find the focus on communications with your spouse/partner to be rare. The topics were broader than many books, more on how to live, from sex to separate vacations, less on money, money, money. Nicely done.

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Review: Why Do I Feel Like an Imposter?: How to Understand and Cope with Imposter Syndrome

Why Do I Feel Like an Imposter?: How to Understand and Cope with Imposter Syndrome by Sandi Mann
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I switched from a true introvert job, researching new technology for a big company, to being a techie sales person. You betcha I feel like an imposter at times, even after decades, and feeling more so the more there is to learn. I found this book quite interesting, although the focus was not what I expected. A lot of the book focused on the difference between the sexes. According to the book, this is mostly thought of as a woman’s issue, but it impacts quite a few men as well. I found this part of the book, the majority, quite interesting. The book also talks about imposter parenting, which I didn’t find as interesting. So why do I feel like an imposter? One reason could be that some people just don’t like me, and some people just like making others feel bad. This book provides some of the logical arguments to move on from this. Good read, and short.

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Review: A Great Place to Work for All: Better for Business. Better for People. Better for the World.

A Great Place to Work for All: Better for Business. Better for People. Better for the World. by Michael C. Bush
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Diversity and trust, trust and diversity.

The points here all seem to boil down to this. I don't recall much actionable advice beyond common sense, except for involving a consultant.

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Review: Cave of Bones

Cave of Bones by Anne Hillerman
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

This was enjoyable in that you get to visit with some of the Tribal Police from earlier books by Hillerman and her father. But this didn’t have the feel of the earlier books in the series, especially the early Tony Hillerman books. What made the earlier books interesting was the unique characters from the tribal areas, the descriptions of the sparsely populated land, and the plots that greatly borrowed from American Indian traditions. While you get some of the old characters here, they don’t sparkle. The land is well described, but the highlight of this book is lava fields in Winter – not the most cinematic location. The “Indian content” just didn’t seem that interesting here. I had found that the books Anne has written were getting better as she gained experience, but this wasn’t a better one. I already have her next one, and hope it rebounds. I listened to the audiobook version of this, narrated by Christina Delaine. I liked the narration, except for when Officer Manuelitto’s sister calls Chee “Cheeseburger.” She’s being a brat when she calls him that, and the continuing teasing is grating.

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Review: Assault: Thoroughbred Legends

Assault: Thoroughbred Legends by Eva Jolene Boyd
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

As I work my way through the Thoroughbred Legends series (one left!), I found this one broke the mold, in a good way. Most of these stories are very formulaic, telling the history of the breeder, owner, trainer, and main jockey, and following the horse through its training, races, and breeding, with a heavy dollop of ancestry and progeny name-dropping. When you combine all those elements in what are generally short books, you don’t get very deep into any kind of compelling story. Add on the fact that most of these champion racehorses are owned by old-money families from East of the Mississippi and you find many of these stories feel similar. This one, though, was different. Assault was a horse against the odds. He was small, and damaged one foot when young, enough that he had to run in special shoes throughout his racing life. He was bred by a major Texas rancher, quite unlike most other breeders and owners in this series. And Assault was a bust as a stallion, so the progeny section was quite short. Of all the horses in this series, Assault was likely the one with the fewest races run as the favorite. He was certainly a winning underdog and a great subject for a racing biography. Given this wonderful material to work with, the author weaves a story that holds interest all the way through. Well done.

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Review: Machine Learning

Machine Learning by Ethem Alpaydin
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I found this a good re-introduction to machine learning. By re-introduction, I’m using my perspective based on experience, having worked in AI and neural nets twenty years back, but keeping up through pop science magazine articles and such since then. For me, I was reminded of many of the methods I knew, and a few I hadn’t heard of. Short. Nice description, just what you want.

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