Who’s in charge around here?
I’m a former daily newspaper journalist who worked in the Pacific Northwest and New England. Now a book reviewer, writer, editor, iMac user. I founded Rich Litho Media, which provides writing/editing and publishing services for authors and small businesses.
Read more in the About section.
Email me at kimberly@typelikethewind.com
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Category Archives: Books
77 Words: “Twilight at the World of Tomorrow” by James Mauro
Twilight at the World of Tomorrow: Genius, Madness, Murder, and the 1939 World’s Fair on the Brink of War by James Mauro. (Random House, 2010) Expecting dry and serviceable, I got lively, amusing, informing. Mauro’s magazine-writing roots serve him well: strong researching with an eye for the absurd. He captures a particular sort of visionary—that [...]
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77 Words: “The Love Letter” by Cathleen Schine and “The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest” by Stieg Larsson
“The Love Letter” by Cathleen Schine (Penguin; Signet 1995) – Before I get Schine’s latest rave-receiving novel, I figured I’d try this older work. Verdict: Excellent and smart summer escapism. A middle-aged bookseller has an affair with a much-younger man, motivated by a mysterious love letter… oh, yeah, and lust too. Schine nimbly chronicles the [...]
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77 Words: “Lean on Pete” by Willy Vlautin
Lean on Pete by Willy Vlautin (Harper, 2010) – At first this writing is simple, straightforward, plain. But soon 15-year-old Charley’s voice has so fully filled the reader’s head that she sees her world as he would. And long after the book’s done, an image or word will bring it back. Author Willy Vlautin, it [...]
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77 Words: “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks” by Rebecca Skloot
“The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks” by Rebecca Skloot (Crown, 2010) - Cells from Henrietta Lacks, a cancer patient in the 1950s, started something that seems more magical than scientific. Johns Hopkins doctors who took the cells from Lacks, a poor African American farmer, never imagined creating HeLa – the “immortal” cells grown in culture [...]
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77 Words: “What I Loved,” by Siri Hustvedt
“What I Loved” by Siri Hustvedt (Picador, 2003) – This is a brilliantly written story of a long friendship between two men, its immense rewards and unique pain. Hustvedt’s writing is like a hologram that allows depth perception to change with a flick of a page; no character is shortchanged, every exchange between characters is [...]
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77 Words: “The First Patient” by Michael Palmer
“The Second Opinion by Michael Palmer (St. Martin’s Press, 2009) – Yes, a distracting thriller that doubles as a medical-terminology vocabulary builder! The prolific Palmer delivers another escapist doctor drama–with appealing characters in an enjoyably improbable plot. When arrogant, charismatic doc (and neglectful dad) Petros Sperelakis is injured in a hit-and-run, some of his offspring [...]
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77 Words: “The Swimming Pool” by Holly LeCraw
For more “77 words: Tiny book reviews,” click here. “The Swimming Pool” by Holly LeCraw (Doubleday, 2009) – This debut is an intriguing hybrid: romance fiction, dash of mystery, literary craft. LeCraw seizes on ways guilt can coexist with love, sometimes choking out happiness, other times making joy more precious. No real humor or lightness [...]
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77 words: “Gone to Soldiers” by Marge Piercy
For more “77 words: Tiny book reviews,” click here. “Gone to Soldiers” by Marge Piercy (Ballantine, 1987) – I missed this oldie until finding it (used) at Powell’s; happily it stood the test of time. The prolific Piercy wrote her heart out, tracing 10-or-so interconnected Jewish lives during WWII. Think Herman Wouk with more–and more [...]
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77 Words: “Gone Tomorrow,” by Lee Child
For more “77 words” Tiny book reviews, click here. “Gone Tomorrow (A Jack Reacher Novel)” by Lee Child (Dell, 2010) – Jack Reacher is an ex-military cop who travels light: toothbrush, cash, clothes on his back, chip on his big shoulder. He can’t resist a tangled mystery or a bad guy…and this time the bad [...]
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Book Review: “Imperfect Birds” by Anne Lamott
I reviewed Lamott’s new novel for The Seattle Times: “Imperfect Birds,” Riverhead, 278 pp., $29.95 “Anne Lamott’s new novel at first invokes the sort of twinge one feels when catching that Bob Dylan song on a Victoria’s Secret commercial. Yes, it’s still good art. No, you can’t blame an artist for wanting to make a [...]
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Hero with a camera.
Photographer Charles Moore did as much to move civil rights ahead in this country as almost any other individual. He died last week, at age 79. (See the obituary by Douglas Martin of The New York Times here.) Moore’s famous photos of lawman Theophilus Eugene “Bull” Connor are iconic proof of a shameful side of [...]
Vote YES for BookTithe
I can’t be the only lover contemplating sneaking out on my beloved. Some of you other book-lovers share my guilty fantasizing about getting a Kindle. Right? Like you, I’m sold on the technology, which I could get either as the Kindle proper or as an iPhone ap. What could be cooler than deciding I want [...]
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Reviewing the reviewer.
Michiko Kakutani is a powerful book reviewer, whose work in The New York Times can kill book sales or torpedo an author’s career in a few column inches. I’ve been reading Kakutani’s reviews more closely these days, considering the pieces’ success as essays rather than endorsements or rejections of new books. I now picture Kakutani [...]
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New book review: “Reality Hunger: A Manifesto” by David Shields
(Published first by The Seattle Times, Feb. 28, 2010) As I work my way through a review book, I often stop and picture the sort of people who will fall in love with it. By the end I’ve assembled a roomful of imaginary party guests. Sometimes it’s festive; other times I just want them the [...]
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Brothers under the skin
I’ve just finished two books chosen with my patented speed-browsing library technique (see earlier post) and it was a gratifying, if odd, mix. One is the autobiography “Black is the New White” by Paul Mooney, a groundbreaking stand-up comedian in his own right, who wrote and inspired much of the late Richard Pryor’s comedic work. [...]
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A hero
I did some work for Portland author Lisa Shannon last year–small organizational tasks as she put together a retreat for writers. So my attention was grabbed by the print and video story on her by New York Times columnist Nicholas D. Kristof. The lives of Congolese women and their children continue to be ones of [...]
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Judging books by their covers…it works
My local library branch shelves the newly acquired books on a long bookcase right inside the front door. The books are divided into fiction and nonfiction, but otherwise no distinctions are made. I’ve developed the habit of zipping through the section, picking a few books for late-night recreational reading based on such deep thinking as [...]
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Food tips made funny
It’s conventional wisdom that most of us have less-than-great eating habits. But a New York Times Q&A with food guru Michael Pollan, author of “Food Rules: An Eater’s Manual,” reminds us that we know more than we think about healthy knoshing. Pollan, a calm voice in the babble over nutrition and health, compiled 64 pithy [...]
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Not a vookworm. Yet.