Adam's bookshelf: all en-US Thu, 10 Sep 2026 18:17:06 -0700 60 Adam's bookshelf: all 144 41 https://www.goodreads.com/images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg <![CDATA[The Weeping Tide (Wilderlore, #2)]]> 59250027 Barclay and his friends must save an island city from the Legendary Beast of the Sea in this exciting second book in the Wilderlore series, perfect for fans of Nevermoor and How to Train Your Dragon.

Something is wrong at the Sea. The weeping tide, a carnivorous algae bloom, is eating up all the fish. Beasts are terrorizing the nearby Elsewheres. And Lochmordra, the Legendary Beast, is rising at random and swallowing ships whole.

Barclay’s teacher, the famous Guardian Keeper Runa Rasgar, has been summoned to investigate, and as her apprentice, Barclay gets to join too. But Runa’s nemesis has also been called to the Sea, and he’s brought apprentices of his own. When the not-so friendly competition between them grows fierce, it’s Barclay—the only one from the Elsewheres—who can’t seem to keep up.

The key to stopping Lochmordra lies in his mythical home, but as the flood of the weeping tide encroaches, time is running out to find it. If the rival groups can’t cast aside old grudges and learn to work together, soon the Sea will be destroyed completely. And all the while Barclay must ask is there truly a place for him in the Wilderlands?]]> 362 Amanda Foody 1534477616 Adam 5 4.60 2022 The Weeping Tide (Wilderlore, #2)
author: Amanda Foody
name: Adam
average rating: 4.60
book published: 2022
rating: 5
read at: 2026/03/11
date added: 2026/09/10
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review:

]]> <![CDATA[The New Girl: A Graphic Novel (The New Girl #1)]]> 195261538 Instagram sensation and Tapas webcomic superstar Cassandra Calin makes her long-form debut with this funny, feel-good middle-grade graphic novel about change.

Goodbye, old life...

Lia and her family are waiting to board a flight across the Atlantic, leaving behind family, friends, and Romania -- the only home Lia has ever known. But Lia's heartache is overshadowed by the discomfort of her first period. As if things weren't difficult enough! Now Lia is thrust into a world where everything is her home, her language, and even her body. With so many changes happening at once, Lia struggles with schoolwork, has trouble communicating with classmates, and has no idea how to manage her unpleasant periods. Will she ever feel like herself again?

Inspired by the author's own immigration experience, The New Girl is a comically charming story about change and acceptance.]]> 272 Cassandra Calin 1338762478 Adam 0 currently-reading 4.59 2024 The New Girl: A Graphic Novel (The New Girl #1)
author: Cassandra Calin
name: Adam
average rating: 4.59
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2026/09/06
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Ever Storms (Wilderlore Book 3)]]> 62927613 Barclay and his friends find new dangers and fresh adventure when they encounter mysterious sandstorms in the Desert in this “engaging, dragon lover’s fantasy” (School Library Journal) that’s the third book of the New York Times bestselling Wilderlore series.

After saving the Sea, Barclay and his fellow apprentices are eager to take part in a new kind of adventure—the Symposium, a set of courses that all apprentices of the Lore Keeper Guild need to pass before they can take their licensing exam. Barclay is excited to travel to the Desert to study at the University of Al Faradh, the most respected school in all the Wilderlands, and to reunite with the new friends he made at the Sea.

He’s slightly less excited about the Tourney, the traditional, good-natured prank war between the various apprentice tracks. As an Elsie, he’s pretty sure he’ll have enough on his hands keeping up with the Symposium without having to worry about stink bombs and slime warfare.

But as mysterious, unnatural sandstorms start to appear around the Desert, there are more than just exams and bragging rights at stake. And the appearance of an exclusive, magical library might just be the key to everything…]]> 356 Amanda Foody 1665910771 Adam 5 4.68 2023 The Ever Storms (Wilderlore Book 3)
author: Amanda Foody
name: Adam
average rating: 4.68
book published: 2023
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2026/03/22
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]]> Chasing Blue 8649792 275 Jessica Burkhart Adam 0 4.47 2009 Chasing Blue
author: Jessica Burkhart
name: Adam
average rating: 4.47
book published: 2009
rating: 0
read at: 2026/02/11
date added: 2026/02/11
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]]> <![CDATA[Scandals, Rumors, Lies (Canterwood Crest, #11)]]> 8488985 192 Jessica Burkhart 1442403845 Adam 5 4.25 2010 Scandals, Rumors, Lies (Canterwood Crest, #11)
author: Jessica Burkhart
name: Adam
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2010
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2026/02/08
shelves:
review:

]]> City Secrets 8649781 276 Jessica Burkhart Adam 5 4.46 2010 City Secrets
author: Jessica Burkhart
name: Adam
average rating: 4.46
book published: 2010
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2026/01/19
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]]> <![CDATA[The Exile's Journey (Survivors: The Gathering Darkness, #5)]]> 35819981
To find them, Storm must fight through longpaw dangers, Leashed Dogs, and a forbidding pack of wolves, all in search of a place where she might finally belong.]]> 312 Erin Hunter 0062343521 Adam 0 currently-reading 4.53 2018 The Exile's Journey (Survivors: The Gathering Darkness, #5)
author: Erin Hunter
name: Adam
average rating: 4.53
book published: 2018
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2026/01/05
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[A Pack Divided (Survivors: The Gathering Darkness, #1)]]> 24605975
From Erin Hunter, #1 nationally bestselling author of Warriors, Survivors is full of “wild and wonderful adventure” (Kirkus, starred review)

For the first time Storm can remember, she has a place in a Pack, and the world that was devastated by the Big Growl is finally at peace. But tensions are rising among the dogs of the Wild Pack—and the greatest danger they face may come from within.]]> 278 Erin Hunter 006234336X Adam 0 4.38 2015 A Pack Divided (Survivors: The Gathering Darkness, #1)
author: Erin Hunter
name: Adam
average rating: 4.38
book published: 2015
rating: 0
read at: 2026/01/04
date added: 2026/01/04
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]]> Little White Lies 8492282 241 Jessica Burkhart Adam 0 currently-reading 4.27 2009 Little White Lies
author: Jessica Burkhart
name: Adam
average rating: 4.27
book published: 2009
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2026/01/02
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> This Again? 195834343  
Noah Nicholson has plenty to be grateful for. He has solid grades and great friends, he’s  finally  becoming closer with Lucy Martinez—his crush since second grade—and he just might have a chance to be elected class president next week. But despite all that, Noah fixates on the should’ve-beens and could’ve-beens and the belief that he can make his life perfect. Then Noah comes upon an opportunity to do just that.
 
At the local bowling alley, Noah runs into someone most unexpected: himself. The look-alike is him from nine days in the future, and he insists that if Noah does every ridiculous thing he says—from quacking like a duck in science class to painting himself green—they can achieve their dream of perfection. However, fate may have other plans, and Future Noah may not be entirely honest about what he’s doing there.…

Perfect for fans of Rebecca Stead and Louis Sachar,  This Again?  takes readers on an incredible journey through time, mind, and middle school. ]]> 265 Adam Borba 0316553395 Adam 0 to-read 4.62 2024 This Again?
author: Adam Borba
name: Adam
average rating: 4.62
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/08/15
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[Sleeping Giants (Themis Files, #1)]]> 25733990
Seventeen years later, the mystery of the bizarre artifact remains unsolved - the object's origins, architects, and purpose unknown.

But some can never stop searching for answers.

Rose Franklin is now a highly trained physicist leading a top-secret team to crack the hand's code. And along with her colleagues, she is being interviewed by a nameless interrogator whose power and purview are as enigmatic as the relic they seek. What's clear is that Rose and her compatriots are on the edge of unravelling history's most perplexing discovery-and finally figuring out what it portends for humanity. But once the pieces of the puzzle are in place, will the result be an instrument of lasting peace or a weapon of mass destruction?]]> 320 Sylvain Neuvel 1101886692 Adam 0 3.81 2016 Sleeping Giants (Themis Files, #1)
author: Sylvain Neuvel
name: Adam
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2016
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/01/17
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]]> <![CDATA[The Collapsing Empire (The Interdependency, #1)]]> 30078567
Our universe is ruled by physics and faster than light travel is not possible -- until the discovery of The Flow, an extra-dimensional field we can access at certain points in space-time that transport us to other worlds, around other stars.

Humanity flows away from Earth, into space, and in time forgets our home world and creates a new empire, the Interdependency, whose ethos requires that no one human outpost can survive without the others. It’s a hedge against interstellar war -- and a system of control for the rulers of the empire.

The Flow is eternal -- but it is not static. Just as a river changes course, The Flow changes as well, cutting off worlds from the rest of humanity. When it’s discovered that The Flow is moving, possibly cutting off all human worlds from faster than light travel forever, three individuals -- a scientist, a starship captain and the Empress of the Interdependency -- are in a race against time to discover what, if anything, can be salvaged from an interstellar empire on the brink of collapse.]]> 336 John Scalzi 0765388898 Adam 0 4.09 2017 The Collapsing Empire (The Interdependency, #1)
author: John Scalzi
name: Adam
average rating: 4.09
book published: 2017
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/01/17
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]]> Ilium (Ilium, #1) 3973 731 Dan Simmons 0380817926 Adam 0 4.02 2003 Ilium (Ilium, #1)
author: Dan Simmons
name: Adam
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2003
rating: 0
read at: 2021/01/17
date added: 2021/01/17
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[El Principito (Spanish Edition)]]> 15220985 0 Antoine de Saint-Exupéry 9580204756 Adam 4 4.41 1943 El Principito (Spanish Edition)
author: Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
name: Adam
average rating: 4.41
book published: 1943
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2015/04/26
shelves:
review:
The first book that I ever read in Spanish. Having a Spanish-English dictionary on the Kindle really helped.
]]> <![CDATA[Kabbalah: The Way of the Jewish Mystic]]> 1223344 171 Perle Besserman 0877734380 Adam 4 4.17 1980 Kabbalah: The Way of the Jewish Mystic
author: Perle Besserman
name: Adam
average rating: 4.17
book published: 1980
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2014/03/23
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]]> Those About to Die 9176604 Daniel P. Mannix 058601019X Adam 3 3.78 1958 Those About to Die
author: Daniel P. Mannix
name: Adam
average rating: 3.78
book published: 1958
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2014/01/17
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Orientalist: Solving the Mystery of a Strange and Dangerous Life]]> 109378
Part history, part cultural biography, and part literary mystery, The Orientalist traces the life of Lev Nussimbaum, a Jew who transformed himself into a Muslim prince and became a best-selling author in Nazi Germany.

Born in 1905 to a wealthy family in the oil-boom city of Baku, at the edge of the czarist empire, Lev escaped the Russian Revolution in a camel caravan. He found refuge in Germany, where, writing under the names Essad Bey and Kurban Said, his remarkable books about Islam, desert adventures, and global revolution, became celebrated across fascist Europe. His enduring masterpiece, Ali and Nino—a story of love across ethnic and religious boundaries, published on the eve of the Holocaust—is still in print today.

But Lev's life grew wilder than his wildest stories. He married an international heiress who had no idea of his true identity—until she divorced him in a tabloid scandal. His closest friend in New York, George Sylvester Viereck—also a friend of both Freud's and Einstein's—was arrested as the leading Nazi agent in the United States. Lev was invited to be Mussolini's official biographer—until the Fascists discovered his "true" identity. Under house arrest in the Amalfi cliff town of Positano, Lev wrote his last book—discovered in a half a dozen notebooks never before read by anyone—helped by a mysterious half-German salon hostess, an Algerian weapons-smuggler, and the poet Ezra Pound.

Tom Reiss spent five years tracking down secret police records, love letters, diaries, and the deathbed notebooks. Beginning with a yearlong investigation for The New Yorker, he pursued Lev's story across ten countries and found himself caught up in encounters as dramatic and surreal, and sometimes as heartbreaking, as his subject's life. Reiss's quest for the truth buffets him from one weird character to the next: from the last heir of the Ottoman throne to a rock opera-composing baroness in an Austrian castle, to an aging starlet in a Hollywood bungalow full of cats and turtles.

As he tracks down the pieces of Lev Nussimbaum's deliberately obscured life, Reiss discovers a series of shadowy worlds—of European pan-Islamists, nihilist assassins, anti-Nazi book smugglers, Baku oil barons, Jewish Orientalists—that have also been forgotten. The result is a thoroughly unexpected picture of the twentieth century—of the origins of our ideas about race and religious self-definition, and of the roots of modern fanaticism and terrorism. Written with grace and infused with wonder, The Orientalist is an astonishing book.]]> 447 Tom Reiss 0812972767 Adam 5 3.92 2005 The Orientalist: Solving the Mystery of a Strange and Dangerous Life
author: Tom Reiss
name: Adam
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2005
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2013/05/09
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]]> <![CDATA[Gødland Celestial Edition Book One]]> 1140551 360 Joe Casey 1582408327 Adam 3 3.94 2007 Gødland Celestial Edition Book One
author: Joe Casey
name: Adam
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2007
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2013/05/09
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]]> The Catcher in the Rye 5107 It's Christmas time and Holden Caulfield has just been expelled from yet another school...

Fleeing the crooks at Pencey Prep, he pinballs around New York City seeking solace in fleeting encounters—shooting the bull with strangers in dive hotels, wandering alone round Central Park, getting beaten up by pimps and cut down by erstwhile girlfriends. The city is beautiful and terrible, in all its neon loneliness and seedy glamour, its mingled sense of possibility and emptiness. Holden passes through it like a ghost, thinking always of his kid sister Phoebe, the only person who really understands him, and his determination to escape the phonies and find a life of true meaning.

The Catcher in the Rye is an all-time classic in coming-of-age literature- an elegy to teenage alienation, capturing the deeply human need for connection and the bewildering sense of loss as we leave childhood behind.

J.D. Salinger's (1919–2010) classic novel of teenage angst and rebellion was first published in 1951. The novel was included on Time's 2005 list of the 100 best English-language novels written since 1923. It was named by Modern Library and its readers as one of the 100 best English-language novels of the 20th century. It has been frequently challenged in the court for its liberal use of profanity and portrayal of sexuality and in the 1950's and 60's it was the novel that every teenage boy wants to read.]]> 277 J.D. Salinger 0316769177 Adam 4 3.81 1951 The Catcher in the Rye
author: J.D. Salinger
name: Adam
average rating: 3.81
book published: 1951
rating: 4
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date added: 2013/05/09
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]]> Don Quixote 3836
With its experimental form and literary playfulness, Don Quixote has been generally recognized as the first modern novel. The book has been enormously influential on a host of writers, from Fielding and Sterne to Flaubert, Dickens, Melville, and Faulkner, who reread it once a year, "just as some people read the Bible."]]> 1023 Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra Adam 3 3.87 1605 Don Quixote
author: Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
name: Adam
average rating: 3.87
book published: 1605
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2013/05/09
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I kept thinking that I was missing out on jokes because of the translation. I'd like to try it again in Spanish sometime.
]]> <![CDATA[Parallel Worlds: A Journey through Creation, Higher Dimensions, and the Future of the Cosmos]]> 33418 361 Michio Kaku 1400033721 Adam 4 4.21 2004 Parallel Worlds: A Journey through Creation, Higher Dimensions, and the Future of the Cosmos
author: Michio Kaku
name: Adam
average rating: 4.21
book published: 2004
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2013/05/09
shelves:
review:

]]> The Sun Also Rises 3876 The Sun Also Rises (Fiesta) is one of Ernest Hemingway's masterpieces and a classic example of his spare but powerful writing style. A poignant look at the disillusionment and angst of the post-World War I generation, the novel introduces two of Hemingway's most unforgettable characters: Jake Barnes and Lady Brett Ashley. The story follows the flamboyant Brett and the hapless Jake as they journey from the wild nightlife of 1920s Paris to the brutal bullfighting rings of Spain with a motley group of expatriates. It is an age of moral bankruptcy, spiritual dissolution, unrealized love, and vanishing illusions. First published in 1926, The Sun Also Rises helped to establish Hemingway as one of the greatest writers of the twentieth century.]]> 189 Ernest Hemingway Adam 4 3.80 1926 The Sun Also Rises
author: Ernest Hemingway
name: Adam
average rating: 3.80
book published: 1926
rating: 4
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date added: 2013/05/09
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]]> <![CDATA[Mistborn Trilogy Boxed Set (Mistborn, #1-3)]]> 6604209 New York Times bestselling series from Brandon Sanderson.

This boxed set contains:
Mistborn: The Final Empire
The Well of Ascension
The Hero of Ages ]]> 2176 Brandon Sanderson 076536543X Adam 5 4.60 2009 Mistborn Trilogy Boxed Set (Mistborn, #1-3)
author: Brandon Sanderson
name: Adam
average rating: 4.60
book published: 2009
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2013/01/08
shelves:
review:
Like a few other reviewers mentioned, I came to this series after reading the first two books of the "Kingkiller Chronicles" by Patrick Rothfuss. I was initially pretty disappointed. I found the world of Mistborn kind of hard to get into. But after the first 100 pages or so I was completely hooked and it ended up being one of the best series that I have ever read. The magic system is logical, consistent and interesting. The characters are well developed and it's interesting to watch them change and grow over time. And the story is fascinating: it's basically about a bunch of thieves that set out to kill god.
]]> <![CDATA[Fuzzy Nation (Fuzzy Sapiens, #7)]]> 9647532
Then, in the wake of an accidental cliff collapse, Jack discovers a seam of unimaginably valuable jewels, to which he manages to lay legal claim just as ZaraCorp is cancelling their contract with him for his part in causing the collapse. Briefly in the catbird seat, legally speaking, Jack pressures ZaraCorp into recognizing his claim, and cuts them in as partners to help extract the wealth.

But there's another wrinkle to ZaraCorp's relationship with the planet Zarathustra. Their entire legal right to exploit the verdant Earth-like planet, the basis of the wealth they derive from extracting its resources, is based on being able to certify to the authorities on Earth that Zarathustra is home to no sentient species.

Then a small furry biped—trusting, appealing, and ridiculously cute—shows up at Jack's outback home. Followed by its family. As it dawns on Jack that despite their stature, these are people, he begins to suspect that ZaraCorp's claim to a planet's worth of wealth is very flimsy indeed…and that ZaraCorp may stop at nothing to eliminate the "fuzzys" before their existence becomes more widely known.]]> 303 John Scalzi 0765328542 Adam 3 4.13 2011 Fuzzy Nation (Fuzzy Sapiens, #7)
author: John Scalzi
name: Adam
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2011
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2013/01/08
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]]> <![CDATA[First Shift: Legacy (Shift, #1)]]> 13603717
In the same year, the CBS network re-aired a program about the effects of propranolol on sufferers of extreme trauma. A simple pill, it had been discovered, could wipe out the memory of any traumatic event.

At almost the same moment in humanity’s broad history, mankind had discovered the means for bringing about its utter downfall. And the ability to forget it ever happened.]]> 238 Hugh Howey Adam 5 4.22 2012 First Shift: Legacy (Shift, #1)
author: Hugh Howey
name: Adam
average rating: 4.22
book published: 2012
rating: 5
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date added: 2013/01/08
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]]> Up Against It 9069545
Life isn't as good as it seems, though. A mysterious act of sabotage kills Geoff's brother Carl and puts the entire colony at risk. And in short order, we discover that the whole thing may have been cooked up by the Martian mafia, as a means of executing a coup and turning Phocaea into a client-state. As if that wasn't bad enough, there's a rogue AI that was spawned during the industrial emergency and slipped through the distracted safeguards, and a giant x-factor in the form of the Viridians, a transhumanist cult that lives in Phocaea's bowels.

In addition to Geoff, our story revolves around Jane, the colony's resource manager -- a bureaucrat engineer in charge of keeping the plumbing running on an artificial island of humanity poised on the knife-edge of hard vacuum and unforgiving space. She's more than a century old, and good at her job, but she is torn between the technical demands of the colony and the political realities of her situation, in which the fishbowl effect of 'Stroiders is compounded by a reputation economy that turns every person into a beauty contest competitor. Her manoeuverings to keep politics and engineering in harmony are the heart of the book.]]> 416 Laura J. Mixon 0765315157 Adam 3 3.63 2011 Up Against It
author: Laura J. Mixon
name: Adam
average rating: 3.63
book published: 2011
rating: 3
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date added: 2013/01/08
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]]> The End of Eternity 509784 192 Isaac Asimov 0449016196 Adam 5 4.22 1955 The End of Eternity
author: Isaac Asimov
name: Adam
average rating: 4.22
book published: 1955
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2013/01/08
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review:
I think that a lot of otherwise good movies and books are ruined by lazy implementations of time travel. Somehow, this book actually manages to explain away the paradoxes of time travel. Granted, it's pretty far fetched, but at least it makes logical sense. Like most Asimov books, this one focuses more on the core idea than realistic characters, but I thought that this idea was pretty awesome.
]]> Wool Omnibus (Silo, #1) 13453029
The first Wool story was released as a standalone short in July of 2011. Due to reviewer demand, the rest of the story was released over the next six months.

This is the story of mankind clawing for survival, of mankind on the edge. The world outside has grown unkind, the view of it limited, talk of it forbidden. But there are always those who hope, who dream. These are the dangerous people, the residents who infect others with their optimism. Their punishment is simple. They are given the very thing they profess to want: They are allowed outside.

Alternate cover for B0071XO8RA]]> 509 Hugh Howey Adam 5 4.22 2012 Wool Omnibus (Silo, #1)
author: Hugh Howey
name: Adam
average rating: 4.22
book published: 2012
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2013/01/08
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]]> The River of Time 101891
Here are powerful tales of heroism and humanity, playful excursions into realms of fancy, and profound meditations on time, memory, and our place in the universe.

CONTENTS:
DESTINY
The Crystal Spheres
The Loom of Thessaly
The Fourth Vocation of George Gustaf

RECOLLECTON
Senses Three and Six
Toujours Voir
A Stage of Memory

SPECULATION
Just a Hint
Tank Farm Dynamo
Thor Meets Captain America

PROPAGATION
Lungfish
The River of Time]]> 352 David Brin 1857234138 Adam 3 3.85 1986 The River of Time
author: David Brin
name: Adam
average rating: 3.85
book published: 1986
rating: 3
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date added: 2013/01/08
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]]> <![CDATA[The Gospel According to Jesus Christ]]> 28859 ]]> 341 José Saramago 186046095X Adam 3 4.32 1991 The Gospel According to Jesus Christ
author: José Saramago
name: Adam
average rating: 4.32
book published: 1991
rating: 3
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date added: 2013/01/08
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]]> Vortex (Spin, #3) 9359796 Vortex tells the story of Turk Findley, the protagonist introduced in Axis, who is transported ten thousand years into the future by the mysterious entities called "the Hypotheticals." In this future humanity exists on a chain of planets connected by Hypothetical gateways; but Earth itself is a dying world, effectively quarantined.

Turk and his young friend Isaac Dvali are taken up by a community of fanatics who use them to enable a passage to the dying Earth, where they believe a prophecy of human/Hypothetical contact will be fulfilled. The prophecy is only partly true, however, and Turk must unravel the truth about the nature and purpose of the Hypotheticals before they carry him on a journey through warped time to the end of the universe itself.

]]> 331 Robert Charles Wilson 0765323427 Adam 4 3.70 2011 Vortex (Spin, #3)
author: Robert Charles Wilson
name: Adam
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2011
rating: 4
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date added: 2013/01/08
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In typical Rober Charles Wilson fashion, the first 95% of the book focuses on character development, romance, human emotions, and other non typical sci-fi themes, then the last 5% spins out of control on a mind bending tangent that proposes some fascinating ideas about the universe that I had never considered. The first part makes for a really entertaining read and the last part sticks with you and provided food for thought for a long time.
]]> Cloud Atlas 49628
Cloud Atlas begins in 1850 with Adam Ewing, an American notary voyaging from the Chatham Isles to his home in California. Along the way, Ewing is befriended by a physician, Dr. Goose, who begins to treat him for a rare species of brain parasite. . . .

Abruptly, the action jumps to Belgium in 1931, where Robert Frobisher, a disinherited bisexual composer, contrives his way into the household of an infirm maestro who has a beguiling wife and a nubile daughter. . . . From there we jump to the West Coast in the 1970s and a troubled reporter named Luisa Rey, who stumbles upon a web of corporate greed and murder that threatens to claim her life. . . . And onward, with dazzling virtuosity, to an inglorious present-day England; to a Korean superstate of the near future where neocapitalism has run amok; and, finally, to a postapocalyptic Iron Age Hawaii in the last days of history.

But the story doesn't end even there. The narrative then boomerangs back through centuries and space, returning by the same route, in reverse, to its starting point. Along the way, Mitchell reveals how his disparate characters connect, how their fates intertwine, and how their souls drift across time like clouds across the sky.

As wild as a videogame, as mysterious as a Zen koan, Cloud Atlas is an unforgettable tour de force that, like its incomparable author, has transcended its cult classic status to become a worldwide phenomenon.]]> 509 David Mitchell 0375507256 Adam 4 4.02 2004 Cloud Atlas
author: David Mitchell
name: Adam
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2004
rating: 4
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date added: 2013/01/08
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After seeing a preview for the movie, I knew I had to read the book first. The first chapter about Adam Ewing was pretty hard to get through, but after that it really takes off. I'm a sucker for books with gimmicks and I really enjoyed trying to figure out just how this one worked. An added bonus was that after reading this, I was able to actually understand the movie too.
]]> <![CDATA[The Amber Spyglass (His Dark Materials, #3)]]> 18122
But how can he go looking for Lord Asriel when Lyra is gone? Only with her help can he fathom the myriad plots and intrigues that beset him.

The two great powers of the many worlds are lining up for war, and Will must find Lyra, for together they are on their way to battle, an inevitable journey that will even take them to the world of the dead...]]> 465 Philip Pullman 0440238153 Adam 4 4.11 2000 The Amber Spyglass (His Dark Materials, #3)
author: Philip Pullman
name: Adam
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2000
rating: 4
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date added: 2013/01/08
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]]> <![CDATA[The Subtle Knife (His Dark Materials, #2)]]> 119324
Each is searching—Lyra for the meaning of Dark Matter, Will for his missing father—but what they find instead is a deadly secret, a knife of untold power. And neither Lyra nor Will suspects how tightly their lives, their loves, and their destinies are bound together... until they are split apart.]]> 326 Philip Pullman 0679879250 Adam 4 4.12 1997 The Subtle Knife (His Dark Materials, #2)
author: Philip Pullman
name: Adam
average rating: 4.12
book published: 1997
rating: 4
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date added: 2013/01/08
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]]> <![CDATA[The Golden Compass (His Dark Materials, #1)]]> 119322
Can one small girl make a difference in such great and terrible endeavors? This is Lyra: a savage, a schemer, a liar, and as fierce and true a champion as Roger or Asriel could want--but what Lyra doesn't know is that to help one of them will be to betray the other.]]> 399 Philip Pullman 0679879242 Adam 4 4.03 1995 The Golden Compass (His Dark Materials, #1)
author: Philip Pullman
name: Adam
average rating: 4.03
book published: 1995
rating: 4
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date added: 2013/01/08
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I liked this book much more than I expected to. And the series keeps getting better!
]]> <![CDATA[A Fire Upon the Deep (Zones of Thought, #1)]]> 77711 Alternate Cover Edition can be found here.

A Fire upon the Deep is the big, breakout book that fulfills the promise of Vinge's career to date: a gripping tale of galactic war told on a cosmic scale.

Thousands of years hence, many races inhabit a universe where a mind's potential is determined by its location in space, from superintelligent entities in the Transcend, to the limited minds of the Unthinking Depths, where only simple creatures and technology can function. Nobody knows what strange force partitioned space into these "regions of thought," but when the warring Straumli realm use an ancient Transcendent artifact as a weapon, they unwittingly unleash an awesome power that destroys thousands of worlds and enslaves all natural and artificial intelligence.

Fleeing the threat, a family of scientists, including two children, are taken captive by the Tines, an alien race with a harsh medieval culture, and used as pawns in a ruthless power struggle. A rescue mission, not entirely composed of humans, must rescue the children-and a secret that may save the rest of interstellar civilization.]]> 613 Vernor Vinge 0812515285 Adam 4 4.14 1992 A Fire Upon the Deep (Zones of Thought, #1)
author: Vernor Vinge
name: Adam
average rating: 4.14
book published: 1992
rating: 4
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date added: 2013/01/08
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]]> 1Q84 (1Q84, #1-3) 10357575 The year is 1984 and the city is Tokyo.

A young woman named Aomame follows a taxi driver’s enigmatic suggestion and begins to notice puzzling discrepancies in the world around her. She has entered, she realizes, a parallel existence, which she calls 1Q84 —“Q is for ‘question mark.’ A world that bears a question.” Meanwhile, an aspiring writer named Tengo takes on a suspect ghostwriting project. He becomes so wrapped up with the work and its unusual author that, soon, his previously placid life begins to come unraveled.

As Aomame’s and Tengo’s narratives converge over the course of this single year, we learn of the profound and tangled connections that bind them ever closer: a beautiful, dyslexic teenage girl with a unique vision; a mysterious religious cult that instigated a shoot-out with the metropolitan police; a reclusive, wealthy dowager who runs a shelter for abused women; a hideously ugly private investigator; a mild-mannered yet ruthlessly efficient bodyguard; and a peculiarly insistent television-fee collector.

A love story, a mystery, a fantasy, a novel of self-discovery, a dystopia to rival George Orwell’s — 1Q84 is Haruki Murakami’s most ambitious undertaking yet: an instant best seller in his native Japan, and a tremendous feat of imagination from one of our most revered contemporary writers.]]> 944 Haruki Murakami 0307593312 Adam 3 3.94 2009 1Q84 (1Q84, #1-3)
author: Haruki Murakami
name: Adam
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2009
rating: 3
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date added: 2013/01/08
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I really wanted to like this book but I just couldn't get into it. Some of the fantasy elements were sort of interesting but I just never really cared what happened to the characters.
]]> <![CDATA[Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience and Redemption]]> 8664353
The lieutenant’s name was Louis Zamperini. In boyhood, he'd been a cunning and incorrigible delinquent, breaking into houses, brawling, and fleeing his home to ride the rails. As a teenager, he had channeled his defiance into running, discovering a prodigious talent that had carried him to the Berlin Olympics and within sight of the four-minute mile. But when war had come, the athlete had become an airman, embarking on a journey that led to his doomed flight, a tiny raft, and a drift into the unknown.

Ahead of Zamperini lay thousands of miles of open ocean, leaping sharks, a foundering raft, thirst and starvation, enemy aircraft, and, beyond, a trial even greater. Driven to the limits of endurance, Zamperini would answer desperation with ingenuity; suffering with hope, resolve, and humor; brutality with rebellion. His fate, whether triumph or tragedy, would be suspended on the fraying wire of his will.]]> 475 Laura Hillenbrand 1400064163 Adam 4 4.38 2010 Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience and Redemption
author: Laura Hillenbrand
name: Adam
average rating: 4.38
book published: 2010
rating: 4
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date added: 2013/01/08
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]]> <![CDATA[The Age of Wonder: How the Romantic Generation Discovered the Beauty and Terror of Science]]> 4371507 380 Richard Holmes 0007149522 Adam 3 3.96 2008 The Age of Wonder: How the Romantic Generation Discovered the Beauty and Terror of Science
author: Richard Holmes
name: Adam
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2008
rating: 3
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date added: 2013/01/08
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The stories in this book are fascinating but they all suffer from the same problem: they are each about 50 pages too long. I slogged through the first half before I realized that for every 50 pages I read, there was a 1 page nugget of awesomeness. So I skimmed through the second half and enjoyed it much more.
]]> <![CDATA[The Hunger Games (The Hunger Games, #1)]]> 2767052
In the ruins of a place once known as North America lies the nation of Panem, a shining Capitol surrounded by twelve outlying districts. The Capitol is harsh and cruel and keeps the districts in line by forcing them all to send one boy and one girl between the ages of twelve and eighteen to participate in the annual Hunger Games, a fight to the death on live TV.

Sixteen-year-old Katniss Everdeen regards it as a death sentence when she steps forward to take her sister's place in the Games. But Katniss has been close to dead before-and survival, for her, is second nature. Without really meaning to, she becomes a contender. But if she is to win, she will have to start making choices that weigh survival against humanity and life against love.]]> 374 Suzanne Collins 0439023483 Adam 3 4.35 2008 The Hunger Games (The Hunger Games, #1)
author: Suzanne Collins
name: Adam
average rating: 4.35
book published: 2008
rating: 3
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date added: 2013/01/08
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This book was a lot better when it was called Battle Royale. Still, I have to admit that it was pretty entertaining.
]]> <![CDATA[Ready Player One (Ready Player One, #1)]]> 9969571 Librarian's note: An alternate cover edition can be found here

IN THE YEAR 2044, reality is an ugly place. The only time teenage Wade Watts really feels alive is when he's jacked into the virtual utopia known as the OASIS. Wade's devoted his life to studying the puzzles hidden within this world's digital confines, puzzles that are based on their creator's obsession with the pop culture of decades past and that promise massive power and fortune to whoever can unlock them.

But when Wade stumbles upon the first clue, he finds himself beset by players willing to kill to take this ultimate prize. The race is on, and if Wade's going to survive, he'll have to win—and confront the real world he's always been so desperate to escape.]]> 480 Ernest Cline 030788743X Adam 4 4.21 2011 Ready Player One (Ready Player One, #1)
author: Ernest Cline
name: Adam
average rating: 4.21
book published: 2011
rating: 4
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date added: 2013/01/08
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]]> <![CDATA[Physics of the Future: How Science Will Shape Human Destiny and Our Daily Lives by the Year 2100]]> 8492907 Imagine, if you can, the world in the year 2100.

In Physics of the Future, Michio Kaku—the New York Times bestselling author of Physics of the Impossible—gives us a stunning, provocative, and exhilarating vision of the coming century based on interviews with over three hundred of the world's top scientists who are already inventing the future in their labs. The result is the most authoritative and scientifically accurate description of the revolutionary developments taking place in medicine, computers, artificial intelligence, nanotechnology, energy production, and astronautics.

In all likelihood, by 2100 we will control computers via tiny brain sensors and, like magicians, move objects around with the power of our minds. Artificial intelligence will be dispersed throughout the environment, and Internet-enabled contact lenses will allow us to access the world's information base or conjure up any image we desire in the blink of an eye.

Meanwhile, cars will drive themselves using GPS, and if room-temperature superconductors are discovered, vehicles will effortlessly fly on a cushion of air, coasting on powerful magnetic fields and ushering in the age of magnetism.

Using molecular medicine, scientists will be able to grow almost every organ of the body and cure genetic diseases. Millions of tiny DNA sensors and nanoparticles patrolling our blood cells will silently scan our bodies for the first sign of illness, while rapid advances in genetic research will enable us to slow down or maybe even reverse the aging process, allowing human life spans to increase dramatically.

In space, radically new ships—needle-sized vessels using laser propulsion—could replace the expensive chemical rockets of today and perhaps visit nearby stars. Advances in nanotechnology may lead to the fabled space elevator, which would propel humans hundreds of miles above the earth's atmosphere at the push of a button.

But these astonishing revelations are only the tip of the iceberg. Kaku also discusses emotional robots, antimatter rockets, X-ray vision, and the ability to create new life-forms, and he considers the development of the world economy. He addresses the key questions: Who are the winner and losers of the future? Who will have jobs, and which nations will prosper?

All the while, Kaku illuminates the rigorous scientific principles, examining the rate at which certain technologies are likely to mature, how far they can advance, and what their ultimate limitations and hazards are. Synthesizing a vast amount of information to construct an exciting look at the years leading up to 2100, Physics of the Future is a thrilling, wondrous ride through the next 100 years of breathtaking scientific revolution. (From the Hardcover Edition)

(Duration: 15:39:15)]]> 416 Michio Kaku 0385530803 Adam 2 4.01 2011 Physics of the Future: How Science Will Shape Human Destiny and Our Daily Lives by the Year 2100
author: Michio Kaku
name: Adam
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2011
rating: 2
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I haven't been this disappointed in a book in a pretty long time. I have read almost all of Kaku's other books and loved all of them. After reading Hyperspace in High School, I nearly changed my college major to physics. But this book is just lazy. All he did was recopy old chapters from Visions. Does that mean that there have been no new predictions about the future since 1999? That's kind of depressing.
]]> Aleph 9086994 256 Paulo Coelho 8575425773 Adam 3 3.41 2010 Aleph
author: Paulo Coelho
name: Adam
average rating: 3.41
book published: 2010
rating: 3
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date added: 2013/01/08
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Good story and some fairly interesting ideas but nothing mind blowing. I liked it but I would be a little hesitant to recommend it.
]]> <![CDATA[The Third Wave: A Volunteer Story]]> 11021069
With $300 in cash, some basic medical supplies, and a vague idea that she’d go wherever she was needed, Thompson headed to Sri Lanka. Along with a small team of volunteers, she settled in a coastal town that had been hit especially hard and began tending to people’s injuries, giving out food and water, playing games with the children, collecting dead bodies, and helping rebuild the local school and homes that had been destroyed. Thompson had intended to stay for two weeks; she ended up staying for fourteen months. She and her team helped start new businesses and set up the first tsunami early-warning center in Sri Lanka, which continues to save lives today. 

The Third Wave tells the inspiring story of how volunteering changed Thompson’s life. It begins with her first real introduction to disaster relief after 9/11 and ends with her more recent efforts in Haiti, where she has helped create and run, with Sean Penn, an internally-displaced-person camp and field hospital for more than 65,000 Haitians who lost their homes in the 2010 earthquake. In The Third Wave , Thompson provides an invaluable inside glimpse into what really happens on the ground after a disaster—and a road map for what anyone can do to help. As Alison Thompson shows, with some resilience, a healthy sense of humor, and the desire to make a difference, we all have what it takes to change the world for the better.]]> 240 Alison Thompson 0385529163 Adam 4 3.57 2011 The Third Wave: A Volunteer Story
author: Alison Thompson
name: Adam
average rating: 3.57
book published: 2011
rating: 4
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date added: 2013/01/08
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Pretty interesting take on volunteering. Inspiring and depressing at the same time.
]]> <![CDATA[The Name of the Wind (The Kingkiller Chronicle, #1)]]> 186074
The intimate narrative of his childhood in a troupe of traveling players, his years spent as a near-feral orphan in a crime-ridden city, his daringly brazen yet successful bid to enter a legendary school of magic, and his life as a fugitive after the murder of a king form a gripping coming-of-age story unrivaled in recent literature.

A high-action story written with a poet's hand, The Name of the Wind is a masterpiece that will transport readers into the body and mind of a wizard.]]> 662 Patrick Rothfuss 075640407X Adam 5 4.52 2007 The Name of the Wind (The Kingkiller Chronicle, #1)
author: Patrick Rothfuss
name: Adam
average rating: 4.52
book published: 2007
rating: 5
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date added: 2013/01/08
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Definitely one of the best fantasy books I have ever read. I put this series, the Mistborn series, and the Song of Ice and Fire series on an equally high pedestal.
]]> <![CDATA[The Wise Man's Fear (The Kingkiller Chronicle, #2)]]> 1215032 There are three things all wise men fear: the sea in storm, a night with no moon, and the anger of a gentle man.”

«My name is Kvothe.
I have stolen princesses back from sleeping barrow kings. I burned down the town of Trebon. I have spent the night with Felurian and left with both my sanity and my life. I was expelled from the University at a younger age than most people are allowed in. I tread paths by moonlight that others fear to speak of during day. I have talked to Gods, loved women, and written songs that make the minstrels weep.
You may have heard of me.»

So begins the tale of a hero told from his own point of view — a story unequaled in fantasy literature. Now in The Wise Man's Fear, an escalating rivalry with a powerful member of the nobility forces Kvothe to leave the University and seek his fortune abroad. Adrift, penniless, and alone, he travels to Vintas, where he quickly becomes entangled in the politics of courtly society. While attempting to curry favor with a powerful noble, Kvothe uncovers an assassination attempt, comes into conflict with a rival arcanist, and leads a group of mercenaries into the wild, in an attempt to solve the mystery of who (or what) is waylaying travelers on the King's Road.

All the while, Kvothe searches for answers, attempting to uncover the truth about the mysterious Amyr, the Chandrian, and the death of his parents. Along the way, Kvothe is put on trial by the legendary Adem mercenaries, is forced to reclaim the honor of the Edema Ruh, and travels into the Fae realm. There he meets Felurian, the faerie woman no man can resist, and who no man has ever survived ... until Kvothe.

In The Wise Man's Fear, Kvothe takes his first steps on the path of the hero and learns how difficult life can be when a man becomes a legend in his own time.

]]> 994 Patrick Rothfuss 0756404738 Adam 5 4.55 2011 The Wise Man's Fear (The Kingkiller Chronicle, #2)
author: Patrick Rothfuss
name: Adam
average rating: 4.55
book published: 2011
rating: 5
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date added: 2013/01/08
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]]> Tree of Smoke 271074
Tree of Smoke was the 2007 National Book Award Winner for Fiction.]]> 614 Denis Johnson 0374279128 Adam 2 3.61 2004 Tree of Smoke
author: Denis Johnson
name: Adam
average rating: 3.61
book published: 2004
rating: 2
read at: 2013/01/08
date added: 2013/01/08
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]]> Agent to the Stars 88072 286 John Scalzi 1596060204 Adam 3 3.91 2004 Agent to the Stars
author: John Scalzi
name: Adam
average rating: 3.91
book published: 2004
rating: 3
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date added: 2011/11/25
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]]> <![CDATA[What the Dog Saw and Other Adventures]]> 6516450
In the past decade, Malcolm Gladwell has written three books that have radically changed how we understand our world and ourselves: The Tipping Point, Blink, and Outliers. Now, in What the Dog Saw, he brings together, for the first time, the best of his writing from The New Yorker over the same period.

Here you'll find the bittersweet tale of the inventor of the birth control pill, and the dazzling creations of pasta sauce pioneer Howard Moscowitz. Gladwell sits with Ron Popeil, the king of the American kitchen, as he sells rotisserie ovens, and divines the secrets of Cesar Millan, the "dog whisperer" who can calm savage animals with the touch of his hand. He explores intelligence tests and ethnic profiling and why it was that employers in Silicon Valley once tripped over themselves to hire the same college graduate.]]> 444 Malcolm Gladwell 0316078573 Adam 5 3.85 2009 What the Dog Saw and Other Adventures
author: Malcolm Gladwell
name: Adam
average rating: 3.85
book published: 2009
rating: 5
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date added: 2011/05/28
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]]> <![CDATA[Counting Heads (Counting Heads, #1)]]> 499429 Counting Heads is David Marusek's extraordinary launch as an SF novelist: The year is 2134, and the Information Age has given rise to the Boutique Economy in which mass production and mass consumption are rendered obsolete. Life extension therapies have increased the human lifespan by centuries. Loyal mentars (artificial intelligence) and robots do most of society's work. The Boutique Economy has made redundant ninety-nine percent of the world's fifteen billion human inhabitants. The world would be a much better place if they all simply went away.
Eleanor K. Starke, one of the world's leading citizens is assassinated, and her daughter, Ellen, is mortally wounded. Only Ellen, the heir to her mother's financial empire, is capable of saving Earth from complete domination plotted by the cynical, selfish, immortal rich, if she, herself, survives. Her cryonically frozen head is in the hands of her family's enemies. A ragtag ensemble of unlikely heroes join forces to rescue Ellen's head, all for their own purposes.
Counting Heads arrives as a science fiction novel like a bolt of electricity, galvanizing readers with an entirely new vision of the future. It's the debut of the year in SF.]]> 336 David Marusek 0765312670 Adam 4 3.76 2005 Counting Heads (Counting Heads, #1)
author: David Marusek
name: Adam
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2005
rating: 4
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date added: 2011/05/28
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]]> Matterhorn 6411016
Intense, powerful, and compelling, Matterhorn is an epic war novel in the tradition of Norman Mailer's The Naked and the Dead and James Jones's The Thin Red Line. It is the timeless story of a young Marine lieutenant, Waino Mellas, and his comrades in Bravo Company, who are dropped into the mountain jungle of Vietnam as boys and forced to fight their way into manhood. Standing in their way are not merely the North Vietnamese but also monsoon rain and mud, leeches and tigers, disease and malnutrition. Almost as daunting, it turns out, are the obstacles they discover between each other: racial tension, competing ambitions, and duplicitous superior officers. But when the company finds itself surrounded and outnumbered by a massive enemy regiment, the Marines are thrust into the raw and all-consuming terror of combat. The experience will change them forever.

Written over the course of thirty years by a highly decorated Vietnam veteran, Matterhorn is a visceral and spellbinding novel about what it is like to be a young man at war. It is an unforgettable novel that transforms the tragedy of Vietnam into a powerful and universal story of courage, camaraderie, and sacrifice: a parable not only of the war in Vietnam but of all war, and a testament to the redemptive power of literature.

A graduate of Yale University and a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University, Karl Marlantes served as a Marine in Vietnam, where he was awarded the Navy Cross, the Bronze Star, two Navy Commendation Medals for valor, two Purple Hearts, and ten air medals. This is his first novel. He lives in rural Washington State.]]> 663 Karl Marlantes 0979528534 Adam 5 4.25 2010 Matterhorn
author: Karl Marlantes
name: Adam
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2010
rating: 5
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date added: 2011/05/28
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]]> <![CDATA[The Great Book of Amber (The Chronicles of Amber, #1-10)]]> 5367 Alternate cover edition can be found here

Roger Zelazny's chronicles of Amber have earned their place as all-time classics of imaginative literature. Now, here are all ten novels, together in one magnificent omnibus volume. Witness the titanic battle for supremacy waged on Earth, in the Courts of Chaos, and on a magical world of mystery, adventure and romance.
--back cover]]> 1258 Roger Zelazny 0380809060 Adam 5 4.31 1999 The Great Book of Amber (The Chronicles of Amber, #1-10)
author: Roger Zelazny
name: Adam
average rating: 4.31
book published: 1999
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2011/05/28
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]]> The History of Hell 676701 288 Alice K. Turner 0156001373 Adam 4 3.89 1993 The History of Hell
author: Alice K. Turner
name: Adam
average rating: 3.89
book published: 1993
rating: 4
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date added: 2011/05/28
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]]> <![CDATA[Disrupting Class: How Disruptive Innovation Will Change the Way the World Learns]]> 2546421 We owe it to them to make sure this book isn't merely a terrific read; it must become a blueprint for educational transformation."
--Joel Klein, Chancellor of the New York City Department of Education “A brilliant teacher, Christensen brings clarity to a muddled and chaotic world of education.”
--Jim Collins, bestselling author of Good to Great According to recent studies in neuroscience, the way we learn doesn't always match up with the way we are taught. If we hope to stay competitive-academically, economically, and technologically-we need to rethink our understanding of intelligence, reevaluate our educational system, and reinvigorate our commitment to learning. In other words, we need “disruptive innovation.” Now, in his long-awaited new book, Clayton M. Christensen and coauthors Michael B. Horn and Curtis W. Johnson take one of the most important issues of our time-education-and apply Christensen's now-famous theories of “disruptive” change using a wide range of real-life examples. Whether you're a school administrator, government official, business leader, parent, teacher, or entrepreneur, you'll discover surprising new ideas, outside-the-box strategies, and straight-A success stories. You'll learn how]]> 288 Clayton M. Christensen 0071592067 Adam 4 3.81 2008 Disrupting Class: How Disruptive Innovation Will Change the Way the World Learns
author: Clayton M. Christensen
name: Adam
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2008
rating: 4
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date added: 2010/10/20
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Very interesting. Basically the take the principles from Innovator's Dilema (a business school classic) and apply them to improving the education system. The book is extremely well researched, entertaining, and full of well thought out ideas. I like that they don't just explain the problem , but they actually provide step-by-step solutions that are backed up by data. If you're at all interested in education or innovation in general you would probably enjoy this.
]]> The 4-Hour Workweek 368593
Join Tim Ferriss as he teaches you:
- How to outsource your life to overseas virtual assistants for $5 per hour and do whatever you want?
- How blue-chip escape artists travel the world without quitting their jobs?
- How to eliminate 50% of your work in 48 hours using the principles of a forgotten Italian economist?
- How to trade a long-haul career for short work bursts and freuent "mini-retirements"?
- What the crucial difference is between absolute and relative income?
- How to train your boss to value performance over presence, or kill your job (or company) if it's beyond repair?
- What automated cash-flow "muses" are and how to create one in 2 to 4 weeks?
- How to cultivate selective ignorance-and create time-with a low-information diet?
- What the management secrets of Remote Control CEOs are?
- How to get free housing worldwide and airfare at 50-80% off?
- How to fill the void and create a meaningful life after removing work and the office]]> 308 Timothy Ferriss 0307353133 Adam 4
Some of the more annoying bits are:

1)When he says to avoid going to South America, Africa, and the Middle East of you're a traveling newb. That's a pretty huge chunk of the world to just write off.

2) When he says reading is a waste of time and should be avoided (except of course his book).

Still, I think the good outweighs the bad and it's a worthwhile read.

]]> 3.92 2007 The 4-Hour Workweek
author: Timothy Ferriss
name: Adam
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2007
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2010/10/20
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The author seems like kind of a shmuck but I think as long as you take his advice with a grain of salt there are some really good nuggets of wisdom. If nothing else, the book did wonders for re-awakening my entrepreneurial spirit.

Some of the more annoying bits are:

1)When he says to avoid going to South America, Africa, and the Middle East of you're a traveling newb. That's a pretty huge chunk of the world to just write off.

2) When he says reading is a waste of time and should be avoided (except of course his book).

Still, I think the good outweighs the bad and it's a worthwhile read.


]]> <![CDATA[A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier]]> 43015
My new friends have begun to suspect I haven’t told them the full story of my life.
“Why did you leave Sierra Leone?”
“Because there is a war.”
“You mean, you saw people running around with guns and shooting each other?”
“Yes, all the time.”
“Cool.”
I smile a little.
“You should tell us about it sometime.”
“Yes, sometime.”

This is how wars are fought now: by children, hopped-up on drugs and wielding AK-47s. Children have become soldiers of choice. In the more than fifty conflicts going on worldwide, it is estimated that there are some 300,000 child soldiers. Ishmael Beah used to be one of them.

What is war like through the eyes of a child soldier? How does one become a killer? How does one stop? Child soldiers have been profiled by journalists, and novelists have struggled to imagine their lives. But until now, there has not been a first-person account from someone who came through this hell and survived.

In A Long Way Gone, Beah, now twenty-five years old, tells a riveting story: how at the age of twelve, he fled attacking rebels and wandered a land rendered unrecognizable by violence. By thirteen, he’d been picked up by the government army, and Beah, at heart a gentle boy, found that he was capable of truly terrible acts.

This is a rare and mesmerizing account, told with real literary force and heartbreaking honesty.]]> 229 Ishmael Beah 0374105235 Adam 5 4.16 2007 A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier
author: Ishmael Beah
name: Adam
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2007
rating: 5
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date added: 2010/10/20
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Top notch. There were several times when I was reading this when I almost burst into tears on the bus. This is the kind of book that stays with you for life. Time to find some brown-brown.
]]> <![CDATA[The Rise of Endymion (Hyperion Cantos, #4)]]> 11289
But first they must embark on a final spectacular mission to discover the underlying meaning of the universe itself. They have been followed on their journey by the mysterious Shrike--monster, angel, killing machine--who is about to reveal the long-held secret of its origin and purpose. And on the planet of Hyperion, where the story first began, the final revelation will be delivered--an apocalyptic message that unlocks the secrets of existence and the fate of humankind in the galaxy.]]> 709 Dan Simmons 0553572989 Adam 5
That being said, Simmons really doesn't know how to nail an ending. You can't just make discontinuities go away by saying that the original character (Martin Silenus) didn't know what he was talking about. I can think of about 20 mysteries that were never resolved but I guess that's what is part of the fun. ]]> 4.14 1997 The Rise of Endymion (Hyperion Cantos, #4)
author: Dan Simmons
name: Adam
average rating: 4.14
book published: 1997
rating: 5
read at: 2010/06/29
date added: 2010/06/30
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I'm so stoked to finish the Hyperion Cantos. I spent too many nights staying up until 3am reading these. It's the kind of book that makes me not want to read any more books because I know they won't be as good.

That being said, Simmons really doesn't know how to nail an ending. You can't just make discontinuities go away by saying that the original character (Martin Silenus) didn't know what he was talking about. I can think of about 20 mysteries that were never resolved but I guess that's what is part of the fun.
]]> <![CDATA[Endymion (Hyperion Cantos, #3)]]> 3977
Two hundred and seventy-four years after the fall of the WorldWeb in Fall of Hyperion, Raoul Endymion is sent on a quest. Retrieving Aenea from the Sphinx before the Church troops reach her is only the beginning. With help from a blue-skinned android named A. Bettik, Raoul and Aenea travel the river Tethys, pursued by Father Captain Frederico DeSoya, an influential warrior-priest and his troops. The shrike continues to make enigmatic appearances, and while many questions were raised in Hyperion and Fall of Hyperion, still more are raised here. Raoul's quest will continue.]]> 563 Dan Simmons 0553572946 Adam 5 4.16 1996 Endymion (Hyperion Cantos, #3)
author: Dan Simmons
name: Adam
average rating: 4.16
book published: 1996
rating: 5
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date added: 2010/06/05
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]]> <![CDATA[The Fall of Hyperion (Hyperion Cantos, #2)]]> 77565 517 Dan Simmons 0553288202 Adam 5 4.23 1990 The Fall of Hyperion (Hyperion Cantos, #2)
author: Dan Simmons
name: Adam
average rating: 4.23
book published: 1990
rating: 5
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date added: 2010/06/05
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]]> <![CDATA[Hyperion (Hyperion Cantos, #1)]]> 77566 500 Dan Simmons 0553283685 Adam 5 4.27 1989 Hyperion (Hyperion Cantos, #1)
author: Dan Simmons
name: Adam
average rating: 4.27
book published: 1989
rating: 5
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date added: 2010/06/05
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This is the first book in a series that belongs on the same pedestal of classic sci-fi as Foundation and Dune. One of the books that stays with you long after you have finished it.
]]> Kick-Ass 3918010
COLLECTING: Kick-Ass 1-8]]> 144 Mark Millar 0785132619 Adam 4 4.06 2010 Kick-Ass
author: Mark Millar
name: Adam
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2010
rating: 4
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date added: 2010/06/05
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]]> The Source 12657 "A sweeping chronology filled with excitement."
THE PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER]]> 1080 James A. Michener 0375760385 Adam 5 4.29 1965 The Source
author: James A. Michener
name: Adam
average rating: 4.29
book published: 1965
rating: 5
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date added: 2010/06/05
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]]> Infinite Jest 75786 A gargantuan, mind-altering tragi-comedy about the Pursuit of Happiness in America.

Infinite Jest is the name of a movie said to be so entertaining that anyone who watches it loses all desire to do anything but watch. People die happily, viewing it in endless repetition. The novel Infinite Jest is the story of this addictive entertainment, and in particular how it affects a Boston halfway house for recovering addicts and a nearby tennis academy, whose students have many budding addictions of their own. As the novel unfolds, various individuals, organizations, and governments vie to obtain the master copy of Infinite Jest for their own ends, and the denizens of the tennis school and halfway house are caught up in increasingly desperate efforts to control the movie—as is a cast including burglars, transvestite muggers, scam artists, medical professionals, pro football stars, bookies, drug addicts both active and recovering, film students, political assassins, and one of the most endearingly messed-up families ever captured in a novel.

On this outrageous frame hangs an exploration of essential questions about what entertainment is, and why it has come to so dominate our lives; about how our desire for entertainment interacts with our need to connect with other humans; and about what the pleasures we choose say about who we are. Equal parts philosophical quest and screwball comedy, Infinite Jest bends every rule of fiction without sacrificing for a moment its own entertainment value. The huge cast and multilevel narrative serve a story that accelerates to a breathtaking, heartbreaking, unforgettable conclusion. It is an exuberant, uniquely American exploration of the passions that make us human and one of those rare books that renew the very idea of what a novel can do.]]> 1079 David Foster Wallace 0316066524 Adam 5 4.30 1996 Infinite Jest
author: David Foster Wallace
name: Adam
average rating: 4.30
book published: 1996
rating: 5
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date added: 2009/11/12
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]]> Axis (Spin, #2) 116410 Spin won science fiction's highest honor, the Hugo Award for Best Novel.
 
Now, in Spin's direct sequel, Wilson takes us to the "world next door"--the planet engineered by the mysterious Hypotheticals to support human life, and connected to Earth by way of the Arch that towers hundreds of miles over the Indian Ocean. Humans are colonizing this new world--and, predictably, fiercely exploiting its resources, chiefly large deposits of oil in the western deserts of the continent of Equatoria.
 
Lise Adams is a young woman attempting to uncover the mystery of her father's disappearance ten years earlier. Turk Findley is an ex-sailor and sometimes-drifter. They come together when an infall of cometary dust seeds the planet with tiny remnant Hypothetical machines. Soon, this seemingly hospitable world will become very alien indeed--as the nature of time is once again twisted, by entities unknown.]]> 303 Robert Charles Wilson 0765309394 Adam 3 3.51 2007 Axis (Spin, #2)
author: Robert Charles Wilson
name: Adam
average rating: 3.51
book published: 2007
rating: 3
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date added: 2009/05/27
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]]> The Stars My Destination 333867
The Stars My Destination is a classic of technological prophecy and timeless narrative enchantment by an acknowledged master of science fiction.]]> 258 Alfred Bester 0679767800 Adam 5 4.07 1956 The Stars My Destination
author: Alfred Bester
name: Adam
average rating: 4.07
book published: 1956
rating: 5
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]]> Spin (Spin, #1) 910863
One night in October when he was ten years old, Tyler Dupree stood in his back yard and watched the stars go out. They all flared into brilliance at once, then disappeared, replaced by a flat, empty black barrier. He and his best friends, Jason and Diane Lawton, had seen what became known as the Big Blackout. It would shape their lives.

The effect is worldwide. The sun is now a featureless disk--a heat source, rather than an astronomical object. The moon is gone, but tides remain. Not only have the world's artificial satellites fallen out of orbit, their recovered remains are pitted and aged, as though they'd been in space far longer than their known lifespans. As Tyler, Jason, and Diane grow up, space probe reveals a bizarre The barrier is artificial, generated by huge alien artifacts. Time is passing faster outside the barrier than inside--more than a hundred million years per day on Earth. At this rate, the death throes of the sun are only about forty years in our future.

Jason, now a promising young scientist, devotes his life to working against this slow-moving apocalypse. Diane throws herself into hedonism, marrying a sinister cult leader who's forged a new religion out of the fears of the masses.

Earth sends terraforming machines to Mars to let the onrush of time do its work, turning the planet green. Next they send humans...and immediately get back an emissary with thousands of years of stories to tell about the settling of Mars. Then Earth's probes reveal that an identical barrier has appeared around Mars. Jason, desperate, seeds near space with self-replicating machines that will scatter copies of themselves outward from the sun--and report back on what they find.

Life on Earth is about to get much, much stranger.]]> 458 Robert Charles Wilson 076534825X Adam 5 4.02 2005 Spin (Spin, #1)
author: Robert Charles Wilson
name: Adam
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2005
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[Old Man's War (Old Man's War, #1)]]> 51964
The good news is that humanity finally made it into interstellar space. The bad news is that planets fit to live on are scarce-- and alien races willing to fight us for them are common. So: we fight. To defend Earth, and to stake our own claim to planetary real estate. Far from Earth, the war has been going on for decades: brutal, bloody, unyielding.

Earth itself is a backwater. The bulk of humanity's resources are in the hands of the Colonial Defense Force. Everybody knows that when you reach retirement age, you can join the CDF. They don't want young people; they want people who carry the knowledge and skills of decades of living. You'll be taken off Earth and never allowed to return. You'll serve two years at the front. And if you survive, you'll be given a generous homestead stake of your own, on one of our hard-won colony planets.

John Perry is taking that deal. He has only the vaguest idea what to expect. Because the actual fight, light-years from home, is far, far harder than he can imagine--and what he will become is far stranger.]]> 355 John Scalzi 0765348276 Adam 5 4.22 2005 Old Man's War (Old Man's War, #1)
author: John Scalzi
name: Adam
average rating: 4.22
book published: 2005
rating: 5
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]]> Snow Crash 830 Snow Crash is a mind-altering romp through a future America so bizarre, so outrageous… you'll recognize it immediately.]]> 438 Neal Stephenson 0553380958 Adam 4 4.02 1992 Snow Crash
author: Neal Stephenson
name: Adam
average rating: 4.02
book published: 1992
rating: 4
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date added: 2008/01/25
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]]> <![CDATA[The Anti-capitalistic Mentality]]> 154242 The Anti-capitalistic Mentality, the respected economist Ludwig von Mises plainly explains the causes of the irrational fear and hatred many intellectuals and others feel for capitalism. In five concise chapters, he traces the causation of the misunderstandings and resultant fears that cause resistance to economic development and social change. He enumerates and rebuts the economic arguments against and the psychological and social objections to economic freedom in the form of capitalism. Written during the heyday of twentieth-century socialism, this work provides the reader with lucid and compelling insights into human reactions to capitalism.

Ludwig von Mises (1881–1973) was the leading spokesman of the Austrian School of Economics throughout most of the twentieth century. He earned his doctorate in law and economics from the University of Vienna in 1906. In 1926, Mises founded the Austrian Institute for Business Cycle Research. From 1909 to 1934, he was an economist for the Vienna Chamber of Commerce. Before the Anschluss, in 1934 Mises left for Geneva, where he was a professor at the Graduate Institute of International Studies until 1940, when he emigrated to New York City. From 1948 to 1969, he was a visiting professor at New York University.

Bettina Bien Greaves is a former resident scholar, trustee, and longtime staff member of the Foundation for Economic Education. She has written and lectured extensively on topics of free market economics. Her articles have appeared in such journals as Human Events, Reason, and The Freeman: Ideas on Liberty. A student of Mises, Greaves has become an expert on his work in particular and that of the Austrian School of economics in general. She has translated several Mises monographs, compiled an annotated bibliography of his work, and edited collections of papers by Mises and other members of the Austrian School.]]> 88 Ludwig von Mises 0865976716 Adam 3 3.91 1956 The Anti-capitalistic Mentality
author: Ludwig von Mises
name: Adam
average rating: 3.91
book published: 1956
rating: 3
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]]> <![CDATA[The Jew in the Lotus: A Poet's Re-Discovery of Jewish Identity in Buddhist India]]> 1148312 While accompanying eight high–spirited Jewish delegates to Dharamsala, India, for a historic Buddhist–Jewish dialogue with the Dalai Lama, poet Rodger Kamenetz comes to understand the convergence of Buddhist and Jewish thought. Along the way he encounters Ram Dass and Richard Gere, and dialogues with leading rabbis and Jewish thinkers, including Zalman Schacter, Yitz and Blue Greenberg, and a host of religious and disaffected Jews and Jewish Buddhists.

This amazing journey through Tibetan Buddhism and Judaism leads Kamenetz to a renewed appreciation of his living Jewish roots.

]]> 304 Rodger Kamenetz 0060645741 Adam 5 4.02 1994 The Jew in the Lotus: A Poet's Re-Discovery of Jewish Identity in Buddhist India
author: Rodger Kamenetz
name: Adam
average rating: 4.02
book published: 1994
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[Prelude to Foundation (Foundation, #6)]]> 30013 This is an alternative cover edition for ISBN 9780586071113

It is the year 12,020 G.E. and Emperor Cleon I sits uneasily on the Imperial throne of Trantor. Here in the great multidomed capital of the Galactic Empire, forty billion people have created a civilization of unimaginable technological and cultural complexity. Yet Cleon knows there are those who would see him fall—those whom he would destroy if only he could read the future.

Hari Seldon has come to Trantor to deliver his paper on psychohistory, his remarkable theory of prediction. Little does the young Outworld mathematician know that he has already sealed his fate and the fate of humanity. For Hari possesses the prophetic power that makes him the most wanted man in the Empire. . .the man who holds the key to the future—an apocalyptic power to be known forever after as the Foundation.]]> 460 Isaac Asimov Adam 3 4.16 1988 Prelude to Foundation (Foundation, #6)
author: Isaac Asimov
name: Adam
average rating: 4.16
book published: 1988
rating: 3
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]]> <![CDATA[The Man Who Was Thursday: A Nightmare]]> 184419
As Jonathan Lethem remarks in his Introduction, The real characters are the ideas. Chesterton's nutty agenda is really quite simple: to expose moral relativism and parlor nihilism for the devils he believes them to be. This wouldn't be interesting at all, though, if he didn't also show such passion for giving the devil his due. He animates the forces of chaos and anarchy with every ounce of imaginative verve and rhetorical force in his body.]]> 182 G.K. Chesterton 0375757910 Adam 5 3.84 1908 The Man Who Was Thursday: A Nightmare
author: G.K. Chesterton
name: Adam
average rating: 3.84
book published: 1908
rating: 5
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]]> Narcissus and Goldmund 5954 Narcissus and Goldmund tells the story of two medieval men whose characters are diametrically opposite: Narcissus, an ascetic monk firm in his religious commitment, and Goldmund, a romantic youth hungry for knowledge and worldly experience. First published in 1930, Hesse's novel remains a moving and pointed exploration of the conflict between the life of the spirit and the life of the flesh. It is a theme that transcends all time.]]> 315 Hermann Hesse 0374506841 Adam 5 4.27 1930 Narcissus and Goldmund
author: Hermann Hesse
name: Adam
average rating: 4.27
book published: 1930
rating: 5
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]]> Blindness 2526 No food, no water, no government, no obligation, no order.

Discover a chillingly powerful and prescient dystopian vision from one of Europe's greatest writers.

A driver waiting at the traffic lights goes blind. An ophthalmologist tries to diagnose his distinctive white blindness, but is affected before he can read the textbooks.
It becomes a contagion, spreading throughout the city. Trying to stem the epidemic, the authorities herd the afflicted into a mental asylum where the wards are terrorised by blind thugs. And when fire destroys the asylum, the inmates burst forth and the last links with a supposedly civilised society are snapped.

This is not anarchy, this is blindness.

‘Saramago repeatedly undertakes to unite the pressing demands of the present with an unfolding vision of the future. This is his most apocalyptic, and most optimistic, version of that project yet’ Independent]]> 326 José Saramago Adam 5 4.04 1995 Blindness
author: José Saramago
name: Adam
average rating: 4.04
book published: 1995
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[The Mind Parasites: The Supernatural Metaphysical Cult Thriller]]> 14495 240 Colin Wilson 0974935999 Adam 5 3.75 1967 The Mind Parasites: The Supernatural Metaphysical Cult Thriller
author: Colin Wilson
name: Adam
average rating: 3.75
book published: 1967
rating: 5
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]]> Atlas Shrugged 662 This is the story of a man who said that he would stop the motor of the world and did. Was he a destroyer or the greatest of liberators?

Why did he have to fight his battle, not against his enemies, but against those who needed him most, and his hardest battle against the woman he loved? What is the world’s motor — and the motive power of every man? You will know the answer to these questions when you discover the reason behind the baffling events that play havoc with the lives of the characters in this story.

Tremendous in its scope, this novel presents an astounding panorama of human life — from the productive genius who becomes a worthless playboy — to the great steel industrialist who does not know that he is working for his own destruction — to the philosopher who becomes a pirate — to the composer who gives up his career on the night of his triumph — to the woman who runs a transcontinental railroad — to the lowest track worker in her Terminal tunnels.

You must be prepared, when you read this novel, to check every premise at the root of your convictions.

This is a mystery story, not about the murder — and rebirth — of man’s spirit. It is a philosophical revolution, told in the form of an action thriller of violent events, a ruthlessly brilliant plot structure and an irresistible suspense. Do you say this is impossible? Well, that is the first of your premises to check.]]> 1168 Ayn Rand 0452011876 Adam 5 3.67 1957 Atlas Shrugged
author: Ayn Rand
name: Adam
average rating: 3.67
book published: 1957
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[Travels with Charley: In Search of America]]> 5306 A quest across America, from the northernmost tip of Maine to California’s Monterey Peninsula

To hear the speech of the real America, to smell the grass and the trees, to see the colors and the light—these were John Steinbeck's goals as he set out, at the age of fifty-eight, to rediscover the country he had been writing about for so many years.

With Charley, his French poodle, Steinbeck drives the interstates and the country roads, dines with truckers, encounters bears at Yellowstone and old friends in San Francisco. Along the way he reflects on the American character, racial hostility, the particular form of American loneliness he finds almost everywhere, and the unexpected kindness of strangers.]]> 214 John Steinbeck 0142000701 Adam 5 4.07 1961 Travels with Charley: In Search of America
author: John Steinbeck
name: Adam
average rating: 4.07
book published: 1961
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[Cerebus, Vol. 3: Church and State I]]> 198469 592 Dave Sim 0919359094 Adam 5 4.31 1987 Cerebus, Vol. 3: Church and State I
author: Dave Sim
name: Adam
average rating: 4.31
book published: 1987
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[Cerebus, Vol. 4: Church and State II]]> 198464 630 Dave Sim 0919359116 Adam 5 4.32 1988 Cerebus, Vol. 4: Church and State II
author: Dave Sim
name: Adam
average rating: 4.32
book published: 1988
rating: 5
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]]> Cerebus, Vol. 1: Cerebus 198462
Welcome to Estarcion, the wildly absurd and funny world of Cerebus the Aardvark. This initial volume collects the first two years of stories from Dave Sim's 300-issue magnum opus. Don't be discouraged by the initially crude artwork or the silliness of the stories. It gets better--even noticeably within this volume. This first installment is the most valuable in preparing for the larger stories ahead.

When we first meet Cerebus--a small, gray, and chronically ill-tempered aardvark--he is making his living as a barbarian. In 1977, when the Cerebus comic book series began, Sim initially conceived of it as a parody of such popular series as Conan, Red Sonja, and Elric but quickly mined that material and transformed the scope of the series into much more. Even by the end of this volume, the Cerebus story begins to transform beyond "funny animal" humor into something much more complex and interesting.

High points in Cerebus include the introduction of Lord Julius, the dictator of Palnu, who looks, acts, and talks just like a certain cigar-smoking, mustachioed comedian; Jaka, Cerebus's one true love; Elrod the Albino, an innept swordsman; and the Cockroach, the-mother-of-all-superhero-parodies and "inspiration" for the much-later TV and comic character--the Tick. All of these characters appear later on in the series as part of a constantly present ensemble of supporting figures.

Even if Cerebus doesn't knock your socks off, give its successor, High Society a try, as this is where the plot really gets going.

]]> 534 Dave Sim 0919359086 Adam 5 3.71 1987 Cerebus, Vol. 1: Cerebus
author: Dave Sim
name: Adam
average rating: 3.71
book published: 1987
rating: 5
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]]> Cerebus, Vol. 2: High Society 198463
Parliamentary politics were never so much fun as they are in the Prime Minister election of 1414. Lord Julius and the mysterious Astoria battle for control of the city-state Iest with Cerebus as their unwitting pawn. Goats, bunny sketches, the Regency Elf, and Moon Roach join the pandemonium, helping to set the stage for things to come. High Society is a home run; an instant classic both as a stand-alone volume and in the context of the rest of the series. Beware though, the ending dovetails directly into Church and State; You may want to grab that volume as well, because once you start the series, the story of Cerebus gets increasingly harder to put down.]]> 520 Dave Sim 0919359078 Adam 5 4.22 1986 Cerebus, Vol. 2: High Society
author: Dave Sim
name: Adam
average rating: 4.22
book published: 1986
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[The Sandman, Vol. 8: Worlds' End]]> 25103 160 Neil Gaiman 1563891700 Adam 5 4.46 1993 The Sandman, Vol. 8: Worlds' End
author: Neil Gaiman
name: Adam
average rating: 4.46
book published: 1993
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[The Sandman, Vol. 10: The Wake]]> 25104
Glavni lik Sendmena je san, tačnije – personifikacija sna. Poznat je i kao Morfej, ali i pod mnogim drugim imenima, i jedan je od sedam Svevremenih... Na početku ovog slavnog serijala, koji se odvija u Morfejevom svetu snova, ali i u stvarnom, savremenom svetu (ponekad i drugde: u Paklu, vilinskom svetu ili Asgardu), Morfej je tokom okultnog rituala zatočen i sedamdeset godina je proveo kao sužanj. On, međutim, uspeva da pobegne i, pošto se osvetio onima koji su ga uhvatili, kreće da obnovi svoje kraljevstvo, koje je oronulo i propalo tokom njegovog odsustva... Iako je, posle toliko godina u zatočeništvu, Morfejeva kruta i katkad okrutna narav donekle smekšala, nekome ko je navikao da eonima suvereno vlada može biti veoma teško da prihvati neminovnost i nužnost promene i pokuša da raščini negdašnje grehe...]]> 192 Neil Gaiman 1563892871 Adam 5 4.52 1996 The Sandman, Vol. 10: The Wake
author: Neil Gaiman
name: Adam
average rating: 4.52
book published: 1996
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[The Sandman, Vol. 9: The Kindly Ones]]> 71252 352 Neil Gaiman 1563892049 Adam 5 4.59 1995 The Sandman, Vol. 9: The Kindly Ones
author: Neil Gaiman
name: Adam
average rating: 4.59
book published: 1995
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[The Sandman, Vol. 6: Fables & Reflections]]> 25106
The critically acclaimed THE SANDMAN: FABLES AND REFLECTIONS continues the fantastical epic of Morpheus, the King of Dreams, as he observes and interacts with an odd assortment of historical and fictional characters throughout time. Featuring tales of kings, explorers, spies, and werewolves, this book of myth and imagination delves into the dark dreams of Augustus Caesar, Marco Polo, Cain and Abel, Norton I, and Orpheus to illustrate the effects that these subconscious musings have had on the course of history and mankind.

A new edition of this title collecting issues #29-31, 38-40, 50 and SANDMAN SPECIAL #1 with recolored pages.]]> 264 Neil Gaiman 1563891069 Adam 5 4.43 1993 The Sandman, Vol. 6: Fables & Reflections
author: Neil Gaiman
name: Adam
average rating: 4.43
book published: 1993
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[The Sandman, Vol. 5: A Game of You]]> 25102 The Doll's House, who here finds herself a princess in a vivid dreamworld. collecting The Sandman #32–37]]> 192 Neil Gaiman 1563890933 Adam 5 4.42 1992 The Sandman, Vol. 5: A Game of You
author: Neil Gaiman
name: Adam
average rating: 4.42
book published: 1992
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[The Sandman, Vol. 3: Dream Country]]> 25100 160 Neil Gaiman 156389226X Adam 5 4.25 1990 The Sandman, Vol. 3: Dream Country
author: Neil Gaiman
name: Adam
average rating: 4.25
book published: 1990
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[The Sandman, Vol. 4: Season of Mists]]> 25101
Collects THE SANDMAN #21-28.]]> 224 Neil Gaiman 1563890356 Adam 5 4.54 1991 The Sandman, Vol. 4: Season of Mists
author: Neil Gaiman
name: Adam
average rating: 4.54
book published: 1991
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[The Sandman, Vol. 2: The Doll's House]]> 25099 The Doll's House, after a decades-long imprisonment, the Sandman has returned to find that a few dreams and nightmares have escaped to reality. Looking to recapture his lost possessions, Morpheus ventures to the human plane only to learn that a woman named Rose Walker has inadvertently become a dream vortex and threatens to rip apart his world. Now as Morpheus takes on the last escaped nightmare at a serial killers convention, the Lord of Dreams must mercilessly murder Rose or risk the destruction of his entire kingdom.

Collecting issues #9-16, this new edition of The Doll's House features the improved production values and coloring from the Absolute Edition.

]]> 232 Neil Gaiman 1563892251 Adam 5 4.44 1990 The Sandman, Vol. 2: The Doll's House
author: Neil Gaiman
name: Adam
average rating: 4.44
book published: 1990
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[The Sandman, Vol. 1: Preludes & Nocturnes]]> 23754
In PRELUDES & NOCTURNES, an occultist attempting to capture Death to bargain for eternal life traps her younger brother Dream instead. After his 70 year imprisonment and eventual escape, Dream, also known as Morpheus, goes on a quest for his lost objects of power. On his arduous journey, Morpheus encounters Lucifer, John Constantine, and an all-powerful madman.

This book also includes the story "The Sound of Her Wings," which introduces us to the pragmatic and perky goth girl Death.

Includes issues 1-8 of the original series.]]> 240 Neil Gaiman 1563892278 Adam 5 4.25 1988 The Sandman, Vol. 1: Preludes & Nocturnes
author: Neil Gaiman
name: Adam
average rating: 4.25
book published: 1988
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[The Hidden Connections: A Science for Sustainable Living]]> 429671
In the 1980s, complexity theory emerged as a powerful alternative to classic, linear thought. A forerunner of that revolution, Fritjof Capra now continues to expand the scope of that theory by establishing a framework in which we can understand and solve some of the most important issues of our time. Capra posits that in order to sustain life, the principles underlying our social institutions must be consistent with the broader organization of nature. Discussing pertinent contemporary issues ranging from the controversial practices of the World Trade Organization (WTO) to the Human Genome Project, he concludes with an authoritative, often provocative plan for designing ecologically sustainable communities and technologies as alternatives to the current economic globalization.]]> 320 Fritjof Capra 0385494726 Adam 4 4.02 2002 The Hidden Connections: A Science for Sustainable Living
author: Fritjof Capra
name: Adam
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2002
rating: 4
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]]> Children of Dune (Dune #3) 112 But there are those who think the Imperium does not need messiahs...]]> 408 Frank Herbert Adam 5 3.92 1976 Children of Dune (Dune #3)
author: Frank Herbert
name: Adam
average rating: 3.92
book published: 1976
rating: 5
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]]> Dune Messiah (Dune, #2) 106
Dune Messiah continues the story of Paul Atreides, better known—and feared—as the man christened Muad’Dib. As Emperor of the known universe, he possesses more power than a single man was ever meant to wield. Worshipped as a religious icon by the fanatical Fremen, Paul faces the enmity of the political houses he displaced when he assumed the throne—and a conspiracy conducted within his own sphere of influence.

And even as House Atreides begins to crumble around him from the machinations of his enemies, the true threat to Paul comes to his lover, Chani, and the unborn heir to his family’s dynasty...]]> 331 Frank Herbert 0441172695 Adam 5 3.88 1969 Dune Messiah (Dune, #2)
author: Frank Herbert
name: Adam
average rating: 3.88
book published: 1969
rating: 5
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]]> Dune (Dune, #1) 234225 Dune is the story of the boy Paul Atreides, heir to a noble family tasked with ruling an inhospitable world where the only thing of value is the "spice" melange, a drug capable of extending life and enhancing consciousness. Coveted across the known universe, melange is a prize worth killing for...

When House Atreides is betrayed, the destruction of Paul's family will set the boy on a journey toward a destiny greater than he could ever have imagined. And as he evolves into the mysterious man known as Muad'Dib, he will bring to fruition humankind's most ancient and unattainable dream.

A stunning blend of adventure and mysticism, environmentalism and politics, Dune won the first Nebula Award, shared the Hugo Award, and formed the basis of what is undoubtedly the grandest epic in science fiction.]]> 604 Frank Herbert 0340839937 Adam 5 4.21 1965 Dune (Dune, #1)
author: Frank Herbert
name: Adam
average rating: 4.21
book published: 1965
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[The Foundation Trilogy (Foundation, #1-3)]]> 46654 Foundation begins a new chapter in the story of man's future. As the Old Empire crumbles into barbarism throughout the million worlds of the galaxy, Hari Seldon and his band of psychologists must create a new entity, the Foundation-dedicated to art, science, and technology-as the beginning of a new empire.

Foundation and Empire describes the mighty struggle for power amid the chaos of the stars in which man stands at the threshold of a new enlightened life which could easily be destroyed by the old forces of barbarism.

Second Foundation follows the Seldon Plan after the First Empire's defeat and describes its greatest threat-a dangerous mutant strain gone wild, which produces a mind capable of bending men's wills, directing their thoughts, reshaping their desires, and destroying the universe.

This adaptation for BBC Radio 4 was first broadcast in 1973 with a cast which included Lee Montague, Maurice Denham, John Justin, Angela Plesence, Wolfe Morris, Julian Glover and Prunella Scales.]]> 679 Isaac Asimov 0380508567 Adam 5 4.42 1953 The Foundation Trilogy (Foundation, #1-3)
author: Isaac Asimov
name: Adam
average rating: 4.42
book published: 1953
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[Second Foundation (Foundation, #3)]]> 29580 256 Isaac Asimov 0553803735 Adam 5 4.27 1953 Second Foundation (Foundation, #3)
author: Isaac Asimov
name: Adam
average rating: 4.27
book published: 1953
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[Foundation and Empire (Foundation, #2)]]> 29581
Filled with nail-biting suspense, nonstop action, and cutting-edge speculation, Foundation and Empire is the story of humanity’s perpetual struggle against the darkness that forever threatens to overwhelm the light—and of how the courage of even a determined few can make all the difference in the universe.]]> 256 Isaac Asimov 0553803727 Adam 5 4.23 1952 Foundation and Empire (Foundation, #2)
author: Isaac Asimov
name: Adam
average rating: 4.23
book published: 1952
rating: 5
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]]> Foundation (Foundation, #1) 29579 The first novel in Isaac Asimov's classic science-fiction masterpiece, the Foundation series

For twelve thousand years the Galactic Empire has ruled supreme. Now it is dying. But only Hari Seldon, creator of the revolutionary science of psychohistory, can see into the future--to a dark age of ignorance, barbarism, and warfare that will last thirty thousand years. To preserve knowledge and save humankind, Seldon gathers the best minds in the Empire--both scientists and scholars--and brings them to a bleak planet at the edge of the galaxy to serve as a beacon of hope for future generations. He calls his sanctuary the Foundation.]]> 244 Isaac Asimov 0553803719 Adam 5 4.18 1951 Foundation (Foundation, #1)
author: Isaac Asimov
name: Adam
average rating: 4.18
book published: 1951
rating: 5
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]]> Shantaram 33600
So begins this epic, mesmerizing first novel set in the underworld of contemporary Bombay. Shantaram is narrated by Lin, an escaped convict with a false passport who flees maximum security prison in Australia for the teeming streets of a city where he can disappear.

Accompanied by his guide and faithful friend, Prabaker, the two enter Bombay's hidden society of beggars and gangsters, prostitutes and holy men, soldiers and actors, and Indians and exiles from other countries, who seek in this remarkable place what they cannot find elsewhere.

As a hunted man without a home, family, or identity, Lin searches for love and meaning while running a clinic in one of the city's poorest slums, and serving his apprenticeship in the dark arts of the Bombay mafia. The search leads him to war, prison torture, murder, and a series of enigmatic and bloody betrayals. The keys to unlock the mysteries and intrigues that bind Lin are held by two people. The first is Khader Khan: mafia godfather, criminal-philosopher-saint, and mentor to Lin in the underworld of the Golden City. The second is Karla: elusive, dangerous, and beautiful, whose passions are driven by secrets that torment her and yet give her a terrible power.

Burning slums and five-star hotels, romantic love and prison agonies, criminal wars and Bollywood films, spiritual gurus and mujaheddin guerrillas—this huge novel has the world of human experience in its reach, and a passionate love for India at its heart. Based on the life of the author, it is by any measure the debut of an extraordinary voice in literature.]]> 936 Gregory David Roberts 192076920X Adam 5 4.27 2003 Shantaram
author: Gregory David Roberts
name: Adam
average rating: 4.27
book published: 2003
rating: 5
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]]>