Recently Mentioned Books

If you are wondering, three of my favorite travel books are Robert Byron’s The Road to Oxiana , David G. Campbell, The Crystal Desert: Summers in Antarctica , and also Suketu Mehta, Maximum City: Bombay Lost and Found , perhaps the best travel book ever written.

My biggest complaint is that travel books seem not to discriminate between what the reader might care about or not.  Here is a randomly chosen passage from a recent travel book of Jedidiah Jenkins :

Paul Lewis, Joseph Haydn, Piano Sonatas 32, 40, 49, 50 .

Bach, Violin Sonatas and Partitas, get both the latest Christian Tetzlaff recording and Ning Feng , and:

Bach, Violin Sonatas and Partitas, get both the latest Christian Tetzlaff recording and Ning Feng , and:

John Adams, Doctor Atomic , 2018 recording.

Murray Perahia, Beethoven, Hammerklavier Sonata/Moonlight Sonata .

Hector Berlioz, Les Troyens , conducted by John Nelson.

Kyle Gann, Hyperchromatica , “…an extended set of movements…scores for three retuned mechanics pianos…The music draws together every facet of Gann’s style and life-long musical interests: rhythmic complexity, microtonality, extended “tonal” harmonies and voice leading, post-Minimalist surfaces, and more.  The result is a tremendous mix of sheer enjoyment coupled with extremely sophisticated compositional craft.” (Carson Cooman).

That is the new and excellent book by Alain Bertaud , so many pages have excellent food for thought.  Here is one simple bit:

There are also books which I think very likely deserve to make this list, but I have not had time to read much of them.  Most notably, those include the new biographies of Alain Locke , Thomas Cromwell , Gandhi , and Winston Churchill .

There are also books which I think very likely deserve to make this list, but I have not had time to read much of them.  Most notably, those include the new biographies of Alain Locke , Thomas Cromwell , Gandhi , and Winston Churchill .

There are also books which I think very likely deserve to make this list, but I have not had time to read much of them.  Most notably, those include the new biographies of Alain Locke , Thomas Cromwell , Gandhi , and Winston Churchill .

There are also books which I think very likely deserve to make this list, but I have not had time to read much of them.  Most notably, those include the new biographies of Alain Locke , Thomas Cromwell , Gandhi , and Winston Churchill .

Victor Sebestyen, Lenin: The Man, the Dictator, and the Master of Terror .

Francesca Lidia Viano’s Sentinel: The Unlikely Origins of the Statue of Liberty .

David Olusoga, Black and British: A Forgotten History .

Emily Dufton, Grass Roots: The Rise and Fall and Rise of Marijuana in America .

Allen C. Guelzo, Reconstruction: A Concise History .

Tyler Cowen, Stubborn Attachments: A Vision for a Society of Free, Prosperous, and Responsible Individuals .

Uwe Johnson, From a Year in the Life of Gessine Cresspahl .  I haven’t read this one yet, I did some browse, and I am fairly confident it belongs on this list.  1760 pp.

Homer’s Odyssey , translated by Emily Wilson.

Anna Burns, Milkman , Booker Prize winner, Northern Ireland, troubles, here is a good and accurate review .

Madeline Miller, Circe .

Gaël Faye, Small Country .  Think Burundi, spillover from genocide, descent into madness, and “the eyes of a child caught in the maelstrom of history.”