Bookstooge's Reviews On the Road

Monday, March 06, 2023

Brainwash - MTG 4th Edition

Sunday, March 05, 2023

Curtains for Three (Nero Wolfe #18) ★★★★☆

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Title: Curtains for Three
Series: Nero Wolfe #18
Author: Rex Stout
Rating: 3 of 5 Stars Appended to 4
Genre: Mystery
Pages: 149
Words: 70K

This is another collection of 3 novellas and consists of:
The Gun with Wings
Bullet for One
Disguise for Murder

While I enjoyed this collection, part of that was because I was determined to overlook the novella aspect and simply enjoy the stories for what they were instead of what I wanted them to be, ie full novels. So I dinged a half-star right out of the gate. Then the final story, Disguise for Murder, had appeared in a previous collection and while it was still a good story, I dinged a good star and a half off for wasting my precious time on old material when I wanted new stuff.

So still happy with this read but not as happy as I could have been if it was all new stuff. Of course, now I’ll actually pay attention to the names of the novellas as I suspect this will happen again. Can’t trust publishers not to make an easy buck by gypping their customers. Bunch of lowlifes. If I was Archie Goodwin I would bust their chops for doing such a thing to me.

Ahhh, the life of a book reader/reviewer isn’t for the faint of heart, that’s for sure. Thankfully, since I’m doing all the drama, you don’t have to. But feel free to chime in. So, if any of your “father’s brother’s nephew’s cousin’s former roommates” had any drama too, let me know. I’m all about those family drama stories after all.

★★★☆☆ Appended to ★★★★☆

All My “Nero Wolfe” Reviews

Appended:
It turns out that I had read the story “Disguise for Murder” as “The Affair of the Twisted Scarf” in the Alfred Hitchcock Collection “I Want My Mummy” back in June of 22. Because I didn’t pay enough attention to figure out what I had read when, I am un-penalizing this collection because it’s my own fault. Thanks to Fraggle for setting me straight on this.

Saturday, March 04, 2023

PCP: Facing the Future

And thus ends that particular aspect of our story. Before we were lovers, we were friends. Before we were friends, we were Christians. Our foundation was Jesus Christ and that allowed us to put everything that has come into our lives since this time into its proper perspective. No matter the pain, no matter the circumstances, whatever life throws at us, we both know that Jesus has saved us from our sins and that we will see Him after death. That is why we know we will have a truly Happily Ever After.

I don’t mean to preach here, but how can I not when the center of both of our lives is Jesus Christ? Mrs B and I are side by side, marching towards the same goal.

Wishing you all a blessed Sabbath day as I wrap up this particular series. It has been fun to share it with you all and I hope you enjoyed getting to know some of our past history.

All “Project Christmas Present” Posts

Friday, March 03, 2023

Blitz (Checquy Files #3) ★★☆☆☆

Title: Blitz
Series: Checquy Files #3
Author: Daniel O’Malley
Rating: 2 of 5 Stars
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Pages: 622
Words: 250K

Long, bloated, two storylines that didn’t actually have any impact on each other and worst of all, boring. I was bored. The first storyline is dealing with London and World War II and the bombs being dropped on London. The second story involves a woman (who is married to a cop and has a daughter who is a toddler) who joins the Checquy because she can discharge electricity and it is in the present day.

I enjoyed the present day storyline. She was an engaging character with just the right amount of feistiness to keep me from rolling my eyes and she was SMART. She used her brains. Then I would just groan in spirit at the next chapter when we would go back to the stupid idiots who I was forced to read about during WWII. It was nothing more than a boring history info dump about the Checquy and I didn’t care two squats for it. Unfortunately, it seemed to play the bigger part and sucked the life from the entire book.

I actually feel rather generous giving this 2 stars. But it wasn’t bad, so I don’t feel like I can really go any lower. But I certainly won’t be reading any more in the Checquy Files if O’Malley writes any more. I hope he doesn’t because this was bad and I’m going to pretend The Rook and Stiletto are just a duology. Blitz has no business sullying the good literary name of the Checquy Files.

★★☆☆☆

Thursday, March 02, 2023

The Casebook of Sherlock Holmes (Sherlock Holmes #9) ★★★☆☆

Title: The Casebook of Sherlock Holmes
Series: Sherlock Holmes #9
Author: Arthur Doyle
Rating: 3 of 5 Stars
Genre: Mystery
Pages: 309
Words: 84K

A bunch of short stories to round out and end the career of Sherlock Holmes. While nothing was really good, nothing was bad and I feel like this book sums up my overall experience with Holmes.

I’ve always thought I was strictly an idea guy when it came to stories and that the characters were simply meant as bones to hang the “idea” on. Well, reading Holmes has made me realize that I’ve changed and I like a good, fleshed out and relatable character. Holmes and Watson are none of those and so it makes it hard for me to enjoy these. Of course, it might just be the era that Doyle wrote in. Then I realize that Dickens didn’t write like this, at all, so I think it was all on Doyle. When I’m reading a collection of short stories like this, I don’t expect great characterization, but none of the previous novels have ever given that to me either, so I can’t even rely on that.

While I am glad to have finally read the entire Holmes canon, I don’t foresee myself ever wanting to re-read these. I want something more than they offer and I don’t think the future me is suddenly going to want that “lack” and thus desire to try these again 😀

★★★☆☆

All of my “Sherlock Holmes” reviews

Dreams (Bone #18) ★✬☆☆☆

Title: Dreams
Series: Bone #18
Author: Jeff Smith
Rating: 1.5 of 5 Stars
Genre: Comics
Pages: 22
Words: 1K

From Bookstooge.blog

Thorn realizes that all of her dreams have been memories and gets all butt hurt at Gran’ma Ben for not telling her all these years. Gran’ma goes stubborn and won’t talk, Thorn goes all stubborn and won’t talk and Fone is stuck in the middle. Meanwhile, at the bar Lucius reveals the bet between him and Phoney and when things start going bad for Phoney, he wishes that Fone’s Dragon was there. This leads everyone to start questioning him, rather threateningly.

Finally, the various Bone characters start getting on track into one plot. With Phoney’s reveal to the town folk that he knows about a dragon, and Gran’ma Ben revealing Thorn’s history, everybody is about to be on the same page.

But you know what? Not. Quite. Yet. Because Smith is a bonehead and spends 3 pages showing us what should take a mere panel. There are several pages where he re-uses the same art but changes how an arm is resting or where a character is looking and we get about 10 words of text. It is beyond blatantly obvious that he is either puffing things up or is floundering and trying to give himself some operating space.

It is amazing to me seeing how a story, spaced out in monthly installments, shows such a markedly different set of weaknesses from the collected story. This is why I am not a fan of serial fiction either. Even if the author knows exactly where they are going, it is still a big pain in the butt to read on THEIR schedule and not mine. Maybe that had as much to do with me not reading a lot of comics as much any economic reasons.

Like I have stated before, I’m going to read this comic, issue by issue, even if it kills me. It just might too, hahahahahaa 😀

★✬☆☆☆

All My “Bone” Reviews

Wednesday, March 01, 2023

Uncle’s Dream (The Russians) ★★★✬☆

Title: Uncle’s Dream
Series: (The Russians)
Author: Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Translator: Garnett
Rating: 3.5 of 5 Stars
Genre: Fiction
Pages: 183
Words: 49K

In so many ways this reminded me of the Mapp & Lucia series by EF Benson if there was only Lucia with a daughter. In this story, Mama is trying to get a rich match for her daughter and a rich, but old, sick and partly crazy, Prince is the target. The Mama has the entire village under her thumb and they chafe and so do what they can to upset the plans. And the daughter is horrified but goes along and the other, younger suitor, acts like an idiot and hurts the feelings of the daughter and thus extinguishes his own chances. Eventually, the Prince, thinking it is all a dream, escapes from the village and the Mama is a laughing stock and the daughter eventually marries some high ranking politician.

I guess this was a commentary on the people of the times. Of course, that’s not much different than the people of today. Selfish, back stabbing, irresponsible, greedy, etc, etc. Thankfully, Dostoyevsky uses humor so it’s not grim and horrible but by the time the story was done I was ready to leave that little Russian village.

★★★✬☆