Books At Work (3)

Note: I did publish part 2 last Monday, but apparently the Blogger feed ate it up for lunch. I would never not post on a day without telling everyone ahead of time.

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Before we get into the next five selections, I would like to clarify something that I wrote in the first post of this series. I originally said that the bulk of my purchases were from Borders Books & Music and only a few where from elsewhere. Well, that is turning out to not be the case, as the further I tap into my memory for these books, the more I realize that I picked these up at more places than I originally realized.

One more thing: I wrote the first draft of this series not by hand, but by using my Dragon software. So long as I don't try to write a regular story and simply stick to writing blog posts, I don't encounter the mental blocks that have plagued me for the past year while I was trying to use Dragon for writing.

Two more thing: Since everyone is ga-ga over Ebooks, I decided to make the book links reflect that ga-ga-ness as much as possible.

10} The Chrysalis, The Map Thief by Heather Terrell. I acquired the second novel listed in a most unusual way. Back in 2008 when I first started blogging, one of the first things I did was to search out writing related blogs to read and learn from. One of this blogs that I found and still read to this day, is called Fumbling With Fiction, written by YA writer Chandler Craig. Chandler Craig is one of those extreme type A people who we admire from a distance but are afraid to even try one tenth of the things that they do for fear of imploding.

Anyways, back in 2008, she was running a contest to give away one of those advance copies to a lucky commenter. The copy in question was a hardcover mystery called "The Map Thief", and it just so happens that I became the lucky commenter and scored a free copy. I enjoyed this book so much, as it was written with two distinct plot lines that were approximately 500 years apart and covered quite a bit about the art and antiquities world, that I decided to pick up the first volume in the series a couple of months later. I would only recommend picking up the first volume to use as a reference tool in order to make sense out of the second one. The first one actually lays the groundwork for the second one, and covers three different time periods: the Flemish art world of the sixteenth century, Vichy France and the modern era.

12} The Road to Somewhere by James Dodson. James Dodson was a well respected golf writer when he decided to take his son on a trip around the world during the summer of 2001. This book is about his partial journey around the world, as he decided to call it quits halfway through because some of the political turmoil that was bubbling beneath the surface was starting to make itself known. 'Course we all know what happened later that year, and in fact the book opens up with that particular tidbit as it applies to Mr. Dodson's wedding and reception. This was another book that I picked up at the discount rack at Ocean State.

13} The Restless Sleep: Inside New York City's Cold Case Squad by Stacy Horn. This was a book that I found in the three dollar bin that Border's had periodically during 2010 when they were trying to raise money to avoid bankruptcy. As the title states, this book covered NYC's cold case homicides, both old and recently new, and Ms. Horn did a very commendable job writing this book. Not only does she cover the history of this particular organization, but she also wrote about five cases that they were working on while she was there. In fact, by the time she'd finished the book, four of the cases were solved and a fifth was partially solved. If you're into true crime and the various offshoots like I am, then this would be a good book for you to pick up.

14} Blue Highway by William Least-Heat Moon. I originally listened to the audio cassette version of this book back in 1992. At the time, I was working the overnight at a gas station convenience store and I needed something on my days off to keep me occupied. One of the things that I used to do to keep myself occupied was to either read very long books or listen to audio cassettes of books, so this was one of the audio books that I'd listen to. Unabridged.

Fast forward about 19 years. If everyone remembers back in January of this year, I ran a post asking for suggestions on what I could buy for a book and a CD with my Borders gift card. This book was what I wound up buying with my gift card. Short review is that the book was a fantastic read and I highly recommend it to anyone who likes travel writing.

15} The Tarnished Star by Jack Martin. This was one of the few books that I bought with my credit card and in fact, remains the only book I bought online. I do plan on buying a couple more books online this year but before I can do that I have to get my finances in order. Anyways, you can read my full opinion of this book here as I decided to do a review of this book after I'd read it.