Book Excerpt for the Day

    Harry grinned to himself as, unnoticed by either Hagrid or Slughorn (now swapping tales of illegal trade in dragon eggs) he pointed his wand under the table at the emptying bottles and they immediately began to refill.

    After an hour or so, Hagrid and Slughorn began making extravagant toasts: to Hogwarts, to Dumbledore, to elf-made wine, and to —

    “Harry Potter!” bellowed Hagrid, slopping some of his fourteenth bucket of wine down his chin as he drained it.

    “Yes, indeed,” cried Slughorn a little thickly, “Parry Otter, the Chosen Boy Who — well — something of that sort,” he mumbled, and drained his mug too.

    (from Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince by J.K. Rowling)

 

    9*/10.  The complete review is here.

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Book Excerpt for the Day

    “Let’s go back to the very beginning then,” he said, opening a Spanish textbook that was clearly aimed at children.  “Counting to ten…”

    Further up the garden, Sheelagh was probably conjugating the imperfect subjunctive by now; she picked up foreign languages as easily as most people picked up colds.  Still, as long as one of us knew how to say, “Sir, could you kindly call an ambulance as my friend has just been electrocuted in the shower?”, I was happy enough.

    (from Backpacked by Catherine Ryan Howard)

 

    8*/10.  The full review is here.

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Book Excerpt for the Day

    “People planning trips generally want up-to-date information.  How would you like to fly all the way to Gabon and find your hotel went out of business a year ago?”

    “You’d never get me there in the first place,” he said.  “You gotta be crazy to go someplace like that.  You’re layin’ on the beach there, drinkin’ somethin’ with fruit in it, and the next thing you know they’re havin’ themselves a cootie tah.”

    “A what?”

    “You know, where they overthrow the government.  Before you know it you’re the main course at a cannibal banquet.”

    (from The Burglar Who Thought He Was Bogart by Lawrence Block)

 

    7*/10.  The complete review is here.

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Book Excerpt for the Day

    The Boss sighed.  Everything was getting messier and messier.  First Bolt disappeared, and in retrospect, the Boss had to admit that he should not have taken out his frustration on Bucket and Caracas.  And then Bucket disappeared and the Boss in retrospect had to admit that he should not have taken out his frustration on Caracas.  And then Caracas disappeared — to buy a watermelon.  And the Boss now in retrospect had to admit that he … should never have whacked him over the head with the melon.

    (from The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared by Jonas Jonasson)

 

    8*/10.  The complete review is here.

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Book Excerpt for the Day

    The plan was for me to reach my overly long pinky fingernail, grown especially for easy cocaine snorting, into my pocket, fill it with six hundred mics of pure, powdered LSD, and with a large entertainer’s gesture, drop the acid into Tricky Dick’s teacup.  If I missed, Abbie would be my backup.  We knew we wouldn’t have the pleasure of seeing Nixon tripping (LSD takes a while to kick in), but the idea that he might be stumbling through the White House a little later, talking to paintings, watching walls melt, and thinking he was turning into a bulldog, was irresistible.

    (from Somebody to Love? by Grace Slick)

 

    8½*/10.  The complete review is here.

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Book Excerpt for the Day

    “I found this sword after a very long search, after mastering a dead science.  The men call it Mightblade.  Not mighty.”  He spoke slowly.  “It might; it might not.  Might not meaning potency, but potentiality.  It is a bastardization of its true name.  There was a time there were many weapons like this,” he said.  “Now, it is, I think, the only one left.

    “It is a Possible Sword.”

    (from The Scar by China Miéville)

 

    9½*/10.  The complete review is here.

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Book Excerpt for the Day

    “It’s the best thing I’ve ever read!” Milo declares vociferously.  “It’s even better than that book with the chocolate factory!”

    “What’s it about?” I ask.

    “There are all these men and ladies and they wear strange costumes and they have magical powers which they use to help people.  It’s not like normal books, though, it’s got pictures as well as words!”

    Megan nods her agreement.  His enthusiasm makes me proud.  I’m glad I gave him such an intriguing gift.

    “It’s a bit childish if you ask me,” Mother remarks.

    “They are children,” I remind her.

    (from The Fall by David L. Dawson)

 

    6*/10.  The complete review is here.

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Book Excerpt for the Day

    “I think we’ll be good for a month at least.  More if we go on reduced rations.”

    “Which is a wise course of action,” Hellatz replied.

    “Agreed.  Once the replicators are back online we can replenish the supplies, but for now, it seems we’re going to have to tighten our belts.”

    “I do not wear a belt, Captain.  My uniform is tailored to my—”

    “It’s a figure of speech, Hel.”

    (from Deep Space Boogie by Scott Baron)

 

    7½*/10.  The full review is here.

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Book Excerpt for the Day

    With a good estimate for the speed of light, we can come close to a reasonable estimate of the age of the universe.

    The concepts are not exclusively cosmic.  True, when you flick on a wall switch, you don’t have to wait around for the light to reach the floor.  Some morning while you’re eating breakfast and you need something new to think about, though, you might want to ponder the fact that you see your kids across the table not as they are but as they once were, about three nanoseconds ago.  Doesn’t sound like much, but stick the kids in the nearby Andromeda galaxy, and by the time you see them spoon their Cheerios they will have aged more than 2 million years.

    (from Death By Black Hole by Neil deGrasse Tyson)

 

    9½*/10.  The complete review is here.

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Book Excerpt for the Day

    Even if it took centuries to travel from star to star (…) this might be no obstacle to sufficiently determined explorers.  The technique of hibernation, used on Discovery herself, was one possible answer.  Another was the self-contained artificial world, embarking on voyages that might last for many generations.

    In any event, why should one assume that all intelligent species were as short-lived as Man?  There might be creatures in the universe to whom a thousand-year voyage would present nothing worse than slight boredom…

    (from 2001 – A Space Odyssey by Arthur C. Clarke)

 

    8½*/10.  The full review is here.

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Stupidity Vaccine

Book Excerpt for the Day

    “I can’t thank you enough for introducing Nicholas to me.”

    “Introducing Nicholas?  Carol, I didn’t introduce you two.  We were out on a date, you and me.  I was attempting to ply you with Cosmopolitans if you’ll recall.  Then that Nicholas guy showed up and took my stool and the next thing I know you’re speaking French.”

    “Oh, don’t be silly.  It’s just that he is so different, so interesting, so, so, romantic.  He’s… oh, I don’t know… so really different than you.  I mean in a number of good ways, I guess.”

    That didn’t really help me.

    (from Bombshell by Mike Faricy)

 

    7*/10.  The complete review is here.

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Book Excerpt for the Day

    “And you spoke to a human?”

    Tal listened for any trace of disapproval in that, but he came up empty.  Torg only sounded curious, maybe even too curious.  Consorting with humans had been forbidden since the ashes settled on the Final War.  They weren’t even supposed to exist, and he’d announced himself like a fool to the old hag.  “She mostly spoke at me.”

    “What was she like?”

    “Wrinkled.”

    (from Horded by Frances Pauli)

 

    7*/10.  The complete review is here.

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Book Excerpt for the Day

    ”What’s taking your friends,” Filipov asked for the hundredth time.  “They keep on stalling.”

    To his surprise, the man’s eyes finally met his.  It made him uneasy.

    “You complain of the silence of my friends?”

    “Right, exactly.”

    “In that case, I apologize on their behalf.  But let me assure you that, when the time comes, they will be delighted to meet you.  Although I fear that, on the off chance you survive the encounter, you’ll wish you hadn’t met them.”

    (from The Obsidian Chamber by Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child)

 

    5½*/10.  The full review is here.

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Book Excerpt for the Day

    Although not common on the Discworld there are, indeed, such things as anti-crimes, in accordance with the fundamental law that everything in the multiverse has an opposite.  They are, obviously, rare.  Merely giving someone something is not the opposite of robbery; to be an anti-crime, it has to be done in such a way as to cause outrage and/or humiliation to the victim.  So there is breaking-and-decorating, proffering-with-embarrassment (as in most retirement presentations) and whitemailing (as in threatening to reveal to his enemies a mobster’s secret donations, for example, to charity).  Anti-crimes have never really caught on.

    (from Reaper Man by Terry Pratchett)

 

    9½*/10.  The complete review is here.

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Book Excerpt for the Day

    While cuneiform was first invented, it is currently thought, by accountants, and developed by scribes and scholars, the alphabet seems to have had much more plebian origins.  The latest archaeological discoveries suggest that alphabetic writing was the brainwave of a group of expatriate Semitic workers resident in Egypt early in the second millennium BCE.  Inspired by the pictographic Egyptian writing system we call hieroglyphs – ‘priest signs’ – they dreamt up a shorthand to use with their own language.

    (from Babylon by Paul Kriwaczek)

 

    9½*/10.  The complete review is here.

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Book Excerpt for the Day

    “You’re going to let Professor Rapson tinker with your chair? You’ll probably go into orbit.  What sort of idiot are you?”

    “I’m hoping I’m the idiot who works for you, Dr. Maxwell.”

    “So am I.  You sound too good to be true.  What’s your position on chocolate?”

    “You can never have enough,” he said, pulling a handful of miscellaneous chocolate bars from mysterious depths.

    “You’re hired,” I said.  “Starting now.”

    (from A Symphony of Echoes by Jodi Taylor)

 

    9*/10.  The complete review is here.

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Book Excerpt for the Day

    “Of course you can stay with us.  But I don’t get it.  Tyler, you’re a very rich young man.  Why don’t you just rent a place here for the year?  The price is like pocket change for you.”

    “My own place would mean stocking my own fridge, doing my own laundry, and cleaning my own floors.  If I stay with you, I get free room and board.”

    “So you’re a mooch.”

    “I bring you flowers and wine for dinner.”

    “You’re a classy mooch.”

    (from Bone Box by Faye Kellerman)

 

    5½*/10.  The complete review is here.

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Book Excerpt for the Day

    It left me thinking I couldn’t make a mistake, that I had to be precise and fine, which of course was no way to go after a batter—especially a batter with the pedigree of Wade Boggs.  No, he couldn’t hurt you with a single swing of the bat, not like Jim Rice or Don Baylor, but he could hurt you, make no mistake.  Death by a thousand paper cuts, by seeing-eye singles … that’s how a guy like Wade Boggs could hurt you.

    (from Game 7, 1986 by Ron Darling)

 

    8*/10.  The complete review is here.

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Book Excerpt for the Day

    “Is there any reason why the boar attacked Crackling Rosie?”

    “Hard to say.  It could have been territorial; sometimes a pig won’t accept other porcines in its boardom.”

    “What?” I said, puzzled.

    “A king has a kingdom.  Therefore, a boar has a boardom,” Mr. Catt explained, smirking.  “I thought everyone knew that.”

    (from Inspector Hobbes and the Bones by Wilkie Martin)

 

    7½*/10.  The complete review is here.

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