Kirby C.

A trilogy of Villains stories

Revisado: 08-09-23

Fairest of All - 3 stars
The Beast Within - 2.5 stars
Poor Unfortunate Soul - 2.5 stars
3 stars overall

I've read Poor Unfortunate Soul, The Beast Within, and Fairest of All, and this one was my least favorite of the three. Too many intertwined characters, too many witches, too convoluted, repetitive. I feel like reading all of the Villains series would be too much because the stories overlap so much. It would be super repetitive. And the Odd Sisters have their own story, but they're characters in literally all the other stories. I haven't read The Odd Sisters, but I'm not sure I would need to after reading the other stories they're in. How much new information could there be for them to have a separate story of their own? An example of the repetition: There's a scene in Poor Unfortunate Soul where a princess had invited a prince to have tea, and it's stated no fewer than 4x during this one scene how much both of them hate small talk and it's awkward. The writing honestly isn't great, and Poor Unfortunate Soul is book 3 in the series. Then there are 7 more stories. I really think Serena Valentino ran out of ways to say the same thing over and over again. I found Poor Unfortunate Soul boring and almost DNF, but it's so short. I have the audiobook collection that includes these three stories, and none of them are long enough for me to count them toward my 2023 reading challenge, so I guess I just read them for my own pleasure, and then I just hated to DNF something so short.

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Thought I'd DNF but glad I didn't

Revisado: 08-05-23

**Review contains spoilers**

The first half to two-thirds of this book was difficult for me because the majority of the characters are just so damn unlikable. They're awful people. Wealthy, WASP-y country club folk for whom it's difficult to feel sympathy because their lives are so much more comfortable than the reader's own. They're stereotypes. The only characters I liked were Suzanne, the MC; Iris, the girl Suzanne finds near the woods; and maybe Reid, the MC's son, because he has convictions about things and isn't totally insufferable like the MC's parents, husband, and daughter. And the names! Suzanne's parents are Tinsley and Anson; her husband is Whit. Seriously? Those are the most haughty names I've ever heard. The relationships between these people are absolutely broken. Brynn, Suzanne's 15-year-old daughter, curates her life so that her mother only sees what Brynn wants her to see. She's spoiled and entitled. Meanwhile, she's 15 and plays Tinder roulette w/ her friends, smokes weed and drinks, and is an absolute horror of a human being. She calls Iris "the stray" and makes her the butt of jokes to humiliate her. "Granny Tinsley" buys her a $2k designer dress for prom and sees no problem w/ that. Brynn is growing up into a terrible person, and Suzanne is so busy she doesn't recognize it. She barely disciplines Brynn because it's difficult. She does try to instill some empathy into Brynn, but the message is ignored. Whit, Suzanne's husband, spends all his time chasing money and success. He's absolutely clueless. Brynn is his perfect little girl who can do no wrong. As a result, Brynn treats Whit w/ respect and offers only open hostility toward Suzanne. The most important thing to Whit is success, and success to him looks like obtaining as much wealth as he can from closing real estate deals. I do think he genuinely believes he "adores" and "cherishes" Suzanne. They don't have a bad marriage. He feels like he's always on the lookout for signs that Suzanne is unhappy, but he certainly doesn't genuinely see her or understand her. She attempts to have conversations w/ Whit about how she's feeling and what Iris coming into their lives is awakening in her, and he's just so oblivious. He has no idea what she's talking about, but Suzanne is going through something, and she has absolutely no support from her husband. He just likes having his beautiful trophy wife, but Suzanne feels like "a very organized, efficient zombie." She's always busy - and the author makes the point repeatedly that who isn't? - working for the school boosters, planning charity fundraisers, running here and there to pick up flowers for some event or another, and she keeps up w/ the kids and housework. Heaven forbid there's a pile of dirty laundry in the laundry room behind a closed door. Disorganization irritates Whit.

When Suzanne finds Iris on the ground at a rest area along the Blue Ridge Parkway, sick and emaciated, her world begins to come apart. After Iris can leave the hospital and has no known family living, Suzanne and Whit take Iris in, and Suzanne makes every effort to help her adjust to life outside the woods. Iris has lived in the forest by herself for approx. 3 years since her mother died. Before her mother died, Iris lived in a cabin in the woods w/ her family - including her father and brother - away from civilization, and they survived off the land. The theme of "true places" runs throughout the book, and the symbolism is pretty heavy handed. This book did not need to be as long as it is and becomes very repetitive. Iris has a hard time understanding the family's need for so much STUFF. There's tons of food right there in the fridge. They don't have to hunt and gather to survive. They have indoor plumbing and hot showers. And yet, they're all so busy and buzz through their overloaded lives without stopping to appreciate anything. They all have their own secrets and things they choose not to say to each other, and Iris thinks that they must need to do this when their lives are so complicated. Iris wonders at one point how much money Whit could possibly need and doesn't understand his drive to always be winning, always acquiring more.

Things get worse before they get better for Suzanne and her family. Brynn - again, 15 years old - goes to a college party w/ a college guy named Robby, who she met playing Tinder roulette. Robby is the son of someone her father has a business interest in. Brynn ends up drinking too much, and the police find her on the front lawn of the house where the party took place and take her home. Whit had the opportunity to prevent this from happening. One day at the country club while Reid is helping to set up for a fundraiser, he meets Robby, and Robby shows Reid a photo on his phone of a girl wearing only her bra and underwear lying across a bed. Her head is cut off in the photo, so her face isn't visible, but Reid recognizes the bedroom at his grandparents' house and realizes the girl in the photo is his sister. Reid tells Whit, who blows up at him because Reid recognizing a design on a pillow isn't enough evidence for Whit. He says nothing to Robby's father, Robert, about his son going after Whit's 15-year-old daughter because of his business interest in Robert. Suzanne and Brynn both have arguments w/ Whit later over the fact that he put his own interests, including making money, above the interests of his family. Again, a parent doesn't address a delicate issue because it's just too difficult to have a conversation w/ his teenage daughter about her rebellious behavior that is not age-appropriate. A lot worse could have happened because of Whit's selfishness. He never does talk to Robert about his son's behavior.

Ultimately, Suzanne decides she can't stay in her house and live her life anymore. She argues w/ Whit, packs a bag, takes Iris, and leaves. No one knows where she's going, and the whole family is completely lost w/o her. Suzanne is gone for at least 3-4 days, and during that time w/ Iris, they use topographical maps and drawings Iris makes from memory along w/ their collective knowledge of plant habitats to search for the cabin in the woods where Iris used to live. They do end up finding the cabin, and Suzanne finds some peace and clarity while she's away from her family and the demands of her daily life. The nature imagery throughout the book is beautiful and evocative. Suzanne rediscovers her passion. But Suzanne leaving forces Whit, Brynn, and Reid to deal w/ each other w/o her running interference. After Brynn and Whit argue, she also leaves and goes to "Granny Tinsley's" house to get away from him because he chose his business deal over his daughter's well-being and safety. Reid and Whit also argue because Reid has never been good enough for Whit. He's not a jock or outgoing like Brynn, and Whit feels like Reid isn't a real man because he doesn't have the drive to be a winner. Whit wishes Reid were more like himself and believes that a man w/o ambition isn't a man. Later, Reid finds his father crying over Brynn and Suzanne leaving and does pity him, but they still can't relate to each other.

Suzanne leaving shakes up the whole family, and when she finally decides to return home, she has their full attention. The ending is a little trite because everyone basically lives happily ever after. Iris's father is found. He's in a drug rehab facility where Iris visits him. Until he is released, Iris stays w/ Suzanne and her family. Suzanne buys a property near Iris's cabin in the woods. She turns it into a botany research center and names it after Iris's mother. She creates a burial site for Iris's brother, Ash, and her mother near the research center at the edge of the woods. It becomes Iris's habit after each visit to her father to then visit the grave sites and go to stay in the cabin for an undetermined amount of time, usually a few days to a week. Suzanne doesn't worry about her anymore and allows her this independence to come and go as she pleases. She knows Iris will always come back eventually, and Iris knows Suzanne will always welcome her back. Whit and Suzanne are still together but taking things slow like they're dating again. He makes a lot more of an effort, and she has the freedom to spend the summer living at the research center and meeting w/ an architect, etc., to make things ready to open. She asks her mother, Tinsley, to do the interior design for the research center and her living space there because Tinsley has style, and it's something she's very good at. Tinsley understands the assignment and brings Suzanne's vision to life by using natural materials and actually listening to what her daughter wants. Brynn spends a lot of time at the research center w/ her mother and takes up photography as a hobby that might turn into more as Brynn improves her skills. Reid and Whit take up karate together, and their relationship improves. They find some common ground and have something they can do together as father and son that's sporty and competitive - but in a healthy way. Even w/ the too-perfect ending, at least there are a few decent character arcs.

I didn't enjoy the narrator's voice at first. I don't know that I'd say I ever came around to enjoying it, but I at least got used to it. The narrator's voice is like a Siri or Alexa voice -- very robotic and flat. But it did get better.

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Applies to millennial women, too

Revisado: 07-25-23

I found Why We Can't Sleep: Women's New Midlife Crisis by Ada Calhoun quite relatable. I'm not Gen X; I'm a millennial (an elder millennial but still). A lot of the topics Calhoun writes about in this book are things I've faced and felt the same as she describes. I'll be 40 this year, and I'm definitely going through something. I don't know if I should call it a "mid-life crisis" or something else, but I'm absolutely feeling like I'm languishing. I also feel like I don't really have a right to complain. My problems are largely "first world problems." I don't have children, so I don't have the stress and worry of being a mom. I'm a homeowner, which makes me feel lucky in the current economy. I definitely bought my house at the right time without even know it would be the wrong time within just a few years. I have a decent job w/ a relative amount of job security. I don't know if I'd call it a career. I guess I could since I've been w/ the same employer for almost 10 years, started as a temp, and slowly worked my way up through converting to a permanent role and two promotions. I have a wonderful husband, but I could probably figure out how to hold it down w/o having a partner to help w/ bills and daily housework. And yet, I've suffered w/ depression for over a decade. I wonder to myself sometimes, What did I do wrong? Where did I get lost? If my life hasn't turned out how I expected, what did I expect to be different?

I do feel like I have to be a "24-hour woman." I make more money than my husband and have for many years, so I've been the bread winner for much of our relationship. I cook (so does he), and I do the majority of the cleaning and pay the majority of the bills. I feel like I have to be the sex gatekeeper in our relationship and that we don't have sex unless I'm the one to initiate, so I feel like I'm expected to remain young and sexually exciting and adventurous and always sexy and ready for my partner. It's not necessarily that he makes me feel this way. I just feel like I've failed in this sometimes due to the lack of sexual intimacy in our otherwise healthy partnership. And I don't want to be the sex gatekeeper. Women have a lot of varied pressure on them almost at all times.

As a millennial, I've been told I can have it all - both kids/a family AND a successful career. I just have to "lean in" (Sheryl Sandberg), make a chore chart, use Pinterest to make a vision board... These are not helpful suggestions, and they're just more work for me to do, another box to check on my to do list. As is the suggestion that I ask my partner for help when I need it - as if our house isn't his living space, too, and he can't see w/ his eyeballs what needs to be taken care of when he walks into a room.

At least Calhoun does offer some advice. Here are my takeaways:
1. Lower or let go of expectations. Disappointment comes from expectations not being met. If we lower or let go of expectations or at least have realistic expectations, we're less likely to be disappointed. My goal for a long time has been to deal w/ what I can control and not to worry about things I can't control. I can control my reaction to something I can't control happening, and I can acknowledge and process my feelings.

2. Find support - clubs, therapy. Everyone needs support and different types of support. It's nothing to be ashamed of. Success doesn't happen in a vacuum.

3. Don't compare your insides to their outsides. People curate what they want others to see, whether that mean their clothes, choice of partner, house, etc. If I compare what I know to be myself on the inside to what someone else is curating for the world to see, I'm going to be disappointed or stressed or feel like I'm not successful, etc. You know that what people are posting on social media isn't the whole story.

4. Decide what you care about. Don't expend too much energy on the stuff you don't care about.

5. Reframe/recast your life story. I use reframing to see more than one side of an issue or something that's happening to me. Sure, my car broke down on the way to work. Yes, that sucks. But I have my health, I didn't get into an accident, I have AAA to come tow me, and I don't have to go to work today. Could definitely be a worse day.

6. Wait - it will end. I'm told and I've read that women's lives improve after menopause. Women feel physically better once menopause is over. They feel happier and more confident. Age 50 is a restart, not a crisis. A woman's mid-life crisis is an awakening. I'm feeling some kind of way about turning 40 this year, but I'm hoping I'm on my way to something better than 40.

My one issue w/ the audiobook - and I don't know if this is the case w/ the paper copy - is that chapter 9 repeats a large portion of an earlier chapter.

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Strongly recommend the audiobook read by the autho

Revisado: 07-04-23

Failure Is An Option: An Attempted Memoir by H. Jon Benjamin was recommended to me by a close friend of mine. We're both fans of H. Jon Benjamin from TV shows like Archer and Bob's Burgers. I strongly recommend listening to the author read the audiobook.

It's a book written by a comedian, and I've found these can be hit or miss. Failure Is An Option is hilarious, and Benjamin is self-deprecating and relatable in a very funny way. I enjoyed this audiobook very much and literally laughed out loud.

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Problematic, a lot of red flags

Revisado: 07-04-23

Joanna "Jo" Teale is a graduate student who is researching nesting birds in rural Illinois. Jo is grieving the death of her mother and has fought her own battle against breast cancer at a young age. She drives herself to focus entirely on her research and thinks about almost nothing else.

Jo is living in a cabin in the woods while conducting her research, and one night, a strange girl appears. She's barefoot, wearing pajamas, and covered in bruises. She says her name is Ursa and that she is an alien from the stars. She says she was sent to Earth by her people to witness five miracles and then return to her planet. Jo doesn't know what to do w/ the child and believes she must live nearby and ran away from home or something. She thinks of calling the police, but Ursa begs and pleads w/ her not to, and Jo pushes it off because she knows that the child could be returned to a home where she's potentially being abused.

Instead, Jo starts checking missing children websites but doesn't see Ursa on any of them. Jo meets the reclusive neighbor, Gabe, who she sees regularly selling eggs on the side of the road. He starts helping Jo search missing children websites to try to help Ursa, but the more the three hang out over the course of the summer, the more they bond, and the less they check the websites. Throughout the summer, Ursa witnesses "miracles." One of them, for example, is seeing baby birds in their nest while she's tagging along w/ Jo on her research days. As the summer comes to a close and Jo plans to go back to school, she doesn't know what to do about Ursa, especially as information about some dangerous and painful secrets come to light.

This was an Amazon First Reads pick. I almost DNF Where the Forest Meets the Stars because of all the red flags. The way Jo and Gabe handled the situation w/ Ursa was not at all realistic in my opinion. It's unbelievable. They let a strange kid hang out w/ them all summer for weeks, and even when they do contact the police, the police don't care or do anything. Sure, let's not take the kid and try to find the parents or anything. Let's allow two random people to be her pseudo parents. There are also a lot of red flags in the developing relationship between Jo and Gabe. These two people have a lot of unprocessed trauma. Being a workaholic isn't going to help Jo reckon w/ her mother's death and her own health battles. Gabe has his own mental health struggles w/ depression. Jo is obviously militantly independent, and it's clear she has no idea what the depressive experience is like. She pushes Gabe to shave his beard, doesn't respect his boundaries, and pushes back on him a lot when he tries to stand up for himself. She seems to think he could simply "snap out of it" if he wanted to, which isn't at all how depression works. A complete lack of empathy, which makes Jo unlikable as a character.

I think the whole situation is very weird. I can't really express how weird I think it is. Let's keep this kid around all summer long, buy her clothes, feed her, take her to work w/ us, and basically act like we're her parents, even though Jo and Gabe are strangers themselves and didn't even meet until she showed up. That's totally normal behavior for adults, right? I understand suspension of disbelief to a point. It is fiction, and maybe the girl is actually a literal alien. I'd be more inclined to believe that, but I would not behave this way if I was in this situation, and I don't know that anyone I know would either. I dislike the "forced parenting" situation. I mean, nobody asked Jo and Gabe to parent this girl, but she won't go away. No one is forcing them to do anything, but nobody else is taking the responsibility to care for Ursa except them. I would have turned in the girl to the police, which I think is the right thing to do, and I don't believe I'd feel guilty about it. But then we wouldn't have a story.

I also completely disagree w/ the idea that a woman who isn't a mother is somehow broken, which this book seems to imply. If Jo becomes a mother figure to Ursa, she'll feel better, right? Her life will turn itself around all of a sudden because there's a child in the picture.

Didn't like the ending. The author, Glendy Vanderah, wraps up all this melodrama in a perfectly neat bow in the last 10% of the book. It feels rushed, and this isn't the type of story where a "happily ever after" feels appropriate. Once Vanderah reaches the climax, it's feels like the ending was an afterthought.

2.5 stars rounded up to 3 stars. I originally picked Where the Forest Meets the Stars because I thought I'd like the premise. And then the cover was beautiful. However, some of the topics in this book requires a lot more nuance that the characters don't provide. They're pretty one-dimensional, and the character arcs are flat.

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Rated 3 stars due to the flat ending

Revisado: 07-03-23

Elzibeth "Lizzy" Moon never wanted to be a Moon Girl, even though it was her family's legacy. The Moon Girls are known to be skilled healers. They don't marry, but their children are always daughters. The Moon Girls founded Moon Girl Farm and live communally and each keep a precious book of their lives that includes things like recipes (for soaps, healing ointments and salves, etc.), knowledge they want to pass down to the next generation of Moon Girls, stories of their lived experiences, etc. Lizzy was gifted her blank book but never wrote in it. When she left Moon Girl Farm to go to college, she left her blank book behind.

Now Lizzy's grandmother, Althea, has died. Althea was the matriarch of Moon Girl Farm, and there's nobody left to take care of Moon Girl Farm or Althea's earthly possessions. Only Lizzy.

Lizzy has a very successful career working for a New York City perfumer. She figures she'll go to Salem Creek, New Hampshire, assess the situation and take care of her grandmother's personal effects, sell Moon Girl Farm, and return to New York. But it's not that simple. Lizzy returns to Moon Girl Farm, and everyone in the small town of Salem Creek knows she's back. Salem Creek is a town where everybody knows everybody's business. The people of the town are suspicious and wary of outsiders, and the Moon Girls of Moon Girl Farm have always dealt w/ the town thinking they're witches, etc., due to their lifestyle and shunning them - whether overtly and w/ hostility or through their busy body gossip. Almost ten years ago, two local girls were murdered, and their bodies were discovered in Althea's pond on Moon Girl Farm. Althea was never able to escape the rumors that she was the killer, and the taint of that tragedy hangs over the place even now.

Lizzy becomes tangled up in trying to clear her grandmother's name, and nobody in Salem Creek who might have answers - including the local police - have any interest in helping her. This book is part mystery, part romance, part magical realism, part domestic/family drama. I liked the narrator after a little while, but her male voices sound very similar. I didn't like the ending. I'm not going to spoil actual events from the book in my review, but I'll just say that the main character's arc is not believable to me. I was really disappointed in and left feeling flat by how the book ended, and I expected more. It's like the author reached the climax of the book and wanted to wrap it up as quickly as possible.

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A story of multi-generational survival

Revisado: 07-03-23

TW (in no particular order): domestic abuse, marital abuse, Holocaust survival, medical experimentation, concentration camps, marital infidelity

Miriam Winter is caring for her sick and dying Holocaust survivor father in 1989 Germany over the backdrop of the fall of the Berlin Wall. Miriam doesn't know that her father, Henryk, is a Holocaust survivor until she discovers an Auschwitz tattoo on his wrist, hidden underneath his watchband. Henryk barely speaks anymore but cries out for Frieda. Miriam doesn't know anyone in her father's life named Frieda.

Miriam's mother is gone, but Miriam searches through her mother's belongings looking for answers. She finds an old uniform from Ravensbrück women’s concentration camp, and inside the seams of the dress are dozens of folded and hidden letters written to Henryk by Frieda. Miriam begins to read the letters and learn about Frieda and her struggle to survive as a so-called "Rabbit Girl," one of many women who were experimented on at the camp. This part of the book is based on real history, but the characters are not meant to represent any specific historical people. Miriam is able to slowly piece together the puzzle of the love between her father and Frieda and finds out who she truly is in the process.

The Rabbit Girls is also the story of Miriam's own struggle to survive. When we first meet her, she has recently escaped an abusive relationship and struggles to maintain the separation from her husband, Axel. Her escape and current living situation are tenuous and fragile, and her sick and dying father can't protect her. She's always looking over her shoulder as if she's going to find Axel there, and she has to implement security measures in her apartment, like wedging a feather in the door, so she will know if Axel has been there.

This book was an Amazon First Reads pick. The story is emotional, terrifying, and heartbreaking. The twist in the plot as Miriam reaches the end of the letters is super predictable, and I knew what would happen before I actually read it. The title implies this book is mainly about the "Rabbit Girls," but their story as a group is a small part of this book. It is not the main plot. I bumped down my rating from 4 stars to 3 stars due to the predictable plot twist.

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Took a few read-throughs but enjoyable

Revisado: 07-03-23

I ultimately listened to Astrophysics for People in a Hurry by Neil deGrasse Tyson 3x before I felt like I had absorbed the content. I like that it's read by the author. His voice is absolutely buttery to listen to, and I even used this audiobook to help me fall asleep. Tyson explains astrophysical concepts in small chapter-sized bites, but there are some concepts in this book that are more complex, including theoretical concepts, and I needed to listen to it more than once. Definitely an enjoyable, short read.

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Positive, uplifting, & inspiring story

Revisado: 03-11-23

Great story and a perfect example of why I love listening to audiobooks read by the author. The narration and tone are perfect because the author reads his own words the way he wrote them and intended them to be read. The story takes Sam Heughan on a journey to walk the West Highland Way, which is almost 100 miles long and runs from Glasgow to Fort William and ends with a hike up to the summit of Ben Nevis, the highest mountain in Scotland, the UK, and the British Isles. Along the way, Heughan talks about waypoints throughout his life on his journey to become an actor.

I found this memoir to be intimate, revealing, funny, touching. Heughan seems like a really grounded person and has a hopeful, positive attitude. This uplifting book was kind of what I needed. It didn't completely banish the negative emotions I've been dealing with lately, but I did find it inspiring.

Recommend for fans of the outdoors, soul-searching journeys, pushing their own limits, people who enjoy Heughan's other work (especially the Outlander and Men in Kilts TV series), people who love Scotland, etc.

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Not recommended if you're easily squicked out

Revisado: 02-19-23

I wasn't all that squicked out by Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers by Mary Roach. Stiff is a deep dive by Roach on the topic of human cadavers and their contributions to medical science, cosmetic surgery, and organ donation; safety and injury prevention testing; accident investigation; studies and innovation related to the process of decay and human waste disposal in more environmentally-friendly ways; and the ethics of warfare and the weapons of war we employ. It can be vividly descriptive and graphic in places - for example, when Roach describes in detail the various stages of decay or relays the process of human composting. In the case of TWA Flight 800, the victims' bodies told the story of the crash and helped accident investigators figure out what happened. The injuries sustained by the victims are described so that Roach can explain how the knowledge of how an explosion damages a body vs. an impact with water, for example, helped solve the mystery of why this plane crashed.

I found this book extremely fascinating. Stiff is well-researched and informative, and Roach's humor/wit is also right up my alley, and although there's humor (sometimes darker humor) throughout, I don't think it's a disrespectful handling of a grim and morbid topic. I learned a lot from reading this book, and it honestly gave me examples of some options that are available to me after I die. After reading Stiff, I completely agree that people who will or donate their bodies to science or donate their organs, etc., are the heroes of the cadaver world. (I know that sounds weird.) The best and most effective experiments and tests to find out what happens to the human body if XYZ are tests on human cadavers. Roach explains that some animals are similar - i.e. pigs have a similar organ arrangement inside their torsos to human organ arrangement and are sometimes used to test vehicle safety - but the test is the most comparable to real world conditions and likely effects when a human cadaver is used. It may be distasteful to think about, but it's absolutely necessary to the advancement of science (like advancements in surgical techniques and more environmentally-conscious ways of disposing of human remains and maybe head transplants in the future?) and technology (like air bags and seat belts and windshields made of materials that don't shatter into a million pieces in a crash).

I liked the narrator of the audiobook, Shelly Frasier. There were a few incorrect pronunciations of words. I don't know the age of the narrator, but I thought I could hear that she wears dentures. And it isn't the narrator's fault, but the quality of the audio irked me. There were pauses of silence between sentences or paragraphs where it's like I could tell that was where they stopped and started. Like when you record a mix tape onto a cassette from the radio and have that clear division between songs where you pressed stop and then pressed record again. That exists throughout, and I wasn't a fan. I would have wanted the audio to be more fluid. Frasier's voice was nice to listen to though, and it was perfect for the type of humor in the author's commentary.

Stiff made me think of another book by a different author, The Nature of Life and Death: Every Body Leaves a Trace by Patricia Wiltshire. This other book was every bit as informative as Stiff but maybe not as entertaining. The Nature of Life and Death focuses on explaining what palynology is and how Wiltshire was able to assist with many crime investigations using her knowledge and skills to find an exact place at the edge of a field or in a wood where a murder victim's body was dumped by the pollen and spores captured in samples from the soil.

Recommend if you're not squeamish and appreciate non-euphemistic discussions of serious or distasteful topics with some humor to break the tension.

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