Jonathan Cook

The promise of this book is thoroughly broken

Revisado: 09-26-24

When you title a book "How To Write A Mystery", you're making a promise: The book is going to tell you how to write a mystery.

This book thoroughly fails to fulfill that promise. A minority of the chapters, essays written by a scattering of well-connected authors, actually address the topic of writing mysteries. Other chapters offer generic writing advice that you've already heard over and over again. Much of the material dwells in literary quibbles that are irrelevant to the writing process, such as what the difference is between story and plot.

Even among those small number of chapters that do directly address the topic of writing mysteries, there are few that offer much concrete advice that's specific to mystery writing.

The editors of this book clearly had difficulty obtaining the cooperation of a sufficient number of contributors who could speak with clarity about writing mysteries. They would have done better to have organized a book written comprehensively by just 3 or 4 authors.

The further one goes in this book, the more clear it becomes that the editors don't respect the readers. It feels like a project they just wanted to get done and out of the way.

Avoid this book, and avoid the writers' associations that are plugged over and over again throughout its pages.

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A rock solid and fascinating description of our planetary history

Revisado: 05-07-24

One of the greatest strengths of this book is that, by explaining the geology of our planet, it lays a solid foundation for understanding the impact of humanity on global climate. If you know people who are still in denial about the science of climate change, or who don’t believe in evolution, for that matter, ask them to read this book or listen to it. It could be life-changing.

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Extremely conservative and unreflective

Revisado: 12-09-23

I wanted to get Jewish literacy, literacy of Jewish culture. I did not want an unreflective conservative rant like this.

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Cloying narrator, presumptuous text

Revisado: 07-05-22

As an audiobook, this is very difficult to listen to because the narrator’s voice is so condescending. This combines with the author’s repetitive writing to create a tone that seems to presume that the listener cannot understand some very basic concepts.

The content of this audiobook also makes certain presumptions about what a family‘s experience in dealing with anxiety will be. In the case of my family, these presumptions do not apply, and I presume that there are other families out there for whom this will be the case.

Anxiety is a very common experience, and diverse. The way that this book is written, it feels as if the author came up with a program and route backwards to describe anxiety experiences in order to fit that. I am left with very little new understanding that applies in my family‘s case.

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Clunky narrative nonfiction

Revisado: 11-13-20

Once upon a time, narrative nonfiction was a clever new form of writing. This book exemplifies the dead end that narrative nonfiction has become. It is low and repetitive, revealing very little non-fiction content and with a narrative that doesn’t really go very far. Please, publishers, stop the narrative nonfiction bandwagon! I was hoping for a book with more substance. The author went here, the author went there, and what did he discover? Not very much.

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A Dreary Shade of Magic

Revisado: 08-26-19

What a disappointment. The author lazily relies on the setting of royalty and magic to make up for thin characters and a drab plot line... and doesn't even succeed with the setting. Never has magic been so dreary. There's so much possibility for imagination in the framework of this story, and so little realized in the writing. A Darker Shade of Magic is a dreadful story, poorly told.

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Exclusion of Growing Non-Religious Part of America Derails The Book

Revisado: 10-27-17

Author Brene Brown clearly has good intentions with this book. Nonetheless, her work is deeply flawed because of a cultural blind spot that seems to come from her religious identity. One of the major ideas in this book is that we should not exclude others because of difference, book the author does just that when she insists that spirituality is a necessary component of finding common ground. In every state in America, The number of non-religious Americans is growing at a quick, steady pace. Approximately 1/5 of the American population currently identified as having no religious affiliation. Among young Americans the rate of nonprofit just identity is even higher. However, throughout the book, Brene Brown speaks as if religious belief in a higher power is something that we can all agree on. She repeatedly assumes that everyone takes part in religious rituals such as prayer, and takes it for granted that the reader will have her particular Abrahamic religious background. That’s just not the America that we live in, and the credibility of the author’s ideas about how to overcome cultural differences is devastated by this astonishing oversight. For Brene Brown to talk about her own religious beliefs isn’t necessarily a problem. For her to pretend that all of America can rally around spiritual language and practices is disrespectful of our nation’s diversity.

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