From the yellow chair

Books make life larger.

[pandxareads]

Review: Zen Camera

Zen Camera is not another straightforward “how to” photography book. You won’t learn how to adjust your camera’s aperture or shutter speed. You won’t read any debates over which SLR brand is truly the best (it’s Nikon, by the way). You won’t find any information on what exposure is or how to control it. You will learn how to see differently.

Author David Ulrich uses his career as a photographer and professor in conjunction with lessons and advice from his various “gurus” to develop these exercises. These exercises cover enough ground to collectively make up a photography course curriculum. Designed for every experience level, from total newbie to seasoned pro, and for any type of camera, the clear focus of Zen Camera is to help readers break the habit of taking shallow but aesthetically pleasing “instagram style” photos in exchange for thoughtful photos with a voice. This is a flexible curriculum; exercises can be done in order or not depending on what you want to learn. However, Ulrich suggests taking several months to complete the whole thing. 

There’s an old adage that anyone can learn the technical aspects of photography, but having a good eye is what makes a real photographer. It’s also often said that the latter can’t be taught, it’s something you either have or you don’t. Zen Camera is a breath of fresh air that challenges this belief. Every library or bookstore photo section is crammed full of books that teach the technical stuff but very few (if any) that teach how to see. 

Although I do find it hard to read any “spiritual” book like this without rolling my eyes, I found myself doing it less during this read. The exercises and insight far outweigh any irritation or doucheyness from the author. I highly recommend Zen Camera to anyone interested in taking more meaningful photos, regardless of access to equipment or level or experience. 

I received a copy of this book for free in exchange for my honest review.

[pandxareads]

Review: How Democracies Die

I’ve read a lot of dark books in my day and plenty of horror novels. This scared me more than any of them. The monsters in this book are real; the story doesn’t stop when you put it down- and that’s exactly why it needs to be read.

How Democracies Die, by two Harvard professors, dives deep into the mechanisms that successful democracies rely on to function. Providing in depth examples from various countries and time periods, this is much more than the same Trump criticisms you hear on any talk show. Or news program. Or really anywhere (for good reason). In fact, Levitsky and Ziblatt argue that Trump is just one symptom of a greater disease inflicting our democracy, positing “No single political leader can end a democracy; no single leader can rescue one either.” Living in the constant onslaught of information on the current administration and it’s various scandals and controversies, this book is a voice of reason. It provides context for the things we are currently experiencing by telling the stories of authoritarian leaders and their rise to power in once-successful democratic governments. It manages to give detailed examples while staying accessible to readers with no background in politics or history (me.)

This book ends with a chapter titled “Saving Democracies” which encourages the idea of unity between opposing political parties, but fails to give any real information on what steps a regular person can do to stop the breakdown of our government. Although there are examples of would-be authoritarians being thwarted both in the U.S. and abroad throughout the book, it still ends on a hopeless note. Is there really nothing the average person can do?

Hopelessness aside, I highly recommend this book to anyone looking to make sense of the current political climate. The information here provides understanding of events that took place both before and after the writing of the book. While I still don’t know if there’s anything within my power to help the situation, I know it’s important to put context and facts behind our outrage and horror. This is a great place to start.

I received a copy of this book for free from the publisher in exchange for my honest review.

[lovelyowlsbooks]

REBLOG IF YOU’RE A BOOKLR!

My dash is seriously dead and I need more booklrs to follow. I came back a few hours later and saw a post I reblogged ages ago still on my dash a few posts down.

So, if you’re a booklr and post:

- Pictures of books

- Talk about books (mostly YA but it’s okay if you don’t)

- Post reviews, blog posts etc

- If you’re a new booklr and need help/followers

- Or if you have any book related content at all

Please reblog this and I will check your book blog out. I unfollowed a lot of inactive blogs and need new and active users on my dash!

[verylostpenguin]

Book: *has dragon on cover*

Me: wOW

[pandxareads]

Review: Live Lagom by Anna Brones

Jumping in on the hygge craze, Live Lagom is an introduction to the Swedish principle of balanced living. 

There’s only so much that can be said about balance in this context; it’s a pretty straightforward concept. This is obvious almost immediately after the introduction when the same ideas are rehashed over and over again. I expected more specific tips and ideas that were more traditional to Sweden and less just common sense. I also could have done without the near constant criticism of American culture. While it’s obvious Americans are far from the poster children for balanced, conscious living, the repeated examples began to feel more like a lecture instead of a light and simple lifestyle book. I think we all know that taking frequent breaks during the work day and vacations throughout the year would reduce stress. It isn’t exactly a new idea that eating heavy meals of rich food isn’t healthy. While I agree with virtually everything in this book, it hardly seems worth a full-length book and certainly not worth reading cover to cover. Nothing new was said after the first 50 pages. Even the instagram-worthy photos on every other page grew tiring and redundant. 

The standout section of the book is the one on food, which contains a dozen or so recipes for simple Swedish recipes. 

I haven’t read any of the new books on hygge, so I can’t compare them to lagom. However, this was a clearly a rushed effort to cash in on that trend. If you’re looking to adopt a more lagom lifestyle, I recommend getting ideas online instead of from this book. 

Live Lagom: Balanced Living the Swedish Way by Anna Brones

I received a copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

[pandxareads]

Review: The Chalk Man by C.J. Tudor

Books like this are the candy of the literary world. They’re easy and fun, but there’s not much substance. 

*The rest of this review contains spoilers.*

The Chalk Man tells one story through two alternating time period- the 80′s, when our main characters are children experiencing one trauma after another, and 2016, when they are adults trying to keep their secrets in the past. Eddie and his group of oddball friends endure a string of horrific things, starting with a freak accident at the town fair that leaves a young girl permanently disfigured. All these things- accidents, deaths- come with mysterious stick figures drawn in chalk. And it seems like one person is responsible, or at least involved, in all of them. So what does it mean when Eddie gets a stick figure draw in chalk in the mail decades later? 

It’s a great set up. The problem with this book is not in the build up. The build up of suspense and suspicion is excellent. It seems like nearly every chapter ends on a line that keeps you hooked, adding layer after layer to the drama. The problem comes with the resolution. While I love the current trend in mystery/thriller/suspense of complex answers and the end of the story, the ones offered in The Chalk Man felt too convenient. About two-thirds of the way through the book Eddie repeatedly thinks about how complicated the idea of personal responsibility can be, how in a situation as horrible as murder, everyone involved is a little responsible. Which.... is exactly the ending of the book. In the real world, that makes sense. It’s way more plausible that a series of deaths is caused by horrible timing, coincidence, and a handful of violent people than one super villain with an evil master plan. But in a novel it’s just a let down, especially in story that built suspense as well as this one did. No new ground was broken in the suspense genre here. Certainly there is some middle ground between hokey endings from bad episodes of The Twilight Zone and this? Eddie (childhood and adult versions) repeatedly thinks about how frustrating and cheap it feels when a character in a story is suddenly saved from certain peril through some lazy writing and the story is wrapped up in a neat little package. It’s hard to tell if this irony was deliberate or not. Either way it felt a bit like a slap in the face from the author. 

With that said, I read this book in just a few sittings. I devoured it. At times, I even enjoyed it. After a quick search on Goodreads, it’s clear that my criticisms put me in the minority. 

I received a copy of this book in exchange for my honest review. 

[pandxareads]

Review: Chasing Phil by David Howard

Chasing Phil is the story of one of the first major undercover FBI investigations in US history, detailing the crimes, investigation, and prosecution of white collar criminal Philip Kitzer. Starting in the mid ‘70s, Jim Wedick and Jack Brennan embedded themselves in Kitzer’s “fraternity” of con men. Over the next year, the two junior agents followed Kitzer all over the world, listening in on a nearly constant stream of shady deals being made through fraudulent banks.

Some parts of Chasing Phil sound like they’re directly from a movie. Charming con men drinking all day and all night. Mobsters shaking people down for a payment. Phony bank robberies. Elvis Presley’s plane... Kitzer was a larger than life character with a stranger than fiction life than makes for an engrossing read at times. Unfortunately, this level of entertainment is not sustainable. Pages and pages on end of convoluted financial dealings and legal loopholes are about as interesting to read as your last bank statement. Needless to say, I have mixed feelings about the book.

Two things are undeniable. The first is how important this case would prove to be for the FBI and (presumably) other enforcement agencies in the country. Wedick and Brennan began the investigation just as the FBI began to offer training for undercover operations and years before they offered any kind of support for agents returning to their regular lives after an operation. Wedick and Brennan received none of this training. The went undercover using their real names and, while they made an effort to avoid talking about their personal lives in any detail, they remained as close to the truth as they could. They often traveled without informing anyone at the bureau beforehand and relied heavily on their ability to memorize complex details about the illegal activities of their group. With no protocol in place, they had to make it up as the went.

The second is how much work David Howard had to do to make this book as interesting as it was. Even with the quirky characters, the thousands of pages of court testimonies he used as the main source couldn’t have been very exciting. Out of what would have otherwise been impossibly dull material, Howard gives us colorful three-dimensional characters and compelling stories.

I received a copy of this book for free from the publisher in exchange for my honest review.

[sparkitors]

Classic lit + Onion-style headlines = the mashup you never knew you always wanted. Click here to see all 14!

brought to you by our resident genius, @roonil-freakin-wazlib

[mirnah]

[macrolit]

Reading is that fruitful miracle of a communication in the midst of solitude.

Marcel Proust (via macrolit)

[theticklishpear]

View this post on Instagram

From Old English Bindery

[doctorofwhut]

Wait, what? That’s how it’s done?

[coffeeandserotonin-deactivated2]

^Right?! I never knew how the gold detailing on book bindings was done. And this… isn’t how I thought it worked out, for some reason.

[homotology]

This is so fucking cool!

[pandxareads]

This is art!

[pandxareads]

Review: Carve by Melanie Abrantes

I always thought of whittling as something weird old guys do on their front porches while drinking moonshine, but Melanie Abrantes presents it as a meditative hobby, the creation of simple and elegant household objects. 

Carve is full of beautiful photographs and simple, easy to understand instructions for whittling spoons, trays, chopsticks, combs, and more. There is also information on different tools, types of wood, and where to get them, plus an entire section on how to care for your projects so they can last for a lifetime. Just skimming the pages makes me want to pick up a piece of wood and a knife to see what I can create. This books makes an unconventional craft seem not only easy but also worthwhile, in more ways than one. 

I was personally drawn to this for several reasons, even though I have never really considered whittling. This seems like a great skill to have for many different people, including those who (like me) are interested in zero waste lifestyles or reducing their reliance on plastic products. Why would you want to buy an ugly plastic comb or camping utensils when you have beautifully handcrafted wooden ones? 

I recommend this book to anyone looking for a new hobby or zero waste skill.

I received a copy of this book for free in exchange for my honest review.

[pandxareads]

Review: A Record of My Vinyl

A Record of My Vinyl is exactly what it sounds like. It’s a great way to keep pretty detailed records of your records. There are perforated pages for a wish list in the back and a section full of care instructions and cleaning tips. Most useful to me, a new collector, is the section explaining the differences in grades. I would have liked for it to have alphabetized sections for keeping track of albums as opposed to just one section for everything. This way you end up with an ongoing disorganized list which would be a pain for larger collections. The tear out pages in the back are also very fragile, some were halfway torn out by the time I got it in the mail.

While not quite perfect, this is still incredibly useful for novice collectors or those with small collections. The information sections serve as a helpful introduction into the world of vinyl collections. The simple and straightforward care tips are a breath of fresh air after reading overly complicated and pretentious instructions online.

I received a copy of this journal for free in exchange for my honest review from Blogging for Books.

[pandxareads]

Review: The Great Nadar by Adam Begley

Félix Tournachon, or Nadar as he is better known, was a forward thinking photographer, caricaturist, writer, and balloonist in 1800′s France. He ran in bohemian circles that included legendary figures such as Victor Hugo, Alexandre Dumas, and countless others. Always described to be larger than life, Nadar is deserving of a biography to match. The Great Nadar is an interesting and engrossing read mainly for it’s subject matter, often feeling dry and slow.

Nadar played many roles throughout his life. This biography focused mainly on his exploits in portrait photography, which is what I found to be the most interesting. Begley spent a disproportionate amount of time describing various figures from the Paris bohemian and literary society who crossed paths with Nadar, giving unnecessary backstories and bios. Celebrity was clearly an important part of his life and career but reading back to back retellings of long forgotten historical figures was drudgery.

Regardless, this is a worthwhile read for anyone with an interest in photography or 19th century France. Nadar’s life and work is important and endlessly interesting. His portraits are still breathtaking, especially considering the equipment available at the time. The Great Nadar is full of photos and sketches along with descriptions of how they were made and insightful criticisms and descriptions. The author effectively contextualizes Nadar’s work both as an artist and an advocate for air travel, showing the reader how influential his career really was. 

Although unbalanced, I still enjoyed reading this story of such an important photographer who I had previously never heard of.

I received a free copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

[enjoy-the-life-baby]

[pandxareads]

Review: Evicted by Matthew Desmond

The description of this book grabbed me right away: an in-depth examination of the relationship between landlords and tennants in the poorest areas of American cities. I also expected it to be full of the same cliches that always seem to be called on during discussions of poverty. I was prepared to agree with the spirit of the book while rolling my eyes at the details. I was wrong.

Matthew Desmond immersed himself in the lives of the people he wrote about, even living for extended periods in a trailer park and, later, in a rooming house. He shadowed landlords during visits to properties, court hearings, and at their own homes. Many times throughout the book, Desmond sites meticulously designed and executed studies that he conducted during his research. The result is an incredibly detailed account of a complex issue written with heart-wrenching empathy. While it is clear Desmond takes the side of the tennants, he writes about landlords and other powers that be with great respect and fairness. The picture he paints is nothing if not well-rounded. 

By following only a handful of families in one US city (Milwaukee) and supporting his findings with statistics and facts of the whole nation, the author shows not only the scale of the problem but the magnitude of the pain it causes. The level of research alone makes this required reading for anyone looking to broaden their understanding of major human rights issues facing the US today. 

For more information on Matthew Desmond and Evicted, check his website.

I received a free copy of this book in exchange for my honest review. 

[amytipton]

A client just shared this & it’s perfectly me:

[doubledaybooks]

Important.