Bookworm Room

Tweet One of the best history books ever written, bar none, is Paul Fussell’s The Great War and Modern Memory, a book that elegantly and seamlessly manages to be a comprehensive overview of WWI from the English point of view and of British literature during WWI.  My copy of the book, which I got during [...]

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Tweet The New York Times has a long article about Edward Conard, a former Bains partner, who makes the case — a compelling one, I believe — that in America, the wealthy aren’t parasites, they’re economically useful.  In a stagnant, agrarian class society, the wealthy simply live at the top, feeding off the poor.  In [...]

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Tweet I’ve already confessed to having a weakness for romance novels.  My problem with this shameful weakness is that there was only one Georgette Heyer. Everything else is second best, with most books being more secondary than others. Because of my fondness for Heyer’s wit and delicacy, I prefer true romances — the literary dance [...]

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Tweet Americans, especially Leftist Americans, will invariably assure you that Europeans are more civilized than Americans are.  When pressed for details, they’ll cite art, music, architecture, skinny French women, and gun control.  By those standards, I have to agree that the Europeans are indeed more civilized.  I’ll go even further:  when it comes to art, [...]

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Tweet A month ago, I reviewed Tom Grace’s excellent book, The Liberty Intrigue, which is a very rare animal indeed — a political polemic that isn’t didactic or boring.  I also got the opportunity to send Tom a list of questions about his book.  They’re not very good questions (I’ll never make it as a [...]

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Tweet One of my rules of thumb when reading a book, or watching a movie for that matter, is that I have to like at least some of the characters in the book.  Since I’m investing my time in the book or the movie, I want to be in the company of pleasant people.  After [...]

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Tweet One of the nicest perks about having a slightly well-known blog is the fact that authors and publishers occasionally ask me to review a book.  In this way, I get the opportunity to read books that I otherwise wouldn’t even know exist.  My approach to book reviews is simple:  If I enjoy the book, [...]

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Tweet I mentioned yesterday that we live in such strange times that it’s often difficult to distinguish fake news from real.  It occurred to me that, by making this statement, I missed the opportunity to alert you to a book full of fake news — very funny, sometimes prescient fake news. Tom Elia, who blogs [...]

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Tweet If you have any device that will run the Kindle App, you can buy a great book for free right now:  Ralph Peters’ Endless War: Middle-Eastern Islam vs. Western Civilization.  I’m reading it right now, when time permits, and it’s fascinating.  Peters is a delightful writer, and the subject matter, although it reaches far [...]

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Tweet I happen to be extremely fond of Georgette Heyer who, in the mid-20th Century, picked up Jane Austen’s mantle.  Here is a lovely character description she wrote about the romantic lead in her book Black Sheep: He was not a rebel.  Rebels fought against the trammels of convention, and burned to rectify what they [...]

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Tweet Actually, The Bookworm Turns : A Secret Conservative in Liberal-Land, is not new and improved.  It’s the same blazing, original, intelligent, witty, thought-provoking e-book it was the last time I shilled for my own book.  Two things are different, however.  First, I revamped my cover, which now shows a rip-roaring serpent that harks back [...]

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Tweet A weekend of uninterrupted domesticity (read:  youth activities, cleaning and shopping) left me with neither time nor energy to blog.  I’m still rocking and rolling with family stuff, but anticipate that I’ll be back at my computer tonight. I did read something very enjoyable this past week, though, that I’ll share with the Irving [...]

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Tweet Today wasn’t a bad day (at all), but it was a very, very tiring day.  I meant to post this afternoon, but I simply dropped in my tracks when I got home.  If I get a break from family tomorrow, I’ll be back in business.  Until then, here’s a post that’s both an Open [...]

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Tweet My brain today is a clear, shallow pond, perhaps with a few fluttery goldfish drifting by (think Fantasia).  I’m trying have deep thoughts, but they’re eluding me.  I think the problem is that I spent chunks of my weekend alternately reviewing documents and trying to bulldoze my son into doing his 6th grade science project, [...]

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Tweet I really did mean to post more today, but after a double workout at the dojo this morning (I was having too much fun to stop), followed by housekeeping, shopping, chauffeuring the kids, and cooking dinner, I just ran out of steam.  Right now, I’m not Superwoman, I’m “hanging on by a thread woman” [...]

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Tweet Although my regular stat counter is still refusing to speak to me, another stat counter has indicated that my numbers have plummeted, going from the thousands to the hundreds overnight.  (I feel just like the stock market.) Since I’m not going to panic and assume that everyone has suddenly abandoned me en masse, I’m [...]

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Tweet I wrote yesterday about the vagaries of buying books on Kindle.   I look for the cheap stuff and, occasionally, I get very, very lucky.  Michael Walsh, a National Review contributor, has just put out one of his own books out on Kindle for an introductory price of $0.99.  The book sounds great, and you [...]

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Tweet The news is so terribly depressing, it’s nice to retreat into a good book.  I’m reading H.G. Wells’ The Outline of History: Being a Plain History of Life and Mankind. It’s not bad, as it’s written in simple, declarative sentences. It’s fascinating, too, to see how history has been revised since 1920, when he [...]

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Tweet I got the latest Commentary Magazine in the mail yesterday, so that’s what I’m reading today.  What are you reading today?

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Tweet In response to an excellent suggestion, here is a Sunday morning opening thread for those who want to discuss books they have read, are reading, or hope to read.  Go to it, my friends!  As for me, between chick-lit (my vice, along with chocolate), I’m reading Nick Bunker’s Making Haste from Babylon: The Mayflower [...]

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