Operation "Fifty in Twelve": September Round-Up, October Round-Up
Oops.
I know, I know, it's been ages since I posted the last book post. I kind of totally messed it up when I was at my sister's in mid-October. I'd planned to do the September Round-Up there but forgot to take my calendar (I note down the books for the month in the calendar) and then kind of kept reminding myself to do it but yeah, here we are. So, let's get this over with, so I can catch up with mybook count before the year is out.
Without further ado, let's move forward.
September:
How to Marry A Marquis, Julia Quinn
Yes, another Quinn re-read. It has a special place in my heart because it has a lot of Lady Danbury in it. Mostly, because it takes place at Lady Danbury's country seat, so that was probably a given. I also liked that it's a bit of a different setting to the usual London ball and drawing rooms and instead taking place in summer in the English countryside. It makes for a relaxed and light atmosphere, despite the plot of intrigue. It's a very funny book, and the heroine especially is wonderfully plucky, caring and witty. It has children, which is always a bit tricky in romance novels but masters it because all three of them are pretty much awesome. The hero's a bit too assertive at times (nothing non-con or dub-con, just a tad too forward) but yeah, I can live with it. It also has a bad-tempered cat with a heart of gold, which is always a plus.
Rating: * * * */* * * * *
Weit hinterm Horizont, Tara Haigh
Despite the English sounding name, the author is actually German and managed to remind me of why I don't read German romance. The setting - Northern Germany and Hawaii before becoming part of the US - and the idea - German spice merchant's daughter runs away from home and gets on a ship to Hawaii to take over her dead uncle's sugar cane farm - was quite original but that were about the only good things about the book. Just a trigger warning: it has rape scenes in the beginning, and honestly, I found them absolutely superfluous and annoying. The style of the book is unnecessarily stilted and somewhat inauthentic, most of the characters - especially the heroine and her Hawaiian lover - get on your nerves and the romance is mostly boring. The plot attempts intrigue but fails because it's really just not that exciting, the info dumps on island politics and the historical setting are kind of annoying and there's an embarrassing amount of neo-colonial bullshit in the entire book. I'm saying this now loud and clear: Germans can't write romance. Don't buy German romance. German romance is shit.
Rating: */* * * * *
Thanks, Obama: My Hopey, Changey White House Years, David Litt
The second memoir out of the Obama White House that I read (after Alyssa Mastromonaco's) and it's awesome. Litt came to the White House relatively late (compared to others who have written books about their time there and who've been with Obama since he was a state senator or junior US senator, respectively) because he started out as a field organizer in the first campaign in one of the states dubbed "flyover country" and it took a while until the White House started to get interested in him after Obama won in 2008. Litt then started out as a speech writer for Valerie Jarrett and left the White House as one of Obama's chief speech writers a few years later. If you loved Obamas Correspondent's Dinner speeches, David Litt made you laugh because those were one of his main responsibilities. Which is also why this book was so highly enjoyable. Litt is a gifted comedy writer (he's heading up Funny or Die's DC office nowadays) and the book profits from this immensely. It's also fascinating to learn about just another facette about how a (functioning) White House works (especially, since Litt didn't actually work in the White House but in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building) and what working the White House does to a person (nothing good. If you value your mental and physical health, don't work there. Just don't.). This is an insanely funny and quick read with a very warm-hearted, sometimes emotional approach to politics that shows that people working in politics are more than just the unfeeling automatons and drones as they're often caricaturized in the media and I'd definitely recommend this even if you're only marginally interested in American politics and policy. This is really, really good.
Rating: * * * * */* * * * *
Die preußischen Königinnen, Karin Feuerstein-Praßer
This one was a spontaneous addition when we visited Neuhardenberg Manor in summer on a hellish hot day and decided to look into their tiny museum detailing the history of the village and the Prussian noble family von Hardenberg who owned most of it until they were first ousted by the Nazis for having been part of the Stauffenberg plot and then again by the Soviets for being Prussian nobles. They had a lot of books on Prussian history in the museum shop and, considering myself first generation Prussian (Berlin born and raised, baby), I bought this one. Everyone learns a lot about the Prussian kings and emperors but their wives are often just an afterthought, even though some of them had considerable influence on Prussian politics, so this one called out to me. I dreaded it a little, fearing lots of dry history - and yes, there is a lot of dry history and lots of dates and names and why was every damn noble woman from the 17th century on called Sophie or Charlotte or Sophie-Charlotte??? - but for some reason, Feuerstein-Praßer manages to still make it entertaining and fascinating. She has a pretty obvious sympathy for all her protagonists and their misfortune of having to grow up and live in times and places that exclusively valued anything male associated, and yes, while some might find that "unprofessional" for a historian, I found it made the book better, both thematically and in readability. Like I said, it's a little dry at times and every queen seems to have the same name (except for Louise, but then again, Louise is... Louise) but it's a lovely bit of overlooked Prussian history and a puzzle piece in the history of women - and female history - so yes, I'd recommend it nonetheless.
Rating: * * * */* * * * *
Yes, We (Still) Can: Politics in the Age of Obama, Twitter, and Trump, Dan Pfeiffer
Pfeiffer worked as a communications director in the Obama White House (in his own words: "I lasted 220 Scaramuccis") and today co-hosts one of the most important politics podcasts in the US, Pod Save America (I highly recommend it, despite it being hosted by four white guys. They got me through the mid-terms, they supported a couple of my favorite candidates (Amy McGrath, Beto O'Rourke, Stacey Abrams, just to name a few), they swear so fucking much on air and they are genuinely funny). Pfeiffer is a communications guy through and through and it shows in the book. He lives and breathes communications. The book itself is part memoir, part campaign manual, part political analysis and part FOX News hate (I liked that part, especially. Pfeiffer's unmitaged hate for FOX pours out in droves from this book and it feels kinda cathartic reading it). It's full of four letter words (so if you're not a fan of non-fiction authors swearing in their books, don't read this) and frank speech, and Pfeiffer doesn't bother to hide his disdain for Trump and his politics and methods. It's entertaining, it's scary (especially in the parts where Pfeiffer explains how right-wing communications and messaging works), it's cathartic and it also gives one hope. This is. Just. So. Fucking. Good.
Rating: * * * * */* * * * *
October
Die Zuckerbäckerin, Petra Durst-Benning
A historical novel, also a romance and one honestly would have thought I'd learned my lesson from Weit hinterm Horizont, but no, I had to go and buy this one, too. I'd read stuff by Durst-Benning before (mostly her Glasbläserin saga) that I actually liked, and I wanted to read something outside the usual setting and knowing that this series took place at the 19th century Russian court eventually, I decided to go for the first one. And that is definitely also going to be the last I read in this series. Almost everything was annoying about it. The heroine's goody-two shoes attitude, the hero's boorishness, basically all secondary characters, the plot... the style was a little better than in Weit hinterm Horizont but it still felt a little contrived, a little stilted, so that was annoying, too. But the thing that really pissed me off the most was that basically everyone who was in the way for the heroine's happiness died. At some point, everyone who seemed to be holding her back from joining her One True (boring and boorish and did I mention boring) Love just died. The court's confectioner who taught her everything but had to go so she could become court confectioner, her ne'er do well sister, her One True (really, really boring) Love's first wive and son. Like... Durst-Benning is an accomplished, experienced writer, why in God's name would she resort to that kind of really, really lazy writing? This is one for the recycling bin.
Rating: */* * * * *
Believer: My Forty Years in Politics, David Axelrod
Another Obama era memoir, but this one from one of the senior guys. Axelrod indeed spent forty years in politics, first covering them as a journalist and then changing sides and working as a political consultant managing political campaigns until he went on to the Obama White House to become one of the Senior Advisors to the president until he retired in 2015 (this book was written and published before the 2016 presidential election). Originally from New York, he settled down in Chicago and became Barack Obama's campaign director after managing several other successful and not so successful candidates. Axelrod is what they call a political animal - someone who lives, eats and breathes politics (as evidenced by the fact that "retiring" for him meant taking a teaching position at the University of Chicago and hosting a political podcast on CNN called The Axe Files). He never actually ran for office himself or considered running for office himself but he's one of those peoople who've got politics in their blood, and it shows in the book. If you want to know how to make a president, you need to read this one. However, the most surprising take away for me as an avid fan of The Good Wife who always thought the depiction of Chicago politics in the show was somewhat over the top was that no, it was actually pretty tame. Real world Chicago politics are so. Much. Worse. There were times when the Democratic machine in Chicago was much more like the mafia than a political party and man, that the fuck? I thought politics in my hometown were sometimes pretty fucked but Chicago honestly takes the cake. And for that alone, you really should read this one.
Rating: * * * */* * * * *
Book Count as of October 31: 50/50
Boom! Made it! Awwwww yiss!
(no, I'm not stopping with the reading and blogging, but I am going to celebrate just a little. Maybe by buying a new book. Sounds fair, right?)
I know, I know, it's been ages since I posted the last book post. I kind of totally messed it up when I was at my sister's in mid-October. I'd planned to do the September Round-Up there but forgot to take my calendar (I note down the books for the month in the calendar) and then kind of kept reminding myself to do it but yeah, here we are. So, let's get this over with, so I can catch up with mybook count before the year is out.
Without further ado, let's move forward.
September:
How to Marry A Marquis, Julia Quinn
Yes, another Quinn re-read. It has a special place in my heart because it has a lot of Lady Danbury in it. Mostly, because it takes place at Lady Danbury's country seat, so that was probably a given. I also liked that it's a bit of a different setting to the usual London ball and drawing rooms and instead taking place in summer in the English countryside. It makes for a relaxed and light atmosphere, despite the plot of intrigue. It's a very funny book, and the heroine especially is wonderfully plucky, caring and witty. It has children, which is always a bit tricky in romance novels but masters it because all three of them are pretty much awesome. The hero's a bit too assertive at times (nothing non-con or dub-con, just a tad too forward) but yeah, I can live with it. It also has a bad-tempered cat with a heart of gold, which is always a plus.
Rating: * * * */* * * * *
Weit hinterm Horizont, Tara Haigh
Despite the English sounding name, the author is actually German and managed to remind me of why I don't read German romance. The setting - Northern Germany and Hawaii before becoming part of the US - and the idea - German spice merchant's daughter runs away from home and gets on a ship to Hawaii to take over her dead uncle's sugar cane farm - was quite original but that were about the only good things about the book. Just a trigger warning: it has rape scenes in the beginning, and honestly, I found them absolutely superfluous and annoying. The style of the book is unnecessarily stilted and somewhat inauthentic, most of the characters - especially the heroine and her Hawaiian lover - get on your nerves and the romance is mostly boring. The plot attempts intrigue but fails because it's really just not that exciting, the info dumps on island politics and the historical setting are kind of annoying and there's an embarrassing amount of neo-colonial bullshit in the entire book. I'm saying this now loud and clear: Germans can't write romance. Don't buy German romance. German romance is shit.
Rating: */* * * * *
Thanks, Obama: My Hopey, Changey White House Years, David Litt
The second memoir out of the Obama White House that I read (after Alyssa Mastromonaco's) and it's awesome. Litt came to the White House relatively late (compared to others who have written books about their time there and who've been with Obama since he was a state senator or junior US senator, respectively) because he started out as a field organizer in the first campaign in one of the states dubbed "flyover country" and it took a while until the White House started to get interested in him after Obama won in 2008. Litt then started out as a speech writer for Valerie Jarrett and left the White House as one of Obama's chief speech writers a few years later. If you loved Obamas Correspondent's Dinner speeches, David Litt made you laugh because those were one of his main responsibilities. Which is also why this book was so highly enjoyable. Litt is a gifted comedy writer (he's heading up Funny or Die's DC office nowadays) and the book profits from this immensely. It's also fascinating to learn about just another facette about how a (functioning) White House works (especially, since Litt didn't actually work in the White House but in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building) and what working the White House does to a person (nothing good. If you value your mental and physical health, don't work there. Just don't.). This is an insanely funny and quick read with a very warm-hearted, sometimes emotional approach to politics that shows that people working in politics are more than just the unfeeling automatons and drones as they're often caricaturized in the media and I'd definitely recommend this even if you're only marginally interested in American politics and policy. This is really, really good.
Rating: * * * * */* * * * *
Die preußischen Königinnen, Karin Feuerstein-Praßer
This one was a spontaneous addition when we visited Neuhardenberg Manor in summer on a hellish hot day and decided to look into their tiny museum detailing the history of the village and the Prussian noble family von Hardenberg who owned most of it until they were first ousted by the Nazis for having been part of the Stauffenberg plot and then again by the Soviets for being Prussian nobles. They had a lot of books on Prussian history in the museum shop and, considering myself first generation Prussian (Berlin born and raised, baby), I bought this one. Everyone learns a lot about the Prussian kings and emperors but their wives are often just an afterthought, even though some of them had considerable influence on Prussian politics, so this one called out to me. I dreaded it a little, fearing lots of dry history - and yes, there is a lot of dry history and lots of dates and names and why was every damn noble woman from the 17th century on called Sophie or Charlotte or Sophie-Charlotte??? - but for some reason, Feuerstein-Praßer manages to still make it entertaining and fascinating. She has a pretty obvious sympathy for all her protagonists and their misfortune of having to grow up and live in times and places that exclusively valued anything male associated, and yes, while some might find that "unprofessional" for a historian, I found it made the book better, both thematically and in readability. Like I said, it's a little dry at times and every queen seems to have the same name (except for Louise, but then again, Louise is... Louise) but it's a lovely bit of overlooked Prussian history and a puzzle piece in the history of women - and female history - so yes, I'd recommend it nonetheless.
Rating: * * * */* * * * *
Yes, We (Still) Can: Politics in the Age of Obama, Twitter, and Trump, Dan Pfeiffer
Pfeiffer worked as a communications director in the Obama White House (in his own words: "I lasted 220 Scaramuccis") and today co-hosts one of the most important politics podcasts in the US, Pod Save America (I highly recommend it, despite it being hosted by four white guys. They got me through the mid-terms, they supported a couple of my favorite candidates (Amy McGrath, Beto O'Rourke, Stacey Abrams, just to name a few), they swear so fucking much on air and they are genuinely funny). Pfeiffer is a communications guy through and through and it shows in the book. He lives and breathes communications. The book itself is part memoir, part campaign manual, part political analysis and part FOX News hate (I liked that part, especially. Pfeiffer's unmitaged hate for FOX pours out in droves from this book and it feels kinda cathartic reading it). It's full of four letter words (so if you're not a fan of non-fiction authors swearing in their books, don't read this) and frank speech, and Pfeiffer doesn't bother to hide his disdain for Trump and his politics and methods. It's entertaining, it's scary (especially in the parts where Pfeiffer explains how right-wing communications and messaging works), it's cathartic and it also gives one hope. This is. Just. So. Fucking. Good.
Rating: * * * * */* * * * *
October
Die Zuckerbäckerin, Petra Durst-Benning
A historical novel, also a romance and one honestly would have thought I'd learned my lesson from Weit hinterm Horizont, but no, I had to go and buy this one, too. I'd read stuff by Durst-Benning before (mostly her Glasbläserin saga) that I actually liked, and I wanted to read something outside the usual setting and knowing that this series took place at the 19th century Russian court eventually, I decided to go for the first one. And that is definitely also going to be the last I read in this series. Almost everything was annoying about it. The heroine's goody-two shoes attitude, the hero's boorishness, basically all secondary characters, the plot... the style was a little better than in Weit hinterm Horizont but it still felt a little contrived, a little stilted, so that was annoying, too. But the thing that really pissed me off the most was that basically everyone who was in the way for the heroine's happiness died. At some point, everyone who seemed to be holding her back from joining her One True (boring and boorish and did I mention boring) Love just died. The court's confectioner who taught her everything but had to go so she could become court confectioner, her ne'er do well sister, her One True (really, really boring) Love's first wive and son. Like... Durst-Benning is an accomplished, experienced writer, why in God's name would she resort to that kind of really, really lazy writing? This is one for the recycling bin.
Rating: */* * * * *
Believer: My Forty Years in Politics, David Axelrod
Another Obama era memoir, but this one from one of the senior guys. Axelrod indeed spent forty years in politics, first covering them as a journalist and then changing sides and working as a political consultant managing political campaigns until he went on to the Obama White House to become one of the Senior Advisors to the president until he retired in 2015 (this book was written and published before the 2016 presidential election). Originally from New York, he settled down in Chicago and became Barack Obama's campaign director after managing several other successful and not so successful candidates. Axelrod is what they call a political animal - someone who lives, eats and breathes politics (as evidenced by the fact that "retiring" for him meant taking a teaching position at the University of Chicago and hosting a political podcast on CNN called The Axe Files). He never actually ran for office himself or considered running for office himself but he's one of those peoople who've got politics in their blood, and it shows in the book. If you want to know how to make a president, you need to read this one. However, the most surprising take away for me as an avid fan of The Good Wife who always thought the depiction of Chicago politics in the show was somewhat over the top was that no, it was actually pretty tame. Real world Chicago politics are so. Much. Worse. There were times when the Democratic machine in Chicago was much more like the mafia than a political party and man, that the fuck? I thought politics in my hometown were sometimes pretty fucked but Chicago honestly takes the cake. And for that alone, you really should read this one.
Rating: * * * */* * * * *
Book Count as of October 31: 50/50
Boom! Made it! Awwwww yiss!
(no, I'm not stopping with the reading and blogging, but I am going to celebrate just a little. Maybe by buying a new book. Sounds fair, right?)