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The post where Chris makes a startling confession

Before I finished Watchmen on Sunday night, I had never read a graphic novel. Watchmen was awesome. Really, it’s just a great story. The artwork in that it is a comic just adds to it. What other graphic novels should I put on the reading list?

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John Scalzi: Agent to the Stars

So you are an intelligent, peaceful race of aliens that wants to make contact with the humans on earth. Unfortunately, you smell bad, and in your natural state you are essentially an intelligent blob of jello. What do you do? You hire an agent, of course! The Yherajk, highly intelligent, and mostly hip to earth [...]

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Book Review: Zoe’s Tale

Today was Parelli Play Day at the farm. That meant I had about 4 hours out in the fresh air while Delaney was horsing around. I used the time to read Zoe’s Tale by John Scalzi. Actually, I had about 15 pages left when we left for home, but I’m going to round up and [...]

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An excellent letter

This response from a librarian to a parent complaining about a children’s book on the subject of gay marriage is very good.

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Victory of Eagles

The next installment of the Temeraire series hit the streets this week. Breck and I headed down to a cool and funky little sci-fi book store in Richmond to meet the author, Naomi Navik. Imagine the movie Master and Commander with domesticated dragons fighting from the sky and you have the Temeraire books in a [...]

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Homeschooling: The Book

Milton Gaither, a professor at Messiah College in Grantham, PA. has just published Homeschool: An American History, which looks to be a rather robust and even handed view of the home as the center of education in the US. I know nothing about Professor Gaither other than what I’ve picked up via his blog. Given [...]

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John Grisham: The Appeal

I stayed up until 1 AM reading last night, yet still got up at 6 AM and ran. Yea me! The Appeal is Grisham’s take on dirty politics and the influence of money in elections. A chemical company whose pollution has caused many deaths in backwoods Mississippi loses a $41 million verdict. They decide to [...]

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New book blog aimed at teenage boys

This looks like it could be a great resource. Guys Lit Wire exists solely to bring literary news and reviews to the attention of teenage boys and the people who care about them. We are more than happy to welcome female readers – but our main goal is to bring the attention of good books [...]

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To read or not to read

We are firmly in the non-censorship camp in this house. I think the potential damage caused by discouraging reading far, far outweighs the potential damage caused by what they may read. I mean, my son had read the entire Harry Potter series several times and has only caused several small animal deaths testing out his [...]

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Little Brother : The most important book your teen will read this year

Sunday night I was up until 1 AM reading. Last night I finished the book at 2 AM. That probably tells you all you need to know about my opinion of the book. Breck read it in one sitting the day it came in. I handed him the book at 1:30 PM and he was [...]

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10 books that screwed up the world

I call BS on this list. Books don’t screw up worlds, people screw up worlds. I’ve read two of the 10, The Prince and The Communist Manifesto. John Dewey and Dr. Spock also make the list. I’m not sure either are quite bad enough to be on a list with Mein Kampf. And if we [...]

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Book recommendation for teens

I haven’t actually read the book yet, but I’m ordering it for Breck. One of my favorite authors, Cory Doctorow, has written his first young adult sci-fi book. With praise like this, I’m betting Little Brother is awesome. “A wonderful, important book…I’d recommend Little Brother over pretty much any book I’ve read this year, and [...]

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Recent Books

I really need to get back into the habit of writing proper reviews. Maybe next time… Nemesis – Isaac Asimov: Stand alone sci-fi story from the master. Very entertaining. Forward the Foundation – Issac Asimov: Completed just prior to his death, it’s a prequel to he Foundation trilogy. Halting State – Charlie Stross: If you [...]

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Mommy has new hooters

Just in case you need it, there is a children’s book to help mothers explain their new flat tummy, smaller nose, and uh, less smaller chest, to the kiddies.

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Greg Bear: Anvil of Stars

Anvil of Stars is the sequel to The Forge of God. In Anvil, a group of 80 teenagers have been plucked from the survivors of earth’s destruction and tasked with hunting down and eliminating the creators of the robots that destroyed earth. They are guided by robot overlords who train them for the task but [...]

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