Tag: ★★★

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Read: Ubik by Philip K. Dick ★★★ 📚

Instant Ubik has all the fresh flavor of just-brewed drip coffee.
Your husband will say, Christ, Sally, I used to think your coffee was only so-so. But now, wow! Safe when taken as directed.

I am Ubik. Before the universe was, I am. I made the suns. I made the worlds. I created the lives and the places they inhabit; I move them here, I put them there. They go as I say, they do as I tell them. I am the word and my name is never spoken, the name which no one knows. I am called Ubik, but that is not my name.
I am. I shall always be.

Long time since I’ve read any pkd. Plenty of twists & turns between life & half-life, psychics & anti-psychics. Great sucker punch at the end.

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Read: The Things We Never Say by Elizabeth Strout ★★★ 📚

As he steered the sailboat back to his wharf, it came to him how he had once, when he was a kid, said to his father, "I'm going to have a boat one day," and his father had smiled and said, "No, Artie, you're not ever going to have a boat." This did not hurt Artie to remember.

Rather melancholic novel. Older teacher Artie, goes through things in a Strout-ian way. Some rather dramatic twists, turns & happenings. Sadder than I expected, perhaps a little crammed with ideas, but the writing goes straight in.

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Read: Same as it ever was by Claire Lombardo ★★★ 📚

but the strangest thing I remember about having young children is how interminably the time moves, just these days upon days upon days, and every single one of them feels a million years long, but then suddenly months have gone by, enough time for a new baby to be born or one of the kids to start kindergarten, or college for God’s sake

Took me a long a time to get into this one. The central character irritated at first. She did grow on me as I got further.

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Read: Reconstruction by Mick Heron ★★★ 📚

he was Civil Service; they could take his life, but they'd never take his annual leave

Slough House adjacent novel. After a confusing start, where there seemed to be too many characters, it settled down to an exciting read where absolutely no one was what they first seemed.

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Read: Watershead by Percival Everett ★★★ 📚

Geologist, Robert, becomes involved with fictional Native Americans exposing pollution plot. Mixed in with quotes about geology & legal treaties. Details of Robert childhood & his families involvement with the Black Panthers fits well with the Plata tribe fight for water rights. His awful relationship with a 'mad' girlfriend less so.