janelog

I really haven’t seen the point to the super-natural beings fiction.  But I read a brief summary about A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness in a library catalog and thought I would try it.  I found it in audiobook form.  Diana Bishop is a history professor at Oxford, specializing in Alchemy.  She is able to call a long-lost manuscript from the closed stacks of the Boodlian library and briefly break the protective spell.  She comes from a long line of strong witches, but rarely uses magic herself. After seeing the manuscript, she notices an increase in the witches, vampires and demons around her.  One vampire, Matthew Clermont, appoints himself bodyguard.   Of course they fall in love, which is forbidden.  She discovers why she has used her magic so little, since her parents died when she was 7 and perhaps why she was able to view that protected manuscript that so many other creatures want.  When I started listening to disc 20, I was pretty sure that there was not going to be enough time to finish the story.  I am sure this is a first in a series.  I did like it, the scene with Juliette in the field felt a little manipulative and too much, but that could be listening rather than reading.

 I really do love Agatha Christie.  Although, I think she may have been the inspiration for Scooby-Doo. Her mysteries are somewhat easy to figure out who-dun-it.  While I usually prefer the Poirot stories versus the Marple, this story was enjoyable.  I did figure it out.  My recommendations for the best Christie’s are:  The Murder of Roger Ackeroyd, And Then There Were None and (of course) Murder on the Orient Express.

I finished Water Wars last night.  This book was on the United Methodist Women Reading list.  I am interested in the topic, but I did not find this book really interesting.  It concerns the decisions that governmental entities make to dam rivers for irrigation and other consumer needs as well as polluting tolerence that affects other countries (or states). I really enjoyed Water: a Natural History by (I kid you not) Alice Outwater.  The two books really looked at two different aspects of a really BIG picture.  Water Wars looked globally on conservation practices and recent irrigation solutions that have caused problems, the rule of unintended consequences.  The Outwater book looks at the consequences of water decisions and starting with the medieveal fashion for beaver coats! Another book that looked at regional struggles with water rights that I liked was The Late Great Lakes by William Ashworth.