Book Notes: "Atlantic: Great Sea Battles, Heroic Discoveries, Titanic Storms & a Vast Ocean of a Million Stories" by Simon Winchester

Atlantic: Great Sea Battles, Heroic Discoveries, Titanic Storms & a Vast Ocean of a Million Stories by Simon Winchester

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


A heavy commercial formula with tenuously enervating connections to the Atlantic on every page, it took a very long time to get into, picked up a bit in the final quarter, then dragged on laboriously until I was happy to be finished, but only so I could scratch it off my list of part-read books. I very much enjoyed The Meaning of Everything, but I think the scholarly topic piqued my interest. I really struggled with Atlantic as it made me re-think how I select the books I read. Winchester obviously spent a great deal of effort on researching this book, and I was happy to learn more about St Helena and other parts of the world that were entirely unfamiliar, yet I am now beset by a desire to be more discerning in the books I read, and to stop and give up on a book when I know it was designed as an airport read, and would have served that purpose admirably had it stayed in the airport. I, however, brought the book home and its contents were ill-suited to this less-than-sympathetic environment.



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Book Notes: "The Road" by Cormac McCarthy

The Road by Cormac McCarthy

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


I like Cormac McCarthy because of his typewriter. I have the same model. Regrettably, I saw the movie version first (with Viggo Mortensen) so there was little left to the imagination. I will have to try another of McCarthy's works. His style is rather brief and I wondered whether the book was somewhat "padded out" and should be called a novella rather than a novel?



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Book Notes: "Far Away and Long Ago" by William Henry Hudson

Far Away and Long Ago by William Henry Hudson

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


It took me a while to get into this book but once I started I managed to keep up the momentum. The story about the story was interesting but it is difficult to comprehend Hudson's lot until he deals with Darwinism and his own inclinations as a naturalist. Delivered as the story of one's boyhood, it is not until after finishing the book and reading the preface, one reflects and Hudson's genius comes to light.



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