Lacking Magic: Terry Pratchett's "Dodger"

First off, I am a huge Terry Pratchett fan. Or at least I have read and loved all the Discworld books. I liked Good Omens too, but when I read that I thought of it more as a Neil Gaiman book.

That said, I did not like this book. I wanted to. But I couldn’t.

I kept reading hoping something would happen that caught me into the world, but it never did.

I couldn’t believe either of the central characters, their relationship, or the antagonism. The world is interesting, but Terry is an old hand at Victorian London. The difference is just that in all the other books it is called Ankh-Morpork. The difference is that on the Disc there is magic, both the kind the Wizards practice, but also between the author and the reader. There is none of that in Dodger.

Not Just Mommy-Blogging: Jenn Mann's "People I Want to Punch in the Throat"

I have to be honest – the author was never on my radar.

I am not in her demographic. Jenn Mann is a mommy-blogger of some sort. If I would have known that, I might never have picked up the book. Reading the book showed that she was from an area of Kansas I have some familiarity with. When I was in Grad School at Kansas State, we had kids from all over the state. There was a special breed of rich and entitled kids that we could talk about just by saying the name of the county they were from. The kids were the “Johnson County” kids. Mann writes about their mothers.

I only learned this because I picked it up. I only picked it up off the shelf at my library because of the title. Bravo to whomever came up with that one.

I’m glad I did pick it up tough. The stories are fresh and funny and real. Perhaps they are too real. I myself have never been a mother, or a parent for that matter, but the stories hit home in a way that produced just a bit of anxiety as I was reading them. It was a fun country to visit when you had Mann as a tourist guide, but I’m glad I’ll never have to live there.

Food: A Love Story - Gaffigan at his Dirtiest

Hey.  You wanna read a lot of stuff about food?

No. That’s the wrong question. Do you like Jim Gaffigan (and his wife/writing partner)?

If so, you will like this book. It is basically 300 pages of riffs on food. It can get a bit much at times, and you wonder why you’re reading a book about a comic’s take on different food products, but it made me laugh. Even if there is some duplication from his live shows, this is a good collection from Gaffigan. It’s basically a “greatest hits” collection. There’s even an extended meditation what Hot Pockets mean to him.

He owes his career to Hot Pockets. If you talk about him to someone and they don’t know who he is offhand, all you need to say is “Hot Pockets” in that voice and they will know. That’s awesome connectivity.

So do you like Jim Gaffigan AND food? Then buy this book.