Review: Catch and Kill by Ronan Farrow

Format: ebook
Pub Date: October 2019
Publisher: Hachette
Length: 464 pages
POV: Mostly first person past, some 3rd person
FTC: borrowed from the library
Content Warning: this book details patterns of abuse, rape, sexual assault and harassment including a few graphic descriptions. 

While the blog was on "hiatus" due to my broken laptop, I decided I needed to try reading more nonfiction and other genres besides romance. Because I was in a rut. Most of the books everyone was squeeing about were written in first person present, a tense POV combo I cannot stand, and many of the books being lauded just weren't my cup of tea. So I asked for recommendations and placed several holds through my rural library. It took months, but this one finally became available last week. It feels like forever ago, but Harvey Weinstein was sentenced on March 11. So it's been 12 days. I'm incredibly glad I waited to read this post-conviction, because it reads like a true crime novel with an element of justice now. I'm not sure it would have felt the same without the real life conclusion.

Nonfiction Review: Prague Winter: A Personal Story of Remembrance and War by Madeleine Albright

Format: Hardcover, ebook
Pub Date: April 24, 2012
Publisher: Harper
Length: 450 pages
FTC: Review copy courtesy of the publisher

If you're like me, the most you know about Czechoslovakian history is tied directly to appeasement during World War II.  I knew just the bare facts about what happened: France and England allowed Hitler to take over Czechoslovakia without putting up a fight (effectively ignoring an alliance that should have protected the country), hoping that he would be happy with that and would not encroach further outside his current sphere of influence. And, as history tells us, that appeasement was a spectacular failure.

What I didn't know was what life was like for those living inside German-occupied Czechoslovakia. I didn't know why Hitler wanted that land, what ruses or justifications he used, or what happened after the West basically turned a partially blind eye to the problem. Prague Winter fills in those gaps with a wealth of research and knowledge in a way that incorporates the author's, former US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, family history and background.

Between the Pages

 

If there's one thing I complain about regarding modern technology, it is the demise of the snail mail letter. We still send a limited number of cards, but actual letters have been replaced by email, texting and Facebook. And that, I feel, is a shame. Because there's a certain impersonality and impermanence to electronic mail or comments. There are few (if any) painstakingly handwritten letters anymore to be filed away in someone's keepsake drawer. Or tucked away in the pages of a favorite romance novel...like the set of three letters I rediscovered today.

During my time as a used bookseller, I found all kinds of crazy things stashed in between the pages of books: grocery lists, handmade bookmarks, business cards, cash register receipts, prescriptions...but my favorite discoveries were always letters. The letters I saved. And while cleaning out my office papers today I found my favorite letters of them all: a set of letters between two obviously young people written in 1984/1985. If the handwriting didn't give away the fact that these are teenagers, the content definitely would. But they are still incredibly sweet.