Category Archives: Book Reviews

What We’re Reading: Take Out

Posted on by
Take Out book cover

Available on the New Book Shelf at the Durham Tech Main Campus Library

Title: Take Out: A Mystery

Author: Margaret Maron

Read by: Mary Kennery, Library Technician

Genre: Mystery

Why did you choose to read this book?
 I read all of the Deborah Knott character series of books. This is the first Sigrid Harald, a  NYPD homicide detective, book that I tried.

What did you like about it?
 I like to read a mystery. I enjoyed learning about the new character (for me). The neighborhood residents each had a rich history.

Did it remind you of any other book, or a movie?
Margaret Maron concluded the Deborah Knott series 2015 with Long Upon the Land. Now she has returned years later to Sigrid Harald.

Was there anything noteworthy about the book?
This is a take out (murder) with take out (food.) It was quite an interesting case! Many colorful suspects had motive and opportunity.

What feeling did the book leave you with?
A need to read the other books in the series! One Coffee With (first in series) was published in 1981 and Fugitive Colors (last in series until now) in 1995, so there is a big gap until Take Out was released in 2017.

Whom would you recommend the book to?
Margaret Maron fans. Sigrid has a Southern grandmother with family ties to Deborah.

What would you pair this book with?
New York diner food – not usually poisonous!

This book is available now on the New Book Shelf at the Durham Tech Main Campus Library!

What We’re Reading: The Radium Girls

Posted on by
The Radium Girls: The Dark Story of America's Shining Women by Kate Moore book cover

Available at Main Campus on the New Book Shelf

Title: The Radium Girls: The Dark Story of America’s Shining Women
Author: Kate Moore
Genre: Historical Nonfiction

Why did you choose to read this book? Well, I’d heard a lot about it. I tend to like historical nonfiction that tells the stories of groups of people who maybe aren’t as known in American history. I read Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI by David Grann earlier this year (also HIGHLY RECOMMENDED) and realized not for the first time how many pieces of American history I just am not aware of. This was filling in a gap in my knowledge with a really engaging book. (Clarification: Horrible events. Engaging book.)

What did you like about it? Despite being a sad book because the events that happened to these women in order to get justice and make change in the way radiation was treated in America and the American work environment, I did like it because, unlike some other historical nonfiction, it seems as though the industry actually learned from their mistakes and made real changes that positively impacted the workers so they’d stop dying en-masse after-the-fact from radiation poisoning. Well, they learned eventually…once men started coming down with cancers due to radiation poisoning, too. …

Another thing I really liked about it was the author’s profound respect for the women who suffered and fought to get the radium industry to recognize that their product was dangerous. They weren’t just characters in an interesting story to her; they were real people who suffered and fought for what was right and just despite numerous hurdles.

Who would you recommend the book to? I’d recommend it to anyone who is interested in underreported American historical events. Or anyone who wonders why we have to do the chemical safety training at the beginning of each year/class that involves chemicals.

What would you pair this book with? A radiation suit and a steaming mug of justice.

What We’re Reading: The Lying Game

Posted on by

The Lying Game book coverTitle: The Lying Game

Read by: Mary Kennery

Author: Ruth Ware

Genre: thriller/suspense/female friendships

Why did you choose to read this book?  I love mysteries.  I have read the other books by Ruth Ware – In a Dark, Dark Wood (a favorite!) and The Woman in Cabin 10.  I was waiting to read her latest one.

What did you like about it?  How the plot begins:  a text of three words: I need you.  Then three texts in reply:  I’m coming.  I’m coming. I’m coming.  Fatima, Thea, Isa and Kate were best friends in boarding school in England.  They were inseparable and known for their little game – the Lying Game.  The rules were simple:  1. Tell a lie.  2. Stick to your story.  3. Don’t get caught.  4. Never lie to each other.  5.  Know when to stop lying.  Oh the consequences that would have seventeen years later!

Did it remind you of any other book, or a movie?  Other mystery authors and the foreboding elements of Ruth Ware’s other books.

Was there anything noteworthy about the book? The scenery I imagined – Salten, the English coastal village; the remote tidal marsh, the Reach; the crumbling, sinking Tide Mill with its rickety planks and flooded bridge; and narrator Isa’s sweet infant, Freya, in her pram.

What feeling did the book leave you with?  Whom do you hurt?  Be careful if you lie. Lies always catch up to you.  Once you begin, can you ever stop?

Whom would you recommend the book to? A mystery lover, a Ruth Ware fan

What would you pair this book with?  A pub brew, battered haddock, a portion of chips with salt and vinegar and a side portion of mushy peas.  Plus a flashlight for the darkness.

The library has In a Dark, Dark Wood and The Woman in Cabin 10 by Ruth Ware in our collection and we plan to order The Lying Game soon. This book can also be requested through Interlibrary loan.

Durham Tech Faculty & Staff’s Best of Summer 2016 Reads

Posted on by

For those who enjoy reading, summer can be a great time to re-read old favorites, discover new authors, or just make a dent in a to-read list.

Click through the slideshow to see Durham Tech Faculty & Staff’s incredibly diverse favorite reads of summer 2016.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

You can check them out for yourself from the display downstairs in the Main Library or by requesting a book through ILL (login through eforms).

Click to see the whole list: Durham Tech Faculty & Staff Best Reads of Summer 2016

What Durham Tech Has Read: Homegoing (& more!)

Posted on by

This book was read by Meredith Lewis, the Orange County Campus (mostly) Librarian, and several Durham Tech faculty & staff over the summer.

Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi book cover

Two half-sisters, Effia and Esi, are born into different villages in eighteenth-century Ghana. Effia is married off to an Englishman and lives in comfort in the palatial rooms of Cape Coast Castle. Unbeknownst to Effia, her sister, Esi, is imprisoned beneath her in the castle’s dungeons, sold with thousands of others into the Gold Coast’s booming slave trade, and shipped off to America, where her children and grandchildren will be raised in slavery. One thread of Homegoing follows Effia’s descendants through centuries of warfare in Ghana, as the Fante and Asante nations wrestle with the slave trade and British colonization. The other thread follows Esi and her children into America. From the plantations of the South to the Civil War and the Great Migration, from the coal mines of Pratt City, Alabama, to the jazz clubs and dope houses of twentieth-century Harlem, right up through the present day, Homegoing makes history visceral, and captures, with singular and stunning immediacy, how the memory of captivity came to be inscribed in the soul of a nation. (Description from Goodreads)

Why did you choose to read this book? 

I’ve been reading reviews of it all summer and mentally putting it on my “to-read later” list, but when I polled Durham Tech faculty and staff about the best book they read this summer, this one kept coming up and so I picked it up. And it was amazing!

What did you like about it?

The story itself was powerful and, despite many of the settings being upsetting (as enslavement and its various repercussions should be!), it was hard to put the book down. I loved how, even though the point-of-view changed every chapter, it wasn’t hard to follow, either. You could also clearly see how the families’ histories were influencing their present–something I think most people know, but maybe don’t think about in their daily lives.

Who would you recommend the book to?

Anyone who finds the premise interesting! It really was great and incredibly thought-provoking.

What would you pair this book with?

A hefty dose of self-awareness– the past (and the societal forces that shape our families) heavily influences who we are in the present.

You can find this book and more in the downstairs display featuring the rest of Durham Tech Faculty & Staff’s Best of Summer 2016 reads!  Check it out for yourself!

What We’re Reading – It’s What I Do: A Photographer’s Life of Love and War

Posted on by

This book was read by Julie Humphrey, Assistant Director, Library.

It's What I Do: A Photographer's Life of Love and War book cover

–It’s What I Do: A Photographer’s Life of Love and War by Lynsey Addario

Why did you choose to read this book?

I really enjoy nonfiction, biographies, memoirs, and reading about women’s lives.  I am also interested in photography, photojournalism, and travel.  This book about a woman war photographer sounded compelling to me.

What did you like about it?

I especially appreciated the author’s honesty and the vivid details she shared of living and working in conflict and war zones around the world. She has worked in Afghanistan, Iraq, Darfur, The Democratic Republic of Congo, Somalia, Libya, etc… and lived in Istanbul and London.  I was really glad the book included many of her photographs.  These striking, award-winning photos really enhanced her story and brought it to life. I also liked learning about the logistics of this work and what happens behind the scenes with support staff like local drivers and translators.  I have a new appreciation for everything and everyone involved in international reporting.   

What feeling did the book leave you with?

Addario deals with sexism so often while working in the heavily male-dominated profession of war photojournalism.  I felt really frustrated for her in many situations and admired her fight to be taken seriously.  I also felt extremely afraid and disturbed when she shares her accounts of being kidnapped, assaulted, and abused while working. I ultimately feel a deep appreciation for the work of journalists around the world who risk their lives every day in order to document and tell important stories.

Who would you recommend the book to?

Readers who like a gripping and intense personal story.  I would also recommend this to anyone interested in world politics and international conflicts.  This is a must-read for aspiring journalists and photographers.    

What would you pair this book with?

Fresh, cold water! She describes being severely dehydrated on some of her work assignments.  Also, a bottle of cold beer, which she describes having from time to time, in order to unwind with her fellow journalists after an intense or grueling day of work.

Interested in reading It’s What I Do? Check it out from the library!

 

 

What We’re Reading – The Fire Sermon

Posted on by

This book was read by Meredith Lewis, a Reference Librarian at (mostly) the Orange County Campus Library.

A burned and smoking Omega symbol is in the center of a white cover with burned edges

The Fire Sermon by Francesca Haig

Why did you choose to read this book?

If we’re being honest, the cover was impressive—a picture of a burned out Omega symbol with no other text and artistically “burned” corners. I picked it up, realized it was dystopian lit without a zombie apocalypse (nuclear destruction, yes) and not focused solely on romance (those are not my favorites), so I picked it up… and read it in two days. During the work week.

What did you like about it?

I liked that, despite being yet another book in a pretty common genre nowadays, it had its own vibe, and I wasn’t constantly comparing it to the other books in its dystopian genre. The twin idea that this world is centered around is unique—after a period of very few births post-nuclear blast, two twins are born in every birth.  One is deformed in some way (missing leg, extra eye, etc.), the Omegas, and they are separated and subjugated in society run by the “normal” twins, the Alphas. I also like that I’m pretty sure Cass’s twin Zach is just simply evil (I don’t trust the guy), but I still, at the end of the first book, can’t quite tell. A little mystery is a good thing in the first book in a series.

What feeling did the book leave you with?

Eager anticipation for the next one in the series, which luckily will be released on May 3, so I don’t have to wait around very long for the next in the series. I’m also curious to see how the trilogy progresses—there was only one real plot twist in the first book, and I expected it, but not until close to the reveal. I don’t know where Cass, Zach, Piper, and Zoe will end up and if/how they’re going to be able to save this society from itself. (They have to, though. Right?)

Who would you recommend the book to?

Anyone who liked The Hunger Games or The Red Queen or The Queen of the Tearling other dystopian novels that deal with a broken societal structure becoming even more broken. Other reviews compare it to Cormac McCarthy’s The Road, too, but not nearly as bleak. It’s a pretty fast and engaging read, too, so I’d also recommend it to someone who didn’t want a tough read.

What would you pair this book with?

Some fresh, clean water–this book did kind of make me thirsty. Maybe a good pair of walking shoes and fresh socks, too.

Interested in reading The Fire Sermon for yourself? Check it out from the library!

Want to read The Map of Bones, the second book in the series that will be coming out May 3? Use the book request form to ask the Durham Tech Library to buy it.

What We’re Reading: Gut

Posted on by

This book was read by Meredith Lewis, a Reference Librarian at (mostly) the Orange County Campus Library.

A tan cover with a comic-style representation of the intestines leading from the title of the book, Gut

Why did you choose to read this book?

The Orange County Campus has a new small collection of medical and scientific nonfiction, and this one stood out because it was about an entire body system that, frankly, I realized I knew very, very little about. Plus, who doesn’t want to know more about what goes on inside their own body (presented in an interesting and easy-to-read way)? I’m also trying to read more nonfiction as a personal goal.

It’s also described as “A cheeky up-close and personal guide to the secrets and science of our digestive system.” Are you sold on it yet?

Did it remind you of any other book, or a movie?

It reminded me of a Mary Roach book— presenting science in a funny and interesting way so that a non-scientific, non-medical person (me) can understand and learn… while still being entertained. It also kind of reminded me of the Magic School Bus and Futurama episodes where they go inside a digestive tract (for obvious reasons).

Was there anything noteworthy about the book?

I’m just so amazed by how much I didn’t’ know and how much is still being discovered about the human digestive system, considering how much impact it has on our day-to-day and overall well-being. I also didn’t think much about spit before—did you know it’s partially made up of white blood cells?

Who would you recommend the book to?

Everyone? Anyone who wants to learn from a reputable source (the author has a medical degree and cites scientific studies to back up her facts)… but doesn’t want to have to read a textbook and decipher the complex terminology. Or someone who is cool with the terminology, but wants an easier, more engaging read.

What would you pair this book with?

Some probiotic yogurt… or yogurt in general. Healthier gut, healthier life.

Interested in reading Gut for yourself? Check it out from the library!

Check out the Science Slam Berlin video of the author about the charming guts (in German with English captions)!

February Book Club Meeting

Posted on by

The next Library Book Club selection is Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates which appeared on many best books lists of 2015. We will meet on Thurs. Feb. 4th at 1:00 pm in the ERC Schwartz room.

book coverHere’s a book description from the Goodreads website:

In a profound work that pivots from the biggest questions about American history and ideals to the most intimate concerns of a father for his son,

Ta-Nehisi Coates offers a powerful new framework for understanding our nation’s history and current crisis. Americans have built an empire on the idea of “race,” a falsehood that damages us all but falls most heavily on the bodies of black women and men—bodies exploited through slavery and segregation, and, today, threatened, locked up, and murdered out of all proportion. What is it like to inhabit a black body and find a way to live within it? And how can we all honestly reckon with this fraught history and free ourselves from its burden?

Between the World and Me is Ta-Nehisi Coates’s attempt to answer these questions in a letter to his adolescent son. Coates shares with his son—and readers—the story of his awakening to the truth about his place in the world through a series of revelatory experiences, from Howard University to Civil War battlefields, from the South Side of Chicago to Paris, from his childhood home to the living rooms of mothers whose children’s lives were taken as American plunder. Beautifully woven from personal narrative, reimagined history, and fresh, emotionally charged reportage, Between the World and Me clearly illuminates the past, bracingly confronts our present, and offers a transcendent vision for a way forward.

Please join us for a discussion of this thought-provoking book.

You can also listen to this interview with the author on National Public Radio.