The knowledge : how to rebuild our world from scratch

The knowledge : how to rebuild our world from scratch / Lewis Dartnell.
340 Pages

This book supposedly is to serve as a manual to restore civilization should something happen to cause the downfall of our current society.  While parts of it are interesting I think the author oversteps or misses steps that would be necessary to use the book as a survivalist manual.  I think it more a discussion of how society could quickly rebuild from the ashes of civilization.

Little Green Book of Chairman Rahma

Little Green Book of Chairman Rahma By Brian Herbert
412 Pages


In the not too distant future, North and South America have become one green dictatorship ruled over by Chairman Rahma.  Corporations have been ousted and citizens compressed into large cities, leaving the rest of the countryside to be turned back over to nature.  In the name of ecology 10's of millions have died or been recycled. 

What is interesting about the book is some parts sound good and acceptable and the premise is not entirely implausible. 

Was

Was by Geoff Ryman                     371 pages

This is a story about Oz.  We are introduced to Dorothy Gael, a little girl with a dog named Toto, going to live with her Aunt Em and Uncle Henry in Kansas.  We also find out about Frances Gumm, who became Judy Garland, who starred in The Wizard Of Oz movie.  We find out about the making of the movie and we meet several other people along the way, who in various ways become connected to either Dorothy or the movie.  This book spans the decades between the 1870s and the 1980s and tells several stories that come together in the end.  There were parts of the book that I liked a lot because some of the story was really interesting but I’m not sure that overall I really liked this book.  Because I like the Oz stories so much, maybe, and because this book is unsettling it’s hard to reconcile this book with the Oz series.  I’m not sure that I would recommend this book to people generally and I’m honestly not sure who would like it. (Except Ed)

I Married a Dead Man

I Married A Dead Man by Cornell Woolrich           254 pages

A young woman named Helen meets a young couple on a train.  Patrice and Hugh are recently married, very much in love and very happy.  Patrice is pregnant and they are on the way to meet Hugh’s family, who have never met or even seen Patrice.  Helen is also pregnant, but has been abandoned by the father of the baby.  Patrice takes Helen under her wing and the women are on the way to becoming friends when the train crashes.  Patrice and Hugh are killed and Helen gives birth to her baby.  Helen is mistaken for Patrice and is being cared for by Hugh’s family.  Desperate, with nowhere to go, and feeling loved and part of a family for the first time, Helen doesn’t tell the truth immediately.  Although she feels somewhat guilty, as time goes by and she comes to love Hugh’s family, she finds it harder and harder to admit the truth.  Then her ex-lover, who knows the truth, arrives and threatens to expose her lies.  Helen doesn’t know what to do.  I read this book because the movie, Mrs. Winterbourne, was loosely based on it.  I liked the writing style and I liked the story but I didn’t like the ending of the book.  I don’t want to give away the ending, but I felt like it wasn’t tied up enough.  I prefer more definitive endings.  People who like mystery and crime stories might like this book.

Defy The Dark

Defy The Dark edited by Saundra Mitchell            466 pages

This is a collection of stories from various authors such as Sarah Rees Brennan, Rachel Hawkins, Malinda Lo, Jackson Pearce, and others.  All of the stories deal with the dark in some form or another.  Most of the stories have an element of horror or fear about them.  I really liked several of the stories.  A few didn’t appeal to me as much but overall I thought it was a pretty good collection.  One of my favorite stories, Almost Normal by Carrie Ryan, was about a group of high school teens who have snuck out for one last “Normal” night because a pack of zombies is reportedly on the way to town.  Unfortunately, the zombies appear earlier than expected and the teens are caught in an amusement park and don’t know how to escape.  Not all of them are quite so horror-oriented though, Now Bid Time Return by Saundra Mitchell seems like a ghost story but in the end is really more of a slightly supernatural love story.  I think that teens who like scary fiction would be drawn to this book more than other teens, but if a teen has liked books by any of the authors, they may like the whole compilation.