Cart
|
|
my account
|
wish list
|
help
|
800-878-7323
Hello, |
Login
MENU
Browse
New Arrivals
Bestsellers
Featured Preorders
Award Winners
Audio Books
See All Subjects
Used
Staff Picks
Staff Picks
Picks of the Month
Bookseller Displays
50 Books for 50 Years
25 Best 21st Century Sci-Fi & Fantasy
25 PNW Books to Read Before You Die
25 Books From the 21st Century
25 Memoirs to Read Before You Die
25 Global Books to Read Before You Die
25 Women to Read Before You Die
25 Books to Read Before You Die
Gifts
Gift Cards & eGift Cards
Powell's Souvenirs
Journals and Notebooks
socks
Games
Sell Books
Blog
Events
Find A Store
Don't Miss
Spring Sale
Big Mood Sale
Teen Dream Sale
Powell's Author Events
Oregon Battle of the Books
Audio Books
Get the Powell's newsletter
Visit Our Stores
Powell's Staff:
Five Book Friday: In Memoriam
(0 comment)
Every year, the booksellers at Powell’s submit their Top Fives: their five favorite books that were released in 2023. It’s a list that, when put together, shows just how varied and interesting the book tastes of Powell’s booksellers are. I highly recommend digging into the recommendations — we would never lead you astray — but today...
Read More
»
Brontez Purnell:
Powell’s Q&A: Brontez Purnell, author of ‘Ten Bridges I’ve Burnt’
(0 comment)
Rachael P.:
Starter Pack: Where to Begin with Ursula K. Le Guin
(0 comment)
{1}
##LOC[OK]##
{1}
##LOC[OK]##
##LOC[Cancel]##
{1}
##LOC[OK]##
##LOC[Cancel]##
Customer Comments
bgelean has commented on (9) products
Stunt Road
by
Gregory Mose
bgelean
, March 17, 2010
Gregory Mose takes the reader on a whirlwind ride into the world of the obscure, enlightening, mystic, and colorful world of Horokinetics. Never heard of Horokinetics? Oh, you will in this book, and enjoy the journey. Unemployed Pete McFadden, along with his old college friend and mathematician Emily, and childhood friend and psychologist, Susan take on a project thrown out almost as a challenge by the person Pete has been trying to get a job interview with. He is promised an interview if he can produce a program "as good as" astrology but based on science, a program which he and his friends have successfully produced based on pure math. Something profound, dedicated, prophetic and insightful. When his challenger reneges and doesn't even return his calls, Pete is devastated. He takes a long drive up into the mountains, gets out of the car and gives in to memories and self-deprecation over his apparent latest folly. He is so deep into his thoughts that he doesn't realize he is not alone. A man on horseback has come up the trail behind him. Both begin to talk and it appears that both are soul-searching and currently unemployed. Jake does not laugh at Pete's program but seems very interested in it and soon has turned Pete's thoughts to positive ones. The journey of selling his idea and program begins as Pete finds himself at a table with his program and Jake at a "New Age" fair, a place he never dreamed of being at any point in his life. The book begins to take on an entirely different, and yet still similar forward movement. Over the next several chapters there is mystery, suspense, mythology, corporate greed, mistrust, and many more elements and switches. The author combines fractals, chaos and philosophies in such a fluid way the reader won't find the sometimes obscure words difficult. The beginning of the book in particular is quite tongue-in-cheek humorous, but becomes more serious in later chapters. There is quite frankly a lot that can be learned about ourselves as a whole without effort within these pages. On the other hand, the book contains, and in some way combines, the unscrupulous with purity. I've never read a book quite like Stunt Road. It is fascinating, depressing, joyful, cynical, provocative and even deadly, all at one go. Quite an undertaking for a first novel. The range of characters really breathes life into the story. Without the strong characterizations, this would be a different book. The ending brings to mind Robert Frost's poem "The Road Not Taken" and the lines "...Two roads diverged in a wood, and I— I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference." I am left to wonder, which road did Peter take when he came to the crossroad at the end of the book? 4 ½ stars
Was this comment helpful? |
Yes
|
No
report this comment
Go Ask Alice
by
Anonymous, Beatrice Sparks
bgelean
, April 17, 2008
I first read this book many years ago, and it was very powerful. I always thought it should be read by all teenagers and parents; now I think it should also be read by younger students. It is no holds barred writing about life.
Was this comment helpful? |
Yes
|
No
(5 of 9 readers found this comment helpful)
report this comment
Concubines Children
by
Denise Chong
bgelean
, April 12, 2008
Denise Chong is the granddaughter of the Concubine. This is a wonderfully insightful book about the arrival of the Concubine in Chinatown in Vancouver, BC in the late 1890s- early 1900s -- what was referred to in China as the Golden Mountain. The 'shared husband' sends most of his money earned back to his wife and family in China, leaving his Canadian family in poverty. The family divided in its extreme. There is so much west coast history in this book! I think this book warrants a wide reading base, it is an amazing story and it has been one of my favourites since I first read it in the 1990s. It moves me and the ending is very gratifying.
Was this comment helpful? |
Yes
|
No
(4 of 14 readers found this comment helpful)
report this comment
Good Rat A True Story
by
Jimmy Breslin
bgelean
, April 09, 2008
A surprisingly entertaining book considering the topic. Jimmy Breslin has built a story of the Mafia old and current around the court case against two extremely âdirtyâ cops in the NYPD. Burt Kaplan, working for the Mafia for decades, is the witness; now in his 70s and tired of prison life, he has turned âratâ. Kaplan is, from the book cover in this version âone of the most devastating turncoats of all timeâ. The court transcripts have a certain fascination which give great insight into the minds of the Mafia. Everything is run like a business, as is fairly well-known, but to hear it in the words of Kaplan, the descriptions of murder, making people disappear, comes across as just a day in the office. He tells everything straight as if describing ordering a meal to be delivered, or shipping a parcel out. Kaplanâs âvoiceâ and Breslinâs style are what make the story so entertaining. Breslin fills in background between sessions of the transcript with what appears to be the results of interviews through the years. Raised in the same location as the Families, he knew them personally and by reputation. This is what makes the story. He knows what he is talking about and has a wonderful flow between the transcripts and the ânormalâ lives of the people referred to. He gives us perhaps the most accurate picture of the history from the 1950s to the present of the âfamiliesâ including their movement from Brooklyn to Staten Island, and on into the final crumbling days of the Dons. I was pleasantly surprised by this book, I thought it would be a lot of blood and guts described in great detail and do not usually read books to do with the Mafia. This book is so unexpected, Iâm inclined to read Breslinâs other books on the same topics. I would recommend this book for itâs courtroom interest, itâs historical fact, and itâs entertainment value. Very good.
Was this comment helpful? |
Yes
|
No
(4 of 5 readers found this comment helpful)
report this comment
Monsters of Templeton
by
Lauren Groff
bgelean
, March 12, 2008
I liked this book a lot; it is complicated in its own way and yet all laid out for us in a relatively direct manner. The occasional (revised) family trees helped to keep it in order. I loved the first line in the version I read “The day I returned to Templeton steeped in disgrace, the fifty-foot corpse of a monster surfaced in Lake Glimmerglass.” Now, who wouldn’t be interested in a book that begins with the whole outer limits of the story presented in those few words? This book has so much within its pages! There are many stories within the story, some short, some longer, but all pertinent to the whole. There is also a quote from the Author’s Note referring to her final prompt to begin writing that I think gives us a glimpse of Lauren Groff’s own character as to how this story would be written: “That’s about the time his [James Fenimore Cooper] characters knocked on the door and joined the party.” This book is ostensibly about Willie (Wilhelmina) Upton, but it is also about a small town’s occupants, the history of both town and Willie’s heritage and much more. The book is descriptive, the characters are fully formed, and I can picture it all so easily. Willie came home from Alaska where she was working as part of an archaeology team, with a feeling of guilt and uselessness. Through living back in Templeton, Willie comes to an understanding of who she is. Her mother, a descendent of the town’s founding father Marmaduke Temple, challenges her to discover who her father is and tells her only that he lives in the town and is also a descendent of Marmaduke (Duke). An old school friend and an elderly librarian become two unlikely allies in her search. Each new search brings us another story as each descendent is “discovered”, and she learns there were more “monsters” in the town than the one in the lake, but it makes for a very interesting debut book. I am fascinated by Groff’s method and writing. I am certainly looking forward to more books by this author.
Was this comment helpful? |
Yes
|
No
(18 of 28 readers found this comment helpful)
report this comment
Man In The White Sharkskin Suit
by
Lucette Lagnado
bgelean
, March 09, 2008
I thoroughly liked this book. The author speaks from the heart about her family's life with respect and candor. Mostly autobiographical in content, the history of the family and particularly the patriarch is the backbone on which it is written. A complete "riches to rags" story, the early part of the book deals with a world completely alien to post-war Egypt and its Jewish population. Fleeing from their country of birth and rich lifestyle into the unknown life of refugees with "no state", no home, is a journey of changes, separation, religious deprivation, illness, and much more. Lucette "Loulou" takes this journey and relates it without prejudice or blame. She gives us an understanding of the life of a refugee immigrant in the post-war world of the 1950/60s and beyond; a time of change not just in the country they have left but in the countries to which they flee. The suffering of the father trying to raise his family in the ways of both a strict religion and a strict culture is described with the perspective of both a little girl with great love for her father and as a young lady gradually breaking with tradition. She has written this book in a gentle, insightful and caring way that can teach us a lot without hammering it in.
Was this comment helpful? |
Yes
|
No
(5 of 10 readers found this comment helpful)
report this comment
Invisible Armies
by
Jon Evans
bgelean
, March 06, 2008
This is the first Jon Evans novel I have read. What an adventure in reading! This book is positively vibrating with intensity and action. If you want a book that you will not want to put down, this is the book for you. The action is constant with occasional breaks where you can catch your breath before again boarding that rollercoaster ride through the pages. I found that with all the switchbacks and turnabouts I was holding my breath. This book spun me around and topsy-turvy with every change in direction. At first I found the narrative bits a bit unsettling, somewhat like watching a TV program with voice-over narration for the blind, but I soon overcame that feeling with the dialogue and action. The story begins with a somewhat typical girl, Danielle, doing a favour for a friend. She is soon literally fighting for her life and for humanity. Nobody is who they seem, nobody wants to trust anyone else. This book will amaze you in how far the world has actually come in technology, but don’t concern yourself with whether you will understand technobabble; it will usually be explained. I guess you could say technology is one of the heroes. Jon Evans has built a brilliant story which includes the best and worst in people, greed, awareness, and the survival instinct in all of us. It takes us to different countries and in dark places and communities which seem worlds away. I highly recommend this book, it is outstanding in its genre. If it weren’t for the few calm spots in the book, I would have had to read it cover-to-cover in one sitting. In fact, I finished it at 3:00 in the morning. You will not be unaffected.
Was this comment helpful? |
Yes
|
No
(3 of 5 readers found this comment helpful)
report this comment
When to Walk
by
Gowers, Rebecca
bgelean
, March 04, 2008
I had a hard time concentrating on this book at the outset. The book covers 1 week (each day a chapter) in the life of Ramble (how aptly named she is!) Saturday left me very confused and seemed more erratic than necessary, but by Monday I was getting into how it flows. The first part of the book was definitely difficult, and left me mostly confused and wondering when it could possibly garner some cohesion. It took me fewer days to get through the rest of the book which was enjoyable, but the first part I really dragged through. Once a bond was made with a neighbor, Ramble began to become more real to me. Once you get into the convoluted mind of Ramble, you can begin to enjoy her non-adventures as a travel writer who never goes anywhere. She definitely has an interesting command of the English language and her research methods are quite fascinating. For the full week her mind narrates the book, but I for one felt that the end was rather predictable. The book in itself is an interesting scenario of how a mind can work, but do we ever really know who she is by the end? I would have to leave that to future readers. Nevertheless, it is a very different book, full of unorthodox ideas and fun as well. Worth the read, although I'm not sure who I would most recommend it to. Certainly to anyone who is more interested in the psyche, and how people react to various crises. I believe Ramble is stronger than she knows and her current predicament is somewhat of a blessing. An unusual book, well researched in an odd way.
Was this comment helpful? |
Yes
|
No
(5 of 7 readers found this comment helpful)
report this comment
Surviving the Odds D Day to V E Day with the Fourth Division in Europe
by
Jack Capell
bgelean
, March 03, 2008
Being a Canadian, most WWII books I have read have been Canadian also. That said, this book is extremely well-written, is told truthfully and remarkably straight-forward. This is the story of the undecorated heroes as told by one person who was there. These are the true heroes who fought in the front without questioning their duty and with no intention of giving up what they were fighting for. The book takes us from Capell’s early history and his journey into front line combat. Due to a mixup in his citizenship (he was born in Canada but lived almost his entire life in the U.S.) he was placed in the lowest ranks. What is interesting in the early part of the book is the number of mistakes made while still in training in the U.S. and England. This is unconscionable. This followed by the infamous error incurred during the landings on the beaches of Normandy, including the one that caused his division being dropped in deep water in the wrong part of the beach, complete with the vehicle he was driving and managed through ingenuity to recover from the bottom. This is one of many instances throughout the book where soldier’s inventiveness saved their lives and others. As has notably happened in both Canada and the United States, perhaps everywhere, after 40 to 50 years, many servicemen felt they were able to go back to that time in their recollections and hence we are able to benefit from the reliving of not only the hardships, horrors, chaos and deprivations suffered at these times, but also see the amazing strengths, faith, and indeed the humor which kept them going. So it goes in this book. It is strongly researched, but the memories come through as honest remembrances of actual acts, good or bad, no holds barred. That the author survived to tell his story is nothing short of a miracle, especially as a wireman, laying wire through enemy lines. In light of the “friendly fire” visited on his division so many times it’s remarkable that anyone survived the front lines. This story demonstrates humanity among inhumanity. The story is conversational in tone and very easy to read considering it’s content. I highly recommend this book for it’s integrity, it’s ability to bring the experiences to a new level of understanding, and it’s unfaltering faith. I firmly believe this book needed to be written, for what is the use of reading literature by the observers? This is literature by a full-time player.
Was this comment helpful? |
Yes
|
No
(21 of 24 readers found this comment helpful)
report this comment