Brought home a couple lousy books . . .

. . . wanted to let you know about it, because it does happen.  One was a medieval history by a reputable historian incapable of documenting his bizarre conjecture and innuendo.   Very weird.  The other was a local history booklet that was 98% Town Yearbook 1945, with all the editorial biases of the genre.  I was okay with it, actually, but I have a school-spirit deficiency, so it wasn’t a good match.

All that complaining to prove this: There are actually books I do not like.

I was beginning to feel a tad self-conscious, because I keep finding books that I do like.  As if I were a yearbook editor, just cheerin’ on everything that passes my desk.  Kind of refreshing to read 1.15 horrible books in the row.

So there you go.  I don’t need my books to be perfect.  I’ll give a ‘recommend’ rating to a book that has weaknesses, as long as it does what it sets out to do.  Assumes of course it sets out to do something worthwhile.  I guess maybe my standard is this: When I’m done with the book, am I glad I spent my time on it?

(And my secret review program technique for avoiding the obligation to write bad reviews — which I hate to do — is to try to pick books I already know are going to be good.  Sometimes they turn out better than expected, sometimes not quite as good as hoped.  But I do try to rig the system that way.  Not such an altruist that I’ll intentionally obligate myself to read a dubious book.  Which makes me super super glad that horrid to-remain-nameless medieval history was not on a review program choice list.  That would been very many pages of pain.  And I would have totally fallen for it.)

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *