In Pursuit of the Unknown, by Ian Stewart

The sub-title is "17 equations that changed the world."  I was very optimistic about Professor Stewart's book and really wanted it to be great.   Sadly, that was not to be.

Why not?   With few exceptions, Stewart failed to make the complex equations understandable.   It is pretty easy to explain Pythagora's theorem.   Logarithms too, although the author didn't do a great job.  By the time we got to Euler's formula for polyhedra, things were going downhill at an alarming rate.

In fairness, it isn't easy to explain all these equations in lay terms.   But also in fairness, that was Stewart's mission; the job he took on and he failed at it.

The good news:  some interesting commentary about the figures behind the equations.

Don't waste your time, though, unless you're extremely well grounded in mathematics.

ISBN 0465029736

The Professionals, by Owen Laukkanen

Mr. Laukkanen, in his first novel, has taken the title of top notch mystery writer.    It is clear that the two main characters of this book, FBI agent Carla Windemere and Minnesota state police investigator Kirk Stevens, will be the basis for a long series to come.

To avoid spoilers, I won't say much about the plot.   A group of young college grads, unable or unwilling to find "normal" jobs, take on small scale kidnapping as a career.   Things go wrong.   Police, and other bad guys, get involved.

The writing is great, plot is great, pacing is great.  I'm a big fan.

If you like mysteries, you'll want to read this book.

Storey's Guide to Raising Chickens, by Gail Damerow

This is the go to book on the topic.   Its breadth is amazing:  from understanding how chickens communicate (and differentiating between different sounds) to how best to kill and pluck a meat bird.  It is a phenomenal reference.

If anything, it provides a bit too much information:  if you're considering some egg layers but read this book first, you might reconsider, just because you'll learn about all the little details.   In that regard, it is like reading too much about what might happen during pregnancy:  at some point, you get a head ache.

Having said that, this is worth having as a reference for anyone with chickens, and is an interesting read even if you're fowl-free.

Keeping a Family Cow, by Joann Grohman

If you have any interest in having your own dairy cow, this is the go to book.   You will have to endure a bit of proselytizing for the concept of humans drinking cow milk up front.   By the way, I don't drink milk.   Mostly because I stopped nursing a very long time ago and continuing to do so, even with another species' milk -- or especially with another species' milk -- would at best make no sense and at worst be just gross.

But I am interested in homesteading and in the general topic of having a household cow.   For that, this book is superb.   It covers everything from nutrition to behavior, and the author just drips with credibility from her personal experiences.

Certainly if you do drink cow's milk, and you want to avoid steroids, chemicals and who knows what sort of living conditions your source experiences, having your own dairy cow seems a great alternative.

You will, however, have to wake up to milk every single morning.  Even if it is raining, you had a bit to drink the night before, and you just want to stay in bed.   That laziness, that lack of discipline, is perhaps the most significant reason for me to forgo home grown dairy products.

The Hitman's Guide to Housecleaning, by Hallgrimur Helgason

This is not a great book.   I got it at deep discount and would have been ahead on my savings had I not bothered to complete the read.

The plot:  an assassin leaves New York, ends up in Iceland, finds love and reforms.

The writing is not great; were the author American and not Icelandic, I'd say dreadful but I'm giving him the benefit of the doubt and the ability to blame it all on a poor translator.   Realistically though, I believe the problems are far beyond translation issues.

Oddly enough, the last several pages were the best written in the book.   Still, it would be cruel of me to recommend this.

Even on discount.

Vulture Peak, by John Burdett

It has been nearly two years since I read a John Burdett novel, and the last one didn't impress me as being up to his level of quality.   In this, his latest mystery featuring the unlikely hero Sonchai Jitpleecheep, devout Buddhist, pimp and police detective, Mr. Burdett has more than redeemed himself.

An excellent novel!   But to try to summarize the plot -- well, it is complicated, at the edge of convoluted. Worth reading though.

As an aside:  this is the first book I've read in Adobe Digital Editions; I borrowed the novel electronically from my public library.   It worked quite well, and was very readable.   Would have been more convenient to read on a Kindle though.

Asylum, by Claude Bouchard

One review (unfortunately read after I'd finished this novel) used the word "unreadable."   That's pretty close to my view.  Sadly, I'm so obstinate, I wasted my time reading this to the end.   The ending was almost predictable.  That I'd look back on this as a theft of my time was also predictable after the 10th page or so.   Oh well.

Just say no to this novel.

Sick, by Brett Battles

The concept of this novel is a massive conspiracy theory:   evil forces, attached to the government, seek to introduce a fatal illness into the world population.   This leads to a military officer (and our hero), Ash, and his family to become unwitting participants in a test.   Ash is extracted by a mysterious group of do-gooders.

There's very little resolution at the end of the novel.   It was at that point that I noticed the colon in the title: "A Project Eden Thriller."   Oh my, that explains it.   The novel was just an initial installment.

It was interesting enough to keep me reading.   And, if I happen upon a sequel while browsing the library stacks, I would borrow it to read.

Zero Day, by David Baldacci

This is a great novel.    But let me get one thing out of the way up front:  there's no question that Mr. Baldacci's book is a complete rip off of Lee Child's Reacher character.   I don't know if it was accidental, and I don't care, because it is a great book.

Of course, I have that view because I've also been a fan of Mr. Child, so the similarities don't cause any negative fall out to me.   Reviewers on Amazon aren't as kind.   So if you see negative reviews, I suspect they're more due to annoyance about the similarities in character and plot arcs, and less about this as a fun read.

If you like Mr. Child's work, you'll probably like this book too.   If you're not familiar with Mr. Child's work, you might even enjoy this book even more.

Okay, details:  the hero is an Army investigator.   A lovely woman deputy helps him.   He's a loner who makes unorthodox career decisions.   There are more plot twists than I anticipated.    The book is quite well written.

Hit List, by Laurell K. Hamilton

I've read other of Ms. Hamilton's series about a vampire killer with a variety of para-normal abilities and a strange lifestyle.   I confess this with some trepidation:  hardly literature.    This most recent of Ms. Hamilton's novels in the "Anita Blake" series does little to improve my reputation, nor hers.

So the plot:  bad guy super special creatures are killing folks.  But really just to get the hero's attention so that the big bad vampire lady can kidnap her and take over her body.   Which she (spoiler alert!) ...

... fails to do at the end.   Although it is a bit unclear, since the ending is so choppy and abrupt that it almost makes the material prior to it well thought out and clear.   Oh, which it isn't.

Bottom line:  pretty poor entry in what was at best a marginal series.