Mike Gs Eclectic Reads | Top 15 Reads of 2022 @mikegseclecticreads | Uploaded January 2023 | Updated October 2024, 2 hours ago.
It was another good year in the reading world. What more can I ask?
0:00 Intro
---
1:19 Burning Down the House
2:29 Wild Swans
3:39 The Biggest Bluff
4:53 The Lincoln Highway
6:09 King Lear
7:35 Stories of Your Life and Others
8:09 Amusing Ourselves to Death
9:01 Klara and the Sun
10:09 Vanity Fair
11:09 The Body in the Library
11:35 Heaven
13:38 Flowers for Algernon
14:37 Slowness
15:27 Beautiful Country
17:12 Thank You, Mr. Nixon
---
18:33 Looking ahead
It was another good year in the reading world. What more can I ask?
0:00 Intro
---
1:19 Burning Down the House
2:29 Wild Swans
3:39 The Biggest Bluff
4:53 The Lincoln Highway
6:09 King Lear
7:35 Stories of Your Life and Others
8:09 Amusing Ourselves to Death
9:01 Klara and the Sun
10:09 Vanity Fair
11:09 The Body in the Library
11:35 Heaven
13:38 Flowers for Algernon
14:37 Slowness
15:27 Beautiful Country
17:12 Thank You, Mr. Nixon
---
18:33 Looking ahead
![Thank You, Mr. Nixon Gish Jen [Book Review]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/uSIRpWU7hh8/hqdefault.jpg "Thank You, Mr. Nixon Gish Jen [Book Review]
Experience the intersection of China and America through the past 50 years in this wonderfully witty fictional short story collection.
Author Gish Jen talks with Politics and Prose about her work:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qp4WpoZRbJA
My Goodreads account: https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/5996769-mike")
![The Clocks Agatha Christie [Book Discussion] [Spoilers Second Half]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/uY7j2PdKFWg/hqdefault.jpg "The Clocks Agatha Christie [Book Discussion] [Spoilers Second Half]
What seems like a promising start to the novel turns out to be what Poirot calls one of the most unimaginative crimes hes ever seen.
0:00 Intro
2:45 A well-paced novel, maybe
5:34 Subpar mystery plot
SPOILERS BEGIN
7:13 Who are the suspects?
9:01 On coincidence
11:47 Red herrings not that fishy
14:42 The clock")
![Divided We Fall David French [Full Book Review] [CC]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/vGWbTcrSGaU/hqdefault.jpg "Divided We Fall David French [Full Book Review] [CC]
Is there a secession threat facing the U.S. today? I talk about David Frenchs new book, Divided We Fall: Americas Secession Threat and How to Restore Our Nation.
0:00 Intro
1:18 Secession?
2:17 Key topics in the book
4:14 Political polarization in the U.S.
4:51 Stifling of free speech and political discourse
6:57 Pluralism and federalism
9:18 My reservations about Frenchs federalist proposal
12:25 Summing things up
I learned a lot from it, but I dont think it does any one topic better than the other books out there.
However, I highly recommend this episode of the Ezra Klein Show, in which French was an invited guest and discussed secession more directly.
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/david-french-i-debate-polarization-secession-filibuster/id1081584611
Book link:
https://www.amazon.com/Great-American-Divorce-Country-Apart-ebook/dp/B07P8H7V6T
Twitter: @mikegreads https://twitter.com/mikegreads
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/5996769-mike
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Mike-G-Reads-104046585263367")
![Klara and the Sun Kazuo Ishiguro [Book Review] [Spoilers After First Few Mins]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/vNWzzoUmYXM/hqdefault.jpg "Klara and the Sun Kazuo Ishiguro [Book Review] [Spoilers After First Few Mins]
Klara would have had some rough evenings after Daylight Savings ended. Just like I did when filming this video.
Note: I changed the way I was pronouncing “Ishiguro” when recording this video because I thought I was doing it wrong before, only to then learn that I was probably closer in the first place … oops!
0:00 Intro
0:43 Recurring Ishiguro themes
2:56 Emotional weight
SPOILERS BEGIN
4:37 The Sun and religion
8:45 Continuation of a human life
13:52 The transformation
16:50 Wrapping up
LINKS:
Other recommended YouTube reviews:
Eddiecational: https://youtu.be/Lo7e7T-bm3Q
A solid review, placing this story within the context of Ishiguros other novels. Some spoilers.
Kaela’s Archive: https://youtu.be/56BW9PD07qQ
An extended and insightful reflection on the themes of the book, and an excellent possible interpretation of the ending. Spoilers (obviously).
Books and Bao: https://youtu.be/rvOJIGJvGOw
An engaging and passionately positive review, as I always expect from this channel. Spoiler-free.
Freshly Read Books: https://youtu.be/05aNeOgVEX4
A more lukewarm, but ultimately still positive, review of the book. Spoilers.
Short interview with Kazuo Ishiguro on the narrative perspective, themes, and framing: https://youtu.be/6GJ7mrqo9nQ
Spoiler-free.")
![The Anarchy William Dalrymple [Full Book Review] [CC]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/veH4OleMepA/hqdefault.jpg "The Anarchy William Dalrymple [Full Book Review] [CC]
How the British East India Company took advantage of local rivalries to conquer the Indian Subcontinent over a period of 200 years.
Update on 10/23/2021:
One of my favorite history channels, Extra History, is doing a series on this very topic! Check it out for what Im sure will be a much better analysis of this time period: https://youtu.be/E4vonIphF4E
Twitter: @mikegreads https://twitter.com/mikegreads
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/5996769-mike
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Mike-G-Reads-104046585263367")
![Trents Last Case E. C. Bentley [Full Review] [Spoilers in Second Half] [CC]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/wvx5Nduqvog/hqdefault.jpg "Trents Last Case E. C. Bentley [Full Review] [Spoilers in Second Half] [CC]
0:00 Intro
4:03 Spoilers begin
I review the classic and influential Golden Age detective story Trents Last Case.
Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
Project Gutenberg:
http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/2568
LibriVox free recording:
https://librivox.org/trents-last-case-version-2-by-edmund-clerihew-bentley
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6yQdH_QoMU) (part 1)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FMHv0thdEBE (part 2)
A nice (spoiler-filled) review I found that sort of contextualizes the novels importance:
https://www.criminalelement.com/re-investigating-trents-last-case-by-ec-bentley-scott-adlerberg
Twitter: @mikegreads https://twitter.com/mikegreads
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/5996769-mike
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Mike-G-Reads-104046585263367")
![The Man In The Brown Suit Agatha Christie [Spoilers Second Half] [Full Book Review]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/xl5uQ1SGgnI/hqdefault.jpg "The Man In The Brown Suit Agatha Christie [Spoilers Second Half] [Full Book Review]
An adventurous young woman sails to Africa in pursuit of some dangerous criminals, in this novel where Agatha Christie tries something a little different from her signature whodunit mysteries.
0:00 Intro
0:40 Style
2:32 Characters at first glance
8:25 SPOILERS BEGIN
8:42 Characters revealed
12:07 Final thoughts
Twitter: @mikegreads https://twitter.com/mikegreads
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/5996769-mike
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Mike-G-Reads-104046585263367")
![Five Weeks In a Balloon Jules Verne [Quick Book Review] [Spoiler-Free] [CC]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/xp0mFYihnrU/hqdefault.jpg "Five Weeks In a Balloon Jules Verne [Quick Book Review] [Spoiler-Free] [CC]
The first adventure in Jules Verne’s now-classic Extraordinary Voyages series – a cartography expedition over Africa in a hot-air balloon.
A really nice written review on a more updated translation of this book from the original French: http://www.strangehorizons.com/non-fiction/reviews/five-weeks-in-a-balloon-by-jules-verne-translated-by-frederick-paul-walter
^ Among other topics, this reviewer talks about issues of racism as they compare in Verne’s original French edition, William Lackland’s English translation (the one I listened to on Librivox), and Frederick Paul Walter’s newest English translation, which he considers the better of these two translations.
This book is in the public domain in the US!
Librivox: https://youtu.be/nQGYIPPlEPM
Project Gutenberg: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/3526/3526-h/3526-h.htm
Wikipedia article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_Weeks_in_a_Balloon
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1219103.Five_Weeks_in_a_Balloon
StoryGraph: https://app.thestorygraph.com/books/e3ece042-bcc2-4ba6-9998-6ecd41bfca3d
Image through Creative Commons (CC 3.0): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_Weeks_in_a_Balloon#/media/File:Five_Weeks_in_a_Balloon.jpg
Twitter: @mikegreads https://twitter.com/mikegreads
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/5996769-mike
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Mike-G-Reads-104046585263367")
![The Hunting Party Lucy Foley [Full Book Review] [Spoilers Second Half]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/yKrg-M0IXl4/hqdefault.jpg "The Hunting Party Lucy Foley [Full Book Review] [Spoilers Second Half]
Someone turns up dead during a winter weekend getaway of former friends poorly pretending not to hate each other.
0:00 Intro
0:26 “Evocative of Agatha Christie?”
3:52 The characters
SPOILERS BEGIN
7:06 My meta-deductions
10:22 My real deductions
11:42 My take on the mystery plot
My Goodreads account: https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/5996769-mike")
