New books by month

New books for October

I’m finishing up a light read, Carol Burnett’s This Time Together: Laughter and Reflection, a memoir of her times as a comedienne. She is funny. Towards the end of the book is a chapter on getting updates about her soap operas in Europe, and I about died laughing, with no one in the room but me. I loved Carol Burnett as a kid and still remember the funny variety show that she had. They don’t even have shows like that anymore. Now people have to get their laughs with junky reality shows that are really making fun of people in a mean way. Always “eliminating” this one and that one. A real shame.

Anyway, I got an e-mail from Amazon (like I do every month) about the best books in October. One that stood out for me was Bill Bryson’s new book, At Home: A Short History of Private Life. This time, he is looking into domestic life, including the rooms and items we use. He created a journal about where these things came from. The book will be good, because he knows how to bring these things to life; at least he did for the English language in The Mother Tongue, one of Tracey’s picks from long ago. I reserved At Home at the library, and it is still on order so the library doesn’t have it yet. I can’t wait to get into that one.

Now I have Finders Keepers: A Tale of Archaeological Plunder and Obsession by Craig Childs waiting for me at the library. It examines what history is being served by archeology, and ethical problems that they have in revealing history, from what I gather. It may be a pretty intense read, but I’m going to read it next. I also have some cookbooks that have shipped, so I am trying to wait for them to come in so I don’t waste a trip (and gas). I don’t know if I will review them or not, but they are the books by the doctors that recommended that Bill Clinton go on a vegan diet. I’ve really been trying to eat more vegetables, so I got the cook book along with The Spectrum: A Scientifically Proven Program to Feel Better, Live Longer, Lose Weight, and Gain Healthby Dean Ornish. To top it off, (while I was at it) I did order Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trailbut I don’t know if I can get them all read before they are due with the archeology book, too. I’ll try.