Review: Knight's Shadow

Knight's Shadow by Sebastien de Castell
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This series is great; so original. A dark, corrupt world with noble characters fighting for justice, love, and hope. The story is well-told, exciting and gripping. Lots of twists and turns and surprises. Maybe a bit longer than it needed to be, but when you love the characters it's hard to complain about that!

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Review: A Glorious Liberty: Frederick Douglass and the Fight for an Antislavery Constitution

A Glorious Liberty: Frederick Douglass and the Fight for an Antislavery Constitution by Damon Root
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Douglass was a great American -- in every way imaginable. His life and work should be even more the focus of attention than they are. Root's short book focuses on Douglass and his work to end slavery and persecution. Root tells the story of Douglass's development from a William Lloyd Garrison follower who thought the US Constitution supported slavery and thus had to be rejected to Douglass's break with Garrison. Douglass comes to see the Constitution as thoroughly antislavery and that if properly understood and enforced would mean the end of slavery. The book follows Douglass's efforts after the Civil War to work towards securing the civil rights of Blacks only to be thoroughly and disgracefully disappointed by the Supreme Court's gutting of the true meaning of the civil war amendments. As he later remarked, there would be no more 'race problem' if only the Courts had enforced the law.

Douglass's intelligence, power of persuasion, and moral courage should be a guiding light for all Americans. Root's concise book does a great job display all three of these.

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Review: The Ink Black Heart

The Ink Black Heart by Robert Galbraith
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Love this series. The characters and plotting are great. Rowling keeps you guessing about whodunnit. Cormoran and Robin are a great duo -- though they are skating into 'Sam and Diane' territory. I agree with many critics of this particular book, it was probably longer than it needed to be -- but I love the characters and the story telling so much, I didn't care. Robert Glenister is a master narrator, he really brings the characters alive and captures the subtle nuances of accents, ages, and state of mind.

The story here revolves around an online game and twitter; Rowling does a great job of capture both the ways in which the online world connects people but also the real dangers and pitfalls of these online connections. She does a great job of capture the troll-ness of twitter and social media -- much of which Rowling herself has direct experience with.

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