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Phil in SF

kingrat@sfba.club

Joined 1 year, 7 months ago

aka @kingrat@sfba.social. I'm following a lot of bookwyrm accounts, since that seems to be the only way to get reviews from larger servers to this small server. Also, I will like & boost a lot of reviews that come across my feed. I will follow most bookwyrm accounts back if they review & comment. Social reading should be social.

2024 In The Books

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Phil in SF's books

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Success! Phil in SF has read 35 of 28 books.

Matthew Perry: Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing (AudiobookFormat, 2022, Macmillan Audio) No rating

The beloved star of Friends takes us behind the scenes of the hit sitcom and …

He's definitely making "just so" stories. Here's one about how he felt at 11-ish months old, 6 weeks after his parents split. How he thought his dad was just at work for those 6 weeks, before giving up. I'm sure his dad not being around was confusing or possibly even traumatic to 10 month old Perry, but no way in hell did he have any concept of "going to work" nor any actual memories of the time. Maybe he doesn't know he's making shit up, but he's making shit up.

Matthew Perry: Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing (AudiobookFormat, 2022, Macmillan Audio) No rating

The beloved star of Friends takes us behind the scenes of the hit sitcom and …

I'm early in the audiobook, but I'm beginning to get a sense that Perry is going to fill this book with a bunch of self-diagnosed pop psychology. "Not having a parent on that flight is one of many things that led to a lifelong feeling of abandonment." " if I drop my game, my Chandler, and show you who I really am you might notice me. but worse you might notice me and leave me, and I can't have that. I won't survive that... so I will leave you first." I heard this kind of BS all over alcoholism recovery spaces and it's usually bullshit. it's meant to make one's brokenness a sympathetic kind, rather than an asshole kind.

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Matthew Perry: Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing (2022, Flatiron Books) No rating

In an extraordinary story that only he could tell, Matthew Perry takes readers onto the …

Textbook confirmation of every horrible thing you've ever suspected about celebrities

No rating

2022 reads, #54. So, the latest tell-all celebrity trainwreck memoir is here, this time from Friends star Matthew Perry, who turns out to have spent by his reckoning approximately seven million dollars over the years on rehab facilities and their associated private plane rides to and fro, to feed an uncontrollable liquor and opioid addiction that by all rights should've killed him several years ago (or at least according to the horrific tale that begins the book, in which his colon literally explodes, he goes into a coma for three days, and his family is told that he has an only 2% chance of surviving). The good news here is that it's clear Perry wrote this himself, versus the usual celebrity route of handing off a box of dictaphone tapes to some anonymous ghostwriter schmuck in Echo Park; but unfortunately the way you can tell this is that Perry's prose …

Hugh Howey: Beacon 23 (AudiobookFormat, 2023, Blackstone Publishing)

For centuries, men and women have manned lighthouses to ensure the safe passage of ships. …

Shell shock comes for a space war soldier

Content warning minor spoilers

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Tasha Coryell: Love Letters to a Serial Killer (2024, Penguin Publishing Group)

An aimless young woman starts writing to an accused serial killer while he awaits trial …

A weak thriller that felt more like a premise than a novel-length story

I'll admit to being disappointed. Despite having low expectations from the go, I was left with the nagging sense that I wasted my time. I wanted something compelling, interesting, or shocking to happen. I didn't get that, and 80% of the book is summed up in the back cover blurb. Hannah was obnoxious and narcissistic, William was bland, and the true killer is so obvious that it was difficult to care about anything that happened. All in all, it's a book best avoided.

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John Steinbeck: The Moon is Down (1970, Bantam Books)

Worth reading.

No rating

The first thing you should know about “The Moon Is Down” by John Steinbeck is that it was written in March 1942 as Allied propaganda. It tells a story of the invasion and occupation of a small northern European village. The parties are not named, but it’s a clear depiction of the invasion of Norway by SS troops. It was clearly written to bolster the resolve of Allied soldiers and remind them that a larger, more powerful force is no match for the human spirit and our innate desire for freedom.

The second thing you should know is that it was published simultaneously as a novel and a play. The book is written in a manner that makes this clear. Short, impactful episodes with powerful dialogue tell a story of how the villagers resist their occupier; how the village mayor negotiates with and debates the decisions of the invading general; …

Adam Roberts: Lake of Darkness (EBook, 2024, Orion Books) No rating

Good is a construct. Evil is a virus.

The Starship Sa Niro and the Starship …

It was different enough to a handshake, and superior enough, to deserve all the palaver of having to lie down on your back and shuffle round to position your feet correctly.

Lake of Darkness by  (16%)

new vocabulary: palaver

unnecessarily elaborate or complex procedure

this book has so many new to me words. i haven't posted most of them. However, the story is not engrossing yet, so I'm already thinking of tossing on the DNF.

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Veronica Gorrie: Black and Blue (2021, Scribe Publications)

Harrowing

I feel bad rating this so low when it is such an important story to have told. It reads like someone dumping data (as she describes later on) - this happened then this happened then this happened then this happened. I almost DNF due to the stacking nature of one awful thing after another, but persisted out of respect for the fact it’s a true story and the events weren’t told for shock or awe, but to bear witness.