Bogormen

Title: The Silent Patient
Author: Alex Michaelides
Genre: Suspense
Rating: 3/5
# pages: 339
Date read: July 2024

Alicia Berenson lived a seemingly perfect life until one day six years ago. When she shot her husband in the head five times.

Since then she hasn't spoken a single word.

It's time to find out why.


I'm having a really hard time deciding what I thought of this, and it is basically impossible to review it properly without spoiling parts of it. I found it captivating, and the writing style drew me in right away. It seemed awfully disjointed at times, but not in a way that felt jarring, I was just puzzled how it would all fit together.

( Spoiler )

Basically - if you enjoy an unreliable narrator, this might be a book for you. If not - give it a miss.

Title: Hamilton: The Revolution
Author: Lin-Manuel Miranda, Jeremy McCarter
Genre: Non-fiction
Rating: 5/5
# pages: 288
Date read: April, 2017

Lin-Manuel Miranda's groundbreaking musical Hamilton is as revolutionary as its subject, the poor kid from the Caribbean who fought the British, defended the Constitution, and helped to found the United States. Fusing hip-hop, pop, R&B, and the best traditions of theater, this once-in-a-generation show broadens the sound of Broadway, reveals the storytelling power of rap, and claims our country's origins for a diverse new generation.

HAMILTON: THE REVOLUTION gives readers an unprecedented view of both revolutions, from the only two writers able to provide it. Miranda, along with Jeremy McCarter, a cultural critic and theater artist who was involved in the project from its earliest stages--"since before this was even a show," according to Miranda--traces its development from an improbable perfor­mance at the White House to its landmark opening night on Broadway six years later. In addition, Miranda has written more than 200 funny, revealing footnotes for his award-winning libretto, the full text of which is published here.

Their account features photos by the renowned Frank Ockenfels and veteran Broadway photographer, Joan Marcus; exclusive looks at notebooks and emails; interviews with Questlove, Stephen Sond­heim, leading political commentators, and more than 50 people involved with the production; and multiple appearances by Presi­dent Obama himself. The book does more than tell the surprising story of how a Broadway musical became a national phenomenon: It demonstrates that America has always been renewed by the brash upstarts and brilliant outsiders, the men and women who don't throw away their shot.


A true 5-star read. It made me laugh, it made me tear up, and it made me (even more than I did already) wish I could get to see the play with the original cast.

I know I said earlier that I didn't think it was a book I needed to own... I may have to rethink that decision, because it really was awesome! I put it down and didn't want to pick up anything afterwards... I needed to just let it percolate.

Highly recommendable to any Hamilton-fan.

Title: Un Lun Dun
Author: China Miéville
Genre: Childrens fantasy
Rating: 3.5/5
# pages: Audiobook ~13hrs
Date read: August, 2013

Zanna and Deeba are two girls leading ordinary lives, until they stumble into the world of UnLondon, an urban Wonderland where all the lost and broken things of London end up... and some of its lost and broken people too. Here discarded umbrellas stalk with spidery menace, carnivorous giraffes roam the streets, and a jungle sprawls beyond the door of an ordinary house.

UnLondon is under siege by the sinister Smog and its stink-junkie slaves; it is a city awaiting its hero. Guided by a magic book that can't quite get its facts straight, and pursued by Hemi the half-ghost boy, the girls set out to stop the poisonous cloud before it burns everything in its path. They are joined in their quest by a motley band of UnLondon locals, including Brokkenbroll, boss of the broken umbrellas, Obaday Fing, a couturier whose head is an enormous pincushion, and an empty milk carton called Curdle.

My expectations were totally off with this one. I'd heard it compared to Neverwhere so I expected a novel for grown-ups - or YA at the very least. But it's a children's novel. Not that I have a problem reading books aimed at children, and it was really well written, so definitely appropriate for grown-ups as well. It just meant that I had to do some serious mental readjustment along the way to figure out that the book was not at all what I thought it was.

That said, I really liked the book. I thought the characters fun and quirky and liked the traditional fairytale structure to the story. The plot wasn't anything special, which is probably where my mistaken expectations come into play, as there was less depth to it than I would have thought, but once I realized that and took the story for what it was, I found it a very enjoyable tale.