Redbery Books

Wow!  As good as The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo was, The Girl Who Played with Fire is even better.  In fact, a lot better (and Tattoo was very good).  Lisbeth Salander, the troubled, introverted, eccentric hacker is as amazing character as you'll come come across.  The book starts fast and keeps going in an adventure that leaves you wondering ... is Lisbeth alive or dead?

Be forewarned, this book is not for everyone.  But if you like zany, offbeat, ribald and outrageous, in a Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman sort of way, then Pete Dexter's story of the relationship between the perteptually misfit Warren Spooner and his stepfather, Calmer Ottosson, who go through life and never quite connect, might be for you.  You can't make this stuff up.  From two separate botched burials at sea to double asthmatic fatalities, you have to wonder about the wild, creative imagination of Pete Dexter or worry about his own life.  This book is more about antics than the relationship but the relationship ties all of the antics together.

A haunting book set in World War II Germany and narrated by death, The Book Thief both thrills you with young adult ideals and realistically sets the Jewish scene in Hitler's Germany.  A fascinating read, not only for young adults, but young adults of all ages.

In the winter of 1913-1914, Theodore Roosevelt began an arduous, thrilling, life-threatening and life-changing adventure exploring an here-to-for unexplored portion of the Amazon basin, a tributary of the Amazon River then-called the River of Doubt. Roosevelt often undertook physically challenging tasks following personal defeats and he had just lost a bid for re-election as President of the United States. This journey, however, was particularly challenging presenting white water rapids, potentially hostile natives and, most of all, the unknown. Their perils included loss of equipment and near starvation as well as personal intrigue among the expedition’s members.

This book is more than an adventure. It is more than an historical novel. It is more than an ecological look of the Amazon basin. It is all of the above and more as Theodore Roosevelt and his traveling party, including one of his sons, literally struggle to survive in a hostile environment unexplored at the time. Roosevelt himself never fully recovered from the effects of the expedition and died prematurely only a few years later. The River of Doubt is the best historical book that I have recently read. I recommend it heartily to the adventurer, the historian and the ecologist.

We all learned in school that John Wilkes Booth, Abraham Lincoln’s assassin, was captured in a barn in the countryside following a chase that ensued following the horrendous murder. But did you know that Booth was not captured until twelve days following the event? I thought it was probably an hour and a half or so! This tale details not only the mood surrounding Washington at the time of the assassination, the preparations for and the event itself but also the desperate escape attempt by the hobbled Booth with a broken leg.

You will learn where he went, who he encountered and how he eluded detection for nearly two weeks, mostly in northern supported Maryland. That he was finally betrayed and killed in southern supported Virginia adds to the intrigue. We also learn what happened to those that planned with him (yes, it was a conspiracy!) and all those along the way who helped him evade capture. Four people were hung for abetting Booth in the months following. We have read about the Civil War and about the assassination itself, now learn about the chase, the manhunt, that followed.