Mr. Burke's Reading List

The Joy of Cookies: Cookie Monster's Guide to Life , Cookie Monster, Julie Kraut (Ghostwriter) (2018) Of course, a monster would have a ghost writer! You probably already know what you're getting when you pick up a book written by a Sesame Street Muppet . If not, the teeth marks and the missing bite in the corner should clue you in. The book is similar to other inspirational books, with a quote or passage on each page or two. In this case, familiar adages, proverbs, nursery rhymes and even song lyrics appear, except rewritten in Monster-speak -- e.g., using "Me" instead of "I" -- and centering the quote around Cookies. But that is generally just the beginning. If Cookie Monster were to say "Ask not for who Cookie tolls, it tolls for me", it would be followed by whatever actions or thoughts might occur to a monster after saying something like that. And there might be an illustration. There are Word of Wisdom, like Keep Calm and Eat a...

At some point, it seems that I forgot that I had an "SF" tag and started using "Science" and "Fiction" as two separate tags. The Science tag was meant for books with actual science in them (usually nonfiction). I've corrected that. I hope. If anyone spots an errant tag, please feel free to leave a polite message.

How to Break Up With Your Phone , Catherine Price (2019) This was among a bunch of books slated to be removed from my house. The title intrigued me, so I took it out of the recycle pile. As a result, I only read this in school, not at home, because someone might've been upset that I'm rescuing what is supposed to be trashed. But I digress... My phone is the least of my problems. Until a few years ago, I still had a cheap flip phone because it was costing me about $7 per month, and because I still have a legacy house phone that isn't going away any time soon. However, it could be said that I have a problem with my iPad and any working PC with Internet at work (or at home). I'll sit down to do one thing, and I'll find myself checking out the same handful of sites over and over again, and not getting done the things I'd planned on doing. That sure kills writing projects (and sometimes comics), and is one of the reasons I no longer post weekly TV/movie/w...

Star Wars: Jedi Apprentice: The Dark Rival , Jude Watson (1999) Not really a review, just reminding myself about some of the details of what I read ... In the final pages of the first book, there's an Epilogue that is really just a set-up for the next book. We find out that Qui Gon's first padawan, whom he lost, is still alive. He lost him to the dark side. (I don't know if this mentioned in the first movie or any other expanded universe stuff.) Qui Gon took the boy from his planet with his father's blessing, but for his last step as a padawan, Yoda sent the two back to that planet. Xanatos's father was preparing for war. Without spoiling too much for whomever reads this, Xanatos turns away from the Jedi and now embraces the dark side of the Force. And he has major issues with his former Master. As such, it was Xanatos would arranged for Qui Gon to be sent to Bandomeer. Less clear is if he arranged for Obi Wan to go there as well, or if he just assummed...

Star Wars: Jedi Apprentice: The Rising Force , Dave Wolverton (1999) Not really a review, just reminding myself about some of the details of what I read ... As soon as I saw the first two books in this series sitting on a shelf in the Teacher Room at the high school I'm currently assigned to, I knew I had to borrow them. The fact that the apprentice was Obi-Wan Kenobi, and the Jedi was Qui-Gon Jinn just made it better. The fact that Scholastic had labeled it RL 4 was less attractive, but it didn't deter me. Actually, that meant that I should be able to read both and return them before anyone notice they were gone. (Or if I was suddenly reassigned, I wouldn't have someone else's property!) The first book in the series opens about a month before Kenobi's 14th birthday when he'll be asked to leave the Jedi Temple that he's known his whole life if he isn't selected to be a Jedi's padawan before then. He'll be "condemned" to a l...

Speak Thai: The Easiest Way to Learn Thai and Speak Immediately , Daniel Flood (2019) NO IMAGE ADDED There are lots of free ebooks out there, so many that I've stopped downloading things just because they were free. But every now and then, a title pops up that intrigues me. If a newsgroup online (okay, it was really a "subreddit"), the author posted a link, stating that the book was free for a short time. His approach makes sense: you don't need an extensive book that covers everything. ou won't see a zebra in Thailand, so you don't need to say it. On the other hand, there are too many references to "ask a native speaker" because they will be glad to help. I'm not going to find a native speaker (outside of a restauurant), and I'd have to keep asking them to slow down so I can hear how the language is spoken. Speaking is the problem. There are a few references to how some letters or letter combinations are promounced. There neede...

Tales from Dragon Precinct , Keith R. A. DeCandido (2013) Not really a review, just reminding myself about some of the details of what I read ... To date, I have read all the Dragon Precinct novels which have been published. I have not read all the stories. As I discovered in a sit-down at Heliosphere (NY) this past spring, Keith has submitted a number of Precinct stories to various anthologies that ask him for stories. Some of those are collected in this volume. Not all, obviously, because it was printed in 2013. The better stories are the ones that remind me of Barney Miller episodes, even if I don't try to see specific analogues. The only downside was that the "first meeting" story, which concludes the book, was published in one of the actual Precinct books -- or at least in the edition that I purchased. (People who bought it "back in the day" might not have seen it.) The other amusing thing -- and this isn't a criticism, but a hazard of ...

Buffalo Dogs (The Amazing Conroy, Book 0) , Lawrence M. Schoen (2001) Not really a review, just reminding myself about some of the details of what I read ... Not a book, just a story from 2001, which was republished as a standalone book, available for free. It's a great introduction to the series. And least I hope it is because I haven't read the series, but I would like to. Disclosure: I've met Schoen at conventions, and while I doubt he'd remember it, we even had dinner together once, as a group of six were trying to eat before other panel appearances. (My brother and I were the only two who were not panelists, but I gave a ride to one of the others.) I also own a small Buffalo Dog stuffed animal that I won at a Reading at a different convention -- there were twelve people in the room, so he rolled a d12. Woo Hoo! Back to the story. Conroy is a space-traveling hypnotist who works lounges on foreign planets and space stations. He gets into a little bit o...