Just finished some very interesting history bits. They talk about a tragic airplane crash that occurred while carrying U-2 test pilots back to California from Area 51. Because the project was top secret, the military couldn’t acknowledge the crash or it’s connection to the base. So the families of the ones who died didn’t learn what happened to their loved ones. They were just given a generic story that they died in an accident, and fed the media a story about a routine supply flight that crashed. Sad, but these are the kinds of things that happen when you’re dealing with top secret projects.
So far, I am not quite sure what to make of this book. The author has a very interesting writing style. It’s compelling on one hand but quite confusing on the other hand. I find myself having to go back and reread things more than once because I got lost somewhere and don’t know what’s happening. I also am not sure what the first chapter has to do with….well anything. I am hoping we tie up that thread at some point, because it seemed totally irrelevant.
I am cemented in my belief that Fern doesn’t know a single normal human being. Everyone she knows seems to be a complete psychopath who thrives on making her feel afraid. At this point Fern has become convinced that she is the girl that Astrid referred to as witnessing her kidnapping. She is attempting to track down clues to prove that fact, but also to try and unlock more memories of what happened. There have been some big revelations too, that I can’t really mention without spoiling the book. I have developed a theory about who is responsible for the kidnapping, I’ll be interested to see if I’m right. Hopefully this book has a better payoff at the end than the last one.
This one has been slow going. I went out of town this week for a long overdue vacation with my spouse and kids. It was fantastic but also meant I couldn’t read much, and I didn’t even bring this book with me. I didn’t really want to lug a 540 page book around to hotels. So far we’ve delved into the history of Area 51, it’s original use as a testing facility for spy planes. This led to some misidentifications as UFOs, which the Air Force was more than happy to play along with. UFO rumors provided cover to what they were actually testing after all. But we’ve now also covered how the UFO rumors started to become inconvenient for the CIA and Air Force, people were making too many assumptions that the government was covering things up. And so they changed tactics and admitted that they were researching UFOs, but that most of the time there was nothing unusual after investigation. I’m interested to see where we go next.
So far I am learning a lot of interesting things in this book. Last week we learned that the original entity in charge of Area 51 was the Atomic Energy Commission. This week we learned that the first official use of Area 51 (apart from nuclear tests at the Nevada Testing Site) was to engineer and test the U-52 spy plane that the government wanted to use to spy on the Soviet Union. Because the project was secret, many residents reported that the planes were UFOs because..planes weren’t supposed to fly that high. And that was the first connection with Area 51 and UFOs.
When Fern Douglas sees the news about Astrid Sullivan, a thirty-four-year-old missing woman from Maine, she is positive that she knows her. Fern’s husband is sure it’s because of Astrid’s famous kidnapping—and equally famous return—twenty years ago, but Fern has no memory of that, even though it happened an hour outside her New Hampshire hometown. And when Astrid appears in Fern’s recurring nightmare, one in which a girl reaches out to her, pleading, Fern fears that it’s not a dream at all, but a memory.
Back home in New Hampshire, Fern purchases a copy of Astrid’s recently published memoir—which may have provoked her original kidnapper to abduct her again—and as she reads through its chapters and visits the people and places within it, she discovers more evidence that she has an unsettling connection to the missing woman. As Fern’s search becomes increasingly desperate, she hopes to remember her past so she can save Astrid in the present…before it’s too late.
How it’s going:
This story has a really good premise. And so far I have learned a lot abut Fern and a bit abut Astrid. Fern has had recurring nightmares about a girl with no face reaching for her. When she sees Astrid on the news she realizes that Astrid is the girl she’s been dreaming about. I have also learned that Fern was raised by complete psychopaths. And seemingly everyone she knows, except her husband, is completely twisted. I’m excited to see where this goes.
A young woman descends into a seductive magical underworld of power-hungry scholars, fickle gods and monsters bent on revenge to break her family’s curse in this spellbinding contemporary fantasy debut.
For centuries, generations of Everlys have seen their brightest and best disappear, taken as punishment for a crime no one remembers, for a purpose no one understands. Their tormentor, a woman named Penelope, never ages, never grows sick – and never forgives a debt.
Violet Everly was a child when her mother left on a stormy night, determined to break the curse. When Marianne never returns, Penelope issues an ultimatum: Violet has ten years to find her mother, or she will take her place. Violet is the last of the Everly line, the last to suffer. Unless she can break it first.
To do so, she must descend into a seductive magical underworld of power-hungry scholars, fickle gods and monsters bent on revenge. She must also contend with Penelope’s quiet assistant, Aleksander, who she knows cannot be trusted – and yet whose knowledge of a world beyond her own is too valuable to avoid.
Tied to a very literal deadline, Violet will travel the edges of the world to find Marianne and the key to the city of stardust, where the Everly story began.
How it’s going:
I am listening to this one on audiobook. The narrator is lovely. She presents the material well and I find her voice very soothing. But this book is leaving me wishing that it was something more. There is precious little character building and even less world building. I have no idea who Violet is except that she looks very much like her mother. There is also a lot of narrative skipping but it’s not immediately clear which narrative I’m in, and with little world building I am often not sure who those people are, or why they’re relevant to the story. Hopefully it becomes more clear soon, I’m about halfway through.
Area 51: An Uncensored History of America’s Top Secret Military Base by Annie Jacobsen
Published: May 17, 2011 by Little, Brown & Company
It is the most famous military installation in the world. And it doesn’t exist. Located a mere seventy-five miles outside of Las Vegas in Nevada’s desert, the base has never been acknowledged by the U.S. government-but Area 51 has captivated imaginations for decades.
Myths and hypotheses about Area 51 have long abounded, thanks to the intense secrecy enveloping it. Some claim it is home to aliens, underground tunnel systems, and nuclear facilities. Others believe that the lunar landing itself was filmed there. The prevalence of these rumors stems from the fact that no credible insider has ever divulged the truth about his time inside the base. Until now.
Annie Jacobsen had exclusive access to nineteen men who served the base proudly and secretly for decades and are now aged 75-92, and unprecedented access to fifty-five additional military and intelligence personnel, scientists, pilots, and engineers linked to the secret base, thirty-two of whom lived and worked there for extended periods. In Area 51, Jacobsen shows us what has really gone on in the Nevada desert, from testing nuclear weapons to building super-secret, supersonic jets to pursuing the War on Terror.
This is the first book based on interviews with eye witnesses to Area 51 history, which makes it the seminal work on the subject. Filled with formerly classified information that has never been accurately decoded for the public, Area 51 weaves the mysterious activities of the top-secret base into a gripping narrative, showing that facts are often more fantastic than fiction, especially when the distinction is almost impossible to make.
How it’s Going:
I am only just starting this book, but so far it’s very interesting. I have learned several interesting tidbits. Like that the original entity that claimed ownership of Area 51 was the Atomic Energy Commission. And there’s a lot of shady dealings and secrets surrounding them, including that they were the entity that covered up the true nature of the Manhattan Project. Which is quite an interesting correlation to say the least. I am very interested to see what else is in this book.
I am about halfway through this book now and I am entranced by it. Greg Hickey uses words quite intentionally. All the words he writes have meaning and importance, there isn’t a millimeter of page that is wasted. I admire an author that can do that. Being quite verbose, I appreciate someone who can be so tightly succinct but also so beautiful. We are delving ever deeper into the psyche of these characters and I care about them in different ways. We are exploring the ex-athlete’s attempts at a relationship even though she fears good things happening to her because she might forget them due to her head injuries, but she also fears that she might end up doing bad things too. The veteran who is struggling with feeling purposeless, he finds no meaning in life since he left the war. The student who is deeply depressed but wants to be memorable to the world, he just isn’t sure how. The programmer who is thoroughly disgusted with humanity and wants no part of it, but finds observing it much like observing an ant farm. So far we have traveled with these characters through their personal struggles, as they each made their first socially unacceptable display of anger and/or violence. Any one of them could be the shooter, but personally I have my bets on one in particular.
Synopsis: In the far north of Canada sits Camp Zero, an American building project hiding many secrets.
Desperate to help her climate-displaced Korean immigrant mother, Rose agrees to travel to Camp Zero and spy on its architect in exchange for housing. She arrives at the same time as another newcomer, a college professor named Grant who is determined to flee his wealthy family’s dark legacy. Gradually, they realize that there is more to the architect than previously thought, and a disturbing mystery lurks beneath the surface of the camp. At the same time, rumors abound of an elite group of women soldiers living and working at a nearby Cold War-era climate research station. What are they doing there? And who is leading them?
Thoughts so far: This book follows the story of three people. Rose is a woman who was hired to go to the settlement as a prostitute for the men in charge of the project. But she’s also been hired as a spy to find out what the man in charge is really up to. We also follow Grant who was hired as a teacher for a school the doesn’t seem to exist, and when he arrives finds that things aren’t what they were portrayed. But since he’s running from his family’s wealth and trying to forge his own path, he stays. The last character doesn’t seem to have a name, but it’s following the settlement of White Alice. White Alice is a climate research outpost led by all women.
So far Rose is absolutely fascinating. I enjoy her narrative the most. She is thoughtful and intense. I can’t wait to get to know her more. Grant seems a bit naive but I’ll be interested to see how he develops. I’m not sure about White Alice. The information is interesting but not sure how it relates to the rest of the story thus far
I’m listening to this on audiobook and find the narrators very good. Each perspective has its own narrator but it feels cohesive.
A shooting at a Chicago beach leaves several dead and dozens injured. In the year before the attack, four individuals emerge as possible suspects.
An apathetic computer programmer. An ex-college athlete with a history of head injuries. An Army veteran turned Chicago cop. A despondent high school student.
One of them is the shooter. Discover who and why.
Thoughts so far:
The characters are becoming increasingly distinct through the narrative at this point. I no longer need the author to tell me which character we are following, I can tell by their voice and the circumstances who it is. Each chapter opens with a short piece on morality, or crime or the morality of crime. I am not entirely sure yet if this piece is supposed to be a part of a “manifesto” that the killer is writing, and therefore offering clues as to who it is, or if it is just a part of the narrative. We’ll see how that turns out, I am interested to see the purpose of those fascinating pieces. I still have the same suspicion on which character the shooter is, but the author is carefully laying the pieces to where it could logically be any of them. So far I am really enjoying this book.
For this week, that is all I have. It was a crazy busy week with school coming to an end, so I didn’t get a chance to start anything else and made only marginal progress on this one. Hopefully a longer update next week.
A shooting at a Chicago beach leaves several dead and dozens injured. In the year before the attack, four individuals emerge as possible suspects.
An apathetic computer programmer. An ex-college athlete with a history of head injuries. An Army veteran turned Chicago cop. A despondent high school student.
One of them is the shooter. Discover who and why.
Progress: Page 49 of 354
Update: This book started off a tad confusing. The premise is that a shooting happens, that’s the opening scene of the book. Then we are introduced to several characters, and the book description tells us that one of these people is our shooter. We will discover who it is along the way. But since we haven’t named these people, just descriptions (like the student, the veteran, the ex-athlete) it was a little hard to track them at first. Now that I’m learning more of their personalities I think I have it figured it out now. They have images in my head that accompany them now, so that stumbling block should be tackled. I also have a suspect in mind, but at the same time it feels like the easy answer so I suspect it is not that person. Stay tuned, we’ll find out together.
Synopsis:
It is the most famous military installation in the world. And it doesn’t exist. Located a mere seventy-five miles outside of Las Vegas in Nevada’s desert, the base has never been acknowledged by the U.S. government-but Area 51 has captivated imaginations for decades.
Myths and hypotheses about Area 51 have long abounded, thanks to the intense secrecy enveloping it. Some claim it is home to aliens, underground tunnel systems, and nuclear facilities. Others believe that the lunar landing itself was filmed there. The prevalence of these rumors stems from the fact that no credible insider has ever divulged the truth about his time inside the base. Until now.
Annie Jacobsen had exclusive access to nineteen men who served the base proudly and secretly for decades and are now aged 75-92, and unprecedented access to fifty-five additional military and intelligence personnel, scientists, pilots, and engineers linked to the secret base, thirty-two of whom lived and worked there for extended periods. In Area 51, Jacobsen shows us what has really gone on in the Nevada desert, from testing nuclear weapons to building super-secret, supersonic jets to pursuing the War on Terror.
This is the first book based on interviews with eye witnesses to Area 51 history, which makes it the seminal work on the subject. Filled with formerly classified information that has never been accurately decoded for the public, Area 51 weaves the mysterious activities of the top-secret base into a gripping narrative, showing that facts are often more fantastic than fiction, especially when the distinction is almost impossible to make.
Progress: This is a bit of a cheat, I apologize, since I haven’t actually started this book yet. But I heard a very intriguing interview with Annie Jacobsen on the Lex Friedman podcast. She was there talking about her new book, Nuclear War. Nuclear War is about what the process looks like for a nuclear bomb to be unleashed. Who makes the call? What happens then? How long does it take? What if they’re wrong? Well, I want to read Nuclear War desperately, but I don’t have a copy of it yet. So, while I wait, I am reading another of her books. Also, if you haven’t checked out the Lex Friedman podcast, I highly recommend it. He has a ton of interesting conversations with fascinating people.
Synopsis: Gilly, Talia, Anders, and Jackson are astronauts captaining a new and supposedly indestructible ship in humanity’s war against an alien race. Confined to the ship for years, each of them holding their own secrets, they are about to learn there are threats beyond the reach of human ingenuity–and that the true nature of reality might be the universe’s greatest mystery.
In this near future, our world is at war with another, and humanity is haunted by its one catastrophic loss–a nightmarish engagement that left a handful of survivors drifting home through space, wracked with PTSD. Public support for the war plummeted, and the military-industrial complex set its sights on a new goal: zero-casualty warfare, made possible by gleaming new ships called Providences, powered by AI.
But when the latest-launched Providence suffers a surprising attack and contact with home is severed, Gilly, Talia, Anders, and Jackson must confront the truth of the war they’re fighting, the ship that brought them there, and the cosmos beyond.
Thoughts So Far: I am LOVING this book. It has reminded me what I loved about Max Barry’s writing in Lexicon. He uses word like they contain actual power. He uses words with intent. Not a single word is wasted. And it is beautiful. I find myself losing time reading this book. I ❤ Max Barry!
Synopsis: She tried to run, but she can’t escape the other Mrs….
Sadie and Will Foust have only just moved their family from bustling Chicago to small-town Maine when their neighbor Morgan Baines is found dead in her home. The murder rocks their tiny coastal island, but no one is more shaken than Sadie.
But it’s not just Morgan’s death that has Sadie on edge. And as the eyes of suspicion turn toward the new family in town, Sadie is drawn deeper into the mystery of what really happened that dark and deadly night. But Sadie must be careful, for the more she discovers about Mrs. Baines, the more she begins to realize just how much she has to lose if the truth ever comes to light.
Thoughts So Far: I keep putting this book down and then forgetting to pick it back up. As a result it’s taking me forever. Sadie is horrendously dull as a character. I get the sense that there’s more to the story with her but for now she’s boring. Camille is amazing and even Mouse is starting to interest me a little. I have a few theories about the ending right now and I hope all of them are wrong. If my theories are right it will be yet another thriller that disappoints me with the conclusion. Please let me be wrong!
Synopsis: The Society for Single Ladies is a crime-solving club founded by the wealthiest woman in London. Yet even Miss Angela Childers’ charming detectives are not immune to the forces of love…
Dorothea Rowland attends a country house party to investigate a long-lost heir—not to find a husband. But when the dashing American claimant discovers her prowling for clues, she is startled—and then seduced—by his provocative kiss. It’s all Dorothea can do to remember her mission. Especially when a series of accidents adds up to something far more dangerous…
Benedict only meant to silence lovely Dorothea—not find himself enamored. What’s a gentleman to do but join forces—and propose to the clever beauty? Yet as Ben and Dorothea pursue the truth about his inheritance, their faux betrothal threatens to become the real thing. Soon, Ben’s plan to return to his life in America is upended—not only by his deepening bond with his bride, but by someone who wants his fortune badly enough to jeopardize his future—even end it. And Dorothea can’t let that happen. Not for the title, but for Ben…
Thoughts: So far I am really liking this book. A society of wealthy London women who solve crimes and occasionally fall in love. Ben is charming and I understand why Dorothea is falling for him again. Ben has been hiding out in the colonies of America after a duel with his cousin for the love of a woman. He had no interest in returning to claim his title from same cousin, until he heard that his cousin was moving to have him declared dead and had plunged the estate into ruin.
The Warehouse by Rob Hart
Listened to: 7:07 of 13:08 hours
Synopsis: Cloud isn’t just a place to work. It’s a place to live. And when you’re here, you’ll never want to leave.
Paxton never thought he’d be working for Cloud, the giant tech company that’s eaten much of the American economy. Much less that he’d be moving into one of the company’s sprawling live-work facilities.
But compared to what’s left outside, Cloud’s bland chainstore life of gleaming entertainment halls, open-plan offices, and vast warehouses…well, it doesn’t seem so bad. It’s more than anyone else is offering.
Zinnia never thought she’d be infiltrating Cloud. But now she’s undercover, inside the walls, risking it all to ferret out the company’s darkest secrets. And Paxton, with his ordinary little hopes and fears? He just might make the perfect pawn. If she can bear to sacrifice him.
As the truth about Cloud unfolds, Zinnia must gamble everything on a desperate scheme—one that risks both their lives, even as it forces Paxton to question everything about the world he’s so carefully assembled here.
Together, they’ll learn just how far the company will go…to make the world a better place.
Set in the confines of a corporate panopticon that’s at once brilliantly imagined and terrifyingly real, The Warehouse is a near-future thriller about what happens when Big Brother meets Big Business–and who will pay the ultimate price.
Thoughts: A lot of this book has been fairly predictable. Cloud is obviously based on Amazon, and naturally they are up to nefarious things. This is my audiobook at the moment and I like the narrator a lot. The narrator who does the voice for the company’s founder is great. I have a feeling that I know where this is going but I’m having fun getting there.
Thoughts: This has been really good. I got an ARC of this and have read over 200 pages in about 24 hours, that’s how much I’m enjoying it. Even though I haven’t read the first one, that turned out to not be a problem. I’m hoping to finish this up tonight
Progress: 18% finished with audiobook
Thoughts: At first I was very confused by this book and the way it is told. But I think I am getting into the rhythm of it now. It is voiced by the author and I find his narration very soothing, with a gorgeous accent. The people who run the Calm app should hire him to do some sleep stories, his voice is amazing.
Progress: 174 of 359 pages
Thoughts: I hesitated before jumping into the Witcher books. I have never played the game but I loved the Netflix series. I have watched it three times so far. So I didn’t want to start the series only to find that I liked the show better. But, I didn’t need to fear because this is excellent. These short stories are wonderful and add so much depth to the Witcher character. I like it so much I bought the entire series.
Written Among The Stars 