I’m a restless writer. I move back and forth between writing tools like a child changes crayons. I recently spent part of a weekend reviving an old interest in the Vim text editor, rebuilding my configuration file and installing plugins that made it friendlier for writing prose. Then I
Read June 20 - July 1, 2026 I’d been looking forward to this, a history of the creation of the Oxford English Dictionary (affectionally known as the OED), and was a little disappointed because I thought there should be more to it, but in the end figured author Simon Winchester
Read June 23-29, 2026 This is an old book, published in 1980, which I picked up for some historical research. It’s subtitled “The Essential Guide To Home Computers,” though it’s probably not what people expected when they read it. The microcomputer revolution really got started in 1974
Read 5/31/26 - 6/14/26 I haven't had much interest in short stories, but I'm trying to change that as I work to increase the number of stories I read at one time. The latest part of that effort was Mary Ladd Gavell'
Read May 22 - June 7, 2026 I've been cogitating for a couple of weeks on what to say about Alix Harrow's The Once and Future Witches. Put simply, I found it a really good book, and like most books I get caught up in, it was
Cleaning Up My Mac (None of the links in this article are affiliate links (though the Medium links below are member-only articles), and nothing here was created with AI.) I opened my Medium newsletter the other day and was confronted with three or four links to articles about what
Read from March 25 to May 19, 2026 This book was part of my experiment in reading multiple books at a time. It’s a big book, and I needed a break from it at times. But I think its role in the experiment was a success. Inventing The Renaissance
Read May 14 to 16, 2026 It’s always fun returning to Murderbot’s universe, at least as long as I don’t have to live there. The latest book starts out more in medea res than almost anything I’ve ever read. I was more than an hour in
Read May 12 - 14, 2026 When I finished the Agatha Christie biography I thought I would devote all my reading time to Inventing The Renaissance. The publishing industry had other plans, however, releasing two entries in two of my favorite series, one close on the other’s heels. Medusa is
Read May 5 - 11, 2026 I rarely read biographies, but I’ve become a huge fan of Lucy Worsley over the last couple of years and enjoyed her TV series associated with this book. Thanks to her, I’ve started reading Christie. Lucy is an engaging author, even as she
I neglected to write individual reviews for my blog of the books I read in April, so this round-up article will be more in-depth than usual. Three Bags Full: A Sheep Detective Story — Leoni Swann, April 1–19, 2026 Look at the headline and you’ll see it
This article was originally published in Big List Energy on Medium.com I watched all three King Kong movies over a recent weekend and started my Monday feeling a little nauseous. (No, not because of the movies. It was my GLP-1 pill. It’s that slightly nauseous feeling that