I'm Back with More Library Loot

maphead

May 16

It's been too long since I've posted something. Until I can crank out a review or two I'll get things rolling with a little Library Loot. As always, even though I'm up to my eyeballs in library books I couldn't resist borrowing more reading material. I hope to eventually apply these towards several reading challenges, including the European Reading Challenge and Nonfiction Reader Challenge. Over the last month or so that tower of library books by my reading chair has only grown taller, so I better knuckle down and do some reading. Too many books and not enough time. Story of my life!

Homelands: A Personal History of Europe by Timothy Garton Ash (2023) - I've been in the mood to read this one ever since Rosa Brooks mentioned it on a podcast last summer. Fortunately, I was lucky to borrow a copy from Overdrive. So far it's been a great read.
The Rooster House: My Ukrainian Family Story: A Memoir by Victoria Belim (2023) - A little something to represent Ukraine for Rose City Reader's European Reading Challenge.
Merchants in the Temple: Inside Pope Francis's Secret Battle Against Corruption in the Vatican by Gianluigi Nuzzi (2015) - I'll be applying this one towards the European Reading Challenge as well as Introverted Reader's Books in Translation Reading Challenge. Something tells me this book will be either really great or really awful.
Origins: How Earth's History Shaped Human History by Lewis Dartnell (2019) - I suspect I'm a bit of a geographical determinist so this book appealed to me.
The Last Voyage of the Andrea Doria: The Sinking of the World's Most Glamorous Ship by Greg King and Penny Wilson (2020) - After having fantastic luck with Steven Ujifusa's A Man and His Ship: America's Greatest Naval Architect and His Quest to Build the S.S. United States I thought I'd give this one a chance. Only upon closer inspection did I realize it's by the same authors who wrote Twilight of Empire: The Tragedy at Mayerling and the End of the Habsburgs.
The West: A New History in Fourteen Lives by Naoíse Mac Sweeney (2023) - Before I tackle Simon Sebag Montefiore's 1,300 plus page The World: A Family History of Humanity I'll first try something a bit lighter.

As you can see below even Orion, one of our three farm cats knows I've got a lot of reading ahead of me. Library Loot is a weekly event co-hosted Claire from The Captive Reader and Sharlene from Real Life Reading to encourage bloggers to share the books they've checked out from the library. If you'd like to participate, just write-up your post, steal the Library Loot icon and link your post using the Mr. Linky on Claire's Blog.