Category Archives: Books
[Book Nerd News] Novelist Ernest J. Gaines Dies at Age 86
[Women Reading in Art] Woman Reading in a Cozy Nook

Illustration from “Radiation and Decoration,” a catalogue from the American Radiator Company (1905).
Daily Diversion #434: Silent Spring

Silent Spring by Rachel Carson
Tea (not shown): English Rose
[Book Nerd Art] Eliza by Barry Pain, 1904
The cover of Eliza by Barry Pain, 1904:

Eliza by Barry Pain , 1904. Illustration by Wallace Goldsmith.
Daily Diversion #433: Sunday Reading…

Let Fury Have the Hour
Tea (not shown): English Rose
What I’m Reading: 18th October 2019
My book consumption slowed to a trickle in the weeks surrounding our move. Too much to do, too little sleep, no time to think or, after a certain point, properly process words. It was that draining. No joke.
Now that most of the volumes are back on their shelves, my reading is nearly back to its normal, healthy pace. Yay!
Here’s what I’m actively digging at the moment:
- Murder in St. Augustine: The Mysterious Death of Athalia Ponsell Lindsley by Elizabeth Randall (I’m including this book, even though I finished it last night.)
- Let Fury Have the Hour: The Punk Rock Politics of Joe Strummer Edited and with an Introduction by Antonio D’Ambrosio
- Hollywood Character Actors by James Robert Parish with Earl Anderson, Richard E. Braff, John Robert Cocchi, and Harry Purvis
- A Glorious Freedom: Older Women Leading Extraordinary Lives by Lisa Congdon
- Sex with Kings: 500 Years of Adultery, Power, Rivalry, and Revenge by Eleanor Herman
- A Little Tour in France by Henry James

Portrait of Henry James by John Singer Sargent (1894)
What are you reading this week? Please share in the comments!
[Book Nerd Links] Eve Babitz, Louise Bourgeois, Bloomsbury, and Harold Bloom
I should probably rename this regular feature, as it often spotlights artists, musicians, and other creative-types. Until I decide on a new one (suggestions welcome!), however, Book Nerd Links it shall remain.
- The Perseverance of Eve Babitz [THE PARIS REVIEW]
- Step Inside Louise Bourgeois’s Beautifully Sacred Realm [ARCHITECTURAL DIGEST]
- The Interior Decorators of Bloomsbury [THE PARIS REVIEW]
- Literary Critic Harold Bloom has died at 89. [LITERARY HUB]

Nina Hamnett by Roger Fry (1917). (c) University of Leeds Art Collection and Gallery; Supplied by The Public Catalogue Foundation. Public Domain.
Daily Diversion #430: Duncan and Sir Alec

Dunc and Sir Alec
Daily Diversion #429: Bookish Restraint
I think I showed admirable restraint at the Half Price Books warehouse sale, don’t you?

Book haul