There’s something beautifully tragic about Greece—foreshadowed in the work of Euripides or Sophocles—that’s both enchanting and sad.
Tag: book review
The Encyclopedia of Ancient Greece | Greece
I picked up The Complete Illustrated Encyclopedia of Ancient Greece by Nigel Rodgers on a whim. I thought, “Hm, this might be nice to thumb through.” Did I thumb through it? No. I read it, and it was quite the endeavor. Overview: This book starts with the Minoans and Mycenaeans, the precursors to the Greeks, and works…
The Republic | Greece
When it came to picking a Greek classic for my month of Greece, I was inundated with choice, except I’ve already read most of the big ones: The Iliad, The Odyssey, Euripides, Sophocles…check, check, check check. And I didn’t want to read Herodotus’ Histories. So Plato’s Republic it was. I’m not gonna lie, it wasn’t easy to get through….
Sarah’s Key | WWII
When I first saw the short description for Sarah’s Key by Tatiana de Rosnay, I thought it would be a cute book for young readers (well, as cute as Jewish victims during WWII can possibly be)…but oh, I was so wrong. It was a good book, but I wouldn’t say cute. More like tumultuous. Overview:…
The Secret War | WWII
Success was not due just to bigger navies or faster planes or better soldiers; it was due as well to the intelligence gathered by secret warriors.
D-Day, June 6, 1944 | WWII
Only the bravery and courage of the troops, the leadership of their superiors, and the force of the human will to conquer got the Allies up the beaches.
The Lost City of Z | Brazil
The point of this book is the journey that you take with both Colonel Fawcett and David Grann, the journey through both the jungle and the avenues of the mind.
A Short History of Brazil | Brazil
This book leaves much in a haze of mystery, the same qualities that have always made the Amazon Rain Forest a magical place for me.
Band of Brothers | WWII
Band of Brothers follows one company of men with extraordinary courage through Europe to victory.
The Alchemist | Brazil
Any book that combines following dreams, love, suffering, and God without being sappy is worth reading.
All the Light We Cannot See | WWII
There’s more to light or truth than what we can physically see; that light is almost a tangible essence that lifts us up. Indeed, there’s light all around that can make us our better selves if we let it. It’s a light that Marie-Laure, blind as she was, could see, while Werner, with all this brilliance and knowledge, was blind to until the very end:
An Army at Dawn: The War in North Africa, 1942–1943 | WWII
The point of this book is to take a little piece of the suffering and pain and desperation of those nameless, countless soldiers, and swallow it whole until we carry a bit of them within our hearts.
Tyger Tyger 