If Only They Could Speak: Understanding the Powerful Bond Between Dogs and Their Owners by Nicholas H. Dodman does tell some fun stories, but the first chapter annoyed me…which meant the rest of the book was a bit spoiled. In the first chapter, Dodman tells about a rich client that came to him to get help with her two dogs. She had one dog for longer and it was obviosuly her favorite. Later she added the second dog and immediately had problems. It seems the newer, and larger, dog got very aggressive and sometimes attacked the smaller dog. Dodman recommended they keep the dogs separate and use some behavioral techniques to reign in the aggressiveness. Good advice. Everything was happy. Except the lady didn’t listen to Dodman and decided to do nothing. Then the big dog attacked and killed the small dog.

Obviously that is a sad story. I just didn’t like how super obvious Dodman was about it. Basically he is saying…”LISTEN TO MY ADVICE OR YOUR DOGS WILL KILL EACH OTHER!!!!!” That just put me off.

I haven’t read Cesar Millan’s book yet…but I imagine it is much more positive and better than this one.

Rating: 1.5 out of 5

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For decades the New York publishing world promised a romantic life of fancy lunches, sparkling parties, sophisticated banter and trips to spots like the Caribbean to pitch books to sales representatives. If the salaries were not exactly Wall Street caliber, well, they came with a milieu that mixed cultural swagger with pure Manhattan high life. 

What? That’s awesome! I wish I was in that industry. Or I guess I wish I WAS in that industry.

I do think it is interesting how things are changing. For example:

The group is limiting advances to no more than $100,000 in exchange for giving authors half of the profits from book sales, as opposed to the 10 percent to 15 percent of the hardcover price they traditionally earn in royalties. Borders Group recently agreed to take the first 14 books on the new unit’s 2009 list on a nonreturnable basis. 

That is interesting that Borders is willing to do this. I wonder if that will become more of a standard around book sellers and how that will affect their business. I guess if you were a HUGE Barnes & Noble fanyou wanted to mess with Borders you could find out what books are on the list…go buy them…then return them!

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The Billy Martin Rule?  The practice by which umpires go out of their way to make calls against a certain individual.

As you can imagine, this title of this book is pretty self explanatory.  The copy I got is only the letter “B”, but the real book comes with all 26 letters!

As a big baseball fan AND nerd, this kind of book is cool to read. It’s not the type of book that you read cover to cover, but is good to have as a coffee table book to glance through.  Unfortunately, this book does not explain what Tim McCarver is talking about.

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

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• Living on the Black by John Feinstein
• Catch Every Ball by Johnny Bench
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Happy New Year Everyone!  We made it to 2009!

I reviewed 61 books in 2008.  You can see all of them at my review list.

I look forward to doing more in 2009 as I have a bunch of books on my shelf to read and review.  I plan on posting a quarterly review of my reviews just in case you want to keep track at home.

Thanks to everyone who has helped me get Letters On Pages going as a book blog and thanks to all of the readers for reading my book reviews and I hope you can stay for 2009!

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What Einstein Told His Cook: Kitchen Science Explained by Robert L. Wolke is a book that explains science behind a lot of things that are related to cooking.  He wrote it in Q&A format which is great because it keeps the sections short and readable.  And even though he is a super smart chemistry professor, he is able to explain everything in normal words.  Every once in a while he uses college-level words, but always precedes that with a warning of techspeak.

The most interesting question for me was: What is the fastest way to defrost frozen foods?  The typical options are to use the microwave, soak it in a sink full of water or leave it out on the counter.  BUT WAIT — there is one more option…and it is the best option!  Place the unwrapped frozen food on an unheated, heavy skillet or frying pan.  UNHEATED!!!  You see, metals are super heat conductors.  The pan will conduct the rooms heat efficiently into the frozen food.  The heavier the pan…the faster it will thaw.  Just don’t use a non-stick pan, the coating ruin the conductivity.  (This won’t really work for large objects like chickens and roasts.)

This book was written in 2002 and Wolfe has since come out with the second book in the series, which I am sure is great.  This book is really good and a lot of fun to read (and you will learn too!)

Rating: 4.5 out of 5

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One consequence has been to change the calculations involved in buying a book. Given the price, do I really want to read this? Now it’s become both an economic and a moral issue? How much do I want to pay, and where do I want that money to go? To my local community via a bookstore? To the publisher? To the author? 

In theory, I want to support all of these fine folks. In practice, I decide to save a buck.

Streitfeld goes on to talk to the various people involved with buying the book online. He talks to the publisher, the author, a local book store and the seller. The article is really fantastic and you need to read it. It is short. It also poses some very interesting questions that deserve discussion.

As a reader, where do you get your books? Do you feel bad buying on the secondary market knowing your purchase supports neither the publisher nor the author? For me, I can’t remember the last time I bought a book (apart from gifts). Any books that I don’t get to review I check out of my local library.

If you are a book blogger…do you see yourself as a soldier in the fight to save the industry? As romantic as that sounds, I wonder how accurate it is. I know some of the bloggers have a huge number of readers and certainly some of those people will buy books based on recommendations they read. But my reviews link to Amazon.com, where the buyer has the choice of buying used if they want.

It’s an interesting questions and I am curious how you feel about it.

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Eventually she met an American soldier stationed in Germany and they married.  They moved to the United States and she currently lives somewhere around Dayton, OH.  She has lived a happy life and does not harbor the same anti-Semitic feelings the previous German generation had.

The most interesting part of the book occurred as she tried to figure out her German heritage.  Having a father who was so prominent in the Nazi party caused a lot of guilt (along with a lot of other children of Nazis.)

This book moved along a little slowly but is worth reading for anyone interesting in the WWII generation.

Rating: 3 out of 5

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Title: Welcome To The Jungle
Author: Mary Schmitt Boyer
Publisher: Triumph Books (2008)

This was a very well written history on the Bengals.  It covers pretty much anything you would want to know about the franchise (though has no mention of Mike Brown’s complete inability to run a functioning football team).  The book is peppered with trivia questions (What is Ickey Woods’ real name?) random lists (worst 10 draft picks) and biographies on some of the more notable Bengals.

All in all, a pretty interesting book.

(Ickey Woods’ real name is Elbert)

Title: The Legends
Author: Chick Ludwig
Publisher: Orange Frazer Press (2007)

This book is a much more detailed look at the significant (and some not so significant, like Darnay Scott) players from the Bengals franchise.  The entire book is bio after bio, which is pretty interesting.  The author, Chick Ludwig, is a Bengals beat writer for the Dayton Daily News and is well known for being a HUGE Bengals fan.  Also, he is also known for being one of Marvin Lewis’ least favorite reporters.  (Not that Lewis has many of those)

The biographies are very well written and there are a lot of them.  I assume my mom will be pleased that her favorite Bengal of all-time made it into the book.  I learned a lot of interesting stuff that I did not know before.

A good read for Bengals fans.

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• The Dickson Baseball Dictionary by Paul Dickson
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I should preface this review with a confession: I love baseball and I love John Feinstein’s writing.  So I was kind of biased about this book even before I started it.  Luckily, this book did not disappoint at all…it was awesome.  Feinstein is, in my opinion, easily the best sportswriter out there.  He takes on his subjects and really makes you feel like you are in the story - the sign of a great writer.  In this case, I learned a lot about the art of pitching.

Living on the Black: Two Pitchers, Two Teams, One Season to Remember by John Feinstein takes you through the 2007 seasons of Tom Glavine and Mike Mussina.  Both pitchers have been pitching in the league for a long time and have gone through a lot.  Both guys are also well known for their thoughtfulness on the mound…and off it…which is one reason Feinstein wanted to use them for the book.  Another reason he wanted to use them was because they were both in New York (Glavine pitches for the Mets…Mussina pitches for the Yankees), which would make things a bit easier.

The book takes you through a pretty detailed biography of both pitchers from their early years (and all of the success and failures) all the way through the 2007 season.  Both players really know the art of pitching, but I thought it was especially interesting to read about how Mussina had to change his pitching style as he grew older.  In his younger days, he could throw 95 mph and rely on that power to get out of a jam.  At the end of his career he was lucky to hit 90 mph.  So his ability to completely adjust his pitching style…and still be effective is pretty amazing.  Glavine was never a hard thrower, but still had to make major adjustments as his career went on.

The most significant adjustment both guys (and all other pitchers) had to make was to the Questec Pitching System.  Questec is a computer operated camera that is set up in almost all MLB stadiums.  The system rates umpires on their ability (or lack thereof) to call balls and strikes.  Before the system was in place, pitchers like Glavine and Mussina, who had to rely on perfect placement rather than power, would get the benefit of the doubt from most umpires.  In fact, Glavine was especially famous for getting strikes when the ball was pitched 2 inches outside!  There was a big hubbub when Questec installed as pitchers got squeezed and scoring went up.  (editors note: I am all for Questec as it makes the game more accurate.  For the same reason, I am also for instant replay.)

Interestingly the 2007 season played out in exactly opposite manners for the two players.  Glavine and the Mets started out on fire and took a huge lead in the NL East.  Meanwhile, Mussina and the Yankees couldn’t do anything right.  Of course, by the end of the season, the Yankees came back to win a Wild Card position in the playoffs and the Mets completed their historic collapse losing 12 of their last 17 games to lose the division.  Glavine pitched in the final game and had the worst outing of his career.

The book is a really excellent read…though it is pretty long at 544 pages.  I would highly recommend it to anyone who likes baseball.  If you don’t like baseball…first of all, shame on you…secondly, you won’t like this book at all.

Rating: 5 out of 5

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I think it is totally unneccesary to use and just makes the sentence less elegant.  Why add markings to the page to clog things up?  Otherwise I could just write like this:

Dear Reader,{{{:How are you today?,>>;  Today I went to the store, bought bananas)^^^^, and ate them in the car!+++++!!!><

I see no difference.

Your thoughts?

(Note - EASILY the dorkiest thing I have ever written about)

(Note to my wife - try to refrain from commenting.  We have already discussed this and agreed that your argument was impluasibly wrong!)

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