A Short Tour of Books I've Come Across Recently

After a long hiatus, I'm back with The World According to Bob! This post will be mostly links to web pages about books I've come across recently, both in my job as a substitute teacher and as just a regular guy giving a couple books to a local bookstore, Godfather's, here in Astoria, OR.

First up, a short book I found in a 3rd grade classroom called Wonders of the Rainforest by Janet Craig and illustrated by S.D. Schindler. Fantastic illustrations, and wonderful explanatory text. Great learning tool!

Two books from the wonderful library at Lewis & Clark Elementary School made it to this post, but there were dozens more I glanced at while shelving books there last week. The first one is from a series of books by Simon Basher called Mythology: Oh My! Gods and Goddesses (cool title). An encyclopedia of ancient Greek, Roman, Norse and Egyptian deities, the entries for each are cheeky but informative. The second is an awesome history of the Roman Empire in modern newspaper format that is a blast to read and also informative. It's from a series of books called the History News series (see a list of the books here). The big headline on the front cover is CAESAR STABBED!!

Yesterday I gave Godfather's Books two of the hardcover books I'd been saving to give to another local – but a little farther away – bookstore. One was Doughnut Economics by Kate Raworth. She has put together a website that features further exploration of the concepts in the book and a great discussion site. The site is worth a look, even if you don't read the book, which is a treatise on how economics is taught, and it isn't very complimentary.

The other book was The Well-Tempered City by Johnathan Rose, a big shot in the green development business. I loved the title, but the book was a bit of a slog for me, and for my kid, who was studying environmental policy at Middlebury College at the time.

 

While I was there, I looked at the new books (Godfather's sells both new and used books), and came across two that I looked at for a few minutes. The first is The Monk of Mokha by Dave Eggers, and is based on the true story of a Yemeni American that went back to Yemen to research the origins of coffee and got stuck in the middle of the war there. Fascinating story, and I guess I wonder whether Mokha is where the coffee drink mocha originated...

The final book featured here is The Travelling Cat Chronicles by Hiro Arikawa, translated by Philip Gabriel. This tale is told by the cat, and it has some amazing insights about humans and cats in it. A definite future read for me!

I hope at least one of these books strikes your fancy and you give it a read! If so, please let me know what you thought of it in the comments. Happy reading!