Category: Non-fiction

Jul 24 2015

Beyond Belief: My Secret Life Inside Scientology And My Harrowing Escape by Jenna Miscavige Hill & Lisa Pulitzer

Having just finished a bunch of Orwell, this was both mind-boggling and horribly sympathetic. She describes growing up in a state of repression more suited to communism or a paranoid dictatorship a la North Korea than to any religion that purports to help people self-actualize. I applaud her for having the intelligence to see that …

Continue reading

Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2015/07/24/beyond-belief/

Jun 18 2015

The History of Polish Literature by Czeslaw Milosz

Every literature should be so fortunate as to have a Nobel laureate write a textbook history of its development. The only down side I can see to The History of Polish Literature — so far, that is, I am up to the middle of the 18th century, although that’s just a little less than the …

Continue reading

Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2015/06/18/the-history-of-polish-literature-by-czeslaw-milosz/

Apr 30 2015

So, Anyway by John Cleese

The back of the dust jacket of So, Anyway… by John Cleese gives the book an unofficial subtitle, “The Making of a Python,” and indeed, that is what all but one of the book’s chapters describes. There are a few flash-forwards, or asides regarding later events, but the bulk of the story concerns what happened …

Continue reading

Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2015/04/30/so-anyway-by-john-cleese/

Apr 02 2015

The Perfect Scent: A Year Inside the Perfume Industry In Paris And New York by Chandler Burr

I read Chandler Burr’s original New Yorker article on Un Jardin Sur Nil when it came out and remember being absolutely fascinated. Mr Burr is an excellent journalist and writer, and he really drew me into a world which I never really give much thought to otherwise. This book expands upon that original article and, …

Continue reading

Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2015/04/02/the-perfect-scent-a-year-inside-the-perfume-industry-in-paris-and-new-york-by-chandler-burr/