Review: In the Land of Men by Adrienne Miller

I’ll keep this one brief because I dislike discussing books I didn’t enjoy, but I want to share the good with the bad when it comes to my book reviews.
In the Land of Men by Adrienne Miller: At 22, Adrienne Miller was hired as an editorial assistant at GQ magazine and at 25 she became the first woman to take on the role of literary editor of Esquire. I wanted to know about her unique struggles while working in the male-dominated literary world of the nineties. While she shares some of those stories, this book is mostly a detailed account of her personal and working relationship with David Foster Wallace. Regarded as a literary rock star at the time, his inappropriate actions seemed to get a pass because of his “brilliance.” Every page and section where he was featured was absolutely cringe-worthy, but Miller appears indifferent or accepting of his behavior. In short, smart girls can be stupid and “geniuses” can be total assholes.

Reviews: Upright Women Wanted by Sarah Gailey, Indelicacy by Amina Cain, and The Lost Book of Adana Moreau by Michael Zapata

I have a problem with somehow not reviewing the books I really, really love because I sit and think about them for too long, asking myself how I could ever give them the justice they deserve. This has lead to me not writing reviews for some of my all-time favorites, but I am not going to let that happen with these three novel/novellas—some of the best books I’ve read in ages.


Upright Women Wanted by Sarah Gailey (released 2/4)Pitched as a “pulp Western with an explicitly antifascist, near-future story of queer identity” I thought that this novel sounded interesting, but I was definitely hooked in when I found out that the main characters are “queer librarian spies on horseback trying to do the right thing”. At just 173 pages, I read Upright Women Wanted in a single morning.


Indelicacy by Amina Cain (releasing 2/11)A cleaning woman marries a rich man but does not find peace in her new privilege. She dreams of writing but her new role consumes her time in new ways. This 176-page novella hit me in the same ways as The Resurrection of Joan Ashby. If you know me and my reviews, you know that is almost the highest praise I can possibly give!


The Lost Book of Adana Moreau by Michael Zapata (released 2/4)It took me weeks to read the 266 pages in this book because every sentence, paragraph, and chapter was layered with history and references. The storylines are woven together in such a way that I was totally immersed. I didn’t want it to ever end. I would only let myself read a chapter or two at a time because I knew I’d never get to read this amazing story again for the first time.

Review:: Mengele: Unmasking the "Angel of Death" by David G. Marwell

Mengele: Unmasking the "Angel of Death" by David G. Marwell
(released 1/28/20 from W. W. Norton)

**I received a copy of this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review**

January 27, 2020 marked the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, a place where Josef Mengele determined the fate of countless innocents and selected thousands more for his “scientific” pursuits. In “Mengele: Unmasking the ‘Angel of Death’” (released today) former chief of investigative research at the Justice Department’s Office of Special Investigations (OSI), David G. Marwell chronicles Mengele’s life and career, from his “university studies, which led to two PhDs and a promising career as a scientist; his wartime service, in combat and at Auschwitz, and his postwar refuge in Germany and South America.”

In 1985, Marwell was assigned to the international investigation to locate the infamous Nazi doctor and bring him before a court of law. Name changes, Red Cross passports, document trails, letter interceptions, spy missions, handwriting analysis, and details such as ink comparisons (using the standard ink library of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms—who knew?!) were all employed to trace Mengele’s route of escape. Overwhelming forensic evidence supported the fact that the bones which were eventually found in a cemetery in Sao Paulo, Brazil did, in fact, belong to Josef Mengele, but that did not convince those who most wanted to see him dead and/or brought to justice.

On October 1, 1992, OSI’s full report was forwarded to assistant attorney general for the criminal division and future FBI director Robert S. Mueller III. One week later Mueller forwarded the report to his boss, Attorney General William Barr, formally ending the United States’ eight-year investigation.


Goodreads Summary:
A gripping account of the infamous Nazi doctor, from a former Justice Department official tasked with uncovering his fate.

One of the most notorious war criminals of all time, Dr. Josef Mengele has come to symbolize both the evil of the Nazi regime and the failure of justice in the postwar world. Drawing on new scholarship and sources, historian David G. Marwell examines Mengele’s life and career, chronicling his university studies, which led to two PhDs and a promising career as a scientist; his wartime service, in combat and at Auschwitz, where his “selections” determined the fate of countless innocents and his “scientific” pursuits resulted in the traumatization and death of thousands more; and his postwar refuge in Germany and South America.

Mengele describes the international search in 1985, which ended in a cemetery in Sao Paulo, Brazil, and the dogged forensic investigation that produced overwhelming evidence that Mengele had died―but failed to convince those who, arguably, most wanted him dead. This is a story of science without limits, escape without freedom, and resolution without justice.