Thinking this planet isn't big enough for the both of us? A neat infographic from popular science shows a visual way to  screen potential celestial bodies for your new home. A full color wheel means you can pack your rucksack and fuel up your rocket. Any gray areas, you might just want to think about buying an island. I am looking forward to astronomers learning more about those extra solar planets. My moon boots are burning a hole in the closet.

News flash: processed food is bad for you. Ok, now that the shock and surprise is over we can talk about the book. Salt, sugar, fat is not a diet book or a lifestyle book. It is investigative journalism looking into the history of the processed food industry. It discusses each element in detail, how they are used in processed food, and how they affect consumers. It also discussed how the industry uses advertising to capture and manipulate us.

An interesting factoid... people have something called a "bliss point" with sugar. Adding more and more sugar to food makes it taste better up to a certain point, but then makes it taste worse. The inflection point is known as the bliss point. There is no such point for fat. You can keep adding more and more fat to a book and as long as it is not visually greasy or oily, people like it more and more. But when you mix them, the bliss point changes - the more fat you add, the more sugar you like! Take that waistline.

Another example, sales of crackers and cookies were going down due to consumers concern about uncontrollable snacking. People don't want to go down the cookie aisle because then you might buy a package of oreos, and once you have the oreos, you will eat them. All of them. So, the industry developed those 100 calorie packs of popular sweets like oreos to invite people back down the cookie aisle. The crazy thing is that people didn't just start buying the 100 calorie packs, they started buying more full fat cookies as well as other crackers and things in the same grocery aisle.

Long Story Short: A really fascinating read if you are interested in food, science, and manipulation. I promise it will change the way you listen to tv commercials and review the ingredients list on packages.

Stone Maidens is in my lady detective genre. The main character, Prusik, is a forensic anthropologist ala Bones. Prusik is investigating a case where a serial killer is leaving stones in the bodies of the women that he kills a ritual similar to a tribe she had studied (and been traumatized by) in school.

I give it a resounding "Eh". I was surprised to learn that this book was published recently. it reads much more like a detective story from the early 90s. While Prusik is supposed to have skills as an anthropologist, the discoveries in the case are made due to her intuitive profiling of the suspect. Go watch some early X-Files episodes for reference.  Prusik's character is social awkward and has a romance with the investigating police officer, again ala Bones, but doesn't manage to be charmingly awkward. I didn't actively cheer for her demise, but I also didn't really identify with her.

But, the mystery is about as good as you can expect from this genre for $0.99 (thanks, Kindle) and it filled some time recently hanging out in the airport. 

Long Story Short: Go in with low expectations, don't pay more that 99 cents, and you might be pleasantly surprised.

Confession. I bought this book because I really liked the cover of the third book in the series. Maybe not the best reason for buying a book (I believe there is a proverb on this subject), but props to whoever does the cover art.

A Quest of Heros is a young adult, epic fantasy novel about a 14 year old boy, Thorgrin. I would say it is closer to children's literature than young adult. While there is some boy/girl smooching in this novel, the overall themes are less complex than your average Captain Underpants book.

However, in the way of books always intended to be long series, the story really begins an the end of this novel. Up to the last couple of chapters is really just character development. It is smoothly written and Thorgrin angst about proving himself, beating his brothers, and talking to girls probably resonates better with the appropriate age range. 

Long Story Short: Young adult book for very young adults, doesn't cross genres to be enjoyable by actual adults.