"The Devils' Alliance"

The Devils' Alliance: Hitler's Pact with Stalin, 1939 - 1941 (Roger Moorhouse)

Kind of the European version of Japan 1941. As you can guess from the title, this book covers the strange period of time where Nazi Germany and Stalin's USSR were allies, starting just before the pact was signed and ending with the German sneak attack in June 1941. This is obviously a pretty depressing book, but as a look at a often-ignored period of time, it's fascinating; I guess I shouldn't have been surprised at how cynical Hitler and Stalin both were given that they both agreed to the titular devil's alliance, but here we are. My only caveat is that this is something of a niche title. I found the book very interesting, but a 432-page history of two years about World War II where World War II isn't happening between the subjects is kind of a hard sell. That said, this is probably an excellent appetizer to read before a solid history of the European front in WW2.

Grade: B+

"A History of Britian in 36 Postage Stamps"

A History of Britain in 36 Postage Stamps (Chris West)

This was an interesting book to read; I know basically nothing about postage stamps, and not a great deal about the period of British history covered (1840 - the modern day). I enjoyed reading it, but the history is very basic, and it mostly just left me wanting more. I can easily recommend this for school kids, history novices, and people with an interest in postage stamps; otherwise I'd probably give it a miss.

Grade: B-

"Kushiel's Dart"

Kushiel's Dart (Jacqueline Carey)

A big fantasy novel about a courtesan who's tossed into a high-stakes world of political intrigue in late medieval fantasy Europe. For the first 300 pages or so this was really hard to put down; Carey's great at world-building and weaving exposition, and the world she's made is pretty interesting. Unfortunately the book eventually slows down and starts dragging, hamstrung by two issues, one big and one small. The big one is that it's simply too, well, big - the paperback comes in at a hair over 900 pages, and it's not hard to suggest some useless parts that could be cut (my recommendation would be the entire Master of the Straits storyline, which not only adds almost nothing to the story, but feels very out of place having a super-powerful wizard in a very low-magic setting). The second issue is that the characters are not always fleshed out as much as one would hope; our heroine and the main cast mostly come off pretty well, but the head antagonist is barely more than a sketch.
All in all, I guess this is a good beach book, but it's hard to really recommend seeking it out unless you pass it on the shelf at the library.

Grade: B