Why We Drive: The Past, Present, and Fut...

I received this book as part of the current Humble Bundle that is going on as of this typing.

I agree with the author with some points about why we should drive less like the pollution concerns and the downgrade in community participation. I live in a suburban area where I have to drive out a lot to go shopping and eating out to name a few things. Unfortunately, I don't live nearby where my favorite locally-owned places are at, so I can only visit them infrequently. Most of the stores and food places that are close to where I live are chain places like Mcdonalds or Walmart. Sadly because of where I live, most of my money doesn't go to my local stores, which means the number of unique places to visit will eventually decrease.

The book is a quick read and does a well-done job on explaining the basics to the reader like the history of highways and the formation of the Department of Transportation. When it came to the arguments for depending less on cars, I thought they're too simplistic and presented an extremely black and white view on cars versus bicycles. I wish to stop being dependent on cars, but unfortunately, circumstances prevent me from ceasing. I also appreciate the guide for promoting car-free life and public transportation. However, many people would find it next to impossible to do. As much as I would like to do those activities, it won't work where I live. I live in an extremely conservative suburban area where many of my neighbors refuse supporting things like funding public transportation. I wish the guide shows how to respectfully talk about these issues to someone who is opposed to the ideas mentioned in the book. If I quote the text the way it is from the book, many people in my area will not appreciate the author calling or associating them all sorts of negative terms. 

The electronic version I have of the book has a weird layout like some sentences being more massive than the other lines. Also, I had difficulty reading some sentences due to the color of the words being lighter than the other words. I'm not sure if I'm the only one who has this problem, but I found this to be a minor nitpick. While it was annoying at times, it was at least readable unlike the times I tried reading manga on my Sony Reader.

As a beginner guide for automobile and public transportation issues, this is perfect. But veteran activists would not find anything new or ground-breaking in this small booklet.  

Cannibalism: A Perfectly Natural History...

While looking for what other books I should try out during my free trial on Scribd, I came across this audiobook. I heard about this book before, and I've always wanted to read it because I wanted to read more non-fiction books on unique topics. However, I worried about what other people, like my family members, will think about me if they saw me reading a physical version of this book. It would make an excellent conversation starter, but I didn't want to worry anyone. So I've decided to try it out as an audiobook.

Before I began, I thought this book would have a large amount of detailed information on criminal cannibal cases. I already knew some instances of that kind of cannibalism and that the book would repeat some of the information, but go more in depth compared to the news. My predictions were wrong the moment the narrator read about how this book would have more of a scientific look on cannibalism and not focus on the criminal cannibals. I'm glad my prediction was wrong because concentrating only on that aspect would feel repetitive and dull. Even though there was a lot of scientific jargon in this title, I didn't feel lost while listening to the narrator. The writing is accessible with the author defining some of the terminologies and explaining the difference between a few theories in the book.

My favorite parts of this book were the sections discussing the debate on whether dinosaur did cannibalism or not and how different societies view cannibalism. It didn't surprise me how the colonizers demonized indigenous people by playing up the cannibalism practice even if some of them didn't do it.

At some points, it felt like the author was going off topic when the book talked about the mating practices of some animals and insects and mad cow disease. Fortunately, those parts have connections to cannibalism. The descriptions about holes in the brains being like swiss cheese scared me more than any other horror story. I don't recommend eating while reading through these parts, especially the section on the slugs.

The narrator was never dull and kept my attention thanks to his chipper, Disney Park castmember-type delivery and voice.

From Here to Eternity: Travelling the Wo...

I had a code for a free two-month membership to Scribd from Groupon, and I used it when I found out that this audiobook is available on the website. 

I had a difficult time putting down this audiobook because I found the narration sounded smooth and was eager to learn more about the different death rituals. Caitlin does an excellent job of talking about death and stuff related to it without being too depressing. She describes the various death rituals with respect and describes in detail. My favorite parts were the parts about the lighted-up Buddhas in Japan and the only open fire pyre in America. I also learned more about the funeral industry internationally and here in the United States.

I wish I learned more about the US funeral industry and the various laws related to a person's death sooner because I would have used some of that knowledge to help out my family when they did funerals for relatives. The parts where Caitlin explained about the American funeral industry reminded me of what happened two years ago when my uncle died.

My uncle wanted to be buried, so my mom had to look for a cemetery and casket. She had a difficult time finding those things that were affordable. She found someone (a person close to my uncle) that let my mom use the burial plot for my uncle for free, but finding a casket was a challenge. My mom had to beg the funeral home to order the cheapest casket she saw online because the ones they offer to her were ridiculously expensive (unfortunately my memories are kind of bad on this part, but I recall my mom saying finding a casket was a pain in the butt). The entire funeral cost (including a ceremony, burial, etc.) was expensive even with the cheapest options my family chose. I think the price was around ~$10,000. My mom, unfortunately, learned the hard way how challenging and costly it is to make funeral preparations.

I hope with this newfound knowledge I received from this audiobook will help out in the future.