Laki is a volcanic fissure located in Vatnajökull National Park, Iceland. On June 08, 1783, the fissure opened and spewed forth a lot of steam from super heated groundwater. In addition to that, nearby volcano Grímsvötn, also erupted. Both of these events over an eight month period produced something like four tons of basalt lava, as well as clouds of noxious gasses. The result was contaminated soil and groundwater, leading to crop failure, the death of at least half the livestock in Iceland, and famine that killed a decent percentage of the human population. This massive event also impacted the rest of the world, mostly due to weather changes. The sky was filled with these noxious gasses, causing haze, terrible thunderstorms, high temperatures in summer, very low temperatures in winter, and drought in some locations.

This book was free to listen to on Audible Plus, so I gave it a try. It was a pretty short book. I think it was about five hours, so if you want something that isn't terribly long, this may be for you. I really want to travel to Iceland one day, and visit that national park. I love to see things that I have read about in general, so that would be a good opportunity to see Laki. I thought that this book was particularly interesting when reading about the impacts on weather throughout the world. I suppose that it never really occurred to me that something happening on one side of the world could affect something where I live so much. (Which in hindsight is really stupid because the smoke from wildfires in California certainly made it to Tennessee last season.) In the United States, there were reports of chunks of ice in the Gulf of Mexico and the Mississippi River was frozen. The snow in New Jersey was DEEP and the temperatures were below zero. All of this was happening at the end of the American Revolution, which is wild to think about. This was a pretty interesting book that I just happened to run across. I'm glad that I did. 

 This book is about an extremely devastating hurricane that hit in Galveston, Texas. The resident employee of the United States Weather Bureau, Isaac Cline, could not grasp what the weather indications meant for the town until it was too late. The town of Galveston was utterly destroyed, and as many as six thousand people died as a result of the hurricane. This book was well researched, and includes notes from Isaac Cline, newspaper reports, and testimony from those who survived the storms. I really enjoy Erik Larson's work, and this one was no exception 

 This book is a collection of essays about how the Holocaust of World War II compares to other genocides. I was required to read this book for one of my history classes in college, and I hated it. I think some of the essays offer valid points, but in general it was boring. The Holocaust was certainly a very mechanized genocide compared to others in history, and that certainly adds to the unique factor. I'm finding it difficult to say many positive things about this book. I will say that this was considered essential and required reading, and I feel that it should not have been required nor was it essential. I would not waste my time on this book. 

 This book is about the health services, or lack thereof, of Ireland. The book presented a great explanation of the various forms of healthcare and what they accomplish, or fail to accomplish. I was bored to death by this book, because I thought the subject matter would be something a little more along the lines of experimentation. If anyone is interested in an explanation of healthcare, this is a good one for that. 

 I really wanted to love this book. I really did. I am always interested in true crime, and I am a history major, so I thought this would be a wonderful book for me. I checked it out at the local library, but I had actually planned to buy it for my collection. I'm glad I didn't. This book was so long and tedious. I could not keep my focus on it, no matter how hard I tried. There were some interesting parts, and I did learn some things, but I would not read this again. It was just dull. 

 I had heard about this book many times, and had it on my shelf for a long time as well before I picked it up to read. It was an interesting book, which has been made into a movie. I found myself thinking throughout that this guy was a space cadet. He made the craziest choices, but who am I to judge. His choices were his own, and he lived and died as he wanted to do. I saw that not terribly long ago they hooked this bus up and flew it out via helicopter to keep people from hiking to this place and getting lost and injured. 

 This book is a memoir written by Robert Ballard, who is most known for finding the missing wreckage of the Titanic. The reason I bought this book was because of my interest in Titanic, especially after visiting the Titanic museum in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee. I love all things ocean, and the stories about different experiences in and around the ocean by this author were so engaging. Beyond the actual dealings with the ocean, the author overcame several personal struggles- his failed marriage and issues in academia just to name two. This was a good book, and I would suggest it for those who are interested in Titanic and other ship related books. 

 I really enjoyed this book. I got it for my birthday a few days ago, and I was very much looking forward to reading it. I usually do not like books that have so many multiple accounts, but this one was very interesting. I really liked hearing all of the different accounts about the same events. This book also included a lot of historically relevant photographs, which I also greatly enjoyed. I would highly recommend this book. 

 This book contains scandalous information about a lot of of famous people. Each person has a few pages dedicated to them, and the book is divided up by category. (Artists, Actors, Writers, etc.) It was like a little gossip book, but I had a great time reading it. It is a book that I do not plan to keep, so I wanted to hurry and read it so that I could continue with my pre-move downsizing mission. I was able to share some pretty interesting stuff with my sister, who is my book discussion buddy, and that was fun. I enjoyed this quite a lot. 

 Gitta Sereny is a great author, and this book is a good showcase of her efforts. This is the culmination of over seventy hours of interviews with Franz Stangl, the commandant of Treblinka. This was a very interesting book. I think it is so important to read and listen to things from the perspectives of these former Nazis. It has always made me so curious how people fall into behaviors like this, committing mass genocide and acts of torture and brutality. I really enjoyed this book, and would recommend it.