Lidstreamwise

Rating heuristic:

* -- disasters; books I regret putting time into;

** -- a book that failed in some major way, but has competent bits; a uniformly boring book;

*** -- an "average" book; a competent book that left no strong impression one way or another; a reasonably good book I have no interest in rereading;

**** -- a book I would probably reread, even if I have mixed feelings about it; a book with both very bad and very good parts; a good idea less-than-sucessfully executed;

***** -- a four-star book with one outstanding aspect; a book that was more consistently excellent than a four-star book, even without a standout feature; illogically-chosen favorites