Cogan’s Reviews I’ll let you in on a secret about book reviewing. It’s simply this: it’s much more enjoyable to review a book you don’t like than one you like. Dishing out dirt is a helluva lot more fun than singing praises. When you really don’t like a book, it’s wonderful to be able to […]
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Cogan’s Reviews I’m not sure why I haven’t reviewed this book, currently in its 3rd edition, sooner. It’s been around since 1993 and it was one of the first books my wife and I read when we arrived here in Ajijic eight years ago. And – heaven knows! – I’ve reviewed more than 60 books […]
Continue ReadingCogan’s Reviews I’m not sure how come I’ve lived in Mexico these last seven years and never got around to reading this rather well known account of life in Ajijic a good half century ago. This seems to be about the time that the earliest arrivals from up north “discovered” the place and decided to […]
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Cogan’s Reviews Here’s an interesting collection of stories of nineteen women who came on their own to Mexico in recent years to settle in the Lake Chapala area. The book consists of eighteen interviews plus the story of the author herself. The women range in age from their 40’s to their 80’s. Their backgrounds and […]
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Cogan’s Reviews While I was writing this review, in May 1998, some 9,000 bush fires were said to be burning across Mexico. I don’t know how anyone ever counted that number, but I wasn’t going to argue. One night we sat on our terrace and counted twelve of them on the other side of Lake […]
Continue ReadingCogan’s Reviews I don’t think I’ve ever seen a guidebook specifically on Guadalajara and the surrounding area. There are plenty of such books on the Lake Chapala region, serving the many tourists, retirees and ex-pats who find their way down here. But I just don’t recall seeing a specific English text on Mexico’s second largest […]
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Cogan’s Reviews Here’s a collection of stories with a rather unusual theme. Mexico isn’t just the place where the action takes place in these tales. Rather, it’s as if Mexico – sunny, exotic, mysterious and occasionally slightly dangerous – is yet another character in each of the tales. There are 18 stories here, by authors […]
Continue ReadingCogan’s Reviews I reviewed Chandos’s other book, “House in the Sun”, in MexConnect a couple of months ago and now I’m catching up on what was actually the author’s first book, published four years earlier. The later book covered his life in Ajijic, running a bed & breakfast and dealing with a mixed bag of visitors, as […]
Continue ReadingCogan’s Reviews Here’s a volume that’s aimed very accurately at a specific target audience – namely, people who want more information about retiring in Mexico. Author Dru Pearson has done an excellent job of researching and compiling almost everything anyone needs to know about adopting this country as a place to spend one’s leisure years, […]
Continue ReadingCogan’s Reviews I think there are two audiences for Dru Pearson’s latest book. The first is the same as the audience for her first book, Retire in Mexico, which I reviewed here in 2004. That one was aimed very definitely at those people at various stages of contemplating making the big leap and settling, either part-time or […]
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