Its a new year and one of my resolutions is not to buy any books and just read what is on my shelf. I think I am addicted to buying books, so this is going to hard. So far my exceptions to the rule are when I get gift certificates, which my sister gave me for my birthday. UPDATE, so this didn't really last. I am just too much of a book aficionado.
Additionally I had turned this page into a blog, but I stopped for a couple of reasons.
Date
Title
Comments
Blue
Latitudes: Boldly Going where Captain Cook has Gone Before
by Tony Horwitz
My wife gave me this book for my birthday. I started it in November, but then I ended up switching to reading New York: An Illustrated History and didn't get back to this one till the end of January. I guess the reason I switched was that after reading a hundred pages, I really wasn't that enthusiastic. The book begins, rather excitingly with graphic detail of the author's berthing on an 18th century replica of Cook's Endeavor for a sail on the open sea. This quickly ends as a short jaunt, and the rest of the trip is a travel log, flying to the various places Cook visited, searching for Cook the man amongst the modern setting. This is alternated by synopsis of Cook's actual travels. I found the modern travel log quite unsatisfactory, not very enlightening and it felt more like an excuse for the author to travel to exotic locations for 18 months while researching a book than to really be central to any real insightful story. Topping this off by the fact that the author's companion is an alcoholic named Roger who is always drunk and whose great insight seems to be that life from the bottom of rum bottle looks clearer than any search for Cook. Finally, I had just read In a Sunburned Country , and I unfairly compared Horwitz's travel insight and wit to that of Bill Bryson's, and Horwitz failed at each turn. I would not recommend this book over another that was an actual history of Cook, although I don't yet know what is the best book upon that subject.
Embers
by Sandor Marai
With the soft paper back, with a muted painting of a woman on the cover, this book looks like its from Oprah's book club. But its something entirely different all together. Not only this but Oprah would never have chosen this book since the author is dead, was Hungarian and didn't write in English and she couldn't parade him out on her show and laud him with praise.
What an amazing book though. Set in the crumbling shadows of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the story unravels a mysterious and tragic tale of an old General and whose calcareous life shadows dark secrets, and is revealed through the return of his best friend that he has not seen in forty one years.
I was captivated by Sandor's magnificent prose, his cutting insight and the perspective he paints of a man grown old. It made me think of my grandfather, who is 83 and wonder at how he views the world. Sometimes it seems he is bewildered to still be alive, tired of living, yet unable to exit.
I wont really talk more about the details as that would spoil the story. I will say I was very captivated, anticipatory of each chapter and there were several times I was shocked by the revelations.
In
the Heart of the Sea:
The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex
by Nathaniel Philbrick
This is the story of the Whaleship Essex that sailed from the island of Nantucket (off the coast of Cape Cod) in 1819, at the height of whaling industry from the whaling capital of the world. The ship sailed around Cape Horn at the tip of South America and was sunk in the Pacific by the very prey they hunted, an 80 foot Sperm whale. This story later inspired a young whaler Herman Melville to write Moby Dick. The crew was forced to abandon ship and sailed in small whaling boats for 93 days over 4500 miles. Through this voyage they faced life's darkest moments of survival, and the deepest moral conundrums. The author sums the story up the best: "The Essex disaster is not a tale of adventure. It is a tragedy that happens to be one of the greatest true stories ever told."
Philbrick not only has carefully researched all aspects of the story, but he also is an excellent writer and spins a very solid tale. I was struck by the gripping white knuckle experiences that the Essex faced. As you read through it the main foil to the story is yourself, as you wonder what you would have done faced with similar circumstances. Additionally one thing that struck me was comparing the story of the Essex with that of Shackleton's. Philbrick makes his bias pretty clear when he aptly describes it as : "Sir Ernest Shackleton and his men, who put themselves in harm's way, and then they had the luck to live out an Edwardian fantasy of male camaraderie and heroism." I had to chuckle at this, it was so revelatory of so much of the British attitude in the 19th century, much like The Worst Journey in the World, where men set off in the dark of arctic winter when the sun does not shine with temperatures a teeth shattering 70 degrees below, pulling a 700 lb. sled in search of Emperor Penguin's eggs, for the noble cause of science. Talk about self inflicting yourself with adversity. Life has enough pitfalls prepared without digging a hole and jumping in.
Moby
Dick
by Herman Melville
I finally finished Moby Dick! It was a long haul, several times I nearly gave up, and several times I definitely stalled. This book is so many things, and at once so different than what I thought. I came to the book after my previous reading, In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex, and because of this I in some sense ruined my appreciation for one aspect of Melville's odyssey.
This book is really almost three different books in one. First in the words of the introduction written by Clifton Fadiman it is a "a myth disguised as a story". In this sense one might mistake it for a novel, a tale of revengeful fixation gone wrong. However you quickly realize as you wade through the chapters the story is not contiguous. Interposed with the story are chapters which make up the other parts. Secondly, there are chapters that are filled with allegorical Shakespearean type soliloquies, with dense language that is rich in metaphor and latent with meaning that one has to dig to unearth. I was amazed at Melville's capacity for circumlocutory prose. Lastly the book is an encyclopedia of whaling, with pages and pages devoted to every aspect of the whale and the industry whose aim it was to kill them. An entire chapter devoted to the tale of the whale, another to the head, and another to the blow-hole. To cretaceously uneducated there is much to learn. However since I had just read a book on the Essex, I was well versed in whaling, and Melville's additional verbose exposition combined with the chapters of allegory almost did me in.
I suppose they all weave together to make a classic tale, but I would not be surprised to find others daunted by the breadth and depth of the novel. All in all its a classic I can say at least I have read.
The
Syndrome
by John Case
I was going to write up a more detailed review, but I upon revisit have decided not to. Bottom line, this book was for me a desired and deserved break from respected literature, and despite the fact that I knew it was a thriller, it was disappointing compared to his previous two novels. It felt like a cheap rip off of The Bourne Identity, where the plot, characters and resolution was unbelievable. Having said that The Genesis Code was a great book. One finally thought actually, any agency powerful enough to pull off the stunt that is the main premise of this book, would have easily squashed the two main characters in 15 minutes after the murder scene.
Peace
Like a River
by Leif Enger
Wow! I was blown away by this book. This has to be one of my top ten books of all time. Which of course makes you wonder what my list may be, I'll pause to reflect myself and state in no particular order that the only two that readily come to mind are Cold Mountain and Crossing to Safety. Well, add this to the list. The fact that this is the guys first novel is astounding, though clearly not the first thing he has written. Reading this book was similar to Crossing to Safety, where the prose itself transported you to another plane. Not only individual sentences and turns of phrase, but entire paragraphs and pages that so richly told the story, words pale in their ability to describe, and "scene" is wholey inadequate. Tom Walker from the Denver Post, said it best: "Once in a great while, a book comes along that has such wonderful characters and marvelous prose, that you read it as much for the pure joy it offers on every page as to find out how it ends." I won't waste more words attempting to approach description, other than to say I really loved this book and that my wife read this first and told me for months I should read it. I wish I would have listened sooner.
La
Salle and the Discovery of the Great West
by Francis Parkman
Rene-Robert Cavelier De La Salle(1643-1687) is a name that you might be able to conjure up from a high school history lesson on New World explorers, but not much detail will probably come to mind. This is an amazing book that truly is enjoyable to read, the kind of history book you wish your teachers had used. It covers the life of La Salle, his accomplishments and the wild midwestern territory he ranged through. An odd thought to consider an unsettled midwest, to read about the Wisconsin, Detroit, Chicago and Illinois rivers, the cataracts of Niagara falls, the Green Bay of Lake Michigan and Lake Winnebago, none of them holding the meaning they do today. What's even more amazing is that Francis Parkman, the books author, dedicated the history to the 1844 class of Harvard College, this guy wrote a long time ago. And despite that he writes very well, there are times when he is a bit flowery, but for the most part his descriptions really bring to life the late 1600s. One thing that is annoying is that Parkman includes long quotations in his footnotes in French. I understand that La Salle was French, and that he and many other French people wrote in French, but the reason I am reading the book is because I read English, so the fact that the quotations are in French is not that helpful.
This book cover's the short life of La Salle, his discoveries and failed business schemes. I particularly enjoyed the description of the Native American tribes that he encountered. So much of our historical notions in K-12 are gross generalizations and over simplifications, typically tribes are not individuated and are just referred to as Indians, or at least if not they are conceptually categorized this way. While there were definite cross cultural traits such as the calumet, which La Salle used often in his interactions, but there are still so many distinctions as well. It was refreshing to read the about the different tribes, most who have disappeared completely.
La Salle covered an amazing amount of territory ranging from Quebec/Montreal to the Gulf of Mexico. His ability as a leader of woodsmen, his canoemanship and his ability to survive in the wilderness was paramount; his ability to turn a profit and turn his exploratory ventures into settlements much less so. His urge to explore seemed to continually undermine settlements he built. He first settled a huge tract of land at Fort Frontenac at the head of the St. Lawrence river as it exits Lake Ontario. This was quickly leveraged for further exploration down the Illinois river, the Missouri and Mississippi rivers. La Salle built a second settlement at Fort St. Louis, just south of Lake Michigan on the Illinois River. No sooner that this was barely established, than La Salle made an effort to provide a trade link with Fort St. Louis by establishing a settlement at the mouth of the Mississippi River in the Gulf of Mexico, a highly desirable vantage point for trade and empire building. To fund this, La Salle went to France to convince the King, received approval, and secured 4 ships, a garrison of soldiers and 140 colonists.
They set sail from France for the New World, but La Salle's leadership skills failed with such a large group and bitter distributed command with the Naval military captain. Trouble at sea met with misfortune in their arrival as they overshot the mouth of the Mississippi and continued sailing past in a futile search for the opening. Eventually they disembarked in frustration near Galveston bay and the Navy ships having fulfilled their obligation returned to France. It is seldom in our "civilized" existence we are thrust into a situation where we come to the brink of our existence and transition from living, to the surviving on the razors edge. The colonists had left comfortable lives in France for dreams of good fortune and wealth in the New World, soon they were struggling for their lives. The ship with stores and supplies ran aground at the mouth of the "Mississippi" river, strong surf broke her open and destroyed the contents. The settlement waited in a make shift fort while La Salle and a group went searching for the real Mississippi, hundreds of miles distant. Sickness, alligators, hostile tribes and tension in the group quickly reduced the number over the course of months from 140 to 45. Things became so strained amongst the settlers that eventually a small group conspired against La Salle and assassinated him when he returned from a foray. Stripping his body they left him for the wolves. A small group struggled back up the Mississippi to Fort St. Louis and then on to Montreal where they returned to France. La Salle's epic life ended in tragedy and ruin.
Harry
Potter and the Goblet of Fire
by J.K. Rowling
In lieu of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Book 5) -- which should arrive this week, yes, I broke my rule. I am re-reading Book 4. It had been long enough since I last read it, and they are such a fast read anyway it is easy to for me to forget a lot of detail. I won't really say much about it other than, I enjoyed reading it again.
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
by J.K. Rowling
Wow, 870 pages. Goblet of Fire was only 734. The publishers played games by making the paper of OOP finer and the book therefore is about the same width as Goblet which has much thicker paper. I won't ruin anyone's pleasure in reading the book for themselves, just a few general comments. There were things that really annoyed me about the story, but that was Rowlings intent. They weren't annoying due to flaws in the tale, but deliberate techniques by Rowling. Each book has the great effect of fulfilling the hype, this one is no disappointment, and creating a real palpable sense of anticipation for the next. Looking forward to #6.
The
Map That Changed the World : William Smith and the Birth of Modern Geology
by Simon Winchester
Stacey gave me this book last year for Christmas. It is written by Simon Winchester, who also wrote The Professor and the Madman, which was a fascinating book about the creation of the Oxford English Dictionary. This story was a bit more challenging to get through. I did learn many interesting things, but the topic was just not as thrilling, nor was the story or the telling as compelling. And clearly the title engages in hyperbole. Not entirely sure I can recommend this book in general, perhaps if your really into geology.
One interesting fact: the largest division of time is eon, of which there have been four, the current being the Phanerozoic, which means "visible life". The division goes from eon, to era, periods and epochs.
The
Da Vinci Code
by Dan Brown
Listened to this one on the drive out to Utah.
Gone
for Good
by Harlan Coben
Finished this in a couple of days, I had previously read Coben's other best seller Tell No One. This is clearly a summer read, but for the genre a compelling one.
Life
of Pi
by Yann Martel
This was given to me by Chris Fry at work, and I started it when I left my then current book in Utah. I am not sure why but I was skeptical at first with this book. Possibly because Chris told me that in many ways it was similar to Peace Like a River, which I really really enjoyed, and was therefore a tough comparison to make. And initially I had a bit of a tough time getting into the book. But after the first 90 pages setting the stage I really started to enjoy the story. I especially enjoyed the religious discussions. An aspect of religion that has always fascinated my has been commonality. Most religions, including my own, stress exclusivity. Yann forces an examination of the one great whole circumscribing truth in discussing, Islam, Christianity and Hinduism. Something that struck me in particular was the central role of prayer in the Islamic faith, something that was common knowledge but I had never considered, especially in light of my own beliefs. Another aspect that I pondered on was the encounter with the divine. A lengthy quote from the book:
"One such time I left town and on my way back, at a point where the land was high and I could see the sea to my left and down the road a long ways, I suddenly felt I was in heaven. The spot was in fact no different from when I had passed it not long before, but my way of seeing it had changed. The feeling, a paradoxical mix of pulsing energy and profound peace, was intense and blissful. Whereas before the road, the sea, the trees, the air, the sun all spoke differently to me, now they spoke one language of unity. Tree took account of road, which was aware of air, which was mindful of sea, which shared things with the sun. Every element lived in harmonious relation with its neighbor, and all was kith and kin. I knelt a mortal; I rose an immortal. I felt like the centre of a small circle coinciding with the centre of a much large one. Atman met Allah"
Later on in the story he writes:
"At moments of wonder, it is easy to avoid small thinking, to entertain thoughts that span the universe..."
This made me question: "When was the last time I encountered the divine?" My daughter's birth? Holding Sofi for the first time in the hospital? Surely not the most recent, but certainly two of the most memorable moments. Another was recently at scout camp in Wolfeboro. We camped one night on a elevated flat of granite above and away from camps. The night sky wrapped around us with a myriad of stars, more than I remembered there being or had seen for a long long time. The milky way splashed bright and wide across the heavens, and laying there on my back I could all but feel the curvature of the atmosphere and the frame of space that spread out as the universe cradled around the horizon. The majesty of space and God's creation was awe inspiring.
Finally, and briefly so as to not spoil the meat of the story, I enjoyed the story of struggle. The mythology, the allegory and the tale of survival. Thought provoking, in a way reminiscent, though much more lyrical, of the story of the Essex.
Isaac
Newton
by James Gleick
One of the aspirations of my life is to come to a layman's understanding of science. One general aspect of learning and teaching that has always fascinated me has been the ability to present a subject matter in such a fashion that despite its complexity, can be understood by presenting simple metaphor and building concepts in a linear fashion leading to comprehension. A dream of mine would be someday to teach general history survey courses in college, and perhaps in High School as well, and do so in such a fashion that was both exciting, inspiring and educational. Anyway, science is an area that I am trying to build up an understanding of. I have a friend who inspires me, he is a bona fide a nuclear physicist and it always amazes me at his scientific knowledge. In pursuit of understanding I set off to read this biography.
Gleick has written a terse and dense biography of one of the most intellectually influential "scientists" of the "modern" era. I write scientist and modern in quotes to denote that our perception is particular skewed with the latent meaning we bring to both of those concepts and that not only is it not clear that Newton associated himself with either terms, it is certain that his world view was very different from our own. One particularly striking point along these lines, was the fact that Newton was avid in his pursuit of alchemy, although this fact was not known till long after his death. In the current Newtonian world of formalized science there is a clear distinction between the reputable study of the elements known as chemistry and the disreputable unscientific magical study of alchemy. But Newton lived in a pre-Newtonian world. Newton himself was not a Newtonian, in all the sense that we think of the word.
Gleick makes Newton accessible. He distills an essence of Newton, and skillfully presents vista's into Newton's life, in a short 191 pages of a very small book whose dimensions are only 8 by 5 1/2 inches. This is amended by 47 pages of footnotes as well as 18 pages of acknowledgment and sources. I am not knocking the size, merely noting its shape.
Gleick is a great writer, mostly pulling off a well written and understandable presentation of Newton, his research, writings and habits. He has done a great service, for Newton was a prodigious writer. Tucked away in one of the last footnotes of the book is an enlightening quote regarding one of Newton's books described as a "work of colossal tedium...read today only by the tiniest remnant who for their sins must pass through its purgatory". Gleick notes that Newton had written a million words prior to the publication of one. Newton was a very isolated and withdrawn individual who often would spend days in his room, and he prodigiously copied entire books, paraphrasing and filling volumes with his own writing. Writing seemed a vehicle for focusing and organizing his thought processes. Much of his writing was never published, and so this biography in many ways allows a view of man whose breadth otherwise would be inaccessible to save but a remnant, if not by the staggering volume, then the inscrutable intellectualism.
One final point that struck me was how much of the modern world view, that I am so much akin to, is grounded in Newtonian principles. Gleick notes that "What Newton learned entered into the marrow of what we know without knowing how we know it." Namely a reducible universe, with first causes, and laws that govern behavior in a universal fashion. First principles and universal gravity have at their philosophical underpinnings fundamental principles that are the very fabric of the way we perceive the world.
Post Script, while Newton described and laid bare the laws of the universe, he could not do so without wonder and mystery. Gravity had no known cause, no known agent as its first principle, Newton noted this "question I have left to the consideration of my readers" And so it goes.
Shadow
& Claw: The First Half of
the Book of the New Sun:
The Shadow of the Torturer/The Claw of the Conciliator
by Gene Wolfe
So I have not read fantasy in a long time, probably since high school. I found that after reading several different series that most of them were pale copies of Tolkien's Lord of the Rings, with no real new themes or elements. However on the recommendation of a friend I decided to give the Book of the New Sun a whirl.
This is really two books in one, being published originally as the fist and second books of series. I read the first half before getting side tracked in Quicksilver. After quitting that book I got started in on Surely You're Joking because Stacey forgot to bring Shadow and Claw to Disneyland and I happened to have Fenyman's book in my bag.
Despite initial reservations I really enjoyed this book and look forward, after a break, to the second half. Gene Wolfe deserves all the accolades he has received, he truly writes with great sophistication. This is good literature, not your typical titillating fanciful teenage fantasy. Wolfe's literary device is that this tale is one he translated from history written by its main protagonist : Severian.
Severian, the "hero", is an anti-hero of sorts. He is an apprentice in the Torture guild. The tale follows the hero pattern from unknown to what is hinted will be a position of power and prominence. Severian writing his history drops hints of his rise to position several times.
The setting is Urth, (reminiscent of Earth) and when the story is told Urth's current technology level is that of horses and swords, yet this is a degenerate state from a previous time of great technology. There are references to technology beyond that of Urth's current level, mentions of star travel, startling revelation of robots, and transporters. Even as Severian makes his way across Urth there are individuals that have technology beyond the sword, guns of sorts and laser type of beamers. And there are elements of the fantastical and magical for sure, but these are sometimes shrouded in techno-wonder and other times seem more like true magic. For example there is a journey through a swamp, where a woman is pulled from the water and lives again.
One thing that I really liked about Wolfe's writing style was that he feels no compulsion to describe in great detail the amazing world he has created. He reveals aspects of the setting as a natural part of the story. Never do you feel like he feels the need to illuminate how great of a world he has created and to describe in detail its entirety. He accomplishes very well the assumed sense that this existence is complete and real and he makes no effort to overtly explain it to you.
I won't spoil the tale with the too much plot or tales, just to say that I would highly recommend this complex and enjoyable series.
Quicksilver
(The Baroque Cycle, Vol. 1)
by Neal Stephenson
I had finished the first half of Gene Wolfe's Shadow and Claw, which is actually the first book of his series, and while visiting the bookstore I was captivated by a new book from Neal Stephenson, so I picked up a copy and while waiting for a movie to start I got captivated and jumped ship. However I am stopping. I hit 200 pages and my interest and frankly desire to read further have ground to a halt. Strange given that the story grabbed me enough to make me jump books. What started off interesting wore me down eventually with the tedium. Part of what sparked my interest was the fact that Stephenson set's the story is set in 1600's during the birth of Natural Philosophy and the Scientific Revolution, at least initially following the life of Isaac Newton. However from there the store began to mire in detail that while I am sure his historically valid or imaginatively created by Stephenson, did not hold my interest. The point and plot began to get lost in the verbosity of the story. I don't want to live the life of Isaac Newton day by day. I felt bad, because I really wanted to like it, and in general I never stop a book but will slog through them. And since this is a three part series I wonder what Stephenson's plans are? Has he already finished the other two? Will he even bother? Looking at Amazon 12 of the 14 reviews were negative. :( Too bad, but too true.
"Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!":
Adventures of a Curious Character
by Edward Hutchings (Editor)
When a colleague noticed I had read Gleick's book on Newton he asked if I had ever read the book by Gleick about the physicist Richard Feynman. When I replied that I had not, he suggested I read "Surely you're JOking, Mr. Feynman" and he mailed me a copy of the book. I really enjoyed it although around the end I started to wane. I would recommend the book but not as something you sit down and read straight through. They are series of essays or talks that Feynman wrote about his life. They are all quite interesting as you follow his adventures, but stringing them together consecutively, they begin to be a bit repetitive after a while.
I was a little surprised by his womanizing. He applied the scientific method to bedding women with the same drive as he did toward solving physics problems. And that's fine, choose your pursuits, but the references got a little old after a while.
You really don't get any taste at all for science or the pursuits he followed, this is really about his whacky curious adventures into all aspects of life outside or around his work. I look forward to reading Gleick's book and Fenyman's own Six Easy Pieces.
Angels & Demons
by Dan Brown
Dan Brown wrote this book 3 years prior to The Davinci Code, and from what I can tell this is the first thriller he wrote. Thrillers by their very nature follow a certain degree of formulaic structure, and this first novel defines a pattern that The Da Vinci Code follows to a T. Both are good books, but reading the two so close together was slightly distracting, but not enough to detract from enjoying the book. Here is the general pattern: conspiracy theory that involves historical religious symbolism set in a thrilling mysterious plot unwound with a literary hero figure (professor), a heroine and a direct protagonist who is guided by the the furtive mastermind. This book centers around The Illuminati, the Catholic Church and papal succession and finally anti-matter. Completely unbelievable, over the top and everything you would want in a great thriller. Additionally one of the things that sets Brown's thrillers apart is that they have very interesting based-in-truth religious themes. I highly recommend this as well as The Da Vinci Code. Just don't take what Brown writes too seriously or as the exact truth.
Eragon
by Christopher Paolini
As noted previously I had in times past read fantasy. Those were the days of youth. The classic works of fantasy: Tolkein's now infamous Lord of the Rings, Terry Brooks Shannara series, and Anne McCaffrey Dragon Riders of Pern series. During those salad days, I also played a lot of Dungeon and Dragons, but overall found the genre of fantasy a closed set of ideas in many ways. More recently I have read Pullman's Dark Materials series, which I thoroughly enjoyed, especially the first two novels, before what I felt overt ax grinding in the last book (The Amber Spyglass) lost the story. And I of course read Harry Potter, but view those as candy land popcorn forays into modern magic fairytales rather than fantasy per se. On a colleagues recommendation, I recently gave Gene Wolfe's Book of the New Sun series a whirl and while I really liked it, and it is loosely under the category of fantasy, it is really also just completely a category unto itself, mixing in elements of Sci Fi as well.
Eragon is not hard to categorize, it is fantasy in the purest sense: Dragons, elves, dwarves, magic, swords, good and evil, quests, hero's etc. The book is classified as young adult fiction, possibly because it was began when the author was only 15 himself. (The story of how the book got published is in itself a fascinating tale) And yet I completely enjoyed the book and was really captivated by the accomplishment of Paolini. He takes these fantasy themes, and while being consistent with them, makes them his own, creating a new and original tale within the genre, while making them is own.
If you have ever encountered Joseph Campbell, he posit's that the reason the hero myth is so compelling a tale is that it is the monomyth that is found in all cultures and consequently is part of our latent interpretive fabric. So when a really great rendering of the hero myth exists, we latch on to it. I think Star Wars is a great example of this. Paolini does the same, he weaves a great yarn, and much of the reason it is so good is because of his attention to detail and foresight in creating a believable and rich world.
I'll leave the plot lines and details to be discovered by your own reading and inspire you to with my enthusiastic recommendation.
Sword & Citadel:
The Second Half of the Book of the New Sun:
The Sword of the Lictor and the Citadel of the Autarch
by Gene Wolfe
I finished this book this morning while feeding Miles at 5:15 am. I enjoyed the first half of the Book of the New Sun series and I started on this one quite soon after I finished the first. In hindsight this was probably a little bit too soon. I really enjoyed the third book The Sword of the Lictor, but by the fourth book things started to get a little muddled, and the book started to plod. It could have been me, it could have been too much of a good thing too soon. One thing that started to bug me quite a bit by the fourth book was Wolfe's insistent on "translation" of terms that he provides no definition for. Usually even though you may not know exactly what the word represents, it is clear the general meaning of the word. Sometimes however it is not. Regardless let me say again that this is complex writing, not sugar coated pop-sci-fi.
Being able to finish all four books and look back on the entire series, I would summarize them as great sci-fi, great literature. A truly alien world and an alien social order that has reminiscent of both the past and hints of an advanced future. An odyssey myth of an anti-hero figure on a journey of destiny. A rich tapestry of a tale, that Wolfe introduces in a straight forward fashion. A world not to be expounded, where while not our own, is introduced as if it were a given. And yet you your only shown brief glimpses of all the complexity that is there; Hints of mystery and depth that are only brushed in passing.
A People's History of the United States : 1492-Present
by Howard Zinn
I am not sure if I will get back to completely reading the rest of this book, not because I don't want to, but mostly because the content and subject matter is not suited to a straight read through. I became bogged down because I tried to read it one shot. I'll endeavor to read a chapter at a time after each book I read, but we'll have to see. Despite this, I highly recommend the book and will review the chapters that I have read thus far.
Zinn is what many would call a revisionist historian. A historian who revises the history previously told. Make no mistake there is nothing scientific about history. It is no accident that you can break apart the word "history" as a compound: his story. Fact's by themselves have no meaning and tell no story, they must be interpreted and imparted meaning. (This is an passing reference to post-modernism, which would require much longer to discuss). Zinn is up front about bias and impartiality; he criticizes this about the history he revises, as well as the history he tells.
One of his basic hypotheses is that those in power tell the story, and thus the story is incomplete. For example the father's of our constitution and bill of rights wrote "We the people" and "all men are created equal", but we and all men did not include Native Americans, slaves or women. Consequently the disenfranchised (a shifting definition over the course of history) are missing from the standard histories of the United States. Zinn is not arguing that this state of affairs is always complicit, or Machiavellian. He acknowledges the milieu of the day, which while it can't be used as an excuse, can offer empathetic understanding. What Zinn seems to really want to do is no accept at face value the histories written by the enfranchised and the stories that are propagated in the bulk of public education. Zinn argue a different perspective and provides fodder for thought, not in just a different interpretive opinion but in additional "facts" and stories that you don't often hear.
This is a challenging and illuminating book that should not be dismissed, nor necessarily fully embraced, but pondered upon to be sure.
The
King of Torts
by John Grisham
John Grisham has been writing legal thrillers for some time, so long he has gotten bored with just writing about legal topics and has recently branched out into other ares. King of Torts is standard legal tender. However unlike some of his other novels which I enjoyed, Torts is like a box of HoHos, it's enticing and exciting while your munching your way through the box, but when its all done and you reflect back on what you just did your ultimately unsatisfied.
Grisham uses the story to turn a critical eye to the legal process of tort cases. While it was interesting to see how fear and greed (the crass essence of capitalism) become the circling motivation in the entire system, the tale is weak at best. There is complete transparency to the characters and plot; polemics are poorly disguised. The ending is apparent from the second chapter in the book. There is no protaganist, and the "hero", is more anti than admirable. Grisham needs to get back to better plot lines and more compelling story telling.