Book Review: The 39 Steps by John Buchan

In reading order, this was the latest of the classic "man on the run" or "thriller" series of novels from the early 1900's that I've consumed.  Alongside this one has been Rogue Male, Dance of the Dwarfs and Watcher in the Shadows by Geoffrey Household and The Riddle of the Sands by Erskine Childers.

All have a great English sensibility about them that I keenly identify with due to my WASPish upbringing which ads to my enjoyment.  Its easy to slip into the role of the protagonist when they are so similar to yourself or those you know.

That said, The 39 Steps, in my mind was the weakest of the group with the exception of Dance of the Dwarfs.  Not that it wasn't enjoyable, it was.  Buchan asks too much suspension of disbelief however for the story to have a great effect on the reader.

Richard Hannay, the protagonist is ID'd incorrectly as the murderer of a man holding critical information as to an impending German invasion of England.  His response to this is to go on the run across Scotland.  Bouncing from cottage to cottage, hotel to house, forest to river, Hannay is always one half step quicker than his pursuers.  Unfortunately it comes off more that his trackers are stupid and bumbling than Hannay is skilled and capable.  Again and again it is by the merest stroke of luck that Hannay isn't killed or captured while one should never fear as always at the most opportune moment shall a key item or piece of information fall into his hands.

Yes, I know this is a piece of fiction and that you have to have some "coincidences" to push the action along at times but you cannot fill a novel with deus ex machinas or else your reader will lose their sense of impending danger and wonder, knowing that no matter what happens, the author will always provide a convenient way out for the protagonist--and that's what happens here.

The novel has been heavily modified into both plays and films multiple times over the past 100 years, beefing up the storyline with love interests and female characters and a complete redo of the key plot elements so that the novel does not resemble the film or plays in much beyond some of the character names.  Given that 39 Steps is one of Hitchcock's early films, I will need to go back and watch it as it is claimed to be the start of all action, chase and thriller films to come.

Overall the novel is worth reading for its content and thematic core that falls into place with the other books mentioned above to form a common thread of works defining the British pre-war and interwar periods as well as portraying a very English version of what a heroic male is to be in this period--smart, self sufficient, honorable, loyal to country, able to withstand harsh conditions...almost a cross between a Boy Scout and a member of MI6...Not such a bad thing to aspire to...

Book Review: Dance of the Dwarfs by Geoffrey Household

Having read two previous Household books it is clear to me now that Household is a master of the "chase" or "hunt" genre.  All three involve a mystery of some kind whereby a protagonist is hunted down or haunted by an unknown or at least undetailed outside force.

In the two prior novels I had consumed, Rogue Male and Watcher in the Shadows, these outside forces had manifested themselves as other men, with both works selecting England as their location.  Dance of the Dwarfs trades man for a large otter (yes...an otter...) and England for South America, spinning its tale in the format of a diary in which Dr. Owen Dawnay recounts his time spent in the backwater of Brazil.

You may laugh at the idea of a suspense novel where an otter plays the foil to the human protagonist (an English, government sponsored scientist exploring the use of various terrain for farming) but the strength of the work is such that by the time our human storyteller meets his fate you don't view the opposing mustelids as a joke.

This work is not likely one that would remain in its current form if produced today given the protagonist is "gifted" an Indian girl of 15 (20 years his junior) who has already been passed amongst a few prior owners and who is immediately bedded by our narrator.  Sort of like how Hendrix's "Hey Joe" would never get made today.  Many of the narrator's expressed viewpoints would not be allowed today and never get past an editor who I can hear saying to Household "You just can't write that these days!!"  Perhaps Household is attempting to tell us something of his view of the white man's possession and use of the wild places the story inhabits as the more his main character falls in love with this Indian girl, the more endangered and closer to death he becomes.

There are also angles of criticism here regarding communism, science, religion, and feminist perspectives.  That the work has such depth despite being "only" a horror novel of sorts is impressive.  While not quite the work in terms of the suspense or detailed environment it creates compared to the earlier Household tales mentioned above it is still a solid addition to his library.

As a side note, I guess there was a "loosely based" movie made of this novel back in 1983 "starring" Peter Fonda and John Amos...it was decidedly a B movie affair, transformed the mustelids of Household's imagination into "lizard-men" and has not yet been deemed worthy of being offered on DVD though

The Forgotten Soldier by Guy Sajer

Haven't posted anything here in a while but wanted to for this book.

This work recounts the author's time in the German army during WWII.  Involved in the initial stages of Germany's retreat in the East all the way to the end of the war, the author experienced the worst of what the conflict had to offer and describes it in full detail.

The blood, the cold, the depravity, the cowardice, the heroism, the anger, hatred, frustration, disillusionment, starvation, mutilation...its all here.  Sajer doesn't shy away from his own failings and the work comes across as a beautifully honest recount of his service.  Which isn't to say the book should be taken as a pure academic recap of the German effort of WWII in the East.  It isn't.  It has inaccuracies as others have pointed out.  That's not the overall point and Sajer has been one to say so.

Its more of an emotional synopsis of his experience and the reader comes away with the feeling that no one should have survived what he went through and certainly no one sane could have.

This work is not one to delve into the issues behind Germany's efforts, there is really little mention of Hitler and zero mention of the Holocaust or other well known events of the war and its evils.  If you are looking for that or for Sajer to fall on his knees and beg forgiveness for having fought on the losing side, this is not your book.

If you are looking for an epically honest depiction of the German grunt's viewpoint of how it felt to be driven backwards by the unstoppable masses of Russian soldiers over a period of years through the worst of living conditions, then this is more appropriate.

I have not read a more vivid description of the obscene nature of ground warfare anywhere.  Nowhere else have I felt it better shown the indifferent nature of combatants as to their superiors motives or overarching goals, rather these are purely men fighting for the man next to them and merely in the hope of living to see another day.  Politics and preaching are absent here...as you come to realize, they are in all trenches.

Book Review: The Caine Mutiny

Maudlin, melodramatic, simple, cliche...all of these MIGHT be used to describe parts of The Caine Mutiny...they'd all be partly right and all be significantly wrong.

Some 500+ pages in length this Pulitzer Prize winning work is easy to read.  There are no verbal flourishes or complex structures--yet it fleshes out its characters in ways most novels only aspire to without leaving the reader wishing for plot progress.

Its supposed "main" character is Willie Keith, a young sailor who is an upperclass, spoiled, WASP from NY.  Wouk doesn't shy away from showing all the prejudices of the times (WWII era), blacks, jews, gays, Catholics, women in general, etc. are all viewed as lower than ideal--yet, this is where the book is most progressive.  It is the Jew who rescues Willie Keith and his friend, Maryk during their court martial hearings.  It is May Wynn, the poor Catholic girl, who Willie turns to and away from his WASP mother at the end of the novel.  It is the blacks who stand by and hold their positions on the ship while the white captain jumps overboard to save his precious novel.

At the time the novel was written and following very popular movie made (which I have not seen to date) WWII was only six years behind the audience in 1951.  Likely they were more thrilled with the prospect of reading about the actions on board a minesweeper in the midst of the Pacific War than they were in hearing of the social inequities and conflicts to come foreshadowed here (JFK's election as the first Catholic president, Civil Rights and Women's Rights battles to come) and if someone wants to point out instances of where these parts of the novel were brought up at the time of its publishing you can certainly do so.  To me it seems a book about 15 years ahead of its time.

That said, The Caine Mutiny is also a supremely entertaining novel.  Largely without battles or military conflict one might think of in a book occurring during WWII, the Caine (a decrepit WWI era destroyer) is relegated to menial duties--towing targets, escorting other, more important ships, etc. It is the personal conflict between the crew of the Caine (and particularly the primary protagonist, Willie Keith and his close crewmates) and its Captain Queeg, that move the story forward.  Herman Wouk's portrayal of a nit-picking, paranoid, under-educated, over-promoted captain is one so famous that the term "Captain Queeg" has become synonymous with virtually any overbearing boss, and rightly so.  I would encourage any business person to read this novel and see if they don't recognize a few Captain Queegs in their own organizations.  In fact, the novel may be an excellent educational tool for businesses in teaching management that any rigid adherence to regulation, focus on the minutia of process vs. the evidence of result can be a significant detriment to a staff and its efficiency.

Lastly, the book is a great, if brief, love story.  Largely "book-ending" the novel as it were, the romance between Willie Keith and May Wynn is far from ornamental.  As Willie grows from spoiled, ignorant, prejudiced boy to a man who can see the "grey" areas that exist in relationships and life in general, so does his relationship with May grow from careless dalliance between an immature sailor departing for war to one of respect and true love for the whole person that May represents.

Couldn't recommend this novel more highly.

Book Review: The Water Knife

This is the second novel I've read by Paolo Bacigalupi I've read with the first being "The Windup Girl".  Unfortunately I should have taken my feelings from that first novel and remembered them more clearly before picking up this one.

We are once again in the near future, though this time it is the very near future instead of a hundred or more years away.  While in "The Windup Girl" we were concerned with rising oceans and the absence of oil, here we are concerned with a lack of water, competing water cartels in the desert Southwest and the breakup of the United States

In both cases Bacigalupi writes in a style more attuned with his young adult novels where he got his start.  The language and rhythm of the writing is juvenile and simple.  Cormac McCarthy this is not.

Nor is this William Gibson.  The novel is almost "cute" in its portrayal of its dystopian future.  We have all the queues we see in our daily life just drawn a bit farther out--shiny Teslas, Chinese investment in American real estate, Google Glass like devices, drought ridden California and the Southwest in general, mentions of well known brands like Camelback, REI, Aquafina, etc.  Its like Bacigalupi just threw a bunch of New York Times articles in a blender and put the resulting mush on the page.  He isn't creating much or providing much insight here, he's merely regurgitating what we already know.  And that's the difference between someone like Gibson and himself.

Gibson will create things out of his own mind that do not exist yet and show you a vision of the future you hadn't thought could exist.  Bacigalupi shows you a future that's already been predicted and that you know won't happen because the world just isn't that easy to forecast.

"The Water Knife" is a good novel if you don't want to think and just want to say "Yeah!  Right on!  I think we're going to hell too!"  Sorry but I need an author to show me something I don't already know.

Book Review: Annihilation

Annihilation by Jeff Vandermeer is the first of three novels that make up the Southern Reach trilogy.  I have only read this initial volume and so I don't yet know if the series comes to a satisfactory resolution or if it trails off into boring drivel.

I do know that this first work is an excellent piece of "weird fiction".  There is certainly a Lovecraftian feel to the entire novel both in its use of language, style and content, though its differences are more than significant enough to stand on its own.

The story surrounds an ill fated expedition that is following in the footsteps of previous ill fated expeditions to an location dubbed "Area X".  The first person speaker relaying the novel is the biologist assigned to this four woman expedition and she recounts her travels around this Area X and all the strange things we encounter.  There are dolphins with human eyes, large lizard creatures waiting in the weeds, nefarious team members, microscopic parasites, strange lighthouse keepers, indescribably beautiful/horrifying/powerful creatures from seemingly another world, etc.  No real explanation to many of these observations is given leaving the reader with the disquiet feeling that they only have a small insight into what is going on.

The locale of the tale is within a Southern "transition-land" between the swamps, grasses, forest and dunes bordering the ocean.  The author's favorite Southern hikes taking place in the St. Marks National Wildlife reserve in Florida is the inspiration for much of the book's geography and gives the tale a great feeling of "being there" as the voice coming out of the novel has a great tone of authenticity.  There is a bit of lengthy Lovecraft-like wordiness to the work which sometimes gets in the way of the story as you can be lulled into lethargy by paragraph length sentences at times, though luckily these are relatively rare.

I'm very interested in seeing where the groundwork put down in this work leads in the next two and hope the author didn't use up all his great ideas, mythmaking and mood creation on this one novel as he's certainly composed a world worth exploring further.  I'll label it as my favorite fiction work of '14.

Book Review: River of Doubt, Theodore Roosevelt's Darkest Journey

Find me a better "adventure" yarn...you can't.

Truly stunning in its detail and readability this may be one of my favorite books of the past few years.  Rivaling other books like "Into the Wild", "Perfect Storm" and other modern recaps of "man vs. nature" this book may stand above all of them--certainly right there with them.

Covering Roosevelt's journey, after his first two terms as president and after his failed running for a third term, to run and map an uncharted river in the heart of the Amazon, the book stands as an incredible education on numerous subjects including Roosevelt, the Amazon, South American culture and history, history of South American exploration, American political history, race relations, father-son relationships, plant and animal examinations, etc., etc.  I came away from the book feeling more educated about more things than I have from any work in longer than I can remember.

Which is not to say that the book is uninteresting.  Written by Candice Millard who has previously worked for National Geographic it is written in a clear, concise and coherent narrative, reading like an Indiana Jones film.  You have political intrigue, cannibals, murder, theft, wild rapids, infection, sickness, starvation--and yet its all true.

Throughout the work you sit there stunned that any American president would even contemplate such and adventure, let alone lead it by his force of will.  The days of someone as strong and as independent minded as Roosevelt are long gone and this book makes you hunger for them more than you had realized possible.

Pitch perfect in nearly every way Millard's recounting of the near loss and death of Roosevelt during this expedition that was world class in its ambitions deserves to be read widely and often.  It has you reading it like a summer potboiler trying to consume each page so that you can get to the next while realizing you're reading one of the most remarkable episodes of 20th Century American history.  Read it.  You deserve it.

Book Review: The Moon is a Harsh Mistress

My goodness...

I have yet to consume any Ayn Rand but I would imagine that Heinlein's The Moon is a Harsh Mistress has got to go up there with Rand in terms of solid Libertarian manifestos.

"I am free, no matter what rules surround me. If I find them tolerable, I tolerate them; if I find them too obnoxious, I break them. I am free because I know that I alone am morally responsible for everything I do."

and

"I beg of you — do not resort to compulsory taxation. There is no worse tyranny than to force a man to pay for what he does not want merely because you think it would be good for him."

These are just two of the numerous quotes from the novel that truly resonate with me and I would think with many of the libertarians and Silicon Valley inhabitants among us.

The novel itself is, in theory, science fiction, as it takes place primarily on the Moon and in the future (such as it was imagined when Heinlein wrote the work in the mid '60s).  Heinlein, like a proper great sci-fi author has a wonderfully imagined world of a penal colony on the Moon where the Earth sends many of its undesirables (not just pure criminals) to work as a compulsory labor force producing food for the starving masses back on the homeworld.  You have underground "warrens" where people live, a shortage of women driving all sorts of varied family structures, a mish mash of racial and religious backgrounds, a "self aware" computer, rock throwing rail guns, a global Lunar Authority, etc.  The novel is a futurist's thesis writ large.

Which isn't to say that this world is perfect--the participants are still tied to physical lines of communication--land lines for goodness sake!  But Heinlein can be forgiven for smaller items like this.  His overall call to arms for a rational anarchist revolution is an idea that grows with value each day.  A society with no laws or rules besides ones own morals may be a libertarian fantasy but that's not to say its not something to strive for.

While the main character of the novel is Manuel Garcia O'Kelly-Davis who speaks to the reader in a Russian like patois it is Professor Bernardo de la Paz who gives the novel its motion and inspiration.  la Paz is the theoretician and rational anarchist behind the Moon's revolution against Earth and it is he who drives the ideas Heinlein is directing to the reader. While I'm certainly not one to subscribe to all the ideas herein (and as this is a novel made to both entertain and to challenge it is NOT a political diatribe) the book does present a persuasive argument for revolution against authoritarian regimes as well as the subversive methods by which one might begin such an enterprise.  As with the best sci-fi novels, The Moon is a Harsh Mistress is both an excellent critique of our modern world and an entertaining supposition on where we might be heading.  Well worth the read, it should really get your hamster spinning.

Book Review: The Razor's Edge by W. Somerset Maugham

Picking up this book from a recommendation on the "War on the Rocks" website was an excellent choice. I had head Maugham's name before but never read any of his works. I now will likely read a number more.

The Razor's Edge straddles the periods of the worlds of English literature between say Hemingway and Fitzgerald and that of say Kerouac and Ginsberg. Here, published in 1944, some 13 years prior to the printing of On the Road we have a book covering the search for individual enlightenment involving Eastern philosophies attained via a visit to India by the protagonist. Additionally we have frank discussions of sex, homosexuality, drug and alcohol addictions, religion, social castes, rampant materialism and the choice to "drop out" of societal norms. To say that Maugham was ahead of his time is an understatement.

Leaning back on themes more prevelant in Hemingway and Fitzgerald however, The Razor's Edge concerns a WWI aviator who is traumitized sufficently by his experiences that he comes home to reject all the comforts afforded him as a well to do member of Chicago society. He wants nothing of the cushy investment job offered to him, nor anything of the beautiful but material/society driven woman he had been betrothed to. Instead he wants to "loaf" meaning to search out a greater meaning in life that than offered by modern American society.

Maugham's style is clear, direct and conversational. There are few minced words or sublteties and the book is eminently readable. The structure to the novel is also excellent as Maugham places himself within the story as an observer coming into and out of the lives of the protagonists over the course of many years. The reader observes the rise, fall and self destruction of all involved and no one escapes with their "self" intact.

The weakest part of the work comes when the lead character--Larry Darrell, sits with Maugham and explains just what it is he has found upon his long stay in India. Larry's recounting of his time spent with a guru and learning to find his highest self through meditation and other Hindu practices comes off as a college freshman's dabblings in alternative religions and neither powerful nor explanatory in any satisfying manner. Western culture's coming interest in all things Eastern is forecast quite nicely here.

Outside of this one chapter however the book is quite powerful and riveting. The characters are real in that, to use a cliche, you feel as if you could almost reach out and touch them--likely because we all know people in our lives quite similar to them. If you can get through this work without a twinge of sadness for the tragedies and intellectual searchings befalling those who exist only on the printed page herein, you have a harder heart than I. I always view books that can stir my emotions and my thoughts in the best of regards--and that's what The Razor's Edge has done for me.

Book Review: Caliban's War and Abaddon's Gate

I decided to do this review and include both of these novels as they finish up the Expanse Trilogy that I began with the earlier review of Leviathan Wakes a bit over a month back.

While S.A. Corey's initial novel in this series was very entertaining and a complete work in its own right, the follow ups are less baked.  Leviathan Wakes saw the death of its strongest character, detective Miller, and the rest of the series suffers for it.

Caliban's War and Abaddon's Gate centers on Jim Holden and the other crewmembers of his ship.  Holden is too "good" to be a main character...he is given no flaws other than his "goodness" and "honesty"...not real great flaws to generate action within a novel.

Additional problems arise in the story itself.  While Leviathan Wakes largely focused on a traditional "missing person" hunt and alternated between two characters, the next two novels either repeat that same premise (the missing person) or wander off into an underdeveloped premise without anything remotely close to a satisfactory resolution while adding a bunch of weaker characters to the mix.

Both novels lose the impressive world building nature of Leviathan Wakes and no longer feel fresh while the invasion of the solar system by an alien weapon system dispatched billions of years ago, falls almost to the wayside in both works and the story focuses on almost solely the human to human intrigue--which is a large part of the unresolved nature of the entire series.  Everything that Leviathan Wakes builds towards is left hanging in the next two novels with little learned and nothing gained.

I wish I could recommend these two novels and the series as a whole.  The series isn't a total loss as there are certainly ideas and themes here that are valuable--particularly the "world" building contained within the initial novel.  The descriptions of how humanity moved out into the solar system and the conflicts and machinations that occur with that move are extremely well done.  If possible, the series might have been better hewing even closer to a more traditional military/whodunit style of works.  The authors don't do a great job with their big driver of the series--the alien "protomolecule" and thus...it ultimately isn't worth it.

Book Review: Leviathan Wakes

Written by the combination of Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck under the pen name of James S.S. Corey (why?), Leviathan Wakes is one of the first large form Sci-Fi books I've written in quite some time and one of the most entertaining I've ever read.

Make no mistake, this isn't "hard" sci-fi.  You won't be getting into multipage descriptions of the technological minutiae of a propulsion drive or the math required to calculate the force necessary to move a heavenly body out of its orbit.

What you do get is a fully formed and eminently believable "world" in which the story functions.  Extrapolating from today's space technology, political machinations and corporate expansion, Corey weaves an extremely detailed pathway for his characters to ride.

Corey also does a fantastic job of literally weaving the story together--taking two characters and alternating chapters between them until they come together later in the story and then towards the end returning to the alternating perspective as the characters again are separated.  The convention works well and lends itself well to holding the reader's attention.

The story itself involves the hunt for a missing woman and the eventual conspiracy that is uncovered as being responsible for her death (? here as I'm not sure she really "dies").  You have all the typical features of a great sci-fi story with space battles, weird creatures, items floating around, the danger of space's vacuum, etc.  In fact, much of the story carries familiar aspects that we've all encountered elsewhere--whether its in Alien, Blade Runner, 28 Days Later, Outbreak, etc.  Corey is not exactly breaking new ground in terms of storytelling but he has wrapped together a number of genres into a very entertaining package.

With Leviathan Wakes being the first novel in a trilogy, it does what it sets out to do--which is to get you looking for the next chance you get to buy the followup.

Book Review: The Skies Belong to Us

As a long time fan of Wired magazine (I was a subscriber from issue #1 for many years before my interest in all things computer related waned but have been following them more closely again as they have branched out into so many other areas) seeing that the author of this book possessed some Wired pedigree got me beyond just viewing the front cover as I knew it would be well written and interesting.

I was not disappointed. Brendan Koerner uses one airline hijacking in particular to delve into the whole skyjacking phenomenon prevalent throughout the 60's and 70's. From the reluctance of the airlines to submit to passenger screenings to the sometimes off the hinges methods behind the skyjackings, Koerner covers it all with humor and insight. This is not to say the the book is funny, its not. Its just that its overall attitude is an off the cuff, slightly irreverent one that I enjoy.

One comes away from the book understanding why skyjacking rose in prominence and frequency during this period and why it is nearly extinct today. In today's world of undressing, full body scans, explosive material wipedowns, confiscation of water bottles, etc. it seems downright amazing that in 70's individuals were allowed to board unscreened, unsearched and virtually unquestioned. Carrying a loaded gun onto a plane?? Sure, have at it!!

Not only that but the policies in place by both the airlines and the federal government virtually ensured via their complete capitulation to the hijackers on all terms and conditions (a million dollars?? Sure!! Here you go!) that the numbers and severity of the instances would only increase.

While the book focuses on the hijacking of a plane in California by a Richard Holder (African American, Vietnam Vet with delusions of the many and varied kind) and Cathy Kerkow (a white, hippy, moron--are there any other kind?) and its resulting attempt to free a communist philosophy teacher from her murder charges while absconding with $500,000 at first to North Vietnam and when that didn't work out, to Algeria where they would join the Black Panther leadership in exile and eventually gain asylum in France where they were lauded by all sorts of left wing sympathizers (Jean Paul Sartre as one amongst many).

The story of these two wanna be world changers ends with more of a whimper than a bang (best thing to be said of them is that they never directly injured anyone during their escapades) but by that point you are satisfied with the book because you've learned so much. The advent of modern day airport security, the end of hijacking as we knew it (until 9/11), the collapse of Cuba as a haven for American terrorists, the virus spreading like nature of skyjackings, etc. It is shocking to someone of my age to find out that during the late 60's and early 70's that there could generally be said to occur a skyjacking on American soil every week. Compare that to the 1990's where there wasn't a single skyjacking in the entire decade and you realize the massive change that has occurred. Prior to reading this book I thought the famed case of DB Cooper (the guy who got a ransom and then parachuted out of a plane with said ransom into the wilds of the American Northwest, never to be found) was a one off instance--turns out it was one of MANY instances where hijackers commandeered an airplane, received money and jumped from the plane with a parachute (to one level of success or another). I was dumbfounded. You mean there was a time in recent history where people were routinely taking over planes, obtaining six figures ransom sums and parachuting out all around the country?? That's insane! And sometimes it takes a quality bit of reporting and storytelling to bring the craziness of our recent, overlooked history to light.

Book Review: Into the Silence by Wade Davis

I've read a good deal of non-fiction over the past few years, a lot of it revolving around military history and another good portion of it around outdoor adventures.  Into the Silence covers both topics and covers them in a manner better than any work I've come across.

Truly a staggering achievement, Davis' book was seemingly marketed toward the Into Thin Air crowd--not that there is anything wrong with that--but this book covers so much more than just Mallory and Irvine's ill fated attempt at Everest in 1924.

It covers not only the 1924 expedition but the series of exploratory expeditions and attempts in the years leading up to the 1924 edition as well as the participants upbringings and particularly their experiences in WWI.  Its hard to describe just how comprehensive Davis' work is.  Davis goes through all the members of all the expeditions amounting to several dozen individuals and doesn't skimp on the information provided on any of them.  Details are pulled from personal diaries, military documentation, interviews with descendants, films, photography and a seemingly endless list of other sources.  Everything is detailed in the copious appendixes though the work is not simply a regurgitation of other peoples facts and figures.

Davis tells this story with a flair.  He sets the groundwork and background of the period in which these individuals grew up in and where they came from.  He details the affect being brought up in privileged, private, all boys schools had on them, how their war experiences changed their world views, how they interacted with the Tibetans they encountered on the expeditions.  Everything is here.

And its anything but boring.  Davis includes absolutely horrific experiences of the trenches and covers a great deal of WWI history (you could do worse in learning about WWI than reading this non-military history book) and wonderful scenes of exploration across Tibet.  Which is also an integral part of this work--the history of England and the Raj and their interactions with Tibet.  Again, the coverage of England's relationships with Russia and China and others are covered here as well as English politics of the time.  Really there is so much that is covered here its insane and the fact that it is so entertaining makes it the best piece of non-fiction I have perhaps ever read.  If you have any interest in WWI, England, Tibet, Everest, Mallory, etc. then you owe it to yourself to read this book.

Book Review: A Dawn Like Thunder

This focused and personal account of of one specific flight group in the Pacific during WWII covers in detail what can be argued to be the two most pivotal battles of that campaign.

The Battle of Midway and the Guadalcanal campaign can be viewed as the turning points in the naval and ground efforts and torpedo squadron eight played a key role in each.

Author Rober Mrazek pulls no punches in this work, feeling free to critique all levels of the Naval forces involved--from individual squadron commanders to full blown Admirals, none who deserve blame escape it.

And that's perhaps the most revelatory part of the book--that the US forces could be mismanaged, misdirected and poorly lead and yet still, due to both luck and skill, end up victorious.  Torpedo Squadron Eight benefited from both of these factors to become the most decorated group of Naval aviators in US history.

Initially assigned outdated and outclassed aircraft the fliers of this squadron were often presented with suicidal missions and faced them without hesitation.  There is no real happy ending here as virtually every individual Mrazek introduces you to via devoted chapters will meet their fate either via accident, flak or the hands of a skilled Japanese pilot.  The chances of returning alive from taking part in both of these battles seems to be nearly zero.

A Dawn Like Thunder is a solid work covering a detailed look at one specific unit during two key events of a long campaign.  It covers these events from the 100,000 foot level in terms of overall strategy, movements and decisions to focus on a smaller group of individuals.  This doesn't make the book bad, just a tad limited in its scope.  If you already know the basics of Midway and Guadalcanal this book makes an excellent addition to your detailed knowledge of the events, but make sure you obtain a broader view of these events from other works as well.

Book Review--The Financial Lives of the Poets by Jess Walter

OK, maybe I just don't "get" book reviews...

I went searching for book reviews for The Financial Lives of the Poets to see some other viewpoints on the novel.  Thing is...most don't really tell you their opinion of the novel.  Almost like the authors are scared to say ANYTHING good or bad about it.  And we're talking the supposed educated, in the know, class of reviewers in editions of the NY Times and Washington Post here!!  Surely they should be able to tell you whether they even have an opinion on a work or not, shouldn't they?

Alas, no...instead what you get is a couple hundred words summarizing the plot in a fashion no different than reading the back cover or inside leaf of the book (should you be purchasing hardcover!) and then tell you that its "whip smart with bleeding edge current references", blah, blah, blah, and never getting to whether its truly worth your time.

Not here.  Contrived and recycled.  There.  Lets begin.

So a poor newspaper journalist and his wife overextended themselves by purchasing a large house, sending their kids to private school and a car they didn't need.  Then when said journalist tries to start an ill fated website that merged poetry with financial advice and subsequently loses the newspaper job to which he was forced to return, his life is a shit-show.

That's the basic starting point for Jess Walter's satirical novel.  The supposed "giggle giggle" solution to all this mess for the protagonist is to turn to selling pot via a group of young malcontents he meets one night on his way to buy milk!!  Holy cow!!  Isn't that funny!!  A suburban, upper middle class white guy has to turn to selling drugs to keep his house from getting foreclosed upon and his car repossessed!!  Wow!

OK, so some might say this is satire and that I missed the point of the humor.  I didn't.  It isn't funny.  Its been used--Weeds, Breaking Bad, etc. to name a few in current times at the very least (I'm not up on my drug culture media references).

Its not only the retread of an idea that really isn't new to begin with that is a problem here, its the entire tone of the novel.  It came as no shock to me in reading a section about the author that HE is a newspaperman himself.  To call the novel a personal screed would be closer to the truth than calling it a satire.  As the protagonist "wonders" how he (and by inference the rest of the country) got into such a mess, you wonder "Why on earth didn't the author just write in with his thoughts to the Op-Ed page of the NYT rather than writing this novel?"

As a satire the novel doesn't bring any "wow" factor to analyzing the situation our country found/finds itself in, nor is the author brave enough to lay the blame at any one's feet.  Like his high protagonist the author waffles this way and that, kinda blaming everyone and no one at the same time.  If he targets any one cause for our populous's financial woes its our American consumption and "keeping up with the Joneses" mentality.  The phrase "keeping up with the Joneses" is one that is about 100 years old at this point...the "satire" contained within this novel is nearly as old, and stale...

The language Walter uses to craft the novel is clear, modern and concise.  His descriptions of characters and modern living are fairly spot one.  It is unfortunate that the premise behind the novel and the author's inability to craft a new idea or insightful criticism of modern society leave it so hobbled.