Candice Millard, River of the Gods: Genius, Courage, and Betrayal in the Search of the Nile
(New York: Doubleday, 2022), 349 pages including notes, bibliography, and an index. In addition are 16 pages of prints.
It’s amazing that in the middle of the 19th Century, vast areas in places like Africa remained unknown, including the source of the Nile. . In comes Richard Burton, the English explorer, who put together a team to find the source. While he didn’t succeed, one of his assistants and nemesis, John Hanning Speke did discover and document the source of the Nile in a later trip. To put this in context of what was occurring in the world at the time, the first trip was when the Indian Mutiny occurred. Speke’s later expedition was during the American Civil War.
This book is filled with excitement and misadventures. One such event involved an attack attacked in what is now Somalia, which was just as dangerous then as now. In the attack, a spear pierced Burton’s cheeks, leaving him with a lifelong scar.
I have had this book has been on my radar for several years, but I found myself questioning if it was worthy to read. the time in to read it. But having read the other three books by Candice Millard (The River of Doubt, Destiny of the Republic, and Hero of the Empire), all of which I enjoyed, I finally decided to give this book a try. I’m glad I did.
Millard provides biographical information not only of Speke and Burton, but also several others involved in the expedition. One of these, Sidi Mubarak Bombay, was most interesting. An African, his village was attacked when he was a child. Taken to India as a slave, upon the death of his master, he came back to Africa and helped with all the expeditions.
Burton and Speke’s relationship was always tense. At the end of the expedition, Burton fell ill which delayed his returni to England. Speke, who went ahead of him, claimed credit for the expedition’s finding. The story of Burton and Speke ends tragically. The two were to have a debate, but hours beforehand, Speke died from a gunshot. Was it an accident (as he was a skilled and safe hunter) or did he do it on purpose?
I found myself interested in Burton and may have to read more about his life. Burton mastered languages. As a non-Muslin (he was mostly agnostic), but with a master of Arabic and having studied the Koran, he traveled to Mecca and participated in the Hajj. Dressing the part, he passed himself off as Shaykh Abdullah. He lived to tell of his adventures which he published in a book.
Unlike Speke and most Britains, Burton preferred native dress. He also didn’t see himself as superior just because he was British but respected the people and their customs. However, some things he abhorred such as the Arab slave trade through Africa, which was still going on in the middle of the 19th Century. However, his interest repulsed many in Victorian England such as translating the Karma Sutra into English.
A side story in this book is the relationship between Burton and his young wife, Isabel Arundell. To the horror of her mother, Isabel fell for Burton when she was vyoung. They had a long relationship, but because of Burton’s travels and her family’s disapproval, they didn’t marry for some time. Not only was Burton not affluent, the Arundells were Catholic. Isabel had even considered becoming a nun if she couldn’t gain Burton’s interest. She was willing to travel with her husband on his journeys, but Burton was beginning to slow down by the time they married. She remained devoted to him and helped him with his writings.
This is an exciting book and, somewhat like the first book I read by Millard, River of Doubt. In River of Doubt, she explores a 1914 expedition by Teddy Roosevelt down one of the uncharted rivers in South America. Both books are good stories with lots of insight into the time and what those involved in the expeditions endured.
James M. Dixon, Things I’ll Never Forget: Memories of a Marine in Viet Nam,
Malcolm Hillgarter, narrator (2018, Brilliance Audio),9 hours and 36 minutes.
Graduating from high school in 1965, and not sure what he wants out of life, Dixon joins the Marines. Describing the dinner where he broke the news to his parents is well told. His mother drops her coffee cup and leaves crying. His father congratulated him, but then you learn the family are Quakers, even though his father had served in World War 2. Dixon had initially wanted to join the Army rangers with a friend. But they discovered he was slightly colorblindness and the Army refused to take him. Leaving, he and his friend talked to the Marine Corp recruiter, who promised all kinds of things which turned out not to be true. Unaware of the lies, the two signed up.
The first part of the book tells of his experiences in boot camp at Parris Island. I didn’t realize they had shortened basic training and advance infantry training as the war begin to heat up. Humor fills training experience.. After completing these two courses, he heads to school in Camp Pendleton, California, to be trained as a MP (military police). From there, he travels by ship to Vietnam, with stops in Hawaii and Japan. This was certainly no cruise with the overcrowded ship swaying in the high seas they first experienced leaving the West Coast.
Dixon’s first half of his Vietnam tour was as an MP, mostly guarding the Danang airbase. Then, as happened to many Marines MPs, the Corp transferred him to the grunts. This was much more dangerous as they ran missions into enemy held positions where they set ambushes (and at times found themselves ambushed). He tells the stories straightforward, without glamorizing or glorifying them. Some things he did and saw are hard to stomach. In one battle, he saw a VC dressed figure duck. He shot and then realized it was a boy without a weapon.
On another occasion, they dropped charges into a tunnel, thinking it was a VC hideout only to learn it contained a mother and children. Once, on an extended mission, they captured two VCs. The Lieutenant had the interpreter to ask one about enemy position. He refused to say anything, so the Lieutenant pulled his pistol and shot the man in the head. The other captured soldier began to tell them everything. When they felt they had learned what they could, they let him go, only to shot him in the back as he fled.
Dixon later became a radio operator. This was even more dangerous as radio operators were one of the three most likely positions to be shot by snipers (officers and corpsmen or medics were the other two). He didn’t like this position but when his platoon’s radio operator when down, he was nearby and ordered to pick up the radio.
During his time in Vietnam, he lost a lot of friends and several of their deaths stick with him. One of the saddest involved two buddies who had spent their time together. One was killed and then booby trapped by the VC, so when the other found his deceased friend, he rolled his body over only to take the bast of a grenade that had been planted under the body.
I am still not sure about this book. I can’t understand a Quaker who tells such stories without judgment. However, the book is well written. The author, after Vietnam, taught school for over 30 years.
After a period of dryness, the end of October turned cool and rainy. And, with watching an incredible World Series, it was time to pull out a puzzle. This is “The World of Jane Austen,” and is the third such puzzle we’d done, the other two focusing on Charles Dickens and William Shakespeare.
Erik Larson, The Demon of Unrest: A Saga of Hubris, Heartbreak, and Heroism at the Dawn of the Civil War
(New York: Crown, 2024), 565 pages with bibliography, notes, and index.
Larson is a gifted storyteller historian and has once again brought a story of a pivotal time to life. His latest book looks at the months between Lincoln’s election as President in 1860 and the attack on Fort Sumter in the harbor of Charleston, South Carolina.
As Larson has done so well in other books, he tells the story from several viewpoints. We have Major Robert Anderson, commander of the Fort Sumter garrison. He’s own slaves and has southern sympathies but is also loyal to the Union. There are those in Washington trying to avoid a war and refusing Anderson’s call for more supplies and troops in the fear such actions will incite a war and encourage other Southern states to leave the Union.
Larson follows radical southern secessionists, such as Edmund Ruffin, who worked hard to encourage states to leave the Union. He even got to fire the first cannon at the fort. There’s Mary Boykin Chesnut, the wife of a planter who was a part of South Carolina’s succession convention. Her diary provides a first-hand view of much of what happened from behind the scenes. And then there’s Sir William Howard Russell, a special correspondent from the Times of London. A famed war correspondent (having reported on the Crimean War), he had access to key politicians in Washington DC, including William Stewart and Abraham Lincoln. But he was late to arrive in Charleston.
During the waiting, the South built more batteries so the fort could be attacked from three sides. Lincoln finally authorized a fleet to sail with additional supplies and the ability to support the fort, but confusion still reigned. The main ship with the necessary firepower had been mistakenly sent to a fort in Florida, leaving the smaller flotilla unable to intervene. It arrived off Charleston the evening before the attack. Confederate guns and sandbars at the harbor entry kept the ships from supporting the fort.
The attack on Fort Sumter, led by Confederate General Beauregard, began in the predawn hours of Saturday, April 14th. Throughout the dark hours, the fort’s guns remained silent. During the bombardment, the men in the fort even gathered for breakfast. Anderson wouldn’t return fire until after daylight, when they’d have better views of the Confederate positions. During this waiting time, Edmund Ruffin worried that the fort wouldn’t fight back, making the Confederates look bad. But he received his wish as light appeared and the fort’s guns began to strike back.
Despite all the shells and gunpowder expended on both sides, no one died. The fort, which had been built to protect the harbor from enemy shipping, had a difficult time to train its guns on land targets. Furthermore, the best guns for such an attack were on the top parapet, which made them more open to Confederate shelling. Anderson kept his men safely inside the fort itself. The fort, which was almost out of food, had plenty of powder, but as fire burned, a larger concern came from explosions. Quick thinking by Anderson kept this from happening.
The Confederate forces spent much of the morning attempting to take down the American flag. When the pole was finally broken and the flag fell, Captain Doubleday (from whom legend has it created baseball), ordered guns to aim for a holiday hotel, The Moultrie, where many of the Confederate officers stayed. The guns blew holes in the hotel and sent men running for safety, but again, no one died. A makeshift flag was eventually raised during the battle.
Upon surrender, Anderson was allowed to give a 100-gun salute as he struck the colors and marched this troops out of the fort where they were to be transported to Union ships offshore. The salute was cut to 50 when one of the cannoneers was seriously wounded when gunpower in the cannon prematurely explode. He would die later in a Charleston hospital.
This is a good read and help me understand more about how the terrible war began. Larson begins each section with a quotation from The Code Duello. The 1858 manual laid out rules to be followed in duels. These rules provided a civility to such disputes, trying to maintain gentlemanlike behavior in conflict. Such behavior appears to have been honored by both sides at Sumter. Later in the war, things became uglier.
While I don’t think the book is as good as several other Larson’s books I’ve read (especially The Devil in the White City, In the Garden of the Beast, and Thunderstuck), it’s better than most books I read. This is the sixth book by Larson I’ve read. In addition to this book and the three above, I have also read Dead Wake, and Issac’s Storm.
Kevin DeYoung, The Nicene Creed: What You Need to Know about the Most Important Creed Ever Written
(Weaton, Illinois: Crossway, 2025), 93 pages including a general and scriptural index.
This year marks the 1700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea, from which came the beginnings of the Nicene Creed. The Nicene Creed would be finalized, adding a longer section about the Holy Spirit at Constantinople in 381 AD. For the Western Church, the creed was finalized in 589 with the addition of the filioque statement which says the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son. This last edition has not been accepted by the Eastern Orthodox Churches. But with this small difference, the Nicene Creed is the most accepted creed in Christendom, and used by Protestants, Roman Catholics, Orthodox, and Coptic Churches.
In this short book, DeYoung introduces the readers to the various heresies facing the church (mainly Arianism and Apollinarianism) which led to the writing of the creed. Arianism held to the idea that the Son was created by the Father, not co-eternal. Apollinarism attempted to discredit Arianism, by going too far in the other direction and essentially denying the humanity of Christ. The creed holds the concept of the Trinity together by maintaining a mystery.
DeYoung also fairly lays out both sides of the “filioque” debate. While he accepts the Western version of the Creed, he rightly sees the issue not as important as how the creed sought to maintain Christ’s unity and co-existence with the father. The filioque clause wasn’t added till the 6th Century with the Council of Toledo.
This is an easy book to read for anyone wanting to understand the importance of the Nicene Creed.
Taylor Branch, At Canaan’s Edge: America in the King Years, 1965-68
(New York: Simon & Schuster, 2006), 1039 pages with bibliography, notes, and index, plus 18 plates of b&w photos. Audible, narrated by Leo Nixon and Janina Edwards, (2023) 34 hours and 37 minutes.
I have now finished all three volumes of Branch’s “America During the King Years.” The last volume had more meaning for me, as I remember much of what happened. I would have been between the 3rd and 5th grade in elementary school during this time. I was in the 5th grade when Martin Luther King was assassinated and share below a memoir of that time. Like the second volume of the work, this one read more like snippets from the news media for each day. I mostly listened to the book on Audible but also read some of the interesting sections. Here are links to my reviews of the first two volumes:
At Canaan’s Edge shows the tension felt by Martin Luther King. Strains existed between King and President Johnson. Other strains were between King and those within the movement chanting Black Power and calling for violence. Ironically, this call to violence even came from the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee, which had left behind many of its founders such as John Lewis. And even those who were committed to his non-violent movement resisted King’s visions of expanding the movement to include all poor people and to work against America’s war in Vietnam. Branch helps the reader understand King’s troubles during the last three years of his life.
The book ends abruptly, with an assassin’s bullet striking King on the balcony of Lorraine Hotel in Memphis on April 4, 1968. King had just asked that “Precious Lord, Take My Hand” be played that evening as they dressed and prepared for the event. Then he fatefully stepped out on the balcony.
By providing a “play-by-play” history of what happens up until the shot was fired, Branch provides the reader with the complexity of the world. The beatings of civil rights workers on the Pettus Bridge in Alabama came at the same time as American’s first big engagement in Vietnam in the Ia Drang Valley. The miracle” of Israel’s 6-day war in 1967 occurred during the rising opposition to Americans in Vietnam and the Supreme Court’s decision to end laws against interracial marriage. And finally, King’s desire for a “Poor People’s March” on Washington plays out against the backdrop of the Tet Offensive in Vietnam. And as King’s life came to an end, President Johnson had just decided not to run again for the Presidency.
There was also much tension within the Civil Rights movement as some wanted to advocated violence (especially within the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee) who leaned into the Black Power movement. The tension also increased as King began to take his movement north, spending significant amount of time in Chicago, a move which caused his movement funds as donors, who supported the work in the south, began to withdraw their support.
Also, in the background of all that happened was the FBI, who hounded King. Even in the last month of his life, they sent anonymous letters to King supporters in the north saying that he had plenty of money. At the same time, they sent other letters to Black churches in the south saying that he was broke. This discouraged those interested in the poor people’s march to Washington (which was being planned), suggesting they’d find themselves stranded.
In these three volumes, Taylor Branch provides a wonderfully in-depth history of the Civil Rights movements. Some of this history is hard to recall, but it must not be forgotten.
Memories of ’68
(this is part 2 of a 4 part series I wrote 20 years ago and edited for this post)
I turned eleven barely two weeks into 1968. It was a big deal. I was finally eligible to join the Boy Scouts and go camping with someone other than my family. I wasted no time. Thursday, two days after my birthday, I attended the troop meeting. It’s amazing I stayed with scouting. I experienced more hazing in those first two meetings than the rest of my life. Brian and I were both new to Troop 206 and they put us in the Rattlesnake Patrol. The patrol consisted of a bunch of older guys (probably all of 13 or 14 years old). When the adult leaders weren’t nearby, they arrange things like beltlines for us to run. But it didn’t last. I’m not sure what went on behind the scenes, but by the third week, the Scoutmaster placed us in a new patrol. Gerald, an older scout, but new to the troop, became our patrol leader. We named ourselves the Cobra Patrol, consciously picking a snake more deadly than a rattlesnake. Gerald put an end to the hazing. In a way, he became a mentor. When I became a patrol leader, I always pondered what Gerald would do in a situation before I acted.
A week or two after being placed in Cobra Patrol, I made my first campout as a Boy Scout. We headed up to Holly Shelter Swamp and camped along the bank of the Northeast Cape Fear River. Gerald had us put our tents in a line. Brian and I ended in a slight depression. I argued that we should move our tent, having done enough camping prior to scouting to know we were in the best location. But Gerald was all for neatness. We stayed in a neat line and when the rains came that night, out tent flooded. I now had a second reason to quit scouting. Thinking back on my experiences, I can’t recall a camping trip that I’ve gotten soaked at night except for when I was a scout. However, Gerald made everything better, offering us his semi-dry tent. We assumed Gerald was going to sleep in our pool but found him in the morning asleep in the back of the equipment trailer, the only totally dry place around. The storm cleared and we dried out our bags and had a grand time in the woods, even though we kept having run-ins with our nemeses in the Rattlesnake Patrol.
We’ve come a long way since 1968. There were no I-pods, laptops, game-boys or other forms of amusements in our packs. All I had for fun was a nine-volt transistor radio and we listened to it that first night, as we tried to ignore or forget the moisture seeping into our sleeping bags. I could get the powerful 50-kilowatt station out of Cincinnati and a few local stations. And that night, laying in a sleeping bag on a bluff overlooking the slow waters of the Northeast Cape Fear River, between the music of the Beatles, Stones and Supremes, we heard news reports about the Chinese New Year and the Tet Offensive. For the first time Vietnam seemed real.
Our second night included a game of capture the flag, played pitting the Cobras against the Rattlesnakes. We didn’t win, but we went down honorably, and it would only be a matter of time before we did win. After the game, we had a big campfire, which concluded when our scoutmaster, Johnny R. told us the story of “the Hand.” He made it come alive. I’d hear this story a dozen times over the next couple of years, as he added new twist so that you were never sure when you’d nearly jump into the fire. That night we didn’t listen to the radio; we wanted things to be quiet so that we’d hear “the Hand,” in case it was about doing its dastardly deeds.
Our second camping trip with the scouts was at a camporee on the grounds around Sunny Point, on the Brunswick County side of the Cape Fear River. This gathering involved troops from all over the council and the theme was getting along with one another, with a special emphasis on racial harmony. All the scouts who participated in the event received a badge showing a handshake. One hand was light colored and the other darker, symbolizing getting along between the races. It was a lesson we’d all need to hear for soon all hell broke loose. But that weekend, we didn’t know that. Instead, we worked hard, and Cobra Patrol earned a red ribbon (next to the highest) while the Rattlesnake Patrol only received a yellow (participation) ribbon. I became a hero during the camporee in the signaling event. Few of the patrols had anyone who could read semaphore, and I shocked everyone with my newly acquired skill.
My self-instruction in semaphore came because of what was happening in Mr. Briggs classroom. My mother told me a few years ago about how she heard me talking about these things we were doing in his class and assumed I had a wild imagination until one night, Mr. Briggs called. And did my mother reward me for my honesty? NO! Instead, I was doubly grounded. Not only could I not leave our yard, but I was also stuck in my room except to go to the bathroom or to eat dinner. This sentence was to last a few years, but she relented after I brought my citizenship grade up a notch. In such tight confinement (and there were no TVs in my room back then, it really was a solitary confinement cell), I was stuck with reading. And my choices were meager. I could read schoolbooks, but I had a natural allergy to them. I could read the Bible but figured that if Mom saw me reading the good book, she might keep me grounded for my own edification. The only book of interest was the Boy Scout handbook, and I quickly set down to the task of learning semaphore (which I long since forgotten) and the constellations (which I still remember).
My third Scout camping trip was back to Holly Shelter Swamp. It was early April. We left home Friday afternoon, knowing of Martin Luther King assassination the night before in Memphis. Things went along well during the camping trip, but my nine-volt transistor radio brought in the news that violence was erupting across our nation. Somehow (along before cell phones), our Scoutmaster Johnny Rogina, a detective with the Sheriff’s Dept., got word to report for duty. But there were enough other men along that we camped two nights. Sunday morning, we packed up and headed back into town. Since our troop met in a church, we’d always come back from camping trips in the early afternoon, so as not to disturb the worshippers. But this Sunday, things were eerie. There were no cars on the road. All you saw were police and a few military jeeps. Rioting erupted in Wilmington, as it had in many cities, and the city was under a 24-hour curfew.
Since we lived out of town, far from where the rioting occurred, we weren’t really affected. Instead, we enjoyed a vacation from school, playing sandlot baseball and roaming the woods. With everyone being forced to stay at home, my parents cooked out that Sunday afternoon and invited our next-door neighbors. This was a rarity as I knew my parents didn’t like the man (I later learned that he was very abusive, but as an 11-year-old, I just thought he was a jerk). His wife was nice, and they had a younger daughter. She was several years younger than my sister but occasionally would be in the house early in the morning having slept in my sister’s room. I was an adult when my mother shared that these sleepovers was to protect the girl, as her father had gone on a drunken rampage. But even before learning this, when I first heard of sleeveless t-shirts called “wife beaters,” I envisioned that man in his backyard with wearing such a shirt.
This Sunday evening, after the Holly Shelter’s campout, I remember l sitting in a lounge chair in the yard as the neighbor told my dad (along with my brother and I) about the Wilmington Race Riots of 1898. “The Cape Fear River ran red with n—– blood” he said, suggesting a similar situation out of the problem Wilmington was currently facing. My parents, who didn’t allow us to use the “N” word, weren’t too happy with this conversation and this was the only cookout we ever had with them. Shortly afterwards, they moved. Interestingly, this was the first and only time as a kid that I heard about the 1898 riots. Later I’d learn the event was a massacre. The whites had a Gatlin gun just back from the Spanish American War, while the African American community attempted to defended themselves with hunting guns. I’d also learn later that the guy whose park we played little league ball in, Hugh McCrae, was the one who acquired the Gatlin gun. He, along with several other well-known names in town, were responsible for the “riot.”
I am not sure just how they restored calm to the city in 1968, as we lived far outside its boundaries. After a week holiday, we returned to Bradley Creek Elementary School where everything appeared normal.
I’ve taken this week off to officiate at a funeral in Georgia, which is why there were no sermon posted on Sunday. I’ll be back next Sunday.
James Taylor Concert
In addition to the trip to Georgia, we made another trip with friends to Raleigh, North Carolina last Thursday night, September 4, to attend a James Taylor concert. Although the singer has aged, he’s 77, he put on a good show. And whenever he sings, Carolina in My Mind,” in North Carolina, the crowd erupts as they did this past Thursday. Before the concert, a friend warned there would be no standing ovations as no one in the crowd would have the knees to get on their feet more than once. But that was not the case. He brought the crowd onto their (our) feet repeatedly. I loved all his songs about the road and travel. I appreciated his humor and political insights. When speaking about Carole King, he paused, looked to the crowd and said something like, “Oh, by the way, NO KINGS.” It was a good night.
Most of the summer we have been attending concerts at the Blue Ridge Music Center, which is mostly bluegrass, so it’s good to get back to a bit of rock-n-roll and the music of my youth.
The group of us waiting for James Taylor
Derick Lugo, The Unlikely Thru-Hiker: An Appalachian Trail Journey,
narrated by Derick Lugo, (2021), 7 hours and 12 minutes
I picked this book up on a two-for-one sale from Audible. It sounded interesting and humorous. While it doesn’t quite reach the humor of Bill Bryson’s, A Walk in the Woods, I enjoyed reading about his hike and recalling my own hike on the trail nearly 40 years ago.
Lugo is an African American, which makes him unique on the trail. While I met a few African Americans while hiking, most were only out for a day. The exception was Felipe, a reporter for Springfield Massachusetts, who hiked through his state to write an article about the 50th anniversary of the trail. While he seemed to get on the nerves of other hikers, I got along with him. When done, he sent me a copy of his articles along with a wonderful black and white photo of me resting against my pack as I wrote a letter.
1987, on the AT
Lugo was a city dweller. He had spent little time outdoors, which makes him an unlikely hiker. But he is open to learn from others. Furthermore, hiking the trail these days are different in that there are a lot more people on the trail. This allows him to learn from others the skills necessary for such a hike. Furthermore, he appears to be a genuinely nice guy. He strove never to use bad language and respected other hikers. His attitude paid off and he had a wonder trip, telling his readers about this journey and the people he met along the way.
If interested in the Appalachian Trail, I recommend Lugo’s book. An excellent storyteller, the book is a delight.
Gary D. Schmidt, Okay for Now
(New York: Clarion Books, 2011), 360 pages with chapter illustrations.
I have enjoyed many of Schmidt’s young adult books (Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boy, The Wednesday Wars, Orbiting Jupiter , and Trouble). His books deal with serious issues facing adolescence boys and the larger society. He reminds me of a male version of C. Lee McKenzie, who also takes on such topics with adolescent boys and girls. Lizzie Bright deals with racial issues in early 20th Century, Maine. The Wednesday Wars are played out against the backdrop of the Vietnam War. Orbiting Jupiter deals with teenage parents. And all the books deal with boys coming of age. I met Schmidt a couple of times when I was in West Michigan as he taught in the English Department at Calvin University. I had not heard of this book, but learned about it from Kelly’s blog and immediately picked up a copy at my local library.
Doug Swieteck is a young teenager who adores the New York Yankees, especially Joe Pepitone. The middle brother steals a hat of his that was a gift from Pepitone. It’s the 1960s. His oldest brother serves in Vietnam. While things don’t look good for him, it gets worse. He moves with his parents and older brother from Long Island to a town in Upstate New York when his father accepted a job in a paper mill. He doesn’t want to move and his first impression with his new town are not good.
In time Swieteck makes a friend, Lil Spicer. He takes a job with her father delivering groceries on Saturdays. The people in the town seem weird to him, but he gradually warms up to them. He also becomes enamored with the paintings of John James Audubon and with the guidance of a man who works at the library, learns how to paint.
Swieteck has much to overcome. His father steals from him, taking the salary from his Saturday job (even though he hides the tips he receives). His father’s friend, who got him the job at the meal, is a jerk and seems to egg his father on. The young Swieteck becomes a friend with the manager at his father’s mill at a company picnic. He introduces him to horseshoes, which Swieteck excels.
For a kid who seem to feel the entire town hated him, Swieteck has amazing experiences. Though one of the clients whom he delivers groceries to, he finds himself on Broadway in her play makes its debut (and Joe Pepitone is in the audience). Also, by the end of the book, things with his family seem to have improved, despite the fact his oldest brother has returned from Vietnam without his legs. But things are not all well, as his friend Lil suffers for an illness that threatens her life.
This is an easy read. Growing up is seldom easy as Schmidt shows. But a few helpful adults, hard work, and the right attitude can make a difference.
Joseph Heller, Catch 22
(New York: Simon Schuster, 1961), 443 pages, Audible edition (2017), 19 hours and 58 minutes.
I don’t know why I never read this book. I’ve seen the movie several times, but it’s been 15 or 20 years since I watched it last. The book, I think, funnier than the movie, which is hilarious. As this is a novel about war, it’s dark humor.
Yossarian (I love that name) is a bombardier on an island in the Mediterranean. The commander of his unit keeps raising the numbers of flights required before they can return to the states. Feeling he’ll die in combat, and that he has already flown more missions than others in the operation theater, he tries everything to avoid making more flights. His fear is heightened by the death of Snowden, a tail gunner on his plane. Yossarian comforts him and bandages up his leg, telling him he’ll be fine, only to discover a mortal wound under his flight jacket. The incident haunts Yossarian. Yet, when Yossarian is offered a deal to go back to the states, he can’t accept. The deal would be dishonest and not be fair to his fellow airmen.
This book has a legion of characters such as Major Major (named by his father as a joke) who becomes a major. One can imagine the confusion. Doc Daneeka, the flight surgeon, hates flying and bargains to be added to the flight rooster without flying. This allows him to receive his flight pay. His gig works well until the plane he’s supposedly on is shot down. The army declares him dead. His wife is notified and finds herself the recipient of all kinds of life insurance and burial benefits. She and the kids move without leaving a forwarding address while the doctor is stuck on a war theater without pay.
And then there is the dead man’s stuff in Yossarian’s tent who took off on a flight without having been officially received in the unit. His flight crashed and no one can touch his things since he wasn’t in the unit. And then there is Milo and ex-PFC Wintergreen, who run black market operations who trade with anyone, including the enemy. While they are making a profit (and everyone has a share in Milo’s operations), there are also missteps as when Milo buys all the Egyptian cotton one year and then is unable to unload it.
There’s plenty of sex in the story. The whores in Rome, cause some of the airmen to fall in love. One, Nately, dies in a plane crash. Yossarian has the unpleasant task of telling “Nately’s whore” of his demise. She, in turn, tries to kill Yossarian, and continues to try to kill him to the end of the book.
There are also relationships between airmen and nurses. The wives of their superiors are also tempting, especially the ignored young wife of training officer back in the states who insisted on drilling the cadets every Sunday afternoon. Violence and sex go together in the book. One officer rapes a maid, then throws her out of a window to her death. Yossarian confronts him as the sirens wail in the distance. Expecting him to be arrested for murder, the MPs march by the dead woman on the sidewalk and up the stairs. They arrest Yossarian for being in Rome without a proper pass. The book is filled with such surprising twists. of events.
The book, obviously reflecting on the anti-communist sentiment of the McCarthy era, has intelligent officers trying to trap everyone into confessions, from the airmen to the chaplain. Milo, with his syndicate, displays a weird loyalty to capitalism. He will do anything for a profit, including lifting morphine from the plane’s first aid kits. And why he tries to create his own monopoly, even buying and selling products among his own businesses, he doesn’t want to deal with other monopolies as that wouldn’t be capitalistic.
The incompetent rises to the top, such as the special services officer, who oversees entertainment and such pushing out the general over aviation to claim the spot. Absurdity wins. The classic “Catch 22” holds that you can’t fly if you’re crazy, but if you claim to be crazy, you can’t be crazy because only a crazy person would fly over enemy territory. Of course, in the book, everyone is crazy which drives Yossarian crazier. The book ends with Orr, who everyone thought had died when his plane crashed, is found washed up in Sweden, a neutral county. Of course, no one knows how Orr make it from the Mediterranean to northern Europe, but it’s enough to give Yossarian hope that he too can make it.
This is a classic book which I had a used copy for decades. I have no idea why it took me so long to get around to read and listen. I recommend it with a warning. The contains dark humor. Adult situations are numerous and there’s plenty of violence within the pages. The later should come as no surprise as the book is about war. The writing is amazing. Heller can twist a sentence and a delight to witness.
While I have completed a lot of books this past month, part of the reason is that two of the books were mostly read during June. I just happened to finish them in July! Also, as I am trying to find a way to reduce my library. For the past thirty-five years, I have had expense accounts to buy many of my books, which have resulted in way more books that one needs. I have once again begun to check out books from the library. Two of the books here (James and The Folly of Realism )were library books.
Leo Damrosch, Jonathan Swift: His Life and His World
(New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2012), 573 pages including notes and an index. Audio book narrated by David Stifel, 20 hours and 43 minutes.
Impressed with Damrosch’s The Club: Johnson, Boswell and the Friends who Shaped an Age, I explored other books written by him. Having never read a biography of Swift, even though I read Gulliver’s Travels twenty-some years ago, I dug into this book. Swift lived a generation before Boswell and Johnson. While I listened to the book, I also brought a hard copy to reread sections.
In addition to having read Gulliver’s Travels (and Swift’s short parody, “A Modest Proposal”), which made me curious about Swift’s life, in 2011, I was in Dublin. I attended worship at St. Patrick’s Cathedral. I knew Swift served as the dean of the cathedral. He was also buried there. I found it shocking to learn Stella burial is next to him. Stella, is a woman to whom he may or may not have been married. Learning this, I became even more intrigued with Swift.
I enjoyed Damrosch’s extensive biography. While somewhat academic, this book is very easy to read and includes lots of snips from Swift’s clever writings. In the prologue, Damrosch teases the reader with one of Swift’s affairs, then provides a brief survey of other Swift biographies. Chapter 1 begins with Swift’s early life, in which there are a lot of gaps and questions. It’s assumed he was born at his uncle’s house in Dublin, Ireland, in 1667. Oddly, as a toddler, Swift’s wet nurse Tok him to England. He wasn’t reunited with his mother until he was older. It is assumed his father died before his birth although Damrosch hits at other possible explanations. .
Damrosch leads us through Swift’s life. Swift thought highly of himself and I am curious if he ever preached on humility. He held out hope for a better position in life. Only later did he eventually settle in the position of Dean at St. Patrick’s in Dublin.
Even though he was born in Ireland, Swift considered himself as English. But in time, he became a champion of the Irish cause. But it appears his concern was only for Irish Anglicans. He didn’t care for the Catholics, who made up most of the Irish subjects. He also had disdain for the Scots and Presbyterians
Of course, the Anglican communion was filled with political landmines. Swift didn’t make it easy to navigate, especially after it was discovered he was the “anonymous” author of a satire of the church titled, A Tale of a Tub. In that book, Jack represents John Calvin, Peter the Catholic Church, both with whom he had issues. Marty was for Martin Luther, whom he seemed to admire more. However, Swift was more about enjoying life and making jokes and less concerned about theology. .
In addition to church pollity, Swift was also interested in the politics of the United Kingdom. Considering he lived during the first Scottish Jacobite Rebellions, English politics were never boring.
Swift also enjoyed women. In addition to Stella, there was Venessa. A woman twenty years younger, Swift and she carried on quite an affair. In their correspondence, instead writing about their sexual attractions, they substituted “coffee.” Each would write things like “I can’t wait to drink your coffee.” This silly way of flirting kept a rising member of the clergy from suspect.
In the end, after Stella’s death, Swift memory faded. He worried about such a fate. In Gulliver’s Travels, when Gulliver is in Luggnugg, he learns of people who do not die, but instead face eternal senility. Certainly, death was more desirable than living like that. By the end of his life, Swift lost his memory.
This is a massive book with great details into Swift’s life. If you’re interested in Swift, I recommend it.
Ron Shelton, The Church of Baseball: The Making of Bull Durham, Home Runs, Bad Calls, Crazy Fights, Big Swings, and a Hit
narrated by Ron Shelton, (2022), 8 hours and 12 minutes.
Shelton wrote and directed the 1988 movie “Bull Durham.” In this book, he recalls his minor league career in the late 60s and early 70s. He began playing Single A ball in Bluefield, West Virginia (which was eye opening for a boy from California). He eventually worked his way up to a Triple A team in Rochester, NY. During the first baseball strike, he decided to hang it up. The first half of the book talks about how his ideas for the movie came about. Almost everything in the movie, he experienced or heard about as a ball player.
In the second half of the movie, Shelton talks about the making of the movie. Kevin Costner, who played Crash Davis, immediately fell for the script and helped him promote it to studios. Susan Sarandon read the script and even though she wasn’t being considered considering for the Annie character, she earned the spot for the leading lady. The third star, Nuke, played by Tim Robbins, took longer to arrange. Durham became the setting for the movie. During the filming, Shelton continually battled the “suits” in Hollywood.
In addition to learning about how Shelton came up with this idea (based on a Greek play with his baseball experiences), the reader gets an insight into the hassle of making a movie.
I still remember watching the film in Ketchum, Idaho, the summer I was running a camp in the Sawtooth Mountains. I still think it’s a great movie and this book makes me want to watch it again.
Alexander Vindman, The Folly of Realism: How the West Deceived Itself About Russia and Betrayed Ukraine
(New York: Public Affairs, 2025), 290 pages including notes, bibliography and index.
Born in Ukraine, when it was a part of the Soviet Union, Vindman’s family became one of the last group of Jews to leave the country in 1979. Finding himself in America, he served and retired from the US Army as a Lieutenant Colonel. The last half of his career he worked as a military attaché for the United States embassy in Kyiv and Moscow and later for the President as an advisor on Eastern Europe. His positions allowed him a front row seat for much of what happened between the United States and Russia following the breakup of the Soviet Union. Of course, there may be some bias,. This is understandable with his background. However, the book is written in a way that strives to understand the positions of Russia, Ukraine, Europe, and the United States.
This book begins under the presidency of George H. W. Bush. The Soviet Union broke up and many of the former “republics” became independent states. During the first Bush’s term and the first half of Clinton’s term, American interest centered on freeing Ukraine from nuclear weapons. When the Soviet Union split up, Ukraine overnight became the third largest nuclear power in the world. But with Ukraine’s dark history of Chernobyl, it was willing to give up its weapons. Furthermore, it knew it couldn’t maintain the nuclear stockpile, especially as many of the weapons approached the end of their lifespan. In a way, Russia and the United States agreed (for different reasons) that the weapons needed to be dismantled and turned over to Russia.
Starting with the Soviet breakup and for the next 30 years, the United States respected Russia as the legitimate heir to the Soviet Union. For their part, Ukraine just wanted protection from Russia as it attempted to build a new country.
As the 21st Century began, both the United States and Russia found themselves on the same side of the war against Islamic extremism. After the nuclear weapons in Ukraine were eliminated, the United States looked the other way as Russia attempted to control the Soviet’s former states. After all, the United States needed bases in former Soviet states for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Under Putin, Russia strove harder to influence the politics of many former Soviet States, especially Ukraine and Georgia. They even hired an American political operative, Paul Manafort, to help them break Ukraine up so they would have more influence. Manafort later managed Donald Trump’s first Presidential campaign. Convicted for fraud and witness tampering, Trumped pardoned him.. Manafort helped soften the image of Yanukovych, whom the Kremlin wanted as Ukraine’s president. Yanukovych won in a Russian influenced election. . Afterwards the people of Ukraine, desiring to aligned with Europe, revolted. He fled the country. Russia then invaded Crimea and the Donbas. Vindman, working out of the Moscow embassy, was able to report on Russian soldiers moving into the Donbas, which Russia had said was a separatist movement.
Most of this book deals with the period from 1989 to 2014, when Russia began military operations in Ukraine. Vindman makes it clear that Putin’s desire is an empire, like that of the Soviet Union. And the belief in Russia is that without Ukraine, they will not be able to have an empire.
Vindman is critical of all Presidential Administrations. Much of our policy focused on maintaining a positive relationship with Russia, while forgoing ideals of freedom. Vindman shows the failure of America not living up to our own ideals about freedom as opposed to looking out for our short term interests when it comes to foreign policy. He argues that our foreign policy needs not only a realistic approach, but one which honors our ideals. This book provides the readers with an insight into what led up to the Russia attacks on Ukraine. I would recommend this book, along with Anne Applebaum’s Red Famine to better understand the Ukrainian situation.
Percival Evett, James
Version 1.0.0
(New York: Doubleday, 2024), 302 pages.
Surprise, I do occasionally read fiction. James is a fictional story in which Jim, Huck Finn’s sidekick in Mark Twain’s novel, tells his side of the story. I found this to be a good and fast read with some surprising twists which I won’t reveal in case you want to read the book. I hope you do and highly recommend it.
James shows us how those in oppressed situations must live to maintain peace and enjoy some safety. He and his fellow slaves must show deference to all white people. This includes the way they speak. James educated himself by teaching himself to read and “borrowing books” from Judge Thatcher’s library. But he can’t let on that he has read many of the classics and musts talk with the dialect of a slave. He also is unable to speak up when other slaves are punished. His most valuable possession is the stub of a pencil which he uses to write his thoughts down on paper.
Many of the stories are like those in The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. James and Huck spend their time on a raft and try to figure out life. They catch and cook catfish from the river. They run into the two con-artists, Dauphine and the King, who have a notion to sell James or to turn him in as a runaway and collect the reward. And they also meet up with a minstrel group without a tenor. Hearing James sings, the leader buys James as his tenor. However, to perform, they still must paint up Jame’s to make him “blackfaced,” cause no white crowd would come to see an actual black man sing. Through these stories, we see the absurdity of a society in which half the population are in bondage.
James’ mind is always on his wife and daughter, whom he hopes to buy out of slavery. The book ends as the Civil War begins. James frees his family and takes revenge on some who had been especially cruel. Instead of “lighting out to the territories,” as The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn ends, they move north. That’s enough hints to the story. There’s one larger twist you’ll have to read the book to learn.
My one complaint is that James is “too well read” in the classics. He has read (and carries on make-believe conversations with John Locke. Others he read include Voltaire. I found this hard to believe that one without a tutor could read and grasp the full meaning of such books. However, it’s still a good story.
Rebecca Solnit, Orwell’s Roses
(2021) narrated by Rebecca Solnit, 7 hours and 51 minutes.
“In the spring of 1936, a writer planted roses.” This begins the book, a sentence which, which in various forms, Solnit returns to throughout this collection of essays centered around the plant and the writer. Each section provides new insight into roses and to Orwell.
This is not a biography, even though the reader will gain insight into Orwell’s life. It’s more a mediation, as Solnit weaves together insights of the flower and Orwell. We learn about how and why the plant is grown. One tangent takes us into the greenhouses outside of Bogota, Columbia, where they grown most of the roses sold in the North America. We learn of the brutal conditions of those who work inside these compounds.
We also learn about Stalin, who Solnit suggests could have been Orwell’s muse. After all, much of his writing in the last decade of his life was in response to the world Stalin (and Hitler) attempted to create. While Stalin didn’t grow roses, he did grow lemons (or had them grown for him for unlike Orwell, Stalin didn’t get his hands dirty). Orwell, who politically was a socialist, feared what would happen in a totalitarian world.
The book delves into politics, economics, and aesthetics. The latter is important. During and since high school, I have read much of Orwell’s writings (Homage to Catalonia, Burmese Days, Animal Farm, 1984, and his much of his massive, Collective Essays). I don’t think I would have considered Orwell’s appreciation of beauty, but as I listened to this book, I pulled out my copy of his essays and reread several. Solnit is right. While Orwell was often sick and his view of the world wasn’t positive, he does appreciate beauty.
I highly recommend this book especially in our world today in which authoritarianism seems to have much appeal to many people. I believe you’ll appreciate Solnit’s masterful use of language as she conveys a sense that Orwell has something to say to our generation.
Richard Rohr, Falling Upward: A Spirituality for the Two Halves of Life
(San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2011), 198 pages including notes and an index.
I’ve had this book for a couple of years. Robert, a friend from Utah, suggested it to me in 2023. I brought it and my first attempt to read it just didn’t take. But the second time, something caught, and I read it. Possibility, this has to do with me pondering retirement. Two years ago, I was avoiding such thoughts. Now, I’m long past the age I could retire. The topic of retirement frequently on my mind.
Rohr divides our lives into two halves. The first half, we build a life. We also prepare for the second part. In the second half, we’re to be an elder, a mentor, and help others build. I like his distinction here of the two halves. He roots his thoughts in Biblical passages in addition to insights from his life, literature, philosophy, mythology, and other religions.
Early in the story, he shares a story of a Japanese ritual for those who served in the military during World War II. Many came home broken. They’d been loyal soldiers. Not knowing anything else, they needed to be helped to move into a new phase of life. They were thanked for their serve and then instructed by the elders in villages and cities to leave their “loyal soldier” life behind. They were now needed to help rebuild their society. This created a transition for those who had served in the military. Rohr then goes on to compare a successful transition to the older brother in the Prodigal Son parable, who was unable to let go of the past. Failure to let go of the past will lead to failure in the second half of life.
If we’re living, we’re changing. We need to learn to manage change within ourselves and our community. One of the keys to Rohr’s idea is to focus on the good of the community, something which I believe our society lacks these days. You’ll find lot more wisdom in this book. I recommend it.
I have been in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan for the past two weeks with limited internet and not very active in blogland. I’ll write more about my time there, including a 50+ mile paddle around Drummond Island over the next few weeks. Here are the reviews of the books I read or listened to and completed in June. The long drive to the UP allowed me to listen to two of these books.
Derwin L. Gray, How to Heal Our Racial Divide: What the Bible Says, and the First Christians Knew, About Racial Reconciliation
(Tyndale, 2020), 281 pages including notes.
Gray was an African American defensive back who played football for Brigham Young University and later for the Indianapolis Colts and the Charlotte Panthers. After several seasons of professional football, he was led by a teammate to accept Jesus. Later, with his wife, he started Transformation Church in Charlotte, North Carolina. His church is an intentionally mix-race congregation. Gray was a speaker at this year’s HopeWords Writer’s Conference.
In the introduction and opening chapter, Gray discusses why he talks about race so much in his sermons. God has created the world with a variety, a kaleidoscope of colors. God loves diversity and longs to bring us all together, through the church, into one family. However, our churches are often less diverse than most our secular world.
After the first chapter, Gray launches into a Biblical overview, where he starts with Abraham and discusses why he believes that God’s purpose from the beginning was to create a multi-racial family. While he mentions that concept of humanity being created in God’s image, he begins his survey of scripture with Abraham’s promised family. While I might have started at creation itself, by tying together Abraham’s story with the vision of Isaiah, the teachings of Jesus, and the writings of Paul, Gray makes the case that God’s desire is for a multi-racial family. Of course, like all families, in this sin-filled world it will be messy. But in the life to come, we will experience it in fulness.
In the second part of the book, Gray discusses what he has learned at Transformation Church and offers ideas for how we can forge relationships across color barriers. For white readers, he explains the differences in how blacks see the world from our perspective.
I appreciate Gray’s interpretation of God’s vision. This book would make a great study for a church group. Chapters are short and ends with a beautiful Trinity-focused prayers followed by highlights, questions, and ways to implement what is being taught.
Les Standiford, Palm Beach, Mar-a-largo, and the Rise for America’s Xanadu
narrated by John McLain,(Tantor Audio, 2019), 8 hours and 11 minutes.
I have been a fan of Les Standiford since I first read his book on the Florida East Coast Railway, Last Train to Paradise. Since then, I have enjoyed his book on Charles Dickens and the writing of the Christmas Carol, The Man Who Invented Christmas, and his book on business partnership of Andrew Carnegie and Henry Clay Frick, Meet You in Hell.
Palm Beach, Mar-a-largo, and the Rise of America’s Xanadu picks up the story of the visionary builder, Henry Flagler, whom Standiford introduced in Last Train to Paradise. In this book he mostly focuses on Flagler’s hotels and personal life instead of his railroads. Flagler first arrived in what would become Palm Beach in 1893. Soon, he was building resort hotels. After his wife was committed to an asylum (she thought she was engaged to the Russian Czar), Flagler obtained a divorce. Later, at age 70, he married a 34-year-old-woman from a wealthy North Carolina family, Mary Lily Kenan. Many North Carolina colleges have buildings named for the Kenans). The Kenans still control the Breakers, the five-star hotel Flager built on Palm Beach.
Early on, Palm Beach was a resort for the newly rich. These who people not accepted into the “old money society” of Newport and other locations. In time, with the likes of sewing machine heir/developer Paris Singer and architect Addison Mizner, Palm Beach became an exclusive place with Mediterranean styles. Standiford ponders if the high walls of the mansions and resorts were designed to keep out those who didn’t belong or to hide the scandal occurring within.
After Flagler, Standiford focuses on the Post family. C. W. Post, who established Postum Cereal Company, doted on his daughter Marjorie Merriweather Post. In her 20s, she inherited much of her father’s estate and expanded the business (even into frozen foods). Marjorie was the one who built Mar-a-lago (which means from the lake to the sea as the property goes from Lake Worth on the backside of Palm Beach to the Atlantic). One of the interesting marriages in her long life was to E. F. Hutton, the New York stockbroker. Marjorie, the richest woman in American, and was the “senior partner” in that relationship. During the Great Depression their marriage broke up, partly for political reasons. Margorie was a supporter of Roosevelt’s “New Deal” while Hutton felt FDR was a socialist and preferred “trickle-down economics.”
In the early 1960s, Marjorie even offered Mar-a-largo was a winter White House, but it was decided the building was too expensive to maintain and impossible to safely secure the president.
After Mar-a-lago had been shuttered for a decade, Donald Trump purchased the property at a basement price. From the beginning Trump ownership came with controversy. He bragged about paying more for the property until the tax bill came in at the higher rate, then he sued to get them to tax it at a much lower rate (from 13 million to 7 million). Finally, he worked out a deal to make the property a private club which provided him with tax favors and allowed him to share the burden of owning the property with others.
This is a fascinating story. I enjoy how Standiford weaves together the stories of interesting characters around Palm Beach.
George Saunders, A Swim in a Pond in the Rain in Which Four Russians Give a Master Class on Writing, Reading, and Life
Narrated by the author and others. (Random House Audio, 2021), 14 hours and 44 minutes.
Over the past decade, I have read and listened to several of Saunders’ collections of short stories. Saunders teaches at Syracuse University. This book is based on one of his favorite classes in which he uses Russian authors. Those he draws upon wrote during a creative period of Russian history (between Napoleon’s invasion and the Bolshevik Revolution). Each section of the book begins with the story. In the audio version, a different voice reads the story, followed by Saunders’ discussing it. Many of the stories are about simple every day and even mundane events. Saunders helps his students and readers see how such a setting can make a great story. The stories include:
Anton Chekhov, “In the Cart” Ivan Turgenev, “The Singers” Anton Chekhov, “The Darling” Leo Tolstoy, “Master and Man” Nikolai Gogol, “The Nose” Anton Chekhov, “Gooseberries” Leo Tolstoy, Alyosha the Pot”
Some of the stories like “The Nose” are quite funny and many of the others, especially “Alyosha the Pot” are sad. This book would be helpful for anyone wanting to improve their writing, especially if they are working with fiction! It is also a good introduction into Russian literature. Before reading this book, I had read some of Chekhov and Tolstoy’s stories, but not the others in the collection.
Alex Pappademas, Quantum Criminals: Ramblers, Wild Gamblers, and other Sole Survivors from the Songs of Steely Dan
audio book narrated by Michael Bulter Murray (Tantor Audio, 2024), 7 hours and 15 minutes.
The rock group Steely Dan blended jazz and weird lyrics into some memorable rock tunes. Donald Fagen and Walter Becker were the band’s mainstays. The two met in the late 60s at Bard College. Both loved jazz. In an earlier band in college, Chevy Chase (the comedian), played the drums. Over the years, Fagen and Becker drew on numerous other musicians to meet the needs of the sounds they sought, but the two remained the mainstay of the band until Becker’s death from cancer in 2017.
The band is known for mellow jazz-like tunes mixed, at times, with outrageous lyrics. Their songs feature those who down and out or on the other side of the law. These characters, which include drug dealers, violent or dirty old men, and a kid about seeking “cop suicide” as he yells, “don’t take me alive.” Other songs involve love triangles. And then there’s the desire for inappropriate relationships. “Rikki Don’t Lose that Number,” was about Fagen trying to date the wife of a college professor at Bard.
Mostly, the extreme lyrics are presented without moral evaluation. The music behind the lyrics mellows the songs. Fagen and Becker often refused to interpret the songs, leaving them for the listener to figure out or if not, just to enjoy. It’s not surprising that the band’s name came from sexual object in Wiliam S. Burrough’s novel A Naked Lunch.
Quantum Criminals runs through the discography of Steely Dan, while providing insights into the lives of Becker and Fagen. Those who enjoy the music of the band might enjoy this book. Or you might prefer to skip the book and just listen to their jazzy music without knowing all the secrets imbedded into the lyrics. The print book includes artwork by Joan LeMay depicting the characters in the songs of Steely Dan.
While I only completed two books in May (compared to five in April), I am posting three reviews. I finally set out to complete Taylor Branch’s trilogy about the Civil Rights movement in America. I have one more volume to go!
Jim Shea, Get Up and Ride: A Humorous True Story of Two Friends Cycling the Great Allegheny Passage and C&O Canal
(2020), 189 pages with some maps and photos.
Somehow Facebook knows my brother and I are planning to peddle from Pittsburgh to Washington, D. C. in late May. I learned of this book in which two brothers-in-law did the same trip in 2010 from a Facebook advertisement.
Two brothers-in-law. One teaches and has his summers off. The other finds himself between jobs. They decided to do the trip they’d been talking about for a few years. This book is easy to read and humorous, although much of the humor reminded me of listening in at a restaurant to conversation of a family unknown to me. This is not Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods or the writings of J. Marteen Troost traveling in the South Seas. But I did laugh and their stories helped me envision my own planned trips. I just hope the weather is as good for us as it was for them. (It wasn’t as I showed in my blog: Part 1and Part 2). I can handle one day of rain, but it would be a bummer to have a week of rain!
Most of the humor of the book come from the experiences of Jim and Marty before they set off to peddle to Washington. We learn about how they often vacation together (after all, their wives are sisters). While one is from Pittsburgh (and still lives in the Steel City), the other is from just outside Washington but now (or at the time of their trip), also lives in the Pittsburgh area. One is an avid bicyclist, and the other is kind of along for the ride. While there are a few humorous things which happened during their ride, most of the laughs come from how they relate within the two families.
The author of the book speaks of not reading much as if that means he won’t sound like a Hemingway or Steinbeck. At least he can make light of himself, but I would suggest that he read more and learn about how humor works. Bill Bryson’s short adventures on the Appalachian Trail, A Walk in the Woods, which he turned into an international best seller might be a good place to start.
Taylor Branch, Pillar of Fire: America in the King Years 1963-65
(New York, Simon & Schuster, 1998), 746 pages including index, notes, and one set of black and white photographs.
This is the second volume of Taylor Branch’s massive undertaking of chronicling the Civil Rights Movement during the life of Martin Luther King, Jr. Unlike the first volume (review below), this is less of a biography of King than recapping what happened in these three pivotal years to the Civil Rights movement. This included the Burmingham Church Bombings, the death of voter registration workers in Mississippi, and significant Civil Rights work in Mississippi, St. Augustine (Florida), and Selma Alabama. In the background there is the death of John Kennedy and America’s deepening involvement in Vietnam.
In a way, reading this book is like reading the newspapers for three years. At times, it seems Branch jumps around, but the movement was in such flux with events happening in multiple places at the same time.
The book also takes us inside both political parties in 1964, as they struggled with what to do with the Civil Rights movement. The Democratic candidate, Lyndon Johnson, had just passed the 1964 Civil Rights act, shifting African Americans further away from the party of Lincoln, who’d freed the slaves. Furthermore, the Republican candidate Goldwater tried to avoid discussion on Civil Rights, there were those within the party who used the movement to steal away Democrats who were unhappy with their party’s move toward supporting the movement. This was the campaign in which Strom Thurmond would become a Republican and Jackie Robinson would condemn his Republican party as being the party of “white men only.” Robinson would later leave the GOP.
Much is made of the FBI’s role with both King and other Civil Rights leaders. They helped solve the murders of Civil Rights leaders, but they also kept close eyes on the leaders of the movement, watching for communist connections. Through wiretaps, they learned of King’s infidelities an even used this to encourage King to commit suicide. They attempted to thwart King’s reception of the Noble Peace Prize, which he later received. They also called in Cardinal Spellman to give him the dirt on King to block a papal visit. While Spellman supposedly took the information to Rome, the meeting papal meeting still occurred partly due to the intervention of Rabbi Abraham Heschel. Like the first book in the series, King isn’t seen as totally a saint or sinner, but a man who struggled with depression and his own humanity.
Branch spends considerable time providing a background on the Nation of Islam and the conflict between its founder, Elijah Muhammad and Malcom X. The Nation of Islam created a vision of separation of the races and violence toward their enemies, which contrasted to King and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference vision of a beloved community. The book begins with a deadly police encounter after a Nation of Islam meeting in South Central Los Angeles in 1962. Toward the end of the book, the Nation kills Malcom X after he left the Nation for a purer form of Islam. His view of religion had become less racially focused, and he softened his stance toward King’s nonviolent resistance.
This book also shows the tension within churches over supporting Civil Rights. Not all African American churches supported the Civil Rights movement, with some seeing it too dangerous. After all, there were many firebombed churches in the American South during the early 1960s. Northern Episcopal bishops struggled with what to say as they didn’t want to be seen as challenging their southern colleagues. This led to the wives of some bishops taking up the clause. One of the interesting stories was the wife of a Massachusetts bishop and mother of the state’s governor, Mary Peabody, who was arrested and jailed for protesting in St. Augustine.
I recommend this book to anyone wanting to better understand the Civil Rights movement in America. I don’t plan to wait another 19 years before I read Branch’s third volume. The final volume holds interest in me as I remember some of the events which happened.
This review is from 2006, after reading the first book in Branch’s series:
Taylor Branch, Parting the Waters: America in the King Years, 1954-63
(New York: Simon and Schuster, 1988), 1064 pages including index, notes, and two sets of black and white photographs.
This book is an enormous undertaking, for both the author and the reader. The author provides the reader a biography of the Reverend Martin Luther King’s work through 1963, a view into the early years of the Civil Rights movement, as well as showing how the movement was affected by national and international events. This is the first of three massive volumes by Taylor Branch that spans the years of King’s ministry, from his ordination in 1954 to his death in 1968.
This volume also provides some detail about King’s family history and his earlier life through graduate school at Boston University. I decided to read this book after hearing Branch speak in Birmingham AL in June. It’s like reading a Russian novel with a multitude of characters and over 900 pages of text. However, it was worth the effort as I got an inside look as to what was going on in the world during the first six years of my life.
Branch does not bestow sainthood, nor does he throw stones. The greatness of Martin Luther King comes through as well as his shortcomings. He demonstrates King’s brilliance in the Montgomery Bus Campaign as well as in Birmingham. He also shows the times King struggled: his battles within his denomination, the National Baptist; King’s struggles with the NAACP; as well as his infidelities.
The FBI also had mixed review. Agents stood up to Southern law enforcement officers, insisting that the rights of African Americans be protected. They often warned Civil Rights leaders of threats and dangers they faced. However, once King refused to heed the FBI’s warnings that two of his associates were communists, the agency at Hoover’s insistence, set out to break King. Hoover’s inflexible can be seen as he reprimanded an agent for suggesting that King’s associates are not communists.
The Kennedy’s (John and Robert) also have mixed reviews. John Kennedy’s Civil Rights Speech (and on the night that Medgar Evers would be killed in Mississippi) is brilliant. Kennedy drew upon Biblical themes, labeling Civil Rights struggle a moral issue “as old as the Scriptures.” Yet the Kennedy brothers appear to base most of their decisions based on political reasons and not moral ones. This allows King to sometimes push Kennedy at his weakness, hinting that he has or can get the support of Nelson Rockefeller (a Republican).
Although we think today of the Democrat Party being the party of African Americans, this wasn’t necessarily the case in the 50s and early 60s. Many black leaders, especially within the National Baptist Convention leadership, identified themselves as Republicans, with Lincoln’s party.
Many of the black entertainers played in the movement. King was regularly in contact with Harry Belafonte, but also gains connections to Sammy Davis Jr., Lena Horne, Jackie Robinson, James Baldwin and others. The author also goes to great lengths to put the Civil Rights movement into context based on the Cold War politics. Both Eisenhower and Kennedy found themselves in embarrassing positions as they spoke out for democracy overseas while blacks within the United States were being denied rights.
The book ends in 1963, a watershed year for Civil Rights. King leads the massive and peaceful March on Washington. Medgar Evans and John Kennedy are both assassinated. And before the year is out, King has an hour-long chat with the President, Lyndon Johnson, a Southerner, who would see to it that the Voting Rights Acts become law.
As a white boy from the South, this book was eye opening. I found myself laughing that the same people who today bemoan the lack of prayer in the public sphere were arresting blacks for praying on the courthouse steps. The treatment of peaceful protesters was often horrible. There were obvious constitutional violations such as Wallace and the Alabama legislature raising the minimum bail for minor crimes in Birmingham 10-fold (to $2500) to punish those marching for Civil Rights.
I was also pleasantly surprised at behind-the-scenes connections between King and Billy Graham. Graham’s staff even provided logistical suggestions for King. King’s commitment to non-violence and his dependence upon the methods of Gandhi are evident. Finally, I found myself wondering if the segregationists like Bull O’Conner of Birmingham shouldn’t be partly responsible for the rise in crime among African American youth. They relished throwing those fighting for basic rights into jail, breaking a fear and taboo of jail. The taboo of being in jail has long kept youth from getting into trouble and was something the movement had to overcome to get mass arrest to challenge the system. In doing so, jail no longer was an experience to be ashamed off and with Pandora’s Box open, jail was no longer a determent to other criminal behavior.
I recommend this book if you have a commitment to digging deep into the Civil Rights movement. Branch is a wonderful researcher, and his use of FBI tapes and other sources give us a behind the scenes look at both what was happening within the Civil Rights movement as well as at the White House. However, there are so many details. For those wanting just an overview of the Civil Rights movement, this book may be a bit much. As for me, I’m looking forward to digging into the other two books of this trilogy: A Pillar of Fire: America in the King Years, 1963-65 and At Canaan’s Edge: America in the King Years, 1965-68.
This is my third trip to Bluefield, West Virginia for the HopeWords Conference, which is held in the beautifully restored Granada Theater. This year’s theme was “Writing in the Dark.” I have also attended this conference in 2022 and 2023. Unlike the other years, probably because I wasn’t feeling well, I didn’t take many photos.
Bluefield is an interesting setting to discuss hope and writing, as the city has struggled in recent years. At one time, Bluefield was a happening place, as Travis Lowe, the founding director of HopeWords loves to tell. Lowe grew up in Bluefield and while he currently lives in Oklahoma, he still considered Bluefield home. While coal mining was just a bit west of Bluefield, the city grew as a supply point for the mines and for the railroads that served the mines. Still today, cars of coal are built up in the Bluefield rail yard to be hauled to distant locations to “make the electricity to light up the world.”
I had only two complaints about this year’s conference. Neither had anything to do with the conference and everything with my enjoyment of the event. The first had to do with the pollen count in the air. It was at an all-time high. My head pounded. I just wanted to sleep, which was hard because of sinus drainage causing me to wake as I coughed. The second was the replacement of the flooring in the hotel I stayed. In previous ones, I stayed in Princeton, about fifteen miles away, and the hotels were nicer. This time, I stayed in a Quality Inn in Bluefield, Virginia, about seven miles away. The hotel was older and will be nice once the remodeling is done, but for now is under construction.
Wiman served as the main speaker this year. The last conference I attended, in 2023, featured Miroslav Volf, a theologian from Yale. In introducing Wiman, Lowe noted that when Volf was the featured speaker, he confessed that he wasn’t worthy and recommended his colleague at Yale, Wiman. While Volf had much to add to the conference, it was a pleasure to hear Wiman, an excellent poet.
In Wiman’s opening lecture, he discussed faith and God, in contrast to religion. We only experience a fraction of God, yet we don’t have to name God for God to be God. God is always God. And our faith needs to be growing, as we put away our childhood and silly notions of the divine.
On the second day of the conference, Wiman and Lowe had a conversation. For some reason, I assumed (wrongly) that Wiman was European. He grew up in Texas, raised by parents who were first poor, then his father became a physician. He told about attending First Baptist Church in Dallas and writing a poem which first line went, “I love the Lord and He loves me.” He gave the poem to Criswell, the pastor, who had it published in the Baptist Standard. Wiman joked that his first poem was published when he was eight.
Anderson was the first speaker on Saturday morning. This was a shame as I found her insights some of the best at the conference. Most attendees (myself included as I was five minutes late) missed the opening of her talk. Focusing on the conference theme, she spoke about a personal time of crisis (darkness) in which she felt she would never write again. She discussed the need to give herself permission to write again. She also reminded us how, in darkness, we can use other senses to experience the world. But she warned writers not to give too much artificial light into a dark situation. She closed with an essay of hers on Psalm 74, where she acknowledges that God creates light but doesn’t obliterate darkness.
I had read one of her books, Humble Roots, a few years ago. I picked up her book, All That’s Good, from the conference bookstore and recently read and reviewed it. I look forward to hearing wonderful things from my congregation about her as she’s scheduled to preach for me on June 22.
This is Prior’s third appearance at HopeWords. Like Wiman, I’ve also seen her at Calvin’s Festival of Faith and Writing. She began discussing her upcoming book on “calling,” and then gave suggestions for those wanting to be writers:
1. Study language. 2. Read good words by others. 3. Seek honest feedback. 4. Writing is not the same as publishing. 5. Journal, it’s a place for you to record and work out ideas and you may have them burned after your death. 6. If you want to write to feel good about yourself, do something else. Writing is humbling. 7. Don’t write to make a living. While Prior is making money from writing, it’s only after 30 years of teaching in universities. 8. Do the writing you’re called to do.
Gray and his wife pastor Transformation Church outside of Charlotte, NC and has published several books. I am currently reading his book, How to Heal Our Racial Divide: What the Bible Says, and the First Christians Knew, About Racial Reconciliation.
As an African American, Gray attended Brigman Young University on a football scholarship. He later played five years for the Indianapolis Colts and a year for the Carolina Panthers. As he introduced himself, he joked that NFL meant, “Not For Long,” for most players only make it a few seasons. During his fifth year in Professional Football, another teammate led him to Christ. Since he retired from football, he has attended seminary and done doctoral work.
Gray began by telling his story. Much of his early years were spent in special education. He also didn’t grow up in church but, as he proclaims, “God loves to use the ordinary to do extraordinary things.” His talk resembled more of a sermon, mostly based on Psalm 23, with a lot of one-line zingers. “
“God is not a microwave. He’s more like a crockpot.” “Our challenge: May our lives be better than our books.” “Fight for your readers.” “David defeated a giant but lost to lust.” “All of life is worship.” “Let your ink pen become a means of grace.” and from the Roman philosopher Cicero: “The greatest form of revenge is not to become like your enemies.”
We had a long lunch hour, and I went back to the hotel and slept, causing me to miss the S. K. Smith, the afternoon’s first speaker.
A professor at Asbury Theological Seminary, Dr. Craig Keener has been prolific in publishing commentaries on the Bible. While I have a decent commentary library with two or more commentaries on each book in the Bible, I have not read Keener. This cause of this oversight is that I tend to read mainly Reformed commentaries while Keener writes in the Wesleyan tradition.
Keener began his talk which he titled, “Writing Because It Matters,” with a confession. “I like writing better than speaking because you can edit before it’s public.” Most everyone laughed. He also confessed that it was because of God’s grace that he, someone diagnosed with ADHD, could become a writer.
Keener discussed his writing journey. From meeting two missionaries in high school, to his first wife leaving him, which locked him out of evangelical circles, he spoke about how writing and dealing with Scripture was forged with struggles. Fifteen years after his first wife left, he married a woman he met as a missionary in the Congo (she also has a PhD from the University of Paris). Together, they have a book, The Impossible Love.
Keener encouraged the writers in the crowd to remember that they’re not writing for themselves but for Jesus Christ.
Like Hannah Alexander and S. K. Smith, the last speaker on Saturday was another HopeWords regular. Lewis Brogdon, like Travis Lowe, is a native of Bluefield. He teaches homiletics at Baptist Seminary of Kentucky but also holds a part-time position at Bluefield College. Brogdon began discussing an upcoming book of his, The Gospel Beyond the Grave: Toward a Black Theology of Hope. While making the point how writing takes time, he suggested that this book had a long gestation period going back to article he read by a Catholic theologian 25 years ago. The theologian suggested that racial reconciliation would happen in purgatory. Of course, Brogdon acknowledged that as a Black Baptist, purgatory isn’t something he believes in, but the article caused him to think. Then, 23 years ago, his father died. These events, while also dealing with recent events in America, led to the book (which I will look forward to reading).
His theme was how writing can be a place of light, and he discussed how our journeys involve the work and word of God along with our own holy conversations.
Evening and Sunday morning
Inside Christ Episcopal after the service. I especially like the cork floors (which we have in our new addition at home).
After the final speaker, there was free time where I went back to my hotel and napped. Then I went to an evening reception. I wasn’t hungry and a small plate of hors d’oeuvres sufficed for dinner. I had conversations with a few folks but called it an early evening and headed back to the hotel for bed around 8 PM. On Sunday morning, I attended Christ Episcopal, where Amanda Held Opelt, who’d provided music between speakers at the conference, preached. Her text was from John 12:1-8 was on Mary of Bethany, the sister of Lazarus and Martha.
First Presbyterian Church, across from Christ Episcopal. Like most of the large downtown churches in Bluefield, they have lots of extra space. I recently learned that the Presbyterians have converted part of their extra space into bunk rooms for those coming in to volunteer for mission work in Appalachia.
Timothy Egan, A Fever in the Heartland: The Ku Klux Klan’s Plot to Take Over America, and the Woman Who Stopped Them
(2023, Penguin Books, 2024), 404 pages including index and notes on sources.
A Personal note: In late 2010, I was visiting with Earl, a parishioner of First Presbyterian Church of Hastings (Michigan), who was dying. Earl was 96 years old and had lived in Hastings since 1950. Another friend of Earl’s, who was also in his 90s, was present. I no longer remember his name, but I remember that he had grown up in Hastings and was Catholic. The man talked about coming back into town with his father, from a trip to Grand Rapids. On a field outside of the town there was a large cross burning and a huge crowd of men in white robes. His father immediately ordered him to get on the floor of the car. Fright took over his father (and him). In the 1920s, the Klan was popular in the heartland, as Egan reminds us.
My review: Does character matter? Do we expect our leaders to adhere to moral standards? These are questions we should ask ourselves. After all, in the past decade, we’ve had the “me too” movement, which lead to many resignations of politicians, preachers, educators, and others in positions of leadership. Then, in a backlash, none of it seem to matter as we elect to office those convicted of sexual offenses. The appointment of others despite moral failures including sex and drug abuse and alcoholism occur. In a way, reading Egan’s book about a situation in the 1920s, makes me wonder what has changed. If anything, this book just makes another case proving human depravity.
In the early 1920s, D. C. Stephenson arrived in Indiana. Within two years, he would become the Grand Dragon of the Ku Klux Klan of the state. By the mid-20s, Indiana had the most Klan members (by percentage of population) of all the states. The Klan was no longer strictly a southern institution. Many municipalities even in the heartland already had “sundown laws,” which barred African Americans after the sunset. The Klan was also strong in Colorado and Oregon.
The growth of the Klan in the 1920s was racist, just like the Southern Klan during Reconstruction. But they had broadened their racial views to include immigrants from Eastern Europe, especially Catholics and Jews. In the West, they added Asians to those they saw as a threat to American values. Notre Dame University became a big target in Indiana. Egan suggests that their mascot, “The Fighting Irish” came not from their undefeated football team, but the students battling the Klan who held a rally in South Bend.
In addition to racial hatred, the Klan of the 1920s encouraged the purity of white women and supported prohibition. While the Klan was men-only, there were significant numbers of auxiliary groups for women and children.
In Indiana, the Klan held power. They donated to both political parties and to churches with whom they sought to ally in their vision of an idolized America. They owned the governor and legislatures and local officials. People assumed Stephenson would eventually fil an empty Senate seat. The Klan was thinking big, including having eyes on the Presidency.
But for the Klan leadership in Indiana, especially for Stephenson, the rules didn’t apply. He was a masochist and felt women were his for the taking. He used intimidation to silence women he abused. Also, with his close supporters, he not only drank, but drank to excess.
When Stephenson set his eyes on Madge Oberholzer, an attractive young woman who’d asked for his help for her job with the state, things swirled out of control. She resisted his advances. He kidnapped her. When she made it back home, she was dying. He had not only brutally beaten her but had also severely bitten her all over her body. When she couldn’t escape, she attempted suicide.
As she lay dying from her abuse, she dictated a statement which was notarized as her testament, a legal maneuver which allowed her to “speak from the grave,” into a court of law. His friend, the sheriff, arrested Stephenson. But instead of eating jailhouse food, the sheriffs wife cooked his food.
Stephenson and two associates went to trial. The trial began after a lot of legal maneuvering over what could and couldn’t be admissible as evidence. While the court didn’t allow several additional women to testified of their rapes by Stephenson, it also kept out of court Stephenson’s past included an abandoned wife and child. While Stephenson’s followers attempted to bride officials and jury, the jury returned a verdict of guilty of second-degree murder.
The trial brought to the public’s attention the hypocrisy of the Klan’s leadership. In the aftermath of the trial, the Klan in Indiana declined almost as fast as it had risen.
Americans should read this book. The use of “American enemies” to cause a groundswell against the “others” is nothing new. Thankfully, in the 1920s, folks like Madge Oberholzer and a few brave newspapers, ministers, academics, and politicians stood fast against the rising intolerance. It’s never fun to be the one who speaks out, but speaking out is important.
Hannah Anderson, All That’s Good: Recovering the Lost Art of Discernment
(Chicago: Moody Publishing, 2018), 215 pages including study questions for each chapter and source notes.
I became acquainted with Anderson’s work through the HopeWords Writer’s Conference in Bluefield, West Virginia, which I have attended three times. Anderson is a regular at the conference and one of the ones who works behind the scenes to put the conference on each year. (Soon, I hope, I’ll post a review of this year’s conference). I am also looking forward to hearing good things about her when she preaches for me this June (sadly, I’ll be out-of-state that Sunday).
This book is divided into three parts. The first part deals with what’s good and why we should seek it out. In part 2, Anderson approaches discernment using Paul’s exhortations at the end of Philippians. Drawing on verses 8 and 9, she works through the verses dealing with “whatever is true, honorable, just, pure, lovely and commendable. In Part 3, she looks at the meaning of the good and how we’re to work through a community for the common good.
Anderson writing is a pleasure to read. She draws on her own memories to illustrate her points. I recommend this book to those interested in fostering a world where we celebrate the good, the beautiful, and the empathic. This is the second book I’ve read by Anderson. The first, Humble Roots, I reviewed in 2022.
Pat Conroy, The Great Santini
(1976, HarperAudio 2023), 18 hours and 4 minutes.
It’s 1960. Having just returned to America from a stint in the Mediterranean, Bull Meacham is given the command of his own Marine Corp Fighter Squadron in Ravenell, SC. He meets up with his family in Atlanta, where they had been staying with his wife (Lillian) family. They then make a long early morning drive across Georgia and South Carolina. That drive seems to take forever, but in it we get to experience characteristics of Bull and his family. None of his children want to move, especially Ben, who will be a senior in high school. They’ve all been through this drill of having to make friends again.
Ben quickly makes two friends. One is a Jewish boy whom he comes to his aid during a fight and the other is a stuttering young African American man who raises flowers, produce, and honey as well as collecting oysters and gigging flounder for a living. Sadly, Ben loses both friends. The Jewish boy’s family sends him for safety while another white boy kills the African American.
While this goes on, Ben finally beats his father in one-on-one basketball. Bull’s lost didn’t go over well. His father, the Great Santini, fears getting older. He also fears changes to his beloved Marine Corps, that they’re losing their toughness. A few characteristics of his father became grating by the end of the book. When he would enter the home, he’d shout, “Stand by for a fighter pilot.” He would call those he’s talking to, “Sports Fans.”
Ben finds his place in high school on the basketball team. He becomes the star, but his father comes to a game drunk and encourages Ben to take out a kid on the opposing team he’s guarding. Ben snaps and breaks the boys arm, which ends with him kicked off the team for the remaining of the season. When Ben turns 18, his father takes him to the officer’s club. Ben comes home drunk, like his father, ruining the planned family dinner that evening.
This book touches on many themes. Child and spouse abuse, father/son relationships, coming of age, race relationships, life in a small southern town in the early 1960s, and the Yankee/Southern conflict (Bull was from Chicago and Lillian from the South). The story is fictionalized, but Conroy draws on his famil experiencesy. I have heard his novel didn’t go over well in his family and I can see why. In real life, the Great Santini didn’t die as he does in the book (which I left out of the book as it would be a spoiler). Conroy later wrote a nonfiction book about his father titled The Death of Santini.
I enjoyed the story. The book is easy to follow. Conroy tells it in a chronological fashion. There are similar themes to the other Conroy books I’ve read (Prince of the Tides, The Water is Wide, and South of Broad). All these books center on the Low Country of South Carolina. Thoese (except for The Water is Wide) were published later in Conroy’s life and show a more mature writer. I have also seen the movie, which came out in 1979, but it’s been decades so I don’t remember enough to compare the book and the movie.
Two Commentaries on the Gospel of Mark
James R. Edwards, The Gospel According to Mark (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2002), 550 pages
Morna D. Hooker, The Gospel According to Saint Mark (1991, Hendrickson Publishers, 1997), 424 pages
For the past sixteen months I have been working my way through the gospel of Mark. I have preached 53 sermons from Mark. At the beginning, I read through one short commentary by Doug Hare, a former professor of mine. Then, I read through these two commentaries as I worked my way through the gospel, finishing both this past month.
Of the two commentaries on Mark, my favorite would be the one by James Edwards. I first became familiar with his writing with his excellent 2015 commentary on Luke. This commentary on Mark was published 14 years earlier. Both books are a part of the “Pilar New Testament Commentary” series. This author is very familiar with the early church and the role Mark’s gospel in the early church. I have previously reviewed his book From Christ to Christianity. My complaint is that the author didn’t do his own translation and seems to mostly depend on the New International Version of the Bible.
The commentary is easy to read and follow. I especially liked Edward’s use of “Mark’s sandwiches”, a literary technique in the second gospel in which two different themes merge into one passage. The first is mentioned, then Mark moves off on what seems to be a tangent as he writes about something else., Then he returns to the first subject. Soon, having been introduced to the concept, I found such constructions even before reading the commentary. By playing the two ideas off each other helps the reader of the gospel to grasp deeper thoughts.
I also appreciated how Edwards, when things needed more explanation, would insert an “Excursus” to better explain an idea.
The second commentary by Morna Hooker was republished as a part of Black’s New Testament Commentaries Series. In this series, the author was expected to provide her own translation, which she does while admitting that she started her work using the New English and Revised Standard Versions of scripture. Hooker is retired but taught at Cambridge (and the commentary does have an “English feel” to it).
Like Edwards commentary, Hooker’s work is easy to read and understand. Neither commentary gets so far into the weeds that one has difficulty following. With her own translation of the text, Hooker’s work is a welcomed addition to the more traditional types of commentaries.
In addition to these commentaries, I have also read all or parts of commentaries by Douglas R. A. Hare, Mark: Westminster Bible Companion (Louisville, KY: WJKP, 1996), William L. Lane, The Gospel of Mark (Grand Rapids, Eerdmans, 1974), Mary Ann Tolbert, Sowing the Gospel: Mark’s World in Literary-Historical Perspective (1989, Minneapolis: Fortress, 1996); Brian K. Blount, Go Preach! Mark’s Kingdom Message and the Black Church Today (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Press, 1998), and David Rhoads and Donald Michie, Mark as Story: An Introduction of the Narrative of a Gospel (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1982).
For those of you who wonder why I didn’t post a sermon on Sunday, it’s because I didn’t preach. I was recovering from a stomach bug and was still in the “infectious stage.” I doubt anyone wanted to risk seeing me. It all started late Wednesday night when I became violently sick and between episodes, was unable to maintain my blood sugar levels. I ended up in the ER, receiving IV fluids and shots to control nausea. After 4 hours, I came home but as late as Friday was experiencing diarrhea. As I was to have 48 hours after the last symptom, I was blessed to have someone else preach for me. The next sermon, God willing, will be posted on April 11th. This week, I had planned to be off in order to attend the HopeWords Writer’s Conference in Bluefield. Hopefully, you’ll find an interesting book or two from those books I finished reading during March.
Jon Meacham, His Truth is Marching On: John Lewis and the Power of Hope with Afterword by John Lewis
(New York: Penguin Random House, 2020), 354 pages including note, bibliography, and an index.
In a way, Meacham’s biography on John Lewis reads like a spiritual memoir. Meacham provides the details of Lewis’ early life. However, his real focus is on Lewis’ faith and how it helped him as a young leader of the Civil Rights Movement.
Lewis wanted to preach from an early age. The family’s chicken coop became his church. He preached to the birds and took offense when his mother cooked one of his “parishioners.” Throughout this book, Meacham captures the theological themes of Lewis’ life. These include love in the face of hate, non-violence, and with Martin Luther King, a vision of a beloved community.
This book mostly focuses on Lewis’ first 28 years, until the death of Martin Luther King in 1968. A long epilogue brings the reader up to date on Lewis later work. This includes his 17 terms in the United States Congress. Following this is an afterword, written by Lewis himself, before his death on July 17, 2020. The book was published later that year.
Jon Meacham, as a young reporter for The Chattanooga Times, met Lewis on election night, 1992. He had just won his fourth term in Congress and Clinton had beaten George H. W. Bush for the Presidency. They would meet many more times over the years. Meacham began working on this book toward the end of Lewis’ life. Even thought Meacham focuses on Lewis’ work before they met, the closeness of the preacher/politician with the author is sensed throughout this book.
Lewis’ grandfather was born a slave. But after Civil War, he worked hard and brought land. Lewis’ own father was a tenant farmer, but the family seldom saw the white owner of the land they worked. Lewis himself saw few white people in his early life, living in a segregated world. In 1951, at age 11, this changed one summer when an uncle took him to Buffalo, New York. It was an eye-opening event for Lewis.
The 1950s were a time of change and uncertainty in the South. For African Americans, there was a bright light when the Supreme Court ruling against school segregation in 1954. Of course, nothing changed fast. But it was also a time of lynchings and the torture death of Emmett Till, a boy from Chicago close to Lewis’ age.
For young Lewis, another change came when he started listening to the Martin Luther King, Jr. preaching on the radio. In 1957, Lewis left his hometown for American Baptist Theological Seminary in Nashville, Tennessee. The small school trained African American men for the ministry. While a student, Lewis learned about non-violent protests and participated in sit-ins at local cafes. He even volunteer to attempt to integrate a local white university. He was invited to meet with Martin Luther King, Jr. and Ralph Abernathy, who suggested he needed his parents’ approval since he was not yet 18 years of age. They refused and Lewis returned to the seminary. He continued his involved in non-violence as he participated as a Freedom Bus Rider. In all these experiences, Lewis saw the brutality of the Southern Whites as they resisted the demands of Black Southerners.
As a young man, Lewis quickly became a leader within the Civil Rights movement. Even before his brutal beating on the Emmett Pettit bridge in Selma, Alabama in 1965, he had be with other leaders meeting President Johnson in the White House. It’s amazing that Lewis could continue to advocate non-violence and envison a beloved community with the violence he experienced. But he did. He even had to resist others within the movement, especially after Selma and later the death of Martin Luther King, Jr. These events led many to call for violence and Black Power as a way to confront the White backlash. Lewis stood firm for nonviolence.
The reader of this book will take away an appreciation of what Lewis and other Civil Rights leaders endured. At a time when many of our rights as Americans feel threatened, the examples of those like Lewis, who Meacham likens to the Founding Fathers, provides an example of what courage looks like. He kept his eye on justice, avoiding violence but willing to get into “good trouble.”
I have read four other books by Jon Meacham and reviewed Let There Be Light. Like His Truth is Marching On, Let There be Light is also a spiritual biography, but of Abraham Lincoln. I have also read his biographies of George H. W. Bush and Andrew Jackson. All have been exceptional.
Mary Oliver, Upstream: Selected Essays
(2016, Audible, Pushkin Industries, 2023, 4 hours and 3 minutes)
A number of years ago read some of Mary Oliver’s poetry and her book on writing poetry. This is my first foray into her essays. This collection has been finely crafted, showing Oliver’s love for nature, life, and her home in Provincetown at the eastern tip of Cape Cod. As with her poetry, Oliver provides the reader with close views of the world. Owls, foxes, herons, spiders, turtles, fish, and her beloved dogs are all captured with her words. The reader learns the poet’s blessings upon those in the past. She drew strength from writers like Ralph Waldo Emerson, Edgar Allen Poe, William James, Walt Whiteman, William Wordsworth. She takes us on predawn walks. We’re introduced to a carpenter who wants to be a poet. Then we learn of her desire to master woodworking. I recommend this series of essays as a reminder to take our time to enjoy what’s around us.
Amanda Held Opelt, Holy Unhappiness: God, Goodness, and the Myth of the Blessed Life
(New York: Worthy Publishing, 2023), 239 pages including notes.
The title of this book, “Holy Unhappiness,” caught my attention. After all, doesn’t God want us to be happy? Doesn’t God want us to be blessed? Drawing on the account of the fall from Genesis 3, Opelt counters the idea we’re made to be happy. The curse of humanity includes our suffering in this life. Of course, the pursuit of happiness, which Americans hold dear, isn’t found in Scripture but the Declaration of Independence. Yet such ideas have found their way into American Christianity through the various forms of the prosperity gospel. Opelt’s book directly attacks the heresy of the prosperity gospel.
The author grew up in a loving Christian middle-class family in the Bible Belt. She felt she did all the things required of her to achieve blessedness. But as she grew older, she realized many of her expectations were hollow. The idea she just had to find the right job, the right spouse and they’d have the perfect children, and life would be easy was an allusion.
The book is divided into three parts. Each looks at four places where we seek blessings followed by a chapter on the real source of blessings. The first part of the book looks at us as individuals in our work, marriage and parenthood. While there are wonderful aspects to each of these, they can also fluster our attempts to obtain a blessing. The real blessing comes in our delight of accepting what God has given us.
Part two focuses on our life in a community. While much of American Christianity is focused on individuals, Opelt points out that the gospel is to be lived out with others. In this section, she discusses calling and community along with our bodies (through which we serve and work together). The blessing we discover is humility. The third part examines our gathering as believers, along with our suffering and sanctification. The resulting blessing is hope.
Opelt encourages American Christians to avoid “one-verse-theologies” and to delve into the Scriptures. I applaud this suggestion. However, I wonder why Opelt didn’t link suffering and “holy unhappiness” with the cross. Perhaps this is because I am writing this review during Lent, or because yesterday I read nearly 100 pages of Fleming Rutledge’s, The Crucifixion. Nonetheless, there is a lot to commend in Opelt’s book. I was especially moved by what she has to say about the community, the church, and humility.
Nathaniel Philbrick, Travels with George: In Search of Washington and His Legacy
(Penguin Random House, 2021), 375 pages include notes, bibliography and index. Penguin Audio, 2021, narrated by Nathaniel Philbrick, 9 hours and 34 minutes.
This is the third book I read by Philbrick. The first two were In the Heart of the Sea: the Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex and Valiant Ambition: George Washington, Benedict Arnold, and the Fate of the American Revolution. I have enjoyed all three and have his book on the Mayflower sitting on my to-be-read pile.
I began listening to on audio, but ended up picking up a copy from the library. This allowed me to follow along and to see the illustrations. Most notably is John Trumbull’s painting of George standing in front of the hind end of Prescott, his horse. Prescott’s tail is raised. In the background sits the city of Charleston, for whom the painting was made. The artist’s joke is that the horse is relieving himself on Charleston even though I first thought Washington was lifting up the horse’s tail (as to say, go here?).
Unlike the other two books of Philbrick’s I read, this one is more personal. Philbrick and his wife Melissa along with their dog, Dora, retraces the steps of Washington in their Honda Pilot. The one time they left their car behind was to sail, like Washington, to Rhode Island. This created an exciting adventure as they were caught in a dangerous storm. Thankfully, they’d left Dora behind.
Both Philbricks are avid sailors. Early in their married life, Philbrick stayed at home and cared for the kids while working as a freelance writer. Melissa worked as an attorney. I also discovered that he grew up in Pittsburgh. However, he spent lots of time in the summer on the coast where he could sail. Sadly, Phil did not reveal if he remained loyal to Pittsburgh’s sports or if he became a traitor for the Red Sox’s and Patriots.
Blending into their personal experiences along the road, we learn much about Washington and the challenges he faced as the first President of the United States. At the time, the nation’s future was far from certain. Washington, a “Federalist,” was from the anti-federal South. Like all great men, he had his faults, especially when it came to his inconsistent views on slavery. Yet Washington was the man who brought the nation together. He strove to unite a collective group of former colonies into the United States. Philbrick notes that Washington didn’t desire the Presidency. Furthermore, Martha really didn’t relish the possibility of being the First Lady). During the time Washington made these journeys, he also worked on establishing the nation’s capital along the banks of the Potomac. This effort remained on his mind while on his last and longest of the journeys through the South.
Washington’s journeys begins as he leaves his home at Mt. Vernon for New York. There, he took the oath of office. His desire to learn more about the nation and show national unity, Washington, led to these trips.
His first journey left New York for New England, with stops in Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire and a brief foray into Maine. Notably, he skipped Rhode Island as it had yet to ratify the constitution. However, Maine wasn’t even being considered as a state and it didn’t become one until 1820.
Washington’s second journey was a tour of Long Island. The Island had mostly remained under British Control during the Revolution. However, a series of spy rings on the island, kept Washington informed as to the British plans. Even during this trip, Washington kept the identity of almost all the spies quiet. At this time, his concern continued to be their safety. What would happen if the nation failed and Britain regained control?
Then, in August 1790, Washington sails from New York to Rhode Island. While he shunned the colony on his New England trip, he wanted to welcome them into the union after they ratified the constitution. Washington stayed with John Brown, a Quaker who helped establish Brown University. Philbeck had attended Brown, and his family had long ties to the university. We learn Brown’s chariot provide Washington with ideas of the type of coach needed for his southern journeys. More importantly, however, to the story was the Quakers mixed relationship with slavery. While the religion shunned the practice, many of the ships bringing slaves to the Americas came from Rhode Island.
Throughout the book, Philbrick explores Washington’s own troubled relationship with slavery. It has long been noted that Washington freed his slaves upon his death, but they were only part of Mt. Vernon’s slaves. Many of the slaves belonged to his wife’s first husband and were property Washington didn’t control. Furthermore, while troubled by slavery, Washington still chased down runaway slaves and kept them in bondage. And while he was on these journeys, he traveled with enslaved menservants.
Ironically, Washington’s final tour took him through a land of which he was unfamiliar, the South. During the Revolution, Washington time was mostly spent in the northern part of the colonies. Other generals lead the fight in the South. This was area was also the least developed part of the nation. Overland travel was difficult. It was also a place that was most hostile to Washington’s ideas, especially the tax on whiskey.
For me, the Eastern leg of Washington’s Southern journey was the most familiar. Having spent my childhood in Wilmington, NC, and six years as an adult just outside of Savanah, I’ve traveled the roads which parallel Washington’s journey numerous times. Like Philbrick, I’ve read much of Archibald Rutledge’s writings. I have even published a piece on Hampton Plantation, where Washington stayed. I knew all of stories Philbrick told of Rutledge’s ancestors.
The part of the Southern journey that I was less familiar with was Washington’s westward swing which took him from Augusta, Georgia through the Piedmont of South and North Carolina. While I have been to most of the sites mentioned, I never associated them with Washington.
Washington’s travels seemed to help create the myth and numerous stories seemed to be repeated along the way. Many towns have their own version of “He’s just a man,” often exclaimed by some youngest when they met Washington. Another popular and frequent story are about the coins he gave out as gifts. Interestingly, these were British coins as America had yet to mint its own money. And then there was the stories of Washington’s beloved dog, “Greyhound.” Sadly, Philbrick discovered the story had been made up in the 19th Century.
While this book wasn’t as detailed in historical research as the other Philbrick books, I enjoyed it. Philbrick. portrait of Washington gives insight into the type of leadership our nation needs at present. Furthermore, reading this book makes me think it’s time for a road trip.
The weather has often been cold and unpleasant, so I have been doing a lot of reading. These five books are all different, so maybe you’ll find something that is of interest. I often read something in February in honor of Black history. I have been reading His Truth is Marching ON: John Lewis and the Power of Hope by Jon Meacham. But, I won’t finish this book before the end of the month. Look for the review next month.
Stanley Hauerwas, Hannah’s Child: A Theologian’s Memoir
(Grand Rapids, Eerdmans, 2010), 288 pages, no illustrations.
One of the first books I remember reading after my ordination was Resident Aliens: Life in the Christian Colony by Stanley Hauerwas and William Willimon. The book came out during my last year in seminary, and I borrowed a copy for the presbytery office. I liked the book so much that I ordered a copy for myself and reread it. I often go back to that book, and it has informed my ministry over the past 35 years. Beside that one book, I have only read articles by Hauerwas. Learning that he had a memoir, I decided to read it. While this reads more like an autobiography than a memoir,[1] I’m still glad that I read it and recommend it to others.
Hauerwas was the son of a bricklayer. His parents were modest lower middle-class Methodists from Texas. Both parents were older when he was born and his mother, like Hannah the mother of Samuel in the Old Testament, promised to dedicate her son to the Lord. Hauerwas sensed this and even committed his life into that direction, which led him to college and on to Yale Divinity School. But instead of becoming a pastor (he was never ordained and wasn’t even sure, at first, he was Christian), Hauerwas went on to earn a PhD focusing on ethics. He spent his career teaching and writing.
Hauerwas began teaching at Augustana, a small Lutheran College. After two years, he moved to Notre Dame, where he taught for fourteen years, and then on to Duke Divinity School. Throughout this time, the nation dealt with Civil Rights and Vietnam. In his memoir, he is also honest about the political struggles in academia. This was especially true at Notre Dame, where he was a Protestant teaching in a Roman Catholic university.
Another intimate part of the book deals with his first wife, Anne, who had mental health issues that showed up early in their marriage and increased over time in severity. Bipolar by nature, Anne struggled with reality. She often thought she was in love with other men (who she fantasized as loving her) and much of this first marriage was without sexual intimacy. Along the way, they had one child, Adam, who was mostly raised by Hauerwas. After moving to Duke, Anne decided she wanted to go back to South Bend (where she was again in love). They divorced and her world unraveled. In her 50s, she died of a heart attack.
Hauerwas then married Paula, a woman who was working at Duke and an ordained Methodist pastor. According to his story, their relationship has been much steadier, and both have been able to thrive in their relationship with each other and others in the academic community. They also both love baseball and at one time (before I moved to the Blue Ridge) owned a house on Groundhog Mountain, which I pass every Sunday morning between Mayberry and Bluemont.
One of the things I appreciate about the book are details about who have influenced Hauerwas. Early on, it was Barth and the Niebuhr brothers. Later came Catholic theologians and a Mennonite, John Yoder, who helped Hauerwas move toward Christian pacifism. In addition to those Hauerwas personally knows, he also credits books which have helped shape his theology. There is much in this book for those who enjoy theology, philosophy, and how thought process is shaped.
[1] I think of a memoir as focusing narrowly on one aspect of a life. This book tends to focus on many aspects of the author’s life, from his birth to his sixties.
Timothy Snyder, On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons for the Twentieth Century
(New York: Crown, 2017), 127 pages.
This is a valuable little book that shouldn’t take most readers more than an hour or two to read. I’ve heard it mentioned often lately as an antidote (or resistant manual) to a more authoritarian society which seems to be preferred by many in the western world. As for the desire for authoritarian desires, see Anne Applebaum, The Twilight of Democracy: The Seductive Lure of Authoritarianism.
Snyder offers easy to understand lessons on how we might resist tyranny. The first one has become a rallying cry since the election, “Don’t Obey in Advance.” The lessons themselves are just a few words, making them easy to understand. Then, following each lesson is a bolded paragraph highlighting the importance of such action. This is then followed by several pages of examples from European fascist movements early in the 20thCentury and the collapse of Eastern Europe into the communist domain following World War 2. Snyder also highlights the troubling trend of many of these same countries, after having a short bit of freedom with the collapse of the Soviet Union, have slipped back into authoritarian control.
The Twenty Lessons:
Do note obey in advance
Defend institutions
Beware of the one-party state
Take responsibility for the face of the world
Remember professional ethics
Be wary of paramilitaries
Be reflective if you must be armed
Stand out
Be kind to our language
Believe in truth
Investigate
Make eye contact and small talk
Practice corporeal politics
Establish a private life
Contribute to good causes
Learn from peers in other countries
Listen for dangerous words
Be calm when the unthinkable arrives
Be patriot
Be as courageous as you can
I especially liked his lesson on being kind to our language. Here, he encourages us to read books (not just what’s on the internet). His reading list includes:
*Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 45 *George Orwell, *1984, *Animal Farm, and his wonderful essay, *“Politics and the English Language” *Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Brothers Karamazov Milan Kundera, The Unbearable Lightness of Being *Sinclair Lewis, It Can’t Happen Here Philip Roth, The Plot Against America Victor Klemperer, The Language of the Third Reich Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism Albert Camus, The Rebel Czeslaw Milosz, The Captive Mind Vaclav Havel, The Power of the Powerless Timothy Garton Ash, The Use of Adversity Tony Judt, The Burden of Responsibility *Christopher Browning, Ordinary Men Peter Pomerantsev, Nothing is True and Everything is Possible J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
The * indicates books I’ve read (8 out of 18, so I have some catching up to do).
This is an important book. It might be a good one for a small group of people to read together and to discuss, over a period of time, each of the lessons.
Leo Damrosch, The Club: Johnson, Boswell, and the Friends Who Shaped an Age,
narrated by Simon Vance (2019, Audible, 15 hours and 1 minute.
In 1763, the English portrait painter Joshua Reynolds proposed to Samuel Johnson to start a club that would meet each Friday evening. Starting with nine members, the club voted on new members (and membership had to be approved by all members allowing one no vote to blackball a prospective member). While this book focuses only on the activity of club members in the 18thCentury, the club continues to this day as the London Literary Club. For most of the 18th Century, The Club met at the Turk’s Head Tavern, starting with dinner at 6 PM, and then drinks and conversation going on till midnight (or afterwards).
The membership of the Club in the early years were men (the membership was all male), who made their mark on history. In addition to social critic Samuel Johnson and biographer James Boswell, The Club had an impressive list of members. Reynolds made a fortune with commissioned portraits. The great political philosopher Edmund Burke, who is best known for his quote, “All that is required for the triumphant of evil is for good men to do nothing,” was a member. He still influences true conservative thinkers today. Sadly, most who consider themselves conservative probably don’t know him, the exceptions being George Will and Arthur Brooks. Another Scottish political philosopher, Adam Smith, gave us economics as a discipline. Edmund Gibbons wrote the multi-volume Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. Other members included David Garrick, the great Shakespearean actor who changed the way actors performed, and playwright Oliver Goldsmith.
While each of the above members receive a short biography within the book, Damrosch focuses most on James Boswell (who joined The Club after its establishment) and Samuel Johnson. Johnson was English and Boswell was Scottish and would later become the Lord over a vast estate upon his father’s death. Boswell also wrote a major biography of Johnson. The two of them even took a Scottish holiday, traveling across the lowlands and to the Inner Hebrides. Both would published books on the journey.
Johnson valued the control of one’s passions while Boswell often drank to excess and sought out prostitutes. In Boswell’s journals he used codes, which have been broken, to indicate sexual activity. Boswell had a rough relationship with his father. Johnson who was 20 years older than Boswell, became a surrogate father for him while he was in London.
Damrosch dedicates some focus to what was going on in the larger world during this era, from the Seven Years War (known as the French and Indian War in America) to the American and French Revolutions. Club members discussed topics such as capital punishment, slavery, and religion.
While I have listened to this book, I have also ordered a copy because I want to go back and collect quotes. Also, the text often refers to paintings of the era which was printed within the book. I recommend it.
J. Murray, To Hunt a Sub
(Laguna Hills, CA: Structured Learning LLC, 2016), 370 pages.
I picked this book to read because it was about submarines. For some reason, my daughter has been fascinated with submarines and I partly to be able to keep up a conversation with her, I have read several books on submarines over the past several years. I also chose this book as I have followed Jacqui Murray’s blog for years and wanted to read one of her books.
However, if you’re looking for a book on submarines, this isn’t your book. Only a few pages of this story deal up what happens in a submarine. In this case, the sub has lost control due to a computer virus. The story is engaging. It reminds me of some of the action books I read in high school.
To Hunt a Sub centers on an Islamic terrorist group who figured out a way to incapacitate the American submarine fleet. To pull it off, they need the help of an Artificial Intelligence research of Kali Delamagente, a single parent PhD candidate at Columbia University. Her research blends AI, geography, and paleoethology. Her computer program named Otto allows her to go back in time to places where she follows “Lucy” around as she and her tribe made their way out of Africa tens of thousands of years ago. This story is very creative, blending life in the “pre-human world,” paleoethology, computer science, geo-positioning and terrorism.
Center to the story is Kali, who is running of out of funds and time to finish her research and complete her degree. Two shady men attempt to help her, but for their own benefit. One is a male professor who secretly kill off lovers and stole their research, which he published as his own. The other is a Muslim on a secret jihad. Kali’s research will help him in his goal to kill large numbers of “infidels.” He promises money for her research.
Helping Kali avoid the dangers she faces is Zeke Rowe, an ex-Navy Seal, whose last mission resulted in permanent disabilities. He is now a professor of paleoanthropology at Columbia but has been secretly recruited by the Navy to help them discover what’s going on with the submarine fleet. The two are romantically drawn to each other, but both put the importance of their work ahead of any relationship. In addition, Kali is not just concerned for her well-being but that of her son and her three-legged dog.
The book was a fast read as I was drawn into the story. There’s lots of action and plenty of violence, but in the end the good guys win, and the American fleet is safe. The number of characters (and how some of them used various names in different settings), was confusing until I got further into the story. Some of the encounters seemed far-fetched. But this is an action book and it keeps your attention.
Fred Chappell, River: A Poem
(Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1975), 51 pages.
This is a delightful collection of poetry by the late Fred Chappell, who taught at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro for forty years and served four years as Poet Laurate for the state of North Carolina. Originally from Canton, North Carolina, these poems draw heavily on the image of the mountains. River was Chappell’s second book of poetry. In addition to poetry, Chappell has also published novels and short stories.
While the title suggests the book is “a poem,” it consists of 13 rather long poems. Some like “Susan Bathing,” are prose-like. This poem describes in detail but without slipping into pornography his wife’s body. Another, “Science Fiction Water Letter to Guy Lillian takes on the form of a poetic letter. Others are more traditional, often drawing on stories of his grandparents. One moving poem, “Dead Soldiers,” is about the floods in 1944 and the empty liquor bottles in a man’s basement which are washed down the river as he shoots at the bobbing bottles with a 22 rifle. Reading it brought the floods in the mountains after Hurricane Helene last year to mind. The poems capture the rough life many in the mountains endured.
Water, more than rivers, provides a unifying theme of the poems. While rivers often show up, but so does water such him as a child being lowered into a well to clean it. Other water themes include bathing and baptizing. The poems draw on Appalachian sayings and include clever phrases and metaphors. Humor is also inserted into the poems.
I found similarities in these poems and Wayne Caldwell’s Woodsmoke, which I read last year and Ron Nash’s, Among the Believers, which I read several years ago but didn’t review. I recommend this book especially for someone wanting to capture the sense of the mountains in the early 20th century.
