Books We Read/Listen To

[OrangeUte]

There's just something kinky about a male book club featuring SteelBlue and BlueGoose. I want you to picture these guys during your next discussion:

you have no idea how close to real life that is...

[NorthwestUteFan]

Here is your #9. 'The Brothers K', by David James Duncan. (The book has a 4.4/5 rating on Goodreads, with over 10,000 reviews. It is fantastic).

http://www.amazon.com/The-Brothers-D.../dp/055337849X

It mixes the lives of four boys, humorously and poignantly blended through their passions for baseball, religion, politics, and life in a small Washington mill town in the 50s, 60s, and 70s. It may be the best book that nobody knows about. Absolutely charming and poignantly human.

Everybody I know who has read this book has loved it. I believe you will enjoy it as well.

[LA Ute]

Here is your #9. 'The Brothers K', by David James Duncan. (The book has a 4.4/5 rating on Goodreads, with over 10,000 reviews. It is fantastic).

http://www.amazon.com/The-Brothers-D.../dp/055337849X

It mixes the lives of four boys, humorously and poignantly blended through their passions for baseball, religion, politics, and life in a small Washington mill town in the 50s, 60s, and 70s. It may be the best book that nobody knows about. Absolutely charming and poignantly human.

Everybody I know who has read this book has loved it. I believe you will enjoy it as well.

I liked lots of it a lot but couldn't finish it. (It's still on my nightstand.) The looong digressions from the story were too much for me. I haven't given up on it yet.

From one review:

Unfortunately, paying good attention to "The Brothers K" is difficult. While this is the sort of work where the sum of the parts is greater than the whole, it is also true that the sum of the parts is just too big a sum. No one--most particularly including Duncan's editor--knows when to say "No, thank you."

. . .

As clever as Duncan is, he just does try you. So you've to read him as you watch a baseball game, where there is no clock, and we may go into extra innings, and the fun is to ruminate and speculate and contemplate . . . and second-guess the manager. And suddenly, before you even realize there's a rally going, we may have to call for the southpaw in the bullpen.

http://articles.latimes.com/1992-07-...d-james-duncan

I kind of saw it the same way.

[NorthwestUteFan]

Get it on Audible. You need to experience the whole thing to pull it all together.

[OrangeUte]

Get it on Audible. You need to experience the whole thing to pull it all together.

this is the second time it is has been recommended to me. Unfortunately i don't get to select the next book. but i may choose this one.

i just ordered it on Amazon and will read it and let you know what i think. I won't get another choice for 5 more books (Stegner was my selection). I currently plan on making Shaara's Killer Angels for my next book right now. That changes often.

[LA Ute]

Get it on Audible. You need to experience the whole thing to pull it all together.

I got 2/3 of the way through. I'll probably pick it up again. I have a lot of Adventist friends (they're big in the health care industry) and I did get a little tired of the mom and the church members, who didn't seem like real people to me -- more cartoons than real.

[NorthwestUteFan]

I got 2/3 of the way through. I'll probably pick it up again. I have a lot of Adventist friends (they're big in the health care industry) and I did get a little tired of the mom and the church members, who didn't seem like real people to me -- more cartoons than real.

You need to get to the end. You need to understand why she is the way she is.

[LA Ute]

You need to get to the end. You need to understand why she is the way she is.

Don't know if I can do it...reading that thing reminds me of reading Moby Dick. All those chapters describing the whaling industry in stupefying detail....

[USS Utah]

Books I have read in the last seven months:

Aircraft Carriers at War: A Personal Retrospective of Korea, Vietnam, and the Soviet Confrontation by Admiral James L. Holloway III, USN (ret.). Holloway was a gunnery officer aboard a destroyer during the Battle for Surigao Strait in October 1944. Not long after that night he received orders for flight training. Holloway would fly F9F Panther jets during the Korean War, command the carrier USS Enterprise (CVN-65) during the Vietnam War, command a carrier division in the Mediterranean Sea when Syria invaded Jordan in 1970, then return off Vietnam as commander of the U.S. Seventh Fleet in 1972 -- there he led his flagship into Haiphong Harbor for the last night surface battle in U.S. Navy history, a cruiser and a destroyer against NV PT boats. Holloway would finish his navy career as Chief of Naval Operations.

This is an excellent autobiography, but it is also an excellent examination of carrier and air combat doctrine from Korea to the present day. Holloway actually spends more time examining the history, operations and tactics of the Korean War than he does recounting the missions he flew over Korea -- if I remember correctly, he recounts just three or four missions. If you are interested in carrier combat, and U.S. Navy history, or want to understand the continuing importance of the role played by the U.S Navy's aircraft carriers, then this is a book you should read. It may not be, however, a book for the casual reader.

Vixen 03 by Clive Cussler. A C-97 Stratocruiser is found at the bottom of a lake in Colorado, even though the aircraft was reported lost somewhere over the Pacific Ocean. The aircraft's cargo are naval shells weaponized with a deadly organism, and 4 of the shells are missing. Somehow, those 4 shells end up in the hands of a terrorist organization planning an attack on the United States. Can Dirk Pitt, the man who found and raised the Titanic, find the shells and stop the catastrophe that would result from their being fired by an old mothballed battleship? The reader is often asked by Cussler, especially with the Dirk Pitt books, to suspend their disbelief. If the reader can do that, then these books are very enjoyable.

Pacific Air: How Fearless Flyboys, Peerless Aircraft, and Fast Flattops Conquered the Skies in the War with Japan by David Sears. In his fourth book, Sears writes about carrier combat from Pearl Harbor to the Battle of the Philippine Sea, though his focus is primarily on the fighter pilots. Also, more than half of the book covers the period from the Day of Infamy to the end of the Guadalcanal campaign. The author also covers the development of fighter aircraft by Grumman before the war as a preface to the action. Excellent.

Big Red: The Three-Month Voyage of a Trident Nuclear Submarine by Douglas C. Waller. In May 1999, USS Nebraska (SSBN-739) and Ohio class ballistic missile submarine, set sail on a three month strategic patrol, and the author was along for the ride. The majority of the book actually covers the first week of the patrol with its many drills, including, fire drills, sub vs sub drills and the missile launching drill (by which we learn that the Crimson Tide (book & movie) scenario is next to impossible). The rest of the patrol is covered rather quickly. Though the Cold War is over, the Trident Submarines still fulfill their deterrent role; while a nuclear war is less likely after the fall of the Soviet Union, it has not been entirely removed. Very good.

Full Force and Effect by Mark Greaney. This is the first Jack Ryan novel not written by Tom Clancy and Greaney's first novel featuring all of the characters in the Ryan universe. A large find of a natural resource of something called "rare earth" is found in North Korea with the estimated value of $12 trillion and the DPRK seeks to parlay the wealth potential of the mine into a ballistic missile capable of reaching California. North Korea will stop at nothing to get that missile, not even from attempting to assassinate the president of the United States. Great.

13 Hours: The Inside Account of what Really Happened in Benghazi by Mitchell Zuckoff with the Annex Security Team. This book is not about "talking points", or what U.S. government officials knew, said, or did after the attack on the U.S. Special Mission Compound in Benghazi, Libya, on September 11, 2012. This book is not about ongoing controversies, electoral politics, alleged conspiracies or cover-ups. Nor is this book about what happened in hearing rooms of the U.S. Capitol, anterooms of the White House, meeting rooms of the State Department, or green rooms of TV talk shows. This book is about what happened on the ground, in the streets, and on the rooftops of Benghazi, when bullets flew, buildings burned, and mortars rained and when lives were saved, lost, and forever changed. With the author's assistance, the members of the CIA Annex security team attempts to record for history, as accurately as possible, what they did, what they saw, and what happened to them -- and to their friends, colleagues, and compatriots that fateful night in Benghazi. Excellent.

There were protests in Cairo and other middle eastern cities on September 11, 2012, reportedly in reaction to a video on You Tube, but Benghazi was quiet. Until night fell, it was just another seemingly typical day in the eastern Libyan city. At 9:02 p.m., a truck marked with police insignia parked outside the main gate of the U.S. Special Mission Compound -- though sometimes referred to as a consulate, the compound was not officially so designated -- the men inside the truck remained inside the vehicle and did not engage the Libyan guards or anyone else from the compound. After forty minutes, the truck pulled away. Was the truck performing some kind of reconnaissance mission? Earlier in the day, another police marked vehicle parked outside the compound, and the officer walked into a building across the street, climbed up a few floors, and took pictures of the compound with a cell phone. The activities of these to police marked vehicles were the only unusual thing that happened that day in Benghazi, that is until a moment after the truck drove away from the compound gate, for that is when shots and an explosion were heard.

That was the start of a long night for the men of the security team assigned to the CIA Annex, a few blocks away from the Special Mission Compound. When word reached the Annex of the attack on the compound, the security team immediately prepared to rush to the rescue. But, sitting in vehicles in the driveway, waiting for the word to go, they instead were told repeatedly to wait while their team leader and the Annex boss tried to coordinate a response with a friendly Libyan militia. Fed up, the security team finally made up their minds to get going, but they were too late to save the U.S. Ambassador to Libya, who was making a visit to Benghazi, and a staff member. The security team returned to the Annex, with those they were able to rescue at the compound, and there they withstood three separate attacks, in which two more men would be killed. Additional security agents arrived from Tripoli after several hours, and the staffers and security team of the Annex were escorted by a Libyan militia to the Benghazi airport. The surviving security team members took off 13 hours after the first shots were fired at the compound.

There is a cultural divide between western and eastern Libya, between Tripoli and Benghazi, a divide little understood by outsiders. In this divide lay the roots of the civil war that toppled Ghaddafi, but also the roots of the attack on the Special Mission Compound. Because the rebellion that toppled a dictator began in Benghazi, some may have thought that good relations with the people of that city was possible, but by the summer of 2012, the honeymoon was over. The compound was fired upon on a few occasions, and an assassination attempt was made on the British ambassador. The British pulled their personnel out of the city, but the U.S. stayed. Additional security had been sent to Benghazi that summer, but it was withdrawn in August. The ambassador requested additional security, but somebody at the State Department decided a few diplomatic security agents was more than adequate. They were badly wrong. After the attack, four State Department employees were placed on paid administrative leave, but all were reinstated and given new jobs -- two later retired voluntarily.

After the attack began, the president ordered a response with whatever was available. There were no troops close enough to reach Benghazi that night -- nobody knew how long the battle would last. The closest support available were the additional security agents in Tripoli, and they did not arrive at the Annex until almost sunrise. The closest air support was four hours away at Aviano AB in Italy, but those aircraft lacked the tanker support to get them to Benghazi and back. Just before the attack, an intel report was received at the Annex reporting on the possibility of a terrorist attack on a diplomatic post somewhere in the middle east. No specific post was mentioned, there wasn't even a list of possible targets. The bottom line is that security was inadequate at a diplomatic compound that possibly should have been shut down weeks earlier. Despite the heroic efforts of the Annex security team, four men would pay the ultimate price for that failure.

History of United States Naval Operations in World War II, Volume Twelve: Leyte, June 1944-January 1945 by Samuel Eliot Morison. "Mistakes are normal, errors are usual; information is seldom complete, often inaccurate and frequently misleading." Morison quoted this line from Sound Military Decision, an old U.S. Navy handbook regarding naval warfare, in his summary of the Battle for Leyte Gulf, which is covered by the balance of this book. The line can serve as a theme, not just for the naval battle, but for the entire campaign, from the preliminary operations such a Peleliu and Morotai to decisions made by both sides throughout what followed. As expected, Morison does an excellent job in recounting the history of MacArthur's return to the Philippines.

Against All Enemies by Harold Coyle. In a novel originally written in the mid-1990s, but published in 2002, the bombing of a federal building leads to a standoff between the FBI and members of an anti-government militia. When the militia breaks out from their compound, the action moves to the state of Idaho, where the FBI investigates and then arrests suspects for aiding the escape of the militia members. When a federal judge orders the movement of the trial to another state, the governor of Idaho blocks the move and evicts all federal employees from the state. In response, an Army airborne company is sent to secure the national guard armory at the Boise airport. The operation goes badly wrong and a ground assault by an armored division soon follows. A good but not great story, and the book was not very well edited.

The King's Speech: How One Man Saved the British Monarchy by Mark Logue and Peter Conradi. Mark Logue is the grandson of Lionel Logue, who acted as a speech therapist to King George VI, and upon which the move The King's Speech is based. Mark was approached in June 2009 by the movie makers which led to the writing of this book. Born in Australia, Lionel Logue emigrated to Great Britain in 1924, where he set up his practice on London's Harley Street. In 1926, the then Duke of York began to see Logue to be treated for his difficulties with speech. This was the beginning of a friendship that would last through the abdication crisis the elevated the Duke to the throne, and through the Second World War. Excellent movie, excellent book.

The Sea Hunters: True Adventures with Famous Shipwrecks by Clive Cussler and Craig Dirgo. In 1978, using royalties from his best selling novels, Cussler decided to fund a search for John Paul Jones's Bonhomme Richard. It was a naive first effort, with many lessons learned, but it was a beginning. Since then, Cussler has continued to spend book royalties looking for lost ships, including the steamboat Lexington, the USS Cumberland, the CSS Arkansas, the USS Carondelet, the HMS Pathfinder and the U-boat that sank her, and the troopship Leopoldville. But Cussler's biggest find was the Confederate submarine CSS Hunley. To find these ships, Cussler teamed with others and a private organization was created to conduct the searches. When considering names for this organization, the other members decided to name it after the agency for which Cussler's fictional hero Dirk Pitt works, the Nation Underwater Marine Agency. In this excellent book, Cussler gives a dramatized history of each ship and then tells the story of how they were found.

The Centennial History of the American Civil War: Vol. I, The Coming Fury by Bruce Catton. The drift of events carry their own hard logic, and such was the case during the months between April 1860, when the Democratic party split over the nomination of Stephen Douglas, to July 1961 when armies of the North and South met in battle at Bull Run/Manassas. People in both the North and the South, in various factions and groups within those sections made many choices during those months, not really understanding or appreciating the possible consequences, or how others might react. Only the first major battle of the Civil War would finally reveal what the choices and decisions of the previous months had wrought.

Catton clearly believes the primary issue behind the many choices and decisions which led to war was the issue of slavery and its extension into the new territories, but his narration of the events on 1860-61 makes in plain that there really is no other explanation. Yes, there were cultural difference between the sections; there were tensions going back as far as the English Civil War; there were old wounds like the tariff issue, but the southern economy, certainly that of the cotton states, was so dependent on the peculiar institution that even maintaining it in the slaves states was not enough, it had to be extended, or the cotton kingdom would face ruin. The extension of slavery was so vital that many in the South convinced themselves that their rights were being trampled on by those who sought to oppose that extension, and even by those who sought a compromise solution.

The catalyst of the coming fury was not the nomination and election of Lincoln as one might suppose. Rather, it was the split of the Democratic Party and the nominations of Douglas and John Breckinridge. Douglas was unacceptable to Southern Democrats because of his statement on "Popular Sovereignty" give during the Lincoln-Douglas debates and because of the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Douglas had "had given foreknowledge of an unendurable truth -- the slavery would die unless the outside world dropped all other concerns to prop it up, which was obviously impossible." Lincoln might have been "the black-visaged enemy who threatened to upset everything the South lived by" but Douglas was "the apostate, the turncoat, the former friend who appeared on the other side when the pinch came. Douglas was more menacing because he bore no ill-will. In his position, in this summer of 1860, the slavery system could read its own sentence of ultimate death. To get away from him, the men who had Southern sentiment in their control had determined that the choice would be between the Black Republicans and disunion." And at least some in the south appeared almost to wish for a Republican victory so that secession would follow.

But even these events might not have led to war if not for additional events in seceded South Carolina surrounding Fort Sumter. South Carolina could have occupied the fort within days of its secession without a fight, for it was unfinished and unoccupied. But as the federal government in Washington was spending money to construct, the newly declared nation that was South Carolina, and then including the states that followed her, elected to wait until the fort was finished before taking it. A mighty large wrench was thrown into the situation, however, when a Union major decided to abandon a fort which he could not defend and occupy Fort Sumter, which at least was more defensible. The drift of events had launched North and South on an unexpected course, one which could only lead to Bull Run/Manassas.

Fantastic book!

Inferno: The World at War, 1939-1945 by Max Hastings. Rather than presenting a detailed history of politics and strategy, campaigns and battles, Hastings focuses on the human experience of the war. At the same time, this book sustains a chronological framework, while seeking to establish and reflect on the "big picture," the context of events. The principle purpose remains to illuminate the conflict's significance for a host of ordinary people of many societies, both active and passive participants -- a distinction which is often blurred. An additional theme of the book is one of the great truths of the conflict: while the Wehrmacht often fought its battles brilliantly, the Nazis made war with startling ineptitude.

"One of the most important truths about the war, as indeed about all human affairs, is that people can interpret what happens to them only in the context of their own circumstances." writes Hastings. "The fact that, objectively and statistically, the sufferings of some individuals were less terrible than those of others elsewhere in the world was meaningless to those concerned. It is the duty and privilege of historians to deploy relativism in a fashion that cannot be expected of contemporary participants. Almost everyone who participated in the war suffered in some degree: the varied scale and disparate nature of their experiences are themes of this book. But the fact that the plight of other people was worse than one's own did little to promote personal stoicism."

In Britain and America, the Second World War is remembered as "the Good War,' but many people in other countries have a more equivocal view. Britain's colonial subjects, particularly those on India, saw little merit in the defeat of the Axis powers if it meant they had to continue to be subjects of the crown. Many Frenchmen fought vigorously against the Allies while in Yugoslavia, rival factions were more strongly committed to waging civil war against one another than in promoting the interests of the Allies or the Axis. Large numbers of Soviet citizens embraced the opportunity offered by by German occupation to take up arms against Stalin. "None of this implies doubt that the Allied cause deserved to triumph, but it should emphasize the fact the Churchill and Roosevelt did not have all the best tunes." Even so, "It is impossible to dignify the struggle as an unalloyed contest between good and evil, or rationally to celebrate an experience, and even an outcome, which imposed such misery upon so many. Allied victory did not bring universal peace, prosperity, justice or freedom, it brought merely a portion of those things to some fractions of those who had taken part. All that seems certain is that, Allied victory saved the world from a much worse fate that would have followed the triumph of Germany and Japan. With this knowledge, seekers after virtue and truth must be content."

The outcome of the Second World War was principally decided by the battles fought on the eastern front between Germany and the Soviet Union, all other battlefields were dwarfed by the massive numbers engaged on the Russian front. The battles in North Africa and Western Europe were larger than those fought in the Pacific, which were larger and more significant than those fought in China-Burma-India. Hastings, unlike most non-American historians, however, gives ample space to the Pacific battles, perhaps even equaling the space given to the battles of Western Europe (including Italy and North Africa). I mention this as merely another reason to like this book, which is magnificent.

[LA Ute]

I so enjoyed the "Poldark" series on Masterpiece that I started reading the books. I'm enjoying them tremendously. Winston Graham is a good storyteller and creator of characters. Highly recommended.

The second season of "Poldark" begins on PBS Sept. 25. Spouses will enjoy watching it together. I am sure PBS will broadcast the first season again beforehand, if anyone wants to catch up.

[ironman1315]

I just finished the book called Red Seas Under Red Skies, a fantasy novel, and am now reading through Chernow's book about Alexander Hamilton.

[OrangeUte]

I just finished the book called Red Seas Under Red Skies, a fantasy novel, and am now reading through Chernow's book about Alexander Hamilton.

I read Hamilton years ago and recently picked it back up. It is going to be up next for me after I finish this little doozy, which I am really enjoying. https://www.amazon.com/Dont-Be-Jerk-...%27t+be+a+jerk

[NorthwestUteFan]

The first ~100 pages are slow, character development. But the characters are great and there is a LOT of baseball. I am entirely indifferent about baseball , but I ended up loving the discussions and zen aspects of the game.

The impact on the family of a rigid fundamentalist religion (Seventh Day Adventist) is fascinating to watch.

(side note - the author's older brother died when he was young and one of the reasons he was given by the SDA leaders and members for the brother's death was that the author didn't pray hard enough. This book unpacks some of that baggage for him in an enlightening manner).

[NorthwestUteFan]

Then quit shitting all over my suggestion.

[LA Ute]

Then quit shitting all over my suggestion.

How 'bout I just shut up and read the rest of the book?

[Utebiquitous]

LA,
I can't believe you haven't finished "The Brothers K." Remember who recommended it to you my brother.

The digressions are its strength in my opinion. What a lovely book.

[LA Ute]

LA,
I can't believe you haven't finished "The Brothers K." Remember who recommended it to you my brother.

The digressions are its strength in my opinion. What a lovely book.

I know, I know. I will pick it up again.


"It's men in shorts." -- Rick Majerus

[LA Ute]

Nobody has listed The Goldfinch. I loved it.


"It's men in shorts." -- Rick Majerus

[Utebiquitous]

Goldfinch is on my list this summer. I'll get that done LA - although, I finally need to read The Brothers Karamazov which, I believe, is your favorite.

I don't know if I've recommended it here but those of you trying to line up summer reading, consider The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint by Brady Udall. It is a really good story.

[concerned]

I read Goldfinch and thought, what is all the fuss about. I still don't think it came close to its hype, just like everything written by jonathan Franzen. I thought Tartt was trying to channel her inner Franzen through the plot, and seemed to be copying him. Personally tedious, esp. the Las Vegas and New York middle sections. Just my $.02.

[LA Ute]

I read Goldfinch and thought, what is all the fuss about. I still don't think it came close to its hype, just like everything written by jonathan Franzen. I thought Tartt was trying to channel her inner Franzen through the plot, and seemed to be copying him. Personally tedious, esp. the Las Vegas and New York middle sections. Just my $.02.

Philistine.

[concerned]

Philistine.

http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/20...rary-criticism

[LA Ute]

"American Ulysses: A Life of U.S. Grant," by Ronald C. White. Just started. Looks great.

[NorthwestUteFan]

The Professor and the Madman.
This is the story of the relationship between the professor leading the creation of the Oxford English Dictionary, and it's major contributor over a 40 year period.

Boring Background: The English language was never officially set in stone with a compendium until the OED was created between the 1860s-1920s, whereas French was compiled in the 1700s and Italian in the 900s.

People were attempting to find (through crowdsourcing) the earliest-known usage of words, with the book and context containing the word. People would read ancient books, note the usage of specific words, and send them to this Oxford professor to compile.

Good stuff: the major volume contributor to the effort turned out to be a Yale-educated, American, civil war doctor who was a paranoid schizophrenic, and lived in an asylum after murdering a man in London while on a schizophrenic episode.

His episodes tended to happen only at night, and every night he believed that people would crawl through the floorboards, grab him, and make him have sex with young girls or would do horrible sexual things to him.

During the daytime he was entirely normal and lucid as long as he could stay focused on a singular task. He read books voraciously and one day a book included the volunteer pamphlet from the society compiling the dictionary. He began documenting and categorizing the interesting words he would find.

He wrote to the group and offered to help, but then didn't make contact for several years. After his silence he wrote again and asked where they stood, and at the time the hundreds of volunteers were looking for the earliest-known usage of the word 'Ant'. By that time he had already moved beyond the letter E and had many thousands of words documented and meticulously categorized.

The Professor had no idea he was in an asylum as the address just went to Broamoor, which was both the name of the asylum and of the town it was in. After many years the professor came to realize that he was dealing with a mental patient and travelled to meet the man. Their working relationship eventually lasted through the 4 decades required to compile the dictionary.

The book was an interesting study of the man's descent into mental illness, his methods of coping, and of the fanatical devotion to a project that seemingly can only come with very different frame of reference on the world. I wondered while reading whether he would have ever been able to accomplish any of the work in today's society with modern medications and treatments. Would killing his haunting schizophrenic delusions also have destroyed his singular ability to research the language to the extent he did?

Also worth noting was the apparent fact that a certain degree of what we term 'mental illness', being somewhat outside of the range of what we consider to be 'normal', can have very positive benefits to go with the negative affects in some circumstances. We have a number of friends with autistic or Aspergers children, and while they can seem to have serious problems interacting with others in a 'normal' sense, they can be well off the charts brilliant and capable in other areas. In some ways the future will belong to people with a great attention to detail, but without a need for the same level of social norms we have today. That sounds somewhat autistic by modern standards.

[LA Ute]

The Professor and the Madman.
This is the story of the relationship between the professor leading the creation of the Oxford English Dictionary, and it's major contributor over a 40 year period.

Boring Background: The English language was never officially set in stone with a compendium until the OED was created between the 1860s-1920s, whereas French was compiled in the 1700s and Italian in the 900s.

People were attempting to find (through crowdsourcing) the earliest-known usage of words, with the book and context containing the word. People would read ancient books, note the usage of specific words, and send them to this Oxford professor to compile.

Good stuff: the major volume contributor to the effort turned out to be a Yale-educated, American, civil war doctor who was a paranoid schizophrenic, and lived in an asylum after murdering a man in London while on a schizophrenic episode.

His episodes tended to happen only at night, and every night he believed that people would crawl through the floorboards, grab him, and make him have sex with young girls or would do horrible sexual things to him.

During the daytime he was entirely normal and lucid as long as he could stay focused on a singular task. He read books voraciously and one day a book included the volunteer pamphlet from the society compiling the dictionary. He began documenting and categorizing the interesting words he would find.

He wrote to the group and offered to help, but then didn't make contact for several years. After his silence he wrote again and asked where they stood, and at the time the hundreds of volunteers were looking for the earliest-known usage of the word 'Ant'. By that time he had already moved beyond the letter E and had many thousands of words documented and meticulously categorized.

The Professor had no idea he was in an asylum as the address just went to Broamoor, which was both the name of the asylum and of the town it was in. After many years the professor came to realize that he was dealing with a mental patient and travelled to meet the man. Their working relationship eventually lasted through the 4 decades required to compile the dictionary.

The book was an interesting study of the man's descent into mental illness, his methods of coping, and of the fanatical devotion to a project that seemingly can only come with very different frame of reference on the world. I wondered while reading whether he would have ever been able to accomplish any of the work in today's society with modern medications and treatments. Would killing his haunting schizophrenic delusions also have destroyed his singular ability to research the language to the extent he did?

Also worth noting was the apparent fact that a certain degree of what we term 'mental illness', being somewhat outside of the range of what we consider to be 'normal', can have very positive benefits to go with the negative affects in some circumstances. We have a number of friends with autistic or Aspergers children, and while they can seem to have serious problems interacting with others in a 'normal' sense, they can be well off the charts brilliant and capable in other areas. In some ways the future will belong to people with a great attention to detail, but without a need for the same level of social norms we have today. That sounds somewhat autistic by modern standards.

That book is going on my list. Thanks.

I do like the trend in treating mental illness and the steady loss of stigma attached to it. (We fear what we do not understand!) For example, "mood disorder" or "bipolar disorder" are much more useful terms than "insane" or "crazy" or "schizophrenia" (and I'm NOT criticizing your use of that term -- it's just an example).


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[NorthwestUteFan]

That book is going on my list. Thanks.

I do like the trend in treating mental illness and the steady loss of stigma attached to it. (We fear what we do not understand!) For example, "mood disorder" or "bipolar disorder" are much more useful terms than "insane" or "crazy" or "schizophrenia" (and I'm NOT criticizing your use of that term -- it's just an example).


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I thought of you when I wrote the review. I think you will enjoy it. It is a quick read.

If nothing else it demonstrates the monumental quantity of work that lies behind pedantry.

[Mormon Red Death]

Finished the subtle art of not giving a f@$!. https://www.google.com/amp/s/markman...ing-a-fuck/amp

If you can handle some f bombs it is a really interesting and introspective. Its not about indifference but about choosing what to give a f about

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[Rocker Ute]

Finished the subtle art of not giving a f@$!. https://www.google.com/amp/s/markman...ing-a-fuck/amp

If you can handle some f bombs it is a really interesting and introspective. Its not about indifference but about choosing what to give a f about

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Based off your recommendation I just read it. A good read for anybody (who can tolerate an occasional f-bomb).

Lots of good takeaways, pertinent to this day and age though is the notion of "outrage porn".


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[LA Ute]

I finished all 12 of the Poldark books. They were fun to read and quite engrossing. They're not novels - together they are a saga. The author does a nice job of getting us to care about the characters, and that made it a fun experience.

Now I am reading "Dombey and Son" by Charles Dickens. For the first time ever I am having a hard time with a Dickens novel. It is a slog. I will keep at it, however.


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[USS Utah]

Space by James Michener

An epic novel about America's space program. Beginning on October 25, 1944 and spanning almost 40 years, the story follows five principle characters and their families, a German rocket engineer, a naval hero turned U.S. senator, an American aeronautical engineer sent to rescue Peenamunde Germans who later works for the NACA and then NASA, a naval aviator who becomes an astronaut, and his wife who works in Washington for the Senate space committee. Another important character is a con man who first exploits the UFO craze before "finding religion" and then pushing an anti-scientific creationist agenda. The story includes fictionalizations of real events like the Battle for Leyte Gulf as well as purely fictional events like an Apollo 18 mission to the far side of the moon, it is the kind of saga over an extended period of time that Michener was known for. Excellent.

There was a miniseries based on the book which aired in 1985, which I found on You Tube. While the series overall is good, a few changes made by Hollywood almost ruined it for me.

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Franklin D Roosevelt: A Rendezvous with Destiny by Frank Freidel

"The Republicans say officially that the President is an impulsive, uninformed opportunist, lacking policy or stability, wasteful, reckless, unreliable in act and contract. . . . Mr. Roosevelt seeks to supervene the constitutional process of government, dominate Congress and the Supreme Court by illegal means and regiment the country to his shifting and current ideas -- a perilous egomaniac.

"The Democrats say officially that the President is the greatest practical humanitarian who ever averted social upheaval, the wisest economic mechanician who ever modernized a government . . . savior and protector of the American way -- including the capitalist system -- and rebuilder of the nation. . . . Mr Roosevelt has constructed, with daring and fortitude, a sound bridge from the perilous past to the secure future.

"He is not wholly either, and he is certainly something of both."

So wrote Arthur Krock, a prestigious columnist with the New York Times, in 1936. While Krock had the opinion that Roosevelt was much more of how the Democrats viewed him, Freidel's portrait finds FDR more in the middle. Roosevelt could be an impulsive opportunist, but he was at times more concerned with controlling the deficit than he probably should have been, and thus hardly wasteful or reckless. FDR at times pushed boundaries, even going too far with proposals to reform the Supreme Court, but he was hardly a dictator. Roosevelt sought to be pragmatic, and he was motivated by humanitarianism, but he was not always wise. While the New Deal did provide relief, it did not end the Great Depression, and recovery was often undone by fiscal caution. When war erupted in Europe in 1939, and there was no longer a need or desire for fiscal discipline, only then did the Depression end as America became the Arsenal of Democracy.

It was in his role as commander in chief that FDR was most impactful, but not all for the good. The Roosevelt administration found the Russians to by untrustworthy when it gave recognition to the Soviet Union during the first term, which makes it all the more baffling that FDR thought he could trust Stalin at Tehran and Yalta in making the agreements that would create the post war world. Because of the war, Roosevelt ran successfully for a third and fourth term, but by 1944 his health was so poor that this alone should have disqualified him for that fourth term. He would live long enough to travel to Yalta and return home to explain what occurred there, before finally succumbing to a cerebral hemorrhage at Warm Springs, Georgia.

Freidel was the first major biographer of FDR, and this single volume biography was his sixth book about Roosevelt. At the time of its publication (1990), this was considered by some to be the best single-volume biography of FDR. It is excellent, indeed.

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George Washington's Journey: The President Forges a New Nation by T. H. Breen

In the fall of 1789, and later in the Spring of 1791, George Washington, the first president of the United States under the constitution, left the capitals -- New York and Philadelphia -- to tour New England and the southern states. Washington wanted to meet with ordinary Americans and convey to them the importance of a strong federal union. In the process, the president demonstrated himself to be the master of political theater who wrote the rules every president since has followed when they have gone before the people. Breen takes the reader on the journey with Washington, allowing them experience with Washington the parades and celebrations as the hero of the Revolution visited early American towns and cities. The author also examines the issues of the day, the realities of political theater, Washington's talents and the message he took to the people. Excellent.

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The Spy Who Came in from the Cold by John Le Carre

Alec Leamas is sent to East Germany is a faux defector with information meant to persuade the Abteilung that its head of counterintelligence is actually a British spy. But the case unravels with unexpected twists on the way to the climax at the Berlin Wall. The spy thriller everyone should read. Fantastic! The novel was made into a movie starring Richard Burton, which is also excellent.