Book Review: Ruin of the Roman Empire: A New History

I recently finished the audiobook version of:

O’Donnell, James Joseph, and Mel Foster. 2009. The ruin of the Roman Empire a new history. [Solon, Ohio]: Playaway Digital Audio.

Author James O’Donnell is currently provost of Georgetown, but was previously a professor of classics. His book was narrated by Mel Foster, who I thought did a good job of appropriate narration on material that was usually academic, but sometimes veered toward the snarky. Mr. Foster handled both tones of writing well.

Dr. O’Donnell’s book has three main divisions: The Roman Empire around 500 CE, just prior to the reign of Emperor Justinian; Justinian’s reign (527-565) and that of a few successors; and a look at the Western part of the failing empire during the reign of Pope Gregory the Great (590-604).

One flaw of any non-fiction audiobook is the lack of access to an author’s notes. So I cannot make a fully informed decision about Dr. O’Donnell’s evidence for ideas that even he admits may spark controversy. Having said that, he uses quotes from classical texts well to make his point. He also does a good job of bringing ancient authors to life, which helps readers to understand what biases they may have had in their writing.

Dr. O’Donnell posits that the main reasons that Rome (as represented by the Byzantine Empire ruled out of Constantinople) fell were:

• Lack of interest in the peoples and regions beyond the Empire’s borders
• Obsession with conformity in religious belief under Emperor Julian, which alienated the largest Christian cities of the east.
• The waging of unneeded wars on the periphery of Empire while doing little about growing alienation in the Balkan heartland near the capital.

Along the way he attempts to rehabilitate the reputation of Theodoric the Great and other “barbarian” rulers that Dr. O’Donnell sees as Roman in education, outlook and ruling style. Based on the material he presents, I find him successful. But this is the first time I’ve even thought about Theodric since my Western Civilization course back in the 1980s.

We also learn more about the competing versions of Christianity in the period of late antiquity and how the particular doctrines nearly universal in the West can be traced back to Emperor Justinian.

Overall, I think the book is an engaging listen and I think the print version would probably be good too.

 

 

Book Review: The Years of Rice and Salt

I’m a member of our local chapter of the Alaska Library Association. A few months ago we started a book group that seems to be one of our more successful ventures. For that group, I recently finished the Kindle edition of:

Robinson, Kim Stanley. 2002. The years of rice and salt. New York: Bantam Books.

This is a book of two intertwining stories – A story of three civilizations: China, the Muslim world (Dar al Islam) and India (plus its allies) and a story of reincarnated souls dealing with themselves, each other, the world at large and sometimes with a bewildering assortment of gods.

Europe is not a factor because the book assumes that 99% of Europeans were killed off by the Black Death in the 1300s. Despite the chronological table in the front of the book, I was confused at times by when events were supposed to be happening. So I recommend the spoiler laden Wikipedia article on this book for people who wish to explore the chronology further.

The years of rice and salt is divided into ten books, which usually switch between civilizations. Book I was teeth grinding for me. Each of the book’s eight chapters ended with a remark from a 3rd person omniscient narrator that reminded me I was reading a book. This was particularly jarring because Robinson did such a fine job of immersing me in the empty world of Bold, a deserter from the Tamerlane’s army. Temur had decided to invade Europe. But all Bold and his advance party found were empty towns. Emptied by plague. When Bold reports this to Temur, he orders Bold and all of his fellow scouts to be killed and burned. Bold escapes into the now empty European wilderness and wanders for weeks. When he is finally caught by passing Arab slavers, he is grateful — and we understand why. But then the narrator reminds us we’re reading a book and the spell shatters.

Fortunately, this device is dropped for the remaining books. I think it should have been edited out of Book I before publication. If you can get through Book I, the rest of the work is fairly enjoyable.

One of the more notable differences between the world of Rice and Salt and our own, is that Native Americans in what we know as North America managed to hold onto the middle part of the continent fending off Chinese colonies on the West Coast and Muslim colonies on the East Coast. They eventually join with a system of democratic leagues in India to dispute the main empires of China and Dar al Islam (collection of Muslim states) for control of the planet.

One surprising similarity between our world and the world of Rice and Salt is that after a brief period of enlightenment, Islam was perceived as a backward and woman-hating civilization with small pockets of progressives. This is rather surprising to me. The pressure of China on Dar al Islam in their world was different from the pressure Europe put on our world. For one thing, Christian Europe was obsessed with the Holy Land that was also sacred to Islam. China was different – it only competed for trade and territory.  This lack of a religious war component on the part of China should have been a bar against fundamentalism in Islam as it had less to react to.

One thing that did bother me was that most of the scientific advances in the world of Rice and Salt came in the same order as our world. Additionally, most of the most important advances came from the same two Muslim characters – think of Newton, Galileo, Pasteur, van Leeuwenhoek and a host of others rolled up into two people. While I think think there would be scientific advancement on Earth if there had been no Europeans, I do think it would have developed differently because different peoples have different interests – maybe the Chinese would be more advanced in medicine but less advanced in labor saving devices because of their larger population. Maybe the Muslims around the Mediterranean would be very advanced in irrigation and desalination but deficient in something else. Or very advanced in optics, but not electricity, and so on.

Turning from the story of the worlds to the story of the reincarnating individuals, it is hard to say much without providing spoilers. One spoiler that I think is in your best interest is that for the most part, characters are reborn with names starting with the same first letter as the name of their previous incarnation. So Butterfly is a reincarnation of Bold, and Kheim is a reincarnation of Kyu. This information is offered in the Wikipedia article and by Robinson himself very late in the book. While it was somewhat entertaining to guess which new character was which old character, it was sometimes confusing and took away from the flow of the story. So I think you’re better off with the secret decoder ring. Once you identified a character’s previous reincarnations, the similarities and growth of the character were apparent.  Robinson does a good job of making characters similar to, but not exactly like the person they were in a past life.

Overall though, it is a good read. It’s a decent alternative history story with good characters. It does get a little preachy on what justice looks like but it is not overbearing in doing so.

Book Review: Casual Vacancy

I’ve read as much as I can deal with of:

Rowling, J. K. 2012. The casual vacancy. New York: Little, Brown & Co.

I read pages 1-72 and 411-end. This is the first time I’ve ever reviewed a book I hadn’t read completely, but thought some of my 30 or so regular readers might benefit. If you’d like to read reviews from people who did finish the book, check out the Goodreads page for Casual Vacancy.

My take, from skipping the middle? I find it to be well written for what it is. It’s not my cup of tea but could be yours.

Unlike several innocents I saw at Goodreads, I knew several things going into this book:

• This was Rowling’s first book for adults.
• It had a lot of swearing and sex.
• It asserted that the quaint English countryside covered a sea of conflict.
• Casual Vacancy referred to an unscheduled opening in the local city council.

This did not prepare me for a whole town of people whose sole delight appeared to be in cutting one another down. Not that this really made them happy, but not seizing a chance to make someone miserable increased their own misery.

I think I’d met up to a dozen characters, maybe more before I closed the book at page 72. I had not met even one remotely sympathetic character – only the vile, more vile and cowardly. That’s when I started looking up reviews. I wanted some hope that eventually at least one of these characters would grow into a full human being. The reviews told me not to hold my breath. I told a friend and fellow book group member about this. She told me that she was pretending that Pagford was Lord Voldemort’s home town. If that were true, I can certainly see how Tom Riddle picked up his lifetime loathing of muggles.

The other thing I got from the reviews is that what plot there was (as opposed to developing the characters as backbiting savages) started around 300. I couldn’t make myself start that early, so I started on page 412, the second chapter of the last part.

There was indeed a plot, including three major incidents that did seem to bring about changes in some characters. One couple’s marriage gets better. One teenager steps back from suicide and begins to value others. But other people get even more mean and backbiting.

One of the reasons I assert Casual Vacancy is well written is for a scene where a teenager does something that is deeply scandal provoking, but when explained from the teenager’s point of view is necessary to protect a loved one.

In some reviews, Rowling gets hit for ending the book abruptly. I don’t think that’s really fair. While the book does end at a funeral, it does finish the event. At its heart Casual Vacancy is a character story – the bit about the Council and the drug treatment center is just a sideshow. Once Rowling showed how the many characters in the book changed, intensified, or stubbornly resisted change, the work is done and no more pages are needed.

Overall the effect of this book reminded me of the movie Training Day with Denzel Washington. The movie is about the truly harrowing first day of a new LAPD narcotics officer. Pretty much all of the rookie’s woes are inflicted by his deeply corrupt partner. It was well written. It was well-directed. The plot made sense for what it was. And I never want to see it again. Admittedly I did watch the whole movie, but if it were a book I probably would have dropped it at page  72 and not read more.

So, if you think humanity is scum and want a book that validates your beliefs in a well written way, Casual Vacancy is for you. People wishing realistic depictions of domestic violence or drug abuse may also find this work of value. If you enjoy uplifting books or want adventure, stay away.

Book Review: Unspoken

What if your imaginary friend wasn’t? This is the question answered in Sarah Rees Brennan’s book:

Brennan, Sarah Rees. 2012. Unspoken. New York: Random House.

This book made me scream out loud at the end, a testament to how much Sarah Rees Brennan made me care about the characters.

It’s hard to write about this book without giving away important spoilers. Aside from the one I just gave. It’s set in a small town in the English country. For many years the area has been lacking its leading family. Local folk, when you can get them to talk at all, are divided on whether this was a bad thing.

Around this time, Kami Glass, who is both a local girl and an outsider owing to her heritage, plows her way into creating a school paper. Kami sees herself as an investigative reporter and has the will and charisma to dragoon friends into her investigations.

Which is a good thing, because with all the odd things going on in her town of Sorry-in-the-Vale, Kami needs all the help she can get. Even from the newly enfleshed voice inside her head.

Aside from the main story, the scenes with Kami and her family are endearing. Also of interest are the scenes where various secrets are revealed. Most of them are unexpected and a few are deadly. The whole book was well paced and hard to put down.

As with Team Human, I actually read Unspoken awhile back but it has stuck with me too. I also, really, really want to read the sequel!

Book Review: Team Human

Awhile back I finished reading:

Larbalestier, Justine, and Sarah Rees Brennan. 2012. Team Human. New York: HarperTeen.

I was very happy with this book. It was a fast, self-consistent read. The main characters in this book are mostly teenagers, and with few exceptions, talk and act like teenagers. Smart teens, but still teens.

Team Human deals with an alternate reality where vampires are an accepted, if not particularly loved, part of society. Vampires eat at blood banks rather than upon necks — most of them anyway. Some humans admire vampires so much, they want to become vampires themselves.

This world has actual clinics where people can go to become vampires. It is not a light decision as a fifth of all attempts to create vampires wind up killing the patient or turning him/her into a flesh eating zombie.

The story itself focuses around Mel, a girl who never wants to be vampire, and her best friend Cathy, who is interested in the lifestyle after falling in love with the new vampire student. We also hear a lot from Kit, a human raised by vampires after being abandoned. Kit is lucky in many ways – some vampires consider abandoned babies snacks.

The last sentence reminds me of another reason I enjoyed this book. The vampires of Larbalestier and Brennan come in all types – good, evil, crazed and just plain indifferent.

Hopefully I’ve peaked your interest. Sorry for the short review, but I actually read it a few months ago and didn’t write the review when the book was fresh in my mind.

Book Review: Battle Behind Bars (POWs)

I recently finished the book:

Rochester, Stuart I. 2010. The battle behind bars: Navy and Marine POWs in the Vietnam War. Washington, DC: Naval History & Heritage Command, Dept. of the Navy.

This 68 page book will be of great interest if you are:

• A Vietnam War history buff
• A Navy or Marine fan
• Interested in torture, effects of indefinite detention and coping mechanisms for both.
• Writing a story that involves long duration POWs in any kind of war.

This book is well written, avoids jargon and appears to be drawn from many first person accounts, although specific citations are not provided. The book is also well illustrated with prisoner photos, posters and copies of documents such as rules for prisoners. There is a list of suggested reading on page 67.

Notable features of this book for writers include the sidebar for the “tap code” on page 27 and for “indoctrination” on page 40. The chapter on punishment beginning 35 will serve as a primer on writing torture scenes.

For Americans at large, this book is a testament to the courage, intelligence, ingenuity and plain stubbornness brought by our naval and marine personnel during a dark time in their lives.

Ideally, the book’s condemnation of the use of sleep deprivation, stress positions, water boarding and extensive use of solitary confinement by the Viet Cong would prompt Americans to question the use of these techniques on prisoners we’ve held over the past decade.

Finally, unlike most government documents I’ve reviewed in this space, you can’t freely reuse the content of this book. Although the Naval History & Heritage Command contributed resources to this book and it was distributed through the Federal Depository Library Program, the copyright is registered to the Naval Historical Foundation, a private group founded in 1926. This means that no portion of this book may be reproduced without written permission of the Naval Historical Foundation.

Book Review: Burn Out by Marcia Muller

Review of:

Muller, Marcia. (2008). Burn out. New York: Grand Central Pub.

Burn Out is the 25th book by Marcia Muller to feature private investigator Sharon McCone. This was an accidental read for me. I had just purchased my Nook Tablet and I was looking to see how it handled library books. So I went to Listen Alaska Plus and searched for ebooks in the mystery genre. Burn Out just happened to be the first one available for download, so I downloaded it.

It was a happy accident. Each page I read kept me interested. The book begins with a very burned out Ms. McCone hanging out at her husband’s ranch. She’s been there five months after a traumatic case and has been trying to consider her next steps. She’d been getting nowhere until a murder case involving a relative of a family friend. Drawn into the case pretty much against her will, it turns out to do positive things for her.

The book is plotted well, the main characters are fleshed out and the various relationships are believable. If you like mysteries and strong female leads, this book might be for you. I was impressed enough that I’m going to track down the other books in the series.

Book Review: Diary of a Cosmonaut

After reading a total of about 40% of:

Lebedev, V. V., Daniel Puckett, and C. W. Harrison. 1988. Diary of a cosmonaut: 211 days in space. College Station, Tex: PhytoResource Research, Information Service.

I am ready to write a review. Short version – highly useful to science fiction writers but tedious.

I read through April (flight training) and May (1st month) thoroughly. I read most of June and then picked out 3-5 days each of July through December.

The book is what it advertises — a day by day diary by Cosmonaut Valentin Lebedev of his May – December 1982 Salyut 7 mission with Anatoly Berezovoy. Despite the Soviet era publication date, it seems pretty honest and in the pages I read made no effort either to sugarcoat the Soviet Union or villify the United States.

The diary format is the book’s strength for researchers and science fiction writers and a great weakness for general readers. If you want details on how to use a space toliet, sleep in a space sleeping bag or how a space station snack bar is stocked (269-70), this book is for you. There are also valuable insights into station/ground control relationships and tensions. Finally, there are many reflections on how Cosmonauts value and miss their families along with interaction during communication passes.

Despite the addition of correspondence to and from the cosmonauts from family, friends and organizations, reading large sections of the diary makes space life seem tedious. Day after day we read about lost sleep, balky experiments, lack of instructions from ground control and the sleep disturbing habits of crew mates. We learn how cold it gets on the station in the morning. Day after day. It’s a little like the movie Groundhog Day in space, apart from a few guest crews. We also learn that Soviet Russia hands out odd honors, such as the “honorary concrete worker” award given to Lebedev on August 2, 1982 by the Krasnoyarsk Hydroelectric power station building project.

Cosmonaut Lebedev isn’t all negativity though. The book makes clear the pride he takes in his scientific work, his respect for his colleagues and the beauty of the Earth he circle. It’s just that the frustration, boredom and lonliness seem to speak louder. Day after day after day.

One interesting aspect of the book is that the diary entries shorten dramatically starting in September. At first I thought this was due to the mission extension given to Salyut 7. It turns out that I missed the translator’s note on page 294:

“After a two year hiatus, Lebedev published a continuation to his diary. The continuation fills in the large gaps in the latter half of the flight. Much of it consists of repetitions of how he felt, his mood, and other routine notes. What follows is the balance of the diary minus the tedium.”

There is a glossary in the back of the book and what I consider to be an inadequate index. On pages 347-348 there is a bibliography that will probably be useful to people interested in the early days of the Soviet space program.

Although I can’t recommend this book as a good read like I can for Jerry Linenger’s Off the Planet, I feel that Mr. Lebedev has provided a valuable service by providing a frank look at what life in space is like. I believe anyone interested in space psychology or writing a story about remote space outposts ought to check out this book.

Book Review: The 100 simple secrets of happy people : what scientists have learned and how you can use it

Thanks to Listen Alaska, I recently finished reading the following book on my iPhone:

Niven, David. 2003. The 100 simple secrets of happy people what scientists have learned and how you can use it. [New York]: PerfectBound.

 

The format of the book is simple. It’s one hundred ideas, in no particular order, that have been demonstrated to either increase or reduce human happiness. Each idea has a short chapter that was 3-5 screens on an iPhone, so probably 2-3 printed pages. The chapter has a personal story than a description of the research behind the idea. The article concludes with a reference to at least one study behind the idea. The back of the book is an extensive bibliography of the studies mentioned in the book and give enough information to be findable.

 

Here are my favorite ideas from the book:

 

7. Turn off the TV.
10. Limit yourself to thinking about one subject as you lie down to sleep.
34. It’s not what happened, it’s how you think about what happened.
44. Eat some fruit every day.
46. Think in concrete terms [In relation to goals].
48. Don’t blame yourself [For things beyond your control].
51. Make your work a calling.
61. Be positive.
71. Don’t accept television’s picture of the world.
72. You always have a choice.
82. Don’t dwell on unwinnable conflicts.
90. Surround yourself with pleasant aromas.

 

As you might notice from this short list, some of the ideas seem to be very similar to one another (Turn of the TV vs Don’t accept television’s picture of the world.) but the book doesn’t feel too padded. Some of the ideas in this book will appeal to you even if my list does not.

 

This is a good read that can be done over short sittings like waiting for a bus, being on a break or even as restroom reading. Check it out regardless of media.

Book (Series) Review: Demon’s Lexicon by Sarah Rees Brennan

At the suggestion of a friend, I recently read the following books:

• Brennan, Sarah Rees. 2009. The demon’s lexicon. New York: Margaret K. McElderry Books.
• Brennan, Sarah Rees. 2010. The demon’s covenant. New York: Margaret K. McElderry Books.
• Brennan, Sarah Rees. 2011. The demon’s surrender. New York: Margaret K. McElderry Books.

 

Overall, this is a great set of engaging books. Since one of the things I greatly appreciated was that I was genuinely surprised by each book, I’m going to do my best to provide a spoiler-free review.

 

For people of faith who read this blog, don’t be put off by the titles. In some ways it’s better to think of the “demons” in this story as extradimensional aliens who long to break through into our world. The demons would fit in quite well in a Doctor Who story and not at all well in The Exorcist.

 

With that out-of-the-way, what is this series about? In my view, the three books are a story of unconditional love and its power to bring about change in the objects of that love. It’s also about the possibility of redemption for all. The series is realistic in showing that redemption is hard to come by without sacrifice and pain and that not all are redeemed. But it also insists that all have the possibility of making different choices. There are also interesting and sometimes humorous explorations of the lengths people will go to rationalize their actions.

 

All three books crackle with great dialog that avoids preachiness. Each of the three books is told from a different character’s point of view. I didn’t think this would work and neither did Ms. Brennan’s publishers. But it not only works, it was truly required. Otherwise it would have been impossible to believably pull off some of the surprises I mentioned earlier. The use of the different narrators also allows for a fuller exploration of the Demon Lexicon’s universe.

 

The one minor flaw in this series as that the main characters: Nick, Alan, Mae, Jamie and Cynthia (Sin/Thea) are supposed to be teenagers. They all attend high school, but to me they all talk like they are in the late 20s, except for Jamie who sounds like a real teenager and Alan, who is portrayed as about 19 but talks and acts like he’s 40. It’s a minor flaw to me because I love good snarky dialog much more than I love authenticity in voice.

 

The final thing I’ll mention in this hopefully spoiler free review is to watch out for the t-shirts. There are several characters who wear message t-shirts and they often correspond to the mood or situation. My favorite is one of Alan’s t-shirts that proclaims: “I get my fun between the covers” and features an open book.

 

If you do read the series, check out the author’s Live Journal account, which features a number of short stories set in this universe. Sarah Rees Brennan also has an author website.