Virtual Realities
Neelum Saran Gour
Penguin Books, India
11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi 110 017, India.
ISBN 0-14-302806-5, Price - Rs.250, First published 2002, Pages - 241.
Devanshu Gour
Reviewer
Reading this novel makes it amply clear that the author belongs to a class by herself. Anyone
familiar with the Indian literary scene knows that Indian writers belong to two camps- those who
write in English and those writing in one of the many Indian languages . The much hyped festival
of
international Indian writers organised by the Indian Council of Cultural Relations witnessed
rancorous exchanges between members on both sides of this great Indian literary divide. Indian
writers writing in English were critiqued as being mere elitist observers of Indian reality, seldom
in
close touch with living roots, while those writing in Indian languages were described as bound by
choice and situation to confined cultural circuits and though animated by a vital contact with an
essential and active Indian tradition, excluded from reaching a large global audience.
Virtual Realities defies categorization because it handles in English the theme of a Hindi writer's
adventures with imagination ,thus straddling conventional divisions between 'regional' and
English
writing. Neelum Saran Gour is best described as a regional English writer, an author whose voice
emerges from the authentic heart of a culture in a medium that is global in its range. Living and
working outside the elitist boundaries and deeply rooted in Indian reality, Gour writes a flawless,
flexible English. Yet her concerns in this, her fourth work of fiction, are universal ones, plainly
relevant in any creative context. Virtual Realities is an absorbing novel about two obsessive
storytellers, one a professional writer, the other a carefree chatterbox. Sravan and Buddhoo,
though very different in temperament and lifestyle, are old friends who have just one thing in
common. Each enriches his life by creating a fictional reality.
The novel relates their adventures with their imaginary worlds, shifting constantly between
folksy-earthy boisterous humour and searching dead-earnest reflections, never overbalancing,
making the reader think even as he smiles. Sravan finds surreal events emerging straight out of
his
book into his real life world while Buddhoo creates a hilarious hotch-potch of Indian philosophy,
mythology, personal buffoonery and outrageous yarn. Supporting these two central characters
are
others, all of them creating ingenious narratives of their own. Virtual Realities addresses the
universal human need to script a favourite narrative about oneself and the ways in which the
creative imagination preserves, enhances and destroys us. An unputdownable and stimulating
novel,
rich, funny, empathetic, thoughtful.
If there is a flaw it lies in the fact that this is not an event-grounded novel. Its forward movement
relies heavily on cranky dialogue or intensive thought centred round a basically abstract inquiry.
Although it strives to couch its philosophic content in racy banter and multiple culture-specific
narratives, there are times when the creative issues addressed may be impenetrable to the average
reader looking for a good story. To readers who have watched Gour's progress in her last three
books, this novel marks a breaking away in a new direction quite removed from her earlier
tradition-leavened tales of a multilayered India. Whether this growth is in tune with current
reading
tastes remains to be seen.
Creating And Dominating New Markets
Peter Meyer
Amacom Books
1601 Broadway, New York, NY 10019
ISBN 0-8144-0678-5, $27.95, Hardcover, 241 pages, 1-800-250-5308,
www.amazon.com
Roger Herman
Reviewer
So, you're sitting in your office thinking about your business. Or the business you'd like to start.
Building a business is a daunting proposition, not for the weak of heart-or weak of wallet. The
key is
to discover something different that will grab attention. What's the old saw: Find a need and fill
it?
Peter Meyer, principal of a California (where else) consulting firm that specializes in the subject of
this book, suggests a different approach. Instead of competing with everyone else, create a new
market. Makes sense. As Meyer points out, it's exciting, fun, and profitable. New markets are
forgiving and, without rivals you don't have to worry about competitive pricing. Can it be this
easy?
Meyer lays it out in Chapter One: The Mystique and Challenges of New Markets. Prepare to have
your mind opened, your thoughts stimulated, your imagination titillated.
The first part of this highly readable book (type size and leading enables this book to be easily
read
on trains and airplanes) addresses strategies. The second part with application of the strategies.
Good model for this highly practical book.
The other chapters of the first section deliver ideas, perspective, and examples of how the
strategies
have been used. Balancing Your Resources and Opportunities. It's the Problem That Matters.
Choosing the Best Risk. What New Markets are Available to You? Are you beginning to get a
sense of the depth of content of this book?
The book is written in relatively short sections, so the reader never seems overburdened by the
volume of text. I kept slowing down because I was thinking about what Meyer said. Then I found
myself taking notes, like I
was starting to write a business plan. See what I mean? I predict that you'll read this book at least
twice: once for a quick overview, then at least one more time (with Peter Meyer at your elbow)
thinking, talking to yourself (and others), and constructing ideas that may drive your future.
Charts sprinkled throughout the book will guide in your understanding of the message. So will the
questions tossed out by the author. There are many paths to take in creating, exploring,
exploiting,
and dominating new
markets. Each alternative approach has its advantages and disadvantages. Your strength will come
from understanding what's involved in your journey, and that power will come from this
book.
Section Two concentrates on the application of the strategies. Funding the New Market Effort.
What Role Does the Customer Play? Building and Dominating Markets Through Involvement.
What
is the Role of Information
Technology. Using Credibility in Creating and Dominating Markets. What's Next? And the book
closes with a good index to help you find what you want on your second and third readings.
This is the new frontier. You can be on the leading edge. It's a different world, as Meyer warns. If
you think you're up for it-and the book will help you determine that readiness, this book will be
your
guide.
Now my review is done. I'm going back for my second helping!
Never Fade Away
William Hart
Fithian Press
c/o Daniel & Daniel, Publishers
PO Box 1525, Santa Barbara, CA 93102
1564743861 $12.95 www.amazon.com
Helen Heightsman Gordon
http://www.anacade.com
Bill Hart's characters go straight to the heart. Tina Le is a Vietnamese refugee determined to
master
English as her second language and to pass two required English courses at a California state
college. Her teacher and mentor, John Goddard, is a Vietnam War veteran still suffering from
nightmares in the mid-1980's. Both of them keep journals. Through their journal entries we read
Tina's perceptive observations (in endearingly imperfect English), and see Goddard's blend of
worldly cynicism and determination to fight for his students. Survivors, both, of life-and-death
situations -- but they are being thwarted in peacetime USA by a coterie of English teachers who
seem to take sinister pleasure in controlling the fate of their underlings.
If such teachers seem unlikely candidates for villains, I assure you they exist. I've taught
alongside
them, heard them complain in department meetings. This situation will seem familiar in many
colleges where English teachers, after being trained only to teach the finer points of literature,
are
frustrated by having to work with ESL and remedial students. The students, in turn, become
frustrated and bewildered, feeling doomed to flail and fail. Some become bitter; some
contemplate
suicide; some give up in despair.
Goddard sees the quality of mind inTina's papers; the other teachers see only flaws in usage and
grammar. When assigned an inappropriate topic on an important departmental competency test,
two
of Goddard's best students fail. Averaging that grade with their classwork, he assigns them
passing
grades for the course. Having bucked the system, he is judged insubordinate, a threat to the
"standards" of the department. Now they are out to get him -- along with any students they think
he
may have "coached" into navigating through the land mines they have set. The story is sprinkled
with humor and satire. Tina's roommate, Rayneece, contrasts amusingly with the shy and
studious
Tina, providing opportunities for Tina to comment in her journal about American attitudes,
male-female relationships, and interracial dating. A delicious irony occurs when Tina's next
English
teacher tries to teach her about irony using Swift's "Modest Proposal." Tina doesn't like Swift's
suggestions about eating babies, and Goddard encourages her to write her honest opinion. She
does, but there is a price to pay for honesty.
After some misunderstandings, Goddard and Tina begin to help each other heal their emotional
wounds. Having passed through the teacher-student and employer-employee relationships, they
have become friends. They might have a future together if they allow each other enough time to
learn to love and trust again.
Someone will probably make a movie out of this book, and that would be unfortunate. Bill Hart's
prose is snappy and incisive; his deft turns of phrase provide a treat even apart from the story. I
would have liked to see more improvement in Tina's journal entries as the story unfolds, making
Goddard's influence on her writing apparent. But her writing charms me with her insights,
sensitivity, and integrity, so I'll draw on my willing suspension of disbelief and just enjoy her. I
would have preferred a livelier title for the book -- one that suggests the dynamics of the
relationships and the "wars" that siphon off the lifeblood and the talents of soldiers, teachers, and
students. This is Hart's first novel, but his poetic artistry serves him well in fiction.
Already he has me looking forward to the next one.
Jusu And Mother Earth
Sharon Ervin
AmErica House Publishing
PO Box 151, Frederick, MD 21705-0151
1893162877 $19.95 www.amazon.com
Priscilla A. Maine
Reviewer
After five months of grieving the loss of her beloved husband Ruth Pedigo determines to dedicate
herself to the service of others. Putting away any expectation for personal happiness, she packs
her
bags, waves aside the objections of her children, dispels the concerns of her friends, and sets of
for
Bwana, Uganda. Even as she assures everyone she is quite capable of this undertaking, she hasn't
convinced herself. After all, her husband Mickey had sheltered and protected her for the past
twenty-nine years this was a new experience for her. She set her course and refused to be swayed
from it even when she encountered the first of many obstacles in her path.
A primitive clinic in the African wilderness, where he treats the local natives, is Dr. Jack
Standish's
private passion and one he indulges annually. Established in his medical practice, respected by his
peers, and financially secure, he is bored by the continual parade of females vying for his attention.
Yet Jack is intrigued by the lovely lady traveling alone. She is obviously overwhelmed and a bit
intimidated by her surroundings. When a fellow traveler make advances toward her Jack
intervenes
and is even more fascinated when she evades his questions, but not his offer of help.
Fate throws the pair together just long enough to tease and tantalize the "what-ifs" in Ruth's
female
vanity, even against her better judgment. Then, just as quickly, they are separated and she is left
with
troubling dreams and the memory of a haunting smile.
The African bush is a world removed from her native Oklahoma but she blooms in her newfound
independence though she often falters on the cultural differences, especially the practice of
witchcraft. But with the aid of a young orphaned boy, Ruth quickly adapts to life at the mission.
The
mission priest and the members of his congregation take to Ruth immediately, calling her "Mother
Earth" even as they whisper behind her back about Jusu, the magician. Political intrigue, jealousy,
and illness throw Ruth and Jack together again with an unpredictable outcome.
Jusu And Mother Earth is written with a masterful voice, an intriguing plot, and vivacious
characters. A delightful read.
A Wanton Gyre
Christopher WunderLee
Writer's Club Press
910 East Hamilton, Suite 100, Campbell, California 95006
ISBN: 0595197272, $20.95, September 2001, 405 pp., www.amazon.com
Miriam Sante
mirsane@yahoo.com
Imagine if the Marquis de Sade and Thomas Jefferson collaborated on a novel, imagine a book
that
balances a hedonistic banquet of images and words with a treatise on endangered civil liberties
and
contemporary biases. A Wanton Gyre is a breath-taking foray into a fictional future that is all
together so real current events seem to be mimicking its contents. The world of A Wanton Gyre
is
uncertain, an ambitious senator has alleged that subversives have infiltrated key positions in
government & industry, causing a witch-hunt to ensue, and a special congressional committee has
been instituted to investigate the allegations. What Christopher WunderLee has dubbed 'a blue
scare' sweeps across the national and several citizens and organizations are accused of
un-American
activities.
WunderLee captures this rampant social fear by focusing on one man's plight amidst the scare and
with fictional newspaper articles at the end of each chapter that detail the greater social
ramifications. The novel opens in a gallop, as the protagonist, Maxwell Taylor, is arrested and
dragged away to prison by the special congressional committee's police agency. The reader
follows
Taylor as he faces arrest and interrogation without knowing what he's accused of; we are guided
into his confusion by a masterfully woven plot and a battery of his memories.
In Maxwell Taylor, Christopher WunderLee has constructed a striking anti-hero and set him
within a
string of events that highlights both his inadequacies and his beauty. Taylor is a former college
professor with a jaded past, he lost his job because he blackmailed a student into trading sexual
favors for grades. Taylor is a figure imbued with contradictions, he is a hedonist and a libertine, a
man well educated enough to quote Descartes or Socrates but so reliant on sensuality his reason
is
over-powered by his lust. Like many great protagonists, Maxwell Taylor is a brand new
archetype
so well constructed that his personality and character saturate the reader's imagination. We are
disgusted by him while at the same time, we can't help but be intrigued by his individuality.
On the opposing side of the conflict, Mary Lazarus is an assistant to the special prosecutor's office
in
charge of trying Taylor's case. She personifies the average citizen: scared, responsive to the
government's efforts to cleanse society of subversion, offended by Maxwell Taylor's lifestyle and
political views, hypocritical, and willing to remain ignorant. However, like the reader of the
novel,
Mary is also uncomfortably curious about Taylor. She struggles with her own aversion to his
lifestyle and an intense interest in learning more.
Mary Lazarus, along with the special prosecutor in charge of the case, stand on the opposing side
of
Taylor, and this differing ethical position forces the reader to take sides and review their own
beliefs.
Is speech dangerous? Should we be reigning in individuals and groups who have differing
political
views? During turmoil, should civil liberties be restricted? WunderLee's characters offer very
different answers to these questions.
And that, if anything else, is the beauty of the novel. When Maxwell Taylor's trial begins, the
tempo
of the novel changes, it becomes a dialogue between the author and the reader concerning the
First
Amendment. We suddenly realize the devices employed to construct such memorable characters
were done for the specific purpose of turning the book itself into the subject of the debate.
Maxwell
Taylor's sexual exploits are presented not only as plot material, but also to make A Wanton Gyre
itself a questionable piece of literature. The trial that so aptly brings a climax to the story, works
as
the novels own thesis and antithesis, it condemns as well as defends its own content.
There is no confusion on which side WunderLee is concerning the debate and there are parts of
the
novel that are flawed. At times, the rhythm of the prose is interrupted with too much digression,
there appears to have been multiple editors who worked on the novel, as choices differ on the
structure of the content, and the spiraling plot of the first section of the book can be a little
repetitious. Concerning its erotic content, A Wanton Gyre is more Tropic of Cancer than Lady
Chatterley's Lover and some parts may be too much for some readers. But, all in all, A Wanton
Gyre is an incredible accomplishment. You won't find a better discussion of civil liberties in any
other piece of contemporary literature. The novel belongs beside great works like Fahrenheit
451,
Kafka's The Trial (of which it was obviously influenced), and 1984.
With precise words, a rhythmic cadence, and one of the most memorable protagonists ever
prepared, Christopher WunderLee has developed an erotic thriller so complete it literally
challenges
the reader to investigate their own prejudices and rethink their social values. A Wanton Gyre is a
book that would make the Marquis de Sade smile and Thomas Jefferson reflective. For that, I say
it
deserves our respect.
Change Of Heart
Jack Allen
Burping Frog Publishing
6654 Harding, Taylor, Michigan 48180
ISBN: 0-7388-6730-6, price: $16, date: 2001, page count: 318
Jan McDaniel
Reviewer
When the stakes are high and the reading gripping, count on Josh McGowan to balance action
with
fascinating detail. Author Jack Allen created this character to lead the way through a world
studded
with international intrigue and heartbreaking emotion, both tinged with the taste of vengeance.
Allen's carefully planned and certainly human portrayal of McGowan moves this hero smoothly
through whatever situations he must face--from accessing his stakeout partner's true strengths and
weaknesses to changing survival tactics at a moment's notice. Josh's strength, in fact, is his
resourcefulness.
That strength is put to the test when a young woman named Valeria, who has a complicated
agenda
of her own, becomes more than an assignment. Stopping the next cold war is now a guessing
game.
In an around-the-world dash to get the answers to match up correctly, Josh puts everything on the
line . . . his career, his life . . . and even those may not be enough.
Not every man will do such work. When Valeria asks Josh why he does it, he is hard-pressed to
come up with the answer, even in his most private thoughts: "It wasn't for the money; they didn't
pay him enough. Patriotism? He believed in his country as much as anyone else, but he didn't
wrap
himself in the flag. So what was it? The killing? He shuddered. He hated to think he did this job
because it gave him an opportunity to kill. That would make him a blood-thirsty murderer.
"No, he did it because it had to be done."
Fortunately, Burping Frog Publishing plans to release several other titles in this series. A bright
new
talent on the Suspense Thriller scene, Jack Allen leaves his readers wanting more.
"TO ALL VICTIMS OF ABUSE -- for their fear, suffering, and hopelessness; their hope,
strength
and courage, their escape, recovery and renewal; their challenge to change society."
It is customary to begin a review with a representative quote or two from the book in question.
This
amiable convention is deemed to provide the prospective reader with a taste of the book
unseasoned
by the reviewer's peppery opinions and prejudices. Of equal but less-widely understood
importance,
it also affords the self-aggrandizing reviewer the opportunity to select quotes that support those
soon-to-be-unleashed prejudices and opinions. The above passage, from Nora Penia's sturdy first
novel, Invisible Chains, duly serves both these functions. What makes it noteworthy as well as
quoteworthy is that it comes not from the text, but from the dedication page of this psychological
drama cum mystery. You've gotta admire a writer who can stake out her territory, define her
terms,
and announce her intentions all before page one. It only remains to add that the abuse in question
is
spousal, both emotional and physical, and you've got your bearings.
Maddy Tyler is the director of Face to Face, a small agency (besides Maddy there is
fellow-counselor Darcy, and Anne, the idiosyncratic secretary) set up to provide counseling
services
to (mostly) women in abusive relationships. The story centers around Maddy, who is being
stalked
by the aggrieved husband of one of her clients, and two of those clients, Gillian and Laura, both
trying to figure out how to deal with their abuse (one physical, one emotional). Penia's
understated
style is immediately accessible and well fitted to her serious subject matter. The reader enters into
the crisis counselor_s world from the first sentence, and from there it is an easy step off the curb
into
the no-traffic-signs world of the abused women themselves. The building blocks of Penia's
narrative
are the group session, the crisis call, the anecdotal reminiscence and the sudden, wholly
non-gratuitous violence that is all the more shocking because it is so clearly inevitable. You know
what the book is about; you know the author's style is rigorously realistic, you know it's coming,
but
still you can't quite believe it when it does. It seems absurd to talk about "gritty realism" in what is
so unabashedly a "women's book", but there it is--no frills, no romance, no punches pulled.
The stresses of working as a counselor are portrayed with equal, if less-gut-wrenching realism.
Sentimentality is just not a color in Penia's pencil case. There is no glamour in being the director
of
Face to Face, with its one-window offices in a Florida strip mall. Both Maddy and Darcy are
stressed out before the story begins, and have few illusions about the day-to-day struggle and
depressingly low success rate. "I knew I would probably never hear from her again," is Maddy's
refrain after another crisis caller shies away from the truth--her way of acknowledging the cold
reality while at the same time reminding herself not to get too emotionally involved. At first
Maddy
refuses to take her stalker seriously--until she gets a dose of her own medicine from the appealing
Detective Connor, who provides police support as well as a genial romantic interest. In an ironic
twist, Maddy realizes that by denying the seriousness of the threatening letters she is making the
same mistake her clients do when they deny the seriousness of their abusive relationships. No one
is
immune, Penia seems to be saying--nobody wants to believe it is happening to them. Maddy is a
low-key heroine, but she is a heroine indeed, and quickly steels herself to face the truth. Together,
she and Connor come up with a plan to entice the stalker into a trap--although, in series of
hair-raising scenes, things don't go exactly as planned.
The stalker plot provides a nice framework, and will satisfy the mystery lovers' passion for
detection,
but it never threatens to overrun the author's main battlefield--the misery of abuse and the need to
end it. As promised, I point to the dedication to affirm that this book was clearly written for
abused
women, not only to tell their stories, but to encourage women still in abusive relationships to seek
help. For this reason, much of the book is given over to descriptions of what it is like to be in an
abusive relationship. We get Gillian's and Laura's stories in full detail, and representative
snapshots
of the lives of half a dozen others (including one man). Penia's unemotional style nonetheless
imbues
every word her characters speak with emotional truth.
Curiously, this emotional truth does not always translate into the most life-like of characters.
Anecdotal storytelling, though it serves the purpose Penia uses it for (accurate and honest
description), leads to a stilted view of the characters. We know what happened to them, but we
have
little sense of their personality, of whether or not we would actually like them if we were sitting
next
to them on an airplane. It's a trade off I'm sure Penia made gladly; her choice to focus on the
problem rather than the person. It's not like she can't do solid characterization: Maddy and Darcy,
whom we see struggling with the day-to-day problems of job, family, and future, are well-drawn
and
three-dimensional.
If there is any unexpected weakness in Invisible Chains, it is perhaps that the anecdotes becomes
repetitive--not in terms of their specifics, but in terms of their tone. After a while, the submissive
attitudes of the abused women, and the rationalizations they fall back on, begin to grate on the
nerves, especially because they are not explained. Again and again, the abused spouses fail to
stand
up for themselves; they allow their husbands to dictate whether they will go to work, go to
school,
make a phone call, or watch TV. Although it is hard to admit, in the face of Penia's earnest
attention
to detail, this leads to a lack of interest in the characters. One understands that the psychological
pressures--the invisible chains--placed by the abuser around the abused over time, along with
constant compromise, can wreck havoc on a person's judgement and identity. Maddy herself
provides the lone example of what a woman "should" do when confronted by an abusive spouse.
Her first husband was abusive--once. When he assaulted her, she left--pregnant and penniless and
powerless though she was. While Maddy's actions somewhat offset the inaction of the others, still
there is no explanation of what caused her to go one way, and those others to go another. Of
course,
once again Penia provides her answer early on--this time in the title of her book. But the fact that
the
characters themselves don't know how it happened does not remove the reader's desire for
enlightenment. Those invisible chains needed to be a little more corporeal for the average
reader.
That said, there can be little doubt that Penia made a conscious choice to avoid excess discussion
of
"why" and "how," for such discussion would have led to an analysis of social morays, sexual
politics
and the like, which would have taken the focus off the women themselves. As it is, her message
remains clear--abusive relationships are bad, they are the fault of the abuser, not the abused, and
they should be ended. Worthy issues such as what the abused spouse could have or should have
done, how abusers play on social conventions that allow men to be jealous, aggressive, and
dominant, and how women are raised to believe that any man is better than none, are not even
hinted
at. Penia is not writing about causes, remember, but about symptoms, writing a book for abused
women in the hope that some of them will read it, see themselves or their spouses, and take steps
to
get out.
Penia, a writer who lives in southern Florida, has many years of working with abused spouses
under
her belt, and boy does it show. Invisible Chains is a do-it-yourself diagnostic tool for abusive
relationships. It_s also a well-paced and frequently riveting story for the more casual reader. Don't
let this reviewer's interest in and admiration of the author's mission scare you off. Penia
understands
the difference between proselytizing and shining a spotlight on a dark area of human experience.
Her
sense of moral responsibility only makes Invisible Chains all the more satisfying.
Ellen Larson, Reviewer, http://www.enkidu.info/reviews
Brenda's Bookshelf
Halfway To Forever
Karen Kingsbury
Multnomah Publishers
PO Box 1720, Sisters, Oregon 97759
ISBN 157673899X $11.99 www.amazon.com 1-800-929-0910
Two families - four friends - hoping for a miracle.
Matt and Hannah Bronzan knew heartache for Hannah had just laid to rest her husband and oldest
child some four years ago. Now after much soul-searching and prayers, they were ready to add to
their family. They were ready to move forward. To take the step that would forever change their
lives when they adopt a little girl who gets shifted back to her grandma before the adoption is
legalized. Heartbroken, Hannah struggles with her anger and her belief in God. While she
struggles
with her inner turmoil, a miracle is ready to take place.
Jade and Tanner Eastman fell in love years ago. Fate kept them apart for over a decade. Although
they each survived, Tanner resented not knowing his son or being there for his early years so
when
they once again found each other, they believed things were finally working out for them. Now
Jade
is pregnant. Everything seems to be going right when the terrible news hits - Jade has cancer. Due
to
the pregnancy, the cancer is spreading at a rapid rate. Only a miracle can save both Jade and the
unborn child.
Get the tissues out. Halfway To Forever is a tear-jerker. Each of Kingsbury's characters have their
own inner struggles grounded deep with love for the Savior. Yet each has their own doubts.
Wondering why bad things happen to good people. Together, the Bronzan's and Eastman's forge
a
lasting bond showing the true colors of friendship. Remember, in life, and in fiction, anything is
possible.
Day Of Reckoning: The Baxter Series, Book Two
Kathy Herman
Multnomah Publishers
PO Box 1720, Sisters, Oregon 97759
ISBN 1576738965, $11.99, www.amazon.com 1-800-929-0910
He wanted attention. -- He definitely got it.
One man's anger grew until it festered. Boiling. Waiting to be released. Nothing would stop his
revenge against the man who killed his father. He - Wayne Purdy - would be in the spotlight
finally
putting the might G.R. Logan in his place. Making him feel as helpless as Wayne did when his
father
was out of work. When his father died. When Wayne quit school to put food on the table for his
mother and sister.
In his revenge, his anger attacks two innocent children, Taylor Logan and Sherri Kennsington.
With
them missing and perhaps even dead, the entire town of Baxter prays for their safe return while
the
FBI struggles to bring the girls home unharmed. Throw in the visit of Wayne's sister who finds
out
the truth behind the headlines but at the same time she's too scared to go to the authorities. Then
she
makes her move. Will it be too late for all the girls?
From anger to acceptance to forgiveness, Herman has created characters that are human, not
perfect, and certainly willing to show their love of Christ even through they too were wronged by
one man caught in the middle. Happiness. Sadness. Glowing acceptance. Turning to Christ.
Knowing He is the One who made the plan. Numerous themes abound in Day Of Reckoning
while
the suspense builds and the anger ebbs. It is definite that one of the themes is sure to touch the
heart
of Herman's readers.
Brenda Ramsbacher
Reviewer
Peter's Bookshelf
Marketing And Promoting Your Own Seminars And Workshops
Fred Gleeck
Fast Forward Press
209 Horizon Peak Drive, Henderson, NV 89012
ISBN 0936965088, $14.95, 1-800-FGLEECK (345-3325), www.seminarexpert.com,
www.amazon.com
If you want to learn how to make money by holding seminars, workshops, or bootcamps, you'll
want
to get a copy of Marketing And Promoting Your Own Seminars And Workshops by Fred
Gleeck.
Drawing upon his vast experience in holding over 1,300 one-day seminars (and flying over two
million miles to provide them) over the last fifteen years, Gleeck provides a readable introduction
to
getting started in the seminar business. Even if you have experience hosting seminars or in public
speaking, you'll probably find Marketing And Promoting Your Own Seminars And Workshops a
good read.
Gleeck says the business of providing seminars has the potential to earn an individual several
hundred thousand dollars a year or even upwards of a million dollars a year. He says that the
seminar
business also provides the opportunity to learn new things, meet interesting people, travel, and be
an
onstage ham, if you want.
Why ham-it-up a bit during a seminar? After surveying thousands of individuals about the
characteristics great public speakers have, Gleeck found three dominant results: Great speakers
are
sincere, knowledgeable, and humorous.
How do you know if you're humorous? Gleeck writes: "It's only funny if they laugh. The
definition
of funny must come from the people receiving the message. I don't care if you think a joke is
funny.
I don't care if your family thinks it is funny. It is not funny if people don't laugh."
That's a truism many people outside the entertainment field don't contemplate. Two individuals
could sit around all day debating the quality of a dramatic feature film--one person arguing the
film
is high quality and the other arguing it's horrible. But, there isn't much to debate with comedy. Go
ahead and try to convince people that There's Something About Mary isn't a funny film!
In addition to liking humor because we know whether or not it's working, Gleeck likes
measurable
business results. Gleeck discusses setting measurable goals for your events.
Gleeck writes: "I have three goals when I give a seminar. First, I want to get great evaluations.
Second, I want to sell a lot of product. Third, I want to achieve both of these goals in such a way
that people will enthusiastically want to do business with me again. ... All three of these can be
measured."
Gleeck goes on to suggest revenue per person (attending the seminar) per minute (of time
invested
in presenting the seminar) as a yardstick of a financially successful seminar. Gleeck also discusses
price testing of your seminars to maximize profitability.
Gleeck is a strong proponent of the back-end profitability of seminars. Rather than just
maximizing
the seminar registration revenue, Gleeck suggests that the key to seminar success is maximizing
the
total revenue that the seminar generates for you.
Gleeck expresses this as: TR = SR + PS + CB, which says that the total revenue generated by a
seminar is the sum of the seminar registration fees plus the product sales generated during the
seminar plus the consulting business generated by the seminar. (In fact, Gleeck point out that
seminars are a great way to generate business if you are a consultant)
To be able to maximize seminar profitability, Gleeck suggests calculating the lifetime value of
your
seminar customers. Then, you know how much you can spend on marketing to acquire new
customers.
Gleeck also says that you should record your seminars. In addition to allowing you to critique
your
performance, Gleeck writes: "... you may capture a 'magic moment' on tape. What is a magic
moment? This is where you do or say something to your audience that brings the house down.
They
either laugh or cry or explode with applause and adulation. You want to have this on tape. Take
all
of the magic moments and cut them together and you will have a phenomenal demo video or
audio
that you can use to promote yourself as a speaker and seminar leader."
Gleeck is also a strong supporter of recording your seminars to sell audio tapes to people who
want
to hear the seminar but were not be able to attend. At $197 a pop, it's easy to see how selling
seminar tapes can add to the bottom line. Gleeck says successful seminar promoters often
generate
50% or more of their profits from the sales of tapes, videos, books, and other products.
What about people who don't want to sell products at their seminars? Gleeck tells them to get
over
it. He says selling products is too profitable to pass up. Gleeck suggests creating products at many
different price points and upselling to generate more revenue. Gleeck says leave your books at
home--they just aren't profitable enough.
Gleeck also says that your seminar products must not only be good, they must be great (and, of
course, he has a way to measure this--rates of return and rates of customer repeat business).
Gleeck
also points out that withholding valuable information in an attempt to upsell customers to
higher-priced products is a failing strategy. Rather, Gleeck argues that you want to make your
information so useful that customers want more.
Marketing And Promoting Your Own Seminars And Workshops also provides some great advice
about marketing seminars (in particular, writing direct mail promotions for your seminars), hotel
coffee, psyching yourself up for a speech or seminar, keeping audience attention, hiring other
presenters, 1-800 numbers, and many other topics.
Overall, I don't know if any audio tape is worth $197, but at $14.95, if you are thinking of getting
into the seminar business, Fred Gleeck's book, Marketing And Promoting Your Own Seminars
And
Workshops, represents a tremendous value.
Peter Hupalo
Reviewer
Rob's Bookshelf
The Treatment: The Story Of Those Who Died In The Cincinnati Radiation Tests
Martha Stephens
Duke University Press
P.O. Box 90660 Durham, NC 27708
ISBN 0822328119, $28.95, hardback, www.amazon.com
In 1971, Martha Stephens was a junior level English professor at the University of Cincinnati and
probably one of the most unlikely people to uncover and later expose a government project
designed to test the effects of radiation sickness on human subjects.
It was in that year a chance encounter with a colleague led her to a small article in The Village
Voice which had established a link between a program underwritten by the Department of
Defense
and research carried out in secret at the universitys General Hospital.
A simple request to the hospital for information led to a stunning disclosure of what was taking
place inside a specially designed basement chamber. Beginning in 1960, cancer patients, the
majority being black or working poor, were being irradiated over their entire bodies in an effort
to
simulate the exposure a soldier might experience in a nuclear war.
She found that very few of the 86 known patients showed signs of acute illness at the time of
testing. None were informed or consented to the tests. Most died shortly thereafter.
The experiments were made public by Stephens and a number of faculty members and, after a
brief
flurry of media attention, a deal was made between state and federal governments to stop the
testing in exchange for an agreed silence on the identities of researchers and victims.
The incident would be quickly forgotten in the ongoing social and political unrest and it was not
until 1994 that the author is contacted by a Cincinnati television reporter seeking to re-open the
investigation. Once ignored by the local press, the story is made into front page news and
prompts
a congressional inquiry and federal lawsuit filed on behalf of the victims families.
Like similar stories of medical research run amok, this shameful episode makes for both
fascinating
and troubling reading. With an English instructors love of language, Stephens recounts her
tireless
efforts to bring those responsible before the public, as well as restoring the names and
personalities
to victims known in hospital documents by a clinical code number.
However, readers will quickly discover a text hampered by the authors annoying habit of
including
people and events that are unrelated and unnecessary.
"Few of us today - perhaps tomorrow will be different - feel we can do much to challenge the
forces in control." Thats Stephens philosophizing not about the far-reaching nature of the
scandal,
but the 1984 elections in Nicaragua which, obviously, have nothing to do with the books subject
matter.
We also go on vacations with the author to San Jose and Costa Rica, attend a 1992 peace march
in
Washington and review capital punishment as it is practiced in Ohio without any explanation as
to
their relevancy.
Likewise, her tendency to view the experiments in light of the citys social and political
conservatism
rather than in the context of the human radiation tests that had occurred nation-wide since 1945,
under the auspices of the countrys nuclear weapons program, makes for a less than even-handed
view and leaves certain sections sounding conspiratorial in tone.
More judicious editing would have trimmed the extraneous features from the book and eliminated
some of the confusion. Still, "The Treatment," along with James Howard Jones "Bad Blood: The
Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment" and "The Plutonium Files" by Eileen Welsome, belongs on the
desk
of every legislator, university president and research scientist in the country. It stands as another
stark reminder of the harm that can be wrought in the interest of national security or in the name
of
medical science.
In The Forest: A Novel
Edna O'Brien
Houghton Mifflin
215 Park Avenue South New York, NY 10003
ISBN 0618197303, $24.00, hardback, www.amazon.com
Until recently, Ireland was viewed by many as a carefree, bucolic retreat, economically
under-developed, but somehow free of contemporary problems.
The notion was never really true, of course, but made more apparent during the spring of 1994 in
County Clare when a mentally and socially dispersed drifter named Brendan O'Donnell killed a
single mother, Imelda Riney, her son Liam and Father Joseph Walshe shortly after being paroled
from a British jail.
It was the type of bewildering brutality that forever changed village life in Ireland and one
regularly
cited by commentators throughout the United Kingdom when discussing a loss of national
innocence.
While not a murder story in any sense, In The Forest is a fictionalized account of an act which
O'Brien, herself a native of County Clare, sees as symbolizing the tragedy of her time, and also
another sign of a society at the point of imminent breakdown.
Outwardly, what she attempts is nothing new for someone whose previous works have
successfully
intertwined the violence of ordinary life with a peculiar brand of Irishness that characterizes the
rural western part of the country. Likewise, the narrative structure employed here is time-tested,
presenting the personal stories of victim and perpetrator side by side before a terrible symmetry
of
circumstance binds them together.
In this case, the life of Michen O'Kane (O'Donnell), an unmanageable reprobate nicknamed
"Kinderschreck," or one who scares children, parallels that of Eily Ryan (Riney), an artist and
free
soul who, through sheer fate, moves into his former house.
We follow O'Kane from the brutal criminal justice system where he spends most of his youth to
the
town of Cloosh, a place bitterly called home. Months earlier, Ryan has left the city for the
relative
safety of the countryside and spends only a short time there with her son until they are last seen
together with the Kinderschreck in a car headed for the woods.
Widely regarded as a novelist dedicated more to evoking feeling than one to experiment with
form,
O'Brien uses a variety of prose to further develop the psychological complexities of each
character.
O'Kanes extreme mental state is rendered in a nonsensical chattering short-hand, "Why do I go to
this trouble haul this stuff this gear flowers music beef or salmon, madam?" he rattles to a
fearful
townsperson. Ryans final days are told with a tone of childlike innocence while Father John
Fitzgerald (Walshe) tells of his own fate in a brief, naively pious first person account.
The same attention which she gives to the human condition is applied to setting as well. The
town, a
seemingly mediaeval backwater, is populated by helpless villagers moving at a dilatory pace, its
woodland undergoes a transformation from a "drowsy corpus of green" to "a rust-brown carnage
of
old dead leaves" where rescuers eventually recover the bodies.
In many ways, In The Forest captures the human toll of this horrific crime better than any effort
in
non-fiction. The literary flourish O'Brien brings to the story is to be appreciated, her larger
statement on what constitutes tragedy and grief in modern-day Ireland is not to be overlooked.
Arafats Elephant
Jonathan Tel
Counterpoint Press
P.O. Box 65793 Washington D.C. 20035
ISBN 1582431833, $14.00, paperback, www.amazon.com
Jonathan Tels debut collection resists any easy labeling. Each of the 17 stories are independent
pieces with the only noticeable thread connecting them being their Jerusalem setting.
Even more confusing, in a region where people have come to define themselves through rivalry,
be
it religious, territorial or political, Tels characters seem to be free from many of these traditional
burdens. Instead, their ordeals lie in the everyday, a scenario that invites the author to freely
interject his own brand of the unexpected and absurd.
Happiness never really flourishes here: a prospective bride shamed by a random sexual encounter
in
"Beautiful, Strong, and Modest" while in "Alte Zakhen" a UN representative is kidnapped from a
bathroom, "Spleen; or, The Goys Tale" follows an orthodox rabbi who discovers he has Gentile
blood, and there is no room at the inn for the founder of modern Zionism in "Shaking Hands
With
Theodor Herzl."
By far, the volumes strongest entry, "A Story About a Bomb," is one in which the intifada is
brought to a momentary halt by busy traffic. To tell the tale, an unidentified narrator recounts an
almost playful story he read about a hapless suicide bomber who cant seem to cross the road to
reach his intended target, a crowded bus stop. "He stepped out one centimeter into the road -
and
a great Coca-Cola truck went roaring past. He retreated. He strode forth. A Subaru blurted its
horn at him."
After making it to the other side, the bomber is again stopped short of martyrdom by two tourists
who ask to have their picture taken. Although we are told that the story is over when his finger
presses down on the button, readers are left to wonder for several more pages before the author
reveals whether that button was wired to a camera or an explosive.
"Bomb" is a perfect example of Tels technique, which is carefully restrained, sometimes
inconclusive, but with a prose style that always lends to the story an element of distorted
reality.
Another, "I May Be a Ghost but Im Not a Slut," is a barroom conversation between an
ambulance
driver and a young girl who he does not realize is dead. The daily proximity to death has left the
driver immune to the girls ghastly features and incessant talk of suicide. Painfully conspicuous
dialogue, however, derails the story before the reader can first appreciate its conceit.
Tels most effective stories capitalize on their brevity. The role reversal "Ibrahim Kuttab is
Innocent," another nesting of a story within a story, follows the actions of a young
Hebrew-speaking Israeli whose obvious masquerade as an Arab is transparent to everyone but
the
authorities who beat him to get at the truth.
Less effective are his moments of whimsy. "Did Moshe Dayan Have a Glass Eye?" five pages of
arch, disposable fragments, offers nothing beyond its memorable title. Likewise the title piece, a
parable about a cumbersome gift that has present-day implications, ends the collection on a less
than
striking note.
Taken together, Tels stories provide a view of Jerusalem as a city of individuals who, in addition
to
enduring the daily routine of horrors that is the Middle East, verge on surrendering to the
disorder
of their personal lives as well. And while he may sometimes appear obsessed with this trauma, it
is
an obsession that reminds us that suffering in all its forms is easily found in such a tumultuous
part
of the world.
Rob Stout
Reviewer
Shannon's Bookshelf
Finding Ian
Stella Cameron
Zebra Books/Kensington Publishing Corp.
850 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10022
ISBN: 0821770829, $6.99, 384 pp., www.kensingtonbooks.com, www.amazon.com
Thirteen years ago, Byron, in the throes of grief after the death of his young wife in childbirth,
does
what he thinks is best and gives his son up for adoption. It was the only way he could imagine his
child would have a happy life. But, as Byron continues on with his education and begins his
career,
and ultimately becomes famous in his field of work, he always keeps track of where young Ian is.
As long as Ian is happy, Byron is content to leave things as is. But when Byron discovers that
Ian's
adoptive parents have both died and the boy has been sent to relatives in England, Byron decides
to
go see for himself whether Ian is happy and well-cared for.
There will be little, if any, disruption to his own life, he assures himself.
But things aren't that simple. Ian might not be happy with these virtual strangers, in a country so
different from America, so before he knows it, Byron is much more involved with Ian's life than
he
planned. Not only that, but Ian's beautiful cousin, Jade, manages to turn Byron's life completely
upside down, and things are no longer simple at all.
Stella Cameron handles the plot line of Finding Ian with sensitivity. Lives are merged and joined
in a
way no one expected, leaving Byron to make some very difficult decisions about what is most
important in his life and that of his son's. You'll enjoy this book and watching the characters grow
and come together.
Free Stuff For Kids, 2002 Edition
The Free Stuff Editors
Meadowbrook Press/Simon and Schuster
1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020
ISBN: 0881664014, $5.99, 102 pp., www.meadowbrookpress.com
Got bored kids? Free Stuff For Kids (2002 Edition) is the perfect remedy to that.
Packed with hundreds of free and "up-to-a-dollar" stuff to order by mail, there's something for
every
kid. From sports cards to toys, stickers, tattoos and school supplies, kids may actually a hard time
choosing - so it's a good thing the offers are good for the entire year of 2002!
I found the book is also a good learning tool. The beginning of the book gives detailed
instructions,
written in easy-to-follow language, to help kids send postcards and letters for the offers, send any
money necessary for items, and even a checklist to follow, preventing mistakes that might keep
kids
from getting their stuff.
A parent might like to teach their kids a bit about the money they spend on the items, help them
with
their penmanship skills and keep track of what they order and when it comes in.
Also included are internet addresses where kids can check out more free stuff. Free Stuff For
Kids,
2002 Edition, promises hours of fun and excitement, especially as the treasures start arriving in
the
mail!
Passing Through Paradise
Susan Wiggs
Warner Books
1271 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020
ISBN: 044661078X, $6.99, paperback, 419 pp., www.amazon.com
Sandra Babcock's life was full of shame and loneliness... until Victor Winslow came along. He
was
her best friend and then her husband, and Sandra's lonely past fell behind her as the beloved wife
of
the adored politician.
But now the town of Paradise is anything but paradise, as Sandra faces the accusatory stares and
disapproval of Victor's constituents, who call her the Black Widow, believing she caused Victor's
violent and untimely death.
Despite exoneration by the courts, Sandra realizes she will always remain suspect in the eyes of
Victor's friends and family. Her only choice is to renovate her broken-down family home, find a
buyer, and get the heck out of Paradise.
When Mike Malloy comes into Sandra's life, he fixes more than her home. He fixes her life and
mends her broken heart. In turn, she fills the void in his life as a devoted single dad, who sees his
children not nearly enough for his liking.
But, will the dark secrets Sandra keeps about the night of her husband's death keep Mike from
every
fully loving and trusting her? Will Sandra give up any chance of happiness to keep from admitting
the truth?
Of all Susan Wiggs' books I've read, I found Passing Through Paradise the most poignant - the
most
graceful story of committed love. Sandra's despair and resignation to do the right thing, balanced
with Mike's wanting the best for his family, and for Sandra, is a deeply felt thread throughout the
book. Trust and obligation - to others and to themselves - make Sandra and Mike real and
likeable.
With a climax sure to surprise, Passing Through Paradise is a definite winner.
Shannon Cave
Reviewer
Judy's Bookshelf
Championship Writing - 50 Ways To Improve Your Writing
Paula La Roque
Success Press
Marion Street Press
http://www.marionstreetpress.com/
ISBN: 0966517636, $18.95 US Softcover 206 pages
Who would think a book on grammar and composition could be interesting and entertaining? This
one is. "Championship Writing" is filled with tips for using language properly and it is easy to see
that Paula La Roque loves words and language - this is a woman who reads dictionaries for fun.
From Ambrose Briece on words, to Zimmerman's leads, there is something here for all writers
interested in perfecting their craft. Non-fiction writers, especially, will benefit from the practical
advice in this useful book.
Paula La Roque believes the relationship between writer and reader is based on trust: "We don't
trust 'experts' who can't use their tools, and language is the only tool the writer has."
Ms. La Roque certainly qualifies as a writing expert who has earned the trust of professional
writers
all over the continent. Her experience includes four years as writing consultant for the Associated
Press Washington Bureau, she is on the AP Managing Editors executive board and will serve as
President of the association in 2004. Her list of credits is impressive and too extensive to mention
here. This book is a collection of fifty columns originally written for the Society of Professional
Journalists' "Quill Magazine."
I had the urge to dig out everything I have ever written to see if I had fallen prey to the "don't
dos"
mentioned in each chapter. So often when writing about what "not to do," authors neglect to
explain
how to do it effectively. This book sets out examples of ineffective writing and then offers good
examples of how to turn them into writing that has clarity and power. The chapters on writing
"leads" are especially informative. The all- important first lines of a story, whether fiction or news,
are of concern to every writer.
Columns 12 & 13, "Rethinking Headlines," contain numerous examples of "deadend" headlines
that
fail to draw the reader into a piece along with examples of how to rewrite them to provoke the
reader's curiosity.
La Roque shows you how to write with clarity and beauty in mind. Word lovers will particularly
enjoy the column, "Solving the Ambrose Briece Mystery," which touches on the evolution of the
English language. "Notes on Usage" is another good one wherein common words and phrases
that
are often misused are defined.
Most concepts will be familiar to professional writers, though it is surprising that the book fails to
address the new medium of Internet writing. In the forward to the book, Ms. La Roque mentions
workplace writing. Increasingly, workplace writing is making the transition from print to HTML
(hypertext markup language). There is a vast new audience of readers who do not read
newspapers,
they may not watch television, but they are online avidly reading and seeking new content
everyday.
The principles outlined in this book are appropriate for anyone, and writers in new media could
greatly improve their web copy by applying them.
Ms. La Roque's "secret" for good writing appears on page 34: "Memorable writing is usually
simplified language. It emulates speech at its best and is immediate in its clarity and beauty. If it's
also 'informal,' so much the better."
The last chapter is for the writing teacher or editor, there is nothing new here, but some editors I
know could benefit from adopting the respectful attitude that Ms. La Roque encourages. I would
have liked to have seen some transition between the columns, but the informative index briefly
defines each chapter, and provides a concise, handy reference for the working writer or writing
teacher. Highly recommended.
How You Can Be Your Own Publisher
Judy Meininger
Success Press
l12A -10616 Mellow Meadows Drive, Austin, Texas 78750
Format: Ebook (PDF version)
ISBN 0-9675958-3-5 (59 p) Price: $14.95, 1-512-401-4905
http://www.unconventionalwisdom.com/
How You Can Be Your Own Publisher will be of interest to anyone who wants to know more
about the administrative details of setting up a self-publishing business. This 103-page ebook has
a
good index for quick reference to the material, a bonus section with a tips on marketing and leads
to some commercial resources as well. The extensive 45 page appendix lists full contact details
for
International ISBN agents throughout the world.
The author touches on what needs to be considered when starting up: naming and registering
your
business, where to find information on collecting sales tax and what equipment you need to get
started. There are some good tips and advice on how to save money while setting up and
equipping
your office like: shopping the classifieds, bartering and attending auctions.
Meininger has done a good job gathering information to explain the basics of copyright, ISBN
numbers, bar codes and wholesalers, all important considerations for the self-publisher. The
reader
will find more information on each item by following the clickable links to other online resources
concerning these concepts.
A freelance writer and self-publisher since 1992, Meininger's articles have appeared in national
and
international magazines and business publications. A business/paralegal graduate of Huntingdon
College in Montgomery, Alabama, Meininger has 15-plus years working with both start-up and
established businesses. She has helped more than 200 authors develop business, marketing and
publicity plans for books and articles.
This ebook answers most of the basic questions those new to the business of self-publishing will
need to consider as they take those first steps towards establishing their own business. An
updated,
revised paperback version of How You Can Be Your Own Publisher, based on feedback from the
ebook, will be available September 2002.
Something Like A House
Sid Smith
Picador, Macmillan
0330480871, A$21.00 (paperback), 227 pages
"He was the only round-eye on board, but nobody noticed".
Nobody noticed, partly because this Westerner had lived long enough amongst Chinese peasants
to
have become like them in his manners, his movements, even his thoughts. We are told, in the first
pages, that his name is Jim Fraser, but almost everything else we learn about him is learned
through
his actions and the reactions of others. He remains almost faceless - an odd, small figure, in a
culture to which he is alien and in which he is just one more insignificant speck in the flow of
history.
We see that history - thirty-five years of the vast cultural changes which took place in China after
the Korean War - only as it affects the people of the small Miao village where Fraser eventually
comes to live after deserting from the UN army at the end of that war. Eighteen-years old, he hid
in
the fields and surrendered to the Chinese soldiers, became sick, was imprisoned in a clinic near
the
Miao village and, when he recovered, was surprisingly released to live with two of the
villagers.
This remarkable book tells his story in a spare, blunt style which draws you into a history which
is
human and compelling. One of the great strengths of this book is that Smith allows the reader to
experience the village and its people with Fraser, to see odd things happen without
understanding
them or being able to ask, and to know about the changes happening in the rest of China only in
the
random, fragmentary way that people in a remote, mostly illiterate, minority group would know
of
them.
As the events of the Cultural Revolution affect the nearest town, young people wearing red
armbands begin to appear in the area. And as Party policies are implemented, the traditional
farming
life of the villagers becomes more difficult. The book is not focused on history but on the few
villagers Fraser becomes close to. Their lives and his change as their world changes; as political
unrest grows; and as they become more and more involved with things outside the village.
Eventually, Fraser find himself fighting again - this time with a group of Red Guards.
What comes through most strongly in this book, is the strength of the will to survive. The horrors
which the Cultural Revolution brings to the ordinary people are simply endured or participated in,
according to circumstances. They are part of the need to survive and there is little choice.
Culture,
custom and superstitious belief are shown to lie behind some of the most horrific acts, but there is
no moralizing or comment - just bare descriptions, which are no less horrific for that.
Only towards the end of the book are some things explained and, were it not for Smith's
'Afterword', the underlying theme of germ-warfare and genetic experimentation which then
becomes
apparent might be dismissed as too fanciful to be frightening. Smith's narrative shows the actions
of
people from both Western and Eastern cultures. His 'Afterword' outlines the research he
undertook
and the facts on which some of the things in this book were based and they are what makes
Fraser's
story terrifyingly relevant to our own lives.
This is a beautifully written, sensitive, powerful and unusual book, for which Smith deservedly
won
the Whitbread First Novel Award in 2001.
Julian Barnes was not always a Francophile. When he first went to France with his parents, at the
age of thirteen, he found it a "monstrous experience". And French food, as he tells us in the first
essay in this book, seemed formidably eccentric: he disliked the unsalted butter, the bloody meat
and the "foul" vinaigrette sauces. Only fruit seemed reliable. And the French? They "liked onions
far
too much" and "brushed their teeth with garlic paste".
This essay is delightful but it is untypical of the essays and reviews in the rest of the book.
Certainly,
there are other humorous, light-hearted delights, especially in Barnes's easy, inventive prose, but
most of the pieces are more serious, in-depth discussions about French writers, musicians,
film-makers and other things French. Most were originally published in The New Yorker, The
New
York Review of Books, The Times Literary Supplement or The London Review of Books: if you
read these publications, you will know the sort of excellence they demand and the sort of long,
informed pieces they like to publish.
Barnes is familiar enough with French literature to discuss it with authority and his work has won
him recognition and reverence from the French literary establishment. Yet, I take pleasure in the
fact that he presents himself more as the Ultimate Peasant (who figures in a couple of pieces in
this
book) than as the Modern French Literary Critic. His style is closer to that of Samuel Johnson
than
to that of Derrida or Lacan. And praise be for that!
There are surprises, too, in this book. There is a wonderfully funny picture of Barnes trying out
and
Elizabeth David recipe and honouring her special flair as the doyenne of food writing. One essay
deals with an English historian, Richard Cobb, who first went to France in 1935, adopted it as
his
country, became the Revolution's historian and was awarded the L‚gion d'Honneur. Another with
the Tour de France 2000, and with the world of competitive cycling. Edith Warton figures in
several of the essays, most particularly as she motor-tours through France in 1906-7 with her
husband Teddy and with Henry James as a passenger. And there is an essay which begins by
discussing three singers who were popular when Barnes taught "English conversation and
English
civilization" at a French Catholic school from 1966-7 and which takes flight into reminiscences
about some of the Catholic Fathers with whom he worked.
Readers unfamiliar with France and with things French may not share Barnes's enthusiasms and
may
often find his subject matter, here, too French for their taste, but his writing always reflects a
lively,
humorous and worldly mind. Readers who share his Francophilia, and especially those who share
his taste in French literature, will revel in the fact that most often in these essays Barnes is
discussing the lives and work of French writers like Mallarm‚, Baudelaire, Sartre and, of course,
Flaubert.
Barnes is infatuated with Flaubert: his work, his life, his loves, his hates, his friends and his
enemies.
"I wish he'd SHUT UP about Flaubert", Kingsley Amies is reported to have said. "Fat chance!",
is
Barnes's reply and in much of this book he indulges himself in the "necessary pleasure" of Not
Shutting Up About Flaubert.
Ann Skea, Reviewer
http://ann.skea.com
Hodgins' Bookshelf
The Course Of Honour
Lindsey Davis
Century/Random House
ISBN 0712677240, 296 pages, UK pounds 15.99
Mysterious Press
ISBN 0892966742, 336 pages, $22.00, www.amazon.com
It's ancient Rome again, "Commencing in the autumn of AD 31, when the Caesar was Tiberius."
This time author Davis doesn't write about her favourite fictional detective, Didius Falco, but
perhaps her research for the Falco series both inspired and facilitated this "extra" work.
The apparently - at first - fictional protagonist is Caenis, a highly intelligent, educated slave girl to
the (historical) dowager Empress Antonia, who later grants her freedom before dying.
By standards of the British throne, where George III reigned 60 years, Victoria 64 years, and
Elizabeth II now at 50 years, the somewhat rapid turnover rate of Roman emperors through
whose
reigns Caenis lived wasn't half quick enough for the good of their subjects. Their qualities on
average had sadly deteriorated after Augustus; for these men held absolute power and, as the wise
Lord Acton (1843-1902) much later stated, "Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts
absolutely." Aside from other corruptions, these rulers in several cases were terrorists enthroned,
who thought nothing of murder or ordering suicides.
As the story opens, the now corrupt - certainly in Davis's account - Emperor Tiberius (who had
however begun pretty well, according to the Encyclopaedia Britannica) was nominally on the
throne,
but actually hanging out - again, in Davis's account - with disreputable cronies on Capri in the Bay
of Naples area.
The encyclopaedia tasks Tiberius chiefly with being unloving and unlovable, and eventually with
becoming cynical about bloodshed. Such rule might not greatly affect a minor citizen living in,
say,
Gaul, but Caenis is a Roman court personality whose lover (introduced below) will himself
become
Emperor; compared to the general run of a figurative forest, they are high trees who catch more
than
their share of any wind.
A young man of good but impoverished family, the future (again, historical) emperor Vespasian
has
taken notice of a pair of slave girls and becomes enamoured, not of the exquisite and hedonistic
foil
Veronica, but of the plainer but far deeper Caenis - a name from Greek legend, but not mentioned
in
the Encyclopaedia in connection with Vespasian. A note at the book's end, though, suggests that
Caenis was real.
In a middle passage, Davis will also say that the historian Suetonius mentions Antonia Caenis in
an
essay on the Caesars. If this book were "real fiction" one couldn't even be certain that such an
essay
ever existed, but my money is on factuality; for one gets a strong feeling that the fictional content
of
this book goes not much farther than to patch into the historical record a welter of obviously
unrecorded but at least plausible dialogue and events, and possibly the entire, rather minor
Veronica
character.
Writing such a book strikes me as parallel to completing a large, complex, highly demanding
paint-by-numbers kit in which an evidently exact skeleton-sketch is provided - by recorded
history,
for a book - and in which the blank areas are painted in with more or less vivid colours, by the
artist.
In such an analogy, a dedicated history would consist of as complete and orderly a skeleton
sketch
as possible; at the opposite extreme, a science fiction story set in a different world having no
recognizable frame of human or earthly reference would be an abstract or other free-form
painting,
with no predetermined skeleton at all; and other novel genres would tend to use minimal skeletal
sketching, adorned with plenty of imaginative brushwork.
Vespasian's regard is returned by Caenis, it seems, but there is no question of eventual marriage
between their disparate castes. Although Davis allows that Caenis has been pursued by men
before,
evidently with occasional success, the slave holds Vespasian off for years. (The closest to a
rationale
for her to do so is that she isn't HIS slave, but someone else's; it is not however an issue that has
safeguarded her virginity hitherto, if I understand Davis's subtle hints. Nor is there ever a mention
of
her pregnancy.)
In ancient Rome, a rather formalized development programme for young men of high
expectations
existed; the Encyclopaedia states in the case of Tiberius that he "passed through the list of state
offices in the usual princely fashion, beginning with the quaestorship ..." It is from that custom
that
this book's title, "The Course of Honour", clearly is drawn. Accordingly, during the years-long
delay
to a logical consummation of the loving pair's relationship, Vespasian is sent abroad on that
typical
round of official positions.
Consider now the risk Caenis runs as she almost thrusts Vespasian away from her own arms and,
in
effect, into those of other woman in Crete and elsewhere! You may perhaps understand Caenis in
this matter, but not I - although there is a familiar, lamentable female behavioural pattern ...
Even Caenis's becoming a freedwoman - accompanied by her receiving her employer's forename,
Antonia - will not allow her marriage to Vespasian, as she appears to have been aware all along.
Her
freedom does however meet some obscure requirement letting her become his mistress for a few
years.
Yet it is no secret that eventually she will be cast aside to let him marry someone "more suitable";
she seems to expect that event more than he does, but to fear it less.
That turn of events will in fact occur. Yet it develops that the woman who marries Vespasian is
no
paragon, either, but a different man's (a cipher named Capella's) ex-mistress. "The other woman"
is
nonetheless good enough to give Vespasian a favourable and dutiful "family man" image to
support
his long range political ambitions.
Considering the anguish it involved, that switch of partners must have been very difficult to
justify.
The real problem however is that whereas a good logic does exist, the book hides it entirely too
long; for an explanation only emerges in the volume's Part Three, subtitled "When the Caesars
were
Caligula and Claudius", Chapter XVII, page 108. Forlorn after the supposed final departure of
Vespasian from her life, Caenis "could in fact marry anyone in the Empire she liked, except the six
hundred men [such as Vespasian] who were members of the Senate. Augustus had debarred those
from marrying freedwomen [such as Caenis] ..."
As we ancient Romans like to say, "Lux venit" - "Comes the dawn!" It's late to learn that,
though.
The tone of the book abruptly changes with the marriage of Vespasian, and a 20-year hiatus in his
relationship with Caenis begins until his wife ultimately dies. During this long period, the story
occupies itself with Roman politics at the hands of omnipotent, often bloodyminded Roman
emperors including Caligula, Claudius (hands-down the best of this series, but derided for being
lame, in his time), and Nero. Although people and events are portrayed from Caenis's imagined
personal perspective, this period is in essence a straight recitation of history.
Again the tone changes when Vespasian becomes a widower. Although initially Caenis rejects his
advances, it isn't very long before they're happily reunited in her bed, and making plans for a
future
together. He assures her he would have married her years earlier, but for Augustus's
prohibitionary
law. As to that, they still can't marry on the very same grounds, for Vespasian remains a senator.
However, in all other respects Caenis becomes a member of Vespasian's family.
Whether by her infertility (Vespasian had had children by his wife) or by some other miracle,
Caenis
still avoids pregnancy.
Meantime the menace posed by Nero's accession to unlimited power must surely have remained
present, but in Davis's telling it fades into the background almost to the point of oblivion - until
Rome catches fire and Nero makes a scapegoat of the Christian faction of Roman society.
Then, too, there are Nero's family murders, such as that of his younger relative Britannicus, a very
and likeable promising lad whose very existence had threatened the awful (in every sense)
Emperor.
After some years, a now somewhat elderly Vespasian, as really the only man left to do a necessary
job, draws another foreign assignment, now together with his son Titus. They are posted to the
war
zone of Judaea, to quell a serious Jewish uprising. That would, as we know, prove a terrible
disaster
for the Jews, but Davis's book doesn't dwell on it except in exploring the impact of Vespasian's
further lengthy absence upon his lonely mistress, who remains in Rome.
Nero was at last himself murdered, and the infamous "year of four emperors" began - Nero,
Galba,
Otho, Vitellius, and then, after the year was up, finally Vespasian himself to make a fifth in 1 1/2
years' time.
At the end of the upheaval, the hero was back in Rome to begin a goodly reign that was to heal
many wounds the old city and her empire had suffered. It took some astute and patient
manoeuvring
on his part, Davis tells us, but the new Emperor even got his Caenis to move in with him ...
although
nothing, it seemed, could undo the Gordian anti-marriage knot Augustus had tied.
Thus the "girl meets boy, girl loses boy, girl gets boy back" scenario of the typical romance is
played
out more than once in this book, for the former couple has become estranged by three long
separations, each time followed by an almost-new "girl meets boy" episode. The girl (or rather
woman on the second and third go-arounds) manages to be a prickly character on every such
occasion, but the guy is her true and perfect lover, and he wins her again and again.
"And they lived happily ever after," to quote a famous line. Yet not only romantics will enjoy this
tale. "The Course of Honour" comes too near nonfiction to fail to please fans of ancient history,
as
well.
Batavia's Graveyard: The True Story Of The Mad Heretic Who Led History's Bloodiest Mutiny
Mike Dash
Crown Books
c/o The Crown Publishing Group
299 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10171
ISBN 0609607669, 381 pages; U.S.$25, Can.$38, www.amazon.com
The "Batavia" was a capacious wooden sailing cargo ship of the Dutch United East India
Company,
or "VOC" using the Dutch initials of an organization known also as "Jan Company". The vessel
was
newly built, although from our perspective she was of very oldfashioned design, with low bows
and
a far higher stern - a style typical of the 17th century but abandoned in/by the 18th.
Her captain was a tough and much experienced sea officer, but rather overbearing, touchy, and
too
self-assured or status-proud to divert the ship's course even slightly, when the lookout one fateful
moonlit night reported possible rocks lying in wait, dead ahead.
To all appearances, then, the captain was solely responsible for the great vessel's grounding and
destruction on a coral reef in the Houtman['s] Abrolhos archipelago, some 40 miles off Australia's
only vaguely known west coast and two hundred-odd miles north of what is now Perth. (The
Dutch
were exploiting the riches of the East before having fully explored the zone's sea lanes, and in this
case ran off too much easting. The "Batavia" might a few hours later that night even have beached
herself on the mainland, had she not first struck on Morning Reef among a scattering of barren
islets.) Thus did the disasters begin unfolding, already in the book's Prologue.
A shortcoming of the "Batavia", usual in all shipping until, at last, the 1912 disaster to the RMS
"Titanic" put an end to it, was a lack of adequate lifeboat or even liferaft capacity to take off
anything near the ship's full company. At the voyage's outset there were over 330 people aboard
the
great ship, but she carried only two boats - they luckily survived the crash - between them capable
of
carrying 60 people at most, per trip. The only hope for those who had not already perished was
that
sufficient time and energy could be found to move them all, in trip after trip, first to some nearby
dry
but uninhabitable rocks, then onward to more promising islands which lay several miles father
away.
Whether or not the mariners realized they were so close to a mainland, their miserable two boats
could not have carried everyone there, given that supplies, especially drinking water, were now in
critically short supply.
Despite the huge difficulties so occasioned, the book's subtitle makes no bones about informing us
that things were to grow worse yet, involving what author Mike Dash labels "History's Bloodiest
Mutiny". An error at a book's start tends to create confusion, pause for checking and analysis,
and
at last a disappointment lowering overall reader expectations. A frontispiece map of much of the
world, titled "Route of the Batavia", shows a dashed line tracing a path quite at variance with that
verbally described near the bottom of page 2. At no point does the map show the ship
approaching
the South American coast nearer than, at a half-educated guess, a thousand miles; yet pg. 2 states
that the vessel "... swung west on passing Sierra Leone" - the map shows her jinking a bit, then
steering south-southeast - "and crossing the equator headed for Brazil;" whereas the map shows
the
ship then heading more for South Africa! ... although in the South Atlantic the dashed line does at
last depict a southwesterly swing, parallel to but far off the Brazilian coast.
"Off the coast of South America ..." is NOT how a sailor would describe a Midatlantic
course.
Again it will be revealed in Chapter 3, "The Tavern of the Ocean" (referring to the predecessor of
Cape Town) - this chapter reviews the voyage's Atlantic portion, from its outset - that the
squadron
of ships including the "Batavia" put into port, contrary to company rules, at Sierra Leone. This
diversion represents the already mentioned "jink" in the course sailed, but as the line on the map
does not touch land, the graphical representation once more fails to match the written
account.
Moreover, the sailing instructions' prescribed route between two "wagenspoor" or "cart-tracks",
delineating a sailor's fairway, run on the map approximately northwest-to-southeast; whereas at
the
top of page 78 the text defines the "wagenspoor" as "two parallel lines crossing the ocean from
northeast to southwest". Thus these two version run at roughly right angles to one another.
Incredible!
Yet the work gets really fascinating and far less trouble-prone, elsewhere. It's unfortunate that a
"navigational error" so blatantly gives a poor impression, but the harm may be mended by other
good work.
That same map, one of four at various scales, must be credited with our enlightenment about the
existence of the Mogul (Mughal) Empire which covered all but the southern part of the Indian
subcontinent at the time of the "Batavia"'s voyage, in 1628-29. It seems the Empire lasted until
the
Third Battle of Panipat, in 1761 - centuries later than you may have supposed, given that "the
Mongol Empire" sounds so mediaeval.
The book is also valuable for its introductions to many other topics of historical interest, such as
the
merger of many competing, city-based East India trading companies into the United East-Indian
Company or, in Dutch, de Verenigde Oost-indische Compagnie, or VOC; and such as an outline
of
the history of mutiny in VOC ships. Perhaps the surviving records of the "Batavia"'s disasters are
rather thin, but Dash has scraped together a fine collection of essentially background facts and
other
insights, providing both education and entertainment to the reader, above and beyond the core
episode the author sets out to tell.
The climactic wreck of the ship on her maiden voyage having been described in the "Prologue:
Morning Reef" section, Chapters 1 & following provide background analyses and a flashback to
the
voyage prior to the great crash; for in due course at least a second climax will be reached.
Chapter 1 informs us at considerable length about the subtitle's "Mad Heretic", who was to play
the
pivotal role indicated there. His is a most interesting tale - and don't forget that Dash claims all to
be
true, although he does go in for important speculations on various issues, such as those
connecting
the man to his presumed sources of inspiration.
Thus we learn, as background, about Anabaptists, Mennonites, and Rosicrucians, among other
formative matters. One might gladly study such groups in any case, but the setting in Dash's book
makes the reading quite gripping.
The heretic in question was a VOC commercial (as opposed to nautical) officer whom we may
call
the Assistant Supercargo. His direct superior, the Cargo Superintendent or "Supercargo" was,
surprisingly, ranked highest among the ship's officers; for the Captain was responsible, and
entitled,
only to sail the ship wherever the Supercargo might decide on Jan Company's (VOC's)
behalf.
That relationship is reminiscent, but an inversion, of one among The Captain of a British Royal
Navy
warship in Napoleonic times - his was the ultimate responsibility in all matters; the Sailing Master,
who was delegated chief responsibility for navigational matters; and a Lieutenant (meaning "place
holder"), an assistant to the Captain. That is to say, in a VOC ship the Supercargo was, like the
RN
Captain, the supreme boss over all matters; the VOC Captain and the RN Sailing Master were
subordinate navigational specialists; and a VOC Assistant Supercargo, like a RN Lieutenant, came
out as a rough equivalent to the Captain in the former case, and to a Sailing Master in the latter.
(As,
in the RN, a lieutenant held a King's commission whereas a Sailing Master was "merely" a warrant
officer, in theory the lieutenant was superior but in practice a master could enjoy great respect, so
that the two might stand quite evenly.)
Thus a VOC Captain was a flunkey to another man on board "his" ship, commercial matters being
held paramount. It was a situation that no doubt rankled for a proud nautical specialist, and
aboard
the "Batavia", once the Captain and his much resented commercial superior had quarrelled, it
made
the Captain a natural ally of the covertly heretical Assistant Supercargo who, moreover, possessed
as a personal attribute the glibness and address needed, but lacked, by the Captain.
This heretic had over the years seized upon certain religious teachings which, if taken out of
context
and juxtaposed in particular ways, could effectively reverse the positions of right and wrong. In
fact
the original Anabaptist idea had rather done so, setting the ball rolling in this man's mind so to
speak.
However, until events at the Cape of Good Hope brought the Captain and the heretic together,
the
latter could do nothing to seize control of the ship because he lacked all nautical skill.
Fundamentally, Anabaptists didn't believe in the efficacy of infant baptism because babies and
small
children cannot be expected to understand the significance of the rite. They went on, though, to
believe they were commissioned by God to carry out the apocalyptic visions of the Book of
Revelations, and here they opened a hornet's nest by attempting to seize European cities and enact
God's word - by violent means, if need be.
Such actions turned everyone else against them. In consequence the movement was largely
destroyed, driven underground, or converted to benign Mennonitism. However, the old ideas
could
not be entirely erased at the snap of one's fingers, or easily forgotten by this tale's character.
The following specific rationale doesn't seem to have been used by that fellow, but it does provide
a
simple picture of how such a mind may have operated: "Thy will be done," Christians often pray
to
God - and, as God is omnipotent, obviously (goes the cant) His will IS done, despite all else. That
being so, even if our man had committed the most heinous and dastardly acts, God's will was
done,
and no crime had been committed. Thus the person holding such notions felt that he could excuse
himself any crime or cruelty - and, moreover, God (whose will it supposedly was) would excuse
him, too. This is, by inspection, a specious and, yes, heretical argument, but it is one that is
difficult
to confute, in logic.
Author Mike Dash holds our attention also as he traces much of the history and traditions of VOC
-
the Dutch East India Company or, more familiarly, Jan Company. What we need chiefly to know,
though, is that there existed a huge if figurative gap between the privileged men and (a few)
women
living abaft the mainmast in VOC as well as other ships, on one hand; and the miserable paupers
such as Jan Company's sailors and soldiers, crammed together forward, on the other.
That psychological and status gap was to last until the need for huge crews as well as for
mainmasts
disappeared with the coming of steam power; for instance, American author and erstwhile
Harvard
law student Richard Henry Dana named an autobiographical account "Two Years Before the
Mast"
in describing his experiences as a paid hand in the brig "Pilgrim" of Boston, Mass., in 1834-36,
i.e.,
over two centuries after the "Batavia". "Before the Mast" still indicated, to the knowledgeable,
Dana's relatively menial status and living conditions while aboard, although he was later to
achieve
considerable personal distinction.
In discussing those two major classes within the ship's company, Dash among other things states
that
only four organized toilets were provided, two for the few people aft, and two also for the
multitude
forward, many of whom had to relieve themselves onto the stone or gravel ballast beneath the
hold.
Doing so created a rotting, stinking hell in even such a new ship's bowels, before her maiden
voyage
had proceeded far; as may be imagined, it was particularly noisome while passing through
equatorial
heat and heavy storms requiring the blocking of ventilation.
Toilets aboard ships are still called "heads" because, after perhaps the mid-17th century or earlier,
and until the age of clipper ships in the 19th, the forward "seats of ease" were on the headrails, in
the
bows below the bowsprit - and these generally allowed four closely packed men to hang their
buttocks outboard along either side, for a total of eight users at a time, not just two. Even prior to
that period, old paintings show a long, narrow, gallery-like deck with castellated bulwarks in the
same position and probably used in much the same way to give seated latrine space. One suspects
the headrails were adopted to keep men from being as easily pitched into the sea, and perhaps also
to improve ships' aesthetics by hiding uninvolved parts of the men from outboard view.
In either case - and one can't be sure which school of "head" design the "Batavia" followed, for
we
are provided with no picture or diagram of the ship - although such facilities were without privacy
or
comfort, particularly in adverse weather, and were in minimal supply, they almost certainly were
not
as few as Dash suggests. The undoubted use of the hold is more likely to have resulted from poor
discipline and a human preference for being in out of the weather, sunburn too having become a
literally sore trial to those aboard.
Something probably still worse than the foregoing was the ship's infestation with lice, bedbugs,
cockroaches, rats, biscuit weevils, and other vermin. As to that, nutrition aboard was poor; before
the VOC squadron had reached the Cape of Good Hope, many were ill with scurvy (vitamin C
deficiency); some had died of it, to be buried at sea.
Still, a greater problem in the end was the heretical Assistant Supercargo, working on the mind of
his friend, the Captain, to get him to join in a mutiny chiefly against the ship's top officer, the
Supercargo. As already mentioned, the skipper was a touchy cuss; he had got drunk at the Cape,
and had put on a disgraceful display leaving the Supercargo, as the skipper's superior, no choice
but
to reprimand him - resulting in the sailor's level of unforgiving resentment being intolerably raised.
It seems most unlikely that the skipper thereafter ran his ship purposely onto Morning Reef, but
his
judgement was surely impaired. The ship shouldn't even have been in that part of the ocean and,
his
navigation having gone wrong, the skipper should never have adopted a half arrogant, half
reckless,
press-on-regardless attitude after the lookout had meekly reported his (correct) belief that he saw
breakers ahead.
With the Captain gone bad, what more could anyone do? Even the Supercargo would have had to
defer to him in navigational matters, and in any case the crisis probably arose too quickly on that
fateful night for anyone in authority but the Captain, who had been on deck for some time, to
arrive
by his side, size up the situation, and issue orders that might still have saved the ship and cargo, as
well as many lives.
Was the VOC presence aboard this ship, and numerous others, so structured as to have created an
event comparable to the loss of the "Batavia", in some ship, at some time, and in some location or
other? Perhaps so, to judge by the many times author Dash alludes to the excess of profit
motivation
- very well, let us call it simply greed - exhibited by the consortium of merchants making up and
determining the policies and practices of Jan Company. Dash also tells us about various other
revolts
or mutinies against the VOC's authority and management; their ways of governing were clearly a
source of trouble.
Let's stop now, before spilling the beans left and right - or, if you prefer, before prematurely
telling
more than ought to be told in a review, as such. Reverting to only general commentary, Mr. Dash
spins as fine an historical yarn as the surviving records may allow, although he does so in none too
consecutive style, what with the shipwreck already described (no doubt for its reading-hooking
"impact") in the Prologue, before the ship and her consorts even leave their Texel anchorage in
the
Netherlands, as described in Chapter 3.
Before the book's midpoint, unfortunately, the subject matter becomes exceedingly violent and
filled
with ghastly cruel deeds committed upon men, women, even children. Thus, no matter how well
the
tale is told, I consider it to be one instance that could well justify censorship; some of its content
will
appeal only to perverted, sadistic minds, and it may perhaps produce evil influences in better
balanced ones, too.
Yet for those who have the decency and sense to stop reading at, say, page 122 of this work,
there
remains a last point whose omission you might never forgive: a passenger living among the
watchful
officers in the "Batavia" is a beautiful, appealing, patrician, but forlorn widow. To understand
some
of the crusty skipper's failings, cherchez la femme!
Pete Hodgins
Reviewer
Sullivan's Bookshelf
Papal Sin: Structures Of Deceit
Garry Wills
Doubleday
1540 Broadway, New York, NY 10036
0385494106 $25.00 1-800-726-0600, www.amazon.com
Wills, a Roman Catholic, bravely criticizes his church not at the parish but at the papal level. A
wide
range of today's problems within the church, shortages of priests and nuns, the whole pro-life
stance,
divorce and annulment, procreation and sexuality, and more, as they have been and are affecting
the
clergy and laity are discussed in depth.
Several popes are studied. Their deviousness and/or total lack of sensitivity are explored. Pope
Pius
IX, with a few others, is singled out. It was he who, according to the author, snookered, in so
many
words, Roman Catholic bishops when called to confer on various church topics. They hadn't been
told they'd soon be voting for the pope to be considered 'infallible' when he was speaking or
writing
ex cathedra on doctrinal matters of faith and morals.
Railed against, too, in the book are the outmoded, Biblically unjustified, and morally nonrelated
reasons given by the papacy for its continued refusal to change. So, for example, popes still will
not
allow married priests, female priests, and contraception, except for the terribly flawed and
unpredictable Rhythm method.
Also delved into is Pope Pius XII's not speaking out against the Nazi directed Holocaust. The
pontiff's reasoning, according to some sources printed in the book, was that the church was more
afraid of Godless Communism than of Nazism, which, after all, didn't condemn all religions.
The author's frequent reflections on the early church fathers, Peter, Paul, Augustine, and Jerome,
and famous Roman Catholic writers, such as Lord Action and John Henry Newman, are
enlightening.
This book is already controversial amongst Roman Catholic scholars. Even before this reviewer
turned a page, negative comments were heard emanating from a prominent Roman Catholic
university indicating that the author's words were unfair, unbalanced, and just plain wrong. This
reviewer, however, raised in the same faith, found Wills to be quite the opposite, balanced,
reasoned, and thoughtful. Each reader will have to decide for him or herself.
Wills writes: "Most people are familiar with [Lord] Acton's famous axiom, 'Power tends to
corrupt,
and absolute power corrupts absolutely.' Fewer people remember that he was speaking of papal
absolutism - more specifically, he was condemning a fellow historian's books on Renaissance
Popes
for letting them literally get away with murder."
Perhaps the most controversial subjects covered in the book are that of how Mary, mother of
Jesus,
almost unheard of until the Middle Ages, has, since then, risen in prestige and adoration to the
point
where she's nearly co-equal with Jesus. And the popes can be thanked or condemned for that. A
close second in sensitive issues discussed in the book is the documented high percentage of
homosexuals currently filling the priestly ranks of the church.
Wills has taught history at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. He has also written
numerous books, including "John Wayne's America," "A Necessary Evil: A History of American
Distrust of Government," and "Lincoln at Gettysburg," for which he won a Pulitzer Prize.
Roman Catholics, members of other denominations and religions, and nonbelievers all will gain
much from a read of this courageously written, easy to read, informative, and interesting tome. It's
highly recommended.
A Primate's Memoir: A Neuroscientist's Unconventional Life Among The Baboons
Robert M. Sapolsky
Scribner
1230 Avenue of the Americas, 14th fl., New York, NY 10020
0743202473 $25.00 1-800-223-2336 www.amazon.com
The author tells of his twenty years' experience, a la Jane Goodall and her gorillas, as a young
scientist observing and taking fluid and tissue samples from baboons in the wilds of Kenya, Africa.
He also tells us his unrelated traveling and visiting on the cheap other parts of Africa.
His stories run the gamut from humorous to bizarre and from frightening to depressing. All his
tales,
however, are interesting, entertaining, and well written. Many are profound. They mostly concern
how baboons live. Their society is so similar to humans that it's easy comparing one's own life to
that of these primates.
The author says, "Baboons live in big, complex social groups, and the population I went to study
lived like kings. Great ecosystem, the Serengeti. Grass and trees and animals forever, Markin
Perkins country. The baboons work maybe four hours a day to feed themselves; hardly anyone is
likely to eat them. Basically, baboons have about a half dozen solid hours of sunlight a day to
devote
to being rotten to each other. Just like our society - few of us are getting hypertensive from
physical
stressors, none of us are worrying about famines or locust plagues or the ax fight we're going to
have with the boss out in the parking lot at five o'clock. We live well enough to have the luxury to
get ourselves sick with purely social, psychological stress. Just like these baboons."
Much of Sapolsky's book covers baboon group leadership. The alpha male and female, but
particularly the former, are watched quite closely over the years. And the group's leadership
changes
are very much like those of mankind.
The author comes to know all the baboon individuals by sight. And he thinks of, and treats, them
like his fellow villagers. Though a nonpracticing Jew, he gives them Biblical names.
Many human Africans and their tribes come in for praise. But Sapolsky comes down hard on the
Masai, tall and fierce with spears, for being troublemakers. The author backhands Kenya,
too.
Today, and for several years, the author works as a full-fledged scientist teaching biology and
neurology at Stanford University. And he is still involved with various Kenyan scientific
institutions.
A great read and highly recommended!
Sapolsky has written "Why Zebras Don't get Ulcers," among his other books. He also contributes
articles to "Discover" and "The Sciences" magazines. His home is in San Francisco.
Jim Sullivan
Reviewer
Harwood's Bookshelf
No Man Knows My History: The Life Of Joseph Smith
Fawn Brodie
Vintage House
280 Park Avenue, 8th floor, New York, NY 10017
ISBN 0679730540, $18.00, 520 pp, 1-800-726-0600, www.amazon.com
"The Book of Mormon was a plagiarism of an old manuscript written by one Solomon Spaulding,
which Sidney Rigdon, had somehow secured from a printing house in Pittsburgh. After adding
much religious matter to the story, Rigdon determined to publish it as a newly discovered history
of
the American Indian. Hearing of the young necromancer Joseph Smith ... he visited him secretly
and
persuaded him to enact a fraudulent representation of its discovery." (p. 68)
After reporting that reasonably accurate account of the Book of Mormon's true origin, Brodie
then
goes on to say, "Through the years the 'Spaulding theory' collected supporting affidavits as a ship
does barnacles, until it became so laden with evidence that the casual reader was overwhelmed by
the sheer magnitude of the accumulation. The theory requires a careful analysis, because it has
been
so widely accepted." (p. 68) She then concludes, ""When heaped together without regard for
chronology ... and without any consideration of the character of either Joseph Smith or Sidney
Rigdon, they seem impressive." (p. 442) In other words, the character of the perpetrator of the
"Book of Abraham" hoax, a pretended translation (upside down!) of hieroglyphic funerary scrolls,
and of the "Kinderhook plates" hoax, in which Smith promulgated a translation of
pseudo-hieroglyphs created to expose him, was incompatible with his being a barefaced liar.
Sure.
And Santa Claus comes down the chimney on Mithra's birthday.
In fairness to Brodie, who updated her 1945 book in 1971, and died before the publication of two
1985 books that revealed twelve pages of the Book of Mormon to be in Solomon Spaulding's
handwriting, her conclusion that Smith was not a plagiarist was less absurd in 1971 than it was in
1995 when her publisher decided to republish her by then totally discredited interpretation in
paperback. The very fact that Brodie discussed the B of M's Spaulding genesis and rejected it
makes her biography particularly welcome to hardcore Mormons who think that truth is whatever
the marks will swallow. And even since the publication of Joseph Smith and the Origins of the
Book
of Mormon by D. Persuitte (Prometheus, 1985), and Trouble Enough: Joseph Smith and the
Book
of Mormon by E. H. Taves (Prometheus, 1985), Brodie's gullible account continues to be cited as
the definitive biography of the founder of a scam as blatant and consciously fraudulent as
Scientology and televangelism.
Again in fairness to Brodie, she did not suppress any of the negative evidence, and her book is
indeed a useful account of the Book of Mormon's origins as a fictionalization of such evidence as
came to the (true) author's attention in the early nineteenth century. Even someone who accepts
Smith as its author cannot read this book and continue to believe that Smith was anything but an
imaginative fantasizer-unless of course the reader is a Mormon, in which case rationalizing away
the
evidence is no more difficult than rationalizing away the reality that the biblical god's official
biography portrays him as the most sadistic, evil, megalomaniac serial killer in all fiction. To
someone who can read a bible and see "God" as a good guy, reading No Man Knows My History
and seeing Joseph Smith as a good guy is not a big step.
Jews Without Judaism: Conversations With An Unconventional Rabbi
Rabbi Daniel Friedman
Prometheus Books
59 John Glenn Drive, Amherst, NY 14228
ISBN 1573929247, 108 pp., ppb, $20.00, 1-800-421-0351, www.amazon.com
"Today more Jews are secular than religious. They may 'observe' a few of the rituals of Judaism,
celebrating, albeit in the most minimal fashion, a Jewish holiday here and there, perhaps lighting
Chanukah candles and participating in a seder at Passover. They may even belong to synagogues
and temples, enroll their children in religious schools, celebrate a bar or bat mitzvah, engage
rabbis
to officiate at their weddings and funerals. But in their daily lives, the beliefs and requirements of
Judaism have no bearing upon their decisions." (p. 12)
In other words, by any legitimate definition, Jews are typical Americans.
And yet in an economic and social sense, Jews are not typical Americans. Despite constituting
2.3
percent of the American population, "Jews comprise over a third of the billionaires in this country,
over a quarter of the multi-millionaires, and between a third and a half of the elite professionals in
law, in journalism, in medicine, and in academia. More than one-third of America's Nobel Prize
winners have been Jews. Jews occupy a disproportionate number of seats in Congress (37) and
on
the Supreme Court (2)." (p.13)
So in case anyone thinks Jews are still an oppressed minority, even a rabbi agrees that they are
not.
Friedman states (p. 20), "American Jews know (even though they are hesitant to admit it) that
their
values and ideals are defined not by Judaism but by American liberalism; Judaism provides only an
ethnic vocabulary for expressing the values they have already adopted. In the end, that renders
Judaism irrelevant."
Friedman gives no indication of being a biblical scholar, and does not openly acknowledge that
henotheists who had no belief in an afterlife wrote the Torah. But he is clearly aware of that
reality,
for, after describing rituals imposed on Jews by the Torah, he writes (p. 16), "The rabbis added
bodily resurrection and life in the world to come as God's most precious gift to his loyal and
obedient servants." (emphasis added) Jews Without Judaism, and particularly the chapter on
intermarriage, does illustrate one significant difference between humanistic Judaism and America's
largest single religious sect. In his fictionalized interview with a couple planning a mixed
marriage,
Friedman nowhere implies that "My god can lick your god," or that one religion is more valid than
another. I have yet to encounter a Catholic priest capable of such ecumenism.
In contrast, the religious Judaism that Friedman rejects and the redneck Christian Right follow
identical practices in one significant element of observable behavior (p. 42): "This amounts to
deciding what is true and then looking for evidence that God agrees. Whereas values that are
actually demanded by the Bible are conveniently ignored."
Friedman's delineation of how he can be a Jew and a rabbi without believing in an imaginary
playmate willing to grant him eternal life without passing GO and without collecting $200 is
summarized in his answer to an addict's question, "Why do you call yourself a rabbi if you don't
believe in God?" (p. 56): "As I understand Jewish experience, it is impossible to believe that an
omnipotent and omnibenevolent God has been in charge of our destiny. Where was He during the
Crusades? Where was He during the Inquisition? Where was He during the Holocaust?" (p. 57)
Any incurable godworshipper, Jewish, Christian, Muslim or other, who can rationalize a reason
for
an omnipotent, omnibenevolent Master of the Universe to countenance such atrocities, in order to
retain belief in such a creature's existence, is one sick puppy.
Sweet Jesus: Straight-Shooting Scriptural Studies Scrutinizing The Savior
A. J. Mattill, Jr.
The Flatwoods Free Press
750 Lum Fife Road, Gordo, AL 35466-3357
No ISBN, 2002, 117 pages, spiral bound, paper, $6.50
Sweet Jesus is a collection of articles recently published in American Rationalist, Freethought
Perspective and Soar, modified where necessary to take into consideration more recent
conclusions.
Mattill spells out his approach in the words (p. 3), "We shall assume ... that Jesus did exist and
that
the four Gospels ... do give us an accurate account of his words and deeds." In other words, the
subject of Mattill's scrutiny is the Jesus portrayed in his official biographies, not (necessarily) the
Jesus of history.
Since it is the Jesus of literature whom brain-dead fundamentalists (tautology) such as Gee Dubya
Shrub view as their greatest hero, and whom Mattill hopes to set straight, that is a logical
approach.
Mattill's paraphrasing of some gospel myths probably strays no further from a literal translation
than
some of the recent modern language bibles. But because Mattill is not motivated to put the best
possible spin on stories that, when read by anyone with a functioning human brain, reveal Jesus to
be
less than heroic, his loose translations convey the depravity of king Jesus' alleged teachings as
Authorized translations do not.
Mattill shows the biblical Jesus to have been a liar; a thief; a fanatic who hated his family for
recognizing him as a madman; a xenophobe who equated non-Jews with "dogs," an idiom
comparable in Jesus' time with the modern German invective, schweinhund; a consummate curser;
a
prototype Sheridan Whiteside whose abuse of his gracious hosts left much to be desired; a
wandering parasite (as a rich benefactor said of Gandhi (p. 10): "It takes a lot of money to keep
Gandhi poor"); a sadist and a masochist; a hypocrite who, like Jimmy Swaggert and others, failed
to
practise what he preached; and a raving lunatic. He does so by the simple expedient of quoting
gospel passages that portray him as exactly that.
Mattill draws attention to Jesus' teachings on the virtue of communism and the necessity of
disposing of all personal property (and turning the proceeds over to the commune's treasury,
although A. J. does not go into that aspect), that Christian churches tend to sweep under the rug,
since only a capitalist society can keep the church hierarchy in the comfort to which they have
become accustomed.
Mattill reaches the conclusion that the reason Jesus urged his followers to free themselves of
sexual
desire by castrating themselves is that that is what he had done. I disagree. Jesus' official
biographers showed him constantly surrounded by hookers. And a Gnostic gospel author (Gospel
of Philip) wrote, "The Liberator's hetaira (companion/concubine) is Maria the prostitute. And
Messiah loved her more than all of the students, and used to kiss her often on the mouth." The
Gnostic gospel can be disconsidered, since it was written at a time when Jesus was already being
credited with fathering an heir who later evolved from sang real (royal blood) into san greal (holy
grail). But the canonical authors are unlikely to have shown their ultimate hero's constant
companion as a lady for rent, unless they were stuck with the reality that that's the way it was.
And
Jesus is unlikely to have consorted with hookers unless they provided him with regular
freebies.
Since "Sweet Jesus" was a castrato, Mattill sees no reason to consider the theory that he was
homosexual. He does not quote the passage (Matthew 26:50) where Jesus addresses his
apprentice
Judas the Daggerman as hetaire, a word with decidedly male-lover connotations. On Jesus' innate
heterosexuality, we are in agreement, since I see hetaire as a clumsy Greek translation of an
Aramaic
word with no such connotations.
Sweet Jesus is an evaluation of the morality and justice of the Jesus of the bible rather than the
Jesus
of history. On that basis it achieves its objective in spades. For anyone who thinks Jesus was a
nice
guy, it should be mandatory reading.
William Harwood
Reviewer
Terry's Bookshelf
Open Season On Lawyers
Taffy Cannon
Perseverance Press
c/o Daniel & Daniel, Publishers
PO Box 1525, Santa Barbara, CA 93102
1880284510, 284 pages, $13.95, 1-800-662-8351
What do you call 100,000 attorneys at the bottom of the ocean? A good start! -- or.....so the old
joke goes.
The beginning paragraph of Open Season On Lawyers starts like this:
"Somebody was killing the sleazy lawyers in Los Angeles. In the beginning, hardly anybody even
noticed."
Taffy Cannon's new series starring tough-gal Detective Joanna Davis, is a great tour-de-force of
police work, even if the victims are less than sympathetic.
Cannon has an ear for dialogue and she's a cracker jack storyteller. I read the book in one sitting
and
was never quite sure of how it was going end. Cannon doesn't telegraph action, she allows it to
unfold as it might in real life.
The villain in Open Season On Lawyers is a doozie..crafty, clever and well-financed...and
determined to rid the world of ambulance chasing slime balls who prey upon the legal system.
I'll be reading whatever Cannon writes. And, I'm a fan of her heroine Joanna Davis..she's tough
and
she's had her share of hard knocks, but she's a survivor with enough determination to 'stay on the
trail' until the killer is found!
Enjoy!
The English Assassin
Daniel Silva
G. P. Putnam's Sons
375 Hudson Street, New York, NY 10014
ISBN: 0399148515, 381 pages, $25.95, 1-800-847-5515, www.amazon.com
This is my first Daniel Silva novel, but it will not be my last. I was a loyal Ludlum fan and
mourned
his declining craft long before I mourned his death. I liked Follett in the beginning, but he, too has
pandered to the masses, leaving his skills on the word processor.
The English Assassin is Daniel Silva's fourth book and a page-turner from start to finish. While his
body count rivals that of early Ludlum, Silva is a more polished story teller.
The English Assassin begins with the death of Augustus Rolfe, an elderly Swiss banker who
collaborated with the Nazis (no new territory here) to acquire numerous pieces of art during
World
War II. At the end of his life, Herr Rolfe decides to atone for his sins and return the paintings to
the
heirs of their original owners, thus exposing the dirty little secret all Swiss fear. Publicity of this
kind
just won't do, so Herr Rolfe is killed.
Gabriel Allon, Jewish intelligence agent/art restorer who is set to receive the paintings, finds Herr
Rolfe's body and thus the chase begins for the real killer and the enormous power behind the
Swiss
conspiracy of silence.
While I'm a little tired of the Nazi 'rape of the art world' story, I'm glad to have found someone
who
writes solid spy stories. I look forward to more work from Silva. As they say in show business,
he's
got the 'legs' to last a long time.
Enjoy!
The Big Book Of Misunderstanding
Jim Gladstone
The Haworth Press, Inc.
10 Alice Street, Binghamton, NY 13904-1580
ISBN 1560233826 - 239 pages - $27.95, 1-800-429-6784, www.amazon.com
Although bullied by his father into rough and tumble games and some rather cruel scenarios,
Joshua
Royalton grew up in a caring environment where he was allowed to live in his own interior dream
world. Growing up in the Royalton household wasn't easy, nor was it uncomplicated, but his
parents
must have done something right, for when Josh chooses to 'come out' to them during his
sophomore
year of college, they accept his homosexuality with grace and understanding.
What struck me about this book was that, unlike his gay fiction-writing contemporaries, this
author's
ultimate message was one of hope and acceptance of one's family, one's choices and ultimately,
one's
self.
After reading The Snow Garden and some other recent gay fiction, I found the landscape to be
bleak
and so terribly devoid of hope.
The Big Book Of Misunderstanding seems to work through all the messy trial and tribulations of
growing up gay and its hero comes out on the other side with hope and a peace rarely seen in
other
stories.
Kudos to Jim Gladstone for giving other gay teens a ray of hope. While it must be incredibly
difficult
to grow up knowing you're outside society's boundaries of 'normalcy,'Gladstone shows his readers
that there is life after out there ....and it's up to you to become part of it.....gay or not!
Enjoy!
Terry Mathews
Reviewer
Fantina's Bookshelf
Commies
Ronald Radosh
University of Chicago Press
5801 South Ellis Avenue, Chicago, IL 60637-1496
0226044378 $20.00 1-800-621-2736 www.amazon.com
Ronald Radosh was born to proud communist parents. He attended red elementary and high
schools
(whose curriculum could match any modern day college campus) and even spent his childhood
summers at socialist camp. His life story reads like the perfect description to yield a grown-up
replication of Hillary Clinton or Bella Abzug. But something went right along the way.
From a very young age, he embodied a devotion to the truth (or at least, like his parents, what he
honestly believed was valid), and this veracity eventually lead him astray (or home depending
upon
one's point of view.) Ironically, the term "fellow travelers" has become cliche in communist
circles,
and Mr. Radosh uses it generously throughout this work, but he, the ex-communist, is the one
who
"traveled" away from a dead-end philosophy, while the so-called "travelers" continued to ram into
brick walls, getting nowhere at all.
The drive to satisfy his inquisitive nature lead to many disappoints with communist ideals, but
three
incidents seemed to cement his conversion from the failed mindset. Along with a select ruck of
fellow travelers he was invited to spend a month in Cuba--an offer he joyously accepted.
However,
touring the island prison, he painfully learned that the Cuban reality was a far cry from the
communist lure. Despite communism's promise of complete equality, he encountered a nation
where
the ruling class lived like kings while the working class, lived in hopeless squalor and dissenters
and
eccentrics were subject to arbitrary institutionalization, torture, and execution. Touring a mental
hospital where innocent dissidents routinely underwent lobotomies tore Mr. Radosh's heart.
However, his reaction was not shared by Castro's other American toadies; one of whom dismissed
the author's concerns with the seriously spoken statement, "We have to understand that there are
differences between capitalist lobotomies and socialist lobotomies."
A second transmogrifying occurrence, that pays loud testimony to Mr. Radosh's integrity, was his
undertaking the writing of what would become the definitive biography of the Rosenbergs. As a
teenager, he had protested the spy couple's execution, fully convinced that they were innocent
scapegoats murdered by a tyrannical government who had framed them for a false crime. He
knew
the Rosenberg sons, and in his circle Julius and Ethel were icons of unsurpassed stature. Upon
the
government's release of all documentation regarding the espionage case, Mr. Radosh determined
to
provide the martyred Rosenbergs posthumous exoneration. He was cataclysmically dismayed
when
the evidence conclusively proved that they were indeed guilty as charged. Many people with such
strongly held convictions would have abandoned the project rather than publish a book that
thoroughly refuted them. It speaks volumes about his character that he concluded his work
despite
having to change the thesis 180 degrees. Yet this honest trait was not seen admirably by much of
the left. "The Rosenberg Files" author earned widespread ostracization by his leftist peers, even
many of those who agreed with its verisimilitude. Too many felt that the myth of the Rosenberg
image should maintain its luster to sustain the cause--regardless of what the facts stated.
The third and final disillusioning upheaval he experienced happened during Nicaragua's Civil War.
Like all good leftists, he supported the Sandinista regime, and all like all good truth-seekers, he
wanted to comprehensively investigate the issues involved. Embarking on a hegira to the
Sandinista
camps during the war, he was shocked by abundant human rights abuses in stark contrast to all
the
agitprop the regime's liberation. Mingling with a veritable who's who of leftism, he humorously
relates his meetings with Bianca Jagger. The internationally renowned airhead seemed especially
defensive of one particularly brutal Sandinista general. The origin of her support soon became
obvious, as he regularly arrived at the motel late at night and disappeared into her suite until the
wee
hours of the morning. Appalling many of his fellow traveling ideologues, by agreeing to venture
someplace they would never go--The Contras' Camps, he was again rattled to see
humanitarianism
and a thrust for democracy and fairness. Publicly siding with the freedom-fighting contras once
again earned him the wrath of his fellow travelers, but this time he moved on leaving them all
behind.
Ironically, it was the aimless fellow travelers who have repeatedly sacrificed their ideals to
maintain
allegiance to a cause whose bankruptcy constantly reveals itself. Ronald Radosh was the one who
remained true to his principles--human rights, equality, fairness, and openness. He may have the
liked platitudinous rhythms of socialism, but like anyone secure in his beliefs felt that further
investigation is always beneficial. Although he bravely confesses that his misguided actions were
extremely negative, he is correct in acknowledging that now "the capacity for harm is diminished
because so many stood solidly behind America while we tried to bring it down. The country is
stronger for having encountered and withstood us." Interestingly, while Mr. Radosh eventually
found a rich sense of inner peace and self-respect, his adherence to ideals--rather than
ideology--stands as a bold example that all of us, fellow travelers as well as those who never
boarded, should emulate.
Making Patriots
Walter Berns
University of Chicago Press
5801 South Ellis Avenue, Chicago, IL 60637-1496
ISBN 0-226-04437-8 $20.00 1-800-621-2736 www.amazon.com
In his short collection of essays, Walter Berns explores the history of patriotism and identifies why
it
has achieved such a unique plateau here in the United States. Occasionally, bordering on the
esoteric due to its advanced discussion of ancient Sparta and more-than-passing mentions of some
other abstruse historical topics, certain sections of the treatise may overwhelm some readers. Still
those who must plod through the first few chapters will be handsomely rewarded with the book's
later essays. The testimonials to Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglas alone make it a
beneficial
read. In these two sections, Bern's ideas illuminate and his prose soars. Of our 16th president he
rhapsodically ponders, "what Lincoln did at Gettysburg was to create new mystic chords,
stretching
from a new battlefield to new graves, to our hearts and hearthstones, all over this broad land,
South
as well as North, reminding us of the cause written in our book, the Declaration of
Independence."
Analyzing Frederick Douglas' life and the impact he left behind, Mr. Berns offers some notions
that
defy longstanding, putative preconceptions. Mr. Douglas, himself rattles the established elite
thinking when he is quoted as saying, "the federal Government was never in its essence anything
but
anti-slavery...If in its origin, slavery had any relation to the government, it was only as the
scaffolding to the magnificent structure, to be removed as soon as the building was completed."
Mr.
Bern
