451F

Ray Bradbury's novella, "The Fireman", published here in the February 1951 issue, became the classic "Fahrenheit 451".

Great story telling

A River Runs Through It and Other Stories by Norman Maclean
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Great story telling set in the mountains of Montana. Norman Maclean recounts stories of family, nature, hard work in the wilderness, a Forest service camp, rattlesnakes, forest fires, waitresses, pimps and whores, high stakes card games, bar room fights, and of course (if you have seen the movie) fly fishing. Three stories that bring to life living in the mountains in the early 20th century. A nice read.

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Nick Offerman On How He Got Involved With Wendell Berry

explaining the science of Star Trek

The Physics of Star Trek by Lawrence M. Krauss
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I loved reading this book. It is perfect for a Trekkie who loves and appreciates science! Dr. Krauss (who we were fortunate to hear speak earlier this year) is an excellent writer and communicator of complex science to the casual "armchair" scientist. He covers many of the basic foundational technologies portrayed in the universe of Star Trek, and explains them and their implications in terms of proven laws and practices of physics and the the scientific method. A great read for even the casual Trekkie who loves science. I highly recommend this book! I am looking forward to reading Dr. Krauss's newest book "The Greatest Story Ever Told--So Far: Why Are We Here?" which my daughter got signed by him when we heard him speak. He is a great communicator and teacher.

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a gruesome sobering tale from our past

Blood Meridian, or the Evening Redness in the West by Cormac McCarthy
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

i love reading Cormac McCarthy, but frankly, i'm glad this one is behind me. Blood Meridian is wonderfully written, but the story is gruesome. It is filled with an excess of violence and massacre. Were this book not solidly based on historical events, i'd say "don't bother". But because it is based on history, specifically Samuel Chamberlain's memoir "My Confession: The Recollections of a Rogue", i am glad i read it. Chamberlain rode with the Glanton gang of mercenaries between 1849 and 1850. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood_Meridian#Background_and_writing). Even McCarthy's excellent writing gets wearisome as it recounts the bloodshed and cruelty inflicted by this renegade group upon other humans. It was a dark time in our history. As an aside, the story, being based on facts, gave historical credibility to the gangs of outlaws that Clint Eastwood's characters fight against in his classic spaghetti western films.

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a great musically oriented techie book

Analog Days: The Invention and Impact of the Moog Synthesizer by Trevor Pinch
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

My daughter recently attended Moogfest and chatting with her sparked an interest in learning more about Robert Moog and his synthesizer. I love music and am an electrical engineer by training, so my interest is both musical and technical. This is a great overview and history of not only Moog and his company's devices, but also other analog music devices leading up to and following the hay days of Moog modular and Minimoog synthesizers. I enjoyed the story and the facts, and the especially the account of the interplay between musicians, engineers, and sales people in the development of these devices. I also found very interesting the popular and famous artists who used the various synthesizers in their recorded and performance music. This is a great read for a musically oriented techie like me. I highly recommend it!

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one of the best authors I've ever read

What are People for?: Essays by Wendell Berry
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I was recently introduced to Wendell Berry by my son-in-law, who has read several of his books. I borrowed this collection of essays from him and am blown away by the excellent writing and thinking that are expressed in "What are People for? Essays". Mr. Berry is one of the best authors I've ever read, and his wisdom and carefully reasoned thoughts are in the high league of C.S. Lewis and others. While one may not agree with all his positions or conclusions, the wisdom, thought, and reason expressed are superb, with the quality of the writing to match. I am looking forward to reading many more books by Wendell Berry as i can find them.

I also would like to watch this excellent documentary on Mr. Berry again:
LOOK & SEE: A PORTRAIT OF WENDELL BERRY
http://lookandseefilm.com/

For an excellent example of his excellent thought and work, a more recent example is found at:
"Caught in the middle: On abortion and homosexuality"
https://www.christiancentury.org/article/2013-03/caught-middle

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we have been there before

Pocket History of the United States by Henry Steele Commager
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This book is one the best reading choices i've made in a long while. I had not read any American history since i was in high school, and i could not have cared less about it then (sorry H.S. teachers, it was not your fault). Re-reading history as a grown adult is a whole different experience. The relevance of persons, events and policies is much clearer after living the majority of your adult life interacting with the results and consequences of them. I have come up with a list of presidents i want to read more about: Jefferson, Wilson, FDR. And as dysfunctional as things seem at this moment of our history, i have learned that we have been there before and somehow survived. Therefore, i come away with a sense of hope that somehow, once again, the American spirit that created this amalgamation of peoples will show the path out of this, yet another, dark chapter in our history. Moving on from this book, i'll read Howard Zinn's classic "A People's History of the United States" next, then some books related to my favorite president list. Here's hoping we are not too far gone to survive.



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not my imagination...

So, as you probably know from Goodreads, I'm reading a book on US History.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/215448.Pocket_History_of_the_United_States

I am nearly done with the book (my best reading choice in a good while), and am reading the section on Nixon. As i'm reading about Nixon's shenanigans, i'm thinking "this is so much like what Trump is doing, we have been through this before!". And just now, i see this on Twitter:

https://twitter.com/ChadHGriffin/status/862069572282839040

so i guess it was NOT my imagination!

what a shitstorm we are in (again)

the plot thickens...

I am really loving Season 2 of "The Man in the High Castle"! I have not had time to binge it yet, but just finished episode 5 of S2 and wow, Wow, WOW! Loving all the angles and dimensions to this alternative history story! And i love the strong and realistic characters! Excellent.

season_2.0

Last night, we finally made it though the last episode of Season 2 of Mr. Robot! (that doesn't count rewatching it to try to put all the pieces together). We are loving this show, and looking forward to season_3.0.

another dystopian tale

After reading, in quick succession, three classic dystopian novels, (Nineteen Eighty-Four, Brave New World, and Fahrenheit 451) i decided that i am way overdue to re-read another dystopian tale, one that is rooted in historical fact - the History of the United States. It may seem odd that i would group the history of our nation with these other three obviously dysfunctional novels. Isn't our nation the great lighthouse for freedom, justice, equality, opportunity, and peace? Well, the U.S. has certainly been kind to me and my family. But how has our nation treated the "others"? People of color, women, our native people, immigrants from all over the world (my grandparents included), people of other religious traditions, people without religion, people of different sexual and gender identities, people without economic means... the list goes on and on. As i revisit the story of our nation, i expect to find answers regarding these and other questions about our nation, and how we compare to these other dystopian stories in relation to ALL of our people. I'm looking forward to rediscovering the history of the U.S. all over again.

a fun read

The Rook by Daniel O'Malley
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I found the concept of this story compelling; a "new" person waking up in someone else's body and life situation. The modeling of amnesia in this way was pretty cool. But to me, the telling of the story felt contrived and shallow. There were a few times it almost grabbed me - the reunion with a family member for example. And there was no shortage of plot turns, action, and suspense. I did not expect it to wrap up in the way it did. But in the end, it felt two dimensional, and oddly enough, familiar. The message and method of the story seemed to me like a combination of a bunch of stories i already knew: X-Men, Harry Potter, The Hitchhikers Guide, Clue, Ghostbusters, MIB - as if they were all thrown together into a big box and shaken vigorously. In the end, the story felt too familiar to grab me afresh, although it must have been great fun to write. I really wanted to love this book, two of my Goodreads friends loved it, but i just couldn't pull it off. It's a fun read.

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excellent Amazon series!

So glad i went back and started over on this excellent Amazon series The Man in the High Castle! Looking forward to a Season 2 binge soon!

delightfully written travelogue

A Russian Journal by John Steinbeck
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

"A Russian Journal" is a delightfully written travelogue chronicling John Steinbeck's two month visit to Stalin's Russia during 1947. He hoped to capture the Russian people and lifestyle as it was. And to supplement his writing, he took along Robert Capa, the famous wartime photographer to add photos. The book is full of Steinbeck's wit and charm, and feels very human. The stories and experiences are not relayed as cold dry facts, but rather are told in a warm and at times humorous way. Steinbeck lends his wonderful prose style to the account, and includes not only what he and Capa see and hear, but also comments on their experience traveling and lodging in a Russia still rebuilding after the vast Nazi destruction. This is not an academic work, nor is it a complete reference or guide on the subject of Russia or the Russian people in 1947. And it is not at all political. Rather, it is a enjoyable and fun account of two fellows on a quest to see Russia and met her people. I loved reading this, Steinbeck is one of the master storytellers.

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brilliant!

brilliant!

one crazy-ass story

On the Road by Jack Kerouac
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

How very serendipitous that i should finish this book on the author's 95th birthday! RIP Mr. Jack Kerouac. This is one crazy-ass story. I don't know how much of it actually happened, but i believe it is based on real events. It has been referred to as the "Huckleberry Finn" for the author's generation. This story is one (no, actually, MANY) wild ride(s)! It is said to define a generation, or at least a sub-culture of a generation. I just realized that Jack Kerouac and my father were born in the same year - 1922. I am pretty sure that my dad experienced this period of history differently than Sal and Dean in the story, but even with the differences, i see some similarities. Sal's background was different than that of my dad. I do know however that my dad loved to travel. Dad, rather than taking the bus or a travel bureau car, preferred his motorcycle. I do not know how widely he traveled before settling down with my mom, but he never lost the love of traveling across the US and eventually around the world. We made many trips between southern California and the Ozarks of Missouri in my childhood, and dad continued to travel after us kids were grown and gone. I wonder if that love of travel and the open road was truly a part of his generation.

As i said earlier, this story is a series of wild journeys taken in a very different time, but they do capture a freedom and inquisitiveness that continues to be a part of our culture. This was probably the last days an adventure of this type could be undertaken, with the Interstate highway system just around the corner. Although William Least Heat-Moon was able to experience the same flavor of adventure in his excellent Blue Highways journey, with decidedly less flamboyance. Maybe the blue highways are a part of all of us. I certainly like to unplug and hit the road to see where it leads, and hope to do it again soon.

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ps. Oh boy, a movie version http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0337692/

pps. The movie did NOT do justice to the book and missed major themes. Don't waste 2 hours watching it.

too close to home for comfort

Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Wow, this was a great book to follow up Orwell's "Nineteen Eighty-Four" and Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World"! The central message of this classic story was not what i expected, but the close resemblance to our American culture and society today was downright creepy and scary. We are literally watching this unfold in so many aspects of our culture. This is really happening. I got the creeps when i heard the upcoming season of DWTS mentioned with anticipation and excitement. This is too close to home for comfort. Wow!

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what it means to be human

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? 6 by Philip K. Dick
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

this is a really nicely done graphic novel presentation of the entire text of Philip K. Dick's "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep", which is the novel on which he film Blade Runner was based. This is my first reading of the novel, but i plan to return to it in its non-graphic format later this year. A great story which gives the reader much to think about related to what it means to be human. This is a beautifully done series.

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Vi :)