A Book From My Teenage Years

In my early teens I was fascinated by antique radios,  many of which had been left to rot in the dry heat of my Big Grandpa's garage. 

It was not until 2022 that I actually owned one of my own (if I'm counting right,  I own 5, including 3 floor models) but I thought about them enough that I special ordered this book, Antique Radios Restoration and Price Guide by David and Betty Johnson, from either Waldens or BD Dalton's.

I never did anything (at the time) with the info it provided,  but man did I enjoy reading it. 

Sign Me Up!

Fatherland

Fatherland was a bestseller for Robert Harris and it's easy to see why. The story of a SS Detective in the 1960's, twenty some years after a Nazi victory in WWII, it effortlessly melds speculative fiction and noir into a very readable novel. 

I certainly enjoyed it, but I will say the center of the "mystery" was a little obvious, I don't want to spoil anything here so forgive the vagueness, but I bet, if you asked 1000 people to write an original outline for a book like this, 980 would feature the same plot point. 

Aside from that, which is probably just me being a nitpicker, it was very good. 

Grade: A-

read in early October

A Book from my Past

In the late '80's I bought The Complete Films of John Wayne, by Mark Ricci and Boris and Steve Zmijewsky. It's a reference guide to each of the 169 feature films Wayne made in his lifetime, and I purchased it not only because I was a fan of the Duke, but because at the time I was heavily invested in watching classic movies on AMC (back when that was American Movie Classics). 

It's rather a no-frills guide, with a summary of each movie and relevant production data, but very few, if any, behind the scenes snippets and only  black and white photographs.. 

Still, having gotten rid of the book decades ago, I was very happy when my new (to me) copy arrived in the mail recently. Welcome home Mr. Wayne. 

The Big Sky by A.B. Guthrie

 I'm all for troubled heroes, but I don't like troubling ones. And Boone Caudill, the main character in this epic tale of the American West, is about as troubling as a hero can get. 

That's how a review of The Big Sky, the classic Western masterpiece by Pulitzer Prize winner A.B. Guthrie, begins on Goodreads, setand a sad testament it is to the state of the reading public. So enamored are we now of "representation" that we are incapable of immersing oursleves in a novel unless the character looks like us, thinks like us, acts like us - or, to be more precise, acts like the saint we imagine ourselves to be. 

Boone Caudill is not, by the way, the "hero" of the novel, as there is no hero to be found. He is the main character, but only if you ignore the American West itself, the true and only pure character to be found. The novel opens with Boone the victim of parental abuse, and in short order he is chased, betrayed, framed, tortured by a lawman, and made a fugitive. Caudill, a man of many internal flaws, came by them the hard way. 

Set in the 1830's, there is a narrative thread connecting the characters from start to finish, but a thread is all it is. The Big Sky is not concerned about plot or structure. It's more a tale of barely related,  self contained episodes of Caudill's life. 

Be forewarned that life can be dark.  I've already mentioned how the book begins; before it ends there will be murder,  mutilation,  rape, starvation, spousal abuse,  cannibalism, and betrayal.  No one is immune,  not the white characters, not the natives, and it occurs without judgement, just another part of the wild land the characters inhabit.

There is beauty too,  in Guthrie's pen and his insights into the world he so thoroughly and lovingly creates. 

I did NOT have difficulty reading about a troubled lead,  but I did have issues with the frequent use of the N word.  I know,  different era,  different people,  and I'm sure it's accurate to 1837. It was still jarring to read in 2024, especially as it was hard to put my finger on just how it was being used.  I could be wrong,  but I think it was only used once in reference to a black man, was more often than not to describe themselves (white), and in all its uses it seemed rarely to be an insult. Again,  jarring and confusing. 

It is a great novel,  but don't expect sunshine and lollipops.

Grade: B

The Mercy of Gods by James SA Corey

After reading a single book in the last two years,  I've now started and finished two in the last week. 

I guess the anti-depressants are working. 

The Mercy of Gods is the first novel in a new space opera series by James SA Corey, the author(s) of The Expanse.

A planet not our own, but populated by humans with a society much like ours, is invaded and conquered by a race of aliens.  These invaders kidnap a group of human scientists and invite them to continue their work, with the reward for success being life in captivity and failure bringing the end of human history.  Unbeknownst to friend and foe alike, one of the humans is a mole,  planted by a race already at war with the invaders, with the goal of learning information to rid the universe of the invaders once and for all. 

The book is grand in scope and intricate in detail, and I loved it.  I regret that I found the series at its birth,  because it will be years before I get to read the next installment 

Well done.

Grade: A

The Shootist

 

For the first time in over a year I finished reading a book, and my word did I pick a good one. 

The Shootist is a novel by Glendon Swarthout, and served as the basis for the movie of the same name that became John Wayne's final role on film. It's about John Barnard Books, a middle aged gunfighter who travels to El Paso to see a surgeon he trusts. That doctor verifies what he already knew, that he is dying of prostate cancer. Taking up a room in the boarding house of a widow and her troubled teenage son, Books determines that the illness will not best him; instead, he intends to leave the world as he lived it, with a gun in his hand. 

From the start Swarthout charms you with the poetry of his language, the wonderful descriptions of people and places, and insightful glimpes into the inner workings of the main characters. This was once voted as one of the greatrest Westerns of the 20th century, and they weren't wrong. 

I can't say I love the ending, which is much darker than the film. But I cannot say it was the wrong choice, as it fits perfetctly into the tale. 

Grade: A+

Willie Mays

 Willie Mays, in my opinion the greatest center fielder of any era, a man with 660 home runs to his name, who loved the game and was loved by it in return, has died at 93.

Long  ago, as a senior in high school, I set out to learn everything I could about baseball in the way I knew best: through books. One of those books was Say Hey,  one of a few autobiographies Mays put out in his lifetime. It wasn't the greatest book on the sport that I would ever read, and I remember that each chapter ended with a summation of that season stats. Stii, it was enough to convince me that people were right when they said that he was one of the best ever.

RIP