Gary Graham

I won't lie to you: until this morning I couldn't have told you his name if you had given me a year to think on it. Even so, the news today that Gary Graham died on the 22nd at age 73 hit me in the gut. 

Graham was the star of Alien Nation, the 90's TV series based on the book and movie of the same name*. While it was short-lived, I ate up every episode, and the one centered around a massive city riot played in my head many times in 2020. 

Later, Graham would go on to play Soval, a Vulcan ambassador to Earth, in Star Trek Enterprise. That may be his best known role, but I never saw his episodes. To me, he'll always be Detective Matthew Sike, teammate with an alien partner in a much different Los Angeles. 

RIP 

 

*yes, I read the movie novelization. 

On a Sea of Glass and There's Something Alive on the Titanic

For most of my life I've read a minimum of 52 books a year, and I often watched upwards of 150 movies a year too - and that while raising a family, working, and attending classes. 

That was then. 

Now? I recently finished reading my first book in over a year, and even that took me months to finish. I rarely watch a movie. And there have been weeks where I haven't turned on the TV. I also do not write,  ride my bike,  go regularly to Mass, or do pretty much anything I once considered routine and Danny-like. 

I'm sure it's a sign of some deep underlying depression, but if so I don't consciously feel it, and it may just be a big innocent lull. 

Time will tell. 

Anyway, that first book in over a year?  On a Sea of Glass: The Life and Loss of RMS Titanic by Tad Fitch, J Kent Layton, and Bill Wormstedt. 

It is a detailed, 930-odd page (in epub at least) history of the Titanic from conception through the discovery of the wreck. When I say "detailed," I mean there is an appendix debating what the exact time of Titanic's departure was on its maiden voyage, down to the minute; discussions dissecting the timeline of survivor's accounts, comparing it to those of other witnesses and adjusting the accuracy accordingly, etc. Generally, the book displays a love, even adoration, for the minutiae of the ship. 

Just by presenting the facts many of the myths of Titanic are destroyed: Ismay was neither a coward nor an overbearing snit; 3rd class passengers were segregated aboard ship in part because they were subject to immigration laws, not because of the snobbery shown in Cameron's epic (tho', as the era's equivalent of a passenger jet, accommodations were divided by class); the infamous coal bunker fire was routine for the day, etc. 

There were also flaws with the ship, as you'd expect on a maiden voyage. The heating in second class was problematic, making some staterooms a sauna while leaving the majority a chilly icehouse. The public rooms, even in first class, were bitter cold when the ship reached northern waters. And there were innocent mishaps too: a first class woman fell down the grand staircase and broke her arm - up to the sinking, it was apparently the talk of the ship. 

It's a great book, and worth your time. 

* * * 

On the heels of that, in an effort to keep my momentum going, I read There's Something Alive on the Titanic by Robert Serling (the brother of The Twilight Zone creator and host). It is, forgive me, an atrocious novel. Skip it. 

DOCTOR SLEEP

Based on a Stephen King book (a darn good one), DOCTOR SLEEP is a sequel to The Shining, both the novel *and* the Kubrick adaptation that King despises.  To accomplish that merger, the last quarter of the movie diverges from the book. The changes work, and even improve the ending, but in so doing sacrifice some of the emotional resolutions I remember from the novel.

Anyhow, it's good. Real good. Ewan McGregor is top notch, and so is Rebecca Ferguson as the evil Rose the Hat. Be forewarned that a very disturbing murder from the book is even worse when acted out on screen, and is not for the faint of heart.

Get past that, and you're in for a treat.

American Tragedy by Lawrence Schiller

I just finished American Tragedy by Lawrence Schiller, a 900+ page inside look at the OJ Simpson trials (criminal and civil). Great read, great information. As a law student it was enthralling. My verdict (no pun intended): whether factually guilty or not, legally there was plenty of reasonable doubt to find OJ not guilty. The Rockingham search was illegal, the crime scene botched, the DNA samples mishandled, the Bronco (supposedly kept locked) was in fact opened by officers, the prosecutions timeline was too narrow, and of course, most of the pivotal evidence was found by a racist cop who bragged about framing blacks. Seating a nearly all black jury might have sealed the deal, but this white, Catholic Republican would have voted for acquittal.

I should point out that just as everything good in this world inspires some bad, the bad inspires the good. In the wake of the Simpson trial debacle LAPD procedures, training, and diversity all improved. Even the FBI refined their DNA procedures because of the trial. One commentator on the FBI - and I forget the exact quote - said the real title of the new FBI rules might as well have been "How not to screw up another Simpson case."

In an eerie parallel to the Simpson alibi, just about an hour after I finished the book I came home and tried to cut a pan of brownies. The knife slipped and drove into the palm of my hand. Not a bad cut, but a deep one, it left a nifty blood trail across my floor. Lisa immediately joked that it would screw any alibi for the next few hours and I should lay low. But it got me thinking - what if Simpson was telling the truth (he wasn't) and the cut on his hand was just an ill-timed coincidence? The world turns on the tiniest of details.

Room

 A great if sorrowful film. Lisa read the book, and on her recommendation I sold many copies of it in my time at BN. I don't agree that this deserved an Oscar for Best Actress, but it's a damn shame the young boy didn't get a nod for his role.

On Romney

I'm reading Romney's book, and I just don't get many of these "Obama Lite"/weak principles accusations that I hear flying around all over the net. The man skewers Obama on foreign policy and clearly lays out a solid economic plan. He is a politician and unlikely to yak on air just to feed the press, but that doesn't make him weak. So far he has my vote.

I don't think his MA plan was a failure. There were problems, and things that should have been done differently, but that's different from flunking out. He just can't say that and still woo the base, which is ridiculous. What a state wishes to do, God bless. It's different than a invasive federal plan.