BillP's Book\Miniature\Wargame Blog

Oddly enough everything I’ve finished during the month of October has been fiction. It’s been a long while since that happened.

First up was the utterly forgettable Emma Who Saved My Life: A Novel by Wilton Barnhardt. This purported to be a “coming of age in NYC” novel, and while it kind of was, it was also boring and forgettable. There was no discernable plot, the book just kind of meandered along before petering out with a vague and unsatisfying ending. Not recommended.

The Lincoln Highway is the latest novel by Amor Towels, whose previous novels; A Gentlemen in Moscow and Rules of Civility are two of my favorite books. I’ve been waiting for nearly a year for this one to come out and must confess to being slightly disappointed. The book describes the adventures of 18 year old Emmet Watson, who is released from an Iowa reformatory where he has been serving time for accidentally killing another young man during an altercation. Because of his father dying, Emmet is released a few months early to care for his 8-year-old brother Billy. The two plan to leave Nebraska in Emmet’s hard-earned Studebaker, move to California, and search for their mother who abandoned them several years before Emmet went away. The Warden of the reformatory drives Watson home to Nebraska, and once the Warden deposits him home and departs for Iowa it is discovered that two of the other boys from the reformatory have escaped by stowing away in the trunk of the warden’s car. A complicated road trip ensues with stolen cars, riding freight trains, trips to NYC, and a planned burglary. All of which leads to a sort of sad and unsatisfactory ending. I guess I enjoyed the book, and I’m glad I read it. I will probably read it again, but it just didn’t seem as good as the author’s previous two books, on the other hand, that might be on me.

Destiny: Union Station By E.M. Foner is the 20th installment of this author’s Union Station series and is actually a prequel to that series, taking place two years before the first book opens. It was very enjoyable and fun. If you’ve read and enjoyed the other 19 books in the series, you’ll enjoy this one, and since it’s a prequel, if you want to start here instead of with the first book, it will work.

Bless this House by Norah Lofts is a kind of Michneresque novel about a British country house Merrivay, which is built as a reward for one of Queen Elizabeth I’s pirates. The book basically recounts the history of the house and the humans (and ghosts) who inhabited it for nearly 400 years from 1577 when the house was built until the mid-1950s publication of the book. I was absolutely enthralled by the book and actually missed a fair amount of sleep while reading “just one more chapter”. Even better, its available on Kindle Unlimited for interested parties.

Finally, there was Consider Phlebas by Iain Banks. This is the first book in his Culture series and I must confess it took me three or four tries before I managed to actually get through it. I think my biggest issue is Banks’ writing style. He seems to be of the “no exposition” school of sci-fi, where readers are supposed to pick up the details of the book’s milieu in little dribs and drabs throughout the book, rather than having it laid out via exposition at some point early in the novel. C.J. Cherryh is kind of the same way and I’ve had trouble getting into her as well. Anyway, having struggled through and achieved (hopefully) a basic understanding of The Culture, and its war with the Iridians I should be better equipped to enjoy the second book, which I plan to start shortly. Stay tuned, the jury is still out on this series.

So, that’s it, 10 months down and 84 books read for the year, I’m right on track to read a bit over 100 for 2021.

My reading seems to have slowed down quite a bit for reasons that I don’t really have a handle on. In the nearly two months since my last update, I’ve only finished nine books. There is some doubt whether I’ll hit my notional goal of 100 for the year.

Anyway, here they are. First up was a pair of books about the Beatles.

The Beatles and the Historians: An Analysis of Writings About the Fab Four by Erin Torkelson Weber is a very detailed and insightful survey of the historiography of the band. Ms Torkelson has painstakingly analyzed the historical record in an effort to separate fact from fiction. I was very impressed with her effort and results. One key fact that emerged was that the various band members, especially John and to a lesser extent Paul often gave impromptu responses that, colored by the heat of the moment, were not totally accurate. In many cases, the boys later repudiated their answers, but the repudiation never really got any traction. Another theme was how much “conventional wisdom” about the band crystalized in the immediate aftermath of Lennon’s murder. Anyway, it was an outstanding book and if you’re interested in the Beatles in particular, or historiography in general, you’ll want to read this book.

Next was Tune In: The Beatles: All These Years vol 1 by Mark Lewisohn. This is the first volume in a projected three volume project. The intent is to create the definitive extremely detailed biography of not only the members of the band itself, but also including individuals such as Sir George Martin and Brian Epstein, who although not technically members of the band, had a profound effect on it. This first book covers from before the births of the boys (their ancestry and how their families came to Liverpool is covered) up until 1962. To say it was detailed is a massive understatement. It covers literally everything. It’s 940 pages! At the same time, it is massively readable and thoroughly documented. I can’t tell you how impressed I was with this book. If you’re a fan of The Beatles, you’ll want to read this. Readers should be forewarned, it’s very detailed, it’s 940 pages of everyday minutiae about the intersecting lives of half a dozen people. If you’re not a fan of the band, this will be way too much detail for you. I enjoyed it and can’t wait for the next volume.

I Just Had To Go Back To Di Island by Anthony Bjorklund is the fourth volume in how to live one’s life like a Jimmy Buffett song and by far the weakest. Chronologically, this one fit’s into the multi-year gap between the middle and end of the third volume and one sees why the author originally decided to skip that period. Not recommended unless you’re really into the other three.

Victory in the Pacific, 1945: History of United States Naval Operations in World War II by Samuel Eliot Morison. What can I say about this one? It’s the final volume of a magisterial set, if you’ve read the others, you’ll HAVE to read this one. I will say despite being dated by scholarship and information that has emerged in the half century since this books was written, Morison remains a viable source and an excellent read.

The Third World War – August 1985 by Gen Sir John Hackett is the book every wargamer I knew read back in 1979 when it came out. Based on a conversation on the Consimworld on-line forum I decided to re-read it and ordered a cheap copy. Wow! This book has not aged well. It’s a much different book than I remember reading. Back then, I was almost totally focused on the parts of the book that described the combat. Those sections are still well written, but not great. But honestly, they are few and far between. What I didn’t remember was the masses of detail about the political and military policies of the era. These make up the bulk of the book and frankly the world has changed so much that in today’s context, they just don’t make much sense. I guess at the end of the day I’m glad I read it, but I won’t be keeping my copy.

Gad’s Hall and The Haunting of Gad’s Hall by Norah Lofts were a pair of delightful books that reached across several genres. They started off as a fairly standard “family struggles with adversity” story which kind of segued into a standard “horror” story, then flashed back into a period piece about a formidable woman dealing with how the death of her spouse affect the social position and economic prospects of her and her daughters. There are a couple of more shifts before the two book set ends which I don’t want to give away. Both books were extremely well written and engaging. They cost me many hours of lost sleep as I delayed bed to read “just one more chapter”. I enjoyed them immensely and am quite happy to see many other works from the same author available via Amazon’s “Kindle Unlimited” service. Hat tip to long time friend Tricia Jones for turning me on to Ms. Gad!

Decisions at Stones River: The Sixteen Critical Decisions That Defined the Battle by Matt and Lee Spruill was a bit of a disappointment. Usually I quite enjoy these books but this one seems to be an exception and I can’t quite put my finger on why. I think it might be because I am almost totally unfamiliar with the details of this battle so I don’t really have the context to evaluate the “what-ifs” that drive the narrative of the book. I’m going to reserve judgement on this one until I read an overview of the battle, then I’ll come back to this one.

Finally there was The Atlanta Campaign: A Civil War Driving Tour of Atlanta-Area Battlefields by J. Britt McCarley, Stephen Davis et al. I consulted this guide in an effort to put together a tour of what’s left of the three major battles fought by Hood after he relieved Joe Johnston. This is another severely dated book. Since it was published in 1989, many, many, of the street names and landmarks cited in the directions have changed names and or purpose. Luckily I have lived in Metro Atlanta for 35 years so I was vaguely aware of the changes. There were enough changes that it took me several hours of diligent work on Google maps and Streetview to decipher the directions and plan a coherent route. The end result was a decent tour, but it was a lot of work upfront. On the other hand, as dated as this one is, I haven’t found a better source for these battles so we may be stuck with it.

79 for the year