Ideas and Information for Readers Dear Friends, March 2011 “Our 21 st Year” Reviews in This Issue CHRONOS… AND KAIROS There are two Greek words for time: Chronos and kairos. We are all familiar with the former since it is the root of English words such as chronological, chronometer, and chronicle. Kairos is more • Dethroning the King (MacIntosh) Chronos • Bryant & May Off the Rails (Fowler) nuanced and elusive. refers to sequential time, time as the sun passes through the heavens, or a time span. • Hero: The Life and Legend of Lawrence Kairos, however, means the “moment,” a time in between, that critical instant when one must catch the tide or be of Arabia (Korda) swept under, a moment of undetermined time in which something special happens. While chronos is quantitative, • The Lost Books of the Odyssey (Mason) kairos has a qualitative nature. I heard a homily on these terms some time ago in which it was noted that many of us • Brief Encounters with Che Guevara (Fountain) are caught up in busy schedules, are measuring time ( chronos ), thus distracted and preoccupied, so that we miss the • Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase & Fable moment ( kairos ). It is those moments of insight, and emotion and joy, that are so essential to the appreciation of life, (15th Edition) and contentment. So, the thinking goes, let us manage our chronos in a way that allows enjoyment of the kairos. • Shantaram (Roberts) • Rules of Betrayal A PROBLEM WELL STATED… (Reich) Charles F. Kettering (1876-1958), an electrical engineer and inventor, is the • Brute: The Life of Victor Krulak (Coram) source of the familiar and oft-quoted, “A problem well stated is a problem half solved.” I kept thinking about this • The Killer (Hinshelwood) statement when Wall Street and the banks were being demonized last year during the debate on the massive financial • All the Devils are Here (McLean & Nocera) regulation bill, ostensibly adopted to prevent the recurrence of the deep recession we’ve been experiencing. I believe • Outwitting Trolls (Tapply) that when the history of this major downturn in the U.S. economy is written down the road, clear of the finger- • Left Neglected (Genova) pointing and political maneuvering, the role of the Federal Government will be seen as the root cause. There • The Mind’s Eye (Sacks) is, therefore, ample irony in the sense of the government enacting legislation to regulate what they caused, and • Start-Up Nation (Senor and Singer) naming it the Dodd-Frank bill after two of the legislators who many believe were complicit in creating the • Success Made Simple (Wesner) problems to begin with. A problem well stated? The weight and enforcement of the Com munity Reinvestment • Mark Twain’s Other Woman (Trombley) Act, the use of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to underwrite the substandard loans, and the substantial easing • Unnatural Death (Sayers) S • The Attenbury Emeralds by the Fed set the table for the crash. Sure there is plenty of blame to go around, but it was government (Walsh) E • Our Kind of Traitor (le Carré) meddling in the financial marketplace to achieve social goals (affordable housing) that was at the center. N • Scorpions (Feldman)

I “We can’t solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them.” (Albert • The Warmth of Other Suns (Wilkerson)

L Einstein, 1879-1955) • Elizabeth Street (Fabiano) SPRING I find it irresistible to write about Spring when it arrives in California, naturally much earlier than • The Next Decade (Friedman) E in most other areas of the country. While on those early morning forays in the yard with our little dog, you • Rescue (Shreve) H • The Judas Gate simply cannot miss the miracles of nature. By late January/early February the rose bushes begin to break out, (Higgins) T • Separate Beds (Buchan) followed shortly by the camellias, all heralding warmer weather, the resurgence of the deciduous trees and • The Nomination (Tapply)

N bushes and the blooming of the entire garden. This annual revival never fails to generate a sense of awe in this • Scribble, Scribble, Scribble (Schama)

E observer, and a deeper appreciation of the laws of the universe. We’ve written previously in these pages about Features E the concepts of being opposed to doing. In modern times, some are overtaken by compulsive doing to fill the • Jane’s Selections hours and days. For little things like that garden walk and the observation and appreciation of natural miracles, W • TRE Favorites… A Decade Ago welcome to a little slice of being. T • William Tapply Mysteries…

E AN EVENING FOR AMERICA In late February, we attended the Celebration of Freedom Gala at • The Business of Doing Business • English is Not So Easy! B the Ronald Reagan Library (Simi Valley, CA). With Air Force One positioned above us, the event was a

. • Pronunciation for the Careful Speaker

wonderful, inspirational American evening. We were welcomed by the 1st Marine Division Band, sang the • The Words We Use and Misuse . National Anthem, had the presentation of colors, and recited the Pledge of Allegiance. Congressional Medal

• Building Your Working Vocabulary of Honor recipients were honored, and over half of the some 90 living Medal of Honor recipients were in . • Featured Author—Dorothy L. Sayers attendance! Former Secretary of State George Schultz was introduced by Commandant of the Marine Corps G • The Extraordinary Plasticity of the Brain General James Amos and presented with the Distinguished Citizen Award. Connie Stevens and Ann-Margret N • The Charles Lenox Mysteries

I were presented with Bob Hope Awards (“Thanks for the Memories”) for their decades of entertaining service- • … and more

D men throughout the world. The evening ended with the great tenor Steve Amerson filling the room with

A “God Bless America.” This was the type of evening that all Americans should experience, reminding us of THE QUA RTERLY E the price of freedom and the great privilege of being an American. PUBLICATION R Sincerely, Subscribers-Only Password: FOR READERS KIPLING BY READE RS Until June 2011 for March 2011 Stephen H. Ackerman, Publisher www.the-readers-exchange.com Volume XXI Issue 1

1 ©2011 The Readers Exchange BOOK REVIEWS

TITLE Reviews and Ratings: Book reviews are written by the Publisher (SHA) or by one of the Contributing AUTHOR, NO. OF PAGES, Editors and attributed accordingly. The 0-10 rating system was developed to provide some sense of YEAR OF PUBLICATION, the level of satisfaction of a book compared with other books. This is not a sophisticated evaluation. PUBLISHER AND RATING The rating is based on writing, storytelling ability, and the overall impact of each reading experience.

ALL THE DEVILS ARE HERE: What caused the massive financial meltdown in 2008? Many have written good books on the topic: THE HIDDEN HISTORY OF Some on how badly (recklessly) firms were managed, some on the creation of the esoteric financial THE FINANCIAL CRISIS instruments which propelled the crisis, and some on the government’s role in the whole mess. The BETHANY MCLEAN & McLean-Nocera book aims to tell it all, stealing (wonderfully) Shakespeare’s famous line from The JOE NOCERA Tempest. Unlike all the other books that went for one devil, McLean and Nocera round them all up, (2010, 380pp, going back to the very roots of the problem—before new things went in bad directions. But first a Penguin) word about the authors. McLean is a writer specializing in so-called “long-form” pieces (a best- selling book on Enron and numerous articles about financial issues in premier publications); Joe 10 Nocera is famous for his weekly column in The New York Times. McLean and Nocera are at the very top of the game, and the book is proof. They do many things that no one else has done: They take the long view, looking back into the institutions and instruments when they were initially benign but started fast in getting dodgy on the edges; they get big players (silent till now), to talk freely; they explain complicated issues and instruments (e.g., credit default swaps) with striking clarity; and they round up all the devils—they tell as much of the whole story as feasible in one book. And they focus on what has been “hidden” from the public. Correctly, they focus on how Fannie Mae, created by Government with the noble mission of facilitating home ownership, lost its bearings and became a ferociously competitive, profit-hungry player in the sub-prime mortgage scramble—this is the classic tale of something very good going very bad, and with the Government helping all the way. And like the focus on Fannie Mae, when its metamorphosis was beginning, they focus on the metamorphosis of the mortgage-backed security, an instrument that went from benign to lethal. They quote the Salomon Brothers bond trader, Lewis Ranieri, who invented the mortgage- backed security: “I wasn’t out to invent the biggest floating craps game of all time, but that’s what happened.” (Contributing Editor William Lilley, III, Washington D.C.)

OUR KIND OF TRAITOR Le Carré (his pen name) will be 80 later this year. This is his 22nd novel starting in 1961, and he JOHN LE CARRÉ remains best known for 1963’s The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, and the invention of British (2010, 320pp, master spy George Smiley. I’ve read them all and shared many reviewers’ accolades and frustrations Viking) over the years. His specialty was the cold-war, and his novelistic apogee was, I think, The Honorable 9 Schoolboy (1977), set in Hong Kong with strings pulled by Smiley. Movies of his books include The Russia House with Sean Connery and The Tailor of Panama with Geoffrey Rush and Pierce Brosnan (two James Bonds and counting). His MI5 or MI6 characters are never black and white, and often the agents are left fighting the shifting self-interests within their own government in addition to criminals and foreign agents, who are similarly confronted by their sides’ crass sacrifices of truth or a field agent for geopolitical ends. While I thought 2008’s A Most Wanted Man about Islamic terror financiers was a strong book, many other recent le Carré efforts have been didactic or lackluster. In Our Kind of Traitor, English tourists Perry and Gail meet the world’s biggest money- launderer (a Russian criminal named Dima) and his wife, sons, and other family members while vacationing in Antigua. We learn through debriefs what Dima told Perry to tell British intelligence about his desire to “come in” and provide names and bank account details in exchange for protection for him and his family. Dima’s time is up in the criminal enterprise that uses businesses and banks to launder funds from graft, export bribery, official shakedowns, illegal currency transactions, and the like. His son-in-law Misha has been assassinated by the dark leader of the seven “Vory brothers” who make up the Russian mafia cabal, and Dima’s head is next. The front-line British officers Hector, Luke, Yvonne, and Ollie are intrigued because the illegal pay-offs Dima has made reach high levels of their own government. A wonderful plot to isolate Dima from the other gangsters, starting at the French Open in Paris (there is a great rendition of a match between Federer and Soderling) and

2 Continued on page 3 BOOK REVIEWS

Continued from page 2 migrating to Bern, Switzerland, enfolds. Along the way we meet a number of Dima’s inner circle in foreign elites, including lawyers and powerful members of the Whitehall government who are being paid to help London’s financial center receive billions from Dima’s crooked banks, making the plan to pull Dima and his family from the criminal network and bring them to London to squawk quite dangerous for many connected politicians and bankers on the Albion side of the Channel. The story is told mostly in dialogue and strong character develop ment, with intrigue and suspense perceived by a triangle of (i) the intelligence officers, (ii) Perry and Gail, and (iii) Dima and his family. Michiko Kakutani of the New York Times called this, “the author’s most thrilling thriller in years.” I listened to the book’s audio version while driving, narrated by British actor Robin Sachs, who gives each speaker a unique voice, accent, or pitch. His voice of Dima, a “bear of a man,” is priceless. A 9 (and if there had been an epilogue after the abrupt ending, a 10). (Contributing Editor Rob Bunzel, Piedmont, CA)

ELIZABETH STREET As with other avid readers, I spend a fair amount of time searching for good reading material, LAURIE FABIANO reaching beyond the publicized books to ferret out the works of lesser known authors and their (2006, 386pp, books. The novel Elizabeth Street (a street in New York, not a person) came to my attention Amazon Encore) through this screening process, and it was a highly entertaining and satisfying read that I 9 believe all readers will enjoy. Laurie Fabiano writes of her own family’s history and, in the process, tells a wonderful story of the Italian immigrant experience at the turn of the 20th century. In her Author’s Note, she states that the events described in the book are true and the dates accurate, and that the principal characters are based on real people. The central character of the book, Giovanna Costa Pontillo Siena (1873-1963), was her great grandmother. The story opens in 1890 in Scilla, a fishing village in southwestern Italy where Giovanna and her family lived. When her brother Lorenzo, then her husband-to-be Nunzio, and finally Giovanna immigrate to America, the story follows them to New York’s bustling Little Italy where they resided on Elizabeth Street. Giovanna, a strong, resolute woman, suffers personal tragedies, makes do with little money, makes friends and finds companionship, and helps her husband build a business in New York’s Italian community. Her personal story is a captivating one, and while describing events in New York and Scilla, provides an account of the devastating Messina earthquake/tsunami of 1908 (which killed some 200,000 and leveled Scilla) and the activities of the notorious Black Hand gang in New York which Giovanna was forced to confront to save her family. A wonderful story! (SHA) Provocative Quotations We do not remember days, “Simplicity is the we remember moments.” ultimate sophistication.” ‘‘ Cesare Pavese (1908-1950) Leonardo Da Vinci Italian poet, novelist, and literary critic (1452-1519) “Only the curious will learn and only the resolute overcome the obstacles to learning. The quest quotient has always excited me more than the intelligence quotient. Eugene S. Wilson (1905-1981) Dean of Admissions, Amherst College ’’ 3 BOOK REVIEWS

BRYANT & MAY This is Fowler’s eighth novel in the Peculiar Crimes Unit (PCU) mystery series. London’s OFF THE RAILS PCU, a little-known police division created to handle serious crimes that could be considered CHRISTOPHER FOWLER a threat to public order and confidence. The unit is headed by elderly senior detective Arthur (2010, 352pp, Bryant and John May. Bryant the bumbling and disheveled partner given to unorthodox Bantam) methods, and May the fastidious, well-dressed partner who plays it all by the book. In the 8 last installment, the PCU apprehended the King’s Cross Executioner ( aka Mr. Fox), but he escaped and, in the process, killed a police constable. Now the PCU is in a jam, and the unit has been given a week to recapture Mr. Fox else their funding will be terminated and the unit disbanded. As the team goes to work on a highly difficult task, a series of mysterious events occur in the London Underground, believed to be a continuation of the crimes of Mr. Fox. A cosmetics salesgirl is pushed down the subway stairs to her death and an intoxicated student boarded a train but never got off. Levering off a few simple clues, the Bryant and May team investigation centers on a group of students living together, one of whom goes missing when he disappears after boarding a late night train. The London Underground, we learn offers a rich trove of history, lore, and ghost stories and the author revels in wrapping this mystery in the operations of the Underground. This is a well-crafted mystery in which Fowler very slowly brings the reader along (which mutes the narrative drive) but the pace does quicken to a surprising conclusion. (SHA)

Note: The London Underground began operation in 1863, the first underground railway system in the world. Despite its name, about 55% of the network is above ground. The Underground has 270 stations and 250 miles of track making it the second longest metro system in the world after the Shanghai Metro. In 2007, more than one billion passenger trips were recorded, the third busiest metro system in Europe after Paris and Moscow.

HERO: THE LIFE T. E. Lawrence, known to the world as Lawrence of Arabia, is a man who defies coherent AND LEGEND OF biographical treatment (hundreds have tried in books and films). Lawrence is a hero of LAWRENCE OF ARABIA staggering strengths, but a man whose heroism is conflicted by his multiple irregular (perhaps MICHAEL KORDA weird is the better word) personality traits. Further mudding up Lawrence’s heroism is that it is (2010, 762pp, set in a time and part of the world of bewildering complexities. Still, Michael Korda pulls off a Harper) triumph. And he does it by the brilliant structure he imposes on Lawrence, on Arabia, and on 10 World War I. It is an artifice, but it works. Korda writes three biographies within one. Book One (about 150 pages) tells the tale of how and why Lawrence led the famed “Revolt in the Desert” that, momentarily, united the Arabs, drove back the Turks, and deployed dashingly successful guerrilla tactics for, perhaps, the first time in history. Lawrence’s heroic guerilla tactics would become the military roadmap for undermanned warriors as diverse as Mao Tse- tung and Ho Chi Minh. Book Two (again about 150 pages) is a stunning biography of “the young Lawrence” and tells why he became a military hero, why he was peculiar, and why he was a military genius, even as a youth. Book Two commands two sections: how Lawrence’s illegitimacy was so confusingly complex that it is little wonder he became a peculiar loner fixated on heroism; how his intelligence, no matter what the age, was like a blazing fire and how his Oxford undergraduate thesis (he was a scholarship student) took not only a “first” but a “brilliant first,” so uniquely brilliant that outside readers had to be brought in as readers. Book Three (about 300 pages) then tells the long tale, a sad one, of how the dreary complex- ities of a horrific worldwide war diminished the Arab cause (and Lawrence’s efforts), how the American media huckster Lowell Thomas made himself famous (and rich) by glorifying Lawrence’s heroism, and how, at the bitter end, Lawrence discarded his name, his rank (Colonel), his many glamorous awards, and (unsuccessfully) tried to hide as an RAF mechanic named “Ross.” He died on his motorcycle, trying to avoid two young boys riding bicycles, at age 47. (Contributing Editor William Lilley, III, Washington D.C.) 4 FEATURED AUTHOR… Dorothy L. Sayeersrs Dorothy Sayers (1893-1957) was a renowned English crime writer as well as a poet, playwright, essayist, and translator. She was born in Oxford, won a scholarship to Somerville College, Oxford where she finished with first-class honors. Although women could not be awarded degrees at that time, she was among the first to receive a degree when that policy changed a few years later. She is best known for her mysteries set in England between World War I and World War II featuring English aristocrat and amateur sleuth Lord Peter Wimsey, the first of which was Whose Body?, published in 1923. Sayers once commented that Lord Peter was a mixture of Fred Astaire and Bertie Wooster (the P.G. Wodehouse protagonist). Her detective stories were often themed, exploring the difficulties of World War I veterans in The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club, the ethics of advertising in Murder Must Advertise, and women’s education and role in society in Gaudy Night, for example. Interestingly, she considered her best work to be her translation of Dante’s Divina Commedia.

UNNATURAL DEATH Dorothy Sayers (1995, 267pp, Harper) Unnatural Death was first published in 1927 (her third novel) and I selected it at random from among her numerous books. In a country village in Hampshire, the elderly (and wealthy) Miss Agatha Dawson has predictably passed away after a battle with cancer. Her doctor is uneasy, however, believing that her death was premature. When he expresses his concerns to Lord Peter Wimsey and Detective Charles Parker, Wimsey is intrigued and he dispatches the resourceful and persistent Miss Alexandra Climpson to the village to discreetly gather information about Miss Dawsom and those surrounding her, particularly niece Mary Whitaker, her sole survivor and caregiver. While Miss Climpson gathers information and gossip in the country, Lord Peter follows a few leads in London. Suspicions abound but facts are scarce and, knowing who the murderer must be, are frustrated by not being able to formulate a case, despite the fact that two more deaths occur on the path to resolution. Readers will enjoy the complex plot (you must pay attention) spun by Sayers (and the Miss Climpson character, her first appearance in a Sayers novel) and of course the very British flavor of it all, the banter, the humor, the dialogue, the characters, and the setting.

THE ATTENBURY EMERALDS Jill Paton Walsh (2011, 228pp, Minotaur) Some 60 years after Dorothy Sayers wrote the last Lord Peter Wimsey story, a manuscript was discovered in her agent’s safe in London. Award-winning English author Jill Paton Walsh was commissioned to complete it and the result was the Sayers/Walsh bestseller Thrones, Dominations. This was followed by a A Presumption of Death, based on “The Wimsey Papers,” a series of letters on home front conditions, ostensibly written by members of the Wimsey family which ran in The Spectator at the outset of World War II. Now comes The Attenbury Emeralds, a Sayers-inspired mystery built around Lord Peter Wimsey’s first case (1921) which, in a high-profile case, he recovered Lord Attenbury’s heirloom collection and launched this young aristocrat on his career as a detective. It is now post World War II and he and his loyal valet Bunter are recounting for Harriet Vane (Wimsey’s wife and a detective novelist) the essence of this case, when a financially pressed current Lord Attenbury surfaces and wishes to sell one of his jewels. He has learned that his jewels are not saleable since their provenance has been questioned by the claimant, and he now seeks the help of Wimsey in proving just who owns the emeralds. Peter, with Harriet’s help, initiates the probe, and, as might be expected, uncover nasty deeds and intrigue (and suffers a family death), while closely examining the few times the jewels have been out of the bank safe over the years. This is a fine effort by Walsh, a very Sayers-like story preserving the characters, the humor, and the writing style, while fashioning an entertaining and complex mystery. (SHA)

5 The Business… …Of Doing Business Starting and successfully operating a business is a daunting task. It takes courage, time and money, ideas and conviction, and a host of important personal characteristics and values to get started and to maintain a profitable business. There are countless books, seminars, and programs available to assist entrepreneurs with the task of business development and ongoing success. But what are the elements that are deigned to create entrepreneurial success when the evidence is sorted? The two books reviewed below are interesting reads that illuminate some of the elements fostering entrepreneurialism as well as the keys to business success.

SUCCESS MADE START-UP NATION: SIMPLE: AN INSIDE THE STORY OF LOOK AT WHY ISRAEL’S ECONOMIC AMISH BUSINESSES MIRACLE 9 THRIVE 7 Dan Senor and Saul Singer Erik Wesner (2010, 209pp, (2009, 236pp, Twelve) Jossey-Boss) At the conclusion of the Author’s Note, it is noted that, “Finally, if there is one In the Foreword to this book, Donald Kraybill story that has been largely missed despite the extensive media (author of Amish Grace ) notes that in recent coverage of Israel, it is that key economic metrics demonstrate years many Amish farmers have abandoned that Israel represents the greatest concentration of innovation their plows to become entrepreneurs— and and entrepreneurship in the world today.” In Start-Up Nation, succeeded—and there are now some 9,000 Dan Senor, adjunct senior fellow for Middle East studies at Amish-owned and operated enterprises in the Council on Foreign Relations, and Saul Singer, columnist North America. This trend is striking for a and former editorial page editor at the Jerusalem Post, attempt number of reasons, including major community to explain this phenomenon. What follows is a lively, cultural taboos and obstacles, and minimum interesting narrative containing a bit of the history of Israel, education. Amish entrepreneurs held only 8th the economic develo pment of the country, government policies grade diplomas from one-room schools, and that foster innovation, and a liberal sprinkling of case studies had no accounting, marketing, and systems and interviews with some of Israel’s most successful innovators. training. Kraybill adds that these folks, at first The population of Israel was about 800,000 at the founding in blush a backward people out-of-step with, 1948 and even today is only a little over seven million. So how, “progress and without worldly accoutrements the question is posed, can a tiny nation surrounded by hostile or credentials, have applied an uncanny savvy, nations, perpet ually at war and with no natural resources a dose of common sense, an ethic of hard produce more start-up companies than countries many times work, and a bushel of enduring values to the its size. Certainly immigration is a big factor as the country world of business.” The failure rate of Amish is now home to more than 70 different nationalities and cultures. enterprises was less than 5% over a five-year The authors note that between 1990 and 2000, 800,000 people period compared with a failure rate that exceeds from the former Soviet Union immigrated to Israel. Jewish 65% for small business starts in their first seven people made up only 2% of the Soviet population, but they years. Wesner, an independent expert on the accounted for some 30% of the doctors, 20% of the engineers, Amish and their business practices (he has a and so on. Other important factors included clusters (a geo- home in Lancaster County, PA), uses his strong graphic concentration of interconnected institutions—businesses, ties to the Amish community to develop his government agencies, universities—in a specific field), the analysis of their business success. As you might ability to attract high levels of venture capital, an unusual guess, the reasons are all about foundation combination of cultural attributes and, importantly, the social values and a sharp focus on relationships of networks and leadership training provided by Israel’s mandatory all types. Interesting read with somewhat military/reserve service. (SHA) predictable insights. (SHA)

6 BOOK REVIEWS

SHANTARAM This big book has been sitting in my library unread for four years or so, but last night, in tears, GREGORY DAVID I finally turned the last page. Shantaram is a superb, magical story, set in Bombay (Mumbai) ROBERTS India. It incorporates all the major human themes, and a few not so major, all seen through the (2010, 933 pp , eyes of a prison-break fugitive from Australia. “Lin’s” life in Bombay takes many forms. When St. Martin’s Press ) his money runs out he is forced to live in a sprawling slum where he sets up a small clinic with 10 no more than a first aid kit and helps many to take care of small wounds and illnesses. He falls deeply in love with Karla at first sight and pursues her to no avail. He spends months in a tiny rural village and more months in a squalid, brutal prison. He is drawn into the Bombay Mafia and ultimately follows his charismatic boss to the war against the Russians in Afghanistan. Through it all, Lin persists in his deep love of the city and its people. Lovers of novels… do not miss this experience! (Contributing Editor Bill Dohrmann, Stonington, CT)

THE LOST BOOKS In the New York Times Book Review section December 5, 2010, among the 48 new fiction/poetry OF THE ODYSSEY volumes for the “100 Notable Books of 2010,” I was not surprised to see this slim work of ZACHARY MASON genius. Many of us read translations of Homer’s ancient Greek classics The Iliad and The (2010, 240pp, Odyssey telling heroic stories of the Trojan war and Odysseus’ long journey home (or Virgil’s Farrar, Straus Latin classic The Aeneid on the founding of Rome) in school. Makes me think of metaphors like & Giroux) “wine-dark sea” and the “wing-footed Achilles.” Brad Pitt, Eric Bana, Peter O’Toole, and Sean 10 Bean (as Odysseus) made a passably amusing big-screen epic out of Troy in 2004 that told a bunch of the story. Enter Mason, a computer scientist specializing in search term recognition in search of his first novel, and he scores big and lean. He hypothesizes 44 “new” (allegedly lost) short books of The Odyssey, which in the original tells the story of Odysseus’ ten-year journey back from the tiring success at Troy (Odysseus-the-wise invented the winning Trojan horse) to his home in Ithaca, losing along the way his crew to harpies, sirens, witches, and the iconic Cyclops. Upon reaching home, Homer’s hero found his dog Argus dying, his subjects failing to recognize him (other than an old maid-servant who sees his old boar-scar while bathing the stranger’s feet), and his loyal wife Penelope and son Telemachus beset by wealthy suitors for his island kingdom. These are some of the most enduring archetypes in literature. How many ways the Troy story and the journey home can be bent by time and lore to yield other opposite or tangential stories and endings is the focus of Mason’s imagination. Since The Odyssey was an oral poem practiced and doubtless altered over generations before being reduced to writing, Mason’s readers can well wonder if some of these lost stories are any more “true” than Homer’s. Jorge Luis Borges would have loved the conceit of alternate truths and results set against so familiar a literary stage. Plus, unlike the metric translations from the ancient Greek by Lattimore and Fitzgerald that dominate Homer’s books for the English-speaking world, Mason’s stories are told in a breezy mostly first-person prose that, at the same time, has a period-piece authenticity. For all English majors, classics lovers, and alternate endings aficionados, a 10. (Contributing Editor Rob Bunzel, Piedmont, CA) We Want Your Reading Ideas and Comments The not-very-original/creative name The Readers Exchange was selected over 20 years ago for a very simple reason. It was a matter of intention, our desire to have TRE serve as a forum through which readers could exchange their thoughts on books and subjects of interest to readers. To make the “Exchange” work we need your book comments and your thoughts, so please feel free to write away and share your ideas with other readers. We’ll create something like “Letters to the Editors” if we receive responses from you, as your comments are invited and, remember that if you write an opinion we’ll take that as your okay to print them. As always, we welcome your book reviews TRE -style whenever you feel the urge. Our contact information is on page 20.

7 BOOK REVIEWS

BRIEF ENCOUNTERS Reading Ben Fountain’s Hemmingway/PEN award-winning collection of eight short stories WITH CHE GUEVARA makes me think Graham Greene’s come back to write of American dreamers cast into modern BEN FOUNTAIN international plights over which they have no control. The travel writing is as sharp and (2006, 272 pp , acerbic as Paul Theroux’s, in stories that explore the corrupt cruelty of Africa, Southeast Asia, Harper Perennial ) Haiti and Latin America, from perspectives of Americans gone abroad for adventure, service, 10 or a pot of gold. Fountain was a practicing lawyer in Dallas for Akin Gump but has turned to fiction full-time. I heard about Fountain when listening in the car to an Audible download of Malcolm Gladwell’s What the Dog Saw (2009), and one of its essays titled “Late Bloomers,” reprising Gladwell’s 2008 piece in The New Yorker, www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/10/ 20/081020fa _fact_gladwell. Gladwell (also The Tipping Point, Blink, Outliers ) makes the point that Fountain, like Cezanne as a painter, was no precocious genius and that the art of his words comes from deliberate working and reworking of themes and material in the middle and on into the later years of life. For a lot of us that is good news. The wait and hard work for Fountain yielded a tremendous piece of writing. From the opening story of a Duke University ornithologist kidnapped in the wild by Columbian rebels, who are willing to sell remote valleys of tropical trees—sheltering the last canopies of the birdwatcher’s discovered and nearly extinct Crimson-capped parrots—to Weyerhaeuser so the rebels can buy weapons, to the hilariously sad tale of a second-tier U.S. golf pro who becomes a sports hero and pawn of Myanmar’s generals, it is clear Fountain has studied the American psyche. Throwing these disparate idealists or naïfs into topical and outrageous foreign predicaments is accomplished with spare plotting. It is as if he cut off any tangents and narrowed each story to its core. And Fountain’s metrical writing, in phrases such as, “truth washing through him like sickness,” or events “trapdooring his stomach into empty space” or “[r]eality doing a taffy-pull with Sonny’s brain,” or jungles that are a “deckle-edged veil of luminous green,” or “engines keening with a high-pitched weed-eater whine,” make perusing these stories pleasant on the ear as well as stimulating to the mind. The last story in the book at first seems out of place, a fantasy about an 11-fingered Jewish girl pianist in 19th century Austria. But when her virtuosity is wrecked by ethnic hatred, the capstone’s link to the first seven (more modern tales is clear. A 10. (Contributing Editor Rob Bunzel, Piedmont, CA) ENGLISH IS NOT SO EASY!

Many languages are difficult to learn, but English would appear to be near the top of the list. There are multiple reasons for this, one of which is the profusion of individual words that are spelled the same but which have different meanings and pronunciation. Consider the following and just how you might explain to someone attempting to learn the English language.

The bandage was wound around the wound. Since there is no time like the present, he thought it The farm was used to produce produce. was time to present the present. The dump was so full that it had to refuse more refuse. There was a row among the oarsmen about how to row. We must polish the Polish furniture. The wind was too strong to wind the sail. He could lead if he would get the lead out. After a number of injections my jaw got number. The soldier decided to desert his dessert in the desert. I had to subject the subject to a series of tests. The insurance was invalid for the invalid.

8 Jan e’s SELECTIONS By Contributing Editor Jane Ackerman, Studio City, CA

SEPARATE BEDS (Elizabeth Buchan) I needed another book to review for SHA and went into our local bookstore, Bookstar, and the store manager recommended this one, telling me it was the author’s second book and that both books had been very well reviewed. The hero, Tom, who had always loved his job and given too much of himself to it, finds himself being let go and, as expected, devastated. Annie, his wife of 30 years, who also holds down a full-time job, goes into a practical mode and forces him to realize that cuts must be made. The first one involves their grown daughter (who receives an allowance to pursue her ambition to be a writer) who is told she must now get a job. His mother, who lives in an assisted living facility (and not Annie’s favorite) is to come home and live with them. If this isn’t bad enough, their son appears at their door with his baby daughter asking for help as his wife has left him. Both Tom and Annie now realize that their separate bedrooms cannot be any longer and they must join forces in the old one they used to share. This happens quickly in the story and the author lets you see it coming. I woke up laughing in the middle of the night anticipating what was ahead. This is one great book (and I haven’t quite finished it yet because, if I had, I would tell all and ruin it for you). The premise is sad, but the telling is anything but—it is a winner. As the Detroit Free Press said, “Elizabeth Buchan needs to write more books as quickly as possible.”

RESCUE (Anita Shreve) I think one of the reasons Anita Shreve’s novels are so popular is that they always deal with one of life’s difficult problems. Rescue is about Peter, a paramedic who instantly falls for Sheila when he pulls her from her wrecked car after she has been driving under the influence. They begin a very intense love affair, and when she finds out she is pregnant, they get married. This is a true case of “marry in haste and repent in leisure.” After their daughter Rowan is born, Sheila’s drinking problems escalate to the point that she is putting her baby in constant danger. When another traffic accident occurs, and the baby is seriously hurt, Peter forces Sheila to leave the marriage and to get out of town. From this point, Rowan is the main focus in the book. As she grows into a beautiful young woman, she begins to show tendencies of her mother’s behavior, and Peter begins to think that the only person who can save her is Sheila. Anita Shreve does love and forgiveness with just the right touch and this book is another marvelous example of her talent. A wonderful book!

THE JUDAS GATE (Jack Higgins) I shocked the manager of our local book store, when I told her that Jack Higgins was one of my favorite authors. I got back from her a “you like Jack Higgins?” “Well, yes I do,” I replied. Don’t you like to have champagne at the Dorchester with Sean Dillon, eat bacon sandwiches with Roper at the safe house, and plan strategy with Ferguson and his team at the pub (the Darkman) on the wharf? If you haven’t done all these things, then start at the top of the list of Higgins’ fabulous suspense/intrigue novels and work your way down. I wish I had them to do… it has been such a pleasure. In this book, it has come to the attention of General Charles Ferguson, Major Harry Miller, and number one trouble shooter, Sean Dillon, that in the Afghan chatter there are English voices, and one called Shamrock. They have brought this to the attention of the American President, and Dillon, intrigued by the Irish name, accepts the challenge of uncovering the identity of these predators. After several tries to kill Ferguson and his team they quickly realize that Shamrock, his superior named “the Preacher,” and Al Qaeda are all out to get them, and the race is on to find out who they are before they succeed. Higgins has the great ability and knowledge to mirror the political times of today in his writing, which makes it even more interesting. I read a review that said that they did not think this was one of his best. I disagree, I just want to read on and on, and I can’t wait for the next one!

9 BOOK REVIEWS

MARK TWAIN’S Laura Trombley is President of Pitzer College (Claremont, CA) and an acclaimed Mark Twain OTHER WOMAN: THE scholar. I had the pleasure of meeting and introducing her when she spoke at The California HIDDEN STORY OF HIS Club about Mark Twain and her newest book Mark Twain’s Other Woman. In the Preface FINAL YEARS to the book, Trombley notes that the last ten years of Twain’s life (1900-1910) have been LAURA SKANDERA somewhat concealed from the public and that much remained to be discovered, despite the TROMBLEY numerous writings and biographies about Twain. Trombley’s search for the answers to those (2010, 267pp, years centered on Isabel Van Kleek Lyon, the “mystery woman” in Twain’s life who, after the Knopf) death of his wife Olivia in 1904, became Twain’s alter ego. She was devoted to him (and he to 9 her) as she handled all professional issues, arranged his schedule, ran the household, nursed him when he was ill, amused him to abate boredom, and dealt with his difficult daughters Jean and Clara. She was everything to him, companion, aide, and loyal (doting?) factotum. Yet this profound relationship deteriorated to such an extent that he summarily fired her and, in a letter to Clara, called her “a liar, a forger, a thief, a hypocrite, a drunkard, a sneak, a humbug, a traitor, a conspirator, a filthy-minded and salacious slut pining for seduction.” So, what happened? That’s the story told by Trombley in Mark Twain’s Other Woman, a story centering on jealousy (Clara), control of Twain’s affairs, and, importantly, Twain’s own colossal ego and desire to build his legacy. Isabel simply knew too much and had to be erased from the Twain story and, given the little or no attention paid to her over the past 100 years, he was successful. About that ego, Volume 1 of the Autobiography of Mark Twain was just published, 100 years from Twain’s death as he instructed, ostensibly to protect those treated badly in his writings, but more likely to perpetuate/extend his legacy. “I am not an American,” he wrote, “I am the American.” Mark Twain’s Other Woman is a well-researched, entertaining revelation about the man and the women who surrounded him during the last few years of his life. (SHA)

The Name MARK TWAIN Samuel Langhorne Clemens was born on November 10, 1835 in Florida, Missouri and died at age 74 on April 21, 1910 in Redding, Connecticut. He was born during a visit by Halley’s Comet and died on its return. So where did the name Mark Twain come from? The most famous pen name in the world had its origins on the river where he had earned his steamboat pilot’s license. He began using it in 1863 when he was a journalist in Nevada, signing his articles Mark Twain, or two fathoms deep, which signified that the boat had a safe 12 feet of clearance. He wrote of himself that, “Mark Twain was the nom de plume of one Captain Isaiah Sellers who used to write river news over it for the New Orleans Picayune. He died in 1869 and as he would no longer need that signature, I laid violent hands upon it without asking permission of the proprietor’s remains. That is the history of the nom de plume I bear.”

BRUTE: THE LIFE OF This book first caught my attention when it was reviewed in The Wall Street Journal and VICTOR KRULAK, accompanied by a photo of the 1933 Naval Academy crew towering over their coxswain, U.S. MARINE Victor Krulak. When he entered the Academy, he was 5’4” and 116 pounds and it is reported ROBERT CORAM that when a tall midshipman looked down at him, smiled and said, “Well, Brute,” the nick- (2010, 347pp, name that Krulak loved was born. As a young Marine officer, I was privileged to meet Little, Brown) General Krulak at Quantico (VA) in the late 1950s when he was already a USMC legend, so 9 this new biography of Lt. General Victor “Brute” Krulak was compelling for me. Krulak hid his Jewish background, did not tell about his brief marriage at age 16 (which would have prevented him from entering the Academy) and since he did not meet minimum Marine Corps size requirements, used high level connections (particularly Holland Smith who would go on to become a famous World War II general nicknamed “Howlin’ Mad”) to get a Marine Corps commission. Although a decorated combat Marine, Krulak’s major contributions were in Continued on page 11 10 BOOK REVIEWS

Continued from page 10 other areas. He was the prime mover in getting the Marine Corps to acquire the Higgins craft used in American amphibious landings in World War II from Normandy to Iwo Jima, and which Eisenhower proclaimed, “won the war for us.” After World War II, he pushed the Corps to adopt helicopters for outflanking the enemy in battle, way ahead of the other services. He also played a signal role in saving the Marine Corps on several occasions, the first of which was in rallying Congress to defeat President Truman’s efforts to severely trim the Corps. Ultimately, the outspoken Krulak sacrificed his career by telling a painful truth. As commander of Fleet Marine Force-Pacific (FMFPac), he was in charge of the Marines in Vietnam, and, employing counterinsurgency tactics, was much more effective than the big-unit sweeps employed by the Army. When in 1967, he told President Johnson that if the U.S. approach did not change in Vietnam, he would lose the war and the next election as well. Articulation of this position to President Johnson is believed to have cost Krulak his four stars and appointment as Commandant, and he was forced to retire the next year. He died in San Diego in 2008 at the age of 95, a true Marine Corps legend. (SHA) Pronunciation...... FOR THE CAREFUL SPEAKER Readers, we believe, really do care how to pronounce words as well as how to use them. Many of us mispronounce words frequently and other people do notice. Common mispronunciations below are from The Big Book of Beastly Pronunciations ( Charles Harrington Elster).

VICHYSSOISE Waiters in restaurants offering this potato-leek cream soup often mispronounce it “vish-ee-SWAH” in a mistaken attempt to sound authentically French. Setting aside the fact that this soup was invented in New York, French final consonants are not silent when they are followed by an E. The correct pronunciation is “vee-shee-SWAHZ.” MISCHIEVOUS MIS-chi-vus. Three syllables, stress on the first. Mischievous is subject to two beastly mispronunciations: Mis-CHEE-vus and, more often mis- CHEE-vee-us. DIPHTHERIA dif-THEER-ee-uh, not dip-THEER-ee-uh. The ph should be pronounced like an f as in telephone and phonetics. FEBRUARY The traditional and proper pronunciation FEB-roo-er-ee is hard to say, and so most people say FEB-yoo-er-ee because it is easier and because so many others do, not because it is right. CANDIDATE KAN-di-dayt, not KAN-di-dit. Pronouncing the word like can a date or can a dit is beastly. MAYONNAISE MAY-uh-nayz or may-uh-NAYZ, not MAY-nayz. You may stress mayonnaise on the first or last syllable, but take care to give the word three syllables. HIMALAYA(S) Usually him-uh-LAY-uh (z), the anglicized pronunciation, which is recommended. Less frequently hi-MAH-la-yuh(z).

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SCORPIONS Noah Feldman, a Harvard law professor and senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Noah Feldman Relations, has written Scorpions: The Battles and Triumphs of FDR’s Great Supreme Court (2010, 528pp, Justices. Scorpions is a reference to a quote from Alexander Bickel, law clerk to Justice Felix Twelve) Frankfurter (1952-3): “The Supreme Court is nine scorpions in a bottle.” This book is about four of the nine justices appointed by Franklin Roosevelt to the U.S. Supreme Court between 1937 and 1949: Hugo Black, Felix Frankfurter, William O. Douglas, and Robert Jackson. Feldman says of them: “They began as close allies and friends of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who appointed them to the Supreme Court in order to shape a new, liberal view of the Constitution that could live up to the challenges of economic depression and war. Within months, their alliance had fragmented. Friends became enemies. In competition and sometimes outright warfare, the men struggled with one another to define the Constitution and, through it, the idea of America.” Each of these legendary jurists was unique: “A Jewish immigrant; who started as America’s leading liberal and ended as its most famous judicial conservative (Frankfurter); a Ku Klux Klansman who became an absolute advocate of free speech and civil rights (Black); a back- country lawyer who started off trying cases about cows and went on to conduct the most important international trial ever (Jackson); and a self-invented, tall-tale Westerner who narrowly missed the presidency but expanded individual freedom beyond anything previously dreamed (Douglas). Feldman presents these four men to us with all their human deficiencies and, in the process, lets us see the transcendent qualities that made them great. (Jim Galbraith, Pasadena, CA) BUILDING YOUR Y

R WORKING VOCABULARY A

N The key word here is working. There are many words that seem to fall on the fringe of an O I

T average vocabulary. We think we know the meaning of these words, but when we read or C I hear them, are not quite sure. They are, therefore, not regularly used in our writing and in D conversation. The purpose of the TRE vocabulary section is not to stump you, but to sharpen your knowledge and use of words frequently used in books and/or heard in conversation. Here a few such words, with abbreviated definitions and some rough pronunciation guidance.

BALKANIZE To divide (a region or a territory) into small, often hostile units. (From the political division of the Balkans in the early 20th century). (BALL-ka-niz) ABJURE To renounce under oath; forswear. (ab-JOOR) OPPROBRIUM Disgrace arising from exceedingly shameful conduct; ignominy. (ah-PRO-bree-um) OXYMORON A rhetorical figure in which incongruous or contradictory terms are combined, as in deafening silence and a mournful optimist. (ox-ee-MORE-on) SINUOUS Characterized by many curves or turns; winding. Also, characterized by supple and lithe movements. (SIN-yoo-us) PALAVER Idle chatter; talk intended to charm or beguile. (pa-LAV-er) PROPINQUITY Proximity; nearness. Kinship; similarity in nature. (pro-PING-kwa-tee) INVEIGH To give vent to angry disapproval; protest vehemently. (in-VAY) INVIDIOUS Tending to rouse ill will, animosity, or resentment. (in-VID-ee-us)

12 TRE FAVORITES… A Decade Ago …AND OTHER SELECTIONS FROM THE ARCHIVES

These favorites from The Readers Exchange of March 2001, and other older books are offered to suggest that we extend our book selection process to include older works.

THE CHIEF: THE LIFE OF WILLIAM RANDOLPH HEARST (David Nasaw) The story of William Randolph Hearst (1863-1951) is one of epic proportions and is superbly told in this biography by David Nasaw, who had the advantage of substantial new material. Hearst was a larger-than-life character whose involvement and influence spanned politics, the media, Hollywood, and international affairs. The book tells about his numerous failed political forays, his incredible self-indulgence, his love affair with actress Marion Davies his lavish spending and collecting, and the massive homes, including San Simeon. This is a balanced view of a very complex, powerful man who was bigoted, self-centered, and who lived a life of excess. PROTECT AND DEFEND (Richard North Patterson) Newly-elected president Kerry Kilcannon must nominate a new Chief Justice, and he elects a brilliant jurist, Caroline Masters, a judge on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. Meanwhile, in San Francisco, a 15-year-old girl, Mary Ann Tierney, comes to an abortion clinic and asks the young lawyer there to help her sue for permission to have a late-term abortion of a deformed baby who is expected to die not too long after birth. The young lawyer pursues Mary Ann’s request in a highly-charged legal environment which brings out the advocates of both pro-life and pro-choice. The two stories, Mary Ann’s action to secure permission for an abortion and the confirmation of Caroline Masters as Chief Justice ultimately merge (as you knew they would) in a powerful clash of wills and political maneuvering. FLAGS OF OUR FATHERS (James Bradley with Ron Powers) James Bradley’s father, John Bradley, was one of the six men who raised the American flag atop Mount Suribachi on Iwo Jima in February of 1945. This moment was captured by AP photographer Joe Rosenthal in what was to become perhaps the most celebrated military photograph of all time. It was only after John Bradley’s death in 1994 that the family discovered boxes of letters and photos that had been stowed away for almost 50 years, never opened. This prompted Bradley to research the life of his father and the men of his Company, notably the famous six who raised the flag, and to tell their individual stories as well as the heroic battle for Iwo Jima.

COLORS OF THE MOUNTAIN (Da Chen) Da Chen was born in 1962 to a poor rural family in Southern China, apparently destined for a life of poverty and persecution since his grandfather was a landlord, a class reviled after the Revolution. Da persevered, however, became a top student, and achieved a status not available to his family. That he overcame such long odds to attend Beijing Language Institute, one of China’s most prestigious universities, was a testament to his resolve and indomitable spirit as well as that of his family. This is a touching, simply told story of survival set against the backdrop of the tragic, inhumane, stunning impact of the incredibly ill-conceived Cultural Revolution.

NOTES FROM A SMALL ISLAND (Bill Bryson) Bryson lived in England for 20 years, and when he decided to return to the U.S., he planned one last trip around England (mostly by train) chronicling the towns he visited, the people with whom he interacted, the language and customs, and the whole of his trip memories. He is delightfully irreverent as he describes what makes the Brits so, well, British. You will find this to be a humorous, entertaining work, and an incisive description of what England is all about.

13 BOOK REVIEWS

THE NEXT DECADE George Friedman is the founder and CEO of STRATFOR, the world’s leading publisher of GEORGE FRIEDMAN global geopolitical intelligence. The Next Decade follows his best-selling The Next Hundred (2011, 243pp, Years and he notes that this is a more personal book since he is, “addressing my greatest Doubleday) concern, which is that the power of the United States in the world will undermine the 9 republic.” His query is: How should the United States, with its overwhelming economic and military power act in exercising that power while preserving the republic? Friedman asks us to understand the concept of the “unintended empire,” explaining that the United States has become an empire not because that was its intention, but because history had just worked out that way. The corollary issue is just how that empire should be managed and Friedman deals with this by successively referring to the recent financial crisis, terror, Israel and the Middle East, the re-emergence of Russia, Europe, Asia, and the Western Hemisphere, reviewing where we have been, framing the issues, and outlining just how the United States should effectively deal in the foreign policy arena. Friedman emphasizes that successful management requires that Americans, and particularly the American President, accept the concept of empire and understand that the size and power of the American empire is inherently disruptive and intrusive. The Next Decade is a highly interesting and learned analysis and prediction of just what the near future will look like, explaining the conflicts, opportunities, and forces that will shape the world. (SHA)

BREWER’S DICTIONARY OF Phrase & Fable (15th Edition) We’ve acquired a fairly large reference library over the years and this one, lugged back from London some time ago, is a favorite. Published in London, the dictionary is international in scope, but it has a decided British flavor. By way of introduction, I thought readers might enjoy a few of the British-related entries. Note that my copy is the 15th edition 1995) whereas, the most recent is the 18th edition. LONDON SEASON Formerly the part of the year when the Court and fashionable society were generally in town—May, June, and July. This localized Victorian season has now broadened out in “The Season,” as the series of social events, cultural and sporting, at which it is the done thing “to be seen.” They include, in roughly chrono- logical order, the Glyndebourne Festival, the Chelsea Flower Show, the Derby, the Summer Exhibition at the Royal Academy, Royal Ascot, Wimbledon, Henley Regatta, Polo Day at Cowdray Park, Glorious Goodwood, and Cowes Week. PEERS OF THE REALM The five orders of Duke, Marquess, Earl, Viscount, and Baron. The word “peer” comes from Latin par, “equal,” and in feudal times all great vassals were held as equals. MEWS Stables, but properly a cage for Hawks when moulting (Old French mue, from Latin mutare, “to change”). The word acquired its new meaning because the royal stables built in the 17th century occupied the site of the King’s Mews where formerly the king’s hawks were kept. It is now the site of the National Gallery in Trafalgar Square. With the development of fashionable London in the 19th century, rows of stabling, with accommodation above for the coachman, were built and called mews. Since the 1920s these have been steadily converted into garages with flats or into fashionable maisonettes. EAT HUMBLE PIE, TO To be humbled or humiliated. Here “humble” is a pun on “umble,” the umbles being the heart, liver, and entrails of the deer, the huntsmen’s perquisites. When the lord and his family dined off venison at high table, the huntsman and his fellows took lower seats and partook of the umbles made into a pie.

14 William Tapply Mysteries… …Featuring Brady Coyne and Stoney Calhoun

OUTWITTING TROLLS 9 sheriff found that he has uncanny detective and killer skills, (2010, 273pp, Minotaur) but no memory of how he acquired them. The Government’s This is the last of William Tapply’s marvelous Brady Coyne Intelligence Community (for whom he once worked and was mysteries (27), and we are the poorer for it. Tapply died in unwittingly injured, so severely as to be totally without 2009 leaving a large literary oeuvre—30 mystery novels memory of anything before the five-year-old incident) keeps (all superior), seven books about the art of fishing and a track of Stoney’s doing, only to make sure that his amnesia is serious book about the structure of good mystery fiction. still at 100%. Twisting his way between his love—anything Remarkably, all of these high-quality books (38) were involving the art and craft of fishing—and avoiding his written between 1984 and 2009, a mere 25 years. Even more irritation (the Intelligence Agency probes), Stoney Calhoun remarkable is the elegant and sophisticated quality of each solves brutal and complicated mysteries in beautiful rural book; the leading protagonist Brady Coyne, a Boston estates Maine and settles roots into his new local community, and wills lawyer who dabbles in exonerating friends charged managing a mixed-up love affair and a financially shaky with homicide, is kind, smart, quirky, and funny. Coyne is a fishing business. (Contributing Editor William Lilley, III civilized man starring in civilized books. I recommend any Washington D.C.) of his 27 totally without reservation. Outwitting Trolls, like its 26 predecessors, involves Coyne coming to the rescue of a THE NOMINATION 9 long-divorced wife now suspected of murdering her former (2011, 302pp, Skyhorse) husband (once a close Coyne friend). Tapply’s plot requires This is a first-class stand-alone thriller by the late William Coyne to unravel how his former friend—not seen for Tapply, the second novel to be published since his death in decades and suddenly a murder victim—has changed his values (and his business) from good to bad, and how the 2009. The President is nominating a Massachusetts state divorced couple’s two children have taken the same sordid Judge, Thomas Larrigan, to fill a vacancy in the Supreme path. It is Coyne’s job to extract the ex-wife from the murder Court. The President needs a clean pick and his friend and, at the same time, establish where the criminal respon- Larrigan seems like the perfect choice: A squeaky-clean sibility lies—with the twisted children or with the victim’s Vietnam War veteran, family man, and a solid non- unsavory business partners. Trolls might be a Tapply-Coyne controversial judicial record. Despite all of this, one of replica classic, but it is a classic nevertheless. (Contributing the President’s staffers decides on his own to put a tail on Editor William Lilley, III, Washington D.C.) Larrigan, just to make sure. Larrigan, the reader learns, has a few problems in his past and he engages an old BITCH CREEK Marine buddy to help him make sure the issues do not GRAY GHOST surface. Meanwhile, a female bodyguard trying to hide DARK TIGER from a jailed mobster she fingered, thwarts an assassin but These three mysteries by Tapply, the Stoney Calhoun novels her picture is taken and printed in newspaper articles. A were published in 2005, 2007, 2009 respectively, all are solid third part of the story follows a reclusive, retired, and ill 9 rankings, and all run slightly under 300 pages. I wanted the actress who is hiring a ghostwriter to write her memoirs readers to know about Tapply’s “sleeper” Stoney Calhoun before she is no longer able to do so. These three story series, modest in many ways to the larger Brady Coyne lines are all connected and Tapply keeps the heat on as series, but if you like mysteries—then these are good ones. he develops each story, exposes all issues of the past, and This series switches from the Coyne-lawyer-Boston setting then masterfully draws it all together. The Nominatio n is a to the Calhoun-fishing guide-rural Maine setting. Stoney great read, one that you will thoroughly enjoy, suspenseful Calhoun is an excellent fishing guide, an excellent fly fisher, and satisfying. Tapply has a gift for telling his story in and an excellent maker of flies—(hence Gray Ghost and lean, lyrical prose with sharp dialogue built around a plot Dark Tiger, two famous, century-old flies). Stoney (like that will take you in and keep you interested from start to Coyne) is dragged into murder mysteries, because the local finish. (SHA)

15 BOOK REVIEWS

RULES OF BETRAYAL Rules of Betrayal is Christopher Reich’s eighth novel and his third thriller featuring CHRISTOPHER REICH Dr. Jonathan Ransom. For eight years, Ransom had worked as a physician with Doctors (2010, 372pp, Without Borders, working all over Africa as well as in Kosovo, Beirut, and Iraq. His Doubleday) mission was only to bring medical care to those who needed it the most. Now working 8 in a dangerous, Taliban-controlled area of Afghanistan, Ransom is no longer with Doctors Without Borders and is laboring as an individual to atone for the actions of he and his wife Emma ( aka Lara Antonova) who, unbeknownst to him, was a government operative using his role with Doctors as a cover for her violent mission on behalf of a secret organization called Division. Ransom has an accidental encounter with a dangerous, Taliban drug lord from whom he barely escapes. He is subsequently recruited by Division to rescue Emma (who many now be working with the Russians), who has disappeared while on the track of a possible nuclear weapon acquisition by a terrorist group. Out of his comfort zone, Ransom enters the world of espionage to confront the Taliban chief Sultan Haq and an evil arms dealer known as Lord Balfour. Reich spins a tense spy- thriller in Rules of Betrayal, employing Ransom as an espionage insider rather than his usual “outsider role,” in which institutional betrayals are at the center of the action and the topical nuclear arms threat is illuminated. A bit over the top, readers will still be entertained by the non-stop action in Rules of Betrayal. (SHA) The Extraordinary Plasticity By Contributing Editor Jenny Lawrence, of the Brain Bryn Mawr, PA

THE MIND’S EYE 9 Oliver Sacks (2010, 263 pp, Knopf) LEFT NEGLECTED 9 Lisa Genova (2011, 327 pp, Gallery Books, Simon & Schuster) The power of these books by Oliver Sacks and Lisa Genova comes from first-hand accounts of people with brain deficits and how they work around often profound disabilities—proving the brain is less hard-wired than previously thought. Because of a degenerative neurological condition, a concert pianist cannot read—music or words—but an unimpaired memory allows her to continue to perform. A stroke renders an author of mysteries unable to read but able, through dogged alternative strategies, to still write and publish. A cancerous tumor in his right eye requires Sacks himself to make creative adaptations. Perhaps most interesting is Sacks’s exploration of the remarkably various experiences of blindness, from John Hull’s “deep blindness” or the virtual extinction of visual imagery and memory; to Zoltan Torey’s “meticulous construction of an internal visual world;” to Jacques Lusseyran’s projection of thoughts and feelings onto an inner screen; to an intensely colored imagined landscape of synesthete Sabriye Tenberken. In neuroscientist Lisa Genova’s new novel, we learn what it feels like to suffer “Left Neglect”—when the brain ignores information from the left side of the world—through the experience of 37-year-old Sarah Nickerson following a car accident (she was talking on her cell phone) resulting in injury to her brain’s right hemisphere. A high-powered Harvard MBA consultant and mother of three, Sarah grapples with the same question Sacks presents: “To what extent are we the authors, the creators, of our own experiences? How much are these predetermined by the brains or senses we are born with, and to what extent do we shape our brains through experience?” Sarah is a wonderful character—honest, tough, smart, and funny—and we are with her as she accepts creative functioning strategies and upended previous perspectives on family, work, and life. These case histories allow us into another mind’s eye to appreciate the extraordinary plasticity of the brain.

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DETHRONING THE KING As the U.S. mergers and acquisitions correspondent for the Financial Times, Julie MacIntosh covered JULIE MACINTOSH InBev’s takeover of Anheuser-Busch. She notes that, because this happened in the summer of 2008 (2011, 349pp, when the world was distracted by the disintegrating financial markets, the story of this battle in the Wiley) media was relatively tame and short-lived. She wanted to tell the whole story of the collapse of 9 Anheuser-Busch, and, in Dethroning the King (Budweiser was the “King of Beers”) she provides an engrossing account of the stunning takeover of the company. The management of Anheuser-Busch is featured here, particularly August Busch III (“the Third”), who in 1975 at age 35, deposed his father Gussie and took the reins of the company, yielding it in 2006 to his son August Busch IV (“the Fourth”). The latter’s reign as CEO was to last only 19 months, ending with the takeover by InBev. Continued on page 18 The Charles Lenox Mysteries… ...A Latter Day Holmes A BEAUTIFUL DEATH (2008) THE FLEET STREET MURDERS (2009) THE SEPTEMBER SOCIETY (2009) A STRANGER IN MAYFAIR (2010) Charles Finch (Published by Minotaur, the books run slightly over 300 pages) I want the TRE readership to enjoy at least one of these fine mysteries, even though they remain inexplicably “sleepers” according to U.S. book rankings. Charles Finch has constructed a mystery template—and each book in the series sticks to the template—that adheres to the basic Sherlock Holmes template, but with major changes that, in my opinion; create a different and more congenial Holmes. If Finch keeps producing these prize-winning mysteries at a one-a-year rate, then he will have (like Arthur Conan Doyle) his own substantial mystery oeuvre. First a word about the books’ plots and their endearing template; and as I sketch out the plot, look at their rough similarity to the Holmes template, even though Holmes and Lenox differ in their personal backgrounds. Finch’s scene-commanding protagonist is the upper-class gentleman Charles Lenox whose profession is solving murders in the Victorian London of the late 1860’s. Lenox did not start that way. He began as the archetypal London gentleman, nothing more: Extremely wealthy (inherited), the city’s leading amateur expert on daily life in ancient Rome (his monographs have legitimized his brilliant status) and an avid traveler (always with his valet Graham—Lenox’s Dr. Watson so to speak) to ancient civilizations (which generate more learned studies). He is received in all of London’s best clubs, he is genteelly courting his next-door neighbor (the beautiful Lady Jane Grey) and his brother Edmund holds the powerful family seat (from Sussex) in Parliament. Then it all changes for Lenox. Each book begins with the old-new Lenox sitting by the fire in his beautiful house’s comfortable library, working on one of his esoteric subjects (as with Holmes’ plots, it is foggy and raining outside) when valet Graham ushers in a man (or woman) with a serious problem, murder, or something lurching toward murder. Once against his will (when he was just a “gentleman”), Lenox used his brains to help Scotland Yard solve murders (he did it anonymously) but word spread of his uncanny skills, and—accordingly—the desperate come to him as the ultimate recourse. Lenox, once the inadvertent ace sleuth, is now the committed professional detective. Sometimes in physical danger, Lenox’s superior skills (and his charming style) solve the murders, help the bereaved, and escape danger incurring only the usual bumps, scrapes and flesh wounds. Each of the plots is superior, but if you want to start somewhere, begin with A Beautiful Blue Death. Appearing so rapidly on the literary scene, these books deserve a special word about an author whose books are brilliant, fun, and appearing in swift sequence, but with no noticeable decline in quality. Given the heft of the series and its rapid-fire proliferation, the feat is all the more remarkable when you know the barebones facts about the author. Charles Finch just passed his 30th birth - day—he published his debut “Lenox” at 27—and he is not British, though he writes knowledgably (and captivatingly) about 1860’s London (the streets, houses, pubs, police, Parliament, politics, etc.). Remarkably, Finch is a New York City native and current resident, who went to Yale (double majoring in history and English) and then spent two years at Oxford getting a graduate degree in Renaissance English Literature. (Contributing Editor William Lilley, III, Washington D.C.)

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Continued from page 17 The Third’s term as CEO was characterized by his overbearing, demanding, iron-fisted, unforgiving management style. He was the one most responsible for driving Anheuser-Busch to the top of the U.S. beer market, but that growth pattern stalled in the 2000s, the company feeling the impact of a slower beer market, the strain of years of profligate spending, a high degree of arrogance and, oddly, the lack of expansion internationally. They became vulnerable. In the Epilogue, MacIntosh notes that, “While InBev was ultimately the aggressor, Anheuser-Busch fell victim to its own insularity and hubris. It was too hemmed-in by an aging strategy, and too unwilling to accept that the world was changing whether it liked it or not.” Dethroning the King, subtitled “The Hostile Takeover of Anheuser-Busch, An American Icon,” is a detailed account of the people involved at Anheuser- Busch (the Board and management) InBev, Modelo (the Mexican brewer in which Anheuser-Busch had a major interest), and the army of advisors utilized by these companies, and will be of particular interest to men and women of business and those interested in the management of business. At the final $70 per share paid by InBev, the $50 billion plus price for Anheuser-Busch represented the largest cash takeover ever. (SHA)

SCRIBBLE, SCRIBBLE, This is not your usual book, so my rating ranges widely, appropriately befitting the author’s SCRIBBLE: WRITINGS tremendous outpouring of books, articles and digital series, keeping pace with his peripatetic ON ICE CREAM, moves from Harvard to Columbia and back to London home with the BBC. The book, admittedly OBAMA, CHURCHILL, in title and design, is highly eclectic (evidence of a protean mind and an uncontrollable love of AND MY MOTHER words and the structure of the English sentence). For his book’s title, he steals the infamous SIMON SCHAMA thanks that the haughty Duke of Gloucester gave grudgingly to Edward Gibbon upon a personal (2011, 427pp, presentation of Gibbons’ still unsurpassed The Decline & Fall of the Roman Empire (V.2): “Another Bodley: London) damned, thick, square book! Always scribble, scribble, scribble! Eh! Mr. Gibbon?” This book is 7+ – 10 Schama’s unabashed scribblings. Any collection of writings so vast is doomed to expose the author’s Achilles heel, and Schama’s is his grasp of American politics—he simply cannot shed his inborn, classic British, leftish faddism (surely reinforced at Harvard and Columbia)—expressed repeatedly in his distaste for America’s bumptiousness, especially America’s political bumptious- ness. Predictably George W. Bush is the perfect target in several pieces, and perhaps Schama gets away with that, but Barack Obama is his downfall, and a hard one. For Schama, Obama is the Chosen One, written about twice (and often in passing) as the force that finally can pull us above our American pettiness. Alas, the Schama-Obama magic now has been harshly exposed by the perennial rough and tumble of hardball American politics (about which Schama should have calculated). But now to the great strength of the collected writings. Remember that this man wrote two stunning books ( The Embarrassment of Riches, 1987, about the wealthy 17th century Dutch, and Landscape and Memory, 1995, about the powerful role of landscape on memory and culture). And he has written a series of pieces on Winston Churchill which are spectacular. Perhaps his piece on “Churchill as Orator” is the book’s jewel. Remember, these are two men whose currency is the power of words. But the best of the writings is Schama’s incisive but painful defense of his 16-part BBC series on A History of Britain (also a great U.S. success on The History Channel ). For me, the series and the companion three print volumes are unsurpassed in showcasing Schama’s belief, “that the story must come first,” that great history is in narrative form. But Schama infuriated the entire historical academy, and his work was sliced to ribbons by the venerable American Historical Review (2009) which mounted a panel of various experts to attack from different quarters. The critics simply cannot, in their gut, forgive Schama’s basic premise for the series (expressed presciently as early as 1998) that good history, to be successful, must move from just the printed word to digital formats—television, DVD, audio etc. It is a sad commentary, as Borders Books shutters its doors and “e-books” rival print sales, that the professional academy will not even entertain the Schama alternative, especially when it proved so popular—as history. (Contributing Editor, William Lilley III, Washington D.C.) 18

BOOK REVIEWS

THE WARMTH OF Pulitzer prize-winning journalist Isabel Wilkerson has written her first book, The OTHER SUNS Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America’s Great Migration. It is the untold ISABEL WILKERSON story of the decades-long migration of almost six million black citizens from the South to (2010, 640pp, northern and western cities, in search of a better life. Wilkerson tells us the stories of Ida Random House) Mae Gladney (Chickasaw County, Mississippi, October 1937), George Swanson Starling (Wildwood, Florida, April 1945), and Pershing Foster (Monroe County, Louisiana, April 1953). Gladney, “left sharecropping and prejudice in Mississippi for Chicago, where she achieved blue-collar success and, in old age, voted for Barack Obama when he ran for an Illinois state senate seat.” Starling left Florida for Harlem, “where he endangered his job and his family fighting for civil rights.” Foster left Louisiana, “to pursue medicine, becoming the personal physician to Ray Charles as part of a glitteringly-successful career.” Gladney, Starling, and Foster each left different parts of the South during different decades for different reasons, and with different outcomes. The three of them would find some measure of happiness, not because their children had been perfect, their own lives without heartache, or the North had been particularly welcoming. In fact, not one of those things had turned out to be the case. They each believed they were better off for having made the migration, that they may have made many mistakes in

their lives, but that leaving the South had not been one of them. These are stories that

needed to be told, and Wilkerson tells them masterfully. (Jim Galbraith, Pasadena, CA)

ND MISUSE

THE WORDS WE USE. . . A The shape of the English language is not rigid. We often confuse meanings and develop bad word usage habits. Selecting the right word can be tricky and many words and expressions are not so much bad English as bad style. Here are a few samples taken from the website/book Common Errors in English Usage by Paul Brians.

BORED OF/BORED WITH. When you get tired it. Kick-starting is an old-fashioned and difficult way of something you are bored with it (not of it). of starting a motorcycle, so it is an inappropriate label HAPPY BELATED BIRTHDAY/BELATED for a shortcut method of getting something going. HAPPY BIRTHDAY. When someone has forgotten LANGUISH/LUXURIATE. To languish is to your birthday, they’re likely to send you a card reading wilt, pine away, become feeble. It always indicates an “Happy Belated Birthday.” But this is a mistake. The undesirable state. If you’re looking for a nice long birthday isn’t belated; the wishes are. Better-phrased soak in the tub, what youC wonatnint uiesd n ont tpoa glaen 6 guish in cards read “Belated Happy Birthday.” the bath but to luxuriate in it. GRATIS /GRATUITOUS. If you do something SENSE OF FALSE HOPE/FALSE SENSE nice without being paid, you do it “gratis.” Technically, OF HOPE. If you’re trying to lull someone into such a deed can also be “gratuitous;” but if you do or hopefulness you don’t want to give them a sense of say something obnoxious and uncalled for, it’s always false hope. Rather, you want to make them feel really “gratuitous,” not “gratis.” hopeful, although such hope is unjustified. So what you should say is “a false sense of hope.” KICK START/JUMP START. You revive a dead battery by jolting it to life with a jumper cable: An SPADED/SPAYED. If you’ve had your dog extraordinary measure used in an emergency. So if you surgically sterilized, you’ve spayed it; save the hope to stimulate a foundering, you want to jump-start spading until it dies.

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THE KILLER The title character in scriptwriter Tom Hinshelwood’s debut novel is a professional killer, a TOM HINSHELWOOD killer-for-hire named Victor. He operates alone, is deadly, and for him, killing is a straight (2010, 325pp, business transaction. On an assigned mission in Paris, Victor shoots a man in an alley and St. Martin’s Press) recovers from the body a small flash-drive, as instructed. Upon returning to his hotel, the 8 ever vigilant Victor notes two out-of-place characters in the lobby, and he soon becomes aware that there is an ambush team with a mission to kill him and recover the flash-drive. Using all of his well-honed skills, he finishes off the seven-member team of hit-men and escapes, but without being able to determine who hired them and why the flash-drive was so important. So begins a suspenseful, action-packed thriller as Victor goes across Europe trying to figure out just who wants him dead and exactly what information is encrypted on the flash-drive. There are multiple pursuers and he is in mortal danger, but he is joined by an unlikely ally, and together, they collaborate to stay alive. The Killer is a classic hunter- becomes-the-hunted suspense story in which the title character becomes the protagonist and readers will root for him. Readers who enjoy spy thrillers and heavy action building to a rousing conclusion will enjoy The Killer. (SHA)

Jane Says: “I can’t tell you what it’s like living with SHA when he wants my reviews. He nags, he cajoles, he threatens and demands. This cannot be good for my health. Now, if he would just bring coffee to my bed…”

TRE Contributing Editors Jane Ackerman (Studio City, CA) Jenny Lawrence (New York, NY) Robert H. Bunzel (Piedmont, CA) William Lilley, III (Washington, D.C.) William Dohrmann (Stonington, CT) Elaine Lisle (Bryn Mawr, PA) Hugh Evans (Los Angeles, CA) Patricia Santa Cruz (Menlo Park, CA) John D. Kyle (Ponte Vedra Beach, FL)

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