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Science Book Reviews

    Laconic, yet comprehensive.

Book Reviews

    John Updike's rules for literary criticism (as in "book reviews") :

1. Try to understand what the author wished to do, and do not blame him for not achieving what he did not attempt.

2. Give enough direct quotation—at least one extended passage—of the book's prose so the review's reader can form his own impression, can get his own taste.

3. Confirm your description of the book with quotation from the book, if only phrase-long, rather than proceeding by fuzzy précis.

4. Go easy on plot summary, and do not give away the ending.

5. If the book is judged deficient, cite a successful example along the same lines, from the author's œuvre or elsewhere. Try to understand the failure. Sure it's his and not yours?

Quote for the Day

    Jane Austen holds a special place in my heart.  Not.

How Book Reviews Got Started

    ROFLMAO.  Yes, I review books.  Yes, the above applies to me.  And God willing and the creek don't rise, I'll be posting one tomorrow.

Book Review Friday

    With our guest book reviewer tonight, Her Majesty Queen Victoria!!

Mother Nature vs. Mankind

In the case of Mt. Vesuvius vs. Pompeii, put your money on Mother Nature.

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Full review here.

You Suck - Christopher Moore

2007; 328 pages. Full Title : You Suck, A Love Story. Sequel to Bloodsucking Fiends, reviewed here. Genre : Romantic Comedy Vampire Spoof. Awards : #6 on the NY Times Best Seller List in February 2007. Overall Rating : A-. . After more than a decade, Christopher Moore pens a much-asked-for sequel to his first vampire story. You Suck opens romantically : our fanged heroine, Jody, kills her lover, Tommy Flood. Kinda. He's not dead, he's just now a fellow, undead vampire. She was lonely. . Moore mayhem (pun intended) ensues. Since they're now both creatures of the night, Tommy and Jody need to find a daylight minion. Meanwhile, the 800-year old vampire that "turned" Jody gets loose, vowing to terminate both of our protagonists. And Tommy's turkey-bowling supermarket night-shift cohorts, led by a smurf-colored hooker named (appropriately enough) "Blue" who took all their easy-earned money, are out to put a stake in him as well. . What's To Like... Once again, the humor is profuse and laugh-out loud funny. The storyline is well-paced. The great cast of characters from BSF are back : the Emperor and his dogs, Lazarus and Bummer; the sinister Elijah Ben Sapir; the Keystone Koppish Animals, and the gay cop duo of Rivera and Cavuto. . Ah, but Moore also introduces us to a whole slew of cool, new ones - the aforementioned Blue; the teenage Goth minion Abby Normal; her moony friend Jared; and Chet the Shaved Cat. This is more than a cheap, low-effort, feed-the-readers-any-old-tripe story yawned out by Moore. . Be forewarned, there's a lot of cussing, potty humor, and sex in the book. If such things aren't your literary cup of tea, steer clear of YS. And although the book is a stand-alone, it will make a lot more sense if you read BSF first. . Some found the ending to be meh, but I thought it was good enough. Moore seems to keep it sufficiently "open" to allow for at least one more book in the series. . Cool/New Words... onomatopeed (verb, pg. 7) : "onomatopeia" is one of my favorite words, but this is the first time I've seen it turned into a verb. punani (adj., pg. 101) : well, these are "family" book reviews, so we won't give the definition here. You can google it. I had never heard of this word before. Sheltered life and all that. . Excerpts... "Ha!" Jody said. "I am a finely tuned predator. I am a superbeing. I--" And at that point she bounced her forehead off a light pole with a dull twang and was suddenly lying on her back looking at the streetlights above her, which kept going out of focus, the bastards. "I'll be back to get you," Tommy called. He's so sweet, Jody thought. (pg. 45) . "I could be a slave to your darkest desires," Abby said. "I can do things. Anything you want." The vampire Flood commenced a coughing fit. When he had control again, he said, "Well, that's terrific, because we have a lot of laundry piled up and the apartment is a wreck." He was testing her. Seeing if she was worthy before bringing her into his world. "Anything you desire, my lord. I can do laundry, clean, bring you small ceeatures to quench your thirst until I am worthy." The vampire Flood snickered. "This is so cool," he said. (pg. 96) . You b*tch, you killed me! You suck! Those are the opening lines of the book. Sequels (with the exception of Mad Max 2), always struggle to catch the magic of their predecessors. You Suck actually does a pretty good job of that. We'll give it an "A-", and a bloodthirsty recommendation. It kept me laughing and kept my interest. That's good enough for me.

Gunpowder Empire - Harry Turtledove

2003; 286 pages. Genre : Sci Fi - Parallel Universes; Young Adult. Book #1 of the "Crosstime Traffic Series". Overall Rating : C. . The Solter family has a novel way of spending their summer vacation - they travel to a parallel universe where the Roman Empire never collapsed. Technology-wise, that world has evolved up to muskets and cannons, so the "this-worlders" can trade common items from here - mirrors, mechanical watches, Swiss army knives, etc. - for much-needed grain. . What's To Like... Turtledove does a nice job comparing the two Roman Empires, and portraying how history might have changed if the Barbarians had never seriously threatened Rome. He also paints a detailed picture of the parallel medieval city, its government, and its daily life. . OTOH, the "this-world" timeframe is set at 100 years from now, and it isn't much different from the present day. No one wears furs (but we still eat meat), our computer understands our voice commands, and of course, we can dimension-hop. That's about it. Not a lot of progress for an entire century. . As usual, our dimension conveniently happens to be the most advanced one around. Just once, I'd like to see some more-evolved chrono-hoppers land in our world, and be condescending to us primitives. The ending isn't very climactic, and there's too much "telling not showing". See the "sexism" section on page 60. . Excerpt... But people were people, in her timeline or any of the alternates. Knowledge changed. Customs changed. Human nature didn't. People still fell in love - and out of love, too. They still schemed to get rich. They squabbled among themselves. And they needed to feel their group was better than some other group. Maybe they had more money. Maybe they had blond hair. Maybe they spoke a particular language. Maybe they had the one right religion - or the one right kind of the one right religion. It was always something, though. (pg. 43) . And the target audience is... It's important to know for whom Turtledove is writing this series . It quickly becomes obvious. The Solter kids are a pair of teenagers. The names of the parents are given once, then thereafter, it's "Mom said so-and-so" and "Dad did such-and-such". . There's no romance, let alone sex. The characters are cardboard thin and their actions predictable. After a couple chapters, the kids have to fend for themselves in the parallel Rome. War comes, and there is some bloodshed, but the horror of conflict - raping, pillaging, and plundering - is only hinted at. The emphasis at all times is how different the parallel world is from our own. . So this is an ideal book for a young boy - say, 7-12 years old - who is interested in alternate worlds. The lack of depth means there's not much here for an adult, unless you used to enjoy the 50's sci-fi books by Andre Norton. I did, so an occasional book like this is okay. We'll give it a "C", and stress that this isn't your typical Harry Turtledove series.

Unseen Academicals - Terry Pratchett

2009, 400 pages. The latest book (#37) in the Discworld series. Genre : Fantasy, Comedy. Overall Rating : B. . Per some fine print tied to a sizable financial donation to their University, Ankh-Morpork's wizards find themselves forced to learn the plebeian sport of foot-the-ball. Or football to you Old Worlders. Or soccer to us Yanks. . Meanwhile, the University's night kitchen has a new scullery maid, Juliet. A naive girl, slow of wit, but with looks that make even celibate Wizards turn sweaty. And from those two plot starting points, all mayhem eventuates. . What's To Like... If you like new characters, there's lots of them. Glenda, Trev, Juliet, Pepe, Nutt, and more. If you don't like new characters, a lot of your old favorites - including Rincewind, the Luggage, and Sam Vimes - are here, at least making cameo appearances. And, "ook!", the librarian's back as well. There's even a new ...er... species introduced. . Pratchett's themes this time are football. hooligans, fashion models, cooking, (as usual) racial prejudice, and the esoteric "crab bucket philosophy". For the ladies, there's even some romance. . Unseen Academicals is not as uproariously funny as the early Discworld books. Yet it's still full of wit, and Pratchett deftly weaves all those themes and a bunch of plotlines into a cohesive tale. One of my favorite characters, the benevolent tyrant Vetinari, plays a larger-than-usual role here. Some critics say he's "differently portrayed", but I see it as "character development". My only personal quibble is that 95% of the story takes place within the walls of Ankh-Morpork. It's a great city, but I always enjoy visiting other parts of Discworld. . New Words... There were a bunch of them : Concomitant (occurring the same time as another related event); Catenary (the natural curve of something flexible hung between two fixed points); Eventuate (to ultimately result (in)); Abseil (to descend by rope); Chatelaine (a chain worn around the waist, which holds all the castle's keys); Louche (of questionable taste and/or morality); Turbot (a European flatfish); Reticule (a lady's drawstring purse); and last but not least, Bledlow, which is some sort of chap that even Google and the Internet can't define. Perhaps Pratchett made this last one up. . Excerpts... "Oh he was quite healthy," said the Archchancellor. "Just dead. Quite healthy for a dead man." "He was a pile of dust, Archchancellor!" "That's not the same as being ill, exactly," said Ridcully, who believed in never giving in. "Broadly speaking, it's stable." (pg. 30) . Sator Square was where the city went when it was upset, baffled, or fearful. People who had no real idea why they were doing so congregated to listen to other people who also did not know anything, on the basis that ignorance shared is ignorance doubled. (pg. 250) . Apes had it worked out. No ape would philosophize, "The mountain is, and is not". They would think, "The banana is. I will eat the banana. There is no banana. I want another banana." (pg. 76) . Is this Pratchett's Swan Song? In 2007, Pratchett posted online that he had been diagnosed as having a rare form of early-onset Alzheimer's disease. Naturally, every reader of Unseen Academicals has an opinion as to how much this affected the book. My 2-cents is, "not very much". It is an excellently penned book. . However, there is a touching scene at the end, where Nutt asks his mentor, Lady Margolotta, "do I have worth?" She assures him he does. To which he replies, "Thank you. But I am learning that worth is something that must be continuously accumulated." . He then asks her, "Have I become?", and she tells him he has "become" as well. Both questions have to do with whether the world is now a (slightly) better place because of one's having existed in it. And although the person in question here is Nutt, I wonder if maybe this isn't Terry Pratchett self-reflecting about his time in this world, and whether Unseen Academicals is perhaps the swan song of the Discworld series and his writing career. . If so, all I can say is, "Terry, you have worth. Terry, you have become. The world is a better place for you having passed through it."

Roseanna - Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo

1965 (Swedish); 1967 (English). 212 pages. Genre : Crime Fiction. Book #1 in the Martin Beck detective series. Overall Rating : B. . The nude body of a young woman is pulled out of Sweden's Lake Vattern. There are no identifying marks or any other clue as to her identity. Detective Martin Beck checks on all the Missing Person reports throughout Sweden, but none of them match the victim's description; even after a couple months have gone by. There's not a lot for him to go on. . What's To Like... It's cool to see how the detectives go about trying to solve a case so devoid of clues. The plot moves along nicely, and if anything, the book was over too soon. This is a "police procedural" story, so the emphasis is on perseverence and dogged detective work. There are a couple lucky breaks, but they make the story work, so that's okay. . It's also neat to read a story based on 1960's technology. There are no e-mails or cell-phones. Long-distance phone conversations have poor reception and tenuous connections, and snail-mail is the only way to send written communication. And when the snail-mail is coming from overseas, the delays are significant. . There are a couple "holes" in the story. Most notably, nobody seems too concerned about where the girl's clothing and personal effects might have ended up. And the ploy used to catch the killer smacks of Police Entrapment, although maybe this was allowed in Sweden way back then. . Martin Beck is to a certain degree, the stereotypical p0lice detective. He smokes too much, his marriage is on the rocks, and he doesn't sleep well. Oh well, at least he 's not an alcoholic. Yet. . Cool new words in the book... Only one - décolleté. Meaning (in fashion) : leaving the neck and shoulders uncovered. . Excerpt. "Don't think so much about that case. It isn't the first time we have failed. It won't be the last either. You know that just as well as I do. We won't be any the better or the worse for it." "It isn't just the case I'm thinking about." "Don't brood. It isn't good for the morale." "The morale?" "Yes, think what a lot of nonsense one can figure out with plenty of time. Brooding is the mother of ineffectiveness." (pg. 42) . Maj Sjowall & Per Wahloo Roseanna is the first of the 10-book Martin Beck series. Sjowall and Wahloo were a husband-&-wife team, who wrote alternating chapters of each book. Bizarre. . Sjowall and Wahloo blazed the trail for Swedish noir police procedurals. Their influence on Henning Mankell and Stieg Larsson is profound. FWIW, the most famous book in the Martin Beck series is probably The Laughing Policeman, which was made into a Hollywood movie, starring Walter Matthau. I enjoyed Roseanna, and will probably end up reading a couple more of the series.

The Fourth Bear - Jasper Fforde

2006; 378 pages. Book #2 of the Nursery Crime series. Genre : Umm... Nursery Crime. Overall Rating : A. . Golidlocks is dead, but was it an accident or murder? Jack Spratt is on the case, and there's a lot more on his plate than that. The Scissor-man is afoot, trying to separate thumb-sucking children from their digits. The homicidal Gingerbreadman is running as fast as he can. Punch & Judy have moved next door to Spratt, and the noise they make while fighting would keep the dead awake. Jack's sanity is in question, since he claims he has a self-repairing car, sold to him by Dorian Gray. 50-kilgoram cucumbers are being blown up, and someone is supplying illicit porridge to the bear community. . What's to Like... TFB is punnier and funnier than the first book in the series, The Big Over Easy. Every cliché and plot deivce imaginable is deliberately used. There's a multitude of plots, and part of the fun is figuring out if and how Fforde intends to wrap them all up. . The prologues that start each chapter are great. And as usual, Chapter 13 is a study in efficiency. There's a fun-filled theme park called Somme World, where visitors can relive the horrors of World War One trench warfare. The bear society is a hoot. . There aren't many negatives. It does take a while for the story to get around to The Three Bears tale. But you're rewarded by learning how three bowls of porridge, all poured at the same time, can have three different temperatures, and why Mr. and Mrs. Bruin sleep in separate beds. . Cool words in The Fourth Bear... Pedantic (ostentatious concern for details). Probity (complete, utter integrity). Moggy (a domestic cat). Sparrow's Fart (dawn). The latter two are Britishisms. I simply have to incorporate Sparrow's Fart into my daily vocabulary somehow. . Excerpts. "I was one of the first," (Hoffman) muttered sadly, following her gaze. "A life lived in fear is a life half lived. A life half lived is fear lived in half. A life half feared is a fear half lived." Some people have a way wth words, but Hoffman wasn't one of them. (pg. 14) . "When did (the Gingerbreadman) escape?" "Ninety-seven minutes ago," replied Copperfield. "Killed two male nurses and his doctor with his bare hands. The other three orderlies who accompanied him are critical in the hospital." "Critical?" "Yes. Don't like the food, beds uncomfortable, waiting lists too long - usual crap. Other than that they're fine." (pg. 54) . The Fourth Bear is another ffine efffort by Fforde. I liked it a bit better than The Big Over Easy (reviewed here). He seems to be hitting his stride in this series, and it's a bit of a shame that it is planned to be only a trilogy. But Jack Spratt's loss is hopefully Thursday Next's gain.

The Gathering Storm - Robert Jordan

2009; 766 pages. Genres : Epic Fantasy; Neverending Series. Book 12 in the "Wheel Of Time". Overall Rating : A. . The series-ending trilogy begins. Brandon Sanderson takes over for the late Robert Jordan, reportedly using RJ's copious notes and emulating Jordan's style. . TGS focuses on the two main characters in WoT. Rand tries to rally the kingdoms he's conquered and forge alliances with those he hasn't, all in order to resist the looming invasion by the Dark Lord. . Egwene continues undermining the The Amyrlin Seat (Elaida) in the White Tower, while also trying to heal the deep divisions within Ajahs of the White Towers. . What's To Like... For a long-awaited change, there's great action and plot advancement. The other two ta'veren, Mat and Perrin, are being drawn towards The Dragon Reborn. Some loose ends (such as Sheriam and the Prophet Masema) are tidily wrapped up. There are a number of MIA's - Moiraine, Morgase, Elayne, and Loial - that presumably will get their due in the remaining two books. The ending of TGS is quite good. . And if you're one of those readers who liked the plodding aimlessness of the last half-dozen books in this series, then some of the chapters here will make you happy too. A lot of pages are expended on Aviendha's recurring "punishments" and her incessant musings about their cause; and Rand traipses from one kingdom to another, brooding, b*tching, and generally being a PITA to be around. . There are some minor drawbacks. The Gathering Storm is not a stand-alone book, and the Glossary won't help you much make sense of who's who and what the various fantasy world phrases mean. So newcomers are looking at 10,000 pages (2½ million words) as background reading before they can hope to make sense out of TGS. . There is also some Jordanesque repetitiveness. There are umpteen "smoothing of the dress", "arms folded beneath the breasts", and "skirts divided for riding". Further, you are reminded a couple thousand times of the allegorical "coming storm". . Excerpt - The bad guys' viewpoint. "He has failed before and will fail again," Rand said. I will defeat him." . Moridin laughed again, the same heartless laugh as before. "Perhaps you will," he said. "But do you think that matters? Consider it. The Wheel turns, time and time again. Over and over the Ages turn, and men fight the Great Lord. But someday, he will win, and when he does, the Wheel will stop. . "That is why his victory is assured... When you are victorious, it only leads to another battle. When he is victorious, all things will end." (pg. 238) . Excerpt - The good guys' viewpoint. Thom chuckled. "We can't go back, Mat. The Wheel has turned, for better or for worse. And it will keep on turning, as lights die and forests dim, storms call and skies break. Turn it will. The Wheel is not hope, and the Wheel does not care, the Wheel simply is. But so long as it turns, folk may hope, folk may care. For with light that fades, another will eventually grow, and each storm that rages must eventually die. As long as the Wheel turns." (pg. 404) . There are neither beginnings nor endings to the turning of the Wheel of Time... For me, The Gathering Storm was a great read. Sanderson has continued, as he should, to pay homage to Jordan every chance he gets. But personally, I think RJ had lost control of WoT. The plotlines just continued to spread out further and further, and whenever RJ did try to rein them in, the result was stagnation. A fresh touch was needed, and Sanderson supplies it. . So we'll give TGS a solid "A", and give Sanderson a heartfelt "Thank You" for his efforts. It will still take all his resources to bring everything together for the final showdown ("Tarmon Gai'don"), but Sanderson has two books to do it in, and a fair chance of pulling it off.