Shelved: Roundup of Book Posts November 16 - 30, 2023

 

Author talk

All the Sinners Bleed.  S A Crosby.  Flatiron Books, 2023.  352 pages.

"Mystery/Thriller/Suspense" is not a usual genre for me to read, but I've read great things about author S.A. Crosby, and he is one of the guest authors at February's Savannah Book Festival, so I decided to give his latest a try.  It ended up being a good read. The "Mystery/Thriller/Suspense" part is a pretty good thriller that definitely kept me engaged, but there's more to Crosby's books.  He's gotten a lot of attention because he's very good at writing thrillers through the southern history lens.  His books incorporate all the southern threads:  race, class, poverty, religion, change, and resistance to change.  

All the Sinners Bleed's main character is Sheriff Titus Crown, former FBI agent and the first black sheriff in a rural Virginia county.  He has a lot to deal with. Memories of his last major FBI case, which left him mentally and physically damaged, affect every aspect of his personal and professional life as he steps into his new role as Sheriff of the county he was born and raised in.  He knows the people, their stories, and their attitudes.  A year into his tenure, a serial killer emerges, and it becomes Titus' job to stop him.  History is a major part of the story, the characters' histories, the community history, and southern history in general.

Great quote from the book:  "It occurred to him that no place was confused about its past or more terrified of the future than the South."  

James Garner on The Tonight Show

The Garner Files.  James Garner and Jon Winokur.  Simon & Schuster, 2011. 288 pages.  

James Garner may be the most beloved man in the history of the entertainment industry.  No one has ever had a bad word to say about him, and co-stars, crewmembers, and friends speak in glowing terms. Men love his common sense, humble, smart, and funny on -screen characters, and women love his tall, dark, handsome, sensitive, and humorous side. As the saying goes, women want to be with him, and men want to be him or at least be buddies with him.

I'm no exception.  "Maverick" is my all-time favorite western tv show and character, and I still watch often.  I watched "The Rockford Files" as a kid and still watch occasionally.  I discovered his autobiography from a social media reel that quoted from it.  The man was everything you would expect.  James Bumgarner grew up in Depression-era Oklahoma, and he had a really hard life with an alcoholic father and an abusive step-mother.  He got into acting because he didn't want to be a carpet-layer, and he carved out a fantastic career.  The whole book is a great read, and my impressions of Garner are confirmed.  He does seem to really have been a great guy.  OK, he did have one major defect:  even the scent of garlic or onions made him physically ill, but I can overlook that.

Garner, Maverick, and Rockford fans will really enjoy the book with all of its behind the scenes stories.  Garner created two of the most unique, interesting, and beloved characters in television history.  "Maverick" and "The Rockford Files" are both genre-benders that have endured for decades.  Throughout his career, Garner hated all of the trappings of Hollywood stardom, the awards, the pretensions, the publicity, and the business aspects.  He simply saw acting as a job (better than laying carpet), and he did his best at it.  Along the way, he treated co-stars, crew members, and fans respectfully and became one of the most admired and universally loved people in entertainment history.

CBS Sunday morning segment 

Thank You (Falettin Me Be Mice Self Agin): A Memoir.  AUWA, 2023.  320 pages.  

I have always been aware of Sly and the Family Stone. Peripherally, growing up in the 70s and 80s. Mostly country music was played in our house, and my older brother was listening to rock, especially southern rock, but I heard Sly Stone music and caught variety and talk show appearances here and there.  Then, he seemingly disappeared.  I discovered funk as a teen and saw huge connections between Sly Stone and Prince, Rick James, George Clinton, and The Time, so I went back and dug slightly deeper into Family Stone music, still didn't know much beyond the hits.

As Sly and the Family Stone climbed the charts, Stone, aka Sylvester Stewart, fell into the trap of drug addiction and developed an unprofessional reputation of no-shows, tardiness, abbreviated and bad performances, incoherent interviews, tantrums, excess, and even gunplay.  As a result, he disappeared from the music industry. (Actually, he still worked, sometimes in front of very small audiences.) Thankfully, he's now in a period of sobriety, at age 80, and he tells his own story in this just published autobiography.  In spite of his struggles with drug use, the story is clearly and thoughtfully told.  I'm amazed by his memory.  His genius also shines through as it becomes clear that he became a real student of music and music theory at an early age, and he was calculating and methodical about so much of his career, not just the music itself, but also how he put the band together, how he dealt with record company executives, and how he managed the band,  He created a new kind of music and brought people together during a very divisive period, creating iconic and unique songs that have stood the test of time, and he was a major influence on many performers since, but he wasn't always the best human being. It's great that he is still around to tell his story and perhaps still be recognized during his lifetime.  Most people around him in the 1970s probably never imagined that would have been possible.

Interview in two parts (audio)

An Edible History of Humanity.  Tom Standage.  Bloomsbury USA, 2010.  288 pages.

In 2005, Tom Standage published A History of the World in 6 Glasses, telling history through the histories of 6 of the most common drinks in the world, including coffee, tea, beer, and Coke. It became one of my favorite  reads. In 2010, he published An Edible History of Humanity, a more general look at world history.

"More than simply sustenance, food historically has been a kind of technology, changing the course of human progress by helping to build empires, promote industrialization, and decide the outcomes of wars. Tom Standage draws on archaeology, anthropology, and economics to reveal how food has helped shape and transform societies around the world, from the emergence of farming in China by 7500 b.c. to the use of sugar cane and corn to make ethanol today. An Edible History of Humanity is a fully satisfying account of human history." (publisher's blurb)

The result is a really engrossing new perspective on history, but it's not quite as engrossing, in my opinion, as Six Glasses. It reads a little drier --- no pun intended -- and at times is a little dense in science. As the title implies, it's  not as much about specific foods as about the impact of certain foods, like grains, sugar, and spices, and the use of food by governments to drive economies, force change, and even to wage war. 

Author interview

Black Death at the Golden Gate:  The Race to Save America From the Bubonic Plague.  David K. Randall.  W.W. Norton & Company, 2019.  304 pages.  (American Experience documentary here https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/films/plague-golden-gate/ )

A deadly epidemic, originating in Asia, threatens  the US.  Politicians, the press, and scientists are divided and at odds with each other on how to deal with the threat.  Various jurisdictions discuss and implement quarantines and start requiring health documents for travel.  At-risk people are isolated. Large portions of the population lose faith in the government and the healthcare system. Many refuse vaccinations. 

No, not 2020 and the pandemic. All of this took place in California in the first decade of the 20th century. In 1900, the first cases of bubonic plague, black death, occurred in San Francisco's  Chinatown. Eventually, there are over 100 confirmed deaths, and probably many, many more hidden from authorities. While one bacteriologist, one of the first in America,  recognizes the grave threat and fights it, politicians, the press, the US Surgeon General ( his boss), Chinese business and tong leaders, and President  McKinley all actively conspire to deny the plague's existence and to destroy the career  of the one man who knows what's  going on.

This book, published in 2019, very much reads like an Erik Larsen or David Grann work- in other words, first-rate. ... And if you're  that rare bird that has any remaining trust in politicians, journalists, or humanity in general, be prepared to lose some of it.

Shelved: Roundup of Book Posts November 1 - 15, 2023

 

"The Bizarre Origins of Florida Man"

Florida Hustle.  Paul Wilborn.  St Petersburg Press, 2022.  310 pages.

Swamp Story.  Dave Barry.  Simon & Schuster, 2023.  320 pages.

Tourist Season.  Carl Hiaasen. G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1986.  272 pages. (One of many "Florida Man" books by Hiaasen)

The "Florida Man"/"Florida Woman" trope is ubiquitous.  When you see it in a headline or hear it in a tease, you know you're in for some weird and wacky story that you will most likely repeat to friends.  There are jokes, tv shows, podcasts, newsletters, books, memes galore, and tons of merchandise. Many of the true stories are documented and archived by our friend, author and journalist Craig Pittman in his "Welcome to Florida" podcast, weekly newsletter, and books and articles.  (Website https://craigpittman.com/ )

However, I don't think I realized that "Florida Man" also covers a whole unique genre of fiction, and I've sampled several in the last couple of years, including the three featured here.  I've noticed some similar characteristics.

1.  written by former newspaper writers, especially of Tampa, St. Petersburg, or Miami newspapers

2.  All of the characters are losers in some way: damaged, lonely, addicted, abused, busted relationships.

3.  Rich people are all especially miserable.

4.  There always weird, gross, criminal, violent, incompetent pairs of brothers to hire as henchmen.

5.  Women are all incredibly sexy and end up with the loser hero who always forgives their treachery (and their always treacherous to one degree r another).

6.  Every good story involves Seminoles, the Everglades, or at the very least, alligators.  

7. All Florida biological families are broken. "Chosen" families are forever. 

Look, they're not great literature or necessarily historical,, but they're fun reads usually.

Author Talk

Through the Groves:  A Memoir.  Anne Hull. Henry Holt & Co., 2023.  224 pages.

I guess it's mandatory:  if you've ever written for a Tampa, St. Petersburg, or Miami newspaper, you are required to publish at least one book of some sort.

Journalist Anne Hull published her memoir of growing up in 1960s Central Florida.  My wife grew up near Orlando, and I have a couple of friends and multiple cousins who grew up in Central Florida and on the Gulf Coast around the same time, but none of them had connections to the state citrus industry that Hull and her family had.  Meanwhile, I grew up in rural South Georgia.  So, even though Hull's experiences are different, there are definitely familiarities.

Through the Groves has gotten a lot of buzz and acclaim, and it has appeared on many lists of best books of the year.  I realize there is a huge audience for this story, and some readers will absolutely love it.  However, it's just not for me.  Don't get me wrong, Hull is an excellent writer and storyteller.  I simply found the story lacking.  There are some family difficulties and there is inner turmoil within the young Hull, nothing groundbreaking or incredibly shocking or publishing worthy.  There are a lot more interesting lives out there.  Just my opinion, but I'm sure some of you will enjoy it, and that's fine too.

"Finding Traces of a Failed Aryan Colony in Paraguay" New York Times

Forgotten Fatherland:  The True Story of Nietzsche's Sister and Her Lost Aryan Colony.  Ben Macintyre.  Crown, 2011.  320 pages.

I didn't think this was possible:  a Ben Macintyre book that disappointed me.   Macintyre is a British journalist and author who has written many books and created many documentaries, mostly about World War II.  He's highly regarded, and I enjoyed a couple of his previous books.  In 2011, he published a book about his quest for Nueva Germania, a German colony within Paraguay founded by the sister of philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche and her husband in the 1880s.  Nueva Germania was to be a New Germany, free of non-Aryan handicaps.  It failed miserably, but Elisabeth Nietzsche's greatest work was still ahead of her.  First, she singlehandedly edited, shaped, made up, and published her brother's works as he declined into dementia and death.  Without her work, the world at large probably would never have heard Friedrich Nietzsche.  Only a very few academics ever read his philosophy during his lifetime, and it was universally dismissed until Elisabeth got her hands on it.  Second, she linked him and his work forever with the burgeoning Nazi movement and with Hitler.  There is absolutely no evidence that Hitler ever personally read or embraced Nietzsche's ideas, and, in fact, Macintyre makes the case that Nietzsche himself would have fervently opposed fascism, antisemitism, and Nazism just as much as Elisabeth embraced them all.  Hitler, however, realized the potential propaganda value in using the dead philosopher and his living sister's celebrity status among some Germans, and he used them very effectively, so much so that we now associate Nietzsche with Nazism.  Macintyre argues that our connection of the two is faulty.

Unfortunately for me, the book devotes too much time to Nietzsche's philosophy and too little time to the actual colony itself.  I wanted to know more about the colony and about the remnants of the colony that still exists.  Yes, there is a small community of German-Paraguayans descended from the original colonists who struggle to maintain their German purity today.  Alas, there are very few pages about the colony itself.  

Panel discussion on SAS including Damien Lewis

Brothers in Arms:  Churchill's Special Forces During WWII's Darkest Hour.  Damien Lewis.  Citadel, 2023.  400 pages.

Regardless of his faults, Winston Churchill was ahead of his time when it came to recognizing the importance of propaganda and espionage as major parts of the war effort.  He was very involved in those areas throughout World War II.  When he called for volunteers to join the Special Forces and undertake espionage and sabotage missions behind enemy lines, scores of men answered his call, and the SAS was formed.  

If you are a military history buff, this book is definitely for you.  Damien Lewis exhaustively searched through declassified archives, letters, diaries, military reports, and rare photos and films.  Much of the material he researched had never been seen by the public before.  Along with all of that documentation, he conducted numerous interviews with surviving veterans and family members.  The result is an exciting narrative of incredible acts committed by an  incredible assortment of unbelievable real-life characters.

Author's Lecture

The Poisoner's Handbook:  Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz Age New York.  Debra Blum.  Penguin Press, 2010.  336 pages. (American Experience PBS documentary https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/films/poisoners/ )

The Roaring 20s saw a lot of "booms."  The economy boomed, women's rights boomed with the passage of the 19th amendment granting suffrage and with flappers doing things respectable women of past generations never dreamed of, new literary and art movements boomed, jazz dominated the music scene, and there were literal booms of violence as anarchists and racists used bombs, guns, riots, and lynchings to reach their goals.  There was also an epidemic of deaths by poison that swept through New York City during the 1920s. Chloroform, arsenic, strychnine, and other chemicals, natural and man-made, were easy to get, and historically difficult to detect. Before the 1920s, it was extremely difficult to prove murder by poisoning in a court of law; science just wasn't up to the task.  However, that began to change in the 1920s.  NYC's Chief Medical Examiner Charles Norris and toxicologist Alexander Gettler undertook groundbreaking work in a laboratory at the city's Bellevue Hospital. Their work was instrumental in the development of forensics and toxicology.

Author Debra Blum examines their work in this book which is a mixture of true crime, 1920s history, and science history.  The final product is a very interesting read. 

Shelved: Roundup of Book Posts October 16 - 31, 2023

 

Author talk at the Museum of Jewish Heritage

The American Way:  A True Story of Nazi Escape, Superman, and Marilyn Monroe.   Helene Stapinski and Bonnie Siegler.  Simon & Schuster, 2023.  384 pages.

I love connections in history, and The American Way is a great example of connections done in a great and thoroughly entertaining way.  What connections?  In The American Way, co-author Bonnie Siegler manages to connect her Jewish grandparents' story of escaping Nazi Germany to New York to fellow Jewish refugee and Hollywood movie writer/director Billy Wilder to the creators of Superman to Marilyn Monroe and Joe Dimaggio to New York mob boss Frank Costello to a softcore porn magazine publisher.  Each one of the stories told is amazing and interesting, especially the story of Superman's creation and how the creators were cheated out of their just rewards by the publisher, the aforementioned smut peddler.  

Well, OK, true, the hub of the story is the story of Siegler's grandparents, Jules and Edith Schulback, a young Jewish furrier and his wife who managed to escape Nazi Germany just before the start of WWII.  Their experiences in Germany and those of their family members who were unable to escape are well documented and told.  The stories of the other individuals are the spokes radiating from the Schulback hub.  Altogether, the parts make for a very satisfying wheel of reading.

"Who was the best English monarch?" David Mitchell ranks

Unruly:  The Ridiculous History of England's Kings and Queens.  David Mitchell.  Crown, 2023. 448 pages.  

A couple of weeks ago, David Mitchell appeared on my favorite talk show, "The Graham Norton Show," to promote his newly published history of English monarchs.  I had never heard of the book, but I immediately grabbed my phone and downloaded the audiobook version before he even sat down on the couch. Mitchell is one of my favorite British comic actors, and I'm a huge fan of his appearances on the British celebrity panel comedy/quiz shows.  He's incredibly witty, very snarky, and totally out of touch with popular culture, constantly ribbed by co-panelists for being ultra-"posh."  And he has a history degree.  I relate to him on many levels.

Unruly is all that I expected it to be.  Mitchell takes the reader from the beginning - the fictional King Arthur - up to the reign of Elizabeth I (meaning that a volume 2 is in the works, I hope).  He is a true iconoclast throughout, fully exposing the foibles and ridiculousness of the monarchs, their supporters and challengers, and the historians who have chronicled them over them over the centuries, with his characteristically biting Bitter humor in every paragraph.  However, don't be misled.  As the publisher's blurb says,  Unruly is "A funny book that takes history seriously." It's also a seriously funny history book.  

Lecture on the Election of 1932

Histocrats 7 Questions with Author

1932:  FDR, Hoover, and the Dawn of a New America.  Scott Martelle.  Citadel Press, 2023. 407 pages.

Authors use phrases like "Dawn of a New America" and "turning point" in subtitles all the time, but some authors fail to prove their case.  In 1932, Scott Martelle succeeds in laying out evidence that shows the significance of the presidential election between President Herbert Hoover and New York Governor Franklin Roosevelt, and he's written an excellent book about the candidates and the election.

Hoover and Roosevelt represented two different approaches to politics. Hoover was the traditionalist, believing voters would choose his record of administrative competence and conservative leadership over a naive, unproven upstart just spouting off platitudes. He saw campaigning as beneath him.  Like nominees before him, he did not appear at the nominating convention and never really displayed a desire for the presidency. He played hard to get, "Well, if you really, really want me to be your president, I guess I will."  For a large chunk of American history, it was considered unseemly to campaign for yourself; the candidates relied on surrogates to sling the political mud.  On the other hand, FDR was one of the most politically astute politicians in history, in my mind second only to Lincoln among US presidents, and every waking moment for over a decade was spent preparing for his presidential campaigns.  Rags to Riches orphan exemplar Hoover was seen as aloof, cold, uncaring and out of touch with average Americans, while privileged millionaire FDR convinced the poorest farmers that he understood their plight, and he won black voters over despite blocking all civil rights and anti-lynching legislation and even though blacks were often excluded from New Deal benefits.  FDR's new political style changed presidential politics forever.

Martelle also does a great job of putting the election into the context of 1932. Many forces came together, creating a "perfect storm" that led to the transition:  the Great Depression, the farming crisis, the Bonus Army, the Scottsboro Boys case, labor riots, the rise of socialism and communism, the KKK.  I learned things from reading the book about each one, and Martelle weaves all of the threads together to tell a compelling story.

 

Monty Python - Ypres 1914

Great-Uncle Harry:  A Tale of War and Empire.  Michael Palin.  Random House Canada, 2023.  336 pages.

You might know Michael Palin as a member of the great Monty Python comedy troupe or maybe from one or more of his excellent television travel series, but Great-Uncle Harry is a bit of a departure for Palin because it's a very personal family history, a quest in a way, decades in the making.  During the height of the Monty Python days, Palin's family inherited a collection of diaries, photos, and letters, a treasure trove of family documents.  Many of the items had to do with his Great-Uncle Harry, the brother of his grandfather.  Harry had never really been spoken of in the family before.  In fact, Palin had not known he had a Great-Uncle Harry, but he discovered that Harry had been one of thousands of young British men killed in 1916 at the Battle of the Somme.  Palin was intrigued, but life intervened.  Only in recent years did he decide to really dig deep and try to discover who Harry was.  This book is the result.  The finished product is an engrossing story, told of course with Palin's wit, not just of one victim of the Great War, but of the British Empire, as the subtitle foreshadows.  The reader is drawn in for glimpses of British education, class system, and society as a whole through Harry's eyes, and Harry comes across as an ordinary, average bloke kind of flailing around and trying to find his place and fit in a rapidly changing world. Palin makes a real connection, not complete but at least a connection, to a family member he never knew and makes him accessible to the rest of us as well.

Author's podcast appearance

The League of Lady Poisoners:  Illustrated True Stories of Dangerous Women.  Lisa Perrin.  Chronicle Books, 2023.  208 pages.

You say you're looking for a fun read and a beautifully illustrated book about infamous women in history who used poisons to murder?  Well, look no further. The League of Lady Poisoners is the book for you.  Lisa Perrin has illustrated many books in her career, but this is the first book that she's both written and illustrated.  She's obviously a little different; she dedicates the book to her parents, saying they hoped that she would create a beautiful children's book as her first book, and yet....

She tells the stories of 25 women from all over the world and across centuries who were accused of poisoning people, and they are organized by motive.  Some used their knowledge of plants to attain wealth and position, even becoming official, or unofficial, functionaries, providing their services to the powerful or to those hungry for power.  Some used poisons to collect insurance money or inheritances.  Others may have seen poison as their only chance to escape a life of abuse and mistreatment.  Some were just pure evil.  In the stories of the women, the reader learns a lot about their times and societies and where women actually stood in those societies.  

The book starts with a really interesting history of poisons, detailing their origins, uses, and effects.  Perrin also delves into the reasons that poisoning was seen as women's work.  As you might expect from Perrin's background, it's also a beautiful hardcover book with gold foil details on the outside and great illustrations throughout.