Shelved: Roundup of Books Read and Reviewed in December 2024

 

"Vive la Resistance! well, not really ....", WWII on YouTube

The Paris Girl.  Francelle Bradford White.  Citadel, 2024.  256 pages.  Release date December 24, 2024, Advance Reader's Edition.

When Francelle Bradford White was six years old, she learned  for the first time that her mother was a World War II heroine, with the war medals to prove it.  Andree Griotteray was19 when German troops marched into Paris.  She and her brother Alain, who later became a celebrated French journalist, immediately began working in the French Resistance.  She had just begun work in the French passport office.  Her brother created an underground network called Orion, and she proved to be a valuable member of the organization, secretly typing up and copying resistance newspapers, and collecting and forging identity paperwork used by agents in their work and by Jewish citizens in their escape attempts.  She then became an undercover courier delivering critically important military intelligence to Resistance contacts and to Allied forces beyond.  She participated in the creation of a major escape route through the Pyrenees Mountains into neutral Spain; this allowed hundreds of French men to join the Free French forces in Algeria and also allowed downed Allied pilots and crewmen and Jewish refugees to escape.  Throughout it all, Griotteray displayed incredible courage and poise, allowing her to evade capture for a while and to survive arrest and interrogation when she was eventually captured.  Here, the author uses her mother's thorough diaries and letters in addition to research not only to document her mother's extraordinary courage, but also to paint a very detailed picture of daily life in occupied France.  It's a fine read for those who looking for a unique perspective on World War II.

Audiobook preview

Hammerhead Ranch Motel.  Tim Dorsey.  William Morrow, 2001.  384 pages.  #2 of 26 Serge Storms novels.

This book, the second Serge Storms novel written by Tim Dorsey, proves that Dorsey definitely improved and refined things as the series progressed.  Serge,  Florida's greatest hype-man, history nut, and psychotic serial-killing vigilante anti-hero, almost seems like a minor character in this adventure, and he's not the more fully developed Serge that eventually emerges, and there is a real hole created by the absence of his traveling buddy, Coleman.  The other Dorsey Hallmarks are still there:  lots of Florida history, lots of wild characters, lots of crime, a little crazy sex, and lots of frantic storylines that all miraculously come together for an unbelievable climax.  The overarching quest in this novel involves a briefcase containing $5 million dollars.  Readers also get a bit of a deep dive into Serge's childhood and background.  

The Siege of Vienna

The Enemy at the Gate:  Habsburgs, Ottomans, and the Battle for Europe.  Andrew Wheatcroft.  Basic Books, 2009.  384 pages.

For three hundred years, war raged off and on in southern and eastern Europe between the Ottomans and the Habsburgs, simultaneously a war for geopolitical dominance and a religious war, a continuation of the Crusades between Christians and Muslims.  In 1683, Sultan Mehmed IV launched a huge invasion of Habsburg with the territory with the goal of conquering Vienna, the "Golden Apple" as  the Turks called it.  Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I was determined to hold Habsburg territory and to finally eliminate the Ottoman threat.  Leopold was able to forge a new alliance with the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, and Polish King John III Sobieski.  Sobieski and his specialized cavalry, the Hussars, along with grave errors made by the Ottoman commander saved the day, and the city.  Although the war continued until 1699, the Ottomans never again posed as serious a threat and were forced to cede much territory to the Habsburgs.  The Siege of Vienna marked the height of Ottoman and Habsburg power, and both empires began their long declines.

Historian Andrew Wheatcroft draws a vivid portrait of the centuries-long conflict, the battles and strategies, and the personalities involved without making it too tedious for someone like myself who usually finds military history boring.  The Ottoman-Holy Roman Empire Wars represent a weak spot in my knowledge of European history, and this book educated and interested me.

Bluebeard.  An Audible original.  Jim Clemente and Peter McDonnell.  Audible, 2024.  3 hours, 38 minutes.

This "read" was unique.  It's not really a book, more like an original hybrid of a true crime podcast and an old-fashioned radio drama (I happen to enjoy listening to classic radio shows, comedies, dramas, suspense, science fiction, etc.)  It's an adaptation of the real life story of James Watson, one of many aliases used by one of the most prolific serial killers on the West Coast.  Nicknamed "Bluebeard" by the press after the French folktale character who married and murdered many wives. Watson placed lonely hearts ads in newspapers in British Columbia, Washington, Oregon, and California in the early 1900s.  He married at least 30 of the women who responded and eventually murdered as many as 25 of them.  He also found time to rob numerous banks in the process.  In April 1920, he was finally arrested on charges of bigamy.  While being held and interrogated, the body of one of his victims was discovered, and he made a deal with prosecutors to confess in exchange for life imprisonment, dying in San Quentin Prison in 1939.  

It was a highly entertaining story, well told, but it is a dramatic adaptation, not necessarily historically accurate.  

Authors Talk

The 9th Man. Steve Berry and Grant Blackwood.  Grand Central Publishing, 2023.  368 pages.  Book 1 of 2 (so far) Luke Daniels novels.

I recently read and enjoyed the first Cotton Malone novel by Steve Berry. While Malone continues his history-based adventures, Berry has teamed up with another author to spin off a new new series featuring a younger associate of Berry. Luke Daniels.  Daniels is another southern gentlemen, like Malone, a former Army Ranger, highly trained and capable, also with a deep knowledge of history.  Same general idea, lots of action, intriguing mysteries, shady individuals, double crosses and triple crosses, lots of weapons, high body counts, and history-shaking secrets revealed.  A second Luke Daniels title was released in 2024, and another is scheduled for release in 2025.

In The 9th Man, Daniels is drawn into danger, by a woman of course, and finds himself locked in a deadly battle with a very powerful and ruthless man who will literally do anything to cover up his role in the assassination of President Kennedy.  It was a fast and enjoyable read.  I'll be reading more Cotton Malone and Luke Daniels books.

Link to American Experience (PBS) episode on Frances Perkins

Tells the story of Frances Perkins, who was appointed Labor Secretary by FDR during the Great Depression. The first female Cabinet member, she created the Social Security program, the federal minimum wage, the 40-hour work week, and ended the legal use of child labor. Featuring interviews with Nancy Pelosi, George Mitchell, David Brooks, Lawrence O’Donnell and Amy Klobuchar.

Dear Miss Perkins:  A Story of Frances Perkins' Efforts to Aid Refugees From Nazi Germany.  Rebecca Brenner Graham.  Citadel, January 21, 2025.  336 pages.  Advance Reader's Copy.

This biography ended up on my favorite ten reads list for 2024.  I always knew Frances Perkins as a footnote, albeit a major footnote, in American history, and I always made sure to mention her when I taught, but I never did her story the justice that she deserved.  American history buffs might recognize her as the first female in the presidential cabinet, serving as FDR's Secretary of Labor.  More than casual buffs might know that she was a literal eyewitness to the Triangle Shirtwaist Company fire, standing on the street below the building as dozens of young immigrant women jumped to their deaths to escape the fire, and that motivated her to become one of the driving forces behind occupational safety and labor regulations that had a tremendous impact on American society.  She became a leading figure in the New York state government administration before FDR took her to Washington, and she continued to make history and real fundamental, lasting changes, making a real case for consideration as the most effective and important American woman in the 20th century.  Yet, few, including history buffs and teachers like myself know enough about the real Frances Perkins.

She had major struggles in her life and career, a husband who spent most of their marriage in and out of mental institutions as a manic depressive, probably what would be bipolar disorder today. She had to deal with the sexism that women in any career faced, especially politics, as she was always the only woman in the room.  She was the object of vitriolic attacks in the press, and voluminous hate mail that accused her of being a communist  and Jewish (She was Episcopalian.).  She was impeached (but not removed) from Congress, and even FDR, who had been an ardent supporter and admirer, turned his back on her when her progressivism threatened his support.  (Another strong, accomplished woman who made him what he was that he betrayed.)  At the time of her tenure, immigration fell under the purview of the Labor Department, and she made it her mission to help refugees fleeing Nazi Germany.  This book gives the reader a look into her phenomenal character and career, particularly this part of it.  She was a real American hero.

 

Author talk

You Dreamed of Empires.  Alvaro Enrigue.  Translated by Natasha Wimmer.  Harvill Secker, 2024.  224 pages.  

I first saw glowing reviews of this book a couple of weeks ago, reviews that hailed it as original, creative, funny, anti-colonial, genius, etc.  It's mostly an account of the events of one day in history, the day that Hernan Cortex and his conquistadors arrived in Tenochtitlan, the capital of the Aztec Empire, as the guests (or prisoners?) of Emperor Montezuma (Moctezuma II) and a meeting of two vastly different cultures that would prove to be one of the most fateful meetings of history.  My feeling after reading the book?  Meh.  Of course it's anti-colonial, otherwise it would never have been published and would never have made all the media lists of best books of the year.   The Spanish are minor characters in the story, naturally portrayed as arrogant and ignorant buffoons, totally clueless about everything.  The real story is the palace intrigue as Montezuma (Moctezuma) is simultaneously a quivering mass of uncertainty and an all-powerful man-god.  He is so powerful that if one of his subjects commits the smallest infraction of protocol, he simply tells the offender to report to the palace guards to report to the palace guards and tell them to execute him, AND HE DOES!  Yet, these weird visitors have him flummoxed,  his priests advise him that he shouldn't do what his instincts tell him needs to be done, and his empress/sister and subordinates plot against him, so he spends the day eating, napping, bathing, and consuming lots of hallucinogens.  

There's a little humor, a little magic, a little historical accuracy, and a lot of strangeness.  I don't even think it's all that original.  It reminds me of the late 1960s and early 1970s when authors and filmmakers started churning out works that redefined the western - making whites ridiculous and evil, while finally bringing humanity and a more well-rounded characterization to Native Americans.  Overall, I found the book interesting, but overrated.

Author talk

Broadway Butterfly:  Vivian Gordon the Lady Gangster of Jazz Age New York.  Anthony M. DeStefano.  Citadel, 2024.  256 pages.  

In the 1920s and 1930s, there was a group of women who followed their dreams of theatrical stardom to New York City.  There were so many that they were given a name,  "Broadway Butterflies."  Few of them attained stardom, or even work, on the Broadway stage.  Most had their dreams dashed, and some were forced to turn to even less savory occupations in dance halls and nightclubs, or, even worse as kept women, mistresses, or sex workers.  Some found themselves in lives of addiction or criminality, and several were murdered during the Jazz Age.  The most notorious example of the tragic Broadway Butterfly was probably Vivian Gordon.  On February 26, 1931, Gordon's battered lifeless body was discovered in a Bronx park.  The murder led to revelations of her life as not only a prostitute and madam, but also as a blackmailer and extortionist who kept detailed records of important men and their business with her and her girls.  These men were in the top ranks of New York society, business, and government and even included the infamous Judge Joseph Crater, who disappeared, never to be seen or heard from again.  Gordon's murder generated a press frenzy and a public outcry, revealing the entrenched corruption of the New York legal system and the blatant corruption and incompetence of the city's charismatic Mayor Jimmy Walker.  In fact, Walker was a firm ally of Governor Franklin Roosevelt before the murder, but the public nature of the mishandled and bungled investigation led FDR to turn against the Mayor so that his rising presidential campaign suffered no damage.  Was the murderer one of her angry clients, a man afraid that she could testify about the system, of someone else?  DeStefano is a Pulitzer-winning journalist who's written several books about historical organized crime figures, and he takes the reader through Gordon's story, the various theories about why she was murdered, and the political ramifications that resulted.

Shelved: Roundup of Books Read and Reviewed in November 2024

 

Authors Talk

The Cuban Sandwich:  A History In Layers.  Andrew T. Huse, Barbara C. Cruz, and Jeff Houck.  University Press of Florida, 2022.  180 pages.

Every state has a couple of foods that Americans associate with that state.  In Florida, it's most likely key lime pie and the Cuban sandwich.  Personally, I think smoked mullet is a much bigger and better contribution to food than those two combined, but they are the quintessential Florida foods in the minds of most Americans.  

The Cuban sandwich has a long history of popularity, but both its composition and its origin have been clouded by conflicting claims and stories.  Tampa, Miami, and Key West all claim to be the home of the sandwich, which typically consists of some combination of pork (ham, roast pork, pulled pork), Swiss cheese, mustard, and pickles on Cuban bread.  Tampans add salami, a heresy according to other aficionados.  While the origin story has been researched before, authors Huse, Cruz, and Houck felt that there was more to the story and that it hadn't been fully told.  After extensive research, and I'm sure countless Cubans, they've created this fantastic history and a great read.  I have always believed that food is an excellent entry point when studying history, and this book delivers.  Their research reveals that Cuba was known for its sandwiches even before the Spanish-American War, even before the word sandwich reached Cuba, and they were often considered treats for upper class Cubans out on Sunday strolls.  There were different sandwiches with different names.  One of those sandwiches, called a mixto by most Cubans, eventually made its way to the United States, probably with immigrants to New York City.  The original sandwich looked very different, often including turkey or chicken, and/or lettuce and tomatoes. When Cubans settled in Florida, the sandwich went from upper class treat to staple for workers in cigar factories and other occupations.  The authors have done a delicious job of presenting Cuban and Florida history in all of its layers, and, along with the history, they include really interesting profiles of people and businesses that have made and continue to make contributions in Cuban sandwich-ology.

 

Kissinger's Betrayal:  How America Lost the Vietnam War.  Stephen A. Young.  RealClear Publishing, 2023.  432 pages.

Henry Kissinger's recent death at age 100 marked the end of a roughly 70 year career as academic historian, National Security Advisor, Secretary of State, and advisor to a dozen presidents.  He shaped much of America's Cold War policy and history, and he became one of the most powerful and influential men in all of American history, credited with overseeing detente with both the USSR and the People's Republic of China and negotiating the Paris Peace Accords that ended US involvement in Vietnam.  His legacy is incredibly complicated, and historians will be struggling to unpack it and sort it out for decades.  Was he a genius diplomat  who worked tirelessly to achieve peace or was he a war criminal whose actions brought death and suffering on a huge scale, ultimately thwarting peace and stability?

Author Stephen A. Young's book tackles this question of legacy head-on, and one can correctly infer from the title what his opinion is.  Young was on the ground during the Vietnam War, tasked with building support for South Vietnam's government amongst the local populations as part of the US-sponsored CORDS program.  He went on to become an academic and think tank director.  Here, he relies on formerly classified documents in American, Vietnamese, and Russian archives, numerous interviews, and especially the personal papers of U.S. Ambassador to South Vietnam, Ellsworth Bunker to accuse Kissinger of turning his back on the people of South Vietnam, deceiving President Nixon and other Cabinet members, along with the South Vietnamese President Nguyen Van Thieu, causing the collapse of South Vietnam when it could have survived otherwise.  He makes a compelling case, and the background  and history of the Vietnam conflict are phenomenally presented.  However, it is obvious that Young does have a particular agenda, and his interpretations differ from the accepted view.  For example, while conventional wisdom often portrays Nguyen Van Thieu as extremely corrupt and incompetent, I think Young portrays him almost as admirable, even heroic.  And, of course, we will never know for sure if South Vietnam could have survived American withdrawal under different conditions.  Biased as the author as, I still think the book adds to the history of the Vietnam War.

  

Author talk

Mermaid Confidential.  Tim Dorsey.  William Morrow, 2022.  368 pages.  (#25 of 26 Serge Storms novels)

With national and world events in the state they're in, I felt the need for a quick for a quick mental palate cleanse, and what could be better than the continuing adventures of my favorite psychopathic, history-loving, serial-killing vigilante, Serge Storms.  Serge is the creation of Tim Dorsey, the brilliantly twisted comic genius who unfortunately passed away far too early, one year ago this month.  Serge Storms is a manic, obsessive, super-intelligent anti-hero who is Florida's biggest fan and supporter, constantly dispensing knowledge about everything Florida - history, culture, flora, fauna, climate, geology, all things Florida.  He travels the state with his best buddy Coleman who is decidedly not intellectual and is, in fact, drunk and/or stoned most of the time.  As they pursue their Florida adventures, they encounter really good people who have been grievously wronged by really bad people, and Serge goes into full vigilante mode, devising incredibly ingenious plots to exact revenge and set things right.

Mermaid is a love letter to the Florida Keys - and, yes, the Keys are a strange and different place from even the rest of Florida - and the reader learns about real locations, events, and cultural touchstones that make the Keys unique, including learning about Florida condo living, charter boat fishing, drug smuggling, cartel wars, and money laundering. (There's even a chapter set in Forsyth, Georgia that caught me by surprise.)  The Serge novels are always fun and always educational.  I'm glad that I have about 20 more to read, but sad that there aren't more to come.  Why isn't there a Serge Storms TV series yet?  Just begging for Danny McBride to produce it.

Audiobook preview

The Templar Legacy.  Steve Berry.  Ballantine Books, 2006.  496 pages. (Cotton Malone series, book 1 of 19)

Did you read the The Da Vinci Code twenty years ago, like everybody else?  I did, and I remember enjoying the ride but feeling very unsatisfied upon completion, much like I felt with the tv show "Lost" (but not as intensely unsatisfied as I felt with "Lost").  In 2006, author Steve Berry began the adventures of Cotton Malone, a highly capable federal agent who retired to become an antique book dealer in Copenhagen.  When his former boss has personal business in Copenhagen and pops in for a social visit, he finds himself embroiled in a mystery that disrupts and threatens not only his life, but the very foundations of western history and Christianity,  a mystery involving the Knights Templar.

The Knights Templar order was an order of holy warriors formed during the Crusades in Jerusalem in 1118.  Over the next two centuries, the order enjoyed favor and support from popes and secular kings, accumulating great power and wealth.  Then, in the early 1300s, Pope Clement V, at the behest of French King Philip IV, declared war on the Knights Templar.  The Templars were charged with blasphemy, greed, and all forms of sexual deviance.  Thousands of Templars were brutally tortured and executed, their assets were seized, and the order was abolished.  Or was  it?  Over the next seven hundred years, legends grew of hidden Templar treasures and lost Templar knowledge.  Ex-agent Cotton Malone finds himself deeply involved in the Templar legend.  

If you like mysteries grounded in real historical events, the Cotton Malone series is a series that you would probably enjoy.

A "best of" compilation

Don Rickles:  The Merchant of Venom.  Michael Seth Starr.  Citadel, 2022.  352 pages.

Gen Xers and Baby Boomers definitely know who Don Rickles was.  He was a comedy legend for decades even though he polarized audiences throughout his career.  Fitting, because he was really two different people.  In real life, he was a shy, quiet, introverted mama's boy, and his friends described him as incredibly kind, sweet, loving, generous, and loyal.  On stage, he viciously attacked everybody, celebrities and civilians alike, making jokes that broke every single taboo and crossed every line, without regard to race, religion, gender, sexuality, politics, handicaps, and physical appearance.  He was an equal opportunity offender, a lifelong Democrat who was friends with Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush.  Most of his targets took it in stride, believing that an insult from "Mr. Warmth" meant that you had made it. Others took the insults to heart.  Audiences were divided as well, but Rickles zoomed to the top of his field, dominating stages and becoming a fixture on television in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s.  This biography is an informative and thorough recounting of his career, but it's somewhat superficial.  There are no deep, dark personal tragedies, no alcohol, drug, or sexual abuse, no deep dives into anyone's psyche.  However, that might be appropriate considering that the subject himself built an impregnable wall that separated his public and private personas.

Audiobook Preview

The Maltese Iguana.  Tim Dorsey.  William Morrow, 2023.   336 pages.  Serge Storms series, #26 of 26.

I escaped again to Tim Dorsey's brilliantly hilarious Florida Man world, reading the last Serge Storms novel, published in 2023.  But is it really an escape from real life?  Dorsey's books are all filled to the brim with real life since plot lines are all taken from real life, and my favorite psychopathic history-loving serial killer Serge Storms dispenses more Florida history knowledge than any professor in each book, but the story is always presented in an unbelievably surreal and hysterically funny way.  SERIOUSLY, WHY ISN'T THERE A DANNY MCBRIDE-PRODUCED SERGE STORMS TV SERIES?  

In what is sadly the final chapter of the series, Serge and his buddy Coleman are loving life in their Florida Keys condo, all settled in to the routine of weekly game nights and spaghetti and meatballs potlucks with their neighbors, but then the pandemic hits, totally upending their world.  As if that wasn't enough, they find themselves enmeshed in an overcomplicated CIA debacle, allowing Serge to expound on fifty years of CIA history in addition to Florida Keys history and Florida movie history.

Author podcast appearance

Eden Undone:  A True Story of Sex, Murder, and Utopia at the Dawn of World War II.  Abbott Kahler.  Crown, 2024.  352 pages.  

Take a handful of crazy Germans and a barren rugged flyspeck of an island in the Galapagos Archipelago in the chaotic decade of the 1930s, throw in a few American millionaire adventurers and a murder mystery, and you've got one hell of a story.  Narrative nonfiction author Abbott Kahler recognized the hook of a great story and told it in Eden Undone.  Kahler, the author of great books like The Ghosts of Eden Park, Sin in the Second City, and Liar, Temptress, Soldier, Spy. recently changed her name to avoid confusion with another author named Karen Abbott.  After she discovered the story, she learned that movie director Ron Howard had also discovered it, making his own movie adaptation of the story, set for release in the very near future.

The first crazy Germans central to the story are an unhappy housewife diagnosed with multiple sclerosis and an arrogant doctor who detests sick people, follows the philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche, and believes that a life of primitive living, vegetarianism, and nudism will enable him and others to live to be 150 or older.  They meet, fall into something (love? not like you've known it hopefully), convince their spouses to "free" them, arrange for their spouses to move in together as husband and wife, and decide to move to the island of Floreana to establish their own personal utopia.  Once settled on the island, word gets out in the world press, and they're joined, despite their objections,  by a German couple looking for their own slice of Eden and a baroness with her two male sex slaves who plans to make Floreana a resort city for the wealthy, a new Miami Florida.  Lots and lots of tension ensues, and ultimately the baroness and one of her slaves disappear, never to be seen or heard from again.  "Gilligan's Island," it ain't - unless you picture an S&M, fetishistic version with elements of "Desperate Housewives," and Ryan Murphy productions thrown in.  It's a fantastic story that proves truth is stranger than fiction, and this is a great book.  I read it over the course of two days.

 

Audiobook preview

The Big Bamboo.  Tim Dorsey.  William Morrow, 2006.  352 pages.  Serge Storms series, book 8 of 26.

In this, the 8th of 26 titles in the Tim Dorsey series relating the adventures of history -loving psychopath Serge Storms, Serge and his best buddy Coleman indulge Serge's current obsession with movies.  Serge's search for inspiration to fuel his screenwriting efforts takes them on a madcap dash through Tampa, Orlando, and Miami before a family tragedy leads to the next logical location:  Hollywood.  In Hollywood, Serge lands smack-dab in the middle of a chaotic scene involving two incredibly sleazy film-producing brothers, who make Serge look like Mr. Morality, Japanese organized crime hitmen, and murderous Alabama rednecks out for revenge.  The plot is, of course, overly complicated and involves a huge cast of characters - true for every Serge Storms novel - but all the loose threads come together in the end, and of course, there is lots of history and lots of mayhem along the way.  Honestly, this may be least favorite Serge novel so far, but I still love the series and want more.

The 1853 Dinner Party inside the Dinosaur described in the book

Dinosaurs at the Dinner Party:  How an Eccentric group of Victorians Discovered Prehistoric Creatures and Accidentally Upended the World.  Edward Dolnick.  Scribner, 2024.  352 pages.

Natural history was all the rage in Victorian England.  It seemed that everyone spent their leisure time communing with nature, walking, climbing, and beachcombing, collecting animals, plants, rocks, and fossils.  They assembled personal collections which they proudly displayed, museums were established and attendance bloomed, and scientific lecturers drew standing room only crowds across the country.  Scientists who were charismatic and attractive had audiences of adoring female fans hanging on every word.  The prevailing attitude was that God had created a perfect world functioned smoothly according to his plan, and that science existed in order to prove and illuminate His work.  That worldview began to deteriorate around 1800 when fossilized remains of previously unknown creatures were discovered and studied.  They had been found before, explained away as dragons, cyclops, unicorns, animals that didn't catch Noah's ark, fakes planted by either God or Satan to confuse, but a handful of people began looking at them differently, and their claims shook the Victorian mindset, raising confounding questions.  How can this be when the earth is only 6,000 years old?  Extinction was impossible -how could God make that part of His plan?  How could there possibly have been an entirely different world with entirely different creatures long before Man ever arrived on the scene when the world was created for Man to enjoy?

This book is incredibly entertaining and educational as it describes the work of these important, and eccentric, pioneers, the discoveries and theories that preceded their work, and the effects of their work on Victorian thinking.  It's one of my favorite reads of the year so far.  

Shelved: Roundup of Books Read and Reviewed in October 2024

 

Author on History Hack Podcast

Forged in Hell:  The Gripping True Story of the Special Forces Heroes Who Broke the Nazi Stronghold.  Damien Lewis.  Citadel Press, October 22, 2024 (Advance Readers Copy).  400 pages.

Damien Lewis is a well known British military historian who has written many books about World War II, including The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare, which was recently made into a major motion picture chronicling stories of the British Special Air Service (SAS) an elite special forces unit that was formed in 1941.  The SAS specializes in behind the lines clandestine operations that include hostage rescue, counter-terrorism, sabotage, and intelligence-gathering.  In July 1943, an SAS force was assigned to lead the invasion of Sicily, the "soft underbelly of Europe" as Winston Churchill called it, in order to dislodge Axis troops and to make a toehold for the largest invasion fleet ever assembled up to that time so that Allied troops could land and start making their way up  the Italian boot.  The SAS force was outnumbered at least 50 to 1 and had to deal with almost impregnable cliff-based defenses, and the fighting on the Italian peninsula would prove to be some of the most harrowing combat in the European theater, but the men of the SAS had their duty to fulfill.

Lewis is a great military historian, and his books read like novels.  If you are a military buff, especially a WWII buff, this book is a must-read.

CBS Sunday Morning

Love and Whiskey:  The Remarkable True Story of Jack Daniel, His Master Distiller Nearest Green, and the Improbable Rise of Uncle Nearest.  Fawn Weaver.  Melcher Media Inc., 2024.  376 pages.

While I've never been much a drinker, and I don't have a very discerning palate when it comes to alcohol, I was intrigued when I stumbled across a short video of Fawn Weaver discussing her new book.  I read it, and I loved it.   It's a great story of American history, but it's so much more.  It's the story of an inspiring woman who should be an example  of achievement, but I had never even heard her name until I stumbled on that video.  It's a great story of historical and genealogical mystery solving.  It's also a great story for aspiring entrepreneurs and business people, especially women and people of color.

Fawn Weaver's journey is incredible.  The daughter of a Motown music songwriter and producer turned preacher and a minister's wife who published books on marriage and family, she left home  and school at 15, lived in homeless shelters, and worked various jobs until, by age 20, she had become the head of a successful public relations firm. That success led to more success, with stumbling blocks along the way.  One day, she happened to read a story about the relationship between Jack Daniel and his distilling mentor, Nearest Green.  That story implied that the relationship had been mischaracterized by social media (gasps of shock and disbelief!), and she was hooked.  She made it her mission to uncover the true story.  She and her husband relocated from Los Angeles to Lynchburg Tennessee to do research.  Three years later, she had turned the prevailing narrative on its head and discovered a totally unique, and previously unknown, episode of American history, and they founded a brand new distillery, named Uncle Nearest to honor the first known black master distiller in American history, to preserve and to tell the story.  This truly is a great American story, accessible on many levels, even for people who aren't whiskey connoisseurs.  

Book Talk

Twilight Man:  Love and Ruin in the Shadows of Hollywood and the Clark Empire.  Liz Brown.  Penguin Books, 2021.  400 pages.

"In the booming 1920s, William Andrews Clark Jr. was one of the richest, most respected men in Los Angeles. The son of the mining tycoon known as "The Copper King of Montana," Clark launched the Los Angeles Philharmonic and helped create the Hollywood Bowl. He was also a man with secrets, including a lover named Harrison Post. A former salesclerk, Post enjoyed a lavish existence among Hollywood elites, but the men's money--and their homosexuality--made them targets, for the district attorney, their employees and, in Post's case, his own family. When Clark died suddenly, Harrison Post inherited a substantial fortune--and a wealth of trouble. From Prohibition-era Hollywood to Nazi prison camps to Mexico City nightclubs, Twilight Man tells the story of an illicit love and the battle over a family estate that would destroy one man's life."  (Amazon description)

Very few people today have ever heard of either William Clark Jr or Harrison Post, but they were once well known, at least in Los Angeles society, and Post's struggles were covered in the press, long after the society pages lost interest. Author Liz Brown only stumbled onto the story because she is the great-grandniece of William Clark and found a photo of Post in her grandmother's home.  The photo triggered memories of family whispers about her great uncle, and she set out to track down the real story of their relationship.  In the process, she manages to take a self-absorbed bore and leech (Post) whose total livelihood and existence are dependent on his connections to other people and to make his life interesting, even making him a somewhat sympathetic character.  She also takes the reader into the world of a rich and powerful family who played a significant role in the development of the western US, into Hollywood of the 1920s, and into the coded and hidden gay culture of the early 20th century.  It's a story that involves people keeping secrets hidden (even if the secrets aren't really secret) and inventing and re-inventing themselves.  The result is an interesting social history.

Overstated:  A Coast-to-Coast Roast of the 50 States.  Colin Quinn.  St. Martin's Press, 2020.  256 pages.

I stumbled onto this book.  I like Colin Quinn, and I liked I liked his book The Coloring Book,  It was a quick listen, obviously a project to keep him occupied during the pandemic.  It is, as promised, a very mild roast of the fifty states, celebrating the quirks and differences that make each state unique.  There are amusing bits and interesting bits.  While there are occasional historical flubs, he is not a historian and is not writing history, but the reader can see that Quinn does have an appreciation for history.  Try it out if you like Quinn as a stand-up.

Book Trailer

Follow the Stars Home.  Diane C. McPhail.  A John Scognamilio Book, 2024.  304 pages.

When I first encountered this work of historical fiction biography, I was intrigued.  The protagonist of the story is Lydia Latrobe Roosevelt, the great grand-aunt of Theodore Roosevelt.  I had never heard of her before, so I looked her up.  What a life!  She was the daughter of Benjamin Latrobe, one of the chief architects of the US Capitol and the White House.  At age 13, she began "courting" Nicholas Roosevelt, a friend and business partner of her father.  They married when she was 17, and he was 41.  Roosevelt was an inventor and entrepreneur who partnered with Robert Fulton.  Together, they pioneered the development of the steamboat, a huge advance in transportation that had a major impact on westward expansion.  In order to generate publicity and to demonstrate the efficacy of the steamboat in 1811, he sailed the New Orleans down the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers, from Pittsburgh to New Orleans, in 14 days. It was an unprecedented journey, and Nicholas was not alone; Lydia accompanied her husband, 8 months pregnant and with a toddler in tow, breaking all gender barriers.  Lydia was apparently an incredibly woman of her day.

Unfortunately, I am not a fan of romantic historical fiction, and this book -as much as I could read - is definitely in that genre.  The title is a giveaway; it sounds like the title of a Hallmark Channel movie, even a Hallmark Christmas movie, and the book reads that way.  I would have much rather read a straight biography or history.  However, I  know there is a market out there, and there are readers who will appreciate it.  I am just not that reader,

Shelved: Roundup of Book Posts September 2024

 

Audiobook preview

Who Ate the First Oyster?:  The Extraordinary People Behind the Greatest Firsts in History.  Cody Cassidy.  Penguin Books, 2020.  240 pages.

This was one of the most fun books that I've read in a while.  It's very much aimed at a mass audience, and I listened to the audiobook version which was very podcast-like --- a really well done and thoroughly entertaining podcast, not the average podcasts with the clueless host, the breathless host, or the gigglebox host.  Writer Cody Cassidy did his research and interviewed leaders in one of the fastest evolving (pun intended) fields of science there is, paleoanthropology, the study of prehistoric humankind.  New discoveries and conclusions are being made in this field at an incredible pace, turning "established" theories on their heads.  He asked them about firsts, who did certain things first and how did they impact the development of humanity.  Who wore the first pants? Who painted the first masterpiece? Who first rode the horse? Who invented soap?  Who invented the wheel? Who told the first joke? Who drank the first beer? Who was the murderer in the first murder mystery, who was the first surgeon, who sparked the first fire--and most critically, who was the first to brave the slimy, pale oyster?

Of course, no one could provide concrete answers like "Thag did it on June 21, 45,000 BC."  What he does do is set up the context and describe the likely character and scenario and explain the invention, how it came about, and its significance.  In the process, he really prompts the reader to think about prehistoric man in a totally new light.  First, we have to drop the whole idea of prehistoric man being "primitive" and less intelligent.  Just consider the vast knowledge that they had to know in order to survive and how helpless we would be in their world.  Second, there are undeniable universalities across all human cultures that make us human and unite us over place and time.  There were prehistoric geniuses, dullards, clowns, artists, wheelers and dealers, just like humans today.  This was an eye-opening, edifying, and entertaining book.

Red Hook:  Brooklyn Mafia, Ground Zero.  Frank DiMatteo and Michael Benson.  Citadel, 2024.  368 pages.  (Advance Readers Copy:  Official Sale date is November 26, 2024.)

Today, we know Brooklyn as the second largest borough of New York City, at 71 square miles, a vibrant, diverse home to artists and hipsters, but it was an independent city for 250 years before it was officially absorbed into New York in 1898. Around the turn of the 20th century, Brooklyn was known for two things:  a busy port and lots of crime.  It seemed men had two choices according to the authors, "You either worked the docks or you became a crook."  There were as many as 79  juvenile street gangs, and many of the alumni graduated into harder crime.  Irish and then Italian organized crime families came to dominate Brooklyn, with all of the big names involved, with nicknames like "Scarface," "The Mad Hatter," "Peg Leg," "Wild Bill," "Cigar," and "The Executioner."  Over the 20th century, mob activities, turf wars, and hits were commonplace, and Brooklyn became "ground zero' for organized crime.  That century of Brooklyn's history is well documented here by two bona fide mafia historians, one of whom is the son of a former Mafia bodyguard, and the other has published numerous books on the subject.   This is a must-read for those interested in mob history.

Podcast on Willoughbyland

Willoughbyland:  England's Lost Colony.   Matthew Parker.  Thomas Dunne Books, 2017.  313 pages.

Having recently read Keith Thomson's Paradise of the Damned, the account of Sir Walter Raleigh's obsession with the legends of El Dorado, the golden city of South America, this book popped up on my radar.  Raleigh's stories and expeditions inspired many other English adventurers over the next several decades, including Sir Francis Willoughby.  In 1650, Lord Willoughby, a royalist concieved a plan to colonize the land between the Amazon and Orinoco Rivers, present day Suriname, both as a refuge for fellow royalists escaping parliamentarian rule in England and as a profit-making venture.  He recruited hundreds of settlers, including planters from Barbados and Jews who had earlier settled in Brazil.  The colonists discovered a world beyond their dreams:  vast tracks of thick jungle, an area of immense biodiversity including 800 tree species, 1,600 bird species, 300 species of catfish alone, and animals like anteaters, armadillos, caiman, and manatees.  Even in 2013, an expedition documented thousands of species of animals, including 60 never before identified.  By 1663, there were 1,000 white colonists successfully producing and exporting sugar and tobacco. They enjoyed a degree of religious tolerance found in few places in Europe at the time and were ruled by an assembly of planters that voted on proposals offered by the governor and executive council.  The colony largely coexisted peacefully with their indigenous neighbors.  Unfortunately, the economic success was built on the enslavement of Africans, and the Barbadian planters imposed their notoriously brutal form of slavery on the enslaved.  The colony was captured by  the Dutch during the Second Anglo-Dutch War in 1667, but it was nominally re-captured by the British a few months later.  By that time, there wasn't much left of the colony, and Suriname was officially swapped for New Amsterdam (now New York City) in a treaty seven years later.  Today, there is almost no trace of the colony, except for the descendants of those enslaved people, and the jungle has swallowed Willoughbyland.

Author talk

Perfidia.  James Ellroy.  Knopf, 2014.  720 pages.

Are you a misanthrope at heart?  Do you think humanity is innately evil and beyond redemption? Do you like long, overly complicated stories full of vile characters who speak in stilted and totally unrealistic dialogue?  Do you like gritty, grimy, graphic, violent crime noir? with shocking levels of corruption, racism, and brutality?  If so, you are probably familiar with the works of James Ellroy, or definitely should be.  I've read some of his other works, but I somehow missed this book, which won numerous awards and has been called a "great Americal novel" by many reviewers and critics,  until now.

The setting is Los Angeles in December 1941.  The city is on edge well before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on Pearl Harbor.  The entire city police force and government is made up of greedy, corrupt, power-hungry, evil, hateful, racist, misogynistic men who have no qualms about committing rape, murder, theft, or any other crime on the books as long as it adds to their wealth and/or power.  The Pearl Harbor attack leads to an explosion of sorruption and racism, like a gigantic pimple bursting and expelling oozing pus. Every character is tainted, including the alleged hero, Japanese-American police forensic specialist Hideo Ashida, as he attempts to solve the murders of a Japanese-American family in an all-white neighborhood.  This puts him into conflict and collusion at various times with Sergeant Dudley Smith, a war profiteer and schemer extraordinaire, Captain Bill Parker, an alcoholic climber with designs on becoming the next Los Angeles police chief, and Kay Lake, a 21-year old adrenaline junkie who thrives on being at the center of the action. There are also real people as minor characters like J. Edgar Hoover, Eleanor Roosevelt, JFK, Sergei Rachmaninoff, Bette Davis, Joan Crawford, and Paul Robeson.  Sure, it's graphic, violent, disturbing, totally politically incorrect, and disgusting, but I found it hard to put down.

Curator Talk on the exhibit at The Dali Museum

Reimagining Nature:  Dali's Floral Fantasies.   Salvador Dali Museum & Ludion, 2024.  108 pages.  (Available online and in The Dali Museum gift shop)

One of the pleasures of living where we do is that we are an hour from The Dali Museum in St. Petersburg, Florida, one of our favorite museums, and we quickly became members after moving.  "Reimagining Nature" is a current exhibit (through October 27, 2024) of three suites of floral prints created by Salvador Dali between 1968 and 1972.  The prints are a part of the museum's permanent collection, but they haven't been displayed together for 20 years. In order to create these prints, Dali took original 18th and 19th century botanical illustrations by masters of the genre and painted over them by juxtaposing  surreal and incongruous elements and symbols that he often used throughout his career like flies, ants, melting clocks, and body parts.  The prints are collected in this catalog, no texts, just beuatiful engaging prints..  

Shelved: Roundup of Book Posts August 2024

 

The Cruise of the USS Codfish

I Shouldn't Even Be Doing This!: And Other Things That Strike Me As Funny.  Bob Newhart.  Hyperion, 2006.  256 pages.

A short time ago, the world lost a legend when Bob Newhart passed away.  He was one of the most unique and talented comedians ever, and, by all accounts, an extremely nice guy, one of my favorite performers.  He started his comedic career in clubs in the late 1950s, became the king of comedy albums and a favorite talk show and variety guest in the 1960s, the star of a long running hit tv show in the 1970s and another in the 1980s, acted in some big movies, and reintroduced himself to new audiences in great guest appearances in the 2010s.  His autobiography, originally published in 2006, returned to bestseller lists following his death, so I gave it a listen,  The audiobook version is only a few hours long, and it is read by him, a definite bonus.  As you would expect, there is nothing salacious or scandalous.  In fact, real autobiographical details are sparse, not much more than he would have discussed as a talk show guest, but the book is full of some of his greatest bits and the stories and inspirations around them.  This is a real treat for Newhart fans.

Book talk with author

A Deeper South:  The Beauty, Mystery, and Sorrow of the Southern Road. Pete Candler.  University of South Carolina Press, 2024.  400 pages.

Here's another in the umpteen dozen books that fall into what must be one of the biggest genres of nonfiction literature these days: a travelogue of the South designed to investigate and explain what makes the American South the most mysterious, confusing, interesting, misunderstood, demonized, and romanticized region of the United States, usually focused on race.  This  one is written by a member of one of the most privileged families in Atlanta, the Candlers, the wealthy, philantropic, and politically prominent family connected to Coca-Cola, among other enterprises.  As books of this genre go, it's  a good one.  Candler is a good writer.  I enjoyed the journey, - although "enjoyed" doesn't seem the right word - and I learned things and made note of places that I would like to visit myself, so I recommend it to readers of southern history and travelogues.  His description of the National Memorial for Peace and Justice in Montgomery took me there, masterfully. Two things stand out beyond that.  First, Candler is a few years younger than me, and he attended Atlanta private schools that charge about $50,000 or more a year tuition today, but I was shocked to learn that my public school education in small-town south Georgia was better than his.  He constantly refers to things he learned nothing about in school, but they were all part of my education.  Secondly, this was the worst edited book that I've read in years, perhaps ever.  Apparently, the University of South Carolina Press doesn't employ proofreaders.  I ran into grammar errors, spelling errors, wrong words, and repeated words every few pages.  I was so frustrated by the errors that it became difficult reading. (And while I'm complaining, the covers of the paperback both are permanently curled from normal reading.)

Author podcast appearance

Chaos:  Charles Manson, the CIA, and the Secret History of the Sixties.  Tom O'Neill with Dan Piepenbring.  William Heinemann, 2019.  356 pages.

It's one of the most infamous crime sprees in American history, culminating in the bloody slaughter of seven adults in August 1969, at the hands of  The Family, a group of hippies under the control and direction of a self-proclaimed messiah/devil named Charles Manson.  In 1999, journalist Tom O'Neill was contracted to write a piece for the movie magazine Premiere focusing on the impact of the murders on the entertainment industry 30 years later.  As he got into the story, the story developed into an obsession that consumed the next twenty years of his life.  He interviewed hundreds of people and scoured thousands of pages of documents and discovered mountains of evidence that make it clear that the story we all have been told, the story promulgated by prosecutor Vincent Bugliosi in one of the best selling true crime books in history, Helter Skelter, is not the true story.  What he found is shocking.  The real story is full of police incompetence and massive coverups, and Bugliosi intentionally withheld evidence from court, fellow prosecutors, and defense attorneys and even allowed, if not encouraged, witnesses to perjure themselves on the witness stand because he crafted the story of Helter Skelter in order to make his career and fortune.  (Spoiler alert: Bugliosi was a bad, bad man.)  Charles Manson and the Family and/or their victims had deep connections to the entertainment industry:  producers, writers, executives, The Beach Boys, The Mamas and the Papas, Warren Beatty, Candice Bergen, and many others.  They also enjoyed a weird protection from authorities.  Manson and the people under his control were arrested numerous times before the murders, for auto theft, credit card theft, robbery, contributing to the delinquency of minors, drugs, and many more.  Even the accusations could have been used to revoke Manson's parole and reincarcerate him.  Yet, in every case, Manson and the others were released without charges or explanations.  Police officers told O'Neill that they were ordered to leave the Family alone.  Why?  O'Neill spent decades trying to figure out why, and his quest leads him into a deep dive into COINTELPRO, Chaos, and MKUltra - three incredibly illegal, unethical, and destructive secret projects conducted by the FBI and CIA which seemingly prove that government is never to be trusted.

 

author talk

Sunshine State Mafia:  A History of Florida's Mobsters, Hit Men, and Wise Guys.  Doug Kelly.  University of Florida Press, 2024.  194 pages.  

Almost from its inception in America, organized crime has had a home in Florida.  Crime family leaders quickly recognized that Florida was a safe haven from both winter and law enforcement.  Like every other American, mob figures viewed the wide open state as a vacation playground at first but then started running very successful bootlegging, gambling, prostitution, extortion, money laundering, and drug smuggling operations which made them lots of money and inspired some locals to go for their own piece of the action.  Doug Kelly is a licensed private investigator, security expert, outdoorsman, columnist, video producer, and writer who has crafted this short, but informative history of organized crime in the Sunshine State, based on his own experiences, research, and lots and lots of interviews with retired law enfordement members,  It opens with a quick introduction to the organization and inner workings of organied crime and then delves into the stories of the infamous like Al Capone and Tampa's Trafficante family as well as the lesser known figures who carved out their own local fiefdoms built on illegal activities like bolita, the popular lottery ball game imported from Cuba.  It's a good read if you're into organized crime history or Florida history.