I’m still (slowly) going through the
book collection; here are some more of the victims.

How to Live with a Neurotic Dog, by Stephen Baker.
Funny book; we no longer have a dog.

A Treasury of American Anecdotes, edited by
B.A. Botkin. A friend gave me this many years ago, rightly
guessing it’s something I’d find interesting. Unfortunately, the cover
is more interesting than the contents; once was enough.

This is True: Deputy Kills Man With Hammer, by
Randy Cassingham. “This is True” was, and perhaps still is,
a sort of proto-weblog dealing with odd news items. I bought the book
because I used to work with Randy Cassingham.

The Long Valley, by John Steinbeck. I went
through almost all of Steinbeck some years ago, and I’ve concluded that
when he’s being funny he’s really, really good, and when he’s being serious,
he’s really, really serious. This is one of the serious ones.

Little Girls in Pretty Boxes, by Joan Ryan. The
world remembers Nadia Comeneci, Kim Zmeskal, and Dominique Dawes as truly
outstanding gymnasts. They were also the product of a training system
that tested hundreds of little girls to physical destruction to produce
that one star capable of a perfect 10. This is an expose about that
process in elite gymnastics, and the related (though less severe) problem
in elite figure skating. I read it with interest when it was new. But
it’s a little too strident to be pleasant reading (even if the topic lent
itself to that); and besides they’ve adjusted the age limits upwards
precisely to discourage this kind of abuse.

Previn, by Helen Drees Ruttencutter. I think we
inherited this book from my parents.

Sam Walton: Made in America, by
Sam Walton with John Huey. I don’t think we bought this one;
perhaps it was a gift?

Shakespeare’s Insults: Educating Your Wit, by
Wayne F. Hill and Cynthia J. Ottchen. Some things are simply
better in theory than in practice, and this is one of them.

Children First, by Penelope Leach. This book is
subtitled, “What our society must do–and is not doing–for our children
today.” Jane and I will take care of our own children, thank you.

A Confederacy of Dunces, by John Kennedy Toole.
A lot of people are very fond of this book. I do not understand
why. I’ll grant you, the writing is good, and there are some funny bits.
But on the whole, this is one rollercoaster I think I’ll skip next time.

The Citadel of the Autarch, and The Urth of the New Sun,
by Gene Wolfe. I went through a real Gene Wolfe phase many
years ago; it was an era when I confused obscurity with depth. Wolfe is
an amazingly gifted writer, but he no longer floats my boat. Plus, these
are hardcovers, and they take up too much space.

So it ends. After nearly two years, reading approximately one volume a
month (and skipping a couple of months), I’ve finally come to the
ultimate conclusion of O’Brian’s twenty-volume saga, reading this book
for the first time ever just this month. I began it with some
trepidation, given that its predecessor was only so-so; some of my fears
were justified, but not all.

Jack does a lot of hurrying hither and thither in this book, more or less
in clandestine pursuit of Chilean independance from Spain; some of the
action is to the point, and some of it seems like filler. Stephen’s
romance with Christine Wood blossoms; I thought the sequences dealing with
that topic were among the best in the book, which surprised me considering the
cheap and sleazy way O’Brian got rid of Diana in the previous book.

O’Brian didn’t know this was to be his last book; the reports of his
death indicated that he was a chapter or two into a new Aubrey/Maturin
book, and I think that’s just as well. The closing pages of
Blue at the Mizzen bring Jack the orders making him Rear Admiral of
the Blue; and while Stephen’s future with Christine Wood (a woman much
more suited to him than Diana ever was) is by no means assured, there are
promising signs. As this is the last book, I choose to believe that
ultimately they are married, and live happily ever after.

And so they sail off into the sunset. What could be fairer than that?

Oddly, this isn’t so much a mystery as it is a historical novel pure and
simple. Sure, there’s a murder…but what there really is, is a
complicated political setup involving a civil war, some poignant family
connections across the battle lines, and some of Cadfael’s own past
history. It turns out to be quite a good book, but the initial set up is
brutally long, about fifty or so pages, before you can even understand
who the players are. I suppose more of them would have been familiar if
I’d been reading the series in sequence. Anyway, recommended–but don’t
think it’s a typical Brother Cadfael mystery.

This tale of Discworld follows shortly after Lords and Ladies
and takes Granny Weatherwax and Nanny Ogg to Anhk-Morpork (Magrat Garlick
is now a Queen rather than a Witch, and is therefore otherwise occupied).
They are in pursuit of two things: Agnes (Perdita) Nitt, who might just
succeed Magrat as one of the local witches; and the publisher of Nanny’s
cookbook (a collection of dishes with aphrodisiac properties) which has
sold thousands of copies with virtually no recompense to Nanny. But
that’s only what the book’s about; it’s not what the book is.

And what the book is, is a parody of that great Broadway Smash of the
1990’s, Andrew Lloyd Weber’s most overblown production, Phantom of the
Opera, a show which I have seen and which I personally cannot abide.
(I might perhaps expand on that at a later time). Few of Pratchett’s
books are so narrowly targetted as this one, but it’s very well done,
with lots of excellent bits and wonderful lines; plus there are some
walk-ons from some of the usual Ankh-Morpork suspects. The opera will
never be the same.

This book follows directly after Pratchett’s Witches Abroad,
and concerns what happens after Granny Weatherwax, Nanny Ogg, and Magrat
Garlick return home. Highest among the scheduled event is the coming
Royal Wedding; Magrat and King Verence have had an understanding for some while
(if two people who can’t talk to each other without getting tongue-tied
can be said to have an understanding), and the great day is approaching.
But there are troublesome currents among the young girls of Lancre.
They are wearing black clothing and white makeup, choosing new names like
Diamanda and Perdita (yes, that’s right–they’re Goths), and taking up
the study of magic, much to Granny Weatherwax’s disgust.

And to Granny Weatherwax’s dismay as well, as it soon becomes clear that
only Perdita Nitt (nee Agnes) has any talent in that direction at all.
But the leader of the girls has been spending time near the Dancers, a
ring of stones on a high meadow. The Dancers guard one of the entrances
to Faerie, and Diamanda has been getting her power from the Faerie Queen.

This is not a good thing, for reasons that unfold during the tale.
But the important thing to remember is that before J.R.R. Tolkien
came along and redefined elvishness for ever, elves were called “the
Fair Folks” and “the Lords and Ladies” and such like names for one
simple reason–it simply didn’t do to make them mad. Or to attract
their attention, for that matter.

Along with all of this, you also get choice information about the Stick
and Bucket Dance, Ancient Lancre History, what it takes to be the
greatest blacksmith in the world, and the farrier’s word–that secret
word that allows the blacksmith to shoe any horse, no matter how spirited.

On the whole, I’d not say that this one’s quite as good as its two
predecessors….but I enjoyed it all the same.

The Great Purge has begun. Moving my study has meant fitting all
of our books into less space, which practically speaking means purging
the collection of those books we no longer want or need. This is
generally a traumatic experience–at least, it was the last time I did
it–but time and the presence of three children have changed many things,
and perhaps it will be easier this time.

In any event, I decided that I wanted to keep a list of the books I was
getting rid of, so that in some future time when I’m looking for them I
need not remain in doubt over why I can’t find them on the shelves. And
given that, I thought it would be fun to list them here, with the reasons
why I’m getting rid of them. So here it is, more or less a collection of
mini-reviews of books I not only didn’t read in the last month, but may
have never succeeded in reading ever:

Books I No Longer Want

The Great Ideas, by Mortimer J. Adler. This is an
amazing book, a tome among tomes, the product of a truly frightening
amount of scholarship and synthesis. I was introduced to it (truly, this
is a book that needs an introduction; only the very bold would dare
presume to strike up an acquaintance with it without one) by my friend
Rick Saenz, a man whose opinions I respect. Alas, when I first attempted
to make use of the book to research one of the “Great Ideas”, I found
that the book is an outstanding soporific, either as reading material or
(due it its weight) as a blunt instrument. I think I’ll take my ideas a
little less highly refined in future.

Windows Millenium: The Missing Manual by David Pogue. I
bought this when I got my present laptop with Windows ME pre-installed.
Windows ME doesn’t come with much of a manual, and I thought this might
be helpful. Perhaps it was; I no longer recall. What I do know is that
I’ve not had any reason to refer to it in the last two years.

Philosophical Explanations, by Robert Nozick.
Nozick was, so I’m given to understand, one of the great philosophers of
our time. I first heard of him when he died some time ago, and was inspired by
an article about him to send away for this book. The article described
it as playful, whimsical, interesting, a book not just for professional
philosophers but for any thinking person. Indeed, one of the blurbs on
the back cover says, “It is important for you, whoever you are, to
read…this book.” I have no idea what the ellipsis in the previous
sentence represents, but I suspect that the full sentence was something like the
following: “It is important for you, whoever you are, to read books of
all kinds, except for maybe this book.

To be fair, I got through maybe a hundred pages of this difficult and
abstruse book, and on that evidence I must say that Nozick was
able to write with clarity and humor about difficult metaphysical
problems, with no detail lost, no matter how small. But following him
through the logic was exhausting, and I finally was forced to confess
that I had far less interest in the questions he was addressing than he
did.

Our Southern Highlanders, by Horace Kephart. I
picked up this book six or seven years ago when a good friend of ours
(now, alas, deceased) was doing a Great Purge of her own. Since then
I’ve looked at it on the shelf any number of times without the slightest
temptation to open it and read its contents.

XML Elements of Style, by Simon St. Laurent. XML
is something every technogeek needs to be familiar with these days; I’ve
tried to make use of it several times, only to founder on the same
rock–what I’ve been doing instead of XML has been easier and more
convenient for me. In any event, this book didn’t add notably to my
understanding.

Politics in the Ancient World, by M.I. Finley.
Cambridge University Press has an imprint called “Canto”, which they use
for books they think might reach a wider audience. I’ve bought quite a
few of them now, and some of them are very good. This one, however, was
too dry for words. As a history buff and as a sometimes-aspiring author,
I thought a discussion of how the Greek city-states governed themselves
would be interesting, enlightening, and stimulating: good source material
for some future novel. And perhaps it could, in theory: but in practice
I was disappointed.

The Penguin Guide to Ancient Egypt, by W.J. Murname.
I got this after reading a spate of books set in Egypt
ancient and modern. I thought it might lend some perspective. In
practice, it sat on the shelf unregarded.

Undaunted Courage, by Stephen E. Ambrose. This
book details the Lewis and Clarke expedition, and was quite popular a few
years ago. I’ve read it. I’ve grasped the reasons for the expedition,
which Ambrose explains cogently; these remain in my mind. For the rest,
well….it was interesting when I read it, but I can’t picture myself
reading it again.

Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea, by
Marcus Rediker. This is another book from Cambridge
University Press’s “Canto” imprint, and another that I shall discard
without dismay. It’s a history of merchant seaman, pirates, and the
Anglo-American maritime world in the first have of the seventeenth
century, an area to which I was led by my interest in
Patrick O’Brian‘s sea stories. And reading the back cover, I
can see why it sounded interesting. And there was some interesting stuff
in it, but over the whole thing is cast the awful pall of Marxist
Scholarship. Unfortunately the reddish tinge obscured more
than it revealed. So long, Mr. Rediker.

The Naval War of 1812, by Theodore Roosevelt.
Here’s a book I do give up reluctantly, but only because I wish it were a
different book. As a young man, Roosevelt (yes, that Theodore Roosevelt)
discovered that all of the chief books about the War of 1812 were written
by the British, and were horribly biased. In response he wrote a fair,
balanced work, demolishing the bias of those who preceded him. It’s
apparently now considered “the” book on the subject by scholars on both
sides of the Atlantic. It is also astonishingly dry for a book about war
at sea. Sigh.

The Temple and the Lodge, by
Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh. I reviewed this a year or
so ago; you can find the review using the search box if you like. This
is a book that attempts to link the Knights Templar with the Masons. It
has some interesting things in it, but some of the statements strike me
as being so credulous, so filled with wishful thinking, that I’m at a
loss to know what part of it I can trust and what part I can’t.

The Penguin Who’s Who in the Ancient World, by
Betty Radice. Again, this is reference book I bought
thinking I might find it helpful. In the six or seven years since I
bought it, I’ve never referred to it.