This is a simply amazing book, and one that I’m having great difficulty
reviewing. When reviewing a non-fiction book, I like to summarize the
book’s argument. That’s absurdly difficult in this case, because the
book is almost embarassingly rich–is almost bigger on the inside than on
the outside. I think I’m going to need to re-read it every couple of
months for the indefinite future if I’m to do it justice.

Anyway, here’s what it’s about (as opposed to what’s in it). Chesterton
wrote a book called Heretics in which he described several of
the prominent thinkers of his day and the world-views they espoused, and
pointed out the weaknesses and failings of the latter. A critic of the
book declared that it was unfair for Chesterton to deal so with his
subjects without giving them the opportunity to criticize his own
world-view. Chesterton was always willing to plunge cheerfully into
battle, and wrote the current book in answer.

Just as Surprised by Joy describes C.S. Lewis’s
personal journey of faith so this book describes Chesterton’s, and with
great humor. Indeed, the whole book can be described as an enormous
joke on Chesterton himself. As a young man he rejected Christian orthodoxy, and
became a freethinker. And as he examined each school of thought proposed
by the freethinkers before him, he found that it wouldn’t answer.
Rejecting each of them, he boldly struck out on his own, and attempted to
devise his own system of thought that commended itself to his reason and
his common sense. And when he had completed it, and saw that it was good,
he discovered that he had reinvented Christian orthodoxy.

There now, I think I’ve adequately described the premise of and occasion
for the book; it’s the content that’s hard to summarize. I’ll have to
read it again.

In the meantime, I suggest you take a look at this
essay, which undoubtedly does a better job of introducing the book
than I have.

I’ve just posted an update for that epic tribute to Doctors Tolkien and Seuss, The Old Man in the Hat Comes Back. You can find it on our original fiction page.

This is a major update; I’ve actually got our heroes all the way to Rivendell.

Little Anne, my two-year-old, often talks to herself in her crib for quite a while before she falls asleep. My study is right downstairs from her room, so I can usually hear what she says. The other night it was this:

“One! Two! One! Two! One! Two! One! Two! One! BLAST OFF!”

This is the umpteenth Amelia Peabody mystery; it’s just been released in
paperback. The umpteenth+1 has, accordingly, just been released in
hardback, and no doubt we’ll be hearing from Deb about it in a few weeks.

The first thing I have to say about this book (which I devoured) is that
Elizabeth Peters is utterly shameless. I won’t go into details, because
that would spoil things; all I’ll say is that someday I expect Amelia and
her intrepid husband to run into a completely new adversary, and die of
shock on the spot. I’m no longer sure whether this is a mystery series,
or a soap opera.

Anyway, if you’re not familiar with the series by now, go click on
the author’s name, above, to go to our Elizabeth Peters page; there
you’ll find a list of the earlier books in the series. That’s important,
because you won’t want to start with this one.

If you are familiar with the series, then all you need to know is
that it’s much like its predecessors. The Emerson clan arrives in
Egypt, Emerson wants everyone to help
excavate, Amelia wants to organize everyone, there are mysterious
happenings, Amelia wants to investigate, Emerson and Amelia quarrel and
make up repeatedly, scandalizing Ramses and Nefret, who quarrel and
make up occasionally, amusing Emerson and Amelia, while diverse members
of the extended (and growing) Emerson family wander in and out and about,
still more mysterious happenings happen, Amelia succeeds in
organizing everyone and has to make up with Emerson (again), and Ramses
and David investigate this and that and occasionally get injured, until
miraculously at the end we find out who the villains are and how they are
related to the Emersons, who probably can’t wait to make up again.

I enjoyed it thoroughly.

Fair warning–this is another book I read only because I was offered a
free review copy.

Subtitled “The Harrowing Adventures of a Baby Boomer Childhood,” this
book is further labeled, “Warning: This book contains heavy doses of
humor. Do not read while driving or operating heavy equipment. Standard
adult dose is one chapter per day. In case of overdose, discontinue
reading immediately, lie quietly, and watch the news.” I suspect that
this is adequately expresses how funny Fried wishes he were; alas, it’s
an overestimate.

The first chapter is particularly bad; in it, Fried explains how he moved
to Florida, and what he found there. It’s got all the usual tired digs
about development and elderly drivers, and is punctuated with lots of
little gags that mostly fall flat. It short, it’s trying far too hard to
be funny, and not managing.

The remaining chapters are much better, and include many anecdotes of
Fried’s childhood that are genuinely funny, if not quite the laugh riot
the cover bids you expect. And, unsurprisingly, the funniest bits are
those in which Fried stops trying to be a comic and just tells the story.
I enjoyed hearing about his dog Sardo, and the varied population of his
hometown, the more so as he grew up in a time and place that I know
little about (Upstate New York, in the 1950’s).

I suppose what fascinates me the most about the book is the moral
dimension, which is almost completely lacking. There are a handful
of passages infused with PC-piety on animal rights and the environment,
but in all of the tales of his youthful exploits there’s no sense of
shame or contrition or sheepishness, but only the concern then (and
pleasure now) that he didn’t get caught at the time.
He relates an incident concerning one of his childhood
friends, who inadvertently ate some candy after giving
up candy for Lent. The friend was absolutely mortified about it. Fried
comforts him, but clearly doesn’t understand the problem.

Now I’m not looking for heavy-handed moralizing; it’s meant to be funny,
after all. But somehow Garrison Keillor manages to
acknowledge his own moral frailty without ceasing to be funny.
Fried’s parents were Jewish, so he tells us, but were apparently not
particularly observant, and left him to make up his own mind about religion;
which is to say he got no religious instruction whatsoever. Keillor, on
the other hand, was raised in the Church. Fried’s book has no real moral
dimension; Keillor’s books, on the other hand, do. It makes you wonder.

So anyway, I read the book, and enjoyed most of it–except for the first
chapter–well enough, but I didn’t have to pay for it. Would I have paid
money for it? Well, honestly, I probably wouldn’t even be looking in
that part of the bookstore. But if someone called it to my attention,
and I leafed through it….well, probably I would have left it in the
store. Still, if you have a particular interest in mid-1950’s Americana
you might take a look.

Update: Given Ian’s comment (see the comments sections), I want to make it clear that I’m not accusing Fried of being a man of no morals. It’s his book I’m talking about, and it’s what he chose to put in it, and what he chose to leave out, that I find interesting.

The April issue of Ex Libris Reviews is now available.

Just so as not to leave everyone hanging, I’d like to announce that all of the plumbing was in fact completed successfully, and we’re having no further trouble.

Ian thinks I’m being too hard on Peter Jackson and company. He reminds us that unless a thousand little things all come together exactly right an otherwise good movie can be ruined. He points out how much worse Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings trilogy could have been. He says that it’s a miracle that it was made at all, and an additional miracle that it’s so good. He thinks, I gather, that we bookish folks who carp and complain about every little detail are missing the big picture. In his phrase, we’ve been handed a pile of diamonds, and are complaining about how they are cut.

In short, we need to (a) count our blessings, and (b) give Jackson some credit.

Very well.

I went and saw Ralph Bakshi’s animated The Lord of the Rings when it first appeared in the theaters. It was 1978. I was in 9th or 10th grade, and a thorough-going Tolkien geek. But even a young geek’s enthusiasm couldn’t save Bakshi’s movie from being the complete and utter disappointment that it was. So I’m well aware how much worse Jackson’s movie could have been.

In fact, I’ll readily concede that Jackson got almost everything right, especially when it came to the visuals. The Shire was a joy and a delight; Moria was suitably eerie; Lothlorien was suitably ethereal; the Argonath was glorious; Gollum was exactly right, even with that absurd trick with the lembas; Minas Tirith was gorgeous; Grond was a terrible sight; and on and on.

I’ll further concede that, not being a movie buff, I’ve got no real appreciation for all of the difficulties involved in making a movie, so the achievement that seems so unlikely and miraculous to Ian seems less so to me. Nevertheless, it was a superb effort, and I’m genuinely grateful to Ian for filling us in on some of what went on behind the scenes.

So, Ian, I’ve looked at it from your point of view; now look at it from mine.
You compare the movie to a pile of (possibly miscut) diamonds; Tolkien’s trilogy, then, must be the Arkenstone of Thrain. If I’m holding Jackson to a ridiculously high standard, it’s because I’m measuring Jackson’s achievement against Tolkien’s. Not fair, perhaps, but being a bookish person I can’t help it.

This is the midpoint of the Chronicles of Prydain, and it’s of a piece
with the others. Our hero, Taran of Caer Dallben, escorts “the
golden-haired Princess Eilonwy” to the Isle of Mona, where she is going
to live with the King and Queen of Mona and learn all about being a
princess. Nothing goes quite as planned, of course, and no sooner do
they arrive than Eilonwy is kidnapped by Achren, the wicked enchantress
who stole her from her mother when she was a baby. Naturally, Taran must
rescue her.

As in the previous volumes, the other characters seem to be chosen for
the lessons they can teach young Taran. In this case, the major learning
experiences are provided by the feckless Prince Rhun and a giant named
Glew. From Glew he learns that physical size has nothing to do with
moral stature; from Rhun he learns that fecklessness can go with a good
heart, that it is not a permanent condition, and that he really doesn’t
want anyone else to marry “the golden-haired Princess Eilonwy.” And
there are all the usual things about loyalty, courage, and the
importance of good friends.

David’s immediate response when we finished it was, “Tomorrow, we can
start the next one!”

At the moment, we have our house about half-replumbed. That is, the main line from the street to the water heater and service porch (well, it’s not really a service porch, and it’s not really in the house, but it has a washer-driver and a half-bath in it, and the distinction isn’t worth going into) has been replaced with copper; the second half will be done in a month or so.

Well, call it seven-sixteenths done, rather than half-done. To begin with, the hot and cold water lines have been swapped. That’s supposed to be fixed on tomorrow. The problem is, the hot water line had a whole bunch of junk in it from the old water heater; that junk is now clogging the fill valves of all of the toilets in the house. That’s supposed to get taken care of tomorrow as well. In the meantime, we’re filling up the toilet tanks with buckets of water from the shower.

Home ownership–a never-ending source of interest!