Lightning Beneath The Sea: The Race to Wire the World and the Dawn of the Information Age, Tabor - B

         "The laying of the Atlantic Cable far exceeded anything in the annals of science and engineering and changed life around the globe." The challenges appeared insurmountable, and Cyrus Field, a NYC businessman, assembled a scientific "dream team" to tackle "cable, oceans, ships, and telegraphy," the mission-critical aspects of the project. "The cable changed life on earth, and its progeny make life probable in ours." Even today, Google, Meta, Apple, Amazon, and Microsoft spend billions to build and maintain underwater cables.

           In 1854, Field was approached with an idea about a cable from NY to Nova Scotia, and thought that a cable from Canada to the UK made more sense. The idea gained traction in the public arena because it was believed that rapid trans-Atlantic communication would lead to a more peaceful world. Field recruited the two most capable men of the century to work with him. Samuel Morse was already a household name, but not so Lt. Matthew Maury of the US Naval Observatory. Maury was the world's leading expert on currents and ocean floor topography. He also signed on Peter Cooper, scientific genius and one of the wealthiest men in America.

           The first step was to lay cable across the 65-mile strait connecting Newfoundland to the mainland. In a gale, the cable snapped, and Field sailed home. The following year, they accomplished the laying of the cable. Knowing that the British were expert at laying cable and had the deepest pockets, Field went to London in 1856. He received significant financial support, and, of equal import, better ideas to build a cable. He returned to America and received the full support of the US government. The American and British ships began to lay cable off Ireland in August 1857. After laying 380 miles of cable, it snapped and plunged 12,500 feet to the bottom. Field immediately began to plan for an expedition the following year. On June 10, 1858, they sailed again. Six hundred and fifty miles west of Portsmouth, they encountered a hundred-year storm. Soon thereafter, the cable snapped again. Field needed all of his skills to convince his backers to give him one more chance. The third time was a charm, as they successfully transmitted from Ireland to Newfoundland in August. It was a massive accomplishment, and Cyrus Field was heralded as a hero around the world. However, within days, the transmissions stopped.

           Although many on both sides of the Atlantic still believed in the possibility of success, many did not. Competition arose, particularly in the UK and even in Russia. Samuel Morse walked away. Field's warehouse in Manhattan burned down, and then, in the panic of 1860, his business went bankrupt. The war followed, and funding dried up. But Field never, ever gave up and began to rally support on both sides of the Atlantic. Another attempt was organized in 1865 with stronger cable, better-equipped ships, and a wealth of experience in the management of the process. Once again, at the midpoint in the Atlantic, the cable broke. This time, though, the consensus was that they were close and would achieve their goal the following year. On June 30, 1866, the Great Eastern sailed with a new set of improved equipment. On July 27th, they reached Newfoundland, and the world erupted in joy.

           By the time of Field's death in 1892, there were ten trans-Atlantic cables. Today, there are more than 600 fiber-optic cables crossing the Atlantic. Ninety-eight percent of the world's data travels by cable, not satellite. As for Cyrus Field and his international fame, he died broke and mostly forgotten. This is an enlightening and absorbing story.

Lazar, Biedermann - B

           This heralded novel by a young German in his early twenties tells a story of the von Lazars, Hungarian nobility torn asunder by the 20th century. Lajos is born around the fin de siècle and joins his six-year-old sister, Ilona, in the vast, unhappy household. Before the war, their mother, Maria, quietly takes her own life. Their heartless father, Sandor, sends them to boarding school while he drinks his way through the oblivion of the Empire and his world. When the old baron dies, Lajos and his young wife, Lily, move into the manor and take control of the family's business. Success allows Lajos, Lily, and their children to buy a second home in Budapest. Fear of Hitler forces Ilona and her Jewish husband to leave Berlin and alight on the Danube as well. After the Anschluss, they manage to escape to Switzerland.

           Just before the war begins, Lajos and Lily's son, Pista, falls in love with a Jewish girl, Matilda. Matilda's mom quashes the puppy love as fast as she can. The war begins, and Lajos is summoned to the army. Most of his responsibilities are organizational, and he never even leaves home, but works in Pécs near the manor house. In 1944, he rounds up and ships off the local Jews. With the Russians approaching, the family begins to walk west. The Russians pass through on the way to Budapest, and the family returns to the manor house. That summer, Lajos and Pista go to Budapest, and Pista learns that Matilda had been shot by the Arrow Cross.

          In 1948, their house, land, and possessions become "property of the state." A few years later, after settling into office jobs and an apartment in Budapest, they are again dispossessed and moved east to a farm. In 1953, they are allowed to return to the city, but Lajos struggles to maintain any enthusiasm for life. A few years later, Pista is in love with Kati, and his younger sister, Eva, falls for revolutionary writer Akos. In late 1956, the Soviets invade. Leaving their parents in Budapest, Pista and Eva flee to Yugoslavia before their journey ends in Zurich

Hunter, Bidinotto - B

         This is an interesting novel published about fifteen years ago. There are two sequels. Dylan Hunter is a journalist busy exposing the troubling truth behind some prison early-release programs that ignore crimes committed before someone turned 18, as well as the fact that many cases are pleaded down. He takes matters into his own hands and exacts fatal vengeance in the middle of the night.

         Along the way, he meets and falls in love with Annie Woods, who tells him she's an insurance investigator. She actually works for the CIA. When the authorities begin closing in on him, he rescues Annie and another CIA operative from a dangerous man holding them captive in Annie's house. The CIA secures him a pass from the local authorities, and he and Annie leave Washington, D.C., and head to his family's cabin in Pennsylvania.

Ransom, Silva - B

        Gabriel and Chiara are summering at their home in Cornwall when the local billionaire, Edward Knight, asks for his help. His much younger wife, Alice, is missing in Spain. Gabriel begins working with the local police, who believe she was murdered. Gabriel suspects she was kidnapped and soon is handling the negotiations. It all falls apart when a desperate Knight wires the money, and Alice is not returned. A few weeks later, Scotland Yard gets in touch and tells Gabriel they believe Edward is behind it all. Gabriel disagrees, concludes it was Alice, and finds her in an alpine cottage. She tells him that Edward was getting his financing from Moscow and that she needed a way out, so she designed the entire scheme. Allon brings her to MI6 and sets in motion a classic operation to catch the Russians.

         The two sections of this book lead to different conclusions. The half devoted to the ransom makes you ask, "Why bother?" On the other hand, the chase through Europe and the political/terrorism phase of the book are a blast. Still, you come back to the fact that, over the course of this series, Silva has aged Gabriel. He was a young man when he avenged Munich. Now he's an old man. It's inescapable in reality, and it should be in fiction as well.

Red Dawn Over China: How Communism Conquered A Quarter of Humanity, Dikotter

       The Communist Party of China did not dominate the revolution or the war with Japan but instead played a de minimis role in society and the fighting in order to survive until 1945.

        Lenin believed that revolution could only be accomplished by professional cadres advancing the dictatorship of the proletariat to replace capitalism with communism. "Revolution was war, violence its very foundation." Moscow encouraged its followers in Beijing to foster Bolshevism. The CCP was founded in July 1921. The decade saw a contest develop between the Communists and the Nationalists for control of the revolution. It was a time of violent factionalism and chaos. Stalin ordered the creation of a Red Army, which began murdering its opponents. As the Nationalists prevailed in the field, the CCP turned to raiding, looting, and terror. Their actions were analogous to the banditry of the warlords. Their main source of revenue was "plunder and ransom."

        By the end of 1931, the CCP was on the verge of collapse. Its soviets were troubled, chaotic, and violent. Mao controlled the largest, Jiangxi, the capital of communist China. The Jiangxi Soviet ultimately failed after it was defeated by Chiang's Nationalists. The Long March ensued in October 1934.

         The Communists headed west, away from the coastal regions and into the mountains. Within a month, the Red Army had lost half of its effective strength as Chiang's troops hounded their every step. A year later, Mao led his 8,000 survivors to Yan'an after traveling 6,200 miles. The CCP was reduced to a total national membership of 40,000. "Their message of proletarian uprising against capitalism, despite fifteen years of relentless agitation funded by Moscow, had failed to find much of a reception among the workers in any of the country's many towns and cities." Nonetheless, Moscow continued to fund the CCP and provide advisors to help communism survive.

        During the second half of the 1930s, Mao avoided large-scale battles with the Japanese and left most of the fighting to the Nationalists. The Communists instead consolidated power and increased their support in rural regions. They emerged stronger by conserving their military forces while expanding their political control. They also focused on propaganda, convincing many foreigners that they were China's patriotic defenders. This approach continued after the Republic of China declared war on the Axis powers on December 8, 1941. Mao left most of the fighting to Chiang, who was engaged alongside the Allies and receiving their support. Mao believed his forces were far enough removed from the battlefields that they would not become Japan's primary target and that the Japanese would continue to wear down Chiang and his armies. Meanwhile, the CCP worked assiduously across the countryside to build the political infrastructure that would serve it after the war. To this day, the CCP promulgates the story of its heroic battles against Japanese imperialism.

          Three days after Hiroshima, nearly one million Soviet troops stormed into Manchuria. "The unconditional surrender of Japan was met with jubilation across China, but took both Chiang Kai-shek and Mao Zedong by surprise." The Communists infiltrated the south and undermined everything the government undertook. Faced with an enemy armed by the Soviets while ruling a country devastated by years of war, Chiang accepted a cease-fire arranged by the United States. By October 1946, both sides were fighting again. The conflict dragged on as each side inflicted unspeakable horrors on the civilian populations caught in the middle and merely trying to survive.

         By the end of 1948, the prize of Manchuria belonged to the Communists, and in January 1949, the People's Liberation Army marched into Beijing. The ensuing Huaihai Campaign saw hundreds of thousands "clash in the greatest battle in Chinese history." Chiang withdrew to the south as the Communists overran the country, and the Nationalists ultimately fled to Taiwan.

         This book has been lauded for the depth of its research and its dismantling of the widely accepted view that the CCP heroically fought the Japanese oppressors. For Western readers, however, the cultural disconnect and the difficulty of keeping track of unfamiliar people and place names can make this period of Asian history especially challenging.

Slow Horses, Herron - B+

         After reading Books 2–9, I returned to the first, which provides the background on how the horses ended up at the house. As terrorists threaten to behead a young Englishman of Pakistani descent on social media, Lamb calls a meeting with Taverner. Lamb quickly susses out that the kidnapping was orchestrated by MI5 with the intention of staging a rescue and humiliating England's rising right wing. When the agent planted among the terrorists is found dead, Taverner announces that Lamb and the Slow Horses have gone rogue. If Lamb can be outfoxed, it certainly isn't by Lady Di Taverner. The horses run circles around her and make sure she ends up owing Lamb a favor.

Midnight Taxi, Gunasekera - B

         Siriwathi Perera is a 28-year-old NYC taxi driver who discovers that her fare to JFK is dead, with a knife in his chest. She is immediately arrested and calls the Sri Lankan Legal Aid lawyer she recently met. Siri and Amaya embark on a vigorous investigation to find the real killer. The charm of this book lies not in its insights into the legal system or the murder investigation, but rather in its exploration of the challenges of being the American daughter of Asian immigrants. The author is Sri Lankan, previously worked at Legal Aid, and now works with the Innocence Project.

Prague: The Heart of Europe, Paces - B -

         Prague is beloved for its beauty and, providentially, is situated in the center of Europe. It is highly regarded by poets, musicians, and intellectuals, and, after the fall of communism, became one of the most visited cities in Europe. It was also home to the murder of its Jewish population during World War II and was subjected to a brutal communist dictatorship for four decades. "This book presents the political, cultural, and social history of Prague from the ninth to the early twenty-first centuries."

         The city overlooks a bend in the Vltava River. It was first fortified in the 10th century and became a crossroads of trade and culture. Prague and the surrounding region of Bohemia became part of the Holy Roman Empire in the 11th century. In 1346, Charles IV, King of Bohemia, was elected Holy Roman Emperor and chose Prague as his capital. "Charles's city grew larger and more beautiful during his reign. The Caroline era marked the pinnacle of medieval Prague." His son Wenceslas's reign was troubled by conflicts between Avignon and Rome and, locally, by German and Czech burghers seeking supremacy in Bohemia. A Czech priest, Jan Hus, began a reform movement focused on morality and the promotion of the Czech language. It attracted the animosity of the regime and became so popular that decades of civil war followed Hus's execution. A dynastic crisis followed, leading to the Habsburg succession in 1526. They would rule Prague, Bohemia, and the Empire for four centuries but would eventually return the imperial capital to Vienna.

         Prague experienced a religious conflict between Protestants and Catholics in 1618 that led to the devastating Thirty Years' War. The war spread from Bohemia to the rest of Central Europe and even drew in the French and the Swedes before it was settled by the Peace of Westphalia in 1648. The treaty did not extend its terms of religious toleration to Bohemia or the Austrian hereditary lands. The ensuing Protestant exile reduced Prague's population below that of Europe's great cities. Catholics and Jews slowly repopulated the city. The Enlightenment was ushered into Bohemia by Empress Maria Theresa and her son, Joseph II. Their reforms "would transform Prague into a modern imperial city with free public education, a centralized state bureaucracy, and streamlined economic, religious, and legal institutions." Joseph believed religion to be a personal matter, allowed complete religious toleration, and granted peasants civil liberties. The 19th century saw the city begin to industrialize and draw people from the surrounding regions. Czech speakers began to outnumber Germans and pushed for greater Slavic rights within the empire. As Vienna weakened from repeated military defeats, Czech language and culture flourished. Yet everyone "understood that only a large empire could protect their small nation from outside threats."

         Prague entered the 20th century as a booming metropolis with 442,000 residents, more than 90 percent of whom spoke Czech. It was predominantly Catholic, with few Protestants and about 25,000 Jews. "Innovation in the arts, urban renewal, and increased political activism marked the fin de siècle." The city's limited enthusiasm for the Great War faded as battlefield defeats mounted, food shortages and rationing took hold, and refugees poured into the city. Czech independence movements arose as the empire went into free fall and declared independence in October 1918. As the capital of the First Republic, Prague vigorously "de-Austrianized," removing all things Habsburg and German, while relations among Czechs, Slovaks, and Germans throughout the country remained uneasy. The Great Depression devastated one of the world's most industrialized countries. A year before Neville Chamberlain declared "peace for our time," the founder and first president of the republic, Tomáš Masaryk, died. Three-quarters of a million Czechs queued at his bier in Prague Castle.

        The 1938 Munich Agreement allowed Hitler to occupy the German-speaking Sudetenland, bringing the First Republic to an end. Prague's Jews were able to send 669 children* to London under the Kindertransport program. In early 1939, the Germans established the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. Jewish property was forfeited, and the Nuremberg Laws were imposed. Although its Jewish population was decimated, the city itself remained in excellent physical condition in 1945. President Beneš returned from London and expelled nearly all of the country's Germans. Beneš died in 1948, and the communists took over the government, establishing a Stalinist dictatorship throughout the country. Led by Dubček in the 1960s, the Communist Party relinquished some of its iron-handed controls and introduced far-reaching reforms. In August 1968, Soviet tanks arrived and ended the Prague Spring. The last decades of communism were less severe, as the planned economy provided consumer goods. The city was improved, new buildings were constructed, and a metro system was built in the 1970s. As the 1980s saw the entire Warsaw Pact gradually abandon communism's dominance, it all came apart in November 1989. Havel was inaugurated President the week after Christmas.

         He denounced not only the years of communism but also the country's complicity in the Holocaust, its persecution of the Roma, and the expulsion of the Germans. The city's recovery was aided by UN funding after its designation as a World Heritage Site. In 1992, Slovakia and the Czech Republic peacefully separated. Czechia joined the European Union in 2004. The city and the nation have diligently pursued their mission of "returning to Europe" while continuing to wrestle with how to remember their controversial history. "Throughout Prague, sites of memory may blend into their surroundings, but they hold stories about the past. Plaques on buildings mark where famous artists lived. Stumbling blocks bear witness to the lives of Prague's murdered Jews. Statues of saints, German writers, and Czech musicians instruct us on who our heroes should be. They can expose fractures in collective memory, promote healing, or save historical figures from relative obscurity. The meanings of these places expand beyond their original intentions and come to represent multiple, even conflicting, moments in history."

*The children never saw their parents again, and half a century later they, their children, and grandchildren numbered 6,000.

Wolvers, Brown - B+

         Trace's family lost their grazing rights after shooting a Mexican wolf, a lobo, that was preying on their cattle, and then they lost the ranch. He was hired to kill wolves by wealthy men opposed to wolf reintroduction, hoping to create a free state in the wilds of West Texas and New Mexico. While hunting the famous wolf #111, he has the misfortune of running afoul of a somewhat philosophical wild wolf man and winds up with his leg in a bear trap. He survives but quits. He's replaced by Murdoch, who matches wits with #111 and kills her gray wolf partner. Without him, she has to protect and feed the pack on her own.  Trace meets the wolf man again, learns his name is Horn, and is told that Murdoch is likely looking for him as well as #111. Horn and Trace team up to take care of Murdoch. Horn puts an arrow in Murdoch's leg and, a few hours later, another in his chest. Horn and Trace have to outrun a forest fire to survive, and in the end, the good guys are safe, as are the good wolves. This is a blast that I've thoroughly enjoyed. It's probably not for everybody, but I am fascinated by the author's ability to see the world through the eyes of wolf #111.

Tojo: The Rise And Fall Of Japan's Most Controversial World War II General, Mauch - B+, Inc.

        "Tojo Hideki. His bristling, mustached countenance was, from the moment he led Japan into hostilities in the Pacific, the face of the nation's participation in World War II." In the postwar era, he was remembered as the man who brought war and ruin to Japan. When the Yasukuni Shrine enshrined him in the late 1970s, Hirohito never visited it again. This book is "a military biography of General Tojo," and because his career encompassed all of Japan's 20th-century rise and fall, it tells the story of the country's military and government as well.

          He was born in Tokyo in 1884. Hideki entered the Military Preparatory School in 1899. One of the school's core principles was an absolute commitment to the emperor. He entered the Imperial War College in 1912 and graduated at the end of 1915. A deficiency in the curriculum was its focus on the army alone, particularly the infantry. The role of naval and air forces was not considered important, nor was the necessity of coordinating societal support with the government. After a brief staff assignment, Tojo spent three and a half years in Europe as part of a contingent attempting to study and understand Germany's war experience. Their key takeaways were the importance of coordinating with the artillery branch, providing better weapons for smaller infantry units, and working closely with the civilian structures supporting the army—they adopted Germany's concept of total war. Back in Tokyo, he and other like-minded staff members worked toward modernization and implementing a structure capable of managing a nation at war. They believed it was necessary to take Manchuria and Mongolia because the war machine would need their natural resources, and they came to believe that the army should lead the nation once war began.

          He was appointed commander of a regiment in Tokyo during a period of army rebelliousness and opposition to the government. He twice opposed army coups and saw his colleagues rise to the top of the army's hierarchy. Although promoted to general, Tojo wound up politically ostracized and fearful of an early retirement. While in limbo, he applauded the empire's aggressive actions in Manchukuo and supported the country's withdrawal from the League of Nations. He believed the U.S. and the U.K. were vehemently anti-Japanese because of the London and Washington Naval Conferences that imposed limits on Japan. Furthermore, Hideki believed the U.S. and the USSR were coordinating an encirclement of the country. He was transferred to the Kwantung Army in Manchukuo. He opposed the latest coup attempt in Tokyo and worked on industrializing Manchukuo. He wanted to take aggressive action against China and the USSR, and in 1937 led the prosecution of the undeclared war against China, often ignoring advice and orders from Tokyo. His success in China led to a promotion to vice army minister in 1938.

          Although I seem to be quitting more books than usual lately, I've decided I cannot go another 300 pages without finding out whether the author ever addresses the incomprehensible thinking of Japan's military elite. They had virtually no perspective outside of samurai warrior traditions. Tunnel vision would be a broader perspective than the way they looked at the world. They fought and argued among themselves like third-grade boys. There was virtually no consideration of diplomacy, and they often simply ignored orders. The author's treatment of the Rape of Nanking in only a paragraph or two was more than I could handle. Tojo was eventually tried, convicted, and hanged as a war criminal.

Stormy Weather, Hiaasen - B+

        A major hurricane hits southern Florida in this book from the '90s. Scam artists abound and begin to ply their nefarious trades.    A tourist named Max pisses off Skink by reveling in recording the destruction for his friends back in New York. Skink hauls Max off deep into the swamp. Outside the Everglades, the craziness continues. Edie, having given up on finding a Kennedy to fuck, has gone into the insurance fraud business. Augustine, who freed all the animals from his exotic zoo, is now helping (in more ways than one) Max's wife, Bonnie. Everybody, including Skink, gets together to track down the guy who beat up the girlfriend of Skink's best friend, state trooper Jim Tile. In the end, the evil-doer suffers horribly, justice is served, love blooms, and all I can do is laugh and laugh.

Storm Tide, Doiron - B-

        Mike Bowditch is on suspension and awaiting the birth of his first child. But, he senses someone very smart is ghosting him and setting him up. He can't prove a thing, and no one is interested in the imaginings of a game warden who could soon be out of a job. He investigates on his own and soon is on the track of a diabolical young man who holds a grudge - Mike had chased down his stepfather, and young Ben had wound up in the foster care system. Mike takes extraordinary risks in the pursuit and catches his man. He misses the birth of his and Stacey's son, but all is forgiven.

        All series with a singular lead character can be repetitive, and I believe this one more so than most. Part of the problem is that the books are scattered over sixteen years, but I've read them all in the last four-and-a-half. Mike takes way too many predictable risks. I hope I don't feel the same way in a year or so.

The Black Death: A Global History Of Humanity's Most Devastating Pandemic, Asbridge - B+

          The world of the mid-fourteenth century, devastated by the Black Death, was in the midst of massive change. People and goods were traded from Asia to Europe to the Middle East at an accelerating pace, at a higher volume, and on larger ships than ever before. The globalizing world was shrinking.

         It is believed the plague entered Genoa in 1347 from a ship that arrived from a trading outpost in Crimea. Russian and Muslim chroniclers recorded that the plague had struck the Golden Horde the year before. That summer, it reached Constantinople, Sicily, and Alexandria. The next year, the plague spread throughout the Mediterranean world. The meticulous Venetians maintained excellent records. To give some indication of how the disease struck, nine wills were prepared in the city in January, and 662 in May. The city lost two-thirds of its residents. The "merciless scourge" inflicted severe psychological and physical pain on those who lived to see a vastly diminished world. The records maintained in the Middle East were not as detailed as the Europeans', but many estimate that the death toll in the Muslim world was higher, likely because of the "Islamic prohibition on flight." Cairo, with 500,000 residents, was significantly larger than any city in Europe, and it "suffered the most devastating mass mortality of any population center during the Black Death." As the plague spread north into Europe, the story of death and destruction continued unrelentingly. The afflicted developed buboes in the groin area, neck, and armpits, vomited blood, and died in three days. The more populated an area, the faster it spread. Usually, the affliction of one in a family meant death to the entire household. Paris lost 80,000 of a population of 150,000. The British Isles followed the same path, as did Scandinavia, Germany, Eastern Europe, and Russia.

          "Over the course of six horrifying years, the Black Death spread across the face of the known world. The astonishing scope and scale of this pandemic were unprecedented. Never before in human history had a disease wrought such terrible suffering among so many tens of millions and across so vast an expanse of territory. By the end of 1353, the plague was subsiding, but the appalling era of sudden mass mortality and the abject horror that it engendered caused a seismic convulsion in society that brought much of the medieval world to the brink of collapse."

         The Black Death killed approximately 100 million people, scything through communities in 6–9 months and taking away half of the population. No one knew its cause or possible duration. Society abandoned the traditional rituals of mourning and funerals and simply dumped the dead in pits. Everywhere, people abandoned relatives and even children. Urban governments stopped functioning, and agricultural activities were suspended. A Tunisian observer wrote, "Civilization itself approached the point of annihilation and dissolution." Both Venice and England had such capable civil structures that they were able to recover quickly.

          Many thought "they were witnessing a world-ending catastrophe." Muslims and Catholics believed they were being punished by God, but throughout, almost all retained their faith, and Muslims continued their annual Haij. Pope Clement VI was a particularly skilled leader who modified many of the rules about confession, the last rites, and funerals in order to fit within the new paradigm. He told all Catholics who attended a special Mass that they would receive a papal indulgence reducing their time in Purgatory. Religious institutions accumulated significant funds as the dying left assets to churches, monastic orders, and hospitals. In the Muslim world, all three faiths survived peaceably. The Catholic world "did not promote the same sentiments, and the persecution of religious minorities was commonplace in the West." In Cyprus, they rounded up their Muslim slaves and butchered them all in a single afternoon. In Europe, the Jews were the wealthy people "responsible for the death of Christ." The first pogroms were in 1096 during the First Crusade. Every few generations, Europe would unleash a "frenzied barbarity" on their neighbors. Throughout the plague years and across the entirety of Europe, Jews were blamed, often on the pretense of poisoning the water, and indiscriminately murdered. Frequently, they were executed only after confessing and naming others after they had been tortured on the rack. Conveniently, their credit books showing who owed them money disappeared, along with their movable assets. Pope Clement failed in a serious effort undertaken to stop the slaughter. When the plague abated, many Jews migrated to the east. "The Black Death left the medieval world deeply scarred but not broken."

         The Tunisian historian, Ibn Khaldun, wrote twenty-five years later: "In both the East and the West humanity was visited by a destructive plague that swallowed up many of the good things and wiped them out... Civilization decreased with the decrease of mankind and the entire inhabited world changed." The world would continue to face regular plague resurgences for centuries. Nonetheless, Europe, the Middle East, and Central Asia made remarkable comebacks in the 1350s. The return to some sense of normalcy was also challenged by the Little Ice Age, a century and a half of unremitting war, and the failure of the population to materially increase for over a century.

          Strategically, both the Mongol Horde and the Byzantine Empire were hastened to their ends by the plague, and the Ottomans replaced the Mamluks in the Middle East. Many European historians believe that the Church's hierarchy was so unable to respond to the crisis that it propelled the Reformation. The Black Death destroyed a world, and slowly ushered in a changing one with Europe precluded from Asia after the fall of Constantinople, and required Europe to sail into the Atlantic. This is a far-ranging, very interesting read.

Native Tongue, Hiaasen - B+

          This hysterical, laugh-out-loud novel is from the early 90s and the second in the 'Skink' series. Francis X. Kingsbury owns the Amazing Kingdom of Thrills and is in the process of further damaging the environment of North Largo Island by building a golf course. Lined up in opposition are the Mothers of the Wilderness, a very savvy PR man recently fired by Kingsbury, Skink, the FBI, and the NY mob tipped off that Kingsbury is in the Witness Protection Program, but really is the guy who testified against John Gotti. Pretty much all Francis X. has on his side is a security guy mainlining steroids through an IV and an incompetent, preppy aide. Every book of the author has me laughing every ten pages. Highlights here are kidnapped blue-tongued voles, a scientist swallowed by a killer whale, a dead killer whale, a phony snake invasion of the kingdom, a cement truck destroyed by an RPG, Robbie Racoon on TV with Willard Scott, insights into the hijinks of the staff of a major amusement park, but the star is Nina, the PR fella's girl. She works nights talking dirty on the phone. She's constantly trying out new lines, gets so good that the other girls start paying her to write for them. She succeeds and is syndicated around the country, and some of her poetry makes the 'New Yorker.' Gotta love it.

A Murder In Springtime, Walker - B+

        This is the 19th installment in the Bruno, Chief of Police series by the now-retired journalist and historian Martin Walker. Bruno remains one of the most charming, sophisticated, erudite, and philosophical policemen—if not men—in southern France.  A woman in her sixties, a nurse at a nearby nursing home, is brutally murdered.  The victim appears to have completely erased her past. There is nothing to reveal who she really was, and the vicious, deeply personal nature of the crime suggests the motive is buried in the past. As Bruno and his team dig deeper, clues begin to emerge, gradually uncovering the victim's hidden history. Along the way,  exquisite food is served, love is in the air, and modern technology solves the investigation. Justice is served in one of the best in the series.

Shattered Lands: Five Partitions and The Making of Modern Asia, Dalrymple - B++

       A century ago, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Burma, Nepal, Bhutan, Yemen, Oman, the UAE, Qatar, Bahrain, and Kuwait were bound together under a single imperial banner, officially known as the Indian Empire, or more simply, the Raj. It ultimately shattered into multiple partitions. Many of these lands were protectorates, some internationally recognized and others not. Some were princely states within India that had surrendered defense and foreign policy to the empire. This is the story of how those partitions created twelve separate nations.

          In 1928, a British commission went to India to draft a new constitution. They encountered a region divided between Mahatma Gandhi’s Hindu-led movement and Muhammad Ali Jinnah’s Muslim political leadership. Further east, Burma—the largest and richest province of the Raj—felt routinely excluded from Indian politics, and a movement emerged calling for its separation. The commission ultimately recommended this separation. A few years later, London approved the separation of Burma, and also Arab Oman, from India. These changes took effect on April 1, 1937.

         In the late 1930s, India was allowed limited elections, in which Jawaharlal Nehru’s Congress Party won significant support. Plans to merge British India and the princely states into a federation were halted when World War II broke out. It would become the largest war in Asia since the Mongol invasions of China. The British Indian Army grew to 2.5 million men, but enthusiasm for Britain’s war effort was limited, as many struggled to distinguish between Nazism and imperial rule. India wanted freedom, not war.

         Jinnah increasingly argued for a separate Muslim state in northwest India. In early 1942, Japanese forces attacked Burma, causing around 600,000 Indians to flee westward. Japan conquered Burma, and most Indians were forced to leave. Religious and ethnic tensions intensified as Japanese-backed Burmese forces fought in the border regions. That same year, Britain imprisoned the Congress leaders after Gandhi demanded immediate independence, while Jinnah urged the British to remain to protect Muslim minorities from Hindu-majority rule.

         By the end of 1942, the Japanese Empire had conquered much of Southeast Asia. India was in turmoil, flooded with refugees and fearing further invasion. Bengal experienced a devastating famine that killed over a million people, and Prime Minister Churchill was heavily criticized. In late 1944, Japanese forces advanced into India and besieged Kohima. The Battle of Kohima became one of the turning points of the war in Asia, with approximately 40,000 Japanese casualties.

        At the end of the war, the Congress leaders were released from prison and returned to a transformed country. Non-violent resistance had weakened, and there was growing demand for more assertive nationalism.

         Britain was financially exhausted and even indebted to the Government of India. The subcontinent was home to Sikhs, Nagas, Pashtuns, Bengalis, Hindus, and Muslims, many of whom now demanded separate states. In early 1946, around 50,000 Indian personnel in the Royal Air Force went on strike, followed by 20,000 Royal Navy mutineers. Violence broke out in Bengal, where many Muslims demanded a separate homeland, rather than joining Jinnah’s Pakistan.

        By spring 1947, Britain’s retreat from empire resembled a rapid collapse. The government announced withdrawal from Greece, Palestine, and India. Lord Mountbatten was appointed the last Viceroy of India. His plan to partition India and create Pakistan was accepted as the least violent option for separation.

         Some provinces were given choices over their future: Assam, Sindh, and Baluchistan had to decide which country to join; Bengal and Punjab were to determine whether they would be divided along religious lines. The independence date was moved up to August 15, the second anniversary of Japan’s surrender. A massive administrative task involving the borders of the new states was attempted in only ten weeks. Still unresolved was the fate of the 565 princely states, which made up about 40 percent of the subcontinent. Most ultimately acceded to India.

        Across the region, Hindus, Muslims, and Sikhs became caught up in widespread communal violence. By early August, mass migration had begun. Armed militias and paramilitary groups moved through border regions. Independence came at midnight, even as borders remained unclear.

        The resulting violence was on an immense scale. Tens of millions were displaced along religious lines. Millions died, and many more suffered forced conversions and sexual violence. Hindus and Sikhs fled Pakistan, while Muslims in India often became targets of hostility. The Partition of British India remains one of the most significant events of the twentieth century in South Asia, shaping the identity and politics of nearly a quarter of the world’s population. By the end of the year, around 20 million people had been displaced.

        Relations between India and Pakistan were tense from the moment of their creation. Soon after independence, war broke out over the princely state of Jammu and Kashmir. The territory had a Hindu ruler but a majority Muslim population. After its accession to India, both sides deployed regular armies, replacing earlier tribal militias. Fighting continued through 1948, with India gaining the advantage late in the year. A UN-brokered ceasefire took effect on January 1, later becoming permanent, leaving India in control of roughly two-thirds of the region, including the Kashmir Valley. The ceasefire line eventually became the Line of Control.

         Tensions also grew within Pakistan between East and West Pakistan, separated by a thousand miles and marked by a deep economic and political imbalance. The more populous East felt underrepresented in national institutions. Matters worsened after a devastating cyclone in 1970, which killed hundreds of thousands and was widely seen as poorly handled by the government.

        These tensions led to what is often called the fifth partition of the region. In March 1971, the government ignored the electoral victory of the Awami League in East Pakistan. Rising unrest led to a military crackdown, and the League declared independence. Bengali soldiers defected and formed the backbone of the resistance. India eventually intervened militarily, leading to war. Pakistan surrendered, and in exchange for 90,000 prisoners of war, recognized the independence of Bangladesh.

        Today, these countries often overlook their shared and intertwined histories. Questions of citizenship and belonging—of who is considered an outsider—continue to shape the region. India and Pakistan still maintain heavily restricted cross-border relations, limiting opportunities for many displaced families to visit ancestral homes. History, in many ways, remains very much alive.

        This account is very thorough history. The author is an Englishman who grew up in New Delhi and graduated from Oxford. His narrative links religious extremism, political fragmentation, and colonial legacy. The story also raises broader questions about whether Britain’s long imperial dominance—from Ireland to the Far East—has contributed to enduring perceptions of superiority and inequality.

Prisoners of Geography: Ten Maps That Explain Everything About the World, Thomas - B

         "So it is with all nations, big or small. The landscape imprisons the leaders, giving them fewer choices and less room to maneuver. The rules of geography, which Hannibal, Sun Tzu, and Alexander the Great all knew, still apply to today's leaders."

         Russia is a "land where power is hard to defend, and so for centuries its leaders have compensated by pushing outward. It is the land without mountains to its west." It has been attacked from the west by Poland (1605), Sweden (1708), France (1812), and Germany (1914 and 1941). "By 2004, fifteen years after 1989, every single Warsaw Pact country bar Russia was in NATO or the EU." For half a millennium, Russia has defended its flat plains by attacking outward. Thus, the policies of Vladimir Putin derive from those of Stalin, Alexander II, Catherine the Great, and Peter the Great.

         The Chinese "heartland is the political, cultural, demographic, and agricultural center of gravity" of the nation. With vast open plains to the north, the Chinese too adopted the attack-to-defend philosophy. After the humiliation of European and Japanese occupations, China today is a unified and secure country. To the north and east, sparsely populated Manchuria and Siberia pose no threats. To the south, only Vietnam has a border without natural obstructions, and the west is mountainous. Secure on land, China is building its navy to protect its sea lanes and eventually recover Taiwan, 140 miles off its coast. Access to Russian oil and gas, along with a pipeline to the Arabian Sea, may help China overcome its most significant geostrategic risk—the 500-mile-long Strait of Malacca.

         "Geography has determined that if a political entity could get to and then control the land from sea to shining sea, it would be a great power, the greatest history has ever known." The US has been truly fortunate. Otto von Bismarck once said, "God has a special providence for fools, drunks, and the United States."

          Western Europe also has been blessed with an excellent climate, fertile soil, navigable rivers, superb harbors, and a lack of natural disasters. However, with mountains, rivers that act as boundaries, and a long history, Europe has many languages and countries. The south is not as fortunate, with more mountains, fewer arable plains, and shorter rivers. Europe's only strategic threat remains Russia, one enhanced by the flat northern plains of the continent. (Note: this book was published in 2015, long before the war in Ukraine.)

        Africa is cursed by a lack of natural harbors and rivers filled with waterfalls. The Sahara cuts it off from the Eurasian landmass, where ideas and technology were exchanged.

        The Middle East (a purely European characterization) is a thousand miles wide and two thousand miles from north to south. It is filled with mountains, deserts, rivers, fertile plains, and cities. Its center is the Arabian Desert, which is the size of France. For centuries, it was part of the Ottoman Empire, in which there were no borders or lines in the sand. After WWI, Britain and France "arbitrarily created nation-states out of people unused to living together in one region, which has not been a recipe for justice, equality, or stability." Of all the nations created, Iraq was "an unholy mess," consisting of Christians, Sunnis, Shiites, and Kurds. To the various Arab tribes, Zionism, supported by the US and some Europeans, added the state of Israel. The states surrounding Israel—Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, and Syria—have not welcomed or granted rights to the Palestinians who fled Israel decades ago. The failure of pan-Arab nationalism has led to al-Qaeda and the Islamic State. It is an unholy mess that continues. Equally problematic is the ancient, populous, wealthy, and nuclear-armed successor to the Persian Empire, the Islamic Republic of Iran. It is very mountainous, which has defended it from intruders for thousands of years, but has also impeded the spread of its oil wealth throughout the country. Its aggressive desire to push its Shiite religion into Arabia and to destroy the state of Israel further adds tinder to the always-volatile region.

         The Arctic brings us back again to Russia. The Arctic Ocean is small, but it is almost the size of Russia and one-and-a-half times the size of the US. The continental shelves "occupy more space proportionately than in any other ocean." The melting ice allows use of the Northwest Passage for a few months per year, and the Northern Sea Route along the Siberian coast is open twice as long. International law gives each nation 200 miles of sovereignty, called the exclusive economic zone, over mineral rights from its shore. Russia is aggressively claiming more, building bases in the north, and moving armed forces to Murmansk. Putin has said the Arctic oilfields will be "our strategic reserve for the twenty-first century." Whether or not this becomes another Great Game remains to be seen.

         Interesting, but not compelling. I skipped the chapters on India and Pakistan, Korea and Japan, and Latin America.

Clown Town, Herron - B

         In the ninth, and apparently penultimate, novel, Taverner seeks out Lamb's help. Someone has filed an anonymous complaint against her with HR, and she wants Roddy Ho to figure out who it is. Simultaneously, River goes to Oxford to meet with the academics curating his grandfather's library. He has been given a heads-up that something is missing. It turns out the two matters are related. The blackmail attempt against the Park is being carried out by the same person who stole a box disguised as a book, one that contained detailed information about a long-ago but major MI5 cock-up. Filled with the usual plots, subplots, counterplots, bureaucratic infighting, and endless manipulation, this one closes with Lamb doing what he always does—taking care of his Joes.

Wildwood, Pease - B+

         A few months after the events in Northwoods (May 25th blog post), Eli and Marge begin investigating an apparent murder when the FBI and DEA show up. Once again, the FBI agent is Alyssa Mason. The missing woman was a DEA confidential informant. After a principal in the investigation is found dead, the FBI agent is pulled from the case by higher-ups, and the investigation is declared finished. Eli manages to bring Alyssa back in because the case is far from solved. The finale is twisty, surprising, and very satisfying. Alyssa is promoted to SAIC in Chicago, and she and Eli agree to remain friends. This is a different and interesting series, with a third installment scheduled for next year.

A Scandal In Konigsberg, Clark - C

         In the 1830s, the home of Immanuel Kant "bathed in the glow of the late Enlightenment." Wilhelm Ebel was a preacher at the Old City Church, and Heinrich Diestel at the Haberberg Church. Three hundred and fifty miles to the west, in Berlin, the Minister of Culture and Religion received an accusation concerning a clique engaged in sexual promiscuity gathered around Ebel. Diestel rallied to his friend's side. Ebel had achieved a modest notoriety by helping Ida von der Groeben overcome her anxieties after losing her husband in the Napoleonic Wars. Ebel's philosophical considerations of religious dogma attracted enemies among the clergy of Königsberg. He believed he had a unique relationship with God and acted as an intermediary. The accusations against Ebel were made by the brother of a woman in Ebel's circle who had offended him by insisting on her share of the family estate.

         The Church's brief inquiry, coupled with its bias against Ebel, led it to suspend him and join the civil prosecution. The case lacked evidence and eyewitness testimony and ultimately succumbed to hysteria. Similarly, the press created lurid accounts of widespread sexual improprieties. "The official mind of the Kingdom of Prussia had composed itself against the two beleaguered clergymen." Both men were convicted, permanently suspended, and financially penalized, while Ebel was sentenced to incarceration. An appeal overturned the harshest penalties but only partially restored their reputations.

         The author posits that the two men were too liberal for an era marked by the state's consolidation of power and suppression of new ideas. Furthermore, Ebel was different. He had long hair and an effeminate manner. Their prosecutors were relatively liberal and plainly uncomfortable with him. I do not know why an eminent historian took up this story. I believe a reviewer said that he had come across it and had wanted to write about it for decades.

          Sir Christopher Clark of Cambridge University is only 66 and presumably has one or two major works still ahead of him. I read this because I thoroughly enjoyed his book 'Sleepwalkers' (August 2013 blog post). Published on the eve of the centenary of the Great War, he posited that the Russians and Serbians were chiefly at fault in 1914. A year later, Sir Max Hastings, in 'Catastrophe,' vehemently argued for the traditional interpretation (January 2014 blog post). I twice saw Hastings speak at the Pritzker Military Museum in Chicago. He tells a story of being brought to the Dover coast as a young boy and having his grandfather point to the continent. He said to young Max, "There is where the Hun will come from for the third time."

Slough House, Herron - B+

                   Diane Taverner finds herself in a pickle when she sanctions an off-the-books hit in Russia using funds provided by a group of right-wing British businessmen. At the same time, she removes the Slow Horses from MI5's record books. Somehow, the GRU concludes that the Horses are an assassination team, and two former members are killed. Threaten the Horses, and they spring into action. Lamb brilliantly plays his hand, and with a valiant effort from River, they prevail. There are quite a few loose ends, but this is another great entry in the series.

Bad Actors, Herron - B+

                Six months later, a former First Desk is asked by 10 Downing Street to try to find a missing consultant to the PM's closest adviser, a despicable man named Anthony Sparrow. For reasons unknown, Taverner tells Downing Street that the last number the missing woman, Sophie de Greer, called was Lamb's. This bald-faced lie requires the horses to get involved, and they (not Regent's Park) figure out that de Greer is probably a Russian plant. Then Sparrow vindictively manages to get Taverner suspended. Another fabulous outing,  with the hideous but hysterical Jackson Lamb pulling the strings.

A Rumor Of War, Caputo - B++

        "When we marched into the rice paddies on that damp March 1965 afternoon, we carried, along with our packs and rifles, the implicit convictions that the Viet Cong would be quickly beaten and that we were doing something altogether noble and good. We kept the packs and rifles; the convictions, we lost." Eventually, "we fought for no cause other than our own survival."

         This memoir is considered the finest written about Vietnam. Caputo was born in Chicago in 1941, raised in the suburbs, and went straight into the Marine Corps after finishing the PLC program at Loyola in 1964. After training and an infusion of "courage, loyalty, and esprit de corps," it was off to Vietnam. He "was twenty-three years old, in superb condition, and quite confident he would live forever." His brigade was the first to arrive in Vietnam and, for a month, dug in a defensive position around the Da Nang Air Base. They suffered the indignities of heat and filth in their foxholes while they waited. After almost two months, they began long-range patrols into the jungle. Dropped into an LZ, the company walked three miles to a village, where the sniper fire began. When they were flown back to base, they were exhausted and had never seen anyone to fire at.

         Thus began a pattern of flying into the bush for a day or two and then flying back to base. Their first casualty was a man with a 109-degree temperature. Slowly, the men became immune to death and suffering, and they began to hate. Their first meaningful firefight lasted 90 minutes and led to four VC dead. The company's first fatality, a 19-year-old new father, shook everyone to the core. At the end of May, Caputo was sent for training in Japan and assigned to regimental headquarters as a staff officer. Staff work took up three or four hours per day, and the rest of staff life was pure boredom. On July 1, the VC attacked the airbase. They inflicted serious damage but were held off. One of Caputo's jobs was serving as casualty officer, requiring him to view bodies, catalog injuries, and report the causes of death. The job and the nightmares aged him until he felt like an old man just hanging onto life.

          The fall monsoon season brought a new war, no longer guerrilla. Both the VC and the NVA were launching more traditional battles, and Marine losses escalated. Caputo found himself writing up ten casualties a day. By November, he was so bored that he volunteered to go back to a line company. After eight months in-country, his idealistic notions were long gone. He just couldn't do any more paperwork about the dead, and he wanted back in on the intensity of combat. In the first month, his platoon made 200 patrols. One late December day, the platoon was engaged in an intense firefight and performed excellently. Caputo was thrilled. In January, every patrol seemed to run into mines and booby traps, until a helicopter assault into a hot LZ changed the pattern. One day, after five hours of combat, he lost control of his platoon as it torched a village. In his last month, Caputo was haunted by nightmares, and his feet and lower legs were a putrid mess of sores. One night he cracked and sent his men out to capture two suspected VC. When they wound up dead, he and his men were court-martialed. He had to stay in Vietnam a few extra months before the matter was dropped. He became further embittered and came to believe the whole war effort was hopeless hypocrisy.

         A decade later, he was back as an experienced war journalist for the last days of South Vietnam. In the final month, the NVA rolled over its token opposition. He helicoptered out a day before the regime fell—one of the first Americans in-country and one of the last out. The Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist died earlier this month.

The Cormorant Hunt, Idov - B+

         This is the sequel to The Collaborators. For two years, Ari Falk has been hiding in Tbilisi. When a British friend of his is assassinated in Prague, the CIA mentions his name in a way that suggests he might be the killer. He's on the run again — not really, as the CIA only wanted to flush him out and talk to him. They ask him to infiltrate a Russian GRU-funded extremist group. His CIA handler, the Deputy Director of Covert Actions, Asha, is trying to find a mole on the 7th floor. Falk and Asha work together to track down and bring the evildoers to justice. This is a fine, fast-paced, one-day read.

The Collaborators, Idov - B+

         This highly praised spy novel features a CIA agent working for a counter-disinformation team in Riga. Ari Falk loses a Russian podcaster and dissident, and then his Riga team is targeted. With his professional life in ruins, he is sent to London and told to “recover” for a few weeks. At about the same time, a famous and wealthy Russian-American hedge fund manager jumps off a boat into the Sea of Cádiz. Falk skips London to begin looking into both cases, which had crisscrossed in Riga. Falk and the presumed suicide’s daughter, Maya, team up and work through it together. It’s a classic thriller with plenty of confusing rabbit holes, but still a lot of fun.

Northwoods, Pease - B+

          This is a fabulous page-turner set in a small Wisconsin lake town. A teenage boy is found dead, and his girlfriend is missing. The town's small police force is struggling with the fact that its best investigator succumbed to alcoholism after two traumatic tours in Afghanistan. That investigator is Eli North, and the Sheriff is his mother, Marge. Complicating matters is a vast interstate conspiracy involving a Chicago-based drug company. That connection brings FBI agent Alyssa Mason to town. The unlikely trio saves the day, albeit with some befuddling inter-personal tension/attraction between Eli and Alyssa.This is a blast, but the nurse-practitioner author from Wisconsin fully understands and explores alcoholism, drug addiction, and bad parenting.

Moses And The Doctor: Two Men, One Championship, And The Birth Of Modern Basketball, Epplin - B

          Julius Erving made a splash in Hempstead, UMass, and Rucker Park, but he was still relatively unknown when he signed with the Virginia Squires in 1971 after his junior year in college. His talent and ambition were otherworldly, and he took the ABA by storm.  A few years later, a young Petersburg prodigy, Moses Malone, was considering skipping college and heading straight to the ABA. He shocked America by signing a million-dollar contract with the Utah Stars in 1974 right out of high school.

          Julius Erving desired to be more than an outstanding athlete; he wanted to be a role model in the mold of Jackie Robinson and Bill Russell. On the court he was “bold and fearless,” and off it he became “a dignified and accessible ambassador” for the ABA. In contrast to the league’s charming and articulate face, the new 19-year-old rookie Moses Malone barely spoke to the press.

           In the ABA’s final season, Dr. J stole the show at the Dunk Contest, won the MVP award, and led his team past Denver in the finals. When the new NBA season began, Julius was in Philadelphia and Moses in Houston. Both men had excellent years and faced each other in the Eastern Conference Finals, which Philly won in six games. Most observers viewed the NBA Finals against Portland as a clash between the undisciplined and erratic 76ers and a brilliantly structured and focused Blazers. The better-coached Blazers won in six.

          In Houston, Moses’ relentless work ethic earned him the 1979 MVP award. He pulled down 587 offensive rebounds — a number no one has come within fifty of in nearly half a century.

          After Philly flailed for a few years, an unhappy Julius Erving embraced religion and pared down his Afro. Approaching thirty, with creaky knees, he had decided he needed a reboot. The 76ers entered the 1979–80 season with team-oriented players like Bobby Jones and Mo Cheeks, now coached by Billy Cunningham. Julius had his best season since the ABA days. They beat the Celtics in the conference finals and met the Lakers for the title. Magic Johnson made history in Game 6 when he started at center and demolished Philadelphia. 

          The 1980–81 season saw Julius win the MVP award. In the conference finals he wore himself out guarding the younger Larry Bird, and the Sixers blew a 3–1 series lead, allowing Boston to reach the Finals, where they whipped Houston.

          The following year Moses won another MVP, but the Rockets’ owner had died and Malone knew he would soon become a free agent. Philadelphia beat Boston but lost to the Lakers in the Finals. For the first time since his brother’s death years earlier, Julius Erving sat in the locker room and cried.

           The Sixers knew they needed rebounding help, and were fed up with Daryl Dawkins. That summer, owner Harold Katz traded Daryl, and offered Malone a six-year, $13.2 million contract and changed the balance of power in the NBA.

          Moses deferred completely to Doc, pounded the boards, and suddenly the Sixers were beating everyone, including Boston and Los Angeles. Malone’s lack of artistry and relentless effort endeared him to Philly’s blue-collar fan base. His “metronomic reliability steadied a team prone to losing its bearings under duress.” The Sixers started 50–7 before stumbling home at 15–10. Moses was battling serious knee pain and missing games.

            A few days before the playoffs began, Moses had fluid drained from his knee and then overpowered the Knicks in the opener. It was a sweep, during which Moses scored 79 more points and grabbed 29 more rebounds than Bill Cartwright. Philadelphia then beat the Bucks in five before facing the Lakers in the Finals.

           Philly won the first two games at home, with Moses leaning on Kareem Abdul-Jabbar both nights, and took Game 3 when Malone held Kareem scoreless in the second and third quarters. Doc scored the final three baskets in Game 4 to complete the sweep. The Sixers were on top of the world.

          They flopped the following year. The nation’s attention shifted to three straight Lakers-Celtics Finals, and Philadelphia simply fell apart. The owner turned mean-spirited and traded Moses away, while Andrew Toney’s career was shortened because the team ignored his foot problems. Billy Cunningham retired with the highest winning percentage of any coach in NBA history. Doc retired in 1987. Moses played until 1995 and became the last ABA player in the league. He was one of only seven men to win three MVP awards, and Dr. J remains one of only nine men to score 30,000 professional points.

         Gotta just love Julius Erving - incredible skills and a total class act. Philly - not at all.          

Ironwood, Connelly - B+

          This is the second Catalina Island novel featuring Det. Stilwell. Stil loses two deputies in a shootout during a drug bust gone sideways at the island airport late at night. He captures one of the bad guys, but two fake ICE agents release him from jail. His suspicions run deep, and the eventual resolution ruins the careers of many important people in the LA area. He also teams up with Renee Ballard's cold case team to put another very bad man behind bars.

        Michael Connelly remains as sharp, insightful, and flat-out brilliant as he was with the first Bosch novel in 1992.

The Heart Of Europe: The Past In Poland's Present, Davies - B -

         Norman Davies is one of his generation’s most acclaimed and prolific historians. His specialty is Central Europe, with an occasional dalliance into his native England. I’m certain I’ve read three of his books, and possibly as many as five. He wrote a 1,000+ page, two-volume history of Poland in 1981 that was abridged to just under 500 pages a few years later. This is the 2001 edition of that abridgment. The story is not told in chronological order.

         Poland’s communist dictatorship was forcibly imposed by the USSR. There weren’t enough communists in Poland to run a factory, never mind a country in 1944. It was another example of alien-imposed tyranny, a Stalinist creation that lasted until 1989. However, it was never as extreme, violent, or brutal as it had been in the USSR. The Catholic Church was too strong and too deeply rooted to be oppressed completely. There were modicums of both political and economic flexibility, unlike anything in the USSR. The visit home by the newly elected Polish Pope in 1979 was psychologically uplifting and easily led to Solidarity’s rise and successful strike the following year. The regime responded with Jaruzelski’s martial law in December 1981. The suppression that followed was severe, and the economy continued its downward spiral. After almost four decades of Soviet domination, Poles stood in line for bread, their country was bankrupt, and a donee of foreign beneficence. “The essence of Poland’s modern experience was humiliation” at the behest of the Soviets.

         The only European country whose war lasted as long as Poland’s was Germany’s. For 2,078 days, the Poles fought, died, and hoped for a restoration of their freedom. “In proportion to its size, Poland incurred far more damage and casualties than any country on earth.” The two occupying powers of 1939 murdered the leadership class of the country, the Germans put the Jews in ghettos, the Soviets deported two million people to Siberia, and the Soviets murdered 4,500 Polish officers at Katyn. After Barbarossa, western Poland became the home of the camps, where nine to ten million people, half of them Jewish, were killed. When the tide turned, Poles were happy to be rid of the Germans, but deeply anxious about the Soviets. The Soviets brought their own ready-to-go Polish government with them in 1944. For two years after the war, Polish patriots flailed at the Soviet occupiers before they were defeated. When it was all over, Poland had lost significant lands to the east, eighteen percent of its population, and all for naught. They had sacrificed, fought long and hard, and were back under the Russian heel.

         When the Great War began, Poland did not exist. Ethnic Polish men were drafted into the armies of the three empires that had partitioned their country. Polish independence was adopted as an Allied war aim. By the end of the war, the lands that would become Poland were devastated and had lost fifteen percent of their population. The Second Polish Republic was created by the Treaty of Versailles and six border wars fought by the Poles. The two-year, far-ranging war with the Soviet Union saw the Red Army suffer its only defeat, and Marshal Pilsudski became a true national hero. Forming a reborn republic on the ruins of war was no easy task, and in 1926 Pilsudski took over after a military coup. The country was economically stable, the population grew, and Pilsudski tried to steer between and away from Germany and the USSR. After his 1935 death, his successors watched as Germany took over the Rhineland, Austria, and Czechoslovakia. The frail Second Republic was “foully murdered by two assailants acting in collusion.” The years between 1918 and 1939 would prove to be fondly remembered as the only ones between 1795 and 1989 in which Poles lived in freedom.

         The Polish republic was destroyed in 1795. “The overwhelming experience for all Poles during five long generations was one of foreign rule and political oppression.” Polish culture, language, and aspirations survived, and “When the world of the empires fell apart, the Polish idea of nation proved sufficiently mature to seize its destiny.”

         Freedom arrived almost miraculously as “a country of forty million had extracted itself from the communist morass with no violence and with relatively few conflicts.” Massive amounts of foreign debt and a moribund economy offered Jaruzelski limited elbow room to save Polish communism. Lech Walesa, while in prison, received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1984, further diminishing the regime. In early 1989, the government began negotiations with Solidarity. The sides agreed to reverse martial law, legalize Solidarity, and allow free elections. Solidarity swept the elections, and Gorbachev announced that the Soviets would not interfere in Poland’s internal affairs. While the rest of the Eastern Bloc collapsed, Poland remained calm. Jaruzelski still controlled the army and the police, but a free market economy was emerging. In nationwide elections, the communists were swept into the dustbin of history, and Lech Walesa became president. Poland was free.

Spies and Other Gods, Wolff - C

             This novel features a senescent head of MI6 going back into the field and not doing too well. Reviewers seem to like the way it explores the institutional roles that support agents in the field, along with how boring and full of dead ends spying can be. There’s also some nice insight into inter-European bureaucratic infighting, but for me, it’s simply befuddling.

Bloody Crowns: A New History Of The Hundred Years War, Livingston - B

         "We may think of the Hundred Years War as a fight between two crowns, but the reality is much larger, much more complicated and infinitely more interesting. These years of conflict drove enormous leaps forward in military technology and organization. They helped build political systems and national identities. They forged the myths and fundamentally shaped multiple modern states. Few periods in history have done so much to create our world." The era is best seen as "a sequence of steps in France's struggle to define itself."

         Before the beginning of what the author refers to as the Two Hundred Years War, the Capetians and Plantagenets fought for about a century over the English monarch's claims in France. The fighting ended, and the English king, at least on the continent, was a vassal of France. The only meaningful holding that England retained was Gascony, a province along the Pyrenees border with Spain.

          In 1292, pirates began fighting in the Channel, and Philippe V escalated matters by announcing Gascony was forfeit to France. A decade of fighting led to a truce in 1303. The early years of the new century saw continuing tension between the two crowns as Edward refused to pay homage for Gascony. The English queen placed her fourteen-year-old son Edward on the throne and dispensed with her husband. Edward III would reign for fifty years. In 1328, Philippe VI became the first Valois monarch. Two years later, Edward reached his majority and took full control in England. In 1337, the traditional start of the Hundred Years War, Edward renounced his oaths to Philippe.

          In 1346, Edward launched one of England's greatest campaigns, Crecy. He landed in Normandy in early July, sacked Caen, and was trapped and outnumbered at Crecy in late August. The French charged into a line of English longbowmen and were slaughtered. It was a complete and total victory. A year later, France surrendered Calais after a lengthy siege.

         The following year, the most devastating onslaught of the Black Death rampaged across the continent. Somewhere between one-third and one-half of the continent's people died. After a pause, hostilities continued. The Black Prince, Edward's son, spent two summers wreaking havoc through the south of France and, when the French pursued, prevailed at Poitiers while capturing the king. It was another battle where the longbow defeated a superior French force.

         France was in chaos but refused to agree to the deal its captured king accepted. Edward and his son marched from Calais to Paris. The walls could not be breached. The peace that followed expanded the province of Gascony and assured that it was English land. No more would an English king, as Duke of Gascony, need to kneel to the French monarch.

          Charles V succeeded his father in 1364 and began a decade-long reversal of all that England had accomplished in the war. He slowly and methodically pushed back against the English and also defeated them when they tried to intervene in a Spanish succession conflict. By 1380, Calais was all that England held on the continent. Both Edward III and the Black Prince died, leaving ten-year-old Richard II on the throne, while in France Charles too passed away. He was succeeded by an eleven-year-old. Both sides were under tremendous financial strain and agreed to terms in 1389.

         As Richard came of age, he struggled to gain and maintain control. He disinherited a cousin, Henry of Bolingbroke, who defeated him and became Henry IV. France went through decades of turmoil brought on by the madness of Charles VI and the ensuing succession crisis.

         Henry V reinitiated the war in 1415. His first, and most memorable, success was at Agincourt on October 25th, St. Crispin's Day. Badly outnumbered, the English center settled in with their spears pointed forward, flanked by the ever-effective longbowmen. It was a slaughter that eviscerated France's nobility. Henry conquered Normandy and, under the terms of the treaty, married Catherine of Valois. Once again, sons of an English king married to a French princess would be contenders for France's throne.

         However, fate intervened, as Henry died leaving a four-year-old son. During a long truce, Charles VII regrouped and defeated the English, eventually evicting them from France in the fall of 1453. This generally is considered the end of the war, but as the author points out that no one knew it at the time. Defeat in France left England on the cusp of the Wars of the Roses. As England descended into civil war, France reinforced its western lands. Henry VII made an attempt to invade but failed and signed the Peace of Étaples in 1492, renouncing any claims in France.

         The war changed both countries, as they now had vastly superior methods of collecting taxes and maintained standing armies. Parliament was strengthened in England. The French hailed their victory, and the English remembered the three great battles they won. Each country began to look beyond its borders.  "Thus the Two Hundred Years War gave birth to England and France as we know them. It gave birth to our world."

Only Way Out, Goldberg - B

          In a loser town on the Oregon coast, its leading loser is a crooked cop, Jack, who stumbles upon the opportunity of a lifetime. He checks out a van that went over a cliff and finds a dead man, Robert, along with millions in cash and other goodies. The driver had just ripped off the law firm where he supervised clients' private safe deposit boxes. Jack dismembers the body and destroys the van. Every now and then, he uses something from his stash to bribe someone, while the law firm and many others continue to believe Robert is still out there.

          Decades later, however, Robert's sister, Penny, and Mitch, who now has Robert's old job and is also a crook, think otherwise. They believe someone in town — likely Jack — has been gaming the system and that Robert has long been dead. This is a fun dive into a world of grifters, con men, thieves, and miscreants of every variety.

The Rolling Stones: A Biography, Spitz - B+

        This story is very well known, but what the heck, I love these guys.

        In October 1961, Keith and Mick start talking on a train into London about their love of the blues. Keith was fascinated by the records Mick was carrying, and Mick was amazed when Keith said he could play Chuck Berry’s licks. They were soon huddled over records with Mick singing and Keith playing guitar. About the same time, Brian Jones came to London to form a band with his mate, Ian Stewart. They met Mick and Keith at the Ealing Blues Club, and Ian told Brian, “Mick can’t sing to save his fuckin’ life,” but it was obvious he was going places. When the four of them began to look for work, someone asked them their name — Brian responded, the Rollin’ Stones. They started to play gigs in jazz clubs that were offended by the rock ’n’ roll side of the group, and they still needed a drummer and a bass player. With an older Bill Wyman playing bass, they started to draw crowds and generate enthusiasm around London. They finally landed Charlie Watts.

          Brian, Keith, Mick, Stu, Bill, and Charlie were now a band. They believed they were on the cusp of something, and then came the Beatles. They would stick to their blues-based rock ’n’ roll to compete. The Stones landed a regular Sunday gig and began to draw crowds that loved to dance to their music. One Sunday in April 1963, the Beatles came in to listen and were blown away. They soon had a 19-year-old manager, Andrew Loog Oldham, and a deal with Decca. Because of his older, hangdog look, Stu was demoted to session musician and road manager. As 1963 closed, Brian’s demons were getting the better of him, and he was slowly separating from the group. More importantly, Andrew told Keith and Mick they had to write their own songs. They finally delivered “Not Fade Away.” Oldham pushed the bad-boy image and got them a US tour.

          The tour was a bust, with only one good night — 2,600 happy, screaming fans at Carnegie Hall. Upon their return home, they released “It’s All Over Now.” They came back to the US in October on the heels of “Time Is on My Side” and nailed a performance on Ed Sullivan. The following spring of 1965, they recorded “The Last Time” and “Play With Fire.” “Satisfaction” followed, and “it would become the most iconic riff in the history of rock ’n’ roll, as identifiable as the opening of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony.” As the band ascended, Brian fell deeper into abusive drug use and further separated from the group. That summer, they brought in Allen Klein to improve their record deal and released “Get Off of My Cloud.” By the end of the year, the Stones were stars whose concerts were wildly rowdy. Mick and Keith kept writing, and Allen Klein was filching most of the royalties.

          The following year, one of London’s tabloids decided to put two investigative reporters on the Stones. They tipped off the police, who raided a party at Brian’s house on Feb. 11, 1967. Just before they took off on a European tour, Mick and Keith were summoned to appear in court in May. Brian was busted later that spring. At their trial, Keith was sentenced to a year and Mick to three months. Public reaction, even including The Times, was vehemently opposed to the mistreatment of Mick and Keith over absurdly minimal offenses. On appeal, Keith’s case was dismissed and Mick’s deferred. They had dodged a bullet. They were fed up with Oldham, who was equally unhappy and quit. To finish up an unsatisfactory year, Their Satanic Majesties Request flopped.

They opened the new year with Mick beginning to run the business and a new producer in place. “Jumpin’ Jack Flash” and “Street Fighting Man” erupted, and in June they laid down “Sympathy for the Devil.” They released Beggars Banquet, and everyone just loved it. Over the Christmas holiday, Keith and Mick took a trip together and did some serious thinking about the future. They had to get rid of Brian, who had just been convicted of a serious crime. And they had to dump Klein, whom they figured out was stealing them blind. They were on top of the world, and they were broke.

        Back in the studio in early 1969, they produced “Gimme Shelter,” “Honky Tonk Women,” and “You Can’t Always Get What You Want.” They picked Mick Taylor to replace Brian, and Charlie, Mick, and Keith broke the news to Brian, who seemed to accept it. Soon thereafter, though, Brian was dead. Two days later, the band played in public for the first time in two-and-a-half years. They went to LA and prepared for a US tour. They started on Nov. 7 and were ready for the tag many were using — The Greatest Rock ’n’ Roll Band in the World. The tour was a resounding success, with the band developing a show that would carry them around the world for decades. 

         They had agreed to do a free show and went to Altamont, which featured “masses of angry, drug-addled kids.” Security would be provided by the Hells Angels in exchange for $500 worth of beer. The place was a dump, the Angels were using every drug they could find, and in the madhouse they killed a man. The Stones were lucky to escape in a helicopter. Everyone blamed them, and they left the country immediately.

          They looked forward to 1970, a new record deal, and decamping to France to avoid Britain’s taxes. They got the record deal they wanted with Atlantic and convinced France to let them in. The only real fly in the ointment was that Keith was so addicted to heroin and coke that he could barely function. Through a haze of drugs and daily chaos, they created Exile on Main St., a double album released in 1972. The following tour was a much-heralded success. However, they were still fighting with Allen Klein, facing endless drug busts and legal problems, and Keith’s addictions ran rampant. He and Mick were no longer the Glimmer Twins — they were barely speaking and certainly not writing. Mick Taylor got fed up and quit. He was replaced by Ronnie Wood.

         As they prepared for their 1975 US tour, the Stones opted for special effects, turning their monstrous concerts into spectacles. The band rolled on until Keith was in such bad shape that he was arrested for trafficking in Toronto. He had to clean himself up or the band might not be able to renew its record deal or tour again.  He did, for a while.

         In 1982, the band celebrated its 20th anniversary. At this stage, though, they were primarily a performing band. Their music was simply not as impactful as it once was. Soon thereafter, they were falling apart — sniping, fighting, doing solo work, and unable to keep it together. They made an album that Mick decided was not even worth touring behind. Ian Stewart, the foundation of the whole group, died of a heart attack. By the end of the ’80s, the Stones were no more. At their lowest point, one of their financial advisers observed, “The way you make money is as a band. You      have to do group work. This is what the world wants from you.”

         Mick and Keith got together in 1989 and settled their differences. They cranked out the Steel Wheels album in just five weeks in Barbados and were heading out on tour for the first time in eight years. Mick came up with an eight-story, $18 million stage. They reconnected with their audience and with each other. Keith said, “If we made it through the ’80s, we can go on forever.”

         They toured into the ’90s, and no one could unseat them. Bill Wyman withdrew, and they brought in Daryl Jones. They went out on a yearlong tour beginning in the summer of 1994 and grossed $320 million. They have toured ever since, most recently in 2024, although Charlie had to step away in 2019. They opened the Hackney Diamonds tour at SoFi in LA and brought the house down sixty years after their first California gig.

         It has been speculated that they have been seen in person by almost a billion people. They all left smiling and singing the songs of the Greatest Rock ’n’ Roll Band in the World.

The Hidden City, Finch - B-

             In late 1879, Charles Lenox, London’s first private detective, heads to Portsmouth to meet a ship arriving from India. For the first time, he meets Angela, the fourteen-year-old daughter of his late first cousin, along with her Indian maid, Sari. He brings them to his home, where his wife and daughter welcome them. Simultaneously, he begins investigating a case concerning his childhood nanny. The case involving Mrs. Huggins leads in several different directions and immerses Lenox in London’s depraved criminal world. The strength of this series lies in its detailed insights into, and assessments of, London and the UK during Victoria’s reign.

Sherlock Holmes and The Real Thing, Meyer - B+

            Holmes is approached by the recently widowed Lady Glendenning, who is trying to manage her late husband's London leasing business. She asks Holmes to look into a tenant who hasn't paid in three months. Holmes investigates the studio of the missing painter and finds blood spatter on the floor mixed with paint. The man specializes in portraits, preferably of good-looking ladies. It has been a particularly snowy winter, and as it melts, the painter's body is found. Although Lady Glendenning pays Holmes, he continues to pursue the case to its complex and stunning conclusion. The accomplished author has created a perfect setting in 1890s London and filled it with a Sherlock very much at the top of his game.

Devil In A Blue Dress, Mosley - B

         This first book in the Easy Rawlins series is set in postwar LA in 1947. Out of work with a mortgage payment looming, he accepts $100 to look for a good-looking blonde white woman known to frequent bars in Watts. The request and payment are made by a wealthy, elusive white man. And off we go through a dazzling cast of characters and charlatans. By the time it's all over, Easy, his lifelong buddy Mouse, and the stunning white woman all walk away with a pretty penny. This is a brilliant exposition of Black LA long ago.

Lawrence In Arabia: War, Deceit, Imperial Folly and the Making of the Modern Middle East, Anderson - B +, Con't.

          This is a continuation of the March 6th blog on the first portion of this book.

          Lawrence arrived at Faisal's camp in December 1916. Now dressed in the white robes of a sheikh at his host's suggestion, he took up residence among the Arabs. In January, when Lawrence's position as liaison was made permanent at Faisal's request, he knew he was now in a position to "remake the war in Arabia in his own image." Some in Cairo wanted to see Aqaba—a port strategically placed at the northern end of the Red Sea's eastern prong—taken from the sea in an amphibious landing. Had they succeeded, the Allies could have prevented the Arabs from attacking the Hejaz Railway and advancing into Syria. Lawrence took a very dangerous step and informed Faisal of the Sykes-Picot Treaty, in which the Allies agreed to divide the Middle East and exclude the Arabs from a meaningful role. Lawrence and Faisal began to plan an attack to the north, inland and away from Allied interference. Lawrence came to understand that the road to Arab success lay in using the vast desert and its mountainous terrain to their advantage, prosecuting a guerrilla war. He also began to see the advantages of approaching Aqaba from the desert and occupying the city before the Allies arrived from the sea.

          In the spring of 1917, Lawrence met Auda, chief of the Howeitat. He was a formidable desert warrior, and Lawrence realized that with Auda he could take Aqaba. The fact that his superior officer indicated that Britain did not wish the Arabs to take the city gave Lawrence pause, but did not stop him. At this point, knowing full well the treachery the Allies intended, Lawrence resolved to lead an Arab revolt into Syria and attempt to thwart both Britain and France. While he and Auda rode east and fought a handful of hard-fought skirmishes along the way, he also orchestrated the Arab uprising in southern Syria. The Turks surrendered Aqaba on July 6, 1917. Knowing supplies were desperately needed, Lawrence rode 150 miles to the Suez Canal to notify Cairo immediately.

        Lawrence was hailed as a conquering hero, nominated for the Victoria Cross, made a Commander of the Order of the Bath, and promoted to major. He convinced the new commander, General Allenby, to support his thrust north into Syria, coordinated with a British army attack through Palestine. Working with Allenby would prove a challenge. When Allenby explained his tactical plan, the only thing Lawrence could think about was a small raid on a railway bridge. Meanwhile, his Arabs sat in Aqaba, growing restless while waiting for a chance to attack Syria. Allenby's campaign into Palestine succeeded, while Lawrence's efforts did not. He sent a messenger to Hussein in Aqaba telling him to come north. On his way west, he was captured and likely raped and tortured by a Turkish commander. His accounts over the years were inconsistent, leaving uncertainty about what exactly happened. His colleagues, however, were convinced that he became more remote and increasingly ruthless in his pursuit of revenge against the enemy.

        Late in 1917, Arab enthusiasm for Britain's efforts in the region began to fade. There was growing disillusionment over the Balfour Declaration*, and the Turks made public the terms of the Sykes-Picot Treaty.

         In January, on his way to meet Allenby, Lawrence led the defense of a small town under Turkish attack. He managed it so effectively that he was awarded the DSO, having inflicted casualties—killed, wounded, or captured—at ten times his own losses. He was promoted to colonel. That spring, both Allenby's offensive and an Arab attack in the desert failed. To make matters worse, Britain recalled thousands of Allenby's troops to reinforce the BEF in France, forcing him into a defensive posture. When Lawrence learned that Allenby was dissolving his camel corps, he requested—and received—its camels. With that added mobility, the Arabs would be able to attack Syria without British assistance.

         Soon, however, Allenby received a substantial number of Indian troops and resumed the offensive. He tasked Lawrence and the Arabs with destroying the railways around Deraa to isolate the Turks from reinforcements and supplies. They achieved all their objectives, and Lawrence was particularly proud of having destroyed his seventy-ninth bridge. Allenby's offensive was a complete success, and if the railways around Deraa remained severed, Turkish forces would be encircled. The British repeatedly instructed Lawrence that under no circumstances were the Arabs to reach Damascus first. The Arabs rendered the railways  unusable. Allenby then reversed course and allowed the Arabs to take Damascus. Lawrence and Faisal entered the famed city, where Lawrence appointed an Arab governor and briefly held authority.

         On October 3, Allenby, Faisal, and their staffs met, with Lawrence serving as interpreter. Following instructions from London, Allenby told Faisal to recognize French guidance, as Syria was to become a French protectorate. Faisal walked out. The next day, Lawrence requested leave and returned to England.

          "Everything that T. E. Lawrence had fought for, schemed for, and arguably betrayed his country for turned to ashes in a single five-minute conversation between Lloyd George and Georges Clemenceau." They met in London on December 1, agreeing that Britain would control Palestine and Iraq, while France would take Syria, finalizing their arrangement before Wilson's arrival. When it was over, Lawrence fell into "a state of extreme depression and nervous exhaustion." The region continued in its fractious ways: the French exiled Faisal, and ibn- Saud was consolidating power in the desert. Churchill, appointed Colonial Secretary in 1920, sought Lawrence's help. Together they crafted what appeared to be a sensible settlement at the Cairo Conference, bringing a measure of stability to the region.

         Lawrence's only desire thereafter was to disappear. In 1922, he enlisted in the RAF under an assumed name. In retrospect, it is clear that he suffered from PTSD during these years. He retired in 1935, and on the morning of May 13 he crashed his motorcycle. He died on the 19th at the age of 46. Churchill delivered the eulogy.

          As indicated in March, this book has been a struggle for me. It was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award in 2013, but it does tend to wander. To underscore that point, four additional narratives run alongside Lawrence's: a German diplomat and soldier - Major Curt Prüfer; a Turkish governor - Djemal Pasha; a Jewish Palestinian agronomist and spy - Aaron Aaronsohn; and an American oilman - William Yale. Their stories are important, and reading them carefully is worthwhile. However, I found it difficult to weave five parallel narratives together and chose instead to focus on the principal one. The events of a century ago are extraordinarily complex. Despite my criticisms, I have learned a great deal and gained a deeper appreciation for the intricate dynamics of the Middle East.

          Lawrence remains one of the most fascinating, enigmatic, brave, and perceptive military figures of all time—though he would likely have described himself as a civilian temporarily in uniform. Guerrilla wars are typically led by charismatic local figures rebelling against superior forces. In this case, he led the Arabs against his own country. He committed what could be considered treason and was later offered a knighthood, which he declined upon understanding the circumstances behind the invitation to Buckingham Palace—all before the age of thirty. He shattered every mold.

           *In 1918, Lawrence presciently observed, "If a Jewish state is to be created in Palestine, it will have to be done by force of arms and maintained by force of arms amid an overwhelmingly hostile population." He was also perceptive enough to see through Chaim Weizmann's reassurances to the Arabs about coexistence. In a report, he noted, "Dr. Weizmann hopes for a completely Jewish Palestine in fifty years."

Dark Renaissance: The Dangerous Times and Fatal Genius of Shakespeare's Greatest Rival, Greenblatt - A*

         Late Tudor England suffered from many maladies: the weather of the Little Ice Age, filthy streets, plague, entertainment featuring animal fights, religious conflict, and endless real and perceived conspiracies against the Queen—it was a cultural wasteland governed by a somewhat delusional, self-absorbed monarch. However, in the 1580s, from England “burst forth” magnificent advances in science and intellectual growth that propelled centuries of greatness. The author posits, “In the course of his restless, doomed, brief life, in his spirit and stupendous achievements, Christopher Marlowe awakened the genius of the English Renaissance.”

         The son of a shoemaker, he was born in Canterbury in 1564. At 14, he was awarded a scholarship to the King’s School, Canterbury. “Admission was a coup. It changed Marlowe’s life decisively and forever.” How he acquired the skills to pass the admission test is unknown. Learning and speaking Latin was a requisite for success. As the classics preceded Christianity, what one studied in school did not sound similar to the preaching one heard at church. Virgil and Ovid often wrote about lust and desire. “The books to which Marlowe was introduced in school offered an escape from the confining orthodoxies with which he and virtually everyone was hemmed in.” Three years later, he was off to Cambridge, where he was exposed to a rigorous academic life at a time of ongoing religious conflict in England. He brilliantly translated Ovid’s Amores, introducing a new style followed for centuries, and is believed to have indulged in proscribed sexual activities. He spent time in the library, hunched over a four-hundred-year-old atlas featuring the name of Tamburlaine, the title of his first play. After receiving his BA, he stayed on for another three years, declaring, as his scholarship required, his intention to become an Anglican prelate. He had no such intention, spent a considerable amount of time away from Cambridge, and consequently was denied the degree. When a letter from the Queen’s office arrived stating he had been in the service of the Crown, his degree was immediately granted.

         Marlowe had been engaged and sent overseas to spy by Sir Francis Walsingham, the Queen’s secretary and spymaster, whose primary mission was to protect the Crown from Catholic assassins. It was an opaque world in which one was uncertain who was a friend and whom one could trust. In 1587, Marlowe moved to London and rented rooms near the two existing theaters. With the construction of the Rose on the south side of the river, written material to perform was needed to entertain the burgeoning crowds. Into this world, where plays lasted a few weeks, maybe a month, Marlowe introduced to the owner of the Rose Tamburlaine the Great. “Virtually everything in Elizabethan theater is pre- and post-Tamburlaine. No one in English poetry had ever spoken with the grandeur and magnificent self-confidence of Marlowe’s Scythian hero.” The play had not a scintilla of the era’s morality and was a vastly popular success. Henslowe, the theater owner, asked for, and Marlowe cranked out, the sequel. Both were written in unrhymed iambic pentameter—blank verse. It changed everything, not unlike the arrival of talkies. As popular as the two plays were, some thought them blasphemous.

        Henslowe suggested a series of plays on the Wars of the Roses, with Kit Marlowe collaborating with Thomas Kyd and William Shakespeare. Shakespeare did most of the work and is heralded as the author. He admired and emulated Marlowe’s writing but was wary of risk-taking. Marlowe’s next solo success was The Jew of Malta, fiendishly plotted and unlike anything before. The play was a Machiavellian portrayal of the rise of the Stanley family, the sponsor of the theater and the playwright, in Tudor England. In 1593, Lord Strange became the Earl of Derby, and because of his family’s loyalty to Catholicism and rebellious relatives in France, he was highly suspect in the hyper-paranoid world of Elizabeth’s court. A year later, he died of poisoning. For Marlowe, the taint could easily spread to him, particularly as he was indifferent and skeptical about religion and inclined toward homosexuality. He spent time in Sir Walter Raleigh’s circle and was thought to be sympathetic to the ideas of a scientist, believed by the authorities to be an atheist, who worked for Raleigh.

       “It seems entirely possible that the peculiar atmosphere of liberty among those who assembled in Raleigh’s Durham House triggered in Marlowe his most transgressive and risk-taking impulse. Sometime in 1592, Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus was performed—Marlowe understood that he had struck theatrical gold. He had unearthed a deep vein of popular fear and fascination." The play is considered a “tragic vision of a looming catastrophe.” Faustus is Marlowe’s most autobiographical and riskiest work. Faustus celebrates a Black Mass, in Latin—a language banned in England since 1559. It is imbued with Calvinist doctrine and features Faustus making a pact with the Devil. It stood in complete opposition to the evangelicals of his era.

          While plague killed one in six in London, Marlowe was away in the country, lounging with a wealthy friend and working on The Massacre at Paris. In May of 1593, Marlowe was arrested and summoned back to the capital. Although no charges were pressed, the reason for his arrest were documents in the possession of his friend Thomas Kyd, who may have implicated Marlowe as an atheist while he was tortured. Another supposed friend supplied the Privy Council with endless purported scandalous statements attributable to Marlowe. He clearly was in trouble—trouble that could only end in hanging. Nonetheless, nothing happened after he returned to London. On May 30, he spent the day in a bar with three friends. Around six in the evening, there was noise in their private room, and Marlowe was dead. All three men told the police that Marlowe had attacked one of them, who killed him in self-defense. Theories abound about what happened and why. As all four men had at one time, or would in the future, be in the service of the state, many believe he was assassinated for his atheism by officers of the state.

         “The medieval worldview was still intact in Elizabethan England. The structure of society was ordered as it was by God. For the cultural life of England to move forward, someone had to come along and break through the suffocating carapace of inherited dogma.” That person was the reckless cobbler’s son from Canterbury. “Through the fissures Marlowe had made, the light began to flow. Shakespeare saw that he could now enter territory into which no one before Marlowe had dared to venture.”

           I’ve found this to be an extraordinary book. The author is a brilliant writer, and Marlowe is beyond fascinating. The most profound contribution in this book is its depiction of the totalitarian and paranoid views of Elizabeth and her advisors. Perhaps that was simply the nature of the era—but it feels closer to a 20th-century dictatorship.