Kindred: Neanderthal Life, Love, Death And Art, Sykes - B

         "These pages will paint a twenty-first century portrait of the Neanderthals: not dullard losers on a withered branch of the family tree, but enormously adaptable and even successful ancient relatives." They lived for 350,000 years before their fossil history disappeared 35,000 years ago. They ranged from Wales to Siberia, and as far south as Iraq. The finding of fossils in the Neander Valley 160 years ago began the study of our most immediate ancestors. As the world of archeology expanded to 20th century carbon dating and 21st century DNA analysis, our knowledge of them has increased almost infinitely. "Genetics can illuminate many shadows archaeology cannot." The source of our understanding is bits and pieces of 200-300 individual Neanderthals. DNA testing has confirmed that all Europeans have about 2% Neanderthal genes, but they were perceptibly different. Their brains were about the same size, but their heads were differently shaped, their noses were larger and they inhaled more air into bigger lungs, their bones were heavier and they were more muscular. Their legs were further apart and  shorter, but their hands were bigger and stronger. They were different from each other, those from Scandinavia having different features than those from the Middle East. "They rode the earth's climate rollercoaster for hundreds of thousands of years, coping with extremes in weather..." They roamed through every type of landscape. Based on their size, it is estimated that they required twice as many calories as today's homo sapiens. The majority of those calories came from meat. They hunted prey from rabbits up to mammoths, always seeking the fattest animals. Fish and birds were also consumed. The evidence also points to their being "herbaceous connoisseurs." They skillfully managed and processed their food supply for a third of a millennium. One issue that has eluded scientists has been their use of fire. They clearly used it to cook, but just how often and where has not been resolved. Equally uncertain to us is the degree of their mobility, because we know they likely moved in small bands, but we do not know how far.  Also, whether or not they ceremoniously buried their dead is unresolved. As their throats and ears were complex, and because they engaged in collaborative ideas, it appears likely that they were capable of some sort of speech. They wore clothing and probably some decorations. How, when and for how long they interbred with homo sapiens remains unresolved, as does how and why they died out as a species. There is so much that we don't know, but we do know that they were not "a failed early release hominin on the road to nowhere.." "Compared to the millions of years before, Neanderthal existence was a major upgrade to hominin life." This topic has always fascinated me. Four decades ago, the discussions and assessments were based upon a rudimentary study of fossils. Today, the ability to study those fossils down to the the cellular level has revolutionized our knowledge

Hello, Transcriber, Morrissey - B+

                Hazel is a transcriber for the Black Harbor, Wisconsin police department. She is 28, in a miserable marriage, and, at long last, is intrigued by her job. Black Harbor is the 'worst' town in the state, but transcribing oral reports that the cops dictate is captivating. A suspect in a case happens to be her next door neighbor. As she pays more and more attention to the case, she becomes fascinated with the voice of the detective and starts to meet him for an occasional soda or coffee. They fall for each other, which is just about as inappropriate a work place relationship as one can dream up. Good plot, a few deft touches and just enough excitement.

               This is the debut novel for a young University of Wisconsin grad who worked for three years as a - police transcriber.

Dead By Dawn, Doiron - B+

           This is a fascinating, fast-paced thriller set in the north woods of Maine and featuring Mike Bowditch, a state game warden and investigator. Mike's in his early thirties, and a graduate of Colby College. He is asked to look into a death by misadventure four years earlier of a 77 year-old who fell off a boat and drowned. Accident or murder? Once Mike reopens this inquiry, he attracts some unwanted animosity and attention that sees his vehicle sabotaged, and him plummeting into the Androscoggin river in the middle of winter. There is a lot of intriguing information about the wilds of Maine, and the folks who live there. Apparently, this novel is part of a long-running series, suggesting a look at the earlier ones is in line.

Rogues Gallery: The Birth of Modern Policing and Organized Crime in Gilded Age New York, Oller - C+

             Between 1870 and 1910, the city's population grew from 1.5 million to 5 million. Fully 40% of the residents were foreign born, and almost as many were first generation Americans. Crime grew exponentially, and the NYPD had to learn to police the increasingly complex and immigrant-filled city. The man who ushered the police department into the modern era was Thomas F. Byrnes, who joined the department in 1863, the year of the draft riots.  As a captain fifteen years later, he became famous for cracking the Manhattan Savings Institution heist, still the biggest in NY history. It was the first time ever in the city that bank robbers were arrested and convicted. Soon thereafter, Byrnes was promoted to Inspector and put in charge of the Detective Bureau. He initiated the 'rogues gallery' by publishing the daily mug shots of everyone arrested in the city. "Under Byrnes, the NYPD's detective bureau came to rival the great detective departments of Paris and Vienna, Austria." In 1888, the state legislature made him a chief inspector, number two in the police department. Four years later, he was superintendent. His eventual denouement began in the early 90's when crusading moralist, Reverend Charles Parkhurst, began to point out that there still was a great deal of sin and crime that the police let slide. Byrnes countered that they couldn't stop all crime and Parkhurst hammered away on departmental corruption. Byrnes' live and let live approach to minor crime was soon to be over. In 1894, the legislature created the Lexow Commission to investigate corruption in the department. When summing up, the committee's counsel said, "that despite using a microscope, the Lexow Committee had yet to find a business in the city that wasn't being extorted by the NYPD." The committee tried, but couldn't lay a glove on Byrnes. However, he soon met his match in the person of the new police commissioner,  Theodore Roosevelt. TR wanted to clean house, and he did, starting with Byrnes. TR was a high-minded progressive who wanted a professional, depoliticized, and above all, an honest department. He upgraded procedures, enhanced the use of telephones and introduced mobility to the NYPD with his adoption of a bicycle squad. In a short period of time, he transformed the department. Following the letter of the law, Roosevelt closed every saloon in the city over the summer of 1895, leading to his achieving unprecedented heights of unpopularity. He resigned two years later. The reform efforts of the TR and the Lexow Committee affirmed that the department should be clean and honest. However, within a few years, it was back to business as usual with saloonkeepers, prostitutes, and small-timers kicking back to the police. The gangs and violence that once was the exclusive purview of the Irish were replaced by newcomers, the Jews and Italians, who now predominated on the lower east side. The newcomers were rougher and tougher. When the city sent its first Italian-American detective to Palermo to research the criminal records of various gang members, he was gunned down in the Sicilian capital. Thomas Petrosino was the only on duty city policeman ever to die on foreign soil. By the end of the Gilded Age, both the NYPD and the Mafia were established, powerful organizations.

All Her Little Secrets, Morris - B

    This is an excellent thriller set in modern day Atlanta, featuring a 40-ish woman of color, Ellice Littlejohn. She is promoted to general counsel in a large privately owned delivery business. The only problem is that her boss Michael is murdered, and she is sleeping with him and discovered his body. Things start to unravel when Michael's wife acknowledges to her that she knew all along, and discloses information that implies the killer might have been someone at the company as Michael had discovered something very bad and was prepared to resign. Plus, Ellice's estranged half-brother is somehow involved. As it turns out, the company is a den of thieving, money-laundering white supremacists and it takes awhile for Elllice to unravel the mess. The novel fades a bit at the end but still holds your attention.

The White Russian, Bradby - C+

         This is a historical novel set in St. Petersburg (Petrograd after WWI started) in the early days of 1917. Revolution is in the air and the empire is crumbling. Alexander Ruszky, the chief of homicide, tries to do his duty but is caught up in a mess that involves his adulterous wife who is carrying on with a Grand Duke, his brother, his dad, the assistant finance minister, a ballerina who he is in love with and the staff at Tsarskoe Selo.  It sheds very little light on the time and place.

Hero Of Two Worlds: The Marquis de Lafayette in the Age of Revolution, Duncan - B

        Gilbert de Lafayette was born on Sept. 6, 1757 to a family of noble heritage on his father's side, and significant wealth on his mother's. His father died two years later. He grew up in the Auvergne region in south central France until his mother moved him to Paris when he was 11. A year later, she too died. Gilbert was now the wealthy Marquis de Lafayette. The noble de Noailles family set sights on him as a future son-in-law. He and Adrienne were wed in 1774. The following year he summered at Metz where he was a newly appointed officer in the army, joined the Masons, and began to consider freedom and equality as the foundation of his political philosophy. Before his career could begin though, he was caught on the wrong side of an army reorganization and was out of a commission.

      Dreaming of glory, he turned his attention to America and somehow convinced the Continental Army's recruiter in Paris to offer him a commission as a Major- General. His value was his membership in the nobility, his connection to the crown, and his wealth, which he used to purchase a ship to take him and others to America. He arrived in Philadelphia in the summer of 1777 and was warmly welcomed.  At Brandywine, he fought bravely, was wounded and won praise from Washington.  He worked in 1778  as liaison when the French forces arrived in America, and at year's end returned to France, where he was proclaimed a hero.  He returned to America in 1780, and announced more troops, supplies and funds were on the way. Washington assigned Lafayette a division and tasked him with pursuing an army in Virginia. As both sides traversed Virginia, Lafayette had the good fortune to command the army that actually bottlenecked Cornwallis at Yorktown. The twenty-four year old general was in charge of the attack that led to the British surrender. Lafayette had made his name.

   Returning to Paris, he took up the life of a wealthy and famous family man with three children. He was one of 144 Notables called to an assembly in 1787 to try and find a solution to the kingdom's precarious finances. It soon became evident that France's financial mess was caused by the profligacy of the Bourbons, and that massive tax revisions were necessary. However, no consensus was reached and the situation continued to deteriorate. The marquis was identified with the reform oriented republicans and lost favor at the court. When the coffers were completely empty in the summer of 1788, the creditors demanded reform through a calling of the Estates-General. Lafayette was part of the first convocation of the Estates-General since 1614, and made a notable speech on the topic of the rights of man. However, events soon overcame the assembly when the Bastille was stormed on July 14, 1789. A great revolution was underway.  In the new realm, Lafayette was put in command of the national guard, where he had to juggle preserving liberty and keeping order. His design of the guard's uniforms in white, red and blue eventually became the national flag. He deftly averted a peoples attack on Versailles in October and, in the course of seeking a compromise, convinced the king to move to Paris. As the king had indicated a willingness to create a constitutional monarchy, the marquis believed he was heading the revolution toward a peaceful resolution On the first anniversary of Bastille Day, Lafayette hosted a Fete de la Federation involving hundreds of thousands honoring the royal family and the National Assembly. He was at the apogee of his career, and would soon plummet. When the king attempted to escape France in the summer of 1991, Lafayette erroneously told the the government that he had been kidnapped. He had previously assured the Assembly that the king would not run. He was clearly wrong, and was the target of abuse by the angry radicals. When, in the midst of a confusing riotous day on the Champs de Mars, he ordered his men to fire, Lafayette sealed his fate. He resigned in October. He and his family left the city for their ancestral home in Auvergne. A year later, he was accused of treason. Danton, a long term opponent signed an arrest warrant, and the marquis fled the country.  The Austrians considered him an instigator of revolution and arrested him. By doing so, they probably saved his life. His wife was arrested and all of his assets confiscated. The new American ambassador, James Madison, saved Adrienne from the guillotine. The US passed a law authorizing full pay for Lafayette, thus affording him a chance to upgrade his life while imprisoned. Adrienne was set free in early 1795 as a gesture of goodwill to the US. She and her two daughters joined Lafayette in jail. Freedom came in 1797 when Bonaparte defeated the Austrians and they let their French prisoners out.

      Impoverished and unwelcome in France, the family moved to Denmark. He was allowed to return in late 1799 with the admonition to stay out of politics and Paris. The family moved to a chateau in LaGrange that Adrienne's family owned. His citizenship was reestablished, but he and Napoleon were wary of each other. The emperor wanted his support; he wanted liberty and freedom for all. Lafayette focused on his farming and his family. On Christmas Eve in 1807, Adrienne died at the age of forty-eight. Lafayette was saddened by France's losses, but welcomed the downfall of Napoleon. Louis XVIII's restoration bestowed a charter of rights, but it was a gift from the king and not a true constitution. In 1818, he was elected to the Chamber of Deputies. As the monarchy turned to the right, Lafayette began to work to overturn it. He was involved in a plot that failed, and managed to avoid indictment, but did lose his seat in the 1823 elections. With reaction prevailing, he decided it was time to return to America. Accompanied by his son, Georges, and a secretary, the marquis arrived in New York in the summer of 1824. He was honored for a full year throughout the country, where he visited all twenty-four states and commemorated the 50th anniversary of the Battle of Bunker Hill by laying the cornerstone for a new memorial. He met just about every luminary in the land including Jefferson, Adams, Monroe, Madison, Jackson and President Adams. He sailed to France in a US ship christened Brandywine in his honor.

     Charles X was now king and was bound and determined to turn back the revolution. As part of his program was the restoration of the aristocracy's wealth, Lafayette was once again a wealthy man. He was again elected to the Chamber of Deputies. In July of 1830, the king tried to eliminate many of the freedoms that were now part of the body politic. Rioters in Paris put Lafayette back in charge of the National Guard and forced the king to abdicate. He supported the duc d'Orleans for the throne because the duc believed in the principles of the liberals. He and Lafayette stood on the balcony of the Hotel de Ville waving the tricolor flag. Lafayette was again the toast of the country, and Louis Philipe, the new king, vowed to support republican institutions. The king lapsed into the Bourbon's old ways and the opposition had Lafayette removed from power, although he stayed on in the Chamber and continued to argue for expanding the electorate. He wound down his activities in Paris, and died at his country home in 1834 at the age of seventy-seven. His funeral procession in Paris attracted 200,000 spectators. The extraordinary Marquis Lafayette was buried in a churchyard with his wife.

     

Sharpe's Assassin, Cornwell - B+

                 In the first Richard Sharpe book in 15 years, we find now Lt. Col. Sharpe summoned to see Wellington the day after Waterloo. He is tasked to take his regiment ahead of the Allied advance, enter France, and capture a prison. One of the prisoners, an Englishman named Fox, Sharpe, and about a dozen men head to Paris to try and find a fraternity committed to killing the generals, princes, and kings, who are heading there to to occupy the city and establish a peace. Sharpe pursues the 'Fraternite,' guards the Louvre where the Allies are attempting to recover Europe's stolen art, and wreaks havoc and mayhem on deserving French miscreants.  When it is all done, he retires to Normandy with the French woman he has fallen in love with. Considering the time lapse between novels, and the author's age, this is likely the finale in the 20+ book series.  The Sharpe novels are historical fiction at its best. I've learned a great deal about military tactics as Sharpe climbed the ranks through Flanders, India, Spain, France and Belgium. The British riflemen in green coats scouting the enemy, the French attack in column to the sound of their drums, and the British use of squares against cavalry are three that come to mind. Simply great.

Fools and Mortals, Cornwell - B

             This is an intriguing novel set in London in 1595, and narrated by Richard Shakespeare, younger brother of the Bard. Will is working on, and begins rehearsals for, 'A Midsummer's Night Dream.' There are two concurrent stories in the novel. One is the conflict between the city's players and the Puritans focused on purifying the wretched city of London. Will Shakespeare's players are protected by the Queen's cousin, their benefactor, Lord Hundson.  The second story is about the need for content. Four theaters in close proximity to each other need plays to survive and stealing from Will Shakespeare is part of the strategy at the Swan. Good fun.

Project Hail Mary, Weir - B+

        Only twice before in nine years have I posted a science fiction novel on this blog, and this is the first one set in outer space. The author wrote 'The Martian,' and in this book tackles a possible human extinction event. It becomes apparent to scientists that the sun is losing its power, emitting less heat, and setting the earth on course to be 10 degrees colder in 25 years. Food sources will be so disrupted that a substantial portion of the race will starve. The problem appears to be infrared emissions from nebulae spanning the the solar system. Under the auspices of the UN, the world's powers set up a team that captures the emissions and labels them astrophage. After intensive analysis, the conclusion is to travel to the one solar system,  13 light-years away, that has not been impacted by the astrophage and try to sort out why it hasn't been effected. A three person crew is sent on a suicide mission to garner the solution and send back small probes with the hoped for answer. When Ryland Grace comes out of his induced coma, he learns that his two colleagues are dead. When he arrives at his destination, he realizes that there is another spaceship there. He makes contact with, and starts to work with, an astronaut from the planet Erid. Together, they determine how to eradicate the astrophage and, as a bonus, create enough fuel for Grace to get back to the Earth. He sends off the probes and begins the long flight home. About a month into his return, he realizes that they made a mistake and that the Eridian ship was not going to be able to make it all the way. Does he divert to Erid and help his colleague and billions of Eridians or does he keep going? A special thanks to Wendell Erwin, who I know I actually got all of the science in this bit of science fiction.

These Toxic Things, Hall - B

        This is a very good thriller set in today's LA featuring a young Black woman, recent USC grad, still living at home and working for a digital archaeology firm. She is the target of a serial killer who is sending her texts, but no one can sort out how, when or why she became a target. The fact is that the killer is part of the project that she is working on and is following her every move. Combine the main story with a surprising, dramatic personal turn in the final scene for a proverbial page turner. 

God's Shadow: Sultan Selim, His Ottoman Empire and theMaking of the Modern World, Mikhail - B

     The year 1492 saw Spain enter the New World, and finish expelling the Muslims from the Iberian peninsula.  The encounter between Spain and the Ottomans was the "exigent political struggle" of the day.  Indeed, "The Ottoman Empire, contrary to nearly all conventional accounts...was the very reason Europeans went to America." In the decades before and after 1500, the Ottoman Empire was the most powerful on Earth. It pushed the Portuguese and Spanish out of the Mediterranean, compelling them to sail around Africa. Europeans justified their importation of slaves from Africa to America as necessary to defeat Islam. To a great extent, "the Ottoman Empire made our modern world."

     Beginning in the early fourteenth century, the turkic speaking descendants of Osman began to conquer pieces of the deteriorating Byzantine Empire. Mehmet II, the seventh sultan of what was now known as the Ottomans, captured Constantinople in 1453. From that point until the 19th century, the Ottomans stood "at the center of global politics, economics, and war." Mehmet's grandson, Selim, would triple the size of the empire before his death in 1520 at the age of 49. 

    Selim was the fourth of ten sons fathered by the Bayezit, who became sultan in 1581. Born to different concubines, half-brothers and their mothers spent their lives plotting against each other because those who did not become sultan were murdered or exiled. Selim and his mother, Gulbahar, were sent to the far reaches of the Black Sea to govern Trabzon when he was 17.  He would stay there for twenty-five years and was generally considered to have done an excellent job. However, his distance from the capital clearly meant he was not to succeed his father. Nonetheless, he used the challenges of managing a border region to develop his own skills, particularly building military alliances. 

    Raised in Genoa, a city that traded extensively with the Ottomans, Columbus knew full well how Islam dominated from the eastern Mediterranean to the Black Sea. Like his peers, Columbus viewed the world through a religious prism focused on crusading against Islam. Earlier, when the Portuguese had discovered Muslims in W. Africa, a Papal Bull authorized them to "enslave any Saracens." Pagans, Jews, and Muslims were less human than European Catholics, and were the victims of Spanish violence in Europe and America. Columbus spent a decade searching for funding to go west. In Ferdinand and Isabella, he found dedicated 'Moor slayers.' When the Reconquista was completed in January, 1492, the Spanish crown was ready to sponsor Columbus. Attacking the Ottomans from Asia was the plan. The Spanish in the Caribbean were so focused on the Far East that they thought Cuba was Japan,  San Salvador, India and the Yucatan, Egypt. "The vocabulary of the war with Islam became the language of Spanish conquest in the Americas." "Spain conceived of itself as engaged in a perpetual Crusade against non-Christians." Failure of the Amerindians to convert meant that the natives were subject to being enslaved and losing their property. The barbarism of Spain, the only country in Europe ever occupied by Muslims, was condemned by the Dutch, French and English. "Violence, expulsions,  forced migrations, the expansion of religious war, the annihilation of New World peoples, and increased slavery dominated the early modern world in the decades around the paroxysmal  year of 1492." 

    "Much of Selim's time as governor of Trabzon, like much of his later reign as sultan, was focused on facing down the threat of Shiite rebels in eastern Anatolia and the growth of the early modern world's major Shiite power in Iran and the Caucasus." The Safavids dominated the lands west and south of the empire. When they attacked in 1505, Selim struck back with such ferocity that the Safavids appealed to the Sultan for mercy, which Bayezit responded to, thus creating a fault line between Selim and his father. After a raid into Georgia, Selim publicly decried the administrators in Istanbul for being soft, and began to rally more troops to his side.  A second Safavid foray into Anatolia killed the Sultan's grand vizier, further embarrassing Bayezit. Selim rode a horse into battle with his troops; his father and brothers waited in their palaces. He set his eyes on Istanbul and the ultimate prize.  With the help of the Janissaries, the Empire's professional warrior class, Selim was able to bully his father into resigning. He became sultan in April, 1512 in what clearly was a coup.  Soon, all rivals were eliminated and Selim was Sultan. He was assisted by his only son, Suleyman, who someday would be known as the Magnificent. Once he was firmly in control, Selim turned to the Shiite Safavid Empire. He cut off their access to the silk trade, and descended on them with an army of 140,000. He defeated them in battle and took the capital of Tabriz. Selim now ruled the world's largest land empire.

    He next attacked the Mamluk Empire of Egypt, custodian of the holy cities of Mecca and Medina. He crushed the Mamluk army in Syria, killed the sultan, marched to Damascus, then to Jerusalem and Cairo. He defeated the Mamluk defenders in January, 1517, and entered Cairo. Selim had tripled the size and population of his empire. One of the reasons that the Ottomans were so successful was that they maintained the status quo. Almost all local administrators were retained, property rights were respected, taxes were not raised, and freedom of religion was confirmed. In 1520, Selim had his eyes on Morocco and a possible conflict there with the Spanish when he died, in September. Suleyman consolidated and strengthened the empire his father had created. 

    The author is chair of Yale's history department, and a noted Ottoman scholar. The sections of the book on Selim are fabulous. The attempts to equate much of Spain and Catholic Europe's policies as a direct result of, and in response to, the goings on in the Ottoman world feel uncomfortable to me, and also to some of the reviewers I've read.

 

An Unfinished Season, Just - B+

         This is a superb novel set in Chicago and the North Shore in the summer of 1954. Nineteen-year-old Wils Ravan is bored, headed to the University of Chicago in the fall, going to a lot of debutante balls, and working for the summer at an afternoon tabloid about to fold. He learns the ways of the world at the paper, and falls madly for Aurora Brule at night. The fun part of this book is the description of life in Lake Forest, a Lake Forest I've never known, one filled with debs thinking about the East Coast girls schools', dads who are doctors and lawyers, young men back from prep schools and everyone going to the local country club. At one of the parties that summer, one of the moms tells Wils they don't have his paper in the house because they "wouldn't want the maid to see it." He goes on to describe the Winnetka to Lake Forest world as a separate rift valley in the midwest.  Equally fascinating are the descriptions of the city at that time and the line, "Chicago itself had a nineteenth-century identity: a noisy unlovely city of iron and concrete, a city on the grab, fundamentally lawless, its days spent chasing money and its nights spending it.."

        The author was a third-generation newspaperman who attended a private prep school in Lake Forest, and later was one of Ben Bradlee's first hires at the Post. The book was a Pulitzer finalist two decades ago.

Power and Liberty: Constitutionalism in the American Revolution, Woods - A*

        "The Revolutionary era was the most creative period of Constitutionalism in American history and one of the most creative in Western history." Without a common ancestry, America had to create its nationhood from its documents, and uniquely for the times, they retained much of what was said and debated for posterity.

         The disagreement over taxation after the French and Indian War led to an assessment in Britain and America of the meaning of empire. In the colonies, two-thirds of the white men had the vote; in Britain, the number was one-sixth. The colonists thought that they should be able to vote on whether they were taxed. Parliament argued that all Britons were virtually represented. The colonists argued that Parliament could regulate trade, but not tax them, while the British asserted that Parliament held supreme sovereign sway over the empire. The Americans countered that they were not subject to Parliament, but to the king. Soon they were arguing against the king's tyranny. And it was the king's tyranny that drew Jefferson's ire in the Declaration of Independence.

       More important than the Federal constitution of 1787 were the state ones that preceded it. Almost everything we think of as uniquely American was in the state constitutions created during the war. The goal of the state constitutions was to eliminate tyranny. Eight states completed their work in 1776 alone. Fearful of the power exercised by kings, the states reined in the power given to their governors.  They required (unlike England) that no one could be a member of the legislative and executive branches simultaneously. Again unlike the mother country, the constitutions had to be written and specific. Thus, in America, there was a distinction between matters that were legal and those that were constitutional. Whereas in the UK, the only distinction was between what is legal and what is illegal.

        There was no great desire to go beyond the Articles of Confederation because 18th century political thought held that republics must be small and have a population of like people. The new nation was much too big. The Articles were no more than a "firm league of friendship" between 13 sovereign states.  What led to the creation of a centralized nation state? There was no one dramatic event, but rather a compilation of issues in the commercial arena. Businessmen wanted protection from the British mercantile system and felt there was a need to levy tariffs. The Confederation Congress could not raise taxes and needed money to pay its war debts and to ransom mariners kidnapped by the Barbary pirates. There was no one to evict British troops who lingered in Detroit, Niagara, and Oswego. The western and southern borders were not secure. Also, there was an excess of democracy as states elected tradesmen and others not as well educated as their predecessors, and these "middling men" began to provide relief for debtors, and otherwise not respect property rights. They had a too-parochial focus. It was time for gentlemen to be in charge again.  There was a consensus to meet and revise the Articles.  Madison saw an opportunity, and with a few like-minded colleagues, went to Philadelphia in 1787 with bigger plans. Madison's Virginia Plan became the template for discussion. Because the plan severely diminished the status of the states, it was met a vigorous dissent.  Hamilton then proposed such a strong central government that his suggestion made the Virginia plan seem moderate in comparison.  A month later, a compromise providing for equal representation in the Senate helped keep the process moving, but it was viewed by Madison as a catastrophic mistake. In the end, the Constitution that was adopted was a series of compromises.

      By the time of the convention, most northern states had banned slavery, and the Northwest Ordinance, promulgated that year by the Confederation Congress, prohibited the expansion of slavery in the states that would eventually emerge there. Madison believed the institution was dying and did not wish to address it. However, in order to keep Georgia and South Carolina from leaving, the notorious three-fifths compromise was adopted.

       The judiciary of the colonial era was subject to the the executive. It was neither esteemed nor independent. The establishment of an independent judiciary came about as a response to the excessive democracy mentioned above. State legislatures enacted dubious and unfair laws. Once again, some reining in was required. The rationale for judicial review was that sovereignty rested in the people. Hamilton argued that government was subject to wishes of the people.  Judicial review, if an act was inconsistent with the people's constitution, did not raise the judiciary above the legislature. Rather, it was the appropriate method of weighing the laws passed by Congress. Many, including Jefferson, thought that interpreting the constitution was not solely within the purview of the courts. Marshall brilliantly resolved the issue in 1803 in 'Marbury v. Madison' so subtlety in the Court's favor that virtually no one realized what he had done. Thirty years later, Alexis de Tocqueville said, "The Courts of Justice are the visible organs by which the legal profession is enabled to control the democracy."

         A special thanks to Greg Weiss for insisting I read this.

      

Aurore, Hurley - C

       This novel is set in 1943 and features Billy Angell, a Brighton-raised Flight Sergeant in the RAF.  After the completion of his 30 missions over Germany, he is offered a job by MI5. If he completes it, his war is over. He is sent to France, where he is expected to leak a fabrication to confuse the Germans about where the Allied landing will be. Madame Helene Lafosse is chosen as the person to receive the story because she is close to Bjorn Klimt, a colonel in the Abwehr. The seed is planted and the misleading information is under consideration. Billy's job is done, but soon, he and Helene are in custody; Billy is sent to Dachau, Helene to Ravensbruck, and Klimt is in trouble too.  Only Billy survives.

The Authority of the Court and the Peril of Politics, Breyer

         This book is an essay on "the importance of public acceptance in safeguarding the role of the judiciary." The publics willingness to follow and respect the Supreme Court's decisions is a habit developed over the past 200+ years. One the concept of unelected judges overruling elected officials works is that the Court minimizes cases likely to provoke strong disagreements. "The public now expects Presidents to accept decisions of the Court, including those that are politically controversial."

          Political considerations impact Court decisions. During WWII, the Court supported the internment of Japanese-Americans when Justice Black pointed out that Roosevelt had to run the war, not them. In the 1950's, the Court delayed for a decade addressing interracial marriage bans in order to allow 'Brown v. Board of Education' to become accepted. That said, the Court is not per se a political institution, and must not be perceived as such. Preventing the further politicization of legal issues is very important to the future of the Court. One way the Court avoids politicizing issues is to seek to address narrow statutory interpretations rather than making a broad, sweeping constitutional assertion.

           The cases on freedom of religion, speech and the right to abortion are the ones that garner most of the attention from the public and the media. Here, the judges try to find the ultimate end that the Constitution values. What is the 'spirit' the Constitution is addressing? In 'Brown', it was not just the equal protection clause, but "an affirmation of justice itself." We must remember that the "Constitution itself seeks to establish a workable democracy, to protect basic human rights, and to help hold together a highly diverse society..."

            Going forward our society must educate its populace in the rule of law, the importance of the courts, and the structure of our government;  that populace must participate in its community. "Trust in the Court...requires knowledge, it requires understanding, it requires engagement, it requires work, work, work on the part of all citizens."

               This is an excellent read and a very brief restatement of public remarks that Justice Breyer has made. I recommend it to all, and am not presumptuous enough to even think of grading it.

     

Finisterre, Hurley - B

       This is a thoroughly enjoyable novel set in the year 1944. There are two parallel stories that intersect at the end of the book. The best story is that of Kapitan Stefan Portisch, an honored and very successful submariner, whose ship founders off the Spanish coast and is destroyed on its rocky shore. He survives and is nursed back to health by a Spanish woman, Eva. Eventually, the Civil Guards, accompanied by Germans take him in, and the Germans accuse him of desertion. They offer him a firing squad in the morning, or a chance to live by spinning a tale to the British. He tells the tale after the British send him to London. After extensive vetting, they tell him they want the truth, or else. On the other side of the world, Hector Gomez is an FBI agent seconded to the Los Alamos project under the guise of being an army lieutenant. His primary role is providing feedback to Washington because Hoover is livid over the FBI being excluded from a role in the Manhattan project. Gomez unearths a German attempt to frighten the US into believing one of the scientists is leaking to Germany. The tale Portisch told the British was part of the same subterfuge. The Afterword states that each and every person in the book was real, and tells what they did after the war.

Echoland, Moore - C +

         This novel is set in Dublin in the summer of 1940.  Neutrality meant that the Irish were afraid of invasions by both the Germans and the British. The focus is on two young army intelligence officers surveilling a German couple likely engaged in espionage.  They stumble upon a plot involving a minister of the government negotiating with the Germans to purchase rifles that the British army left at Dunkirk. Ireland's tortured history with the English, and their own fractious divisions swirl around the lieutenants, Duggan and Gifford, like the mists that frequently shroud the city. It's pretty thin gruel. The only interesting takeaway is that the UK was so anxious that summer that they tried to tease the republic away from neutrality with a rather non-specific offer to reunite the six counties in the north.

The Rise And Fall Of Osama Bin Laden, Bergen - B

        "There was nothing inevitable about bin Laden's transformation over the course of decades from a quiet, humble, religious young man into the leader of a global terrorist network who was intent on killing thousands of civilians." This is an attempt to tell how this happened.

        He was born in 1957, the 18th son of a wealthy father, the owner of the leading construction company in Saudi America. Unlike his secular, fun-loving, pro-American siblings, he tended toward religious Islamism in his teens. By the time he was 21, he was "a fully fledged religious zealot." The transformative event of his life came when the infidel Soviets invaded Afghanistan in 1979. While continuing to work in the family business, he began to give substantial amounts, $250,000-$300,000 per year, to support jihad in Afghanistan. In 1986, he moved to Peshwar to oversee the Arab force he was building up. When his troops held off a Soviet attack, he became a war hero throughout the Arab world.  By the time the Soviets left, he was widely revered.  He decided that the flame of jihad should spread elsewhere. In 1991, he moved to Sudan, became a member of the Saudi opposition, supported terrorists in Yemen and Somalia, and started to build his anti-American terror network, al-Qaeda. He also ran multiple businesses for the Saudi Binladin Group. His criticism of the royal family led to the loss of his Saudi citizenship and, as his family business relied on the monarchy, they expelled him too and froze his assets.

        With American troops in Saudi Arabia and then in Somalia, he decided he had to strike at America and drive it out of the Middle East. His radicalism led the Sudanese to force him to leave, and in 1996 he was back to Afghanistan. He declared war on the US (only a few Americans knew), and worked out arrangements with the Taliban to stay outside of Kandahar, where he continued to build his organization. He teamed up with Mohammed al-Zawahiri, a noted Egyptian cleric, declared his desire to kill American soldiers and citizens, and told western interviewers that a black day was soon coming for America. On August 7, 1998, the US embassy in Nairobi was obliterated by a massive truck bomb. A few minutes later, a less powerful bomb went off in front of the embassy in Tanzania. The US now knew who bin Laden was, and the CIA began to pursue him. However, at no point were the full resources of the US applied to bin Laden. The attack on the USS Cole came in October, 2000. There was no US response to the Cole attack from the fading Clinton administration. Throughout 2001, there were those in the intelligence community very concerned about bin Laden, but those concerns never cracked the agenda of the new administration.  September 11th changed America and much of the world.

      Pres. Bush signed a Memorandum of Notification turning the CIA into a para-military organization authorized to hunt and kill bin Laden. The closest the US came was that December when we bombed his environs at Tora Bora. Bin Laden and two of his sons escaped. He was on the run in Pakistan until he alighted in Abbottabad in 2005.  The US spent years diligently looking for him and was able to eventually find him because the CIA had extracted the name of one of his two bodyguards during innumerable interrogations. The CIA found the compound in 2010. On May 1, 2011, Navy Seals descended on bin Laden's compound and killed bin Laden, two bodyguards, bin Laden's son Khalid,  and a bodyguard's wife.

    The depth of the US response to 9/11 assured that a repeat of what had happened would not take place. One example is the US 'no fly' list which grew from 16 to forty-thousand by the time of bin Laden's death.  Bin Laden also failed as he expected the US to leave the Middle East, just as it had left Lebanon, Yemen, and Somalia after tactical setbacks. Instead the opposite took place.  This is a concise, well-written book, but one that adds little to the existing narrative. If you've read The Looming Tower, or Stephen Coll's books on Afghanistan, you're way ahead.

      

Leaving The Building: The Lucrative Afterlife of Musical Estates, Forde - B, Inc.

              There are hundreds of artists and estates mentioned in this book, but the story is dominated by the person whose estate has been prospering for longer than he was alive - Elvis. "It [Elvis' estate] has birthed what we can consider to be the industrialization of estate management and many others have taken what it has achieved and run with it." The King left all of his assets in trust for his daughter with his dad as executor. Col. Parker convinced Vernon to extend his management and his 50% cut. This, notwithstanding the fact that four years earlier Parker had sold the royalties for all of Elvis' work to RCA for $5.4M. Priscilla took over when Vernon died in 1979, and the Tennessee probate court vitiated Parker's deal and dismissed him. Priscilla built a highly professional team with the goal of building value, as Elvis' profligacy had left his affairs in an appalling state. First up, and the cornerstone of the estate's success, was opening Graceland to the public, and four decades later it still attracts 500,000 visitors per year. 

             The key to a peaceful and prosperous financial afterlife is proper estate planning, and needless to say, most musicians do not attend to that responsibility.  From those dying young like Jim Morrison and Jimi Hendrix, to those living long into adulthood - Aretha Franklin, John Denver and Prince - the lack of planning leads to never ending uncertainty. Those set forth as having excellent estate plans were Frank Sinatra, Freddie Mercury and David Bowie.

            Another challenge in this arena is who's who?  Many stars had multiple wives, children acknowledged and unknown. The poster child on this topic is James Brown. Fifteen years after his death, the irrevocable trust set up to help poor kids in South Carolina hadn't paid out a penny, while his fourth wife whose marriage may or may not have been valid, battled his kids. Only lawyers were doing well. And on the topic of lawyers doing well, the bank that was appointed executor of Prince's estate pulls down $125,000 per month, and dozens of lawyers are feasting. The estate of Jimi Hendrix, who died young without children or a spouse was still a battleground amongst various relatives almost half-a-century after Jimi stopped jamming.

           This topic is one I've always been fascinated by, thus making my inability to complete it quite disappointing. By definition, something like this will cast its stories far and wide, but as I have said many times here, I cannot follow books with disjointed narratives. An explanation of the different rights and a legal parsing of the components of music creation, as well as the length of royalty rights here and in the UK, probably would've helped.

The Great Mistake, Lee - C

                  This is an odd novel about someone who should be very well-known in NYC, but is not. Andrew Green, who was murdered in 1903, at the age of 83 was known as  the father of New York. He was a very successful lawyer, law partner of Governor Samuel Tilden, and the man behind the Metropolitan Museum, the Natural History Museum, Central Park and the 1898 merger of Brooklyn into the city of New York. The novel hints at a homosexual relationship between Green and Tilden.  His murder was a case of mistaken identity, front page news and of interest to his good friend, President Roosevelt. Notwithstanding my disinterest, the critics loved it.

The Assassins: Conspiracy, Revenge, and the Phoenix Park Murders That Stunned Victorian England, Kavanugh - B-

     The 1880's saw the first viable stirrings of an Irish effort to overthrow the feudal system of land ownership that had been oppressing the indigenous Irish for centuries. Ironically, it was led by a Protestant landlord, Charles Stewart Parnell, MP. In response to a famine in the western counties, Parnell established the Land League.  The League encouraged the Irish to withold rents and developed a system of boycotts that garnered the attention of Westminster. The Crown's response was to banish the League, and indict Parnell and 13 others for inciting violence. After the prosecution floundered, Gladstone suspended thirty-six Irish MPs. Parliament passed a Coercion Act targeting the Irish for engaging in civil disobedience, and under its terms, Gladstone had Parnelll arrested again. 

   The constabulary in Dublin began to hear rumors of impending violence, sponsored by Irish-Americans, against English officeholders. Unbeknownst to the police, an assassins group, the Irish Invincibles, had been formed and high on their list was Wiliam Forster, Chief Secretary of Ireland. The spring in 1882 saw Gladstone and Parnell reach a rapprochement. Parnell was released from jail and headed to London for further discussions. On the evening of May 6th, Thomas Burke, Forster's assistant, and Lord Cavendish, who was in Dublin to succeed Forster, were walking in Phoenix Park in the heart of Dublin. They were murdered by Joe Brady and Tim Kelly. The following day local papers reported that they had been executed on orders of the Irish Invincibles. 

  As Gladstone had appointed Cavendish, the husband of his wife's niece, to help him bring a settlement to Ireland, the assassination was viewed as a disaster by all but the Irish republicans. Parnell was so despondent that he offered to resign from Parliament. It took until the following January for the police to find an informer willing to testify against the Invincibles. James Carey turned state's evidence in exchange for a grant of leniency. The trial began in April, although many of the plotters were in New York. Justice was swift and five Invincibles were hung at Kilmainham Jail in May and June.  Carey was trundled off to South Africa and met an assassin's bullet on the trip. The man who shot him, Pat O'Donnell, was, in turn, returned to England, tried and hung.

  The republicans have honored the Invincibles and O'Donnell as Irish heroes. Gladstone's last attempt to create home rule for Ireland faltered in 1886 and Parliament reverted to hostility toward the Irish. The Irish party in Parliament fell apart when Parnell was named as a respondent in the divorce of his long-time paramour, Kitty O'Shea. Soon thereafter, the forty-five-year-old Parnell died of heart failure. Gladstone's fourth premiership in the 1890's was brief. A Home Rule Bill would not pass until 1914, and even then, its implementation was deferred because of the outbreak of war.

  

Harlem Shuffle, Whitehead - B

      Ray Carney owns a furniture store on 125th St. in the year 1959. He "was only slightly bent when it came to being crooked, in practice and ambition." That was the case until his loopy cousin Freddy was the wheelman for a major hotel stickup, and told his buddies that Ray could fence their stolen jewelry. The truth is Ray has very limited experience fencing jewelry and would rather sell you a sectional. Somehow, he's now part of a gang, and when Miami Joe decides to keep the loot and starts knocking off his colleagues, Ray's life takes a turn for the worse. Fortunately one of his dad's buddies, Pepper, shoots Joe in Rays showroom, the body goes to Mount Morris Park, Harlem's sort of private cemetery in a city park, and soon, life returns to normal. A few years later things are going well for Ray. He's expanded the store and one of his friends suggests he join a local business club. One of the pillars of the Harlem establishment suggests that $500 will put Ray at the front of the line. When Ray is nonetheless rejected, he asks Willie Duke for a refund. Willie asks his secretary to call the cops. Ray works some magic and a few months later, Willie has to do a bunk after a series of pics of him with a hooker make it to the local Harlem papers.  Payback is even sweeter because one of Willie's fleeced investors is Ray's pain-in-the-ass father-in-law.  In 1964, Ray achieves his life-long dream. He moves his family to Riverside Drive. One last time Freddy gets him involved in something he shouldn't have. This time it costs his cousin his life, but Ray stays just far enough away to come out of it ahead.

    The author is a revered expositor of the Black experience in America and does a fine job again. Plus, it's always a blast to read about NYC in its ever-changing ways and to follow a character like Ray who had a fondness for Rheingold and Chock Full o'Nuts.

Dark Hours, Connelly - B+

        At this stage, the Renee Ballard and Harry Bosch team is led by Ballard. Harry's role is completely back-up. Renee is working a case involving serial rapists when she picks up a random New Year's Eve murder. She runs with the murder, knowing full well that she'll be off the case once the holiday weekend is over. She figures out that Harry had an unsolved case that may be connected. He also provides guidance on the the rape case. Eventually, she is so off base with her hierarchial bosses that she quits just before she nails the rapists. She and Harry have a loose agreement for her to join him as a PI. The story closes with the Chief of Police asking her back. With Harry sitting in his house on the hill, Ballard back on the force, and Maddie in the police academy, Connelly can run this for as long as he lives. There are few, if any, better. 

Man On Edge, Hawksley - B-

                The Rake Ozenna story continues a few years later. He is called in to help a shadowy former Congressman who works for the US to uncover and stop the perfidy of a rogue Russian admiral. Once again, we have a plotline and a setting that are both nonsensical. The presidents of America and Russia arrange a spontaneous summit off the Russian/Norwegian coastline in the Arctic Sea on a private yacht. Endless twists, turns and a stupendous body count are a preview to the last minute staving off of a torpedo blowing up the yacht and everyone on board. Comical, but I came back.

Innovation: The History of England Vol. VI, Ackroyd - B

               The  20th century opened with the UK in crisis after the frustrations and failures of the Boer Wars. An army not up to the usual standards barely defeated a guerrilla insurgency, while opening concentration camps in which thousands of civilians died. No longer did the populace believe that the empire was bringing prosperity and civilization to the world; they realized that the empire was primarily exploitive. The UK's economic dominance was fading, with its share of worldwide manufacturing dropping from 30% in the 1870's to 10% thirty years later.  The rise of Germany, in conjunction with England's slow decline, was an ongoing cause for concern. As the Germans spent more and more on its armies and navies, the kingdom had to respond. The UK also faced many domestic challenges including worker demands for a safer and better life, strikes, women's suffrage, parliamentary reform, class struggles, increased duties on the aristocracy, the health and welfare of the poor and an agricultural depression. But there was no greater challenge to the foundation of the British state than that of Ireland. England's dominion over Ireland was without the consent of the people who wanted home rule. The Liberals introduced their third attempt at a Home Rule Bill in 1912 and were met with fierce Tory opposition. Indeed, the Tory leader suggested that, if necessary, violence in the streets would stop the bill if it passed. The Unionists in the four northeastern counties of Ireland would never submit to Dublin rule, nor would their Tory supporters approve of their being subjugated to Catholics. A bill passed in 1914, but was not implemented because of the impending war.

             The UK declared war on Germany in August. The war was an unmitigated catastrophe for all of Europe's participants.  Kitchener's volunteers only army was supplemented when conscription was introduced in 1916. That spring saw the famous Easter Rising in Dublin, which was a complete failure and led to the imposition of martial law. Although the rebels failed, they stirred the emotions of an Irish populace that had been meekly waiting for home rule. The endless slaughter on the western front began to sap morale across the country, as it was perceived to be a case of the upper class sending their underlings to doom. The war that historians later called the catastrophe that begat all the later catastrophes ended in November, 1918. Peace and victory were met with recession, a vast national debt, and a reemergence of the Irish question. In 1919, Ireland declared its independence. The IRA began to wage guerrilla war against the occupiers. Lloyd George recruited unemployed veterans to 'police' Ireland and the Black and Tans proceeded to hunt down and execute the rebels. Martial law was proclaimed. At the urging of the King, the PM offered dominion status to the Irish Free State and for the six counties in the north, to continue in the UK. A year of civil war followed as many in Ireland wanted total independence. In the end though, the Irish reluctantly accepted the terms offered.

             The 1920's was a decade of economic, political and social turmoil. The kingdom's place in the world was slipping, the empire was fraying and the bitterness over the slaughter in the trenches continued. A general strike was declared in 1926. An attempt at Keynesian economics couldn't muster enough support. The coup de grace came with the market crash in 1929, followed by a worldwide depression.  By taking the pound off the gold standard, the country set the stage for a reduction in interest rates and a decrease in the costs of imports. For many, a recovery was underway. However, unemployment continued for the lower classes, who referred to the 30's as 'the devils decade'. The UK generally supported the League of Nations, focused on its empire, and took a hands-off approach to the rising of fascism on the continent. After all, the larger threat was always communism. When Italy attacked in northern Africa, the League sought sanctions, but Baldwin demurred, and King George, fearful of another continental bloodbath, supported the PM. Baldwin was followed by Chamberlain whose policy of trying to appease Hitler failed. September 1939 saw Europe once again facing the abyss. The war was a challenge for the UK, but one that was met with pluck, aplomb and bravery. Churchill led the country in its finest hour, and with Russia and America on his side, triumph followed. 

         The June 1945 election turned out Churchill and opted for Labour's platform of a new welfare state. The nation was in a state of "material haemorrhage." Austerity Britain followed with rationing that lasted almost a decade. The crowning achievement of Labour's tenure was the introduction of the National Health Service in 1948.  As Britain struggled, it saw the empire begin to vanish. Most important was India, which achieved independence in 1947. Palestine was left to its own devices the same year. The Mau Mau's rebelled in Kenya. The failure of Eden's foreign policy when Nasser took over the Suez Canal in 1956 highlighted the UK's impotence on the world stage. 

        England's status in the world took a turn for the better in the 60's thanks to the Beatles, Stones, the Who and the Kinks. The author suggests that there was so little to do for youngsters growing up in the 50's that playing your own music was one of the few creative outlets. The government of Harold Wilson vastly expanded educational opportunities affording opportunity for the less well off. Wembley in 1966 was the highpoint of the decade for sports fans, as the host country defeated Germany for a victory in the World Cup. The following decade saw Heath at 10 Downing Street, where he was met with a fusillade of labor woes. A miners strike opened 1972, only to be followed by a docker's strike that led to the first of four declarations of a state of emergency. Oil shortages and a ramping up of inflation came next. Inflation soon dropped the value of the pound to the point that reserves were so low that the government had to borrow from the IMF. The emboldened unions pushed for wages because of the relentless rise in prices, but the country couldn't afford to pay them. All came to a head in the 1979 election that brought in the country's first and only female PM.

      The Thatcher revolution would not juggle "incompatible priorities," but rather it would crush inflation, the power of the national unions, and reduce taxes. Industry was privatized and home ownership rose. Thatcher unleashed a "capitalist revolution." She reclaimed the kingdom's pride in the 1982 Falklands War. She made the first overtures to Gorbachev. Her tenure began to come apart in the late 80's as the party struggled with the forthcoming adoption of a common currency in the EU. She resigned in 1990 and viewed her actions as not overturning the postwar settlement, but rather "had withdrawn it to frontiers of the feasible." She was succeeded by Major, who sided with the US in the First Gulf War and signed the Maastricht Treaty further integrating Europe. The Tories had pegged the pound to the Deutschmark and interest rates rose because of  German unification. That led to a 1992 run on the pound that was the first crack in the foundation of Tory rule. The following year, the PM announced that Charles and Diana were separating. Throughout the decade, troubles with the IRA, EU issues, immigration, and the wars in the former Yugoslavia battered the ruling party. May of 1997 saw the end of an eighteen year Tory run with the introduction of the Blair ministry and Cool Britannia. A few months later, the nation, indeed the world, was shocked by the death of Diana, Princess of Wales. The decade closed with the adoption of the Good Friday Accords, a step in the right direction hopefully pointing toward a resolution of the kingdom's most intractable issue. The Millennium Dome was built and the twentieth century came to an end. "It may be that as the millennium progresses, the English will recover what was once their glory - a capacity for awe."

     The author is one of the great writers in the English language. He has done a fine service with this six volume narrative. I have rated four B, one C and one A. Interestingly, the first one, Foundations, which stretched from Roman times to the Tudors was the one I liked the most. I felt that the volumes on the 20th, and in particular the 19th, centuries bogged down in partisan political issues of no consequence to an American. That said, the series is superb.

                 

Red Traitor, Matthews - B +

                This is the second book in a series featuring a KGB colonel in the midst of potentially catastrophic events. Previously, we visited a thermonuclear testing facility, and this time we are in the middle of the Cuban missile crisis. As the author is a historian turned thriller writer, the novel is very factual and informative. The focus is on Col. Vasin, a fictional KGB officer, working to find the GRU officer feeding info to the US, and Captain Vasily Arkhipov, an actual Soviet Naval officer who likely stopped nuclear armageddon in Oct. 1962. Vasin tracks down a Soviet working for the US.  (There actually was a highly placed officer sharing information with the US who was picked up just after the crisis. He received his proverbial ounce of lead the following May.) Arkhipov is one hell of a story. He was on the first Soviet nuclear powered sub the year before when K-19 took its trial runs in the N. Atlantic. The sub was off the Greenland coast when the reactor overheated. Over a dozen men died cooling it down, and Arkhipov spent a year receiving medical treatment. He was the commander of the four diesel powered sub flotilla sent to Cuba the following fall. The subs were armed with nuclear torpedoes. When the US Navy harassed them, he opted to surface and ask Moscow for instructions rather than fire the torpedoes. After the collapse of the USSR, his wife told interviewers that he had seen the consequences of nuclear radiation in person and could not authorize the use of the weapon. Per the author, there is a conference room at Langley named for Arkhipov, who many believe stopped the world from going over the precipice.

Billy Summers, King - B+

               Billy is a hit man, hired to do a job that requires a long wait in rented office space waiting for his mark to enter a courthouse across the street. His cover is that he is a writer, and he decides to give it a whirl. His story is one of Appalachian trailer parks, a foster home and multiple tours in "the suck" with the Marines. His training as a sniper is what provided him with his current career. After he accomplishes his job, his employer doesn't pay. On his way to receive his payment and extract a bit of revenge, Billy helps a young woman, Alice, who has been been drugged, raped and left on the side of a road. They are an unlikely but intriguing pair who build a great and touching friendship.  The book is long and the first third is pretty slow, but one's patience is rewarded.

A Study In Crimson, Harris - B-

              In the besieged London of 1942, the Yard is faced with a killer replicating the methods of and copycatting Jack the Ripper, calling himself Crimson Jack.  Lestrade calls in Holmes and Watson. The author introduces the story with detailed references to the films of the 30's and 40's starring Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce. He models his Holmes and Watson on those two. Sherlock brilliantly uncovers that Jack is actually a German spy and, somewhat uncharacteristically, Watson throttles the bad guy. It's all in good fun.

Better Off Dead, Child and Child - B

               Reacher is in Arizona headed for the west coast and the ocean. He stops to help a young woman who happens to be ex-Army Intelligence and ex-FBI. She's looking for her brother, a vet suffering from PTSD and working for a very bad man. Jack outthinks and outfights the endless list of goons working for the Lebanese evildoer headquartered close to the Mexican border. This is the second book in the transition to the author's brother. This book didn't get my usual straight through read, and maybe that's why I don't think it's up to snuff. Or, maybe, just maybe, the transition is not going to work. It'll take two more books to know.

Man On Ice, Hawksley - B-

            This thriller is borderline absurd, but kinda fun. Rake Ozenna is an Eskimo serving as a Captain in the Alaskan National Guard and a resident of miniscule Little Diomode in the Bering Sea a few miles from a larger island that is Russian. After a decade away, he returns with his American fiance, the day the the Russians come up with some nonsensical theory of why they are entitled take over the island. An international crisis of the first order is staved off by a handful of people in Washington, and of course, Rake. There are some preposterous twists and turns, but also an interesting series of intriguing insights into the life, ideas, customs and beliefs of the Eskimos on the US/Russian borderlands.

The Judge's List, Grisham - B

             Here, we pick up a character introduced five years ago. Lacy Stoltz of the Florida Board on Judicial Conduct is bored to death and hating her job. A complainant, Jeri, comes forth to report that she can prove a sitting judge is a serial killer. This is far from the purview of the board, but Lacy takes it up and slowly extracts the information from Jeri. The judge in question is familiar with the deep web, knows how to hack into police and state websites and soon figures out that he is in someone's crosshairs. The FBI is called in and the pursuit ensues. As with any Grisham, there are fun plots, twists and turns along the way, and, as just about always, devoured in a day.

The Dead Are Arising: The Life of Malcolm X, Payne - B+

               Malcolm Little was born to the Reverend Earl Little, a Baptist preacher and handyman, and his West Indian wife, Louise, on May 19, 1925, in Omaha, Nebraska. Earl was from Georgia and steeped in the culture of slavery and Jim Crow; Louise's father was white and she viewed the world through a more optimistic lens. Earl and Louise founded the local chapter of the United Negro Improvement Association, which fostered self reliance, independent thinking  and racial pride. The UNIA was the brainchild of Jamaican born Marcus Garvey, who took a more aggressive, less assimilationist stance than the NAACP. The couple raised their children to not succumb to any demeaning stereotyping from either white peers or teachers. Earl moved his family to Milwaukee in late 1926, and to Lansing in 1928. They purchased a home in a white neighborhood, and soon thereafter, were burned out. Earl built a tar-paper shack on 6 acres of land outside of town. On the night of Sept. 28, 1931, Earl was hit by a Lansing streetcar and killed. Among the many challenges Louise and her seven children faced, one was particularly painful and shameful. The insurance company holding a $10,000 accidental death policy on Earl refused to pay. Even though the Medical Examiner said it was an accident, the insurance company insisted it was suicide. "As the family struggled with raising crops and doing chores, a decided waywardness, or slackness, set in among the growing children." As pressure mounted so did Louise's ability to cope, and in late 1938, the state institutionalized her. By this time, young Malcolm was already hustling on the streets of Lansing. Soon he was an accomplished thief and con man, and one who, according to those who grew up with him, hated whites. The state sent him to reform school at 14. When he was 15, he moved to Boston to be under the supervision of his older half-sister, Ella. Malcolm was smart and ambitious and hoping for more opportunities in the east. His brother-in-law got him a job shining shoes at a nightclub, and soon he was making a fortune pimping and selling reefer.  He shifted his base to Harlem, where he was known as Detroit Red as he broke laws everyday, and as of 1943, evaded the draft. When the induction notice arrived, the 6'4" redhead put on a zany yellow zoot suit and playing a homosexual, talked to the psychiatrist about going south to get some crackers. A 4F classification followed. Back in Boston in the fall of 1945, Malcolm organized a burglary gang. Malcolm, his best friend, and three white girls were arrested and tried for braking and entering.  The two black men received sentences of 8-10 years.  The white girls cooperated with the state and got off with wrist slaps.

                He entered the prison system on Feb. 27, 1946. Encouraged by an inmate of color who seemed to have everyone's respect, Malcolm turned his photographic memory and loquacious verbal skills to the library and learning. He wanted to learn how to fight with words. At the same time, his oldest brother, Wilfred, encouraged him to consider the preachings of the Nation of Islam and Elijah Muhammad. He read extensively and adopted the beliefs of the Nation of Islam. When he was paroled in 1952, he was a new man, his drinking, drugs, and whoring days behind him. He went to work for the NOI in Detroit and soon was a first class recruiter. He was also a stickler for the rules. Elijah sent him east to rejuvenate some failing temples. He was so effective that he garnered the attention of the FBI. His pointed critiques of thousands of lynchings at the hands of the blue-eyed devils  as proof of the nation's institutionalized racism caught Hoover's attention. Both Elijah, and in particular Malcolm, now the Nation's national spokesman, were introduced to America in a documentary on a NY television station. Mike Wallace called Malcom a "remarkable man." That said, the roots of future conflict were arising as the ascetic Malcolm began to hear stories about Elijah's womanizing. Malcolm's fame and national profile brought money into the coffers, but his high profile began to trouble those in Chicago known in the faith as the royal family. By the end of the 1950's, Malcolm was a national figure traveling the country espousing the Nation of Islam's gospel of separation from whites and Black self-reliance. In 1961, Elijah asked him to sit down and talk in Atlanta to the KKK. The Klan desired to see if their mutual opposition to integration might lead to cooperation on some fronts. At the end of a two hour summit, the Klan asked for information about the location of the home of ML King. Malcolm blanched at the desire of the Klan to kill King, and fell out further with Elijah, who continued discussions with the KKK.

                 In 1963, Malcolm confirmed what he had long suspected. Elijah was a hypocrite and adulterer. Malcolm met with Elijah's son, Wallace, who confirmed that Elijah had impregnated a number of his secretaries and expelled them from the NOI for adultery. He also told Malcolm that Elijah's NOI creation myth was completely false. Shaken to the core, the street hustler cum evangelist turned away from the Honorable Elijah. At the same time, Elijah now considered Malcolm an existential threat. Malcolm X left the nation in March, 1964. He studied traditional Islam and even made the haj to Mecca. Upon his return from the seven week overseas trip, he attacked Elijah's paternity of six illegitimate children in the national media. He then focused on trying to create a coalition ranging from ML King to Kwame Nkrumah, president of Ghana, to bring the treatment of America's negroes to the UN. His focus was now political. On February 15, 1965, the NOI firebombed and destroyed his house in Queens. The day after the firebombing while speaking in Harlem, Malcolm disclosed Elijah's connection to the Klan. Elijah had already decreed that Malcolm must be eliminated. One of Malcolm's bodyguards was a NYPD undercover cop. When he alerted the department to what he believed was an  impending assassination attempt, the NYC police reduced their presence in front of the Audubon Ballroom where he spoke again on Feb. 21. When Malcolm stood at the podium to begin, a smoke bomb went off and a member of the NOI Newark mosque, stood up and blasted Malcolm with a sawed off shotgun. Two men jumped on the stage to finish him off with pistols.  He died a few minutes later. The only shooter prosecuted and jailed was the one wounded by a bodyguard at the scene. The other two and the two who had created a confusing distraction, were never pursued. The authorities were more interested in disparaging Malcolm than capturing his killers.

             His teachings have had a profound impact in the decades since his murder, particularly in the wake of Spike Lee's 1992 movie. Young Blacks took inspiration from his brilliance and his insistence that they were not second class citizens. Black replaced negro in daily usage as a proud affirmation of race. This book is 530 pages and a bit of a slog at times. But it is well worth the effort. He was an extraordinary individual who annoyed and threatened the white establishment and most of Black America, but he didn't pull any punches in his crusade against racism. 

Victory City: A History Of New York And New Yorkers During WWII, Strausbaugh - Incomplete

         "In the decades surrounding World War II, New York was a far larger presence in America and around the world than it is today." It was the largest city in the world and 40% of America's exports and imports came through its harbor. An amazing 850,000 New Yorkers wore a uniform during the war. The man who ran the Manhattan project, and the people who betrayed it, were from the city.

            As news of the Pearl Harbor attack spread through the city that fateful Sunday, reactions were many and varied, but none more poignant than that of the New York Philharmonic at Carnegie Hall. After the announcement of the bombing, the orchestra played the Star Spangled Banner.  Soldiers and sailors reported to their duty stations.  Starting Monday, recruitment centers were open 24 hours per day. In the early months of the war, anywhere from 5 to 24 U-Boats patrolled the east coast, with particular attention paid to New York harbor. In the first six months of 1942, Germany snk 226 freighters in US waters. Eventually, the Reich was unable to project that much power that far.

        Throughout the city, businesses converted to war time production. The fabled team at Steinway made army-green-colored uprights and glider planes. That said, by 1942 the city had more unemployed than in 1939, as most of the major defense contracts went to the large industrial states in the midwest. LaGuardia successfully pushed FDR to utilize the garment industry to manufacture uniforms. The Navy began to increase hiring in Brooklyn. "The wartime boom had finally come to New York City and it spread through the entire town." Vast amounts were spent on entertainment by the millions in uniform who passed through the city.

        A great topic - a great city - but an author who, in a 10 page chapter, covers a dozen people doing twelve different things with no sense of narrative or continuity led me to call it a day.

         

The Immortal Irishman: The Irish Revolutionary Who Became An American Hero, Egan - B+

         Thomas Francis Meagher was born on August 3, 1823 in Waterford Ireland, a place where being Irish had been a virtual crime for seven centuries. Edmund Burke, an 18th century statesman describing the institutions of Ireland said: "A machine of wise and elaborate contrivance as well fitted for the oppression, impoverishment, and degradation of a people and the debasement in them of human nature itself as ever proceeded from the perverted ingenuity of man." A colleague of de Tocqueville observed: "I have seen the Indian in the forest and the negro in his chains and thought I saw the the very extreme of human wretchedness, but did not know the condition of unfortunate Ireland. An entire nation of paupers is what never was seen until it was shown in Ireland."

        Meagher's circumstances were very different because his grandfather emigrated to Newfoundland, and returned to Waterford a very wealthy man. Thus, Thomas attended an excellent Catholic college in England, read law in Dublin for awhile, and fell in with the young rebels coming of age in Ireland. The summer of 1845 saw a blight destroy the potato crop that fed almost all of the land's peasants. The English landlords grew corn, wheat and barley. Over a billion-and-a-half bushels of those grains were exported to England. While Ireland, a place not allowed a vestige of self-government, starved, the UK's indifference bordered on genocide. Indeed, the official in charge of famine relief praised the Malthusian diminishment of the population. Outraged by what he saw, Meagher became the radical proponent of 'Ireland for the Irish' and spoke of the need to emulate what the Americans had done. His oratorical skills were exceptional. He toured the country espousing the radical ideas of the Young Irish and garnering the attention of the occupiers. He designed the flag that would someday be the Republic's and participated in a brief flare-up at Ballingarry. He was one of ten men arrested and tried for sedition, but the Crown's plans were undone when one Catholic made it onto the jury. A new ex post facto Treason Felony law was passed by Parliament featuring execution or transportation for any nationalist convicted under its terms. He was arrested on August 12, 1848 . After a week-long trial, he was condemned to be hung, drawn and quartered. An international outpouring on behalf of Meagher and four others led to their sentences being commuted to transportation for life. He was sent to Tasmania, and would never see Ireland again.

        It took 112 days to reach Australia, where the UK had already sent 40,000 Irish.  Because of the notoriety of Meagher and a handful of other political's, they were not put to forced labor but were allowed freedom. The price was a promise to not try to escape. He fell in love with, and soon married, a young governess, Catherine Bennett, in February, 1851. Frustrated by a life without freedom, he wrote a letter to the governor resigning his parole and announcing he was escaping. He rode a horse to the coast, and was picked up by a trader, and arrived in NYC in 1852. He was free, famous, and in a country that offered sanctuary to former prisoners of the British. 

      Of New York's 600,000 inhabitants, fully one-fourth were newly-arrived Irish. On his second night in the city, he was serenaded by 7,000. The Irish diaspora wanted him to free their homeland. Everyone from local barmen to the US president wanted to meet him. He began to speak in public in the city and throughout the north about the plight of the Irish and his experiences in jail. He spoke on behalf of Democratic candidates and was invited by Franklin Pierce to his inauguration. His wife and his father, still a member of the British parliament, visited him in NY. The hurly-burly was too much, and they returned to Ireland, where Catherine died in childbirth. His namesake son would be raised in Waterford by his father. By this time, Britain had ended transportation, provided a dollop of self-government in Australia, and had pardoned the political's it had condemned a few years earlier. However, excluded from the pardon were the few escapees who would never be allowed back. He fell in love again, and married a local woman. However, this time it was the Presbyterian daughter of an established and very wealth family, Elizabeth Townsend. He became a citizen and a lawyer.

  New York's Irish voted Democratic in 1860, and were clearly not sympathetic to the plight of the Negro. Nonetheless, Meagher joined the NY Militia's 69th Regiment and went off to war. Expectations among the Union generals was that the Irish might do a bit better than Blacks. At Bull Run, they were sent into the foray late in the day, but were repulsed, and Meagher had his horse shot out from under him. In William Tecumseh Sherman's report, he said that the"sewage from the city" had fought admirably. Meagher returned to NY and began recruiting. He saw the war as an opportunity to prove to the Americans the value of the Irish. He also wanted to train men for what he hoped would be a later fight for Ireland against Britain. By the following year, he was a brigadier general in charge of a much larger and better equipped Irish Brigade.  Both the general and the brigade excelled on the Peninsula, and garnered praise from McClellan. The Brigade suffered terrible losses at Antietam and began losing its support in NY, as the church had come out against freeing the slaves. Meagher's enthusiasm for the war began to fade.  He was despondent by the time of Fredericksburg. The battle proved to be the bloodiest day of the Irish Brigade's war. The Brigade was shattered, unpaid, suffering from dysentery, down to 500 men, and Meagher had an infected abscess in a knee. Chancellorsville in the spring of 1863 was his last battle. He would no longer send Irishmen to war. He resigned his commission.

        The NYC draft riots that summer tarnished the reputation of the people Meagher had spent years building up. By repudiating the war and killing negroes, the Irish were once again outcasts and Meagher, for continuing to support the war, was a pariah among his own people. Lincoln asked him to return and he finished the war in a backwater Tennessee post, drinking heavily. He and Elizabeth decided to leave behind NY and head west. President Johnson appointed him Secretary of the Montana Territory. The day he arrived in Virginia City, the governor resigned and appointed him acting governor. Montana of 1865 was a lawless place where vigilantes ruled. His two years in Montana were an unpleasant series of confrontations with the vigilantes and the Indians. His dream of bringing the Irish from the cities to the mountains had offended everyone out west. In the summer of 1867, he was broke, ill, and on a riverboat on the Missouri near Ft. Benton. On the night of July 1, he fell overboard and his body was never found. He was mourned in America, Australia, and Ireland. In 1905, the citizens of Montana erected a bronze equestrian statue with words chiseled on the side from a speech he had made in Ireland. In 1963, John Fitzgerald Kennedy presented the Irish Parliament with the green battle flag the Brigade had carried at Fredericksburg.

        This is an excellent book, and an amazing story.  I suggest that anyone with a drop of Irish blood in them  read the first few chapters. Egan sets forth the most eloquent depiction of the insidious policies of the English that I have ever read. I intentionally used the word genocide above, and believe that it is the most apt description of the UK's policies. And as for Meagher, his biography reads like a novel - a well-written one at that.

Not Dark Yet, Robinson - B+

           In this latest iteration, Zelda is kidnapped by Albanians, while the London security forces she worked for are curious about why she may have been spying on her boss. Banks and his team are frustrated by the lack of clues, and fear the worst. A related matter involves the investigation of the murder of a local thug by his Balkan partners. As usual, Banks proceeds with his usual aplomb and grace to resolve complex matters. This is the 27th in the series and there is a hint that Alan is thinking about calling it a day with the Eastvale Police.

Alter Ego, Freeman - B+

     This is another great one about the Duluth PD. A major Hollywood movie is being filmed in town, featuring events that involved Stride a decade earlier. The writer/director is the son of a man convicted of three murders. The problem though is the entitled leading man, an aging star with an appetite for young women and his team of enablers. It slowly becomes apparent that many young women go missing around this guy, and the team including Stride, Serena, and Maggie, with some unauthorized help from Cat, expose the bad guys. Just fabulous.

Marathon, Freeman - B

         This is the eighth novel in the Jonathan Stride series. It has all of the usual quality police work, interesting characters, and late in the game plot twists that make these stories special. A bomb goes off at the Duluth Marathon killing a handful and injuring many more. A man is convinced he saw a Muslim with a backpack, fires off a tweet and soon we are in the midst of a clash between a right wing group in town for a conference and the local Muslim community. To some extent, the plot becomes almost predictable as both sides dig in. My observation is that it is, of course, good, but not as good as most of its predecessors.

Plunder: Napoleon's Theft of Veronese's Feast, Saltzman - B +

           "This is the story of Napoleon's theft of Paolo Veronese's Wedding Feast of Cana, a vast, sublime canvas that in 1797 the French tore from a wall of the monastery of San Giorgio Maggiore in Venice." From the moment in 1563 that the Benedictines first displayed it, the painting became immensely famous. When he invaded Italy in 1796, Napoleon had his eye on the art treasures of the northern regions, with the goal of filling the Louvre. The French would rationalize their thievery with the statement: "The fruits of genius are the patrimony of liberty." The first two cities he extracted money, food, horses, and high art from were Parma and Milan. Rome soon followed. Napoleon then turned his sights on Venice. He demanded 16 paintings for the Louvre, including masterpieces by Bellini, Tintoretto, Titian, and Veronese. The Feast was not portable. It was 22 ft. x 32ft, affixed to a wall on an architects frame and stretcher. When it was taken down, it tore in three different places. To add insult to injury, Napoleon settled his war with Austria by giving Venice to the Hapsburgs. As the French left, they took the four horses from St. Mark's.

            The Venetian paintings were placed on a 32 gun frigate and sailed for eleven weeks to reach France, where they were placed on barges to proceed up the Loire.  It would eventually take a year for them to reach Paris. The Feast, cut in half, reassembled, and restored was put on display for the first time in the Louvre on May 21, 1801. The French advocated to the rest of Europe that they were bringing something extraordinary from behind closed doors to a vast number of people. It was not theft, but liberation. 

            When Napoleon was finally defeated, the Allies were in no rush to return the looted art, lest they appear to not be supportive of the restored monarchy. The Prussians, at gun point, rescued some of their artwork. The Austrians, on behalf of Venice, took back the four horses from St. Mark's. The  Papacy made a demand for its paintings and statuary. Somehow, the French managed to hang onto about half of what they had taken from Italy. The Feast stayed  because of fears about moving it again. The French offered, and the Austrians accepted, a few others as substitutes. The Feast was hidden by the French in the countryside during the  Franco-Prussian War, and again in WWII. Today, it hangs just across from the Mona Lisa in the Salle des Etats in the Grand Gallerie of the Louvre.

Secret Service, Bradby - B+

              It is likely that the only positive aspect of the Russian Federation's return to Stalinism is as pulp for novelists. This very good novel features Kate Henderson as the head of MI6's Russian desk. Kate juggles a mother with dementia, two teenage kids, and a husband who works for an MP, along with her job. She receives what appears to be actionable intelligence from a Russian friend she knew as a student decades ago. Sergei likely has something to do with the Russian state, but neither Kate nor MI6 know exactly what he does. Armed with his lead, MI6 learns that their PM is about to step down and that the Foreign Minister may be in the pay of Moscow Centre. Also, there is a possible mole at what we used to know as the Circus. Is it good information or are they being played? There is not just bribery, manipulation, and disinformation, but also some good old fashioned wet work in the heart of London. 

Double Agent, Bradby - B

          The Foreign Minister, whom all suspected of being in the pay of Moscow Centre, but could not prove, is now at 10 Downing Street. Some desperate Russians, now on the wrong side of the President, offer kompromat on him in exchange for freedom in the West. MI6 bites and flies off to Georgia to take in the the defecting Russians. It all falls apart, the PM is secure and Kate resigns from the Service, knowing everything is wrong but powerless to change it.

Triple Cross, Bradby -B

                   Once again, the Russians undermine the PM by releasing information of his relationship with a known pedophile. Facing a challenge for the leadership, he must find the mole and makes Kate an offer she has to accept. She begins the search and continues to focus on the current and former Chief of MI6. Dangerous trips to Berlin and Moscow follow, and she manages to find the traitor.

                   Most of the British reviewers mention LeCarre when considering these three novels. Clearly, this author does not match the late David Cornwall in degree of complexity or plot development. But the topic is, and has been, at the heart of British society for almost a century. The young men who betrayed the UK to the USSR were recruited in the 30's and exposed in the 50's and  60's. The existence of the Cambridge Five has haunted the security services, and provided the material for some of Britain's greatest novels. Finding the mole was the essence of 'Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy', and the two ensuing George Smiley books. Tinker has been made into an extraordinarily successful mini-series and a great movie. And for me, it has been the connection to Smiley and the pursuit of the mole that drove me to read these three books in less than a week.

The Killing Hills, Offut - B

         "Death begat death" is an apt assessment of this murder mystery set in some forsaken nowhere in the middle of Appalachia. An Army CID agent is on leave and helps his sister, the local sheriff, sort out a murder. A few insights into the life of the poor in Kentucky, but that's about it.

Ridgeline, Funke - A*

                   This is a fabulous historical novel penned by the same man who wrote 'The Revenant.' It is set in the Powder River Valley in the summer of 1866. As America expanded west, the US Army was tasked with building a fort, which was named after Gen. Phil Kearny. The army was intent on establishing a permanent settlement and brought along women and children. For the Sioux, this was a major transgression right in the middle of their hunting grounds. A Sioux chief, Red Cloud, decided to attack, and uniquely gathered together the Lakota and Ogalala Sioux, the Cheyenne, Minnicoujou, and Arapaho. The battle plan was designed by Crazy Horse, and implemented on December 21. Approximately 30 Sioux attacked the daily wood cutting party, knowing full well there would be a response. Both the cavalry and infantry fell into Crazy Horse's trap, which had over a thousand Indians waiting to pounce. The result was 81 dead American soldiers. The author's descriptive powers encompassing the characters involved, and the land in what is now Wyoming is extraordinary.

                  In the historical notes, it is pointed out that in 1868, the US withdrew from the Valley, abandoned the fort, and recognized the Indians sovereignty over parts of Wyoming, Montana, and  South Dakota.  Six years later, gold was discovered in the Black Hills and the US offered Red Cloud $6M. He declined, war ensued, the combined tribes defeated Custer in a Pyrrhic victory. The end of the Indians freedom soon followed. Before Red Cloud died at 87 in 1909, he said "They made us many promises, more than I can remember. But they kept one. They promised to take our land...and they took it."

Lincoln On The Verge:Thirteen Days To Washington, Widmer - B-

    Lincoln's victory was known throughout the nation on election night thanks to the wonders of the telegraph. Four years earlier, it had taken ten days. The reaction in the South was immediate, visceral, and hostile.  A Southern paper predicted Republicans would "distribute the white females amongst the negroes."  There were four long months between election and inauguration days. There was concern that the capital would be captured by the Confederates. With only a single railroad line into Washington through Baltimore, the largest slave city in the country, plans to kill Lincoln when he traveled between the two cities abounded. 

    His train left Springfield on February 11, 1861. The day before, he had told his law partner of sixteen years, William Herndon, that if he lived, he would come back, and they could practice law again. However, he affirmed that he did not expect to survive the presidency. The Special traveled to Indianapolis where 50,000 awaited in and around Union Station. The entire day had been one of multiple stops, many speeches and hordes of people. Cincinnati turned out 150,000 on the 12th, and the next day the destination was Columbus. The 13th was a critical day as the Congress met amidst threats and a heavy guard to confirm Lincoln's election. Pittsburgh, Cleveland, and Buffalo followed as the Special zigzagged east. In the South, Jefferson Davis was traveling from his Mississippi home to his new capital in Montgomery, Alabama. Each day, Lincoln received communications from his security advisor, Allan Pinkerton. Pinkerton and his men were undercover in Baltimore, where there were so many different assassination plans that local barkeeps were taking bets on whether Lincoln could pass through the city. On the day Lincoln reached Albany, Feb. 18, Jefferson Davis was inaugurated as president of the CSA. New York would be the only city where he would stay two nights. While there, he received innumerable visitors, including one of Pinkerton's spies. A full report on the many plots against him was given to Lincoln.  On his way to Philadelphia, he spoke to the legislature in Trenton. Regarding the secessionists, he said "I fear we shall have to put the foot down firmly." Pinkerton met him in Philadelphia to work out a plan to avoid the Baltimore plotters. He spoke at Independence Hall on Washington's birthday. He spoke admiringly of the Declaration of Independence and equality for all. Later that night, Lincoln, Pinkerton, and Lincoln's bodyguard, Ward Lamon, boarded the last regular train for Washington. They passed through Baltimore in the middle of the night. He arrived unobserved, and proceeded to the Willard Hotel. He had traveled 1904 miles, had been seen by millions, and "restored America's flagging belief in her institutions." Nine days later, he was inaugurated.

   Forty-nine months later, Lincoln's funeral train returned to Springfield by almost the same route he had traveled to the capital. Once again, millions saw it pass. In NYC, an estimated million-and-a-half people lined Broadway for a parade. He was buried in Springfield on May 4th.