Checkpoint Charlie: The Cold War, The Berlin Wall, and the Most Dangerous Place On Earth, MacGregor- B -

    This is a history of the 28-years of the wall that divided  Berlin and symbolized the breach between communism  and capitalism. The motivation for the E. Germans to build the wall in 1961 was emigration to the west. The best people were leaving for freedom and financial well-being. Over a decade, 2.1 million people, a sixth of the population, "simply walked out their front doors and never returned." On the morning of Sunday, August 13, E. Germany began to seal off the city of W. Berlin from the German Democratic Republic. Soon, a 97 mile barricade encircled the city. Within a month, it was a wall. There were a handful of crossings for Berliners with permission but only one for foreigners, diplomats and members of the occupying powers - Checkpoint Charlie. Under the terms of the Four Powers Agreement, all of the occupying powers were entitled to travel through each other's sectors. Very early in the fall of 1961, the US exercised its right to travel in E. Berlin and a stand-off with Soviet tanks brought the world to the brink at Checkpoint Charlie before both sides de-escalated. Over the course of the first year of the wall, the E. Germans and Soviets shocked the world when they killed those trying to escape. As Berliners despaired of their plight, the summer of 1963 saw one of the most dramatic moments of the Cold War when President Kennedy, cheered on by virtually the entire population of W. Berlin, stood across from the Brandenburg Gate and made his famous ' Let Them Come To Berlin' speech. After his "Ich bin ein Berliner" line, he told his speechwriter that the day could never be exceeded in his lifetime. He rejuvenated NATO, inspired the Germans, and confirmed the American commitment to the city.  In 1965, the four powers and the two Germany's signed a treaty, which was the first time the US recognized E. Germany, and the all parties reconfirmed the rights of the occupying military powers. 

     In the late 1960's and into the 1970's, the focus of the Cold War moved elsewhere and Berlin reached a kind of stasis. Both sides lived their lives, and spying seemed to become the central occupation of the city. By the 1980's, a new generation  of E. Germans had grown up under the communist regime, felt little loyalty to the past, and simply wanted the better life they saw on W. German television. This was true throughout the Warsaw Pact as communism failed on every level. In the late 80's, W. Berlin featured major pop acts, such as David Bowie, Michael Jackson and Pink Floyd, playing near the wall. In July, 1988, Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band played a 4 hour set before 300,000 in E. Berlin. The concert was televised throughout E. Germany and became "the touchstone of a generation." The following year saw increased protests in Leipzig and Dresden, the end of the iron curtain in Hungary and Czechoslovakia and, in October, Gorbachev criticized Honecker while in Berlin. On the evening of Nov. 9th, a mid-level GDR functionary inadvertently and mistakenly announced that E. Germans were now free to travel, and failed to mention all of the restrictions that would continue to apply.  The story was broadcast by W. Berlin tv and within hours, thousands of Berliners were standing on and dancing on the wall. The following day East Berliners poured into the west. For all intents and purposes, the 45-year Cold War was over in a flash. By the following summer, the Berlin Wall was gone. The Soviets opted to not interfere, Checkpoint Charlie was dismantled and Germany was reunified.

Disappearing Earth, Phillips - B +

               This highly acclaimed novel is set in current day Kamchatka. There are 12 chapters, one per month beginning in August when two sisters disappear from the beach near Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, the regional capital on the Pacific shore. The mystery of their disappearance is the background to the stories of the women of this community, where natives dominate and Russians (white people) are the minority. The natives are one or two generations removed from reindeer herding, fishing and other ancient ways of life. Just about all of the men, native or white, are pretty unreliable in this matriarchy in a society beyond contemplation to us. This is an interesting story with intriguing background on the Pacific coast of Russia.

The Good Assassin, Vidich - B

                                 This time, the novel is set in Cuba in 1958. The corrupt American-backed Battista regime is on the ropes and failing on every level. The rebels are in the mountains and getting ready to finish off the government. A retired CIA agent is sent to see how the man on the ground is doing, because Washington is concerned that he is actively supporting the rebels. As the author's specialty is stories based on actual events, there was a rogue American in Cuba who reached the highest levels of the revolution, only to pay the ultimate price when he came under suspicion by Castro.

An Honorable Man, Vidich - B

                   The author specializes in CIA stories from the distant past that are based on actual events. In this novel, a double agent is suspected, and the CIA is desperately trying to find him in DC in 1953. He had been recruited in Europe after WWII and the Soviets deftly try to change the focus of the US investigation. Interestingly, the book explores the growing pains of the agency, its founding with the veterans of the OSS and its competition with the established and much more powerful FBI.

Germany: A Nation In Its Time, Before, During, And After Nationalism, 1500 - 2000, Smith - B+

     The main theme of this book is that Germany, over the course of five centuries, should be viewed through "radically different" lenses. The second message is that, for the vast majority of the years studied, Germany was a pacific land, often derided for its lack of "martial spirit". The third is an exploration of the role of compassion in national belonging. The book is divided into five distinct eras: Before Nationalism, The Copernican Turn, The Age of Nationalism, The Nationalist Age and After Nationalism. 

     I. At the mid-point of the second millennium, there were few maps and without maps, no sense of a Germany. It was simply the place where the German language was spoken. The advent of printing, the exploration of Africa and the discovery of America "set off a new curiosity about the world." The first maps of Germany delineated its borders as the Rhine, the Alps and the Danube, the Carpathians and Vistula and the Baltic Sea. In the middle of the 16th century, Munster published a "Cosmographia"that provided great detail and accuracy on Germany, its cities, mountains, rivers and boundaries. Germany was slowly becoming divided by religion as Protestantism took hold in all the cities and throughout the north. But unlike the rest of Europe where religious distinctions led to violence, the 1555 Peace of Augsburg created a Germanic patchwork wherein the local ruler could determine his community's devotion to either Catholicism or Lutheranism. However,  "[b]etween 1570 and 1648, the German lands went from a place of flourishing learning to a decimated ruin." The Thirty Years War destroyed Germany, compelling scholars to search for comparisons. The Black Death of the 14th century and the second thirty years of war from 1914-1945 are the two most oft-cited. Probably a third of the population died from battle, siege, hunger, privation and disease. The population loss was a greater percentage than that of the 20th century and it took much longer to recover, somewhere between 60 and 100 years. The war broke out in 1620 when Protestant and Catholic forces clashed over the possibility of a Protestant assuming the Bohemian crown and voting out the Catholic Hapsburgs. Both the Swedes and the French aggressively intervened in the 'Teutsche Krieg'. A contemporary chronicler called the soldiers of the era "booty stealers, plunderers, peasant tormentors, oppressors of people, tribute mongers, torturers, cowards, and deceits." The 1648 Treaty of Westphalia ended the war and brought both the Swedes and French into possession of German land. 

     II. "The German lands underwent fundamental political and ideological transitions, and these resulted in a paradigmatic shift in the way one knew and represented the German nation." The Germans turned to a new way of understanding their nation. Patriotism to the nascent nations of Saxony, Prussia, Bavaria, and Austria grew. No one envisioned a singular nation, but rather a place where German was spoken in different countries.  The War of Austrian Succession raged around the world in the 1740's. Prussia had invaded Austria and annexed Silesia to begin the contest. The price of the war was high for Prussia, which lost 10% of its population. After the war, both Austria and Prussia increased the size of their armies. Both German nations joined Russia in the 1772 Partition of Poland.  The partition caused fear in Saxony, Bavaria, Hanover, the Palatinate, and Wurttemberg,  all of which began to look to France and Britain as possible protectors.  "For the development of German nationalism, the German response to the French Revolution was absolutely crucial." As France began to develop a nationalist ideal which formed people into active citizens, both Austria and Prussia were still thinking about partitioning the rest of the Germany.  In 1796, France crossed the Rhine and began two decades of war, occupation and destruction. There was no German reaction, merely a "melancholic resignation".   The invasion ended the freedoms of the innumerable small cities and eventually, the Holy Roman Empire itself.  "Yet in the protracted period of war and occupation, a genuine German nationalism did, in fact, appear for the first time."  After Napoleon's defeat of Prussia at Jena in 1806,  "a    handful of intellectuals began to write in an unmistakably nationalistic mode."  Johann Fichte wrote 'The Republic of the Germans', envisioning a vast nation from the Baltic to the Adriatic, that dominated central Europe, and honored its war heroes,  its mothers,  dedicated its children to the fatherland, and allowed only Germans to be citizens.   Prussia freed its serfs, granted citizenship to all of its people and began to reform the army.  After Napoleon's  retreat from  Russia, King Frederick William called the Prussian nation to arms to defeat the Emperor. It was a Prussian army  arriving late in the day at Waterloo that delivered the coup de grace.  Germany then reverted to her peaceful ways for half-a-century.

     III.  The years after the Napoleonic wars were peaceful and entailed progress both socially and culturally. Throughout Germany, there was an increase in books published, bookstores and libraries grew in number, and the society was on its way to total literacy.  Prussia, Baden and Saxony built up excellent elementary school systems. Both Austria and Prussia appropriated fewer funds for their militaries.  Unfortunately though, suppression of new democratic ideals was widespread, as was incarceration. Germany also remained a developing nation, trailing almost all of the countries of Europe in every economic measure. Poverty, malnutrition, and infant mortality were pervasive. The revolutions of 1848 were about poverty, political rights and nationalism. A parliament in Frankfurt tried to envision a unified Germany and even offered a crown to the King of Prussia, who refused it. As throughout Europe, 1848 aspired to a new world, but didn't budge the old order. In the 1850's, as many as two million people per year left the poverty of Germany and emigrated to America. The advent of industrialization meant more and more Germans now lived in cities, and both Vienna and Berlin grew to over a million people. Both Austria and Prussia increased the funding for, and the size of, their armies.  In Prussia, a new prime minister, Otto von Bismarck, was in favor of a stronger army, and along with the Prussian nobility officer class, he led the move toward "the militarization of the nation." 

     "In central Europe, the return of war . . . would determine the space of nations." Austria was the more formidable power, with the third largest population and vaster financial resources allocated to the police and military. But Prussia, better equipped, with better access to rail transport and immeasurably better led,  routed the Austrians in their 1866 war. Bismarck solidified Prussian control of northern Germany and made no claim on Austrian land. Four years later, Prussian victory over France led to the creation of the German Empire and the absorption of Bavaria, Saxony, Hanover, Baden and Wurttemberg. For the next four decades, Germany would become a nation with a focus more on a type of bellicose and exclusionary nationalism.

      IV. "Nationalism became the dominant ideology of the age not during the First World War but in a Germany shattered by its fallout." "Not enthusiasm but a sense of duty" was the response to the outbreak of war in 1914. There was "a tacit social contract whose core postulate was neither hate nor expansion but rather the duty to defend and die for the fatherland." They believed in "sacrificing for" the nation. As the slaughter went on year after year, people began to despise the war and in 1917, the Reichstag renounced all territorial gains and called for the cessation of all hostilities. When it was all over, the Weimar Constitution announced that the state derived its power "from the people." For the first time in German history, there was no monarch. The Treaty of Versailles removed twenty-million German speakers from the country, saddled the country with responsibility for the war and demanded reparations. The new Germany was a broken country, filled with the disabled, war-widows, fatherless children, and torn between the right and the left and financially overwhelmed.

     Hitler believed in racial purity and that in order to reinstate itself as a world power, Germany needed to rid itself of Jews. He foisted this central theme of his on his party and eventually, the entire country. Nazi Germany quickly became a one-party police state, in which the country's Jews were completely marginalized and isolated. When Poland was invaded, the Jews and upper echelons of Polish society were brutally murdered and suppressed.

      When the USSR was invaded, the SS was no longer under Army supervision and was free to pursue total war against communists and Jews.  The east became a charnel house for Jews, as the SS, as well as local thugs, unleashed a torrent of  indiscriminate murder and thievery. The decision to completely eliminate Europe's Jewry was likely made by Hitler in December, 1941 and was organized by Heydrich a month later. Although the death camps were already being utilized, they escalated to the systemic and total "final solution" of the continent's Jews in 1942-44. The Nazis achieved genocide. 

     V.  Notwithstanding all it had been through, post-war Germany looked back favorably on the Nazi years as "a good idea gone too far." W. Germany's economic miracle pushed nostalgia for the 1930's further into the past. In the 1960's, magazines and television began to deal with the Hitler years. A 14-part tv documentary, 'The Third Reich', was seen by 60% of the population. It stated that "we" were responsible. But even in the late 60's, the ability to compassionately mourn was still a decade away. The 1979 American mini-series 'Holocaust' brought discussion of what had been done to the Jews to the fore. A 1985 speech by Germany's president told the nation that they "must take on the past." Unification in 1990 led to a massive disruption in the east and an increase in anti-immigrant violence. The response was a compassionate protestation against prejudice that could not have happened in the 30's or 50's and was possible because a modern democracy had came to grips with its past. 

     The author closes by briefly addressing Germany today and the rise of the nationalist AfD, concludes that they remain a small (10%) percentage of the country. and that the nationalism of the past cannot build a society, only destroy it.

     This is an extremely challenging read, one that presupposes a familiarity with German and European history. It enlightens, particularly in the first half of the book. But, from Bismarck through 1945, I can't say that it sheds any truly new light on the greatest tragedy of 20th-century history.

     

Deaths Of Despair And The Future Of Capitalism, Case and Deaton - B+

      This book is a study of the rising death rates among middle-aged white Americans caused by suicide, drug overdoses and alcoholic liver failure. Few of these deaths of despair are among those with bachelor's degrees. "When the fruits of success are as large as they are today, so are the penalties for failing the tests of meritocracy." Fully 38% of the population is non-Hispanic whites lacking a college education. Their wages have stagnated for half a century. Their access to health care is inadequate, they marry less and have more children out of wedlock. Globalization is the oft-cited cause, but the problem is uniquely American as the advanced countries of Europe do not share our fate.  At the heart of the matter is the failed healthcare system and a political system geared toward keeping the rich at the top of the pyramid.

        The 20th century saw a major increase in wages, education and longevity. Since 1990, mortality rates have declined in northern Europe and risen amongst the less educated non-Hispanic white mid-life Americans (LEW hereafter). The key milestones were the  1996 FDA approval of Oxycontin and the 2013 introduction of fentanyl.  Mortality rates for male LEW's have increased by a quarter, while dropping 40% for those with a degree. The LEW's also suffer from poor health and regular pain compounding their problems. These are the people who have lost jobs and the sense of self-worth that goes with being engaged in society. "The social and economic upheaval that has swept through their lives is causing increasing numbers of them to take their own lives." Although educated whites drink more often than LEW's, the latter group is more inclined to binge drink, thus causing more liver damage. Physicians' concerns about pain management in the 90's led to the prescribing of painkillers, which were abused by LEW's and thus increased deaths from overdosing.

       "Inequality and death are joint consequences of the forces that are destroying the white working class." And it is the destruction of opportunity and hope that are the root cause of these deaths, as well as the limited access to health care and the  uniquely American lack of a safety net.  The collapse of the industrial base that provided employment for the LEW's has left them with jobs lacking in pride and money. Being an autoworker is more satisfying and remunerative than being a greeter at a Walmart. This inability to be able to afford to marry, the lack of commitment to offspring, and not being involved with religious or social groups all add up to greater despair. 

       Our country's greatest failure is its healthcare system. It is too expensive. It is "a cancer that has metastasized throughout the economy, strangling its ability to deliver what Americans need." We pay 18% of GDP for healthcare, and life expectancy has slid three years in a row for the first time in 100 years. Our physicians are paid twice as much as in Europe, pharmaceuticals cost three times as much and the same medical devices are also three times more expensive. Insurers and hospitals make significant profits.  Hospitals spent $450M on advertising in 2017. Employers hire fewer workers and pay those in their employ less because of the amount they spend on health insurance. The industry spent $567M lobbying in 2018, and $133M in direct gifts to Congressmen. The industry is in essence a shake down supported by Washington.

      Also threatening the LEW's are globalization and automation and unlike other industrialized nations, our inadequate safety net does not protect the displaced. As American companies grow larger, they are able to suppress wages, while focusing on enhancing the pay of their managers and providing outsized returns to shareholders. The balance between labor and capital has swung sharply to the side of capital.

      The authors do not believe that the answer to America's issues is a redistribution of wealth through the tax system. Rather, they suggest attacking each problem directly. They would suppress opioid sales and fund intervention therapies. They suggest emulating any of the world's successful universal health programs with an eye toward cutting profits and decreasing costs. Changing corporate governance by having workers represented on boards and expanding executives' concerns beyond their shareholders to the broader constituencies is encouraged. Raising the minimum wage and/or wage subsidies are preferred over universal basic incomes. Enhanced anti-trust action and a reduction in the length of patents are desirable. And most importantly, a college education should be less expensive to obtain and an apprenticeship system would  be attractive. America has solved problems in its past and can do so again.

Fair Warning, Connelly - B+

                                  It's unlikely that anyone is better at the cop/mystery/thriller genre than Connelly. His Harry Bosch series has been a dominant player for decades, and here he returns to a journalist who has appeared twice before in LA.  Jack McEvoy is now working for a website that focuses on consumer protection issues. He stumbles upon a crime committed by someone with illicit access to women's DNA from a new entrant in the burgeoning business of DNA analysis for the general public. The business is completely unregulated, and the crime he discovers leads us on a very exciting  chase. This is another great book from a wonderful author.

Bluebird, Bluebird, Locke - B+

                                  This novel is a few years old and is the prequel to 'Heaven, My Home' by the same author that I posted in April. The books should be read in sequence, and I strongly recommend both. Darren Matthews is a Texas Ranger, only the second black one in history, and the principal character in both novels. In this one, he is sent from Houston east to Shelby County to investigate the murder of a black man from Chicago. Butting up against local hatreds and plenty of secrets, he solves that crime as well as one from a few years back. The books are great mystery stories, but what makes them exceptional is the author's skill in dealing with race in communities where blacks and whites have lived side by side for generations, sharing the same space and the rural poverty that comes with it. The author is a young black woman from Texas, who is very good at her craft.

Knife, Nesbo - B+

                           The most recently translated Harry Hole novel is very, very good. A serial rapist who Harry had put in jail over twenty years ago is out, has threatened to kill Harry's wife and is raping again. When Rakel is murdered, Svein Finne is the obvious suspect, but he has an alibi. Harry has been so drunk and the killer so duplicitous that Harry begins to believe he murdered his own wife.  He eventually sorts out who the killer is, gives him a way out and turns the table on Finne as well, ending forever his preying on the innocent. This  is a perfectly crafted addition to a splendid series. 

Music By Max Steiner: The Epic Life Of Hollywood's Most Influential Composer, Smith - B+

      Steiner was born in 1888 into a famous Viennese family. His grandfather managed the 'Theater an der Wien' and produced operettas with Johann Strauss. His father, Gabor, conceived of and opened an amusement park, 'Venice in Vienna'. Gabor was ambitious, extremely hard working and creative. He opened Vienna's first moving picture theater. Max was encouraged to take up the piano by Strauss, and at nine composed his first song. He also met an extraordinary cast of talented people who performed for his father including Richard Strauss, Gustav Mahler, W.C. Fields and John Philip Sousa. Gabor was honored by the Emperor Franz Joseph for his contributions to the arts. Max graduated from Imperial Academy music school and began writing operettas in his teens. When Gabor went bankrupt in 1907, Max moved to London. His new career involved scoring music and traveling with shows and he even composed a ballet. He became musical director of the London Opera House. The outbreak of WWI cast him as an enemy alien and he immediately left for America. In New York, he made a great many friends and developed his skills as a composer, conductor and manager working for different producers on varied musical projects. He became an American citizen in 1921. He had the good fortune to collaborate with George Gershwin, Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein. In 1929 as Hollywood was switching to talkies and focusing on musicals, RKO signed 41 year old Max and he was off to Hollywood.

       Within a year he was Musical Director, but RKO was losing a great deal of money as the Depression wore on. David O. Selznick was put in charge to save the studio. Selznick believed in the role of music and authorized a film to be scored from beginning to end. 'Symphony For Six Million' was Hollywood's and Steiner's first film accompanied by, and enhanced by, music. Max had created a new art form; the techniques are followed to this day. With RKO facing bankruptcy as 5,000 movie theaters were shuttered in the early 30's, Selznick left for MGM, and Merian Cooper came to RKO  to produce one of the most important and successful movies of all time. 'King Kong' saved RKO and made Steiner famous. It was released in March 1933 and the music fit the film perfectly. The score is considered a masterpiece, the foundation of all that followed. Decades later, Cooper credited it with the movie's enduring success. Soon thereafter, with 'Flying Down To Rio', Steiner began his collaboration with Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. In 1935, he received his first Oscar for the score of a John Ford film, 'The Informer'. A year later, he left RKO to join Selznick International Pictures.  Their first and very successful outing was 'Little Lord Fauntelroy'. Selznick paid Max well, but couldn't keep him busy, so he loaned him to Warner Bros. The score for 'Charge of the Light Brigade' was a success and Max  moved to Warner's full time. 'The Life of Emile Zola' won the Oscar for best picture and according to Jack Warner, Max's nominated score was the key. He scored 'Jezebel', the first of fifteen films for Bette Davis. Steiner worked constantly and often at an unimaginable pace. It was not unusual for him to score over a dozen films in a year. The beginning of 1939 saw him score 'Stagecoach' and 'Dodge City', while waiting for a highly anticipated phone call. Selznick had obtained the rights to and, in December of 1938 began filming, 'Gone With The Wind'. At the end of March, Selznick asked, Warner agreed, and Max went to work on what is considered one of, if not the greatest films ever made, and the most memorable music score of all time.

        The filming of GWTW was total chaos. Selznick used three different directors. Almost the entire cast was unhappy, particularly with the producer. Leslie Howard, Vivien Leigh and Clark Gable alternated their frustrations between the producer and director. For Max, the problem was time. Selznick did not provide enough time for Max to score a three hour film and constantly interfered with Steiner's work. Against a December 15th premier, Max announced in early November, he could not finish. Working frantically, the score was completed nine days prior to the 15th. Awards mattered to Max and he was crushed when the Oscar went to 'The Wizard of Oz'. He, de Havilland and Gable were Oscar losers amongst GWTW's eight wins. Notwithstanding his disappointment, the score brought him lasting fame. Max was pleased with his work on 'Sergeant York' which Warner's had set up to prepare America for war. Max's obsession with work and his disastrous lack of attention to his finances led to his third wife leaving him in 1941 as his personal life began a spiral downward that would continue for the rest of his life. Just before Pearl Harbor, he finished up a splendid job on 'They Died With Their Boots On'. He followed up with 'Stella Dallas', 'Arsenic And Old Lace' and won his second Oscar for 'Now, Voyager'.

         In the summer of 1942, he began his work on 'Casablanca'. 'Everyone Comes To Rick's' was a never- produced play that Hal Wallis acquired for Warner Brothers.  Wallis loved the song 'As Time Goes By', from a 1931 Broadway production, and insisted that Max utilize it.  Since the filming was almost over before Max started and the song was an integral part of the story, Max had no choice. He majestically incorporated 'A Time Goes By' and 'La Marseillaise' into the movie. The film and its score were, and continue to be eighty years later, beloved masterpieces, and the defining work of Max's career. He continued working constantly and won his third Oscar for 'Since You Went Away'.  His post-war successes included 'The Treasure of the Sierra Madre', 'Key Largo' and 'Johnny Belinda'. In the early 50's, Max was over 60, struggling with an endless array of creditors, including the IRS, and completely failing the son, Ronnie, born to him and his third wife in 1940. As America turned to tv, movie attendance plummeted and all of the studios were suffering. Max's famous Warner Brothers' Orchestra was disbanded. He left Warner's in 1953 when his contract was not renewed. Columbia asked him to do 'The Caine Mutiny', which was his twelfth and final work on a Humphrey Bogart film. His last great piece of work was 'The Searchers', released in 1956. A few years later, he scored 'A Summer Place'. The theme from the movie became one of the most successful instrumentals in Billboard's history. At 71, Max Steiner had a hit single. He won a Grammy for Record of the Year. His rights in the song earned him $250,000 in a few months and solved a myriad of financial problems. He also prevailed in a twenty-year battle he led on behalf of score composers with ASCAP and soon money was pouring in from television's use of so many of his films. But, in 1962, his troubled and neglected son committed suicide. Max also was legally blind. He scored a few films in the decade and passed away at 83 in 1971. 

         I know nothing about music, but I've loved reading this book. It is extremely well-written and perfectly paced. Growing up in NYC, the three non-network tv stations ran a potpourri of material from quiz shows to cartoons to movies. There were dozens of film classics on every week.  I was fascinated by 'Kong' as a boy. The theme from GWTW is my favorite movie music and Casablanca is my all-time favorite film.  I believe that score music is a major American contribution to world culture, and reading about how it evolved in Steiner's time has been a pleasure.

               

The Last Trial, Turow - B

                   Sandy Stern is now 85 and a survivor of lung cancer. To a great extent, his life was saved by a drug created by a dear friend, Kiril Pafko, and because it is not on the market, Sandy accesses it illegally from overseas. When Kiril is accused of falsifying testing data, committing fraud and violating the insider trading rules, he turns to Sandy. Sandy's health, stamina and memory are all suspect, but he manages to handle the trial with his usual flair. There are some interesting sidebars along the way as Sandy puts his life and career into perspective. The author is a contemporary of mine, a graduate of Harvard Law, a practitioner with one of Chicago's most respected firms and the author of eleven best selling novels. This has been highly acclaimed, but frankly doesn't seem on par with some of his prior efforts.

A Shadow Intelligence, Harris - B

                           This is a very different and very good thriller featuring an MI6 agent, Elliot Kane. After a tricky and long Mideast deployment,  he is back in London when he receives an  encrypted video depicting himself and someone else in a hotel room somewhere. The video is fake, and the message is from a female colleague and MI6 training school classmate conveying that she's in trouble. Unlike almost every other read in the genre, the solutions and plot development rely on modern technology. Elliot is adept with malware, spyware and a few devious devices that can access any information on any device within hundreds of feet. He uses the dark web to ascertain that Joanna is in Kazakhstan and heads off to Astana without head office approval or even letting them know where he is going. Once there, he enters a bizarre world where Russian cyber-warriors are trying to bring down the country, while British petroleum interests fight a more traditional battle to maintain the status-quo. The country has become a battleground because of the discovery of a massive oil field just 50 miles from the Russian border. Plot, counterplot, and disinformation lead to a complex story, one with frightening detail. This is way above  the usual modern thriller.

Hammer To Fall, Lawton - B+

                                 This novel is set in the 60's, but like the previous one, harkens back to Berlin in the late 1940's, when Joe Holderness and a few other Brits, a Yank, a German and a few Russians were 'scheibers', running the black market. Joe and Kostya meet up in Finland, and then again in Prague. Most of the action is in Czechoslovakia during 1968. And once again, the final scene is set on a bridge crossing between the American sector and East Berlin late at night. There's always fog and limited lighting in Cold War meetings like this. An inadvertent shot rings out, and the ending may lead to the next book in the series, or this may be the end. 

A Woman of No Importance: The Untold Story of the American Spy Who Helped Win World War II, Purnell - B

   Virginia Hall was born to a wealthy Maryland family in 1906. She rejected the role of women of that era and sought a life of adventure. She attended five colleges on both sides of the Atlantic. She was in Paris at twenty, and then on to Vienna, where she received a degree. She spoke five languages, and landed a clerical job in the American embassy in Warsaw. She was twenty-seven and stationed in Turkey when a hunting accident cost her her left leg below the knee. She resigned from the State Dept. on the eve of war and briefly drove an ambulance for the French when the Germans invaded. She then went to London and landed a position with the F (French) section of the SOE, and became their first female agent. The disabled thirty-five year old slipped into Vichy France through the porous Spanish border in August, 1941 undercover as a reporter. She was spectacularly successful setting up a burgeoning operation with a series of safe houses able to pass on downed RAF pilots to Spain. Because Vichy was technically neutral, she was able to continue her cover as a reporter and to use the American consular office in Lyon as a method of passing information to London. Into 1942, she continued to excel at building her organization, notwithstanding London's refusal to put her in charge of all SOE agents in France or provide her with military rank. She organized an important jailbreak of a dozen SOE men held by the Germans. As the year wound down, the Gestapo was looking for her, and with the Allied invasion of N. Africa, the Germans occupied Vichy. Virginia fled south and somehow, with a prosthetic leg, climbed over an 8,000 foot snow-capped peak in the Pyrenees, only to be arrested in Spain. The American embassy was able to obtain her release, and she flew to London from Lisbon. SOE rewarded her with an MBE designation. By May, she was in Madrid tasked to work on building safe routes for those escaping France. Bored in Spain, she returned to London where she was recruited by Wild Bill Donovan for the OSS. She was back in France a  few months before the invasion. Once again, she organized resistance activities and now as a radio-telephone operator was able to obtain supplies and disburse them to the Resistance. She was instrumental in significant demolition and sabotage activities in southwest France. Eisenhower had said the Resistance tied down a number of German divisions and materially shortened the war. She was awarded a Croix de Guerre and Distinguished Service Cross. After the war, she worked for the CIA until mandatory retirement in 1966. Never again afforded an opportunity in the field  because she was a disabled woman, she survived as an analyst, but never really flourished. She died at 82. Her accomplishments are now honored in the CIA Museum. Virginia Hall was clearly an extraordinary talent and this is a great story. The challenge with books about clandestine operations after all the witnesses are dead is that there is little detail about what actually happened.

The Unfortunate Englishman, Lawton - B

                                  For any Englishman writing a spy novel, the first, and only, relevant possible comparison is LeCarre. And truth be told, this author made me think that way, as have a reviewer or two. The first book in this series was set in Berlin mostly in the late 40's. In this one, the storyline revolves around the 1961 building of the Berlin Wall. Our MI-6 man, Joe Holderness, manages and pulls off a prisoner trade with the Soviets on the bridge to the American sector.  His efforts are rewarded because the Russian general he deals with used to be his partner in the late 40's blackmarket. The author is an experienced and successful writer. This book is a few years old and the 3rd in the series is out. Likely next read.

Camino Winds, Grisham - B +

                                  Few, if any, are better, and in this one, the author is at the top of his game. This is the second 'beach book' by Grisham set in a Florida beach town and featuring a bookseller, not a gaggle of trial lawyers. A murder in the midst of a hurricane leads to a magnificently laid out plot with the do-gooders on Camino Island, and ex-FBI, FBI, contract assassins, a whistle-blower, a massive fraud and the usual Grisham fun. A must read.

A Good Marriage, McCreight - B

                                 This is a very good page-turner set in modern day Park Slope in Brooklyn. All of the parents of the children at a prestigious private school are stressed about an email hack causing very real pain, but also looking forward to the annual neighborhood party where some spouse-swapping is alleged to go on 'upstairs'. Throw in a murder, some serious,  delusional recollecting, a bad apple or more, and you have a fun read.

Voyage Of Mercy: The USS Jamestown, the Irish Famine, and the Remarkable Story of America's First Humanitarian Mission, Puleo-B +

   This is the history of America's, indeed the world's, first humanitarian mission. Never before had any nation, never mind the people of a nation, come to the aid of another. The mission was occasioned by the Irish famine that began in the summer of 1846, when the potato crop failed for the second year in a row. "Disaster was universal. Irish peasants - impoverished, weak, emaciated, sick, clad only in tattered rags-limped, stumbled, fell, and died by the thousands on country roads and in rain-filled ditches, in town squares, in snow covered bogs and on frozen hillsides, in dark windowless mud huts, in the slums and alleyways of cities......." Most in the Whig  government in London considered the victims as backward-looking slaves to their popish ways, unscientific and unable to fend for themselves. Indeed the assistant secretary at the Treasury for famine relief referred to the famine as a cure for the Irish's over-breeding. Ireland exported oats, wheat, cattle and barley to England. It is believed the exports alone, had they remained in Ireland, would have prevented a million deaths.              When word of the famine reached America in early 1847, there was an immediate response across the country to organize assistance. Led by Sens. Clay and Webster, it encompassed all denominations and was truly bipartisan. A Boston merchant and sea captain suggested the US load up a warship with in-kind gifts to supplement the expected financial donations. Congress and President Polk assigned the USS Jamestown to Robert Bennet Forbes. That spring, thousands made an effort to leave Ireland. In the first six months of the year, 300,000 fled to Liverpool, many on their way to America. Often they were already ill from typhus or dysentery and died on the way across the Atlantic. The ships were called famine ships, and sometimes coffin ships, because by the time they arrived in America or Canada, almost all aboard had died.                                                                                                                              On March 28, 1847, the Jamestown sailed with a volunteer crew and 8,000 barrels of food. Every city, and virtually every community contributed, and 114 more ships followed the Jamestown to Ireland in 1847. Two weeks after leaving Boston, the Jamestown and Robert Bennet Forbes were met with unbridled enthusiasm and praise in Cork. Later that year, the half-hearted English attempts, soup kitchens and public works programs, were wound down because of concern over their costs and a fear of fostering Irish dependency. English antipathy was furthered by Irish demands for independence. American enthusiasm for assisting Ireland waned towards year end as both Boston and New York were literally overrun by poor and sick Irish immigrants, creating a backlash in their new cities.                                

     The Great Hunger took one million lives and sent a million-and-a-half overseas. It also permanently poisoned whatever  was left of Ireland's relationship with England. Irish hatred of England was most manifest a hundred years later when the Republic remained neutral in WWII. The almost million who left for America forever changed American politics and culture for the better, and led the way for waves of immigrants in the following 75 years. And America embarked on a policy of humanitarian generosity that survives in the 21st century.This book offers as fine a description of the famine and its consequences as any history or novel that I have ever seen. The definition of genocide is a 'deliberate' killing, so English indifference doesn't qualify. It should.

The Coldest Warrior, Vidich- B

                                          This is a nicely done CIA thriller written by someone with the apparent knowledge of a former member of the second oldest profession, but with the deft touch of a screen writer, which is actually the author's day job. The novel is set in the mid-70's when the Agency was raked over the Congressional coals for its decades of misdeeds. The event being looked into was the 1953 defenestration of a CIA scientist from the 7th floor of a Washington hotel window. Many of those involved are still around, some highly-placed and not the least bit interested in divulging the truth. It was the height of the Cold War and that's all anyone needs to know. A quick fun read.

The Rabbit Hunter, Kepler - B+

                                  If you can handle off-beat Nordic darkness, this is a fabulous series. This is the sixth and Joona Linna is on the hunt for a spree killer. Unlike serial killers motivated by sex, this type of killer has different motivations and a plan. Here, the motivation is revenge, and once he starts, the bad guy is efficient, effective and on target. Another helluva good read.

House On Fire, Finder - B-

                                  Nick is a private intelligence agent and combat vet who loses a dear friend with PTSD to an Oxydone addiction. He is hired by an heir to the Kimball (think Sackler) Pharma fortune to out her dad, the CEO, who buried the trial reports showing the drug's hideous addictive tendencies. Plus, he'd like to avenge one of his dearest friends. Needless to say, with billions on the line, the obstacles are many, varied and vicious. 

Hitler's First Hundred Days: When Germans Embraced The Third Reich, Fritsche - B +

   President Hindenburg swore in Chancellor Hitler at mid-day January 30, 1933. The political compromises that led to this decision were driven by desperation. The country was hopelessly divided between the extremists of each side. The Nazis and Communists were electorally equally matched and of much more importance in the body politic than the centrist parties of the Catholic Center and the Social Democrats. Reason had departed from whatever was left of the Weimar Republic. The previous decade-and-a-half had seen defeat, degradation, devaluation, anti-semitism, reparations, and depression. Indeed, the Berlin of that winter was marked by malnutrition, unemployment and grinding poverty. The Nazis  had been a feature on the national scene for years, but powered to the top in 1930-1932 when their share of the Reichstag vote moved from 2.8% to 37%. They accomplished their move by relentless effort all around the country, with a well organized ground game led by the hardest worker of them all, Hitler. He never tired of driving and flying around Germany and making multiple speeches a day. It is believed he spoke to 4 million people in person in 1932. His rabble rousing denunciations of the 'stab in the back' and Versailles resonated across all classes and religions. The Nazis sought to unify the country by first breaking down the barriers dividing the country. That said, the Nazis could not unseat Hindenburg's majority party for the presidency, nor could Hindenburg and the forces of the right find a chancellor other than the 'Bohemian corporal'. The conservatives who acquiesced to Hitler disdained him and his mob and believed they could control him. Von Papen, a recent chancellor, said, "We'll box Hitler in......after all, we've hired him." The right wished to break Weimar and they did, just not quite how they had anticipated.                                                                        There was a massive torchlight rally that night in Berlin, reviewed by Hindenburg and Hitler, celebrating what the Nazi's called the "spirit of 1914." Hitler, hoping for a legislative majority,  persuaded Hindenburg to call Reichstag elections for March 5th. The campaign was the first time the Nazis had access to the radio and they blanketed the airwaves for a month. The Reichstag fire of February 27th proved to be a pivotal moment, as it led the following day to emergency legislation that paved the way for dictatorship. Goring, as Prussian Minister of the Interior, arrested innumerable communists and basically frightened the Reds from voting. On the 5th, the Nazis achieved 44% and the Nationalists 8%, thus allowing a right wing conservative majority to form a government. "The week that followed the elections was the single most consequential in German history." The Nazis attacked Jews, communists, Social Democrats and prepared to take over the state. Newspapers were abolished. "Assertions about communist terrorism produced a concrete policy of ant-terrorism that installed the dictatorship." From one end of the country to the other, brown shirted SA stormtroopers marched to city hall and beat and tortured officials until they quit, were jailed or executed. It was a literal and illegal reign of terror. By the middle of March, the communist and SD parties ceased to exist.  On March 23rd, the Reichstag passed an Enabling Act authorizing Hitler's dictatorship.                                                                                              "Most Germans preferred a Nazi future to the Weimar past." It offered renewal and reunion. "Germans credited the Nazis with finally putting in place the national solidarity they had yearned for after the lost war and years of revolution and counterrevolution." The Protestant establishment viewed the immorality of the Weimar years as if it were the 'passion of Christ', assisted in its degradation by Jews and communists in the big cities. The Nazis also embraced and honored the one-third of German males who were war veterans. They attracted the working man by co-opting May Day by recognizing it as a national holiday and calling it the National Day of Labor. April saw the boycott of Jewish businesses and the removal of Jews, of whom there were about half-a-million, from all civil service positions in the Reich. The SA began indiscriminately beating and murdering Jews in the street. German society was severed, and Jews were excluded.                             The year 1933 marked the end of the post-war period and the ascendancy of the Nazis as the number one news story in the world. All of a sudden, the world became focused on the likelihood of a second war. The Nazis had taken  over Germany quickly and violently and the Germans went along willingly after the first weeks and months. This is a magnificent and highly recommended book. It tells not what happened, but how and why it happened better than any I can recollect. My only quibble is that the author stretches out the last third of the book on events after the first hundred days, and around Europe as well.  But again, I think this is a must for those who seek to try and understand the story behind the century's greatest calamity.

Divided Loyalties, Todd - B +

                   In 22 books over 24 years, the authors have created one of the best, perhaps my favorite, series.  I've always admired their sense of history in England immediately after the Great War,  their ability to study the despair of the men who fought, and the society they returned to. It is excellence seldom seen in a novel or for that matter, a history.  The mystery plots are almost always good, and here, it's great. Rutledge is sent to Devon to explore a murder, which he successfully wraps up, when his irascible boss sends him to another town in the west because one of his colleagues has failed in a case. It's the best one in the series in recent memory

An Underground Guide To Sewers, Halliday - B-

  The 19th was a century of world-wide cholera epidemics and massive urban sewer programs. From time immemorial, mankind created systems to access water and dispose of waste, but never gave much thought to the health consequences of either or both or their interaction. Thanks to Victor Hugo, the world's most famous sewers are those of Paris, which were constructed in the 18th and early 19th century. The era of Napoleon III saw the epic reconstruction of the city by Baron Haussmann, who transformed above and below. He significantly expanded the sewers and built masterpieces for the transmission of storm water and liquid waste to the Seine. He apparently did not want #2 despoiling his sewers and continued the use of nightsoilmen to clean out cesspits. Solid human wastes were added later in the century by a successor City Engineer. The construction of London's sewers coincided with the mid-century realization that cholera was a waterborne disease. London, at two-and-a-half million people, was the largest city in the world and in desperate need of extensive water intake and waste output. The Victorian engineers rose to the task and were the first to separate, and thus allow a more lenient disposal of, rainwater from human waste. The unpredictable storms were allowed to flow directly into the Thames. Human waste was routed far to the east. Around the world, the steps taken in Paris and London led the way forward, and as mankind moved into the 20th century and even larger cities, processes for waste treatment moved to the fore. Admittedly, the most apt characterization of this book is odd.

The King At The Edge Of The World, Phillips - B

                                  This novel begins in 1591, with a group of diplomats sent to London by the Ottoman Emperor. When they leave, unlucky Turk physician, Mahmoud Ezzedine, is left behind as a gesture of good will. A decade later, as Elizabeth I lay dying, all are anxious about whether James Stuart, the likely heir, is truly Protestant.  Mahmoud is now Matthew Thatcher, still a physician, and now a Christian. This transition from the Tudors to the Stuarts was fully seven decades after Henry VIII had left the Catholic church, but religion had been and would continue to be an unsettled source of conflict for another nine decades after Elizabeth's death. Indeed, it wouldn't be until the middle of the 18th century that Bonnie Prince Charlie's defeat at Culloden ended the last Catholic threat once and for all. Thatcher is sent to James VI in Scotland by Elizabeth to be his assistant and physician. It is not his health, though, but rather his religious intent, that Thatcher is assigned to monitor. He gains the King's confidence, plays chess with him and slowly poisons him. When called in to administer to him, he does and he observes the King in extremis. He prays to his Protestant God as Thatcher cures him. Thatcher delivers the wonderful news toEngland, easing the way for James I to ascend the throne upon Elizabeth's demise in 1603.

Heaven, My Home, Locke - B+

                                 This excellent novel is set in east Texas a few years ago and features Darren Matthews,  a black Texas Ranger, with a fair share of personal problems and a very complex case. He's got marital issues, and more importantly, one of the local sheriffs thinks he killed a member of the Aryan Brotherhood of Texas. He's called out to investigate a kidnapping, perhaps murder, near Caddo Lake on the Texas - Louisiana border. He uncovers a rat's nest of crime, nasty people, true black-white hatred and a nasty side to a dear friend and FBI agent. The fascinating thing about this book is the background of the lake, its history as a safe place for free blacks and native Americans before the Civil War, and how it all played out a century-and-a-half later.

Play The Red Queen, Jurjevics- B+

                                  This is a fascinating, and recommended, novel set in Saigon in the fall of 1963.  The lady of the title is the nickname of a VC sniper who kills American officers with one shot from the back of a Vespa from a pretty good distance. She is talented and lethal and our two Yank MPs are on her trail after her third kill. The only clue they're able to uncover is that she is after either an American silver fox or America's silver fox. Could be Lodge? Could be Diem? They soon find out that victim #3 was about to file a report exposing the obscenely corrupt practices of the Diem's, which the newly-appointed Lodge was trying to stop. They finally catch up to her on the night in November when the coup against the Diems succeeds. The author was a Vietnam vet and a fine writer with great insight into the Saigon of that pivotal year.

Notre-Dame: The Soul of France, Poirer - A*

     In life, there are enduring symbols and Notre-Dame has been one for 850 years. It has always been more than a cathedral. "Notre-Dame is one of mankind's greatest architectural achievements, the face of civilization, the soul of a nation. "                   In the 12th century, Paris was the capital of France and a thriving multi-dimensional city. It was "the royal city, the merchant city, the bishop's city and the university city."  Bishop Maurice deSully was the man responsible for the cathedral's construction, which began in 1161 and was vigorously pursued for the next 40 years. It took a century to complete the airy, cohesive, austere and majestic building.  Centuries later, the Bourbons would lavish works of art and gifts on Notre-Dame, as they bestowed on it a central role in their monarchy. The Revolution led to the melting of the cathedral's bells for canon, lead coffins for bullets and the beheading of the 28 kings of Judah on the facade because they were wrongly thought to be the kings of France.  Catholicism was abolished and Notre-Dame became the Temple of Reason.  The new century saw the pope and Napoleon sign a Concordat, reestablishing the church in France and confirmed at a mass at Notre-Dame.  A few years later, in 1804, Pius VII came to Notre-Dame for Napoleon's coronation as emperor.  Hugo's 'Notre-Dame de Paris', published in 1832, led to a movement to restore the cathedral to its former glory.  The twenty-year restoration  began in 1845 with the objective of undoing the previous three centuries of filling in, plastering over, removing of stain glass and other intentional defilements, along with damages inflicted by time and weather.  Also, a new towering spire was added to the cathedral. Its collapse in 2019 was the devastating symbol of the fire at Notre-Dame last year. Paris itself by the middle of the 19th century was an overcrowded, congested and filthy mess. Baron Haussmann's renovations completely redid the Ile de la Cite. He evicted two-thirds of its inhabitants in order to clear the sight lines around the cathedral.                                   The day after he arrived in Paris in August of 1944, De Gaulle walked from the Arc de Triomphe  to Notre-Dame  and cemented himself as liberator and leader of France.  The year 2013 saw the replacement of all but one bell with new, meticulously cast bronze bells, and for the first time since before the Revolution, the bells of Notre-Dame were in tune.  On the evening of April 15, 2019, flames began to leap from the roof. The fire was in the 13th-century oak lattice work roof structure.  An hour after the fire began, the spire collapsed. The firefighters saved the towers and the treasures of  Notre-Dame. The next day, donations were promised by rich and poor, in France and around the world. Securing tarps in place of the roof and stabilizing the walls were the first two jobs addressed. How it will be restored and how its role as a church and museum will be modified all remain to be resolved.  It is now the 'building site of the century' and this is a very good book.

To The Edge of Sorrow, Appelfeld - B +

                                 The author survived the Holocaust as a young boy, hiding in the woods of Ukraine before joining the Red Army. He became a noted Israeli writer specializing in fictional accounts of the war. In this tale, a seventeen-year-old narrates the story of a Jewish band of partizans formed in the summer of 1942, near the Romanian-Ukrainian border. It is mostly about the day-to-day details of patrolling, gathering food and surviving. The focus is on the leader, Kamil, the cook, Tsila, and the ancient old lady, Tsirl, with a memory of everyone's grandparents. As time passes, there is less and less fighting with Germans or local police and the group's goal is to  wait for the Soviets. But Kamil decides to take the offensive and begins dynamiting trains, derailing them and rescuing Jews on the way to the camps. Soon, the hilltop hideout has 172 souls. When artillery is heard far to the east, the camp fears that the Germans will finish them off before the arrival of the Red Army. The Germans shell the camp, killing many, including Kamil, before the Soviets run them off. After a few days, they descend, walk to town and bury their dead in the Jewish cemetery.  They then settle in at a warehouse near the train station. Time passes and they lose their purpose and cohesiveness. Without the camp, they are no longer connected. The Ukrainians try to rob them and the decision is made  to return. Not home, back to the hilltop.

A Gentleman In Moscow, Towles - A*

                                  This magnificent novel was voted book of the year by many a few years back and I thank my friends, Dennis and Catie Grindinger, for encouraging me to take it up. The gentleman of the title is Count Alexander Rostov, condemned by the Reds at the dawn of the USSR for being a gentleman to spend his life in the Metropol Hotel, of which he was so fond.  Even after his suite was taken away and he was reduced to an extremely modest room, he retained his aristocratic grace and poise and continued to enjoy life to its fullest. The Boyarsky Restaurant, once and maybe still, the finest east of Vienna was his daily home and source of great joy. Of course, when the Bolshies decided that the hundreds of thousands of bottles in the cellar needed to reflect the nation's new politics and had all the labels removed, leaving a choice of red or white, he was appalled, but accepting. As he meets and charms the many who pass through, including Nina, a nine year old girl, Anna, a famous actress, and Osip, a Red Army Colonel, we see through the wit and learn details of the tragedies that befell his family and his class. As he soldiers on through the years and in the late 20's starts helping out with the seating and waiting in the Boyarsky, we see the history of the USSR through the lens of the hotel. When the trials begin in the mid-30's, Nina returns and asks him to watch over her 5 year old daughter, Sofia, because she must follow her husband to Siberia. Nina is never heard from again and Rostov is now the guardian of a child, whom he raises to young womanhood. Sofia is brilliant, beautiful and the child of the entire staff of the Metropol. She excels at piano and joins the Moscow conservatory, which is scheduled to perform in Paris in the summer of 1954. The Count begins to dream and plot. He had returned from the City of Light when the Revolution  began and had been dreaming of it for decades. Escape is planned for him and Sofia; Paris for one and home for the other. Truly wonderful.

Spies of No Country: Israel's Secret Agents At The Birth Of The Mossad, Friedman - C

 This is the story of four young Jews, all born in the 1920's in the Arab world, three named Cohen, and one Shosan, who were the foundation of one of the world's premier intelligence agencies, the Mossad.  Only Jews born in the Middle East had any prayer of acting as a spy. The Askkenazi Jews from Europe could not speak Arabic and did not look Arab. Even these four had occasional difficulty. They were the 'Arab Section' and we follow them from January 1948 to August 1949 in Beirut and Haifa. The fighting had begun in late 1947 after the UN agreed with British plans to leave Palestine and that there would be an Arab and a Jewish state in Britain's stead. The British left on May 14, 1949. The men of the 'Arab section' spied, bombed, assassinated, reported on Arab attitudes and in particular, on Arab intentions and plans as the Arab invasion failed. They came in from the cold and helped build the state after the Independence War.

High Five, Ide - B-

                                  As intriguing as IQ's brains and the plot lines are in this series, the vast array of idiosyncratic Los Angelenos is just as much fun. Dodson, IQ's occasional aide and old friend, goes to the park and feeds Doritos to the pigeons. Starsky and Hutch are a pair of women hitmen specializing in hits requiring difficult access. They grew up in the Ringling Brothers circus as part of the high-wire act and needed work after it folded. TK plays music to the elephants at the zoo, and there are just an endless list of gang-banging bad guys, most stupid, but some pretty savvy. I'm not sure where this series is going. It hasn't lived up to its debut performance and after a totally crazy gang war, everybody's looking for IQ and he's headed out of town all alone, and without any plans.

The Hunt For Kimathi, Henderson and Goodheart - B

                                   This is the story of the 1950's hunt for the Mau Mau's most ruthless and merciless leader, Dedan Kimathi. The Mau Mau indiscriminately slaughtered Kenyan whites and native Africans. Kimathi was a 32 year-old rapist and thug in 1952, when he assumed a leadership role in the uprising. By the middle of the decade, the rebellion was mostly suppressed,  but approximately 1500 rebels were still free roaming over a vast forest of 6,000 square miles. Ian Henderson was the policeman who led the hunt for Kimathi that began in late 1955.  His strategy was to capture a terrorist with the help of other terrorists. Over the course of seven weeks, he convinced a dozen Mau Mau to abandon Kimathi in exchange for food, arms and safety from the increasingly erratic and violent Kimathi. The collaborators helped Henderson narrow down the are where Kimathi and his remaining 50 followers were when the rainy season began at the end of March. The hunters captured more and more of the rebels, including Kimathi's brother. By August, they were closer than ever and Kimathi was down to a dozen men. By October, the final operation was ready, and traps were set in all the possible places Kimathi would seek water. One of the rebel's top lieutenants was captured, and led them to his hideout. Starving, alone and near collapse, on the 21st, six Kikuyu tribal policemen wounded him and brought him to a hospital. He was tried, sentenced to be hung and executed the following year. Thanks to my Kenyan friend and Colorado neighbor, Jonathan Block, for the recommendation.

Your House Will Pay, Cha - B+

                                 This is an extremely well-done and nuanced novel about modern LA. The story is about a Korean family and a black family, whose paths crossed in 1991 and again in 2019. Three decades ago, a promising 16-year-old Ava was shot in the back of her head by the female owner of a Korean grocery. Convicted of a reduced crime and given probation, she changes her name to Yvonne Park,  and surfaces much later, when she is gunned down out side her pharmacy. Could it have been a member of Ava's family? Is justice possible? Is reconciliation?

The Last Protector, Taylor - B

                                  Cat Lovett, now Cat Hakesby, married to her elderly master for protection, is approached by her childhood friend, Elizabeth Cromwell, granddaughter of the Lord Protector. Richard, banished son of Oliver, exiled on the continent returns to London in disguise to recoup a possession of his mother's buried in Whitehall. The plans for the building where the Cromwells lived are in the possession of Hakesby and the Cromwells seek his help. However, they are being manipulated by the Duke of Buckingham, who is plotting against Charles II. Marwood, in his role at Scotland Yard, works to unearth the plot, and manages to quiet Buckingham's plans. Since I read the first three in this series a month ago and now this the week it came out, I guess I'm hooked. However, obscure novels set in London in the 1680's are an acquired taste.

Sarah Jane, Sallis - C

                                         The author cranks out best-sellers, and this one received a number of book of the year awards last year. The heroine of the title could best be described as a drifter, who managed to finish college, serve in the Army and wind up as sheriff in some small town in the middle of nowhere. The book is a series of disconnected observations and events, lacking in theme or continuity. The sheriff who hired her lets her know he's leaving and not coming back. Towards the end of the book, we learn that Sarah killed a man decades ago and the former sheriff killed the fella who came to avenge Sarah's actions. It all, apparently, ties in to time in the Army in combat, but it's never spelled out. I don't get it, but maybe that's me.

Thirteen Days In September: Carter, Begin, and Sadat at Camp David , Wright - B+

"The Middle East from distant times till now is a cautionary story of the failure of war to impose a lasting and just peace. The struggle for peace at Camp David is a testament to the enduring force of religion in modern life, as seen in the ability to mold history and in the difficulty of shedding the mythologies that continue to lure societies into conflict."  Carter was a very religious Baptist who believed God wanted him to make peace in the Middle East. Begin was an extreme right-winger, considered a terrorist by many and focused on the destruction of Arabs. Sadat was considered a visionary, bold yet capable of being flexible. Indeed, he had taken the first step on the road to peace when he visited Israel in 1977. Carter invited Begin and Sadat to meet in September, 1978. Absolutely no one thought there was one chance in a million anything would come of the conference. And the opening discussions appeared to be fruitless. Neither side would give an inch. Carter had hoped to be an intermediary, and realized he had to place a proposal on the table and facilitate an accomodation. A week into the summit, Carter and Sadat had reached the outlines of an agreement, but Begin fought every issue tooth and nail. Carter was convinced Begin was unbalanced and had never intended to agree to anything. Israel had occupied the Sinai since 1967, fortified it and allowed a modest number of civilian settlements. Returning the Sinai without removing the settlements was pointless for Sadat, and unimaginable for Begin. Begin eventually, literally at the 11th hour, relented. He also accepted Carter's nebulous side letter on the West Bank  and Jerusalem. There would be peace between Israel and Egypt and a framework for discussions with the Palestinians. The three men signed the documents in the East Room of the White House.  Six months later, they met again and signed the formal peace treaty. Egypt recognized Israel's right to exist and the two countries have been at peace for over four decades. Many in the Arab world were unhappy with Sadat. He was assassinated four years later.  Begin ignored the framework on the West Bank and Jerusalem and aggressively allowed more and more settlers in. Today, there are half-a-million Jews in what most of the world considers the occupied territories. It is of course why the conference failed one of its two objectives, and the reason for ongoing and endless violence in the area. Begin resigned in 1982 after his invasion of Lebanon dragged on in stalemate. The Carter presidency is oft-derided and mostly forgotten, but he soared at Camp David.                       This book is an excellent primer on the problems of the region. The Bible stories of the Israelites and Egyptians are retold, as is the history of the Zionist movement, the British occupation and Israeli independence. Begin's story recounts his time in Poland, Siberia and as the mastermind of Irgun's terrorist activities. Sadat's history focuses on the degradations of the British occupation and the USSR's heavy-handed friendship. The wars fought, particularly the Six Day War and the Yom Kippur War, are related.  In essence, this is a history of the Middle East's conflicts viewed through the prism of the Camp David summit. This book is worth the effort. The author is one of our finest writers and it weighs in under 300 pages. Once again, thanks to my brother.

The Red Lotus, Bohjalian - B+

                                 The author is a master of page-turning bestsellers and he's done it again here. The story is about a NYC ER doc who falls for a guy who works in the same building as she does, but is ethically challenged. The scheme that the boyfriend and others are working on involves weaponizing bubonic plague for sale in the international arms markets. Note to those offended by rodents, there's quite a bit here about rats. This is a perfect antidote for self-isolating.

The Printing Revolution Of Early Modern Europe, Eisenstein - B

 This erudite tome reviews the impact on the 15th and 16th centuries of the revolution begun with the printing of the Gutenberg Bible in 1455. "The advent of printing is to be taken to mean the establishment of presses in urban centers beyond the Rhineland in  the 1460's." Early books followed scriptal conventions using similar columns, abbreviations, initials and margins. Printing required previously unnecessary collaboration between creators of ideas and the implementers of the trade. Financing the bigger and more complex process brought together disparate specialists, as did distribution, marketing and sales. Learning by reading expanded and took on new importance.  Knowledge of all kinds spread widely, not through just the printed word, but also the illustrations that were equally abundant. Standardization extended beyond style of print to methods of presentation. Montaigne was the first to use the essay to convey ideas to a wide group of people. In addition to the sharing of sophisticated ideas, there was an abundance of 'how to' books on topics as diverse as making a dress and conducting an inquisition. Alphabetizing, indexing, tables of contents and cataloguing became systematized. Page numbers, punctuation and page breaks soon followed. "Typographical fixity is a basic prerequisite for the rapid advancement of learning." The concepts of authorship and literary property rights came to the fore. In essence, a new method of duplicating handwriting began and it transformed intellectual life in western civilization. 

 The shift from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance was under way when the printing revolution began, thus the focus in this book is on how it was affected by this change. For the medievalists, antiquity was part of their continuum. After a century of printing, it stood out as a distinct historical era. The past was set at a'fixed distance'. A sustained recovery of  the antique heritage could only be accomplished by an abundance of printed materials. Print enabled the spread of ancient languages and scripts. It furthered the study of and the rediscovery of the past. The age of printing accompanied the Renaissance, rather than engendered it. "Under the aegis of the early presses, a classical revival of Italy was reoriented. Under the same auspices, German Protestantism was born. Lutheranism  was from the first the child of the printed book, and through this vehicle Luther was able to make exact, standardized and ineradicable impressions on the mind of Europe." Although no one knows how an academic disputation written in Latin became so widespread, his ideas were literally before the world in a matter of months. The medium also provided the  RC church with the means to respond to the Reformation and to systematize its own liturgy. The new printings of the Bible in multiple vernaculars coincided with the beginnings of nationalism. Because Protestantism spread in many languages, it would be forever divided and lacking Catholicism's unity. "Protestant doctrines harnessed a traditional religion to a new technology with the result that Western Christianity embarked... on a course of historical mutation. Perhaps the civil war in Christendom was not inevitable, but the advent of printing did, at the very least, rule out the prospect of perpetuating the status quo."

 Printing had decidedly different effects on scripture and science*. It was clearly fragmenting and disruptive on the former.  Whereas on the latter, it transcended linguistic divisions and brought unity to scientific knowledge. This book was published in the early 1980's. The author closes with a somewhat prescient thought. "Since the advent of movable type, an enhanced capacity to store and retrieve, preserve and transmit, has kept pace with an enhanced capacity to create, and destroy, innovate and outmode."

* The book also tackles what I consider the desultory topic of the explosion of science in the 16th century. The ideas of  Galileo, Copernicus, Kepler and Descartes  became widely known.

The Bird Boys, Sandlin - C+

                                                  This is a PI novel set in Beaumont, TX in the mid-70's and quite frankly, is not very entertaining.  Phelan sets up an office, hires Debra, recently out of prison, and together they track down a man's long lost brother. The client's a skunk. The brother not so much. They may get to be more than work colleagues. End of story.

The Story Of Silver: How The White Metal Shaped Modern America And The Modern World, Silber - B-

 To qualify as sterling, silver must be 92.5% pure. The standard establishing the pound sterling was announced in the reign of Elizabeth I. In the US, Hamilton established a bi-metallic currency system with a gold to silver ratio of 15:1. The system held until 1873 when Congress demonetized silver. That led to a contraction of the money supply which slowly deflated real estate values and agricultural prices.  William Jennings Bryan, known as the Great Commoner, became famous for making his "Cross of Gold" speech, espousing a return to bimetallism, at the 1896 Democratic Convention. However, the gold standard reigned supreme from the middle of the 19th century until the 1930's. In order to increase the money supply, FDR took the US off the gold standard in 1933. In addition to fixing gold at $35 per ounce, the US took steps to increase the value of silver. Since the Chinese yuan was fixed to silver, this led to a strengthening of the Chinese currency and a severe decline in trade, making the weakened country particularly susceptible to Japanese aggression. Decades later, the Kennedy administration freed silver from government involvement and let the white metal float at market prices. In 1965, all links between US currency and silver prices were severed, leading, at least in the minds of some, to the inflation of the 70's. With inflation perking up and silver the only hard metal hedge, speculation in the new commodities markets was likely. In the early 70's, Bunker and Herbert Hunt began buying contracts and accepting physical delivery of silver. Bunker Hunt was so paranoid about America confiscating his wealth that he shipped his silver to Switzerland. By 1979, inflation was in double digits, silver closed the year at an unbelievable $34.45 oz., and the Hunts were still taking delivery. The Comex Board stepped in in January reducing the number of futures contracts a person could own, thus beginning a slide in the price of silver. The  levered Hunt's were forced to mortgage all they had to avoid bankruptcy. Eight years later, a series of judgements forced them to file Chapter 11. A decade or so later, Warren Buffet made a long play on silver's role as an industrial commodity and made quite a bit of money.          I started this book knowing two things about silver. One was that William Jennings Bryan became famous for excoriating gold and supporting silver. The second was that someone in the Hunt family tried to 'corner' the silver market in the late 70's. That was the limit of my knowledge. And I suspect that is all anyone really needs to know. The author is a renowned financial historian, but most of this is a real  snoozer and I clearly never have, and never will, understand monetary policy or theory. 

Chestnut Man, Sveistrup - B+

                                 A special thanks to my friend, Wendell Erwin, for recommending one of the best thrillers I've read in awhile. This is a page-turning novel set in Copenhagen, featuring a brilliant serial killer. The characters are a social justice minister, a detective who wants out of the murder squad and a washed-up Europol cop sent back home for punishment. The twists and turns are non-stop, the pacing is perfect and the book is as good a police procedural/thriller as any out there.

A Long Night In Paris, Alfon - B

                                  This is a very interesting Israeli novel that has won a prestigious international fiction award. It features a team of semi-official Chinese commandos pitted against Israeli security personnel and Parisian police from one end of Paris to another. The action takes place over a 29 hour period that starts with the arrival of an El-Al flight from Jerusalem landing at  nine in the morning at Charles DeGaulle. As the Chinese are efficient and somewhat indiscriminate, the bodies begin to drop. It's the perfect read for quarantine time.

The Fragility Of Bodies, Olguin - B

                                  This is a fascinating Argentinian novel set in Buenos Aires and featuring a 30ish woman journalist. Veronica comes upon a potential story of kids hit by trains, which she researches and pursues. She starts with the train conductors, many of whom suffer severe emotional trauma after hitting someone. But, the real story is that kids from the ghetto are playing chicken on the tracks, for money and at the behest of gamblers. It's a 100 pesos if you time the jump right. You lose if jump early; you are dead if you're slow. She gets the story, but in a country like Argentina, justice is often partial. This is a different and fun read.

Trace Elements, Leon - B

                                  In this, the 29th novel in the series, Guido follows a hunch that a motorcycle fatality was not the accident that it appeared to be. As is always the case, an exploration of some aspect of life in Venice is center stage. Here it is corruption, venality and pollution, specifically of the water supply, in the Veneto. Donna Leon has lived in and been writing about Venice for decades and presumably, knows the area as well as any American could. She charts the decline of life in Italy, a country haunted by indifference and corruption, and the slow-motion destruction, by rising seas and tourism, of the city she loves. I long ago concluded that writing was the one area of creativity not diminished by age. The author is approaching 80, but continues to crank out mini-masterpieces.

The Deserter, De Mille - C +

                                 The author is a noted storyteller and knows how to tell a tale. My primary issue here is that I think it could have been told in half the time. The deserter refers to a Delta Force officer who did some really bad things in Afghanistan. He was set up by the CIA which is trying to terminate his command with extreme prejudice. The two CID officers sent to Venezuela to find him only know half the story. There's some good background information on the self-inflicted collapse of the country.

Black Sun, Matthews - B

                                  This is a very good novel set in the Urals in the fall of 1961. The Soviet Union's scientists were days away from exploding a thermonuclear game changer. Under the supervision of Andrei Sakharov, they actually dialed down the magnitude of the explosion by changing the tamper from uranium to lead. In the novel, the change of the tamper is the event behind a murder and an investigation by Moscow's Maj. Alexander Vasin from the KGB. I believe it is the first in a series. The author is a historian, who has apparently turned to writing a thriller and has done it very well.

Mengele: Unmasking "The Angel of Death", Marwell - B

 Mengele has "emerged as the embodiment of not only the Holocaust itself but also the failure of justice in the wake of the war." He was born into a caring, upper middle class, Catholic home in 1911. He studied medicine, anthropology and genetics at university. He came under the sway of a professor focusing on racial differentiations. He then studied at the University Institute for Hereditary Biology and Racial Hygiene. Josef Mengele received multiple degrees, and was a published scientist when he joined the NDSAP and SS in 1938. He married the following year. His first job in uniform was to select racially pure Germans among those seeking resettlement in recently acquired Polish lands.  He then spent two very difficult years on the eastern front as a doctor for a combat engineer's division. After a few months working on genetics in Berlin, he was off to Auschwitz in May, 1943, where he came into his own and prospered. Camp doctors had many responsibilities, including the infamous 'selection' process for the newly arrived. In his spare time, Mengele created his own institute for the study of certain cancers, eye color, twins, growth anomalies, and physical anomalies, and he provided specimens to the SS Medical Academy. He was obsessed with and studied gypsies. His infamous twin research was done in conjunction with the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute in Berlin. "Certain research required the simultaneous death and dissection of twins." Mengele shipped tissue samples, body parts and the eyes of twins to the Institute. His research was criminal and monstrous, but was part of the scientific establishment. His son, Rolf, was born in March, 1944 and he hoped that his wife and son would move to Auschwitz, but it never worked out. The camp was closed in January, 1945. He was in a Wehrmacht doctor's uniform at war's end, and when he surrendered to American forces. By August, he was released. With millions of prisoners and dwindling food supplies, the Allies were far from thorough. He would spend the next three years as a farmhand in Bavaria. His family spread the word that he was dead, no one knew otherwise, and he made his way in 1949 to Argentina. Argentina was sophisticated and safe.  His father's business in Germany helped him and allowed him to establish himself in Buenos Aires. In 1954, his wife divorced him. A year later, he visited Europe, saw old friends, and met with his brother's widow. Because she had inherited a piece of the business, Karl Mengele, for the strategic well-being of Mengele and Sons,  arranged a marriage between his son and his daughter-in-law. Things were going so well that Josef Mengele applied for and received a German passport in his own name. An anonymous tip in Germany led to an indictment and an extradition request, but by the time it reached Argentina, Mengele had relocated to Paraguay. After the Israelis captured Eichmann, he was on the run. His wife left for Europe and he moved to Brazil. One of the reasons Mengele could hide successfully for so long was his family's money. He received regular financial assistance from Germany. Little is known of his life in Brazil. Rolf visited him in 1977 and they discussed his role in the war but came to no conclusion. He was unrepentant to the end. He drowned on a Sao Palo beach in 1979.                     

Supreme City: How Jazz Age Manhattan Gave Birth To Modern America, Miller - B+

  This history is focused on the extraordinary growth of midtown Manhattan and its role in setting the urban standard for the country and indeed, the world. The city's peak came in the late 1920's and coincided with Gentlemen Jimmy Walker's terms as mayor. He was elected in 1925 with the vigorous support of Governor Al Smith. The charming Walker had dazzled as a State Senator. "New York was the capital of everything - America's financial, industrial, engineering, architectural, publishing, theatrical, musical, radio, advertising, opinion making, sports and fashion center." The city was larger than most states, had a budget bigger than many countries, and was flat-out corrupt and riddled with self-dealing and Tammany managed lawlessness. The 1920's roared in NY because of Prohibition, an absurd law that never had a chance of succeeding in America's big cities. By the time Walker became mayor, there were more speakeasies in NY than there had been saloons before the law. Prohibition was never seriously enforced in NY, and boot-legging was the source of endless crime, corruption and massive amounts of cash. Throughout Manhattan, night clubs sprang up. They were owned by gangsters and were a place where hoods, pols, entertainers and blue bloods all mixed. The mix of cash and the continuous violation of Prohibition's enforcement laws led to the first organizing of crime and the creation of NY's five families. The midtown of Jimmy Walker's NY had been transformed a decade and a half earlier by a construction project on the east side of the city.  The NY Central's rail lines ran north from grand Central Station like an open sore, utilizing coal burning locomotives, polluting, spewing ashes, and making noise. The train yards had eliminated the city's cross streets as far north as 57th St. The company's chief engineer proposed building a new, more efficient terminal, constructing an office building over it, and paving over Park Avenue. This was all made possible by using electric trains. The new Grand Central transformed the city. By the mid-20's, 43 million people per year would pass through the terminal. A massive building boom followed on the east side. Its apogee was the new Park Avenue which became the "most stupendous aggregation of multimillionaires the world has ever seen."  From 5th Avenue to Sutton Place, apartments for the wealthy were going up at a rapid pace. Up and down 5th Avenue below 57th St. and east along 42nd St. to the river, up went one skyscraper dedicated to commerce after another.                                                                                                         A young immigrant from Byelorussia, David Sarnoff, rose through the ranks of RCA and made it a NY based broadcasting powerhouse. It sold radios and produced content, leading to RCA becoming the fastest growing company of the era. RCA created NBC, the nation's first network. Sarnoff purchased the Victor phonograph company and began research into television. Sarnoff was a visionary, but one with rather pedestrian and bland programming ideas. Soon, Bill Paley's CBS network would challenge him and the two titans would go head to head for the next forty years. The focus at CBS was constantly changing entertainers and a vast marketing of every conceivable product. The 1920's also saw two engineering marvels that improved life in the city. The Port was severed by the Hudson River, thus leading to a trans-river ferry system that grew to the point where almost everything  shipped to and fro the American heartland crossed on a lighter. Thirty-five hundred rail cars were floated across the river daily. The states of NY and NJ created a port authority that built the longest tunnel, the Holland, and the longest bridge, the GW, in the world in an attempt to end the ferry system. The Lincoln Tunnel was added a decade later. A century later, there still is no commercial train line under the Hudson.                                    Everything about the city was bigger and better than anyone could imagine when, in the waning weeks of the decade the stock market collapsed, and with it, the whirlwind of prosperity the Roaring 20's had created. F. Scott Fitzgerald said the Jazz Age was brought "to a spectacular death in October, 1929." But, "no other decade in the life of the city was more exuberantly alive or enduringly creative." Thanks to Bill Barry for the recommendation. There is a never ending joy in reading about our 'city'.

The King's Evil, Taylor - B

                                  The series progresses, and Marwood's efforts have caught the eye of the King. The challenge is that  the issues are more complex and Marwood finds himself betwixt and between powerful courtiers, including the Duke of York, the King's brother and heir. Marwood is assigned to investigate a murder and stumbles upon paperwork that could possibly characterize the Duke as a bigamist and his children illegitimate. Great insights into the time period in a breezy, easy narrative.