Homegrown: Timothy McVeigh and the rise of Right-Wing Extremism, Toobin - B+

                     "The insurrection of January 6, and much else in the contemporary conservative movement, show how McVeigh's values, views, and tactics have endured and even flourished in the decades since his death. That makes the story of Timothy McVeigh and the Oklahoma City bombing not just a glimpse of the past but also a warning about the future."

                     McVeigh grew up in Lockport, near Buffalo, where "he had a troubled, but hardly extraordinary upbringing." In high school, he began his life-long consuming interest in guns. He obsessively collected them as he meandered through a broken home life, and the economic disenfranchisement of the Lockport region.  He began to read right-wing extremist tracts. In a famous white supremacist novel, the principal character drives a fertilizer based truck bomb into FBI headquarters. He was a racist who opposed immigration when he joined the army in 1988 at the age of 20. On his first day at Ft. Benning, he met Terry Nichols. Nichols had come of age in the midst of a farm crisis in Michigan and, like McVeigh "lost what they regarded as their birthright - opportunity, economic security, and cultural status."  McVeigh excelled as a soldier and loved the army. His action in Desert Storm was brief, but he did so well that he received a Bronze Star and was promoted to sergeant. His dreams shattered upon his return when he had to drop out of Special Forces training. Simply put, months in the desert eating C-rations and waiting in the heat had taken the edge off  his conditioning. He resigned six months later. He returned to Lockport and went to work for Burns Security as a supervisor. He spent a lot of time in his car and became further radicalized listening to Rush Limbaugh. After the election of Bill Clinton, he walked away from his middle class life. He gathered his guns and shortwave radio and drove off.

               He drove aimlessly around the country from gun show to gun show while sleeping in his car. He closely followed the siege of the Branch Davidian's compound and was quite shaken by the outcome in Waco. Indeed, it became his obsession. He was convinced the Clinton's were coming for his guns. He and Nichols decided they needed to do something, to take the offensive. They began to plan their bomb in the summer of 1993.  Their goal was to set it off on April 19, 1995, the second anniversary of the Waco siege. They assembled the materials through a combination of purchase and theft. They selected the Murrah building in Oklahoma City because of its proximity to the street.  They mixed the bomb in Kansas and Nichols drove away - McVeigh was on his own. On the night of the 18th, he slept in the rented Ryder truck in a MacDonald's parking lot about 40 miles north of OKC. He parked the truck in front of the Murrah building, lit the fuse, and walked away.  

             The bomb exploded at 9:02 AM. The front third of the six story building collapsed, killing 163. Ninety minutes after the bombing, McVeigh was pulled over by an Oklahoma trooper for driving a car without a plate, and was arrested after the officer noticed a firearm. Two days later, he was in FBI custody. Nichols was arrested the following day. McVeigh happily told anyone who listened that he was responsible for the bombing. The prosecution by the DOJ was narrow, i.e. focused on McVeigh and Nichols. Bill Clinton would have preferred a tie in to "the poisonous rhetoric of Rush Limbaugh, Newt Gingrich, and the right-wing zealotry machine." The two men were indicted in August. A major part of the case came from Mike and Lori Fortier, stoner friends who knew about the plot and turned state's evidence. Because of concern about objectivity in Oklahoma, the case was moved to Denver and overseen by Judge Richard Matsch. He opted for separate trials for the two men. McVeigh's trial began in April, 1997. The government presented an open and shut case proving McVeigh committed the crime. The defense presented a weak case of reasonable doubt. After a few days of deliberations, the jury convicted McVeigh. In the penalty phase, the government presented three days of heart-wrenching testimony from the victim's families. To no avail, the defense tried to paint McVeigh as the ideal soldier. He was sentenced to be executed. Nichols was convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment.  McVeigh was executed on June 11, 2001.

            McVeigh had wished to start a rebellion and to an extent he did. He inspired militias around the country to act. After 9/11, the right tried to deflect the focus away from themselves and onto foreigners. There was an explosive growth in fanatical rhetoric when Obama became president, much of it fanned by Fox News and the Republican establishment. There were constant acts of white supremacist and anti-government violence throughout Obama's eight years. And matters severely deteriorated under Trump, who touted many of the extreme violent tropes of the far right. The Biden administration is working to label those who deem themselves to be patriots as the traitors they are.

          In so many ways, this is a brilliant book. The first half is as fine as anything I've ever read. I believe the author stumbles with his attempt to connect McVeigh to January 6th. It is my observation that in the long road from the John Birch Society to the MAGA movement, McVeigh was a bit player, not a leader.

              

The Peking Express: The Bandits Who Stole A Train, Stunned The West, And Broke The Republic Of China, Zimmerman - B

                      In the dozen years after its 1911 revolution, China fell into chaos as bandits and warlords battled and the government of the Republic of China sat helplessly in Peking. In 1923, a newly launched express train passed through bandit territory. "In early May, the inevitable happened - an attack on the Peking Express, a hostage situation, and a diplomatic crisis that captured the attention of the globe - it not only changed the lives of those caught up in the affair; it also changed China and its relationship with the rest of the world. This is that story." 

                    On May 5th, the fully loaded train pulled out of Shanghai. In Shantung Province, 25 year old Sun Mei-yao and his band were waiting.  Sun was bright, ambitious, and hoping to free the countryside from the brutality of the warlords. In the early hours of the next day, the train derailed, and 1,000 men attacked. They robbed the passengers, and then took over one hundred hostages. Twenty-eight were foreigners, including Lucy Aldrich, daughter of a late U.S. Senator and sister-in-law of John D. Rockefeller, Jr. They began to walk into the mountains. Most were in their nightclothes and many were barefoot. Government troops were soon in hot pursuit. The bandits split the hostages up and continued to try and march away from the government's soldiers. As word of the kidnapping spread, various western governments made demands on the Chinese government. Aldrich escaped when the bandits grew weary of trying to move the overweight older woman along.  

                A German priest was the first to speak to Sun about his demands. He did not want money, just the removal of warlords from the province. He threatened to kill the hostages. An American diplomat made the next approach. Frustrated by the lack of progress, Sun moved the hostages further away from the railway line. The central government was unable to exert any control over the warlords, who continued to threaten and surround the bandits. Sun sent an American newspaperman and two of his colleagues down the mountain to negotiate with the authorities. Sun received what he wanted, which was the dismissal of the local warlord, acceptance of his band into the army, along with a month's pay and a uniform for each man. On June 8, the hostages were released.

              The national government was humiliated and a coup led to an immediate change. At years end, those that Sun had humiliated sought and achieved their revenge. Sun's bodyguards were arrested and shot. He was beheaded. The chaos and violence in the countryside was ended when Chiang Kai-shek bought stability to the country in 1928. 

Zero Days, Ware - B+

                    The characterization 'page turner' isn't appropriate. Pages on fire might fit better. Jac Cross and her husband, Gabe, have a business testing companies' security systems. After a long night out, Jac returns home to find Gabe murdered. The next day, when she realizes she is a suspect, she hightails it off grid. With only a few dollars from her sister and some help from a friend, she is able to sort out that who might be behind the murder. Someone very close to them who was involved with some scary folks from the dark web had killed Gabe. The book trails off a bit toward the end, but all in all is a blast of a thriller.

To Kill A Troubadour, Walker - B+

                     This is another fine addition to the Bruno, Chief of Police series set in fictional St. Denis in the south of France. Because the author is an historian turned novelist, the books often tell an underlying story about the region. The background here concerns the medieval Occitan language, and the interrelationship between Spain and this section of France.  The story involves a group in the region that plays ancient instruments and sings songs from the distant past. Because they recently released a song about Catalan independence, they have attracted the attention of right-wing Spanish nationalists. The security forces orchestrate a very thorough and highly professional response in order to protect the troubadours and stop the would be assassin. At the national level, the French ascertain that Russia is behind the planned attack, which of course Bruno stops at the last minute. Excellent.

Sell Us The Rope, May - B+

                      This fascinating novel is an imagining of the famous 1907 Russian Labour Congress  held in London and attended by Lenin, Stalin, Trotsky, Litvinov, Gorky, Rosa Luxemburg and Elli Vuokko, along with hundreds of other socialists. Vuokko is a teenage Finn of vast talents and good looks, who catches the eye of the Georgian known as Koba. Luxemburg encourages Elli to have a fling with the brooding Stalin, who eyes all around him with great suspicion. Justifiably so, as Lenin orchestrates a tricky entrapment to link Stalin to the Okhrana, which Stalin sees before he is caught. 

                     The background insights into Stalin and Luxembourg are enlightening. The vivid descriptions of London's poverty, hopelessness, congestion and despair are on par with Dickens. Stalin's alleged connection to the Okhrana is based on a very slim reed that has never been confirmed in over a century. As we know, Koba ruled the USSR in a three decade reign of terror and is considered one of history's great monsters. The two women did not last long in Europe's caldron at the end of WWI. Vuokko was murdered by White Guards in Finland's 1918 Civil War. Luxembourg was murdered by a paramilitary unit in Berlin in 1919.

Operation Oskar, Herzberg - B

                 While his superiors are trying to decide if Lt. Reim has any responsibility for his boss's death, he is assigned to a really unpleasant undercover operation. He goes to work in the garbage dump where West Berlin drivers take capitalism's refuse and provide the east with hard currency. There's bit of black market activity, but not enough to merit a deep dive by the Stasi. Nonetheless, Reim's boss, Maj. Blecher is interested and wishes to pursue the investigation. Unfortunately for Blecher, Oskar is working for the KGB and Blecher's command is terminated with extreme prejudice. These books aren't very good, but they are written by a German who actually worked as an archivist for the Stasi, depict Berlin with extraordinary specificity, and set forth the ludicrousness of the paranoia that ruled East Germany with a deft touch.

Stasi Vice, Hertzberg - B

                     Lt. Reim is tasked by his superior to ascertain the whereabouts of Lutz Hofmann, the husband of Sylvie, the woman he is having an affair with. Reim very quickly learns that his boss, Maj. Frohlich, and Sylvie killed Hoffman. Further digging on Reim's part reveals that Frohlich has a very sophisticated plan to head west with Sylvie, and has already put together a paperwork trail that would pin Reim as the person who facilitated their exit. Reim is saved from the Stasi's vengeance when his estranged wife shoots Frohlich, and strolls across to West Berlin with Sylvie. The story is bit preposterous, but it is the first in a series set in East Berlin, and hey - they just don't do the Cold War as well as they used to.

The Aftermath: The Last Days Of The Baby Boom And The Future Of Power In America, Bump - B

                     A nation of 140 million saw 76 million births over a nineteen year period beginning in 1946. The boomers dominated their era, and are now fading from the scene. This book explores the cultural, economic, and political consequences of the millennials replacing them. The post-war boom led to massive economic changes. In the field of education, for example, millions of teachers and hundreds of thousands of classrooms alone were needed around the country. Size begets power. Today, the boomers who constitute 29% of the population hold 56% of the seats in Congress, and 70% of the nation's wealth. The end though is in sight. The Census Dept. calculates that there will be only 2.5 million boomers left in 2060, a mere 1% of the population. The fact that boomers are mostly white and  conservative points to a future whose political inclinations will change. The younger generation is considerably less white. Non-Hispanic whites are 70% of boomers and 55% of millennials. Because of the xenophobic immigration laws that existed from 1924 to 1965, boomers are less likely to be immigrants or the children of immigrants. Millennials tend to be better educated and boomers more religious.

                     It is in the arena of politics that we are seeing the greatest difference in the generations. Trump was elected by older whites without college degrees, who  focused on having lost their status in America. Immigrants, Blacks, Hispanics and women are cutting the line, leaving a minority that is fighting vigorously to maintain its position. Theirs is a "nativist reaction" similar to so many instances in our national past. Shockingly, MAGA supporters believe that white people are discriminated against. 

                     Culturally, the boomers created the modern film and music industry. Every aspect of the boomer's life growing up was inextricably linked to the emergence of rock'n'roll. They are still identified with it and, surprisingly, performers like the Beatles, Stones, and Jimi Hendrix still resonate with the millennials. However, the entire distribution system of both films and music have changed and has been fully adopted by today's younger generation. Financially, the boomers will eventually transfer over $70 trillion to their heirs. They already are  gifting significant assets to their Gen X and millennial offspring. There is a fly in the ointment though, and it is that the wealth is unequally held and it is the pampered children of the wealthy who will receive most of these bequests. As many, many younger people struggle with college debts, and the Social Security/Medicare financial structure requires either more workers or more taxes, the boomer wealth transfer may not be a panacea for the millennials. Politically, America has functioned under a minority rule system for decades, and is now faced with the possibility of a right-wing takeover. However, the threat is fleeting because the millennials are overwhelmingly opposed to the Trump/Republican agenda.

                    "What we can say with the most certainty is that the America into which the baby boomers were born is long gone and that the America they built is crumbling. The uncertainty is whether that America is replaced by ashes, once again, a phoenix." Some interesting points along the way, but not worth the effort.

The Good Turn, McTieran - B+

                      This is the third book in this series featuring Garda Detective Sergeant Cormac Reilly in Galway. When his superior officer, Superintendent  Murphy,  fails to support him and his team while they are looking for a kidnapped child, Reilly begins to have his suspicions. Murphy uses all of the officers under his command to work on a successful interdiction of drug traffickers. Reilly checks around and finds that he is not the only one suspicious about possible collaboration between the McGrath gang and the Garda. Interpol and Internal Affairs are also looking at the matter. They set up a sting operation that totally backfires, and Murphy assures Reilly that he'll be soon out of work. By a pure stroke of luck, Reilly stumbles upon video proof that will prove the connection between Murphy and the McGrath's. The tables are turned, Murphy is off to jail, and we'll wait for the next book to see how Reilly is doing. Very well done. 

Down The River Unto The Sea, Mosley - B

                      This novel is set in Brooklyn and Manhattan and features Joe King Oliver, a PI. Joe was framed and forced off the NYPD a decade before and still seethes with anger about how he was treated. A client asks him to look into the conviction of a man who had killed the two cops that Joe was investigating when his life fell apart. He sees that there is a chance to solve his case while working on the new one. Plot, sub-plots and a vast assortment of evildoers send Joe all around the city in his pursuit of justice. Joe learns that he'll never be able to clear his name, but he does free an innocent man from custody and is well compensated for his efforts.

War And Conflict In The Middle Ages: A Global Perspective, Morillo - Inc.

                      The topic is introduced by a review of three battles from the era. Al-Qadasiyyah in 638 took place in southern Iraq when Bedouin Arabs, newly Muslim, attacked a Persian army. "The Arab Islamic army saw itself as representing an egalitarian society without hereditary rulers; the Persian army saw itself as representing a hierarchical society... and its supporting aristocratic elite." The Arabs had no military history and the Persians a thousand years of success. The Persians outnumbered the Arabs by probably 3:1. The Arab archers wore them down and defeated them in a days long battle. Within four years, the new religion conquered the entire empire. At Xiangyang, the Mongols besieged a Chinese city during the years 1268-1273. The Chinese empire was the wealthiest, most powerful, and innovative entity on the planet. The Mongols were masters of offensive dexterity. It "was a meeting of giants..." The Mongols engaged in an unusual war of attrition against the fortified city. They built forts around the Xiangyang and isolated it. Kublai Khan accepted the city's surrender and proceeded to conquer the entire empire in three years. China was too big though, and within a century, the Mongols were replaced. Morat was fought on June 22, 1476 by Charles the Bold of Burgundy and the Swiss Confederation. Charles' army was international, combat effective, had all types of arms, and laid siege to the city. The almost-democratic Swiss infantry pikemen surprised them, forced them into retreat, and killed 10,000 with minimal casualties on their part. Within a year, Charles was dead and Burgundy no longer an independent entity. "Armed conflict was, ultimately, a central form of communication and negotiation through which medieval people defined themselves and their world..." War and conflict were "a process...that contributed to the formation of a global Middle Ages."

                      Physical constraints imposed "universal patterns on the conduct of war and conflict." War was restricted "to geographic areas within striking distance of grain-growing communities." Similarly, societies were organized around the elites ability to control the food supply and the broader based society. It was the organized states that were able to fight wars.

                      To some extent this is fascinating and intriguing, but it is too academic for me.

The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny, and Murder, Grann - A*

                      In 1740, in the midst of a war with Spain, England sent 5 ships around the Horn to plunder Spanish galleons in pursuit of silver.  The HMS Wager was a converted East Indiaman and packed with 250 men, twice its normal complement. The ship's captain was George Murray, and she "had an unusual number of unwilling and troublesome crewmen..."  After two months and in the mid-Atlantic, the fleet was struck by typhus and 65 members of the squadron were interred at sea. Another 80 were buried at St. Catherine's, Brazil. David Cheap took over as captain when Murray was transferred to replace a captain who had died. The deceased captain  predicted that the expedition "would end in poverty, vermin, famine, death and destruction." To round the Cape, a ship passing through Drake's Passage sails through the strongest currents in the world's oceans.  The winds are ferocious, the seas are shallow, and the waves monstrously high. The area is almost always shrouded in fog. Scurvy struck while they were rounding the Cape.  Two of the ships suffered fifty-percent casualties. Three, including the Wager, lost sails and masts. Eventually, the winds scattered the squadron and the Wager was alone. She sailed north and foundered on the rocks off an island off the South American coast. One-hundred and forty-five men made it ashore, and discovered they were on an island with little food and shelter. They used the remnants of the ship to build shelters, and the wild celery they found cured them of scurvy. But they were quickly running low on provisions and winter was approaching. Discipline and order deteriorated, and Capt. Cheap began to have thieves flogged and abandoned on an off-shore island. Cheap then shot a drunk threatening the peace of the compound. The ship's carpenter began to lengthen, widen, and rebuild the ship's longboat, thus leading to a revival of the company's spirits. Soon, though there was a division amongst the men. Cheap wanted to head north and attack the Spanish. A contingent led by the ship's gunner, John Bulkeley, wanted to try for Brazil via the Straits of Magellan. As both sides dithered, the survivors dropped below 100. In October, 1741, 71 men squeezed into 2 boats and left the island, which they had christened Wager. Cheap was one of the 20 men left behind. Two weeks into their sail, the cutter with only one man aboard slipped under the waves. Eleven men asked to be left on a shore they passed and swam away. They were never seen again. Bulkeley and his men entered the Straits of Magellan. Cheap with two boats and 18 men headed for the Chilean coast. After months of trying, they returned to Wager Island. Bulkeley navigated his way through the Straits and turned north in the Atlantic. A total of 29 men stumbled into the town of Rio Grande in southern Brazil eight months after the Wager had sunk. When Bulkeley returned to England, the Admiralty decided to wait and see if Cheap survived before passing judgement on all that had happened. Bulkeley and the ship's carpenter, Cummins, published a journal that was widely read, and garnered them support from the public. Meanwhile off the coast of the Philippines, the only surviving ship of the squadron, the Centurion, chased down a Spanish treasure ship, Our Lady of Covadonga. After 90 minutes of intense battle, the Spaniards struck their flag. As it turned out, the Covadonga was the richest prize England ever took at sea. A year later, Adm. George Anson returned home to the acclaim of the nation. Ordinary seaman received 300 pounds, twenty years of wages. Anson received ninety thousand, the equivalent of 20 million today. Two years later, Cheap arrived in Dover. He was accompanied by a marine lieutenant, and a midshipman, John Byron, second son of a Lord, and grandfather of the famous poet. The three men had been captured and imprisoned by the Spanish. They were paroled in Chile and allowed to go home when hostilities ended between the two countries. The Admiralty called for a court martial and summoned all of the Wager's survivors to appear. Bulkeley and three others were imprisoned. The Admiralty, however, had no desire to air the facts of the Wager's story in public, and simply concluded that no officer was at fault for the ship's foundering. 

                    Capt. Cheap was assigned another command and performed well capturing a Spanish ship loaded with silver. Bulkeley went to America and faded from history.  John Byron was a career navy man who eventually became a Vice-Admiral. Later in life, he wrote a narrative condemning Cheap's leadership. George Anson was for decades the most famous and successful man in the Royal Navy. Wager Island remains a place of desolation battered by waves and wind. A special thanks to David Gutowski for urging me to read this truly excellent book.

The Collector, DaSilva - B

                      Gabriel has been happily retired for six months, and living in Venice, where he works as a fine art restorer. He is approached by the Carabinieri and asked to help find a stolen Vermeer. As he lives in Italy at the government's sufferance, he obliges. He traces the painting and the theft to a woman in Denmark, Ingrid Johansen. However, as he is talking to her, a Moscow-based hitman makes an attempt on her life, and Gabriel realizes that there is more here than simple theft. He returns to King Saul Boulevard, ascertains that there is a tie in to South Africa's old nuclear program and a wealthy Dane with connections to Moscow. He puts his old team back together and heads back to Copenhagen. They confront the Dane, Magnus Larsen, who acknowledges that he is completely beholden to the Russians, who caught him in a honey trap 20 years ago. After consulting with Langley, Gabriel decides to use Larsen and Johansen to grab a piece of critical intelligence on Russia's plans to use a false flag operation in Ukraine to justify the use of tactical nukes. They pull it off, but wind up in a shoot out at the Finnish border. Another Allon masterpiece.

The Missing American, Quartey - B

                     This novel is set in Accra, Ghana, and features Emma Djan, a private investigator. She and her boss are hired by a young American to find his dad.  Gordon Tilson had been in Ghana decades before in the Peace Corps, and returned to America with his Ghanian bride. In a lonely state of mind after his wife's death, he falls for a Ghanian woman on line. When he goes to Accra, he ascertains that he has been scammed. Trying to find out who is behind it proves incredibly frustrating, as the police and other government officials are all part of the corruption behind on-line scamming. He seeks out to find those who had tricked him and disappears from sight. A month later, two fishermen pull his body from the Volta River. As the detective agency was hired to find Gordon, the case is over, but Emma can't let go. She continues looking into the 'sakawa boys' running the con jobs until she is threatened by the mob, and they eventually make an attempt on her life. A call placed to the police saves her life. Emma helps bring to justice the higher ups who support the criminal system. This is a very interesting tale about a place that is overwhelmed by corruption.

A Godly Hero: The Life Of William Jennings Bryan, Kazin -B

                     The man known as "The Great Commoner" believed in Jesus, and Thomas Jefferson. The Sage of Monticello was admired because of his belief in the wisdom of the people, and his advocacy of equal rights. Indeed, the only book Bryan believed to be more important than the Jefferson Cyclopedia was the Bible. "Bryan was the first leader of a major party to argue for permanently expanding the power of the federal government to serve the welfare of ordinary Americans...He preached that the national state should counter the overweening power of banks and industrial corporations by legalizing strikes, subsidizing farmers, taxing the rich, banning private campaign spending, and outlawing the liquor trust." His strict populist morality based on the scriptures has been rejected since his 1925 death.

                   He was born in 1860 in Salem, Illinois, the son of a successful lawyer. His father Silas was prominent member of the local Democratic Party. He graduated from Whipple Academy and Illinois College. He honed the oratorical skills that would later make him famous. He graduated from Union Law School in Chicago and returned home to Jacksonville, IL to practice. He married Mary Baird who was an invaluable colleague for the rest of his life. In 1887, the young couple moved to Lincoln, Nebraska. His skillful speechmaking on behalf of the Democratic ticket in 1888 attracted the approval of the party. He ran for Congress in 1890. The GOP was facing an agrarian revolt, and that propelled Bryan to victory. He quickly garnered attention and a sterling reputation for his support of tariff reform and bimetallism. In 1894, he failed to obtain Nebraska's senate seat, but rather became the populist Democrats preferred candidate for president.  As an unknown from a state that had never voted Democratic, he had a mountain to climb to achieve the nomination. He toured the country for sixteen months speaking against the gold standard. He arrived at the Chicago convention as a long shot. Bryan is considered one of the greatest orators in US history, and his convention speech was one of his best. His closing sentence brought down the house, and has endured in the history texts for well over a century. "You shall not press down upon the  brow of labor this crown of thorns, you shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of gold." His speech was twenty minutes; the resulting cheers lasted forty. He was nominated on the fifth ballot. He won the nomination of the populist People's Party, but failed to generate any interest in the big cities of the north and east. He lost to McKinley, but came tantalizingly close.

                  Bryan was a moral crusader whose ideas attracted his faithful on a very personal level. His popularity was such that he made a living traveling around the country speaking to his people. Although he supported the invasion of Cuba, he vigorously opposed the annexation of the Philippines. Opposition to the imperial war of conquest in the Pacific was the only issue that seemed to have any traction as 1900 approached. The economy was strong and the silver issue had lost its impact.  Once again, the GOP outspent the Democrats by a 10:1 ratio, and McKinley won convincingly. "Bryan spent the next four years elaborating his self-image as the independent conscience of moral, insurgent white Americans." He promoted his weekly newspaper 'The Commoner.' In Washington, Roosevelt was now governing aggressively and pursued a progressive agenda that co-opted some of Bryan's signature themes. And at the convention, the conservatives nominated Alton Parker of NY. TR crushed him in November. Bryan headed back on the road and toured the country speaking to the assembled believers at Chautaquas in every state. He worked diligently to obtain the next nomination and had it locked up long before the convention. TR had renounced a third term, and recommended William Taft as his successor. He made labor reform his theme, and received the support of the AFL. The Democrats hope was that this would give him a chance in the big states of the north and midwest. Taft simply promised to continue TR's policies and won decisively.

                Retired from electoral politics, he turned to his new role as "moral scourge" of the nation. Notwithstanding the fact that Prohibition was driven by Republicans, it was also a core belief of rural Protestants, and Bryan supported it too. In 1912, he watched as Wilson won the White House because TR's insurgency tore apart the GOP. His support for Wilson led to his taking up the reins at the State Dept. However, his"tenure in the highest appointive office in the land, which presented  a great opportunity to do good in the world, instead began his political decline." He was unpopular with the eastern establishment press, which, among other things, derided his choice of grape juice and water as the preferred libations for events he hosted. His pacifist beliefs led him to criticize the war in Europe and to support a strict US neutrality. However, American businesses were selling vast amounts of goods to the Allies, Wall Street was lending them money and Wilson was appalled by Germany's conduct. Wilson condemned Germany for the sinking of the Lusitania without addressing the UK's embargo of the continent, which Bryan felt was equally to blame for the violence on the high seas. He resigned in June, 1915.

               The following year, he campaigned for Wilson's re-election and is believed to have helped to put him over the top in a very close election. After the US entry into the war, he offered his support to the president, and later spoke for the ratification of the Versailles Treaty. In the new decade, the aging and ailing orator returned to the road, preaching and traveling and was once again the focus of far-reaching press coverage. He supported women's suffrage and urged legislation to eliminate all gender discrimination. He feared the impact of Darwinism on the young would lead to immorality, and began to speak against evolution. The final act of his long career was the Scopes Trial in Dayton, TN in 1925. Local boosters drummed up the trial to support tourism, but it soon grew to be an international event, with both sides putting intellectual giants on a collision course. He was confused by Darrow, and ridiculed in the northern press. He died a few days after the trial's conclusion.

               History has not been kind to Bryan. Noted Baltimore newspaperman H. L. Mencken savaged him during the trial and after his death. Historian Richard Hofstadter echoed his distaste a generation later, and those opinions dominated the history books. They all seem to have forgotten he drew millions and millions of ordinary people to a populist cause and forever changed the way politicians campaign for higher office. I'm intrigued by his valiant efforts on behalf of the poor, and put off by his overly religious preaching. An intriguing man in a fascinating time, and a very boring book.

                    

All The Sinners Bleed, Cosby - B+

                      This near-perfect novel features Sheriff Titus Crown, a Black man who returns to Charon County after an education at UVA and Columbia, and a decade in the FBI. The county on the Virginia coast is majority Black, but still living in the throes of its white supremacist past. Everywhere Titus turns, he runs up against the inherent prejudices of the south. His department is called out for a shooting at the local high school. There are two casualties, a beloved white teacher who had been there for thirty years and the troubled younger man of color who shot him. An examination of their phones and computers show that the two had been involved for over a decade in a pedophile murder ring that shocks Titus to the bone. The evidence reveals that there was a third man, outfitted in a wolf mask, also involved. The department begins the hunt for victims and the third murderer. As they pursue the killer, he strikes back at anyone who may know who he is and at people close to Titus. The finale is a nail biter, but one with a good ending. This book is a brilliant treatise on being a Black man in the south. Highly recommended.

Dead Man's Wake, Doiron - B+

                     Mike and Stacey's engagement party at his stepfather's house on an exclusive lake in Maine is interrupted by a loud crash out on the water. Mike heads for the scene where he dives into the lake and locates a corpse that is soon identified as Kip Whitcomb. Various police agencies are soon involved and the next morning they raise the body of the younger woman he had been skinny-dippping with. Gina Randazza had been strangled. Immediate suspicion fell on Gina's husband, but he had a bona-fide alibi. Mike finds the boat that killed Whitcomb, but the two recent college grads who were in it point to each other as the driver. However,  the accident didn't kill Whitcomb, as he was already dead when the boat hit him, and he certainly didn't kill Gina.  The murderer is caught by Mike after he sabotaged of a Cessna  Mike was flying in with Stacey.  I came upon this series a year-and-a-half ago and find it gets better with age.

 

The Wintering Place, McCarthy - B+

                      We pick up the story from "Wolves of Eden" with Tom and Sara leaving Ft. Phil Kearney just after the Fetterman Massacre, and finding a wounded Michael on the battlefield. They collect him and head west. As deserters, they know the army will punish them if they are ever found. A winter storm traps them while Michael is slowly recovering. They reluctantly share their campfire with two trappers. The trappers are evil men and they manage to kill the leader before they are killed. His quiet companion, Dillard, gets away. Starving, freezing, and battling the elements, the three of them settle down when they realize Tom has frostbitten toes. Michael cuts off two of his brother's toes while Sara holds him through the pain. They use the trapper's pelts to trade with two young Crow warriors for food, tobacco, and a horse. They travel two days west again to trade with some white men and then return to their cave camp. As the spring of 1867 approaches in Montana Territory, they leave their winter camp as the nearby river rises and move on with a peaceful prospector, Whitsable, to where he regularly pans for gold. They enjoy the work, the tobacco, whiskey, and all of the food that Sara prepares. By the standard of their lives, it's almost idyllic. Tom and Whitsable head to a trading post where they see Dillard. Dillard gets a few men to help him attack Tom, but they are drunk and Tom had  spent four years fighting in the war. He kills them all and hightails it out of town. The local vigilantes pull Whitsable from his bed and dispatch him. Tom, Michael and Sara leave their camp and head west again. They are now wanted for desertion and murder.

                     These two books, along with 'Ridgeline' and 'The Revenant' are four exceptional westerns that relate the sheer randomness of life on the plains in the 19th century. Great stories.

Black Ball: Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Spencer Haywood, and the Generation That Saved The Soul of the NBA, Runstedtler - D

                     The NBA was founded in 1949. It "controlled" the slow integration of Black players into the league. Into the 60's, it remained a white league with a growing Black labor force. As players of color advocated for greater freedom and rights, America's tilt to 'law and order' created an environment that blamed Black athletes for violence and drug usage in the league, leading to the downward spiral of the league's popularity in the late 1970's. The author, a black scholar and woman, posits that those players of the 70's actually set the groundwork for the massive popularity that followed.

                    The initial crack in the NBA's dominance of its workforce came when Connie Hawkins filed the first anti-trust suit ever against an American sports league. His suit coincided with the establishment of the ABA, which threatened the league by poaching one of its biggest stars, Rick Barry. The NBA offered Hawkins a generous settlement in 1969. That same year, Spencer Haywood left after two years of college and joined the ABA's Denver Rockets as a nineteen year old rookie. In his first season, he won both Rookie of the Year and MVP. He jumped to the Sonics in the NBA because their owner flouted the 'four year rule.' Litigation followed, the courts struck down the rule, and Heywood went on to play for Seattle.  Lew Alcindor "was unapologetically Black" and did not seek the approval of the league's white writers and fan base. He changed his religion and his name, becoming the second famous Black athlete to do so. Although Kareem played a traditional game, players like Earl Monroe and Julius Erving were revolutionizing basketball by bringing "playground moves" to the court. The free flowing ABA became known as a "Black league." The 1970's were a time of white fans' disapproval of Blacks, disappointment in Black coaches' intellects, and systemic racism that saw the Commissioner's request to be succeeded by his Black colleague dismissed by the owners. Kermit Washington's historic punch that shattered Rudy Tomjanovich's face was symptomatic of the league's degeneracy. A bad tv contract with CBS, the former ABA teams struggling with the NBA's entry fee after the merger, a raft of much younger players, and a perception of rampant drug use really hurt the leagues popularity in the later part of the decade. Cocaine use was highlighted by Bernard King's multiple arrests and the Spencer Haywood's dismissal from the league.

                  The NBA's legendary turnaround began with Bird and Magic, changes in the CBA that allowed the commissioner more authority to discipline players, and the addition of a salary cap. Revenue sharing with the players and drug testing became part of the league. With David Stern, the league now had a very savvy salesman at the top. Michael Jordan, along with Nike, became the epitome of Black athleticism and coolness.

                I found the narrative disjointed and not at all convincing. There is no mention of the fact that the 1977, 1978, and 1979 champs were from small market teams without a national following. When discussing Larry Bird's role as the the great white hope, the author says Boston's fans were reminded of and longed for the good old days. The good old days were 11 titles because of one of the most outspoken Black men in American sports history. Ours was, and is, a society struggling with race, but the NBA I remember adored Bill Russell. The New York I came of age in placed the captain, Willis Reed, on a permanent pedestal and glorified Clyde Frazier. Yes, many sportswriters were racist fools focusing on people's Afros, but many, many more loved the high-flying Dr. J. The owners were penny-pinching zealots, but it wasn't a matter of race. A cursory review of the history of the MLB and NFL shows rampant mean-spirited, often vicious labor practices when all of the athletes were white ethnic immigrants and poor farm boys. Case dismissed.

              

Summer For The Gods: The Scopes Trial and America's Continuing Debate over Science and Religion, Larson - B+

                      In 1913, an Englishman discovered the fossilized remains of 'Piltdown Man,' who many believed was the 'missing link' confirming Darwin's theory of evolution. As the evidence in favor of evolution accumulated, there was a a fundamentalist backlash in the US.  Science and religion had clashed throughout the second half of the 19th century as many thought that "Darwin's denial of design in nature was virtually the denial of God." As more Americans attended high school, particularly in the south, evolution as discussed in the textbook 'Civil Biology' ran up against the anti-evolution crusaders.  Led by William Jennings Bryan, many Protestants moved militantly to  the right. The Great Commoner toured the country honing his 'Menace of Darwinism' speech.  "In his crusade to rally people against teaching evolution, Bryan was nearly omnipresent." Tennessee was the first state to pass an anti-evolution statute in the spring of 1925. The ACLU immediately announced it would defend any teacher prosecuted in the state. The small town of Dayton was looking for some publicity and business, and hatched the idea of being the locale for the test case of the new law. John Scopes, who taught math and physics, and was substituting for the regular biology teacher agreed to be the defendant in the state's prosecution. In essence, one of the most famous trials in American history was created by boosters looking to promote their small town. Bryan, who hadn't practiced law in decades, volunteered to prosecute Scopes. Clarence Darrow, the country's best-known defense counsel, volunteered to defend Scopes. What had started as a narrow case about constitutionality and a legislature's right to control schools,  would now be a nationally followed circus placing religion in a battle with anti-religion. It was now a bible-thumping orator versus an agnostic who believed religion to be the root of much evil. Educators across the north criticized the law, and both Albert Einstein and George Bernard Shaw weighed in from Europe. The trial began July 10th. 

                    With temperatures approaching 100 degrees, Judge John Raulston allowed all to dispense with coats and ties. After a very long opening prayer, the jury was selected in a few hours. Darrow later said that "it was obvious after a few rounds that the jury would be unanimously hot for Genesis." The next three days were spent on the defense's motion to dismiss.  Darrow's argument was that the statute was unconstitutional in that it established a particular religious viewpoint and the Tennessee constitution assured that people "could worship according to their own conscience." The motion was denied. The prosecution's case rested after four students testified that Scopes used the offending 'Civil Biology' textbook to teach evolution. Days were spent debating the prosecution's motion to exclude defense's expert testimony, which was intended to show that evolution and religion were not mutually exclusive. Bryan dueled Dudley Malone of New York in an absolutely brilliant debate which garnered nationwide attention. Succumbing to political pressure, the judge denied the defense's witnesses the opportunity to testify. Darrow called Bryan as an expert on the Bible as his only witness. The ensuing examination was a debate between the two giants with Darrow trying to catch Bryan on his literal reading of the Bible. Darrow peppered him about Jonah and the whale, Cain's wife, and Joshua causing the sun to stand still. Darrow got the better of Bryan, but to no avail. Raulston ordered that Bryan's testimony be struck. Darrow cynically suggested the court instruct the jury to find the defendant guilty, rested his case and waived closing arguments. Scopes was found guilty and the judge assessed a $100 fine.

                     As Bryan never had the chance to present his closing argument, he stayed in Dayton fine-tuning his 15,000 word speech. He died in his sleep a few days later. Dayton returned to normal. Scopes left for graduate school at the University of Chicago. He declined all opportunities to capitalize on his fame. The state appeals court narrowly upheld the statute, but overturned the conviction of Scopes because the judge, and not the jury, had imposed the fine. Arguing over who had prevailed continued for decades. Frederick Lewis Allen, a journalist, wrote a history of the 1920's called 'Only Yesterday.' It was a bestseller and a college textbook for fifty years. Allen depicted the trial as part of a decline in older values and a clear defeat for the fundamentalists. The fundamentalists did not abandon their faith, but "set about constructing a separate subculture with independent religious, educational, and social institutions. By the 1940's, a fundamentalist subculture had formed in the United States, with a creationist scientific establishment of its own." In the 1950's, many began to consider the trial as a foreshadowing of the Red Scare and McCarthyism. This consideration inspired the play and movie 'Inherit The Wind.' It was not history, just very good theater. It honored Darrow too much and unfairly eviscerated Bryan. The 1960's saw Tennessee repeal the anti-evolution statute. Fundamentalism has prospered in the last half century and by the 1990's, the mission was to allow creationism to be treated as an equal theory with evolution. In 2011, Tennessee passed a law called the Academic Freedom Statute, encouraging teachers to be skeptical about evolution and climate change. As the law included a non-religious issue, climate change, and because of the composition of the Supreme Court, the law has not been challenged. Roughly 40% of the American population believes God created man in the last 10,000 years. "The Scopes narrative of fundamentalism versus modernity, majority rule versus individual rights, and science versus religion remains fresh not only because  of the antievolution campaign, but also because of opposing demands for and against reproductive, LBGT+, and gun rights. Pitched battles over climate science compound the issue while partisan politics, conspiracy theories, fake news, and social media reinforce cultural divides." This book received a Pulitzer Prize in the late 1990's and has an updated  2020 Afterword.

                   

The Vienna Writers Circle, Maetis - B

                     This novel is set in Austria's capital just after the Anschluss. The most compelling aspect of the book is its ability to portray the anxiety, stress and fear that takes over the Jewish population. Johannes and Mathias are cousins, both married to Catholics and both working as writers. It becomes increasingly clear that something must be done as the noose tightens. They opt to change their identities and move to different parts of the city. Their social interactions become severely proscribed and life returns to some sense of normalcy. The outbreak of war has little effect on Vienna. But the SS man on the lookout for Jews, Heinrich  Schnabel, is as relentless as Inspector Javert and keeps investigating and pursuing what he believes is a group with false papers. He catches Johannes in 1942. Johannes is sent to Sobibor but a letter he carries from his literary agent saves his life when he begins to help the deputy commandant who had submitted a draft of a novel to the same agent. Schnabel's diligent pursuit eventually leads him to Mathias, who manages to turn the tables on him. And although Mathias is captured by the Gestapo, he uses the money that Schnabel had stolen to negotiate his way to Switzerland. Very few Austrian Jews survived the Holocaust, and the fact that both cousins, their families, and most of their circle live until 1945 strains credulity.

A Fever In The Heartland: The Ku Klux Klan's Plot To Takeover America, and The Woman Who Stopped Them, Egan - B+

                  In the mid-1920's, three governors, fifteen senators, and seventy five congressmen were Klansmen. "But the epicenter was Indiana, which was trying to shape human behavior as no state had ever done." It passed the first eugenics law. The Klan's vigilantes helped enforce the harshest anti-alcohol laws outside of the Muslim world. The state was known as the Alabama of the north. It was not just Blacks that the Klan was trying to suppress, but also Jews, Catholics of any ethnicity, and Eastern Europeans, Greeks, and Asians. The man who ran the Klan in Indiana, D.C. Stephenson, made more money than Babe Ruth, expected to be appointed to the U.S. Senate, and was a violent womanizer. His downfall would be his mistreatment of a young woman in her late 20's.

                The terror and violence wreaked upon freed slaves by the KKK after the Civil War was short-lived. The federal government fought back and the Klan was disbanded just a few years after it had been formed. The 20th century rebirth grew from the populist-nativist response to the wave of immigration around the turn of the century. The Klan was sold as the "Main Street guardian against immorality, immigrants and their foreign faiths, and African Americans who were rebelling against Jim Crow." Stephenson saw the financial opportunity afforded by the Klan's $10 entry fee and quarterly dues, and began to grow the KKK in Indiana, a deeply Protestant and conservative state. Soon Klan vigilantes were acting as the state's morality police. The Klan had millions of members around the country and its leaders dreamed of gaining control of the federal government, rolling back the civil rights amendments and restricting certain religions. They spewed vitriol and hatred in their quest to preserve white Protestantism. Stephenson was a bigamist, wife-beater, cheater, deadbeat, and a liar, who somehow charmed his way to the top of the KKK pyramid. The Klan paraded frequently, and beat, harassed, and occasionally murdered those whom they didn't like.

                Nineteen twenty-four saw the KKK at its high water mark in the US and in Indiana. Stephenson decided to take on Notre Dame University. On a Friday night in May, thousands of Klansmen descended on South Bend. Their parade was stopped by a flying wedge of young students who broke up the Klan's march and sent them scurrying off. The next day's Chicago papers carried the headline "Students Rout Klansmen." In Washington, the incredibly racist and restrictive National Origins Act was signed by President Coolidge. Throughout the country, the Klan rolled up electoral success after success. In Indiana, the governor, and all of the state's politicians owed their offices to the Klan and Stephenson. They offered him an almost feudal loyalty and homage.

               Madge Oberholtzer lived four blocks from Stephenson in an affluent suburb of Indianapolis. She worked for the state, and a Klan sponsored bill would cost her her job. So she befriended Stephenson in an attempt to save it. He asked her over one Sunday, and his henchmen forced alcohol down her throat. He beat her, bit her all over her body, and raped her. She took poison in response. Stephenson's men left her at her parent's home. Knowing she was dying, she swore out a declaration accusing Stephenson of the crimes he had committed. He was indicted based on the affidavit and soon thereafter, Madge died. The local prosecutor was one of the two or three Republican officeholders who was not in Stephenson's pocket. Stephenson and two of his men were arrested for second degree murder and held without bail.

             The indictment and the publication of the declaration began the process of chipping away at the Klan's supremacy in the state. The national chapter had broken with the Indiana Klan and Stephenson a year previously. The trial was held later in the year 1925. The judge admitted Madge's dying declaration, thus sealing Stephenson's fate. Although the Klan attempted to bribe the jurors, a guilty verdict came on Nov. 25th. The sentence was life, and the Grand Dragon was sent off to the state penitentiary in Michigan City.  

            Around the country, leading Klansmen were being sent to jail, and in Kansas the Klan was banned. In the three years after Stephenson's conviction, national KKK membership dropped by 90%. That said, the Klan had achieved Prohibition, the disenfranchisement of Blacks and the anti-immigration law. Perhaps it died out because it had succeeded. As for Stephenson, he died in 1966, a decade after being released from prison.

             I have read about Prohibition, and the post-WWI Red scare, but knew absolutely nothing about the KKK in the 1920's. This has been an eye-opener. The comparison between the KKK of a hundred years ago and today's MAGA movement is obvious. Only this time, the Catholic church is lined up with the right-wing insiders and is no longer an outcast.

Killing Moon, Nesbo B+

                     This is the latest in the long-running series about Harry Hole. We find him in LA, broke, and trying to drink himself to death. When a woman he has befriended needs financial assistance to stay away from debt collectors,  Harry accepts an offer to return to Oslo to work on a murder investigation. He is hired by a man with connections to two young woman, whom Harry concludes were the victims of a serial killer. He collects a team and uses his many contacts with the Oslo police to run a parallel investigation. As good as the collective skills of the police are, Harry's are just a bit better. He outwits the killer in a brilliant move on the rooftop of the police HQ's. The author remains at the top of his game with the plotting, and there may even be hope that Harry stops drinking.

My Father's House, O'Connor - B

                      This the first novel in a trilogy featuring Msgr. Hugh O'Flaherty, an Irish priest assigned to the Vatican. The time is late 1943, after the Germans had occupied Rome in September.  O'Flaherty arranges for downed Allied airmen, escaped POW's and Jews to hide in and around the Vatican. He recruits locals and plans an escape for Christmas Eve. Hundreds are hustled out to the countryside. The Gestapo know the Monsignor is behind it and desire to capture him, but he never leaves the Vatican. Although a novel, this is a true story. Msgr. O'Flaherty is believed to have saved 6,500 souls during the war, was knighted by Great Britain, and honored by all of the Allied powers.

Outlive: The Science and Art of Longevity, Attia

                      A Stanford trained cancer surgeon has turned his focus to longevity and fighting the Four Horsemen: heart disease, cancer, neurodegenerative disease, and type 2 diabetes.  His goal is "to create an actionable operating manual for the practice of longevity." The focus is on  healthspan, a potentially longer life, but one without cognitive, physical, and emotional decline. The four keys are exercise, nutrition, sleep, and social involvement. I skipped the science and focused on personal take-aways.

Death of a Dancing Queen, Giarratano - C

                     This novel is set in New Jersey and features a recent college graduate trying to become a private investigator. Her grandfather has a license and she is supposed to be apprenticing under him. He's just an old drinker and Billie is on her own. She's investigating the murder of a co-ed who was running a podcast and looking into the murder of a dancer three decades ago. Weak plot, tepid writing, and I'm not even sure whodunit and am hard pressed to care.

The Premonition: A Pandemic Story, Lewis - B

                     In 2019, the Economist and Johns Hopkins University partnered on the creation of Global Health Security Index. The US was ranked number one in its ability to manage a health crisis. As it turned out, with 4% of the world's population, we suffered 20% of the world's fatalities during the pandemic. This is part of the story of our underperformance.

                     The United States began to plan for a deadly pandemic in 2005, in response to concerns raised by Pres. Bush after he read a book about the 1919 Spanish Flu. The task was assigned to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).  There were very few people in or out of government focused on pandemic prevention, and those who were planned on stopping disease from coming into the country. The few who truly understood the issue knew that the social transmission of illnesses was the real problem.  Containment needed to be the plan.

                   On January 24, 2020, the first American, someone who had just returned from Wuhan, was diagnosed with Covid. A loose knit group of  physicians and scientists (they called themselves the Wolverines*) who had studied this type of outbreak concluded that the US could be facing a million deaths if their back of the envelope calculations were correct. The CDC was downplaying the risk. This handful of professionals were the only informed people truly frightened. The Wolverines, some of whom had worked in the Bush and Obama administrations, had no access to power in Trump's Washington and could not pass on their concerns and recommendations to anyone. Soon, the government began to pay some attention to them. There was no testing ability outside of the CDC's main office, and the CDC didn't seem to think front line testing was important. Only in California, because of Charity Dean, the number two in the Department of Health, was there any response to the pandemic. Gov. Newsom ordered a stay at home directive in mid-March. Joe Derisi, who ran a search lab set up by the Zuckerberg's built the first test in a matter of days. In Washington, the president told the states they were on their own. By the summer, California was leading the country in Covid testing.

                 The entity that should have prepared the US for a pandemic, and then managed our response, was the Centers For Disease Control. They, of course, did not. The reason is that decades earlier, the director who insisted on the Swine Flu vaccinations, which caused a number of deaths, was fired after there was no pandemic. The directorship became a political appointment and the CDC became risk averse and lost its way. 

* Carter Mecher (VA), Charity Dean (Calif. Dept. of Health), Duane Caneva (DHS), Richard Hatchett (Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority), James Lawler ( US Navy), Michael Callahan ( Mass. General), Joseph Derisi (Chan Zuckerberg Biohub) - partial listing.

The Tenant, Enberg - B

                      This novel is a police procedural set in modern Copenhagen. Jeppe is the lead detective on a case involving the murder of a young woman in the ground floor apartment of a three-story building. She is found by the tenant from the second floor unit, who has a heart attack upon finding young Julie.  Jeppe's quest, which is complicated by the fact that he is barely recovered from a divorce,  takes him into the city's literary scene, as the landlord of the building and others share writings they are working on on a writer's help blog. The landlord penned the murder that took place downstairs. Pretty good read.

Stay Awake, Goldin - C

                     Formulaic is the word that pops up when reading this book. Liv wakes up in a taxi on the way to Brooklyn, has no idea where she has been, and has no cell phone or wallet. As it turns out, she suffers from  amnesia/insomnia and has no recollection of the previous two years. She is being framed for two murders from then and for another one now. Thanks to her keeping her wits under pressure, and more importantly to a savvy NYC detective, the perpetrator is found and brought to justice. Simply not that good.

Winterland, Meadows, B+

                     "Anya Yurievna Pertova has been accepted to the Metallurgist School for Sport for artistic gymnastics." Thus, life in 1973 Siberia turns on a dime for 8 year old Anya. She succeeds in the Soviet sport system, but pays a steep price. She is sternly pushed by coaches because without her success, the coaches are left behind. She endures torn ligaments for which there are shots, but never rest. She is withdrawn from school, and is seldom home, causing her to hardly ever see her dad or the kindly grandmother type upstairs in her building. Shots and more shots delay puberty in the quest to compete with the Romanians. And there is success - an individual bronze and the team gold at the 1980 Olympics. But the terrors of the system are never far away.  The grandmotherly Vera had survived ten years in the camps and thinks often about the hell she lived through. Vera's father was shot, her husband failed to survive the Gulag and her son died of starvation. Anya's father, Yuri, a young Kosmonol, moved to the far north in Norilsk, worked in a copper mine and  was an invalid in his 50's. Her mother Elena, a dancer for the Bolshoi, became so disillusioned with life above the Arctic Circle that she meandered off into the taiga and was never seen again. This is a very good book.

Beyond Glory: Joe Louis vs. Max Schmeling and a World on the Brink, Margolick - B+

                      On June 22, 1938 over a hundred million people around the world tuned in t their radios to the fight at Yankee Stadium between the young twenty-four year old 'Brown Bomber' and the older German who had throttled him two years before. There were more visitors in the city than there had been at anytime since the 1924 Democratic convention. Two thousand Germans also traveled to America for the bout. Joe Louis was the most popular black man America had ever seen. Max Schmeling received a telegram the morning of the match wishing him success from Adolph Hitler. 

                     Schmeling, born in Cologne in 1905, won the heavyweight title in NY in 1930 by defeating Jack Sharkey. However, he won on a foul and the rules were changed to prevent it from happening again. He lost to Sharkey a year later. He regularly fought in the US and Europe in the 30's. His career was perennially up and down, winning big ones and losing easy ones. No matter how well he fought though, he was Germany's and the Chancellor's hero. Louis was born in Alabama in 1914. His family moved to Detroit when he was 12. He won the Golden Gloves in 1933, and a year later, the national title in Chicago. His trainers taught him how to fight and most importantly, how to act. No Black man would ever achieve the title if he acted as brazenly as Jack Johnson had decades earlier. He became an immediate contender because he consistently knocked out his opponents. His first 'big' fight was in June, 1935 at Yankeee Stadium, where he took on 6'7" Primo Carnera, whom he pounded for six rounds before a TKO was called. Joe was one of the most popular people in America, even meeting FDR at the White House. A preacher in Detroit said he had done more for his race than anyone since Lincoln. Later that summer, he devastated Max Baer in four rounds. Louis dramatically increased the popularity and profitability of boxing. He himself made $400,000 in 1935 and rode in his own Pullman car.

                    The first bout with Schmeling was in June, 1936. Louis was the consensus pick to hand Schmeling his head in an early round. The Stadium was not full, many surmised because Jewish fans boycotted the event. It was, however, a global phenomenon wired around the world and heard on American radio by 60 million. Many thought Louis wasn't ready and looked ill at ease that night. Schmeling had a plan. He had observed that Louis dropped his left and that a right cross might be able to hurt him. Louis won the early rounds and Schmeling's left eye was closed by the 3rd round. In the 4th, Louis was knocked down by a right cross for the first time in his career. All of a sudden, the presumptive champ was wobbly and glassy-eyed. He was now a punching bag barely defending himself. Schmeling sent him to the canvas in the 12th. It was over. Louis couldn't get up. In Germany, the nation cheered for their Maxe.  Berlin ordered him home on the Hindenburg. Many, many whites, including members of the US Congress cheered the defeat of a man of color. Black America was in shock and despondent.

                    Next up for Schmeling was the champ, James 'Cinderella Man' Braddock, and Louis would fightJack Sharkey. Sharkey lasted only three rounds. Braddock-Schmeling was postponed because Braddock had injured his hand. Talk of boycotting Schmeling because of his connections to the Reich bubbled up in the boxing world. That played right into the hands of those who wished for the big money payday of Louis and Braddock. A brouhaha ensued, involving Schemeling in NY on the day the fight was originally scheduled, litigation in the federal courts, and an offer by Berlin to host the fight, all to no avail. Braddock and Louis were scheduled for Chicago at Comiskey Park. It was the first time the challenger was favored against the defending champ. Braddock floored Louis in the second, before the tide turned. In the sixth, Louis knocked Braddock out. It took twenty minutes for Braddock to come to.  The twenty-three year old was the new champ. 

                  The Louis-Schmeling rematch was scheduled for June in NY. Both fighters fought a few easy tune-ups and prepared vigorously for the bout. On June 22nd, they weighed in at the Garden and headed to their respective hotels to rest. The fight was scheduled for 10 P.M. Hardly anyone in Germany had gone to bed. Virtually all activity in the US stopped as people huddled around their  radios. When the introductions were made by the ring announcer, Schmeling received the bigger hand. The bell rang at 10:08. Within 20 seconds, Louis had Schmeling on the ropes. At the minute mark, Louis had hit Schmeling more than he had in the first five rounds two years earlier. Schmeling screamed out in pain. At 90 seconds, the challenger was on his knees. Twice he got up and the referee stopped the count. The ref called the fight in the third minute with Schmeling bleeding from the mouth and on his hands and knees. Black America exploded in joy. Half a million people took to the streets of Harlem. Around the world, Jews joined in the celebration.  Communists too were ecstatic. Schmeling was stretchered out of the hospital two weeks later and quietly returned to Germany.

                     Joe Louis defended his title for the next few years against what the sportswriters called the 'bum of the month club.' Only Billy Conn wasn't a pushover. After Pearl Harbor, he joined the Army. Schmeling was still treated like a hero in Germany, but after the authorities saw the tape of the match, they quietly pushed him into retirement. When the war began, he was drafted into the Wehrmacht and became a paratrooper. He was part of the successful invasion of Crete. He was injured and spent a few years performing public relations duties before his 1943 discharge. After the war, he fought a ten round match at 43 and finally retired after the loss. As for Louis, the post-war years saw him in financial trouble. "A soft touch for flashy new clothes, pretty women, people in need, buddies promising him a good time, investors with dubious schemes, he long lived well beyond even his considerable means..." He fought and beat Conn once and Jersey Joe Wolcott twice in an attempt to pay off debts estimated at $350,000. He retired with a 61-1 record in 1949. Two comebacks led to humiliating losses to Ezzard Charles and Rocky Marciano. Schmeling wrangled a distributorship for Coca-Cola in northern Germany and eventually became a very wealthy man. Joe Louis did not do as well. He was a wrestler and slipped into mental illness. He worked as a greeter in Las Vegas, where he died in 1981. Schmeling, Germany's sportsman of the century died in 2005.

                  Thanks to my brother, Will, for recommending this superb book. The author extensively quotes newspapers, announcers, and public figures, all of whom were extraordinarily racist. Joe Louis was compared to King Kong, called Massa Louis, a pickaninny, a sambo, a primeval savage, and a negro with a fuzzy noggin. In addition to being constantly called the n-word by newspapers around the country, one ex-champ said that as a Black he "had no understanding for the honor and dignity of being world champion." Another newsman said he "was a healthy negro boy with the usual streak of laziness."For providing such detail of our racist past, this book could be banned in Florida.

                     

                      

No Way Down: Life and Death on K2, Bowley - B+

                      On August 1, 2008, twenty-nine individuals from eight different teams began the ascent to the summit of K-2. Only 17 would survive. The 4th camp from which they departed was only 2,000 feet from the top of the second highest mountain in the world. It was the "mountaineers mountain, 522 miles further north, colder, steeper, and deadlier than Everest." 

                     "The Karakoram range is part of the western Himalayas and extends from the watershed between the Indian subcontinent and the deserts of Central Asia." On August 1, the climbers were going very slowly up the Bottleneck, and it was evident to many in the camp that they were not going to make it up and down. After the Bottleneck, climbers had to cross the Traverse and then climb the overhanging glacier known as a Serac. The first casualty at 10:30 was a Serb who had fallen about 700 feet to his death. His colleagues stopped, turned, and started to take his body down. A Sherpa who was helping but suffering from altitude sickness fell to his death during the descent. At 3pm, only one climber was on the Serac, and he was urging the rest to quicken their pace. Once on the Serac, the climbing was easier, only 30 degrees steep but with deeper snow. The sole Basque, the only one not part of a national team, reached the summit. At 5:30, two Norwegians reached the summit. A handful of South Koreans and Dutchmen  joined them. More and more climbers achieved the summit.  The Sherpas encouraged them to leave. The last group to depart were the Dutch at 8 pm. 

                   The first safely down was the sole Basque climber. While the four Norwegians were descending the Traverse, there was a violent shaking of the ice and one of them fell to his death. His wife, the only European woman on the mountain and one of the summiteers, screamed his name as she looked for him in the darkness. At 10:30, one of the men on the Traverse radioed Camp Four that the ice slide had severed the ropes, and they were going to have to descend without them. At 1 am, the most senior Frenchman quietly fell to his death. At 3 am, an Italian and two members of the Dutch team halted, waited and began to descend when light appeared on the horizon. However, morning brought a whiteout to the mountain. As they descended, they saw three men, a Sherpa and two Koreans hanging from ropes, alive, but barely. One member of the Dutch team, an Irishman, was killed in an avalanche. A second avalanche took the lives of the Sherpa and two South Koreans who had survived the night hanging in their ropes.

                    The survivors at Camp Four had to descend in order to survive. At 26,000 feet, the camp was dangerously high and they had been there for days.  There would eventually be eleven dead, but at the Base Camp there was still uncertainty about who was alive and who was dead. By Saturday, there was only one person alive on the mountain, a Dutchman who had called Holland and told his wife he couldn't see and didn't know where he was. The Dutch were able to ascertain his location with the help of the satellite phone company and sent two men after him. But he would have to survive another night on the mountain. He was rescued on Sunday morning. Those in need of medical help were helicoptered out of the valley. The names of the dead were entered on the memorial at the Base Camp. Thanks to Marcella for her continual editing, and for recommending this excellent book.

                    The Dead - Dren Mandir- Serbia, Jahan Baig - Nepal, Rolf Bae - Norway, Hughes d'Aubardede - France, Karim Meherban - Nepal, Gerard McDonnell - Ireland, Jumik and Pasang Bhote - Nepal, Park Kyeong-hyo, Kim Hyo-gyeong and Hwang Dong jin - South Korea.

Murder Book, Perry - B

                      Harry Duncan, a private investigator in Chicago, gets a call from the US Attorney, an old friend. The US Attorney asks him to undertake a reconnaissance of a county in southern Indiana where, she fears, organized crime is making a push. Harry is immediately thrown into the middle of multiple efforts to intimidate the locals with the goal of buying them out for pennies on the dollar. Harry creatively thwarts the bad guys and helps bring them to justice. None of the efforts the criminals are making make any sense because there is just not that much money to be made in Ash County. Eventually, it comes out that the area is rich in rare earth minerals and it's not just local criminals, but a big company in on the evildoing.

Retracing The Iron Curtain: A 3,000 Mile Journey Through The End And Afterlife Of The Cold War, Phillips - B+

                     This "is the story of how the continent of Europe gained and lost an Iron Curtain, and of how it learned but then seemingly forgot important lessons about openness and liberty." The British author and Russian scholar took this four month  journey in 2019.

                     The trip begins at Kirkenes in Finnmark on the Barents Sea at the Norwegian-Russian border. In WWII, the Germans occupied the town before they were expelled by the Soviets in 1944. In 1968, the USSR threatened the peace with NATO with menacing military exercises. Today, it is a tranquil border crossing, although the Russian side is home to much of the nuclear powered submarine fleet. And, the local newspaper/website critical of Russian policy is prohibited in Russia.

                     Porkkala, Finland is on the Gulf of Finland just west of Helsinki and north of Tallinn, Estonia. At that point, the Gulf is only 40 kms. wide and quite shallow. Fearing a maritime barrier, the Soviets occupied  Porkkola under a 50 year lease right after WWII. Using German POWs, the Soviets constructed a major naval base. Soon after Stalin's death, the USSR returned the city in exchange for a 20 year promise from Finland to not join NATO or ally with the US. 

                    When traveling east from Helsinki, Vyborg is the first city on the Russian side. It had been Finn, but was annexed by the USSR in 1944. It is one of the nicer cities in Russia, and is a place where older people reminisce about the Soviet Union, and even about Stalin. Reviving the cult of the dictator is part of Putin's domestic policy. 

                     In Riga and Liepaja, Latvia, memories are pre- and post- the freedom that came in the early 1990's. For many older people , particularly the Russian minority, life back then was pretty good. For ethnic Latvians, who remember their people being deported to Siberia, their right to fish in the Baltic being taken away, and their boats burned, there is nothing but disdain for the past. The younger Russians are bilingual, and at ease in a democracy.

                     Sweden was neutral, had no border with the USSR, but it was extremely anxious about the Soviets, particularly when it came to its large island in the Baltic, Gotland. Strategists referred to the 'Gotland Gambit,' in which the USSR would seize the island as a bargaining chip. "How to make Gotland unattractive to would be Soviet invaders was an issue that constantly concerned Stockholm." The coastline was restricted and the island was heavily fortified. The only incident was a 1961 defection by a small fishing boat captain.

                    To the west, the Germans on the Danish island of Bornholm surrendered to the Soviets in 1945 after a heavy bombardment and significant fighting. Their occupation was benign but they appeared to be in no rush on them part of the Soviets to leave. Fortunately, they departed in the spring of 1946. Its proximity to Poland and E. Germany made it an attractive destination to seek asylum. The most famous case was a Polish pilot who landed a MIG-15 on the island. NATO set up one of its most important listening posts on Bornholm.

                   Rugen is a small island off the German coast. A five mile long partially completed cement barracks was started by the Germans, and completed by the E. Germans after the war. It was used as a holiday retreat for retired military personnel. Germany was unique in that it was the only country divided by the Iron Curtain. The largest checkpoint between the two Germanys was in the north at Helmstedt-Marienborn, where both autos and passenger trains were subjected to communist paranoia at its worst. Of course, the wall in Berlin was the most prominent and was well known the world over. From 1961-1989, West Berlin was a backwater,"a seedbed for fringe lifestyles." It was a place with high tolerances for alternative living, heavy pot use, and uniquely, the only place in the country where men were exempt from military service. On the other side, there "was the monolithic official culture the GDR imposed."  Two of America's most famous speeches were made at the Wall by Presidents Kennedy and Reagan. Its breaching on Nov. 9, 1989 was one of the signal moments of the century.

                 In 1951 Czechia, at the border town of Aps a few hundred yards from Bavaria, a passenger train crashed through the barrier bringing a handful of families to freedom. Czechoslovakia was unique in the communist world, as it had never been part of the Russian Empire, and did not have occupying Soviet troops until 1968. Bratislava, Slovakia was the closest city behind the curtain to the free world, only three kms. from Austria. Just outside the city is a vast missile complex built in the 1970's.

                  An hour west of Bratislava on the Danube is Vienna. It was occupied by the Soviets prior to the the four party occupation that lasted for a decade. Notwithstanding Berlin and its tensions, the shared occupation worked in Vienna, likely because there was less emotion among the occupiers than in Berlin, home of the Reich. The occupation ended in 1955 because Khrushchev wished to limit overseas spending and withdrew Soviet troops in exchange for neutrality.

                   Sopron, Hungary was the site of the August 1989 Pan-European Picnic. As ties were loosening around Europe, the plan was to cut the barbed wire separating Austria and Hungary. Six hundred E. Germans appeared and rushed the border in the largest escape of the Cold War.

                  Gorizia, Italy and Gorica, Slovenia are one city, divided by the Iron Curtain for decades. The division went through the city's train station and cemetery. Since Yugoslavia was not as beholden to the USSR, the border was only loosely enforced, allowing people on either side to travel freely back and forth. Trieste, just 45 kms. to the south is the city with which Churchill rhetorically concluded the Iron Curtain in his famous speech in 1946. "From Stettin in the Baltic, to Trieste in the Adriatic..." was not accurate geographically, but oratorically was  brilliant. The city's port was the Austro-Hungarian Empire's window to the Adriatic and still feels more Austrian than Italian. Isolated on a rocky coast, Trieste and its surrounding countryside were declared a Free City at war's end. It didn't work, and the city wound up in Italy and much of the countryside in Yugoslavia.

                 The Corfu Channel separates Albania from Greece.  In 1946, Albanian mines sunk two British ships. From the Greek side, the CIA and MI-6 repeatedly failed in their attempts to unsettle the Hoxha regime.

                 Azerbaijan is 2500 kms. from Greece. As the USSR was falling apart, Azeris and Armenians began fighting in the southwest Caucasus. With so much going on, Gorbachev freed the autonomous region of Nakhchivan, the first piece of the empire to depart. A brief bus ride brings one to the Turkish border where Azerbaijan, Armenia, Iran and Turkey come together, and this story ends.

                 The author's primary conclusion is that there was a surprising amount of 'Ostalgie,' warm remembrances by many of the communist past. Stability and equality, which for many along the border is not readily available, are the attractions. Ever since I read 'Balkan Ghosts' by Kaplan three decades ago, I've enjoyed these rambling travelogues.

                 

                      

Independence Square, Smith - B

                     Forty-two years after 'Gorky Park,' Arkady Renko is still at it. He's asked to look into a murder on Moscow's streets at the same time a local crook asks him to find his daughter, Karina. The missing daughter's friend, Elena, and Renko head off to Kyiv when a few clues about Karina and the murdered victim point there. While there, a dissident who both women had worked with in Moscow is assassinated and the next day, the local head of the Crimean Tatars is murdered in Kyiv. Elena and Arkady go to Sevastopol in Crimea where the matter comes to a conclusion. It's Russia and the conclusion is corrupt and utterly wrong, but it is what one expects. As always, and still after all these years, a fun read.

Red Winter, Cameron -B

                      This is the latest in the Jack Ryan series. It is set in late 1984, a few months after the defection of the 'Red October.' Jack is the CIA liaison in London when Adm. Greer asks him to undertake some dangerous field work in East Berlin.  A Stasi colonel sets in motion a possible defection by dropping a computer disc in the handbag of a young Foreign Service officer. The disc states that there is a mole in the Berlin office and the defection must be handled by officers not from Germany. Mary Pat Foley, Jack, and John Clark undertake the effort and pull it off. It's always fun to return to Berlin and the Cold War, the city and era for great spy novels.

The Island, McKinty - B+

                     This a fabulous page turning thriller involving a family of four from Seattle off to Melbourne for the dad to speak at a medical conference. They take a day trip to an offshore island, inadvertently run over a local, and all of a sudden are captured by the lawless occupants of Dutch Island, the O'Neill family. There's no cell service, and it appears as if there are no civil or police authorities either. It's the American family versus the feral locals. Fortunately, Heather was trained by her dad, a US Army sniper, and she gives the O'Neills a run for their money. There's absolutely no redeeming intellectual material here - just a blast.

Confronting Saddam Hussein: George W. Bush And The Invasion Of Iraq, Leffler - B

                      "However tempting it is to level criticism at President Bush and his advisers - and we most definitely should - we need to recognize, collectively, that the exercise of prudence and the judicious use of power have not, historically, been among our finest qualities as Americans."  

                       Hussein was born into abject poverty in 1937; unwanted by his mother,  and his father unknown. He grew up to be a street fighting thug and sadistic bully. In his early 20's, he was imprisoned for murder. He was a bodyguard for the leader of the Ba'ath party. When the party ascended to power, he became an aide to the president. He was extremely ambitious, led the nationalization of the nation's oil industry, negotiated development deals with many countries, began the modernization of Iraq, and took over in 1978. He had dozens of the party's leaders executed. Two years later, he started an eight year war against Iran. The cost in lives and treasure were immense. He used chemical weapons against the Iranians and afterwards, against the Iraqi Kurds. He developed WMD and invaded Kuwait in 1990. The US led coalition destroyed Iraq's army in days and freed Kuwait. His continued rule of Iraq achieved infrequently seen before levels of violence, caprice, and suffering. His was a totalitarian reign of terror. 

                     When Bush was running for the presidency, he was tutored on foreign affairs by a team assembled by Condoleezza Rice. The group espoused a "militant, hegemonic and missionary role for the United States." The new administration did not adopt any policies on al Qaeda, and wished to only further isolate Hussein. On Sept. 10th, Sec. Rumsfeld made a speech at the Pentagon stating that there was an adversary that posed a significant threat to America - the Pentagon bureaucracy. The following day proved him wrong. Bush's response was "angry yet calm; determined yet dignified; empathetic yet vengeful; reassuring and inspiring." The administration felt that they had missed it and were responsible for the failure to protect the country. There was a palpable fear that another attack would come any day. They resolved that it would never happen again. 

             Bush called our response a Global War On Terror. The administration enhanced cooperation among all of our intelligence agencies and made real progress on the ground in Afghanistan. From the very beginning, Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz wanted to attack Iraq. Bush had no interest. Hussein made the mistake of voicing his support for the 9/11 attack, and soon people began to discuss the risks he posed because it was believed he had WMD. "Bush struggled to define his priorities  - inspections, disarmament, containment, regime change." Slowly, the administration moved toward regime change in Iraq as a major goal in the GWOT. A  lengthy visit to Iraq by a highly placed al Qaeda operative fanned the flames of anxiety over the spread of WMD. The hawks ratcheted up the public condemnations of Hussein. On Sept. 12, 2002, Bush spoke at the UN and asked for a resolution mandating Iraq stop supporting terrorism and remove its WMDs. "The speech was met with stony silence." The Security Council eventually demanded a reinitiating of inspections. Inspections began anew and the UN did not find any weapons of mass destruction, but were frustrated with Iraq's foot dragging and lack of cooperation. With troops in the Mideast and warm weather coming, Bush decided to go to war in March. In Iraq, "Saddam Hussein still hoped to outmenouvre the inspectors, and outfox the Bush Administration."

                 On March 19th, Bush announced that the war had begun. The administration had very specific and concrete plans for fighting and winning the war. What it did not have was a plan for what to do after they won. On April 9th, US Marines pulled down the Hussein statue in downtown Baghdad. DOD and State could not agree on what should happen and the result was pure uncontrollable chaos. The man the US put in charge on the ground, Paul Bremer, exacerbated matters by ignoring and running roughshod over the locals. Extensive looting, civil unrest, if not civil war ran rampant across the country. The security situation was so bad that the UN withdrew its people in August. "Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld bears much of the responsibility. He oversaw the war planning. He scrutinized the combat phase of the mission...but showed scant interest in the stability operations...""President Bush stood atop the morass of postwar planning, and did little to uplift it."

                The US forces diligently searched for, but never found, any weapons of mass destruction. Our rationale to start the war was grounded on a false premise. Our occupation of the country was an unmitigated disaster. The genesis of the war was 9/11 and the fact that the administration lived in overwhelming fear of a repeat that would destroy the Bush presidency, and further damage American democracy. That fear, and Bush's hatred of Hussein, are the reasons the US invaded Iraq. "For the US, the geopolitical, psychological, and domestic costs of the intervention persist and reverberate...The conflict besmirched America's reputation and heightened anti-Americanism...Rather than enhancing the spread of liberty, the president and his advisers left office witnessing the worldwide recession of freedom."

               "We need to ponder what happens when there is too much fear, too much power, too much hubris - and insufficient prudence."