Bored yet? Two more...

The Reality Dysfunction

(Part 1)

Hamilton, P.F.

Peter Hamilton is still long-winded, but I liked this book better than I liked Pandora’s Star. More interesting places, and for the most part, more interesting characters. Well, to me, anyway. Some rather confusing space-aliens didn’t help - more on that later.

It started off bad - a lengthy description of faster-than-light spaceships that are grown - along with their captain-pilots, to ensure some type of holistic (and pseudo telepathic) connection between ships. The ships are intelligent, and love their captains. They also have babies near the end of their lives - when the pilot’s offspring are also born. And they grow up together, And they love each other. At this stage, I almost quit. 

Anyway, the main ship-captain pairing are Oenone and (Edenist) Syrinx, and serve a term in the Confederation Navy. (Edenism is one of the confusing religions in the Confederation.) Later, we’re introduced to the more interesting Joshua Calvert - a 19-20 year old genetically engineered scavenger who finds an archaeological artifact of great value, and sells it at auction for big money. The archaeological subject is the Laymil, a race of intelligent and technically advanced beings who apparently killed themselves in a mass suicide/genocide. A gas giant planet, Mirchusko, has a ring of debris created originally from 1000’s of destroyed Laymil habitat satellites, and that’s where Calvert makes his find. With his winnings, (paid on the orbiting space habitat Tranquility) he rebuilds his deceased father’s space ship - the Lady Macbeth - and starts a new career as a successful freelance space cargo hauler and successful womanizer. 

We’re also introduced to a 19-20 year old troubled genetically enhanced kid - Quinn Dexter - assigned as a virtual slave on a newly colonized jungle-planet - sentenced to do all the manual labour for the new colonists. The planet - Lalonde - is poor, and colonists face decades of hardship before any chance of prosperity, meaning that the slaves (Ivets) don’t have much to look forward to.

Now for the aliens and other oddities. There is the Ly-cilph, an ancient and seemingly benevolent non-corporeal species whose purpose is to map and learn everything about everything. Then there’s Laton - okay, he’s human, but an antagonist doing research on immortality - by transferring consciousness into others’ (unwilling) bodies. And finally, there is the ??? - energy entities, similar in nature to the Ly-cilph, but aggressive, who seem to be doing the same thing as Laton, but far more efficiently, and threatening all life on Lalonde, and presumably, everywhere else…

Yeah; weird, but still...

7/10

The Reality Dysfunction

(Part 2)

Hamilton, P.F.

Peter Hamilton’s “world building” takes up a lot of page turning - a lot. However, part 2 of The Reality Dysfunction moved a lot faster - don’t get me wrong, there are still pages and pages of world building, but it is spaced out with a lot of action - a lot more than in part 1. For the first time, I can say that I can’t stop reading a Peter Hamilton book. This is a good ride. 

Turns out the ??? are the dead - that have been given the power to return from “the beyond” (sort of like vampires) through the intersection of universes caused inadvertently by the Ly-cilph. They begin taking over bodies on Lalonde, and eventually possess almost all of the human settlers. Gradually, they leave on transports destined for many other planets, where they plan to completely take over. Military intervention starts on Lalonde, with mercenaries dropped to reconnoiter, most of whom are possessed; the Dead gain more mobility when the transports return to the motherships in orbit. Once there, they start destroying other ships, making an invasion force untenable. Josh Calvert and crew are involved, but avoid possession (aka sequestration), while managing to save the last bunch of kids and a couple of adults from certain doom. In typical Hamiltonian fashion, the book ends with an introduction to another series of 500+ page books. Well, we’ll see…

8/10

A couple more books...

The Lost Fleet - Victorious

Campbell, J.

6th book of the series; Geary looks like he’ll be arrested by the senate because they’re afraid of his success. Instead, he gets promoted to Fleet Admiral, and gets approval to end the Syndic war, and to investigate the alien race. He beats the Syndics at their home system, travels the gate (wait…) encounters the “enigma” alien race, at the edge of Syndic space, figures out their deception, and deals them a sound beating. Goes home, gets the girl. So, what’s next…

7/10

Post Captain

O’Brian, P.

Second book in the Master and Commander series.

In and about 1802(?) Aubrey and Maturin fall for the same two women, causing jealousy, and even a duel - stopped by ship’s business (and then forgotten). Without a ship, and perhaps no possibilities, his accountant absconds with his money, right when his prize award was reversed - leaving him thousands of pounds in debt, and at risk of being nabbed for debtor’s prison. Finally able to land a command (of a horrible ship), manages to attack the French in harbour, and make away with a French vessel. 

His good work gets him on the good side of some at the Admiralty - he’s awarded post (full-time rank of Captain), and a temporary command of a crack frigate. Without Aubrey’s knowledge, Maturin gets him a spot on a squadron setting out on a big confrontation with the Spanish. (Maturin  is secretly a spy working for the Admiralty.) The squadron captures the Spanish, with great potential for prize money…

7/10

You guessed it; another book...

 The Jacques Plante Story

O’Brien, A.

When I was 10 and 11, my favorite sports hero was then-42 year-old hockey goalie Jacques Plante. He was a retirement-age goalie on his second or third comeback, and was a bright star on my favorite hockey team, the sad-sack Toronto Maple Leafs. 

They were a young team that had missed the playoffs badly the year before (1969-70), and top goalie Bruce Gamble was having a tough life playing behind a young, error-prone defense. 

Then the Leafs obtained Plante in a round-about trade deal, and he proceeded to have the best season any goalie ever had (statistically), and helped the Leafs make the playoffs that year (the 1970-71 season). The team wasn’t terribly good, but Plante ended the season with a 1.88 GAA (that’s very, very good), and a save percentage of .944 (the best ever recorded). He was my hero. I hated when Bruce Gamble played (his GAA was 3.80 - not good, and his save percentage was .882 - also not good).

But to be fair, Gamble was a decent NHL goalie - he had a good career before that year, and he played in the NHL for a couple of seasons after that, before he was forced to retire due to health reasons. He just wasn’t as good as Plante. But that year, nobody was; most weren’t even close.

So I had to read his book. I’m not sure why I waited so many years to get it. (Actually, it’s quite possible that I have read it years ago, but have completely forgotten it.) Plante didn’t write the book himself - although articulate in his second language, English, he just wasn’t a writer. Andy O’Brien was the writer - and he did an okay job, writing in the 1960’s style. His writing assumed that the reader didn’t know much about hockey - that was the style then, but it’s at times a dull read for the knowledgeable fan. Fortunately, he seems to have used a tape recorder, and quoted Plante quite a bit - those bits were very interesting.

Unfortunately, the parts of the book about the Leaf days are the shortest part. That’s fair - the book was written the summer after the 70-71 season, and few people had noticed just how good he was that year. After all, they finished in 4th place and lost in the first round to the Rangers, four games to two. 

But the story was captivating. He had some great years in Montreal, where he won six Vezina trophies (best goalie), including five in a row. He also won another with the St. Louis Blues (his previous comeback, before his stint with the Leafs). However, he was hounded by coaches and management in Montreal. Inventing the goalie mask, his coach didn’t want him to wear it, because it showed cowardice... He had asthma (as I do), but the coach and management thought it was in his head - the gall to have an asthma attack right before a game... He had torn cartilage in both knees, but he was accused of faking soreness to avoid playing in games…

Also some interesting anecdotes - Plante noticed over the years that the nets were not the same size in every NHL rink. He noticed because in Chicago, Boston and New York, the cross-bar was slightly lower when he felt it on his back. After a lot of eye-rolling, some people measured the nets, and sure enough, they were smaller in those cities. Turns out that when they welded them together, they properly measured 6-feet between posts, but in some rinks they welded the cross-bar atop the 4-foot posts, while in others, they welded it between the posts. This resulted in shorter nets in those rinks. (The disparity was quickly and quietly resolved by the NHL.) 

In the 1971 playoff finals, Tony Esposito allowed a goal from center ice by Jacques Lemaire late in the 3rd period of game 7, which played a pivotal role in the result in that game. Everyone was shocked that an excellent goalie like Esposito could allow such an easy goal in a critical game. But Plante knew what happened - having played in the Chicago Stadium many times, he knew that on a high shot, you could lose the puck against all the dark and white shirts across the rink. And if you went down on your knees, you would make it worse. Esposito’s style was to flop on every shot, so it was not his fault - just a matter of bad timing - wrong place, wrong time, wrong shooter, wrong goalie.

If you’re a goalie, a fan of Jake the Snake, or were a huge 11-year-old Leaf fan in 1970-71, then I highly recommend this book.

8/10

And again, more books...

 I'll cover a couple more here; two very different books -- 

Josephus, The Essential Writings Maier, P.

Josephus' writings about the Roman Jewish War and Jewish Antiquities. Josephus is an interesting figure - a former Jewish military leader, turned Roman collaborator - a Jewish Benedict Arnold, if you will. I originally became interested in Josephus because he was one of the few ancient writers who spoke of Jesus Christ, along with Suetonius, Tacitus and a very few others. But to read his histories and personal accounts is also interesting - especially the incident at Jotapata in Galilee, where Josephus is one of two left after a mass suicide of 40 Jewish nobles and leaders hiding in the ruins. Verrrry suspicious; he does some interesting literary tap dancing in an attempt to make himself look good here, but the reader knows that something is fishy. History isn’t kind to Josephus because of this, even though he is well regarded as a historian. This may be because he was writing for a Roman audience for the most part, and his writings were preserved because of this.

In The Jewish War, he speaks of himself in the third person, much like Xenophon did in his writings, and of course comes across very favourably to the reader. Immensely so, actually. So much so that I am suspicious of anything he writes concerning Josephus…

Either way, his record of the Jewish War provides more detail than any other source, due to his personal involvement. And pretty much everything he discusses (beyond his own motivations) is more or less confirmed by other sources. He wrote The Jewish War with Roman readers in mind - the emperors, present and near future, are all spoken well of - even during the battle for Jerusalem. For this episode, he lays the blame on the Jews themselves - actually their splintered leadership in the battle. Especially the leaders of the three rebel factions, keen on engaging and fighting Roman dominance, one being the infamous Zealots. He seems to hold a loathing grudge against these people in The Jewish War which seems to be somewhat (and independently) consistent with the Bible’s New Testament writings. I’m not sure how he is viewed from the Jewish perspective - that would require more research on my part.

The Jewish Antiquities is also very interesting - he basically retells the entire Old Testament from Genesis to the Maccabees. One could say that it is written in a largely secular perspective, although the concept of God, and God’s presence are not at all overlooked. I have wondered why he wrote this, since the books of the Old Testament still existed at this time. I wonder if he felt guilt and what must have seemed like the end of the Jewish people, and his role in it. At that time, Jerusalem was completely destroyed, and the Jews of Jerusalem and the whole Levant were scattered; they were defeated everywhere, and with the destruction of the temple, perhaps he thought that the Jewish religion was in decline, never to recover. In that sense, writing a secularized Greek version of the Old Testament, intended for a Roman audience, was a way to help his religion live on in some way. At least that’s my take on it.

This is a pretty good read, but I can’t say captivating. However, I do recommend it to people interested in a secular-ish look at the highlights of Judaism and early Christianity.

6/10

Thud Ridge

Broughton, J.

This is an account of the air war in Vietnam, as told in the late 1960s by F-105 pilot Colonel Jack Broughton -- it was recommended to me by other online jet airplane enthusiasts. For years I thought that the Republic F-105 Thunderchief was an awesomely cool airplane, so I just had to read this.  The casual observer would say that the F-105 was a bad airplane - so many were shot down - how could be anything but a bad airplane?

Well, it was an amazing airplane that could fly faster than anything at almost ground level - and that was while carrying bombs and extra fuel tanks hanging off its wings! And Broughton explains the craziness that the pilots were up against. Their job was to fly from Thailand into Vietnam, and up to the Hanoi area in the north, and drop bombs on targets protected better than anywhere in the world up to that time. They faced the best surface-to-air missiles (SAMs) that the Russians had, the best rapid-fire and radar-controlled anti-aircraft (AA) cannons the Russians and Chinese had, and the best interceptor fighters that the Russians had.

As if that weren’t bad enough, the US Air Force (and government) leaders insisted that they NOT bomb or shoot the MiG-21s on the ground (only if they were in the air). If the AA or SAMs were in designated “safe” areas, you couldn’t touch them. Worse, the leadership insisted that they go back immediately to the same targets to ensure their destruction, taking away the element of surprise - in fact, allowing their adversaries to anticipate their routes. If a pilot bombed one of these “unauthorized targets” he could expect a court martial. Broughton describes all of this in his book, and probably took a lot of heat over it. But you could hardly blame him, as good pilots were being shot at and killed, and good airplanes were being lost at an alarming rate. 

From my perspective, the Air Force leadership was staffed in part by world war 2 veterans whose plan was to overwhelm the enemy with airplanes and bombs - which worked well back then, when there were an infinite number of airplanes and pilots to churn through. But in Korea, and more so in Vietnam, the supply of pilots was not inexhaustible - there were far fewer in the pipeline, and they took much longer to train. And the airplanes were far more complex and expensive than ever before, and they only had so many. It was a lose-lose-lose proposition, especially for the people in harm’s way. (And the sad thing is that the leadership wouldn’t listen to their feedback on what was going wrong!)

Broughton talks us through all this with his prejudices laid bare. For example, he thought high-flying bomber pilots had a tough time burning their fingers reaching for the coffee pot on their missions. He thought that the enemy MiG pilots may not have been their best, as their tactics seemed less than what their airplanes could manage. Not that they weren’t dangerous; they were, but should have been much more effective. He talks about the tremendous talent and bravery of many of his pilot colleagues - but also mentions some who were perhaps a little opposite - but there weren’t many of those. In the end, he loved his airplane, and thought that if the leadership were in tune with the reality on the ground (and in the air), they could have accomplished so much more. 

The book was well written, and filled with all sorts of detail on the pilots, the airplanes, the leadership and above all, the missions they flew. He carried a tape recorder in his airplane to more accurately debrief his missions, and leverage that in the book, which added a captivating amount of detail and energy into his mission descriptions. A great read for a fighter pilot, and for fans of big fast jet airplanes!

8/10

Yes, More Books...

I'll cover a couple here, my two most recent:

Battleship Sailor, by Mason, T.

A captivating read about a young American who joins the US Navy a year before Pearl Harbor, experiencing the last year of the “battleship navy” - a time when battleships were considered the backbone of any and all navies of the world. (Well, the Japanese and the British were starting to figure that out.) The climax of that line of thinking comes to a crescendo at the end of the book - but it’s mostly about a young guy making friends, learning about the navy, enjoying “liberty”, learning how to handle himself in a barroom brawl, and growing up in the US Navy in 1940 through 1941. The book is filled with anecdotes foreshadowing the events of December 7th, 1941, including the death of several friends, his best friend among them, and his feeling towards many officers, who failed him and his mates on that fateful day. It is well written and engaging throughout; I'll be ordering his follow-up book at some point.

Recommended for people interested in that time and place in history.

7/10

Tale of a Guinea Pig, by Page, G.

The memoirs of a WW2 fighter pilot in the RAF. The title is a tell of his unwilling participation in the burn recovery wards in British hospitals that ramped up at the beginning of the conflict. Not that there was anything wrong with those treatments - they were cutting edge, and on the whole, very successful. In fact, the best plastic surgeons in the British Isles were assigned to these efforts. However, from the perspective of someone who was horribly burned, his first-hand knowledge of the pain involved - in both the healing process, and the surgeries that gave them back varying degrees of normal appearances - gave the ‘guinea pig’ term a definitely significant meaning. The first half of the book covers his entry into the RAF, and his first successes in the air; that ends with an ill-fated mission using questionable tactics (not his) that got him shot down. The unprotected fuel tank right in front of the pilot in the Hurricane fighter plane was blamed (by the author) as the cause of his anguish. A great deal of detail regarding his burn treatments and many surgeries follows, naturally. He does recover for the most part, becomes triple ace, and gets promoted to Wing Commander - no doubt due to his survivability, enhanced in no small part by his down time in the various burn wards. The book has its slow parts, but there are more than a few very descriptive and exciting flying scenes that would appeal to many with those interests. Interestingly (mildly), he ends up marrying the daughter of Nigel Bruce, the actor who played the bumbling Dr. Watson in the old Sherlock Holmes movies in the 1940s.

6/10

And another one: Xenophon's Expedition of Cyrus

The Expedition of Cyrus

Xenophon

I decided to pick this one up for two reasons - first, I was told by my friend Kevin that Greek writer Xenophon wrote about the times of the book of Daniel (actually another Xenophon book - Cyropaedia); then I was told that another book I was reading (the Lost Fleet series) was based on the ‘expedition of the 10,000’ - which is this one, The Expedition of Cyrus… so I just had to read it…

This is the story of a group of Greek mercenaries that agreed to help a Persian prince, named Cyrus to overthrow his older brother - King Artaxerxes II - the current king of the Persian empire, around 400 BC. This is the vast and powerful empire that came to prominence after swallowing up the Babylonian empire under a previous Cyrus, Cyrus the Great, about 140 years earlier. (Well, they were a pretty big deal before that, but became a really big deal then…)

The story starts with Cyrus misleading the Greeks about the true objective - first, he tells them that they’ll be putting down a revolt in Anatolia, but he pays them well, and promises more. By the time Cyrus and the Greeks advance into the middle east, everyone in the army knows that the goal is to fight the Persian king’s army at Babylon. But they all agree, based on Cyrus’ promise of more riches. His reputation and record showed that he was reliable, so that’s why they agreed.

The Persian army was vast, and much larger than Cyrus’ army. Cyrus commanded the 10,000 Greeks (all infantry), as well as a larger number of Persians loyal to Cyrus (20,000+). Artaxerxes’ army numbered about 40,000, but may have been much larger. So they fought at the battle of Cunaxa.

The Greeks on the left put the Persians to flight, which opened up the center somewhat. Cyrus, seeing his brother directly in front of him, brashly attacked and wounded him, but in his reckless eagerness, took a spear to the head, and the battle was over. There was ambiguity concerning the results, though; Artaxerxes insisting that he was the victor, having killed Cyrus, and the Greeks insisting that they won because they dominated the battlefield.

In the end, refusing to surrender, the Greeks marched north to retreat, realizing that they could not go back the way they came (the southern route), because they would starve. They also realized that they would have to endure a fighting retreat no matter which way they went. All this is covered in the first chapter of seven, so the story is really about the retreat.

Artaxerxes’ army hounded the Greeks as they marched north - they had to manage a fighting retreat, while looking for provisions, for a marching army in 400 BC couldn’t carry much food and water (for 10,000 mouths…). The Greek army found that they were at a disadvantage - the enemy always had cavalry, and they didn’t; the enemy always had archers and sling throwers, and they didn’t. So early on in the retreat, they had to muster horses and weapons for archers, and to convert some small amount of infantry to cavalry (about 50) and archers and slingers (about 200). Those numbers couldn’t compare to the enemy, but could and did make a difference in their fighting abilities.

At one point, Artaxerxes asked the Greeks for a truce for the purposes of a conference, inviting the Greek leaders and company commanders. It was a ruse, they were all killed, leaving the Greek army with no leadership. However, the Greeks quickly elected new leaders, and Xenophon became a major player at this time. Before this, he was just along for the ride.

After out-running the Persian army in their northern retreat, the Greeks came upon many different areas with their own armies, loyal to the Persian king. As soon as they were able to win a battle and get on the move, another group would be ready to fight them. No group wanted an army of 10,000 to go through their territory, as that army would have to feed itself on local resources. So the locals always fought. (almost always)

The Greeks suffered from a lack of provisions, hazardous, often mountainous terrain, and winter snows, all while fighting their way north. Attrition played a role, slowly whittling away from the initial 10,000. Making matters worse, internal squabbling always threatened the discipline of the Greek army (an army like the Greeks could fight effectively, and indeed survive only with discipline).

Eventually the Greeks were able to fight their way to the coast of the Black Sea (a.k.a. the Euxine), where there were many Greek colony cities. They shouted “The sea! The sea!!” - thinking that their troubles were over. Alas, they weren’t. It all comes down to the cost of provisioning an army of 10,000 (maybe 8,000 at this point) - whether in enemy territory or in friendly territory.

The journey along the south coast of the Black Sea was no less arduous than the march north - in some ways worse, since discipline started to break down, which affected their ability to get help (in the form of provisions) from what should have been friendly coastal cities. So, often they were forced to march south from the sea to forage (steal) food, which resulted in more fighting, and more attrition - some of it unnecessary. 

In the end, Xenophon gets the army back to where it started in western Anatolia, where a Spartan commander took it over, adding it to his Greek army, to make war on the Persian allies in that region.

While the reader is meant to feel that the Greek army were the protagonists in the narrative (for the most part), one must keep in mind that this was a mercenary army that needed to sustain itself along its whole journey. They were pretty much unwelcome everywhere they went. If you’re interested in ancient history, I would definitely recommend this book.

7/10

And another book: Master and Commander

 This one's a lot more recent - about a month ago. Already have the next book in the series...

Master and Commander

by P. O'Brian

I decided to read this because I loved the movie Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World. And because I loved the Hornblower series of books (and of course the movie Captain Horatio Hornblower R.N.). The book starts much earlier than the movie, and the main protagonist, Captain Aubrey, is as imposing a presence as Russel Crowe is physically, however much heavier… The book was hard to start, with all of the 18-19th century nautical terminology, but got easier as I got along in it. Although a very serious book, it is peppered with the humor one would expect to find in the company of men at sea… “Pray watch the beam. I must beg your indulgence for the smell: it is probably young Babbington here.” “[Our ship could go faster if the convoy we were escorting weren’t] determined to travel very slowly until full daylight, no doubt for fear of tripping over the lines of longitude.” As the ship;s surgeon anticipates a new voyage - “It is a great while since I felt the grind of bone under my saw, he added, smiling with anticipation.” “The senior post captains here [were shrivelled men], (shrivelled in essence: alas, not in belly).” - and many more. 

Make no mistake though, this is a serious book, very entertaining, with lots of action, as well as slower-moving at-sea and on-shore passages that are less action-packed, but no less interesting. The dialogue and description very convincingly place the reader into the Mediterranean Sea, at the very start of the 19th century. One might think that it was written in 1805 rather than in 1970. And while a work of fiction, the narrative holds very true to the events of the day. Even better, it nicely sets up the sequel, which is now high on my “up next” list.

8/10