January book notes

It is really hard to go back over a years worth of reading and give the January books the same attention that the most recent books get so here is a one month set of book notes.  January is a good reading book and I hope you have had some good reading, but still got some great outdoors time.

1. Americans in Paris, Charles Glass is really outstanding history giving us insights into the very complex life in Paris when it was occupied by the Nazis.  First when the US was neutral and then when we were the enemy.  Paris is a complex city in any time, but never more so than in this period.
2. Old Man River by Paul Schneider.  This was an excellent book on the Mississippi River.  It blended old tried and true stories with personal observations and gave an excellent look at this complex geographic location called the Mississippi. 
3. The Trail to Seven Pines, Louis L'Amour.  One of four Hopalong Cassidy novels that L'Amour did.  It is well paced, captures my old hero, but with more edge and excitement and satisfied all my love of westerns.
4. Unfathomable City, Soluit and Snedeker.  Actually a combination of essays, each with a map of New Orleans looking at the layers of the old and eccentric city.  I loved the beginning half and the last chapter, but got lost in a series of essays that were too esoteric for my taste or it would have been number one on the list.  Very well written and the maps are a unique and effect support to most of the essays.
5. Dirt by David Montgomery is a look at the basic building block of all continents and life on earth.  It is the undervalued by lynchpin of our lives too, one we disregard too regularly.  We sacrificed topsoil down our rivers, substitute chemicals and artificial GMOs for the historic organic basis of life.
6. Eighty Days by Matthew Goodman follows the around the world race of Nellie Bly and Elizabeth Bisland.  It is a look at two women who do an amazing travel adventure.  The loser, as is the American tradition does not get the recognition she deserves, but in fact comes out the better in life itself.  It is a time when Jules Verne's Around the World in 80 Days set the standard, even though fictitious for world travel.  A very enjoyable read.
7. Madam by Cari Lynn and Kellie Martin is the story of Storyville in New Orleans.  It is a fictitious story in that the authors have to create a narrative that fits between the blank spots in the information that is available about this experiment in legalized, but controlled prostitution.  The characters are reall and the history that the novel exposes is fascinating.
8. Bull River by Robert Knott is a continuation of the Virgil Cole and Everett Hitch westerns of Robert Parker.  Good characters, the black and white west is crisscrossed by characters who are sure of their decisions, but constantly in the gray zone between good and bad.
9. Catch Me by Lisa Gardner is a very good police thriller.  It is about the thin line between police and vigilante, the dangers of on-line trolling for underage victims and gives good suspense with some real red flags for people to consider.
10. Cooperstown Confidential is the story of baseball Hall of Fame, but not the bio of those who get in, rather the politics of induction.  The choices that were made that should not have been made and the  very human aspect of HOF decisions. 
11. Red Planet Blues by Robert Sawyer was a genre buster for me.  I am not a SciFi fan, but this mix of Sci FI and detective was well done and well paced.  
12. The Persuader by Lee Childs is a Reacher Novel.  I read out of curiosity. It is first and last.  A testosterone novel.  No suspense - he is too good and he is the narrator so he has to make it.

Eighty Days - Matthew Goodman

This is the story of a race around the world by two women in 1890, Nellie Bly, reporter for the New York World comes from poverty in Pittsburgh and makes a name as an investigative reporter.  Elizabeth Bisland comes from the deep south, daughter of a plantation owner in Louisiana who suffers the displacement of the Civil War and the loss of family fortune, she goes to New Orleans to begin her writing career and ends up in New York working for Cosmopolitan Magazine.  

Bly is sent East to circle the globe and with less than 24 hours notice Bisland is sent West as a competitor of Bly.  We see the world through these two travelers and the contrast in how they see the world is fascinating.  It is a comparison between a woman who hates England and finds everything about America better than anything else in the world with her competitor embracing and falling in love with Japan and eventually moving to England.

Jules Verne is visited by Nellie Bly and it is his fictitious character's Around the World In Eighty Days race that inspires this race.  So even though they are racing each other, the women are in fact racing a fictitious person.  It does show how literature can inspire.

The story is also about the place of women and their struggle to survive.  The attitude that women belong in the home and not in the workplace was prevalent in their lifetime - it still lingers in ours - and yet when the fathers die, the daughters are often the sole support of the widowed mother and these women have to create a home and care for their families.

There is a wonderful passage in Hong Kong where Elizabeth Bisland reflects on the speed of communications now that there is the telegraph.  Today we would be upset to think we had to send Morse code and wait for a response.  This and the travel accommodations help us contrast time periods.

The trip around the world is the same year as the Massacre at Wounded Knee, it is a time of rampant racism, and terrible treatment of works who are trying to strike for living wages.  Yet in the midst of this the race consumes the American Public, makes a celebrity of one woman, and disregards the efforts of the loser.

The book follows the two women to the ends of their lives and it is a stark contrast as their personalities might have suggested from the beginning.  Who really wins, who really loses?  That is something the public decides and even today we have not learned to appreciate the efforts of those who try but do not come in first.

Madam by Cari Lynn and Kellie Martin

When the book arrived in the mail I was both intrigued and a little hesitant.  I am not in to pornographic books, overt romantic novels, or overwrought tragedies - I need not have worried, the book is excellent and I only fear that the title and the wonderful photo of the actual Mary Deubler on the cover taken by the enigmatic Bellocq may not convey what the book really offers.

Long before Nevada legalized prostitution, New Orleans had Storyville - 1898 - 1917.  It was the creation of Sidney Story, a real-life crusader who thought that the way to clean up the prostitution and depravity of New Orleans was to designate an area - the District or the Tenderloin - names he preferred.  The result was the elimination of indiscriminate cribs all throughout the town and the legalizing of a business.

Storyville's full impact is not covered in this historic novel, only its beginnings.  Later there would be terrible deeds done within the district, but in the beginning it was actually a way for women who had very little choice in how they could earn a living to find a house and an income.

In this story the authors blend a lot of truth with enough fiction to hold it together as a story.  It portrays the depth of depravity that existed and the hopeless and helpless situation that many poor women faced, the cruelty of the men and the fact that those in power, as is true today, loved to make pronouncements in the public while engaging in the very acts they said they deplored.

I found myself constantly going back to the web to research the people and places that were mentioned in the book and have a much better appreciation for the work of the authors as a result.

The best of my 2014 reading

The list below is a personal one based on the random 120 books I read in 2013.  It was a good reading year and it is hard to pick the best since I remember the last books better than the first and I have read 6 more in 2014 which can't be included in this list - otherwise Americans in Paris by Charles Glass would have to be on the list and probably Old Man River by John Schneider.

Westerns
Among westerns the best I read in 2014 was Badlands by Richard Wheeler.  I loved two of the original Hopalong Cassidy novels written by Louie L'Amour - Trouble Shooter and The Rustlers of West Fork.  And I continue to love the series that was begun by Robert Parker featuring Virgil Cole and Everett Hitch which have been continued by Robert Knott continued the series in Iron Horse and I am pleased.

Sports
It was a good year for sports books - The Art of Fielding by Harbach, The Ghost Horse by Layden and The Old Ball Game by Deford were all books of great writing and excellent stories.  The first is the only fiction.

Science
The Age of Edison by Freeberg was an excellent look the shift from gas to electric.  It is hard to think of how the simple lightbulb could cause a nation to create a massive network of lines and connections, of interconnected electric services.  The bulb was great, but what could have succeeded if the electricity could not be delivered to the homes.  The second excellent book was the Emperor of all Maladies by Mukherjee that traces both the discovery and the treatments for cancer - it was frightening as well as enlightening.

Mystery and Thrillers
I am not much for the thrillers.  For example I find Reacher to be boring - he narrates the story, not much suspense about the fact that he will succeed.  It is just testosterone writing and it does entertain a lot.  This year I discovered Lehane and his Live by Night was excellent - his development of both place and person deepens the story telling.  C J Box has entertained me for years and Breaking Point and Highway were both well written.  Highway is frightening in many ways - the biggest image that stays with the reader is the number of worlds within the worlds exist and not just gangs and gangsters or terrorists and anarchists.  Inferno by Dan Brown was an amazingly quick read.  I guess I would have to get it a high grade based on the fact that it did not let me go until I finished.  Krueger's mysteries in Minnesota continue to entertain and Trickster Point continued the entertainment.  However, I am getting near the end of reading this series - Cork O'Connor is a wonderful character, but it is getting to be too far beyond acceptance that the mysteries and danger continues to be so personal.  A Fistful of Dollars by Spencer Quinn continues to provide me with laughs from my favorite dog detective, but like Krueger and other series it starts to get too familiar and I will be interested in the next book and whether it will be the last I read.  On the other hand I read The Valley of Fear by Doyle again for the ??? time and it is still the writing of the master.  There is no better.

Biography and memoir
Let Me Finish by Roger Angell is a wonderful memoir by one of the great baseball writers, The Man From Clear Lake by Christoferson is the biography of Gaylord Nelson - father of Earth Day and the greatest environmental Senator we have had.  Grant and Twain and Grant and Sherman continue to explore the complex life of this iconic General and president.  The Thunderbolt Kid by Bryson is the funniest of memoirs and The Wizard explores one of our greatest inventors and electrical innovators - Tesla and puts him much higher on my list of great thinkers, scientists, inventors.   Short Nights of the Shadow Catcher follows the life of Curtis and his amazing photographic adventures to record the American Indian in place and culture.  Home to the Wilderness is an old memoir by Sally Carrighar and we forget how influential her words were in speaking to our environmental Conscience.  But number one would be On a Farther Shore by Souder - the biography of Rachal Carson.

History
The Hour of Peril by Stashower was a surprise.  First I never heard of this plot to assassinate Lincoln, but second because it was spell binding and even knowing that Lincoln would not be assassinated it was still a tense read. The Children's Blizzard was a tragic weather event in the Dakota's and all of us who know what winter really is can not help be be caught up in this narrative. In the Footsteps of Little Crow is essential to MN history as well as the history of the western Indian Wars while A Chain of Thunder is a fictional story of Vicksburg that really captures the tragedy of this encounter.  I loved all the details of the New Madrid Earthquake in A Chain of Thunder and Bataan the March of Death leaves you feeling frustrated with the cruelty of humankind and the strength of humankind and the fruitlessness of wars.

Adventure
A Father's Odyssey by Hitchcock - running daily marathons from MN to Atlanta was moving and emphasizes the cause of single parents, but the writing was not as compelling as the less well motivated Paris To the Pyrenees that chronicled one of lessor known pilgrimages across France.  The couple was fun, but not people I would want to walk with.  It was my favorite book in this category this year.  I read three books on walking the Appalachian Trail and AWOL on the Appalachian Trail was my favorite.  Canoeing the Congo was good but I really wanted more about the canoeing.  What may surprise is that Lost and Found on the Pacific Crest Trail which was a best seller was not one I particularly liked.

Environmental
Toms River by Fagin is a classic already.  Covering the chemical plant that takes over a town by offering jobs and then holds the town hostage while it ravages the rivers, ground water, and air is too familiar.  It is playing out now in the battle over the Sulfide Mining near the Boundary Waters.  Jobs, money is the cry, but devastation and finally financial ruin is the reality.   Shadows on the Gulf by Jacobson and The Great Deluge by Brinckley are outstanding looks at the issues at the end of the Mississippi.  I just wish Brinkley would be a little less wordy.  American Canopy by Rutkin, Mycophilia by Bone, and The Town that Food Saved by Hewitt were also entertaining and enlightening books this year.

Novels
Andrew's Brain by Doctorow is a fascinating trip looking out from someone else's brain and a brain that is a little warped too. Paris by Rutherford is a history of the most intriguing city in the world and my favorite novel of the year while Songlines by Chatwin was an intriguing look at the musical trails that guide the Aborigines across Australia and The Man in the Basement by Mosely was the strangest set up for a novel this year - a guilt ridden white man seeks to be locked up in the basement of a black man - imagine the complications this can have.

Poetry
Only two books of Poetry this year - Tin Flag by my favorite poet and humerous - Louis Jenkins and a peaceful combination of poetry and photos - Conversations by Clem and Elizabeth Nagel.

Americans in Paris by Charles Glass

Paris is the city of light, the literary capital of the western world, a gathering place, a place of love and yet for one dark period it was an occupied city with the bleak flags of the Nazi horror fluttering from every post and building and the sound of the Jackboot replacing the light murmur of the streets.  The city was saved because it declared no resistance and we all better off because of that.

But the people suffered from lack of heat, lack of food, lack of freedom and life in occupied places is not pleasant for anyone.  The potential knock on the door, the Gestapo and all the other horrid institutions of intimidation were always there and a neighbor might choose to turn you in for false reasons just because they are angry at you.

But this is only a story of the French in that it is there city and their institutions and their battle, instead it is the story of the Americans who lived there and chose to stay for the occupation.  In the beginning, America was not in the war so they were not subject to the ill treatment of the French, and especially the Jews and the minorities.

The cast of people is a fascinating combination of shopkeepers, doctors, actress, businessmen who each played a significant role in the drama.  We follow a businessman who is so intrigued by his own genius that he is happy to pursue his ideas with anyone who has the power in cash and so he becomes involved with the Nazis as easily as the British, French and Americans he has previously worked with.  Even after the US enters the war and the Americans are captured and put in controlled structures within the controlled city.

There is the couple who saves the American Hospital and the American Library, but has no time for the resistance movement.  We meet the owner of the Shakespeare bookstore who has been a friend of Hemingway, Joyce and numerous other important literary figures – Hemingway even makes an appearance at the beginning and the end.

Doctor Jackson and his family save lives in the hospital and also save pilots through an underground railroad that gets many American fighters out of France, but ultimately all of his family will be sent to prison camp and in a terrible irony die when the British blow up three ships that are filled with prisoners shortly before the war ends.

And then there is the story of the black pilot who had to fly for the French because the Americans prejudice was so great.   He saw how the American’s forced the French to remove Africans from their ranks and refused to allow blacks to walk in the victory parade through Paris – a city that did not share these terrible racial traits – traits that were more in line with the Nazis.  In the city of enlightenment it was obvious that the great American Nation stilled needed its own enlightenment in this area and that would be the next big chapter in American history.

The Man From Clear Lake by Bill Christofferson

The man is Gaylord Nelson, the greatest environmental politician we have ever had, the founder of Earth Day, the author of numerous environmental bills, the Governor of WI who saved more land for the future than any other Governor, and the Chairman of the Wilderness Society.

This is a look at the mans entire life with great insights into the value of growing up in a small rural WI community with parents who were educated, involved, and ethical.  The author does a good job of portraying the man who was nicknamed Happy as a youth and continued to earn that moniker throughout life even as he worked against the challenges that were destroying our environment and resources.

Earth Day was an expression of his love of the Earth and its natural beauty, but more important it was an outlet for millions of people who shared his love and concern.  Describing the Earth day rally in the Chicago Tribune – side by side photos during and after the demonstration, the paper wrote with astonishment, “When the demonstrators left there was no post-rally litter remaining to be cleaned up.”

He recognized the conscience of the American mind, the fact that we had grown as a nation in natural beauty and natural abundance.  His call for a day to raise the political will to protect the environment included every age.  “The National Education Association estimated that ten million public school children took part in Earth Day Programs.”

The day had its detractors, just as we see Koch and others of the Tea Party ilk attacking parks and greenways - the true peoples places - Time magazine wrote that the day “had aspects of a secular, almost pagan holiday.”  Unwittingly this would plague the environmental cause with a “pagan” stigma that would be latched onto by some critics.  But it was not religion and religious leaders with a true sense of creation joined in the day and celebrations.

Gaylord Nelson delivered a speech on a four day tour that included this statement: “This is not just an issue of survival.   Mere survival is not enough.  How we survive is the critical issue…Our goal is not just an environment of clean air, and water, and scenic beauty – while forgetting about the Appalachias and the ghettoes where citizens live in America’s worst environment…Our goal is an environment of decency, quality, and mutual respect for all other human creatures, and all other living creatures – an environment in the deepest and broadest sense.”

His ideas were not new - John Muir, Theodore Roosevelt, Emerson, Thoreau, Rachel Carson, Aldo Leopold and many others had been expressing similar sentiments, but Gaylord had put himself in the political position to do something about these concerns and to answer the question raised in 1873 by Wisconsin Chief Justice Edward G Ryan at a University of Wisconsin commencement said, “Which shall rule – wealth of man; which shall lead – money or intellect; who shall fill public stations – educated and patriotic free men, of the feudal serfs of corporate capital?”

The author spends the majority of life in the political decades that defined Nelson, but he also gave us an intimate look at Gaylord and his buddies in Clear Lake: “Gaylord and Sherman were up in Clyde Jones’s apple tree one night, stealing apples, when Jones came out and turned on the light “so you can see better,” then went back inside while the embarrassed would-be thieves ran off.”

We can also see the man who was eloquent in the Senate and the Governors office as a less polished speaker in his young adulthood.  “…on a walk along Willow Drive on the U.W. campus.  Gaylord shifted from one foot to the other, finally pulled out a ring with a small diamond in an exquisite rosette setting, and said, ‘Here, my mother wanted me to give this to you.’

“’He didn’t say I love you and want to marry you, nor did he drop to his knees, but it was assumed that somewhere along the way that ring would join a band of a different sort,’ Carrie Lee recalled.  She called it the classic Scandinavian approach: ‘If you think it, then the other person is supposed to know and already imagine that you said it.’  At a party for their fiftieth wedding anniversary, Nelson joked about the Norwegian who told his cousin, ‘You know, I love Amanda so much that sometimes it is all I can do to keep from telling her.’”

It is difficult to summarize his life.   Like Theodore Roosevelt, he was a politician for the environment and he knew how to get things done.  But unlike Roosevelt, he was not captivated by the manly art of war and the Vietnam crisis was another time that tested his strength of character and his need to say what was right even it if was not popular.

Edmund Muskie was a leading environmental politician and friend and he shared friendships with other senators - Russell Long, Hubert Humphrey, Walter Mondale.  In fact, despite disagreements, he might have been the most popular Senator on the hill - at least with other Senators who enjoyed the conviviality of his home, the welcome of his wife Carrie Lee, and the stimulation of good debate out of the public eye.

If Earth Day is the thing that will forever be his signature, perhaps if is fitting to end this summary with this is the ad that was run in the New York Times in 1970 for the first Earth Day.

"A disease has infected our country.  It has brought smog to Yosemite, dumped garbage in the Hudson, sprayed DDT in our food, and left cities in decay.  Its carrier is men.

"Earth Day is a commitment to make life better, not just bigger and faster; to provide real rather than rhetorical solutions.  It is a day to re-examine the ethic of individual progress at mankind's expense.  It is a day to challenge the corporate and governmental leaders who promise change, but who shortchange the necessary programs.  It is a day for looking beyond tomorrow.  April 22 seeks a future worth living.  April 22 seeks a future."

Toms River: A Story of Science and Salvation

Toms River: A Story of Science and Salvation  by Dan Fagin  Review posted in Goodreads 

Mike Link's review 

Nov 12, 13  ·  edit

5 of 5 stars

Read in November, 2013

Toms River is essential reading for those who care about health, the environment, and the frustration and rights of those injured by industrial hubris. As a professor of Environmental History I would consider this a book that is essential reading.

Like Love Canal and other incidents around the world - Bhopal for instance which was caused by the same industry and same business, we find the rights of the individual trampled in the rush for jobs and economic salvation.

Of course short term gains in economic growth and jobs is often offset by long term loss - in this case destruction of ground water, cancer in the citizens who are caught unawares because state agencies that are supposed to monitor health and environmental issues are appointed by politicians who are beholding to the donations and lobbyists of industry.

Like Erin Brockovich and Lois Gibbs, we can now add the persistent Linda Gillick the pantheon of environmental heroes who stood up to ridicule, the callous who think that cancer is their problem, chambers of commerce, and corporation lawyers to fight for a cause that is more important than all the "good" the company does.

In the end, politics and agencies fail us and we continue with issues like global warming and severe storms, big issues that we as individuals cannot control, but have to endure, not getting the will of the public and the investment needed.

Companies like Ciba-Geigy who created the chemical plant and problems in Toms River change their names to Novartis and move to other places like India and China where regulations are lax and the story does not go away, it just shifts location.

Employees fear for jobs and income - a serious concern - and fight for the company only to find that the company will not fight for them when their own health concerns arise.

The author did amazing research and documentation. He keeps himself and his opinions out of the text and lets the story and complexities play out in a fascinating account that is spell binding and as intriguing as any fictional thriller.

But of course, unlike the fictional thriller, there is not final resolution that will be satisfying, no kick butt public humiliation of the executives - just the reality that we each have a responsibility to act, to support those who are working for the right causes, and to be aware that there are complex issues which take time and some good researchers and lawyers to help us solve.

A highly readable and excellent book.

Trickster's Point - Krueger

This was one of my favorites in the series. I am getting a ready for the plot to stop being directly about threats to Cork and his family, but that is my only objection.

What makes this story so interesting is the constant development of a back story that gives insights into Cork and his past, as well as, the strong Ojibwe connection.

The best of this series, for me, are the books that build on the traditional aspects of Anishanabe culture. Krueger is quickly becoming the Tony Hillerman of the northern tribes and it is a role that has grown with the development of the series.

The characters are realistic and the tension of the mystery blend well with the lives of the characters. Krueger has created people we care about.

In this case we are introduced to an old friend of Cork from his school days. This is the super person - the one who seems to do everything better than everyone else. Every school has a character like this, but seldom does that person continue to grow with his status - often high school becomes the peak of the life.

In this case the man is a success in every way, except in the personal ways that lead to a successful personal life to match his political and sports success.

We meet classmates of Cork and we are involved with complex life dramas that swirl around a murder and an attempted murder.

Best of all we are brought along to care about the individuals and we can groan and anguish over the fact that Cork is both the suspect and the target in the murder plot that comes together in the politics of the reservation, lake country and Minnesota.

Mycophilia - Eugenia Bone

I am delighted with this book.  I have to admit I got it, started to read and thought - this is more than I want to know about fungus.  But luckily I picked it up again and I found it really was not more than I wanted to know.

It is a book of stories and the stories are told well and are both interesting and factual.  It is like an oral tradition of fungus - a look at lessons and ideas through well told stories.

I loved the telling.  Sometimes I found sections that were of less interest and skimmed them a little quicker, but still found great gems within them.

It made me wonder about wonder how her husband really responded to this obsession with fungus, but otherwise it was a romp.

We traveled places that were fun, met people who were interested and participated in a world I am not interested in being part of, but a world I am interested in.

The kooks were mixed with the scientists, the places and the mushrooms were fascinating and it was a book that I found pleasing in all ways.

Bibliophilia meets mycophilia.

Sample Quotes that I enjoyed:
"There are two types of cheeses that benefit from saprophytic mold. Blue cheeses like Gorgonzola and Roquefort utilize Penicillium roqueforti. The curd is inoculated with the mold, which then grows throughout the cheese, adding flavor and fragrance. Camembert and brie-type cheeses are ripened with P. camemberti. The mold creates teh thick white rind and digests the milk proteins - that's what creates eh silky mouthfeel."

"Sometimes, when two different mycelia [the thread like material that is the real fungus] from the same species encounter each other, they don't fuse but rather become hostile and compete for resources. Individual fungi can communicate with each other via pheromones, the secreted chemicals that trigger social reactions in animals, plants, and fungi. If they recognize a competitor, they can inject toxic chemicals into the substrate in order to repulse competitive species. They can even invade a competing fungus and such dry its hyphae of nutrients."

"A Japanese study looking to reproduce a phenomenon observed in the field, that shiitake mushrooms fruited prolifically after the ground had been hit by lightning, has found that exposing the substrate of various species of fungi to an electrical charge of 50,000 - 100,000 volts for one 0-millionth of a second will double the volume of fruiting. This may be an evolutionary adaptation. Because lightning poses a survival hazard and may deliver a dead tree for dinner, it leads to accelerated fruiting."

"Fungi are organisms that comprise their own kingdom of life, equal in complexity to animals and plants. There are an estimated 1.5 million species, second only to insects in number and diversity, and only 5 percent of them have been identified. Fungi outnumber plants by a ratio of 6 - 1 and make up 25 percent of Earth's biomass. The biggest single living organism on Earth is a fungus. it is 2,200 acres in size weighs 6,286 tons and lives in the Malheur National Forest in the Blue Mountains of Eastern Oregon. Some fungi are so tiny they live between the cells of other organisms. The first terrestrial creatures may have been fungi, and they are more closely related to us, evolutionarily speaking, than they are to plants."