Category: Books

River of Doubt: Theodore Roosevelt’s Darkest Journey by Candice Millard

River of Doubt: Theodore Roosevelt’s Darkest Journey by Candice Millard

Posted on by Jack

I enjoyed The River of Doubt: Theodore Roosevelt’s Darkest Journey by Candice Millard. It thought it might be interesting as I enjoy reading about little known historical events but this book was much more.

The trip started out as a sort of photo-op adventure tour in the wilds of South America to occupy and satisfy former President Theodore Roosevelt after he lost his attempt as a third party candidate to oust President Taft in 1912. For those unfamiliar with the election: Wilson (the Democratic nominee) won; Roosevelt came in second; and Taft (the Republican nominee ) came in third.

Before starting this adventure tour, Roosevelt journeyed to South America and was convinced to make this a real journey of exploration. In partnership with a Brazilian officer, Roosevelt led a small group of men on this hazardous expedition. This small group included Theodore Roosevelt’s son Kermit. Both Theodore and Kermit Roosevelt were ill during the journey and risked their lives as they shared the hardships and work with the rest of the group. In fact, the former President came very close to death.

It amazed me that although I knew both Roosevelts would survive the trip, there was a very real sense of suspense during the river journey. I believe this is due to Candice Millard’s superb writing skills.

My backstory here is that I found this book accidentally. I had just finished a book about President Cleveland and in a discussion of medical care, the shoddy medical care of President Garfield which resulted in his death was mentioned. I saw an excellent review of a recent book by Candice Millard on James Garfield and while I was requesting that one from the library noticed she had published The River of Doubt a few years back. I requested both books but the older one came in first so I read it and was very pleased with it. So now I am looking forward to reading Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President when I get my copy from the library.

The President Is a Sick Man by Matthew Algeo

The President Is a Sick Man by Matthew Algeo

Posted on by Jack

No. It is not the current president or a recent past president. I’m sure there are many people who would think this title is one of the many political hatchet jobs that have been published in the last few years. But the full title The President Is a Sick Man: Wherein the Supposedly Virtuous Grover Cleveland Survives a Secret Surgery at Sea and Vilifies the Courageous Newspaperman Who Dared Expose the Truth makes it clear that this is not about a recent president at all and there is certainly more to it than the usual political hatchet job.

The President is Grover Cleveland, the year is 1893, the country faces a financial crisis and there is some secret stuff going on. Cancer is not spoken off in polite society and a president with cancer would be severely weakened politically at a crucial time. President Grover Cleveland has cancer. So the While House just lied.

This is the story of the event and a cover-up lasting for nearly a quarter century. And, of course, the reporter who broke the story in 1893 was believed to be a liar. (Since the President is an honest man.) Matthew Algeo is a reporter and covers this little-known historical event well, putting things in the context of the times and issues and making the story interesting.

The asides are interesting too. President Cleveland had excellent medical care but this seems to be an exception. President today have very good care but that has not been the case for much of our history. I learned in school that President Garfield was shot and died of the resulting infection. The part you don’t learn in school is that the wounds were not fatal but the infection probably resulted from his medical care. Other presidents had doctors picked for political or social reason. Some were good enough but some were really incompetent. The Baby Ruth candy bar is often said to be named for President Cleveland’s daughter Ruth but that does not seem to be the case. I found the background on newpapers of the day fascinating.

The author addresses differences between journalism and newspapers of the 19th century and today’s journalists and media. This a completely enjoyable book. I highly recommend it.

The Help: good movie and good book

The Help: good movie and good book

Posted on by Jack

A few days ago, I went to see the movie version of The Help. My wife had read the book by Kathryn Stockett on which that the movie was based and said it was a good book and she hoped the movie was as good. I wasn’t so sure about being a good movie, but went anyway. We got there early as we expected a big crowd. Unfortunately, that meant 20 minutes previewing movies that did not interest me and watching advertisements which were of even less interest. The movie started and didn’t look promising. I was worried and just hoped I didn’t start snoring loud enough to disturb those around me. But after a few minutes I was completely taken by the movie.

I am told it was a good book and there is a long waiting list at the library for it. So if you are in any hurry to read “The Help” by Kathryn Stockett, you might want to check at Amazon to see how much the paperback or Kindle edition will cost. Come to think of it, you might want to buy more books there to take advantage of the free shipping.

Independence: The Struggle to Set America Free by John Ferling

Independence: The Struggle to Set America Free by John Ferling

Posted on by Jack

I’ve been reading Independence: The Struggle to Set America Free by John Ferling for a few weeks now. For me, nonfiction goes much slower than fiction and that has its advantages and disadvantages.

The book focuses on the years leading up to the Declaration of Independence. The author is a historian known for his expertise in the American Revolutionary era and several previous books have shown that he knows how to tell the story well. Concentration of this relatively short period of a few years allows the author to tell the story in some detail and explain well both the English desire to control a part of their empire and the change as the colonists and Continental Congress progressed from just wanting their rights as Englishmen to the realization that independence was neccessary.

Of course, not everyone made that jump, and those that did, moved a very different rates. I very much enjoyed reading about the interactions of the members who moved from their uncertain prospects to the founding a successful republic and highly recommend this book for those who would like more insight into this era.

The Little Book of Economics by Greg Ip

The Little Book of Economics by Greg Ip

Posted on by Jack

The Little Book of Economics by Greg Ip is part of the same series as my previous review. I enjoyed the book. It is well written and covers many topics of interest in today’s world where understanding economics is so important. This is not an introductory text book in economics but rather a simplified guide to how economics works in the real world. Greg Ip is a respected financial journalist and he knows how to make the complex economy understandable.

Little Book of Alternative Investments and humor

Little Book of Alternative Investments and humor

Posted on by Jack

The Little Book of Alternative Investments: Reaping Rewards by Daring to be Different by Ben Stein and Phil DeMuth is indeed a little book. It is about 250 page but those pages are little – a bit less 5 by 7 inches according to my ruler.

I have enjoyed several books in this Little Book, Big Profit series. Of course, Ben Stein is not only an economist but a humorist (among his many talents) and for those of us who enjoy his humor, this is a wonderful new addtion to the series. Not only do Stein and DeMuth explain the world of alternative investments beyond the standard stock/bond portfolio in an extemely clear way but they add a touch of humor to make the economic lessons entertaining.

They propose looking at an entire portfolio in terms of risk. And discuss adding alternatives to your portfolio to decrease risk and add a bit of return as well. They also discuss several stategies used to decrease risk and suggest cheaper alternatives. And strategies that are unlikely to work for most of us. Learn about commodities, collectibles, real estate, hedge funds, and more and how they could fit into your portfolio or NOT. Who knew there were so many hedge fund types? Read this book and you may decide to check out more in the series.

In the Garden of Beasts by Erik Larson

In the Garden of Beasts by Erik Larson

Posted on by Jack

I finished reading In the Garden of Beasts: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler’s Berlin by Erik Larson while on a trip last weekend.

A mild mannered history professor, a free spirited daughter, Nazis, Russian spys – what’s not to like. As I said before, it is a wonderful book and I’d highly recommend it.

Reading Now: In the Garden of Beasts by Erik Larson

Reading Now: In the Garden of Beasts by Erik Larson

Posted on by Jack

I am now reading In the Garden of Beasts: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler’s Berlin by Erik Larson. I heard an interview with the author on NPR and was intrigued by the subject.


FDR had trouble finding someone to be our ambassador to Nazi Germany. The American consul general describes the Nazi government as a “danger to world peace” and adds that some members of the government are psychopaths “who would ordinarily be receiving treatment somewhere.” A mild mannered professor becomes the US ambassador to Nazi Germany after several others turn down the job. This is further complicated by his free-spirited daughter who admires the “New Germany”, enjoys elite society, and has a series of affairs including one with the head of the Gestopo and another with a Soviet spy. I’m only about a third through the book but I am completely enjoying it and learning quite a bit of history never covered in school.

New York: The Novel by Edward Rutherfurd

New York: The Novel by Edward Rutherfurd

Posted on by Jack

New York: The Novel by Edward Rutherfurd.


I read this one awhile back and just noticed it while browsing in Borders. It is a wonderful historical fiction about New York City. Follows several families across multiple generations to tell the story of NY City from Dutch days to the present.

I’ve read several novels by Edward Rutherfurd and generally they are long but quite enjoyable and are well worth the time it takes to read a longer book.

You might want to have a look at Edward Rutherfurd’s page at Amazon

Tabloid City by Pete Hamill, a thriller of New York City

Tabloid City by Pete Hamill, a thriller of New York City

Posted on by Jack

Tabloid City has a double murder, a terrorist, a dying newspaper, financial fraud, New York, the Lipstick building, the Chelsea hotel, and more stuff. Well, it’s a thiller and it’s complicated and Pete Hamill tells the stories well and moves among them with apparent ease and ties them together into a bigger story about New York City. And nobody is better than Pete Hamill in writing about New York.


The stories are told in brief, sometimes very brief, snippets. When he moves on to the next story, I often missed the story he just left as I wanted to know more, but usually that feeling didn’t last more than a few sentences as you were pulled into the next story. I highly recommend this book to the Pete Hamill fan. If you are not a fan but think you might be interested in his writing, this is a great way to start. The book is only 280 pages and it moves quickly so it really doesn’t seem that long. As you move about with several characters you get a lot about the city as it is now but also a flavor of the New York City of a generation or two back. So all you have to lose is spending several hours with a good book. And if you like the New York City history aspect of Hamill’s writing I suggest Forever as your next Pete Hamill book.

I like Pete Hamill’s writing. I usually don’t finish books I don’t like and so I don’t review them. And if you’ve browsed through this blog, you may have noticed several reviews of Pete Hamill’s work. I also like New York and I think the 2 things are related.

In my review I don’t like to tell too much of the story because I think it may diminish the pleasure or reading the book. On the other hand if the reviewer doesn’t say enough you may not be interested and will definitely miss the pleasures of the book. So if you like a longer review, here is a good one by the Women of Mystery. I completely agreed with the review and since they are mystery writers from the New York City area, their opinions about this New York City thriller are well worth reading.

The Fifth Witness by Michael Connelly

The Fifth Witness by Michael Connelly

Posted on by Jack

The Fifth Witness by Michael Connelly may be the best in the Lincoln Lawyer series but I can’t say that. It may be, but I’m not the person to say. I had read the first Lincoln Lawyer book years ago. It was OK but I liked other books much better (including his Harry Bosch series). So I haven’t read them all so can’t really say this is the best. But I can say it is very good.

Also Michael Connelly is a very good story teller. In each of his books that I’ve read to date (and it must be close to 20 books now), he constantly surprises you and keeps your interest piqued. One more chapter leads to the next and it is hard to put down the book and take a break to take care of the other things in life. And many of his books are not short quick reads (this is over 400 pages) so this obsessive period where you get little done besides reading usually last several days for me. I started reading his crime stories which were mostly told from the point of view of the investigating detective. I found it surprising when he introduced the Lincoln Lawyer and demonstrated that he is so good at telling stories both through the eyes of a detective and a defense lawyer.

I skipped the next few in the series. But having seen the recent movie on the Lincoln Lawyer and heard this book was very good, I decided to give this book a try. I was not disappointed.

To very briefly summarize the plot (without giving much away), the bad economy has hurt business for Mickey Haller. There are still plenty of criminals and those accused of crime but fewer can afford to pay a defense lawyer. So Mickey has moved over to the new booming business for lawyers, homeowners who are facing foreclosure. But no sooner does the book start than things become much more interesting. A foreclosure client is accused to killing the banker involved with her loan. Yes, Michael Connelly does make the world of foreclosure interesting. And the murder defense makes things more interesting.

The book is excellent as a legal thriller and is also very relevant to current events. The foreclosure mess is very much in the news these days. I’d highly recommend The Fifth Witness.

I headed over to Amazon to see what everyone thought of the book. I thought the book was very good but wanted to know what others thought. There were over 200 hundred reviews so I just read the first few and they were very positive. Then I looked at the summary and about 25% of reviews gave the highest rating (5 stars) and all the rest were the lowest (1 star). There was nothing in between which seemed very odd. Then I remembered a blog entry that discussed the 1 star protest against high Kindle prices (http://thebookstop.wordpress.com/2010/11/06/thoughts-on-kindle-book-pricing-and-the-one-star-protest/) and I read further and that what was happening. The negative reviewers seemed to agree it was a very good book but gave it a 1 star because the Kindle price was too high (in their opinion of course).

I don’t think a review should be based on the price of a book or whether the reviewer thinks the version they read (or refused to buy) is overpriced. The publisher incurs many of the same costs – editorial, publicity, marketing, etc. So I would not expect the books to be extremely cheap since that would mean ignoring some very real costs. But save the cost of actually printing and shipping the book. Preparing and distributing the Kindle versions would also involve cost but I would think these should be lower than warehousing the printed copy and mailing it to the buyer. (Amazon, correct me if I am wrong here. ) It is generally the case that the Kindle version is a little cheaper but I have also seen cases where the Kindle version is actually a little bit more. This makes no sense to me. But it seems to me that the complaint is to the merchant or maybe the publisher, certainly not the author, and the price of various editions has absolutely nothing to do with the quality of the work which is what most of us read reviews for.

They Are Us: A Plea for Common Sense About Immigration by Pete Hamill (Kindle Single)

They Are Us: A Plea for Common Sense About Immigration by Pete Hamill (Kindle Single)

Posted on by Jack

This was my first try at a Kindle Single. When I got the email from Amazon, I thought it was an interesting idea – short pieces of writing where the author is free to determine the length needed to present the idea without the constraints of size imposed by a newspaper or magazine.

Try a Single from Amazon

So I downloaded They Are Us: A Plea for Common Sense About Immigration by Pete Hamill. There has been a lot of talk about immigration and specifically illegal immigrants so I thought I would like to read his thoughts on the subject. His thoughts seemed especially relevant as New York has been the center for American immigrants for long time is he is a well- known New York journalist and writer. (I’ve seen him called the quintessential New Yorker in many places.) I had been hoping for a book length treatment of this but that project was cancelled and this shorter version was available. I had enjoyed a number of his books and articles before and thought it well worth the 99 cent price even though this single seemed very short. It was about 25 pages in the size font I like. I do hope that longer version eventually does come out.

This is really a personal view based on the author’s experience. (The author tells the reader that this is his view not an objective analysis). And it is a well written account of those views and how and why he came to them.

Too often in in our endless discussions on illegal immigrants and possible solutions we focus on the illegal part. People need to be punished for breaking our laws. Let’s deport all of them. But that ignores the children. They did nothing wrong. Some were born here. Other travelled with their parents. (Does a child really have many other choices?) How do we deal with that? Do we have some empathy or even compassion ? It is good to see this side of the debate passionately presented.

Forever by Pete Hamill a novel New York City history

Forever by Pete Hamill a novel New York City history

Posted on by Jack

Forever by Pete Hamill is one of my favorite books. I read it several years back and re-read it recently. I’d highly recommend it. It is a novel dealing with the old Celtic religion, 18th century Ireland, the history of New York City (colonial times to the tragedy of September 2001), and love in an unusual way. I enjoyed it when I first read it several years ago and enjoyed it again recently.

The book is a bit over 600 pages; so be aware reading this is large time commitment for all but the fastest readers. And a fair bit of magic is involved. So unless you are willing to accept that for purposes of the story, the story will seem stupid. But if you do accept the magic for the story (or at least suspend your disbelief), you will be amply rewarded with a great story.

Pete Hamill is a great writer with a long history as a New York City newspaperman and author. It is hard to imagine someone better to tell the story of The City.

Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire workplace disaster

Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire workplace disaster

Posted on by Jack

After watching the PBS special on Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire in New York’s Greenwich Village , I just thought I’d put a couple of books I read about that here. This fire was the largest workplace disaster in New York City until 9/11. Ironically, this industry and this factory had been picketed for unsafe working conditions. The owners fought the unions.

The will be 2 specials this month since the fire occurred one hundred years ago on March 25, 1911.

Triangle: The Fire That Changed America by David Von Drehle
is a well-written account of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory in New York City in 1911 where 146 workers lost their lives. In addition to covering this event in detail, he discusses the effects of this tragic event on the labor movement and government involvement in labor and safety standards. The author was one of many writers and historian interviewed in the PBS documentary. It has been at least 5 years since I read this but it was an excellent book.

Feel free to check out the reviews on Amazon and look around and see if more recent books look more interesting to you.

Triangle: A Novel by Katharine Weber is a novel based on the Triangle fire which came out a few years back. (See my opinion of a nonfiction account directly above here.) This novel is not just historical fiction about the event, but rather a much more complex tale of memory and human nature. The memory is that of a survivor. But it does cover the actual events, too. A thoroughly enjoyable book.

Prophecy by S.J. Parris (advance reader)

Prophecy by S.J. Parris (advance reader)

Posted on by Jack

After a few pages I was back in 1583. Was it a miracle of time travel? No, I had just started reading Prophecy by S.J. Parris.

I had read the first book in this series (Heresy) which introduced me to Giordano Bruno, a renagade Italian monk who fled to England to avoid the wrath of The Inquisition. He was a free-thinker and philosopher and the Pope wanted him burned at the stake as a heretic. Much to my surprise I later learned that Giordano Bruno was a real person and he did flee the heresy charges but was eventually arrested by The Inquisition, declared a heretic and burned at the stake. And he was really in England for several years (including 1583) during his years between the fleeing and the execution. I thoroughly enjoyed this historical novel/thriller based on this character.

When I saw the second in this series by S.J Parris was coming out in a few months, I managed to get an Advance Reader’s Copy (ARC) of Prophecy. As mentioned at the beginning of the review, the author does a wonderful job of setting the stage and transporting you back to the time period. Much more important than adjusting to life with no cars, no TV, and even no internet is the texture of life with the importance of being Catholic or Protestant, superstition, astrology, and so forth.

The story is set in 1583, the year of the Great Conjunction, when the two most powerful planets, Jupiter and Saturn, align in a certain way, an astrologi­cal event that occurs about once every thousand years and was thought to herald the end of one age and the start of another. All sorts of things could happen, maybe even the death of Queen Elizabeth.

When one of the queen’s maids of honor is killed, Francis Walsingham “spymaster” of the Queen asks Giordano Bruno to help solve the crimes. Bruno must allow the plot to progress far enough to give the queen the proof she needs but in doing so may allow the plot to go too far and result in the death of the Queen.

And although historical fiction does have an interest in itself, it is also very relevant to modern day dilemmas. Walsingham uses methods which would seem to be inconsistent with Elizabeth’s desired openness and tolerance. A dilemma in modern day democracy is how far you should go using methods inconsistent with your values to ensure the survival of your government and values. The police certainly want to prevent crime and terrorism but when they discover plots need to let them go far enough that they are sure they are right and maybe even convict the guilty.

The writing of S. J. Parris and her remarkable sense of place and time make both books stories worth reading. Heresy is now available in paperback and Prophecy is scheduled to be out in March in the UK and Australia but May in the US.