#63, "A Time to Kill"

"A Time to Kill"

John Grisham

This is John Grisham's first novel, published in 1989. While it was initially mostly ignored by readers and critics alike, following the explosive popularity and acclaim that accompanied Grisham's subsequent two novels, "The Firm" and "The Pelican Brief," "A Time To Kill" was later widely considered to be an excellent example of Grisham's style and eventually a classic in the legal thriller genre.

The story is complex, extremely well-written, and thick and sticky as a Mississippi summer in the legal, ethical, and moral problems it deals with. Grisham doesn't look away from tough topics. There are very few characters who don't make poor choices, and none that are unquestioningly good--though there are quite a few that are the opposite. The novel opens with a shocking, brutal scene that sets the tone for the rest of the story. There will be no hand-holding. As a reader, you must, before the first chapter is complete, agree to the terms that Grisham sets out: this is not going to be a fun, rollicking ride, but a harsh, painful, and dangerous one. And indeed it is.

The rape is merely the opening act, however, as it precedes the subsequent murder by the girl's father, which is the subject of the remainder of the book. This is the moral and ethical quandary that is really at the heart of the story: is murder ever justified? Does society trust the legal system to condemn and punish offenders, or is the impassioned revenge of a devastated father acceptable as a method of carrying out justice? Though the story ends with the jury suggesting a possible answer, I don't think Grisham is as interested in answering questions as he is in asking them. I appreciate his restraint here, as he never editorializes; he acts almost as a reporter, detailing events that might have happened calmly, objectively. He never instructs his readers HOW to think, but he continually demands that they THINK something. I have my own conclusions

His style is very easy to read, and the story goes from one character and situation to the next with incredible smoothness. He notes every detail in just enough words to convey his meaning without being wordy. I especially enjoy his dry and occasionally ironic humor. The dialogue is fantastic, and the legal sections are fascinating. Grisham started his career as a novelist with courage and clarity, two things I think every writer ought to aspire to.

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#61, "He Is There and He Is Not Silent"

"He Is There and He Is Not Silent"

Francis A. Schaeffer

This is the third of Francis Schaeffer's great trilogy (preceded by "The God Who Is There" and "Escape From Reason"), and is a direct and concise defense of the existence--indeed, the necessity--of God, and the truth of Christianity. He writes mostly on the subject of epistemology: that branch of philosophy concerned with knowing, and how we know that we know. Fairly dense stuff, but if one pays close attention, I think it is not difficult to understand his reasoning. If you miss something, you are likely to become lost. There are no wasted words here; every sentence is focused and makes a difference. This is not exactly light reading. It requires concentration and thought in order for it to fully bloom in the mind. However, I think that once it has been given sufficient attention, the rewards are an incredible look into the mind of a very great thinker.

Schaeffer argues that the central problem facing mankind in the last half of the 20th century (a problem which bleeds into the 21st) is that of knowing. That is not to say "knowledge," which might be thought of as culminating facts, but "Knowing," in a metaphysical and existential sense. We can know truth about God, the universe, and ourselves, because we can know that God exists, that he must exist. I particularly love his coinage of phrases such as "true truth," "infinite-personal creator" and others. Schaeffer never falters, though he does require, as I've said, quite a bit from his reader. I think it would nearly be required to have read the other two books in this trilogy before tackling this one, as he (if I recall correctly) dives more deeply into concepts such as the "upstairs vs. downstairs," the consequences of the "leap of faith" and his "line of despair," all of which are essential to understanding his philosophy but which are not described here.

In the end, this is required reading for those who wish to understand truly the basis of the Christian faith and the existence of the Christian God.

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#60, "The Adventure of the Cardboard Box"

"Sherlock Holmes and the Adventure of the Cardboard Box"

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

An excellent little mystery by the greatest mystery author in our language. It has all the hallmarks of a Sherlock Holmes story: innocuous beginning, mysterious puzzle with obtuse clues, a smug and ever-changing Holmes, a desperate crime and a nicely wrapped ending. Great read for anyone who enjoys mystery, short stories, Sherlock Holmes, or ear-related crime.

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#59, "An Edible History of Humanity"

"An Edible History of Humanity"

Tom Standage

This book is a sort of continuation, or a variation on a theme if you like, of his previous book "A History of the World in 6 Glasses." In that book, which I read very recently, different drinks were tied to historical events and trends in an enlightening and fascinating way. This book, though similar in its unusual choice of lens through which to view history, is much more far-ranging as well as less concise and focused.

Standage covers a very broad table of food-related inquiries, beginning with Neolithic man, hunter-gatherers, and the formation of agriculture, and ending with the man-caused famines of the Soviet Union and Maoist China, and the benefits and pitfalls that accompany the Green Revolution in the 20th and 21st centuries. Between them, he looks at how food was a central factor in the exploration of the world by Europeans, how that exploration led to colonialism as well as initiated worldwide trade, how food, related to fuel both as a mechanical as well as a biochemical power supply, was an indispensable part of the Industrial Revolution, which changed (and is still changing) the world, and how food is related to current trends in world population, war, and humanity's future.

It is superbly written, though, as I mentioned before, it encompasses such a large subject that Standage occasionally gets lost in words, names, and interrelated ideas. A section on the chemistry of food in particular was taxing to get through. Overall, a pretty good read, especially if you are interested in the economic and societal evolution of foodstuffs.

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#48m, "Seizing the Enigma"

"Seizing The Enigma: The Race To Break The German U-boat Codes, 1939-1943"

David Kahn

A fascinating account of the famous German Enigma code machine, as used by the Third Reich before and during the Second World War. Kahn relates the history of the machine as well as techniques and trends in cryptology--codes and codebreaking--starting around the turn of the 20th century. The story follows a several groups of cryptologists and mathematicians who were up against the most advanced cipher creator in history up to that point.

In the past, secret codes had been constructed using more or less simple word and letter replacement techniques. An elementary example of a coding technique would be to assign each letter in the alphabet to some other letter (A= R, B = M, C = E, and so on). A message could then be enciphered using this alternate alphabet, called a cipher key, and deciphered using the same key by the message recipient. This method had many flaws, however, and was easily cracked using rudimentary statistical and linguistic techniques. Even more advanced ways of coding messages still fell back on this basic premise. The Enigma machine, however, used a combination of mechanical and electrical elements to create ciphers that were, ostensibly, unbreakable. These elements have been calculated to provide a military-grade Enigma machine, as used on German U-boats in WW2, with about 156 quintillion possible code cipher combinations. That is what Polish and British (and to a lesser extent American) cryptologists were up against as they sought to break German codes during the war. The story of how they both failed and succeeded, and the accompanying tales including battles, high-stakes raids, military and political hubris, and determination makes for a rewarding read.

The book is extremely detailed and well-researched. The mathematical parts, and the technical descriptions of the working of the machine, is difficult for a layperson like me to follow, but still highly interesting. One of the highlights of my reading so far this year.

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#47, "The Cardinal of the Kremlin"

"The Cardinal of the Kremlin"

Tom Clancy

Not as good as "The Hunt for Red October," this novel started and ended quite well. There was a long stretch in the middle that dragged a bit, but it all came together in the final 60 pages, which made for a great finish. I really like Tom Clancy's style--easy to read, yet occasionally extremely technical and precise. I enjoy when something happens in a book that I have to look up elsewhere to understand a bit of how it works. I think I'm going to try to read more Clancy soon.

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#43, "The President's First Year"

"The President's First Year"

Douglas Cohn

A promising premise marred by poor planning. The object of the book is ostensibly to examine the first year of each of the first 44 presidents, an initially intriguing object. While the author does this, looking at the frequent blunders and rare successes in the early parts of each presidency, he takes, in my opinion, an overly wide historical perspective. By that, I mean to say that he reports not only the first, or "freshman," year (the term also used of legislators and appropriated for the Executive) of each President, but also looks at the events that led up to that year, sometimes going back a decade or more, and often giving a detailed account of the balance of his term in office. The context provided is usually interesting, but I would have preferred a more detailed and pinpoint examination of what each President did, or did not do, in the first 365 days of his Presidency. This problem of wide reporting is compounded by the peculiar--no, the downright strange way in which the presidents are broken up. Instead of a linear historical path traced from Washington to Obama, the author groups Presidents into arbitrary categories, such as loner Presidents (Jefferson, Carter, Obama), witchhunters (Adams and Eisenhower), some general presidents (Harrison, Grant, Hayes), and of course many others. While these men may have had some things in common, in the end, as the author himself says repeatedly, no Presidency is a copy of another. Each is unique from its beginning, and therefore to bunch some of them together in this way proves merely distracting instead of enlightening. There is too many variables to properly compare and contrast so many different men and circumstances. This mean that the chapters fly here and there throughout history, from Civil War to the Great Depression, back to Nullification, jumping to the Panic of 1893 to the civil rights movement. The lack of historical continuity makes it very difficult to follow trends, to trace the evolution of the country or the presidency, or to even gain bearings on whichever president we come to next. This is truly unfortunate, for Cohn has a good style and has done much work to compile the vast amount of activities and actions that accompanied 44 presidents (though William Henry Harrison's chapter wasn't very long).

The big takeaway is that not a single President had a good first year.

#whatIreadin2017.

2017 Book #38, "Smart Fat"

"Smart Fat"

Steven Masley, Jonny Bowden

An informative survey of healthy eating and an outline of the benefits of eating so-called "smart fat" foods and avoiding "dumb fats." Well written, although I rolled my eyes when they turned the phrase "smart fat" into a verb ("here are some ways to smart fat your eating"). It has great advice for cleaning up your diet and the rationale behind it. I don't think I can get onboard with the whole organic thing, though the authors push it hard. They want even your dairy and eggs to be grass fed free range pasture raised, which to me is excessive. However, there is no doubt that their arguments for cleaner eating are true and more important every day, as the much of the world continues to industrialize, and our instincts (at least in America) are often to turn to packaged foods instead of whole and fresh. I've long felt that these microwaved, sugary, salty, plastic-wrapped foods are suspect in value. This books details exactly how they are bereft of nutritional benefit, and, further, how they can act as toxin and poison in the body. Choosing cleaner, fresher, whole foods makes a big difference, and it was good to hear in scientific and nutritional terms things that I've thought about for a long time.

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2017 Book #37, "The Last Juror"

"The Last Juror"
John Grisham

A loosely told story of two relationships; one between the protagonist, the new owner/editor of a small-town newspaper, and the tiny, slow-moving Southern town itself, and between the same protagonist and his friend Miss Callie, a gentle, well-spoken Christian woman with an intriguing history. Their paths all cross following a brutal crime at the beginning of the book, following which Miss Callie is the last juror selected for the trial of the murderer. The trial ends halfway through the book, at which I was surprised (this being Grisham). The remainder of the story is filled with the goings-on of the paper, its rise to prominence in the lives of its readers and editor; the ebb and flow of the town, its changes and resistance to changes. The book touches on things as disparate as the Vietnam war, racism in the South in the mid-70's, and the economic impacts of big business on a small town. It is a rather sprawling book in subject, even as the whole thing is narrowly focused on the main character and the town he grows to care for.

Well written, although the denouement felt anti-climactic. The second half of the book dragged a bit. Maybe that was due to my predisposition to expect big reveals, cliffhangers, twists and turns and things like that. There was little of that sort of excitement in this novel. It felt more like something that maybe actually happened. It was just dull enough that it really seemed like it was the memoirs of a small town newspaperman, and just interesting enough to be curious as to how it turned out. Maybe if I had left aside my preconceived notion of what a Grisham novel is I would have enjoyed it more for what it was; a character-driven drama.

2017 Book #35, "Between Heaven and the Real World"

"Between Heaven and the Real World: My Story"

Steven Curtis Chapman

Steven Curtis Chapman is one of my heroes, in music as well as faith. Through this autobiography, SCC (as he is referred to in my house) opens his life in its triumphs, failures, and tragedies, letting the stories of his music and family point the way ultimately to his faith in Jesus. It is an easy read, meant, I think, for an average reader, with many relatable anecdotes to balance the occasional step into slightly more technical musical jargon (of which there are only a few). It is only focused on his music in that it has been one of the centerpieces of his life, as his job and ministry; SCC speaks as much, or more, about his journey as a man, a son, a husband, a father, all which resonate deeply with me as I begin to experience my own path in these areas. Then, of course, are the stories of the songs that I've known my whole life, the albums that have been with me since I was a boy, and the circumstances that surround many of them. I was surprised, a little, that a few albums were mentioned only in passing. I expected a more detailed look at each and every one, though perhaps because there are so many there simply wasn't enough time or room. I'm not sure about that, but what is there is insightful and enlightening. Finally, reading about the faith journey that SCC has gone through is truly inspiring and has, I dare to say, lit a mini-revival in my own life, both spiritually and musically. He doesn't pretend to be perfect or to know all the answers; indeed, he writes again and again that being hyper-spiritual has proven to be one of his weaknesses and failing points. Seeing this transparency and honesty combined with the humility of one of the great songwriters of all Christian history is humbling and inspiring.

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