The Appeal

Title: The Appeal

Author: John Grisham

Pages: 496

Genre: Legal Thriller

Grade: B+

Synopsis: There is a small town in Mississippi where the water is undrinkable and scores of people have died from cancer or have cancer.  In a related court case, a Mississippi jury hands down a huge verdict against a chemical company for polluting the ground, groundwater and contaminating the area, causing a huge cancer cluster.  The owner of the chemical company is a multi-billion dollar executive living large in Manhattan, who will appeal the verdict to the Mississippi Supreme Court.  His next task is to get a judge elected to the Supreme Court who will overturn this verdict.

My Review: This Grisham novel has generally not received very good reviews, although I found that I enjoyed it.  It preyed on the fact that many of our elected officials have to answer to the big money that gets them elected.  There probably are companies out that that act similar to the chemical company in this book, if there are, then they make me sick (both figuratively and literally).

The Sex Lives of Canibals

Title: The Sex Lives of Cannibals: Adrift in the Equatorial Pacific

Author: J. Maarten Troost

Pages: 11 discs

Genre: Humor, Travel

Grade: B+

Synopsis: When the author, Troost, was 26, he packed up with his girlfriend and moved for a couple of years to the remote country of Kiribati (pronounced Kir-i-bus). They would live on the small Tarawa Atoll, where the majority of the residents of Kiribati live. This book chronicles the authors adventures and misadventures throughout their stay on the small atoll.  The book was quite funny, although there were a few times when the humor was a bit forced.  I did find myself laughing often.

My Review: Contrary to the promise of the title, there is very little about sex in the book although there are times when the author's humor gets a little crass.  For example, the atoll is so flat that there really isn't a good sewer system. Some of the nicer homes have septic tanks, but the majority of the population is left to take care of business wherever they see fit.  This means that the residents (who are often plagued with dysentery-like diseases) will typically stick their booties out over the water and let it rip, which, of course, is the basis for many of the funnier parts of the book.

tuesdays with Morrie

Title: tuesdays with Morrie: an old man, a young man, and life's greatest lesson

Author: Mitch Albom

Pages: 5 discs

Genre: Non-fiction

Grade: B

Synopsis: Mitch Albom hears that his old, most-favorite professor from college is sick with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (i.e. ALS or Lou Gehrig's disease).  His health is declining quickly as the disease attacks his extremities and he is confined to a bed and requires assistance to do just about anything.  Mr. Albom works for a newspaper in Detroit that is on strike, so he decides to make a visit to his professor in the Boston area. His professor invites him back the following week and this quickly becomes their Tuesday tradition until the end of Morrie's life.  Morrie was a strong positive influence on many people and always had thoughts about how to live life to its fullest.  This story and Morrie's thoughts are recorded in this book.

My Review: Not a bad book, and Morrie had some great thoughts, but the book was a bit of a love-fest with the old professor. That's not to say he didn't have a lot of great thoughts and excellent aphorisms. Ted Koppel visited with Morrie and interviewed him a few times on Nightline.  You can see a few of the Nightline clips on youtube.

Mr. Vertigo

Title: Mr. Vertigo

Author: Paul Auster

Pages: 320

Genre: Fiction

Grade: B

Synopsis: Young Walter is a street boy living in St. Louis in the early part of the 20th century when he is approached by Master Yehudi, a Jew of Hungarian descent who promises the boy that he will teach him to fly. The boy agrees to be taught by Master Yehudi and is taken to the master's farm in Kansas where he will eventually learn how to control his mind and body in order to levitate.

My Review: This was a really interesting book.  It read more like a historical non-fiction book than anything fictional.  In fact, when I finished the book, in my mind I had serious doubts that the story wasn't true.  That to me is a sign of a well-written book of this style.

The Thirteenth Tale

Title: The Thirteenth Tale

Author: Diane Setterfield

Pages: 406

Genre: Mystery

Grade: B

Synopsis: Margaret Lea is an amateur biographer who spends most of her time helping her father run their antique bookstore or reading.  Imagine her surprise when she receives a letter from one of the most prolific writers in England inviting her to come and write her story.  This writer, Vida Winter, has never really opened up to anyone and Margaret is afraid that Miss Winter will not tell her the truth either.  As she gets into the story, she realizes that there is a lot more to the story that Miss Winter is leaving unsaid.

My Review:  I enjoyed this book, but I didn't love it.  There were a lot of names and intricacies that I had a hard time keeping track of.  This may have also been due to the fact that I read the bulk of this book while spending time with family (Hi family, sorry I ignored you during Christmas...) and there were always lots of distractions.

From the Book: "(p. 58) I shall start at the beginning. Though of course the beginning is never where you think it is. Our lives are so important to us that we tend to think the story of them begins with our birth. First there was nothing, then I was born.... Yet that is not so. Human lives are not pieces of string that can be separated out from a knot of others and laid out straight. Families are webs. Impossible to touch one part of it without setting the rest vibrating. Impossible to understand one part without having a sense of the whole."

How to be Alone

Title: How to be Alone: Essays

Author: Jonathan Franzen

Pages: 278

Genre: Essays

Grade: B

Synopsis: This book is a collection of essays, all by the same author.  The essays cover a huge range of topics from the fate of the American novel to supermax prisons in Colorado and from the story of his short time as an Oprah book-of-the-month author to the workings of American post offices in big cities such as Chicago.

My Review: This collection was published in 2002 and I would be interested to read Franzen's writings on more recent topics.  His writing has a liberal slant (don't let that scare you) that gave me plenty of food for thought as I read.  Most of the essays were easy to read and didn't digress into too much babble, although there were a couple that could have been trimmed by a few pages.  I was reading this book during a late lunch break at Rich's Mighty Fine Burgers and Grub (which is one of my favorite SLC restaurants) and the cook that brought out my food saw me reading this book and mentioned that it was one of his favorite collections of essays.  Needless to say I was surprised.

Little Bee

Title: Little Bee

Author: Chris Cleave

Pages: 288

Genre: Fiction

Grade: B+

Synopsis: Little Bee is a refugee from Nigeria in Africa who has been a stowaway on a cargo ship and is now in a refugee detention center in Great Britain.  While in the detention center she learns how to speak the Queen's English and works hard to put the atrocities of the past behind her.

My Review:  This is a heart-wrenching book, with some disturbing parts that I won't soon forget.  Although a difficult story to swallow, I still enjoyed it and the writing was well done.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

Title: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

Author: Stieg Larsson

Pages: 644

Genre: Thriller

Grade: A-

Synopsis: Originally published in Swedish, this book is about Mikael Blomkvist who as a financial reporter got suckered into writing an article for which he was sued for libel and lost.  After taking a leave of absence from his magazine, he is hired to look into the disappearance of Harriet Vanger, who is the daughter of the very wealthy, long time CEO of the Vanger Corporation.  Blomkvist, along with Lisbeth Salander, a young genius hacker, take on the assignment of trying to figure out what happened to Harriet many years before.

My Review: Once again this was an excellent book to read while on vacation.  In fact, as I've purchased this book twice from the DI, I left a copy in Jamaica for the next traveler to enjoy. The story is engrossing and unusual, the translation into English is excellent and while the book is long, it was easy to follow along with the story.

Disclaimer: There's a lot of lovin' in the book as well as some rape/abuse, although it was mildly uncomfortable I don't recall it ever being explicit.

The Great Train Robbery

Title: The Great Train Robbery

Author: Michael Chrichton

Pages: 329

Genre: Historical Fiction

Grade: B+

Synopsis: Edward Pierce fits in well in high-society in Victorian England, while also being able to navigate the slums of poverty.  Pierce has a grand scheme to rob the train that is carrying the gold from the bank to pay for England's involvement in the Crimean War.  Over the course of many months he concocts a complicated scheme to get his hands on the money.

My Review: I'm not sure where I picked this book up, but it was the perfect book to read on a vacation (I did my reading in Jamaica).  It was fast-paced and easy to follow.  The details of the story have been filled in by Crichton, but the overall story is true and based on lots of testimonies from a court trial.

Dune

Title: Dune

Author: Frank Herbert

Pages: 19 discs

Genre: Science Fiction

Grade: A-

Synopsis: The Atreides family accepts control of the planet Arrakis, during a time far in the future when noble houses have planetary empires as sanctioned by the interstellar emperor.  Arrakis is a very important planet as it is the only place in the universe where spice can be mined, albeit dangerously.  Spice is the most precious and important substance in the universe as it allows the interstellar trading and trafficking that they emperor relies upon.  Paul Atreides is the heir apparent but must go into hiding once his father's house is attacked as others try to regain control of Arrakis.

My Review: This story is fantastical and complex enough that it is hard to summarize in a short paragraph, but I have found myself over the last few weeks thinking back to the story as it really caught my interest.  I listened to the audiobook version and it was excellent, using a full cast of characters for all of the many different parts.  I have the Dune movie from the early 1980's saved on my DVR at home, I'm interested to watch it, but the few minutes that I watched earlier don't leave me with high hopes.

The Other

Title: The Other

Author: David Guterson

Pages: 9 discs?

Genre: Fiction

Grade: B

Synopsis: John William Barry was born into one of the richest families in the Seattle area.  Neil Countryman comes from a regular blue-collar Irish family, but when the two boys meet at 16 at a track meet they become fast friends with their shared passion for all things outdoors.  After college Neil becomes a high-school English teacher and John decides that the only way to live without hypocrisy is as a hermit living off the land.  Barry excavates a cave for himself on the west side of the Olympic Peninsula and Countryman visits him as often as he can packing in as much food and supplies as he can carry.

My Review: This was a good slow-paced read, a novel with a unique plot and story.  It was one of those books where after you're done you've got to double-check whether or not the book was based on a true story or not.

Red Rabbit

Title: Red Rabbit

Author: Tom Clancy

Pages: 13 discs?

Genre: Fiction, Thriller

Grade: B

Synopsis: This book takes place early in Jack Ryan's career.  At the time, he isn't yet an analyst for the CIA, but he has been offered a position as a freelance analyst in London to work as sort of a liaison between the CIA and the British Intelligence Agency.  The main plot of the story surrounds a Soviet KGB communications officer that learns of a top-secret plan to assassinate newly elected Polish Pope John Paul II.  The Russian defector (or "red rabbit") approaches a known CIA officer asking for help getting safely to the west in exchange for information about the assassination plot.

My Review: This was a fairly typical Clancy cold war spy thriller.  The plot was unique and full of the twists and turns that you would expect.

Paradise Lost

Title: Paradise Lost

Author: John Milton

Pages: 3 discs

Genre: Epic Poem

Grade: B+

Synopsis: Paradise Lost is an epic poem written in the 17th century by the English poet, John Milton.  The poem is about the Biblical story of the Fall of Man, including the temptation of Adam and Even by the fallen angel Satan and their being driven from the Garden of Eden after they had partaken of the forbidden fruit.

My Review:  I was familiar with Paradise Lost, but I didn't know it was a poem, I didn't know it was an epic (in the style of Homer and Virgil) and I was not aware the the poem was about Adam and Eve and the Fall of Man.  Aside from it being difficult to follow the 17th century prose at some points, I thought that the epic was well written and had a good flow to it.  I also felt that Milton did a decent job expounding on the doctrine of the Fall based on what Christians believed in the 1600's.

A strange coincidence was the graffiti that I cam across in an alley in Salt Lake City (between 900 and 1000 S, & West Temple and Main St) of Paradise Lost:

The Coming of the Lord

Title: The Coming of the Lord

Author: Gerald N. Lund

Pages: 241

Genre: Religion

Grade: C

Synopsis: Elder Gerald N. Lund explores the prophecies of things that must come to pass before the second coming of Jesus Christ.  Published in 1971, Elder Lund covers scriptural prophecies and prophecies that have been made by modern-day apostles and prophets up to the book's publication.  Most of the prophecies of the second coming that have been made in the latter-days were made during the 19th century, with a smattering of follow-up prophecies here in the last 100 years or so.  Everything has been meticulously researched and documented and the text of the book is based on scriptural references and quotes while avoiding additional speculation.

My Review:  While the content of the book was interesting and the book itself was well-written and insightful, I had a difficult time reading this book.  It never piqued by interest like I thought that it would and it took me nearly 3 months to make it through.  My personal viewpoint is that while it is important to know and understand what the prophets have prophesied concerning the last days and the second coming, the fact of the matter is that no man knoweth the timing of the second coming.  Another point is that if many of the latter-day prophesies are taken literally, then the prophets of these latter-days were off the mark. For example (and I can't quote exactly who said this, or when it was or what the phrasing was as I don't have the book with me), there were a few times in the 1870's time-range where it was prophesied that there were individuals in attendance that would live to see the great gathering to Missouri and Adam-ondi-Ahman. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that may be a tough one. My suggestion would be to take everything with a grain of salt and use your own judgment and inspiration to determine what you believe to be true.  In the end I think that everything will make sense.

Desert Solitaire

Title: Desert Solitaire - A Season in the Wilderness

Author: Edward Abbey

Pages: 10 discs?

Genre: Memoir, Autobiography

Grade: A-

Synopsis: In this book, Edward Abbey recounts his experiences as a park ranger at Arches National Monument in Moab, Utah.  Arches had not yet been made into a National Park and was only accessible via a dirt road with very limited facilities.  For a couple summers (about April to October), Abbey was the only ranger for the park an lived in a small trailer near balanced rock.  The memoir is filled with stories of his experiences in the southwest and his musing and commentary on modern society and mainstream culture. included are stories about rafting down the Colorado River from Moab to Wahweap, while the Glen Canyon Dam was being built (he and his companion were probably some of the very last to see Glen Canyon before Lake Powell started filling), climbing a mountain in the Henry mountains east of Moab, descriptions of the wildlife, snakes and plant life and search and rescue operations for lost tourists.

My Review: Surprisingly I found that I really enjoyed this book.  I wish that I could pinpoint where, when or who recommended it to me (probably back in 2008).  There are a few points in the book where Abbey goes off on modern society and modern conveniences and complains against people who day-trip to the National Parks (of which my family and I are very guilty of).  He talks quite a bit about what we need to do to be good stewards of our precious environment and complains often about the prevalence of paved roads and Americans reliance on the automobile (This book was published in 1968, and I'm sure it's only gotten worse).  Even with all of the author's tangents I liked the book.