Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling

Title: Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling

Author: Richard Lyman Bushman

Pages: 768

Genre: Biography

Grade: A-

Synopsis: This book touts itself as "a cultural biography of Mormonism's founder" and highlights many of the external factors that influenced Joseph Smith as he tried to respond to his call from God to restore His church upon this earth. The book is setup chronologically and follows Joseph from his birth in Vermont, to the First Vision in New York, marriage in Pennsylvania, building a temple in Kirtland, Ohio, extermination in Missouri and city-building, arrest and murder in Nauvoo, Illinois.  Everything that we know about Joseph Smith is on the table in this book, from fortune hunting to Masonry, secret polygamy to his presidential candidacy and him leading the Nauvoo Legion and running from the law. He sealed his testimony with his death.

My Review: There is a lot of information in this book, based upon testimonies, journals and writings of Joseph and his contemporaries.  The information is presented as fact (i.e. that Joseph Smith really did see God the Father and Jesus Christ in the grove in 1820) and the author leaves it up to the reader to discern between truth and fiction. A couple of things stood out to me: 1) If I didn't already have a testimony of Joseph Smith, there were some things that I may have struggled with. 2) Joseph Smith is human, a flawed mortal being who was called upon to do a great work. He had his faults, as do all of us here on this earth and 3) I'm not without my faults either, but thanks to Joseph Smith, we now have the opportunity to be sealed with our families for eternity again on this earth through Priesthood power, along with many other restored gospel truths.

Les Miserables

Title: Les Miserables

Author: Victor Hugo

Pages: 48 discs

Genre: Classic

Grade: B

Synopsis: Jean Valjean is a convict working in the chain gang.  Upon his release he is shunned and treated poorly due to his low status as an ex-con.  A priest takes compassion on him and lets him stay the night in his house. Valjean seizes this opportunity to rob him, but is caught and returned to the priest for identification. The priest claims the items were s gift, which inspires Valjean to change his life and live honestly.

My Review: Most people know the story of Les Miserables (between the musical and the movie), which do a pretty good job of capturing the main points.  What I really enjoyed about the book was the extra depth that was included in the text (which is expected in a book of this length). The characters are so well developed and the story is so intricate, that I felt like I was really getting to know these characters.  I could have done without the lengthy diatribes and tangents. Typically I am staunchly in favor of only reading non-abridged books, but in this case, an abridgment might actually improve the book (i.e. removing Hugo's tangents). Generally the book was enjoyable.

The Great Gatsby

Title: The Great Gatsby

Author: F. Scott Fitzgerald

Pages: 180

Genre: Classic, Fiction

Grade: B

Synopsis: Jay Gatsby is fabulously wealthy, owns a home on Long Island and hosts huge parties nearly every weekend in the summer.  Gatsby is trying to catch the eye of Daisy Buchanan, his love and obsession, but who is married to the rich and snobbish Tom Buchanan. Imagine Gatsby's luck when her cousin moves into a small bungalow next to his mansion.  He befriends her cousin, Nick Carraway, in an effort to lure Daisy back into his life.

My Review: Alison and I watched the new Gatsby movie which inspired me to re-read this classic, which I had last read in High School.  The movie followed the book fairly well and did a good job for me of visualizing the excesses of the Jazz Age and Roaring 20's here in the US.  The book is great, some classics are hard to identify with, I don't think that this is one of them.

The Disneyland Story

Title: The Disneyland Story - The Unofficial Guide to the Evolution of Walt Disney's Dream

Author: Sam Gennawey

Pages: 336

Genre: Non-Fiction

Grade: A-

Synopsis: This book runs through the history of Disneyland, starting with its inception throughout Walt Disney's early life, then through design and construction of the park.  As anybody who has visited Disneyland more than once knows, the park is nearly always changing, and the book also outlines these changes and the concepts and decisions behind making them.

My Review: This book was just fascinating.  It's no secret that I'm a big fan of Disneyland and this book did not disappoint.  In Walt's early years he was obsessed with trains and Disneyland kind of grew out of that obsession.  He was very meticulous in the design and planning and to some probably came across as a micro-manager.  The speed and scope of construction was amazing.  Construction started in August of 1954 and the park opened in July of 1955.   All of that construction included a 12,000 stall parking lot, Main Street, Fantasyland, the castle and moat (even though Sleeping Beauty would not come out until 1959), Adventureland (including the Jungle Cruise and River and Frontierland (including the River of America).  I found that amazing!

From the Book: "(p. 40) Evans [the landscape architect] took a transparency of the master plan and placed it over an aerial photograph of the property at the same scale. He marked all the trees that were not in the middle of the street or in the Rivers of America and tried to work around them. Evans tagged trees that were to be saved with green ribbons, and he tagged trees to be removed with red ribbons. His efforts were futile. As it turned out, the bulldozer operator was color-blind and they lost dozens of trees that were 50-100 years old. More than 12,000 orange trees were removed."

"(p. 53) Disney archivist Dave Smith said, "Disneyland's true appeal, we admit now, is to adults. Children don't need it. Their imaginations are enough. For them, Disneyland is only another kind of reality, somewhat less marvelous than their own fantasies."

"(p. 61) Using the castle to transition between lands was a visual trick Walt called a weenie. According to Disney historian Jim Korkis, during the development of Disneyland, Walt would come home late at night and usually enter his house through the kitchen, which was closer to the garage. He would walk into the kitchen and grab two uncooked hot dogs, or wieners, one for himself and one for his dog. Korkis said, "By wiggling the treat, Walt could get his dog to go from side to side, around in a circle, jump up and more. Both Walt and the dog loved the game and she was finally rewarded with the tasty and satisfying treat."

"Each of the gateways into the lands offered weenies. The spinning carousel through the portal leading through Sleeping Beauty Castle called guests into Fantasyland. The stockade gates, the steam bellowing from the Mark Twain stern-wheeler, and the seeming infinite horizon beckoned guests to visit Frontierland. Over in Tomorrowland was the clock of the World and the TWA Moonliner ready for launch. Only Adventureland lacked a weenie. It was thought that if guests knew too much, it would not be much of an adventure."

The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle

Title: The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle

Author: Hugh Lofting

Pages: 270

Genre: Children's Fiction, Newbery Award

Grade: B

Synopsis: In this second book about the life and travels of Doctor Dolittle, young Tommy Stubbins joins him on his voyage that takes him to Spidermonkey Island after a perilous shipwreck. Doctor Dolittle becomes friends with the natives on the island, before escaping back to home in the Mysterious Great Glass Sea Snail.

My Review: This Doctor Dolittle book was not much better than the first, and it also won a Newbery medal! I can't help but think the available candidates for the medal in these early years must have been fairly weak... Once again, it's a kids book, a little ridiculous and very outdated (i.e. racist by today's standards).  The book was published in 1922.

The Story of Doctor Dolittle

Title: The Story of Doctor Dolittle

Author: Hugh Lofting

Pages: 176

Genre: Children's Fiction

Grade: B

Synopsis: Doctor John Dolittle just loves animals and his home is always overflowing with animals of all kinds.He has a dear parrot, Polynesia, who teaches the doctor how to speak to the animals. After this, Doctor Dolittle becomes quite famous in the animal kingdom as he travels the world helping animals in need.

My Review:  This book was ok. It's a kids book, a little ridiculous and very outdated (i.e. racist by today's standards).  The book was published in 1920.

Good Omens

Title: Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch

Authors: Terry Pratchett & Neil Gaiman

Pages: 412

Genre: Fiction, Humor

Grade: B-

Synopsis: This is a difficult book to describe because it is very strange...  Basically, there is a book that was written in the seventeenth century by a witch, Agnes Nutter and she predicts that the world will end on a Saturday.  She has never been wrong, so everybody expects her to be correct on these counts as well.  The armies of good and evil are gathering together in preparation.  However, there is a demon and an angel who have lived on the earth since Adam and have grown rather fond of their lives here.  They're not ready for Armageddon quite yet. Not to mention, who they thought was the anti-Christ was misplaced at birth.

My Review: This book took me more than a month to get through.  It just wasn't holding my interest.  Although I seemed to carry it with me nearly everywhere during that month, there were many things that I would rather be doing than reading Good Omens. Which, by the way, kind of surprises me.  The book has a bit of a cult following and appears to be very popular in some circles.  That's not to say that I didn't enjoy portions of the book.  It is written as a humorous noel and while some of the jokes are a stretch, generally the humor is wrapped very tidily in with the rest of the book.

From the Book: "(p. 306) I got another bath," she announced to her fellow telephone salespersons. She was well in the lead in the office daily Getting People Out of the Bath stakes, and only needed two more points to win the weekly Coitus Interruptus award."
"She dialed the next number on the list.
"Lisa had never intended to be a telephone salesperson..."

Physics of the Impossible

Title: Physics of the Impossible

Author: Michio Kaku

Pages: 7 discs?

Genre: Non-fiction, Science

Grade: B

Synopsis: Over the last 100 years, there have been many technological advancements that physicists prior would have deemed utterly impossible.  The author, Michio Kaku, explores many science fiction ideas and categorizes them in three categories: possible in the next 100 years, next 1,000 years, or that our understanding of the physical and atomic world would need to change in order for an idea to be possible.  He examines ideas ranging from invisibility and telekinesis to teleportation, space travel and time travel.

My Review:  While the book was interesting, I've never been that enthralled by some of the science fiction ideas that were being explored, so the book didn't grab me like it may others.  There were parts that were more interesting than others, and I think the content is pretty solid (Kaku is a Theoretical physicist with degrees from Harvard and Cal, and now teaching at the City College of New York).  That said, there is a lot of interesting advancements that may take place over the next 100+ years.

Abandon

Title: Abandon

Author: Meg Cabot

Pages: 8 discs

Genre: Fiction

Grade: B

Synopsis: Seventeen-year-old Pierce is involved in an accident that caused her death and sent her to the underworld.  While there, she met the caretaker of that portion of the underworld but was able to sneak away and return to her body.  When she moved to a new place and started attending a new school, she thought she had been able to escape the caretaker.  When he started showing up more often, Pierce knew she wouldn't be able to get away from him.  The entire trilogy is a re-imagining of the Persephone myth.

My Review: This was an interesting book. Every once in a while I enjoy picking up a book that I know nothing about (and it's often one that I never would have selected had I known more about it...).  This book straddled the line between normalcy and the supernatural, but presented it in a way that almost made it believable.  This is the first book of a trilogy, at this point I would read the other books in the trilogy as well.

Ship Breaker

Title: Ship Breaker

Author: Paolo Bacigalupi

Pages: 9 discs?

Genre: Fiction

Grade: B

Synopsis: In some strange future version of the United States, Nailer works on the Gulf Coast on a light crew stripping old oil tankers of their copper wiring. He and the rest of his crew must meet quota every day to earn the food and stay on the crew.  When Nailer, who lives with his alcoholic, abusive father finds a brand new and very expensive clipper ship he must decide whether or not to save the beautiful rich girl or to strip the ship of all its worth in order to become a rich man.

My Review: The premise for this book is very unique and was surprisingly interesting.  It takes a little while to understand the society and how it is different from the one that we live in, but I gathered that the book is set in some future time after global warming and rising seas have changed the world and the United States forever.

The God of Small Things

Title: The God of Small Things

Author: Arundhati Roy

Pages: 333

Genre: Fiction

Grade: B

Synopsis: This book is set in the latter half of the twentieth century, generally in a small town in India. There is a lot of political unrest in the country. The book follows an affluent Indian family and explores how their lives were changed forever by one fateful day in 1969.

My Review: The writing and prose in this book is excellent.  At least at the beginning of the book, I found that I needed to review a more detailed synopsis to fully understand what was going on. Part of that was probably due to the fact that I found myself only able to read the book in bits and pieces and that I was unable to immerse myself in the book.

From the Book: "(p. 162) She had short, thick forearms, fingers like cocktail sausages, and a broad fleshy nose with flared nostrils. Deep folds of skin connected her nose to either side of her chin, and separated that section of her face from the rest of it, like a snout. Her head was too large for her body. She looked like a bottled fetus that had escaped from its jar of formaldehyde in a Biology lab an unshriveled and thickened with age.

She kept damp cash in her bodice, which she tied tightly around her chest to flatten her unchristian breasts, Her kunukku earrings were thick and gold. Her earlobes had been distended into weighted loops that swung around her neck, her earrings sitting in them like gleeful children in a merry-go-(not all the way)-round. Her right lobe had split open once and was sewn together by Dr. Verghese Verghese. Kochu Maria couldn't stop wearing her kunukku because if she did, how would people know that despite her lowly cook's job (seventy-five rupees a month) she was a Syrian Christian, Mar Thomite? Not a Pelaya, or a Pulaya, or a Paravan. But a Touchable, upper-caste Christian (into whom Christianity had seeped like tea from a teabag). Split lobes stitched back were a better option by far.

Kochu Maria hadn't yet made her acquaintance with the television addict waiting inside her. The Hulk Hogan addict. She hadn't yet seen a television set..."

Grimpow: The Invisible Road

Title: Grimpow: The Invisible Road

Author: Rafael Abalos

Pages: 10 discs?

Genre: Fiction

Grade: B-

Synopsis: Grimpow lives in the Alps during the dark ages when he comes across a dead man in the woods. In the dead man's pouch Grimpow finds a stone that grants him visions of places that he has never been and grants him understanding of secrets and mysteries of the world. In possession of the stone, Grimpow embarks on a journey to unlock the full mysteries behind the mysterious stone.

My Review: This book was interesting and quite enjoyable, but the writing (possibly only the translation from Spanish) left something to be desired. Along with that, the story was a bit unbelievable and the characters felt too scripted.

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.