DWD's Reviews

Well-written, I learned quite a bit probably more than when I visited the battlefield Published in 2010. You just cannot talk about George Armstrong Custer without stirring controversy. Depending on the writer, Custer was a true American hero who was betrayed by his superiors and failed by his subordinates or he was a self-absorbed crazy racist imperialist that finally found someone that could fight back and taught him a lesson. Our movies have shown this as well. Errol Flynn's They Died With Their Boots On (1941) made a hero of Custer while Little Big Man (1970) makes out to be a delusional nut. Sample of how Little Big Man depicts Custer: In The Last Stand: Custer, Sitting Bull, and the Battle of The Little Bighorn , Philbrick notes these views and takes more of a middle road. Custer comes off as a more nuanced man. Ambitious, impetuous and overly confident, but not a fool. Plus, he had reasons for that confidence - the audacious, unexpected move had always worked...

This Spanish teacher has used this one in class for years I have used Touring Mexico in my Spanish classes for years as an introduction to Mexican culture, history and geography. It is a quick-paced movie that does not dwell on one particular theme for any great time, but does not leave you feeling like you are being shorted, either. The only weakness to the movie is the music and video is a bit dated - some shots from the early '80s and a reference to discotheques come to mind - if someone snorts about that in class I remind them that a "dance club" is just a re-named disco! The movie lasts about an hour and I primarily use it on days when I have to be out of class. I made a little worksheet to go with it and it becomes an easy day for the substitute teacher. 5 stars out of 5. Reviewed on September 21, 2008.

Chichen Itza A short, breathtaking look at Mexico's Indian ruins Filmed almost entirely from a helicopter, Sentinels of Silence is a double Academy Award winning documentary is narrated by Orson Welles. This movie is shown in by the Mexican government in embassies around the world and serves as a fantastic 18 minute introduction to the Ancient Indian Civilizations of Mexico. Orson Welles, dramatic photography and an equally dramatic soundtrack combine to make this a memorable movie. A must-see and must-have movie for all fans of Mayan and Aztec history. 5 stars out of 5. Reviewed on September 21, 2008.

Does a brilliant job of looking at the meaning of the battle of Antietam Published in 2002 by Recorded Books. Read by Nelson Runger. Duration: 5 hours, 48 minutes. Unabridged I have nearly 90 books that cover the Civil War on my bookshelf. Most books that cover the Civil War compartmentalize the battles into little chapters with titles like "Chancellorsville", "Antietam" and "Shiloh". The battles are thoroughly covered but the feel for the larger flow of the war is sacrificed. In Crossroads of Freedom: Antietam 1862 , McPherson dramatically sweeps the reader along and I was left with a renewed sense of amazement and respect for the fact that Lee's Army of Northern Virginia was able to fight, let alone go on the offensive against two separate armies and fight multiple, large battles from June through September of 1862. McPherson does an extraordinary job of tying in many of the political and military threads of this war to demonstrate that Anti...

A wonderful sci-fi trilogy Trilogy originally published in 1967 and 1968. The White Mountains is just the first in a trilogy of sci-fi adventures aimed at young people. This classic trilogy was a childhood favorite of mine and I was fortunate enough to have rediscovered them. I re-read them after 20+ years and still find them to be engaging and really quite good. The second book is called The City of Gold and Lead and the final book is The Pool of Fire . The premise of The Tripods Trilogy is that an alien race called the "Masters" have taken over earth, destroyed its great cities and control men's minds with a device called "the cap". All people are capped at age 14 and human beings live in small villages at a near-medieval level of technology. The main characters are Will, Henry, Beanpole and Fritz who are all young men who question the practice of capping and the presence of the Tripods - giant three-legged machines that enforce the capping an...

An excellent beginning to a promising career. Howard Bahr First off - The Black Flower is one of the best books I've read in a long time. It follows a group of Confederate soldiers during and after the Battle of Franklin, Tennessee (November of 1864), especially an educated Private named Bushrod Carter. I will not go into great detail, for fear of ruining the plot for others. For a first book, this is a remarkable work. The characters are well-written and "feel" like real people. They have weight and depth, a feature that many readers and writers on this forum have decried as missing in most of modern literature. They speak in dialect that is easy to read and does not take much decoding (as opposed to some of Twain's). I am a Civil War buff, and I can testify that the historical aspects of the story ring true. Confederate Soldiers This book reminded me very much of The Red Badge of Courage , but not in its theme or its plot. It reminded m...

Read by Dion Graham. 7 hours, 4 minutes. I have rarely heard a narrator's voice so well-suited to a character as is Dion Graham's voice is to Rutherford Calhoun. Middle Passage (winner of the 1990 National Book Award ) is written in first person as a personal journal of a ne'er-do-well former slave from Illinois who lives in New Orleans in 1830. Calhoun is forced to go on the run. He stows away on a slave ship bound for West Africa. It is captained by a diminutive American explorer and adventurer with a strong personality and an insatiable desire for new experiences.The crew is discontented and on the edge of mutiny. Along the way, Calhoun discovers that the slaves and the cargo in the hold are not normal, in fact they might be more accurately described as paranormal. I would say more but I want to avoid spoilers. Charles Richard Johnson In reality, this book is not a good piece of historical fiction - historical anachronisms abound. Rather, it i...

Learn a little every day.  Read by Oliver Wyman and Helen Litchfield Duration: a little more than 17 hours. Published in 2008. The Intellectual Devotional: Modern Culture is designed on the same format as a religious devotional - a small bit of inspiration every day. In this case, it is designed to be a small bit of learning every day. It is not set up with specific dates (Such as Thursday, October 23), but it starts with Monday of Week 1 and works it way through the year. There are 16 CD's in this set, with an estimated length of a little more than 3 minutes for each day and a little more than 17 hours overall. There are Intellectual Devotionals with other themes as well, such as American history . The topics vary widely. The first CD ranges from Sigmund Freud to Hal Roach (the man behind the Little Rascals). The topics are interesting and I found myself dispensing with the intended one-a-day format and listening to upwards of 20 of them as I putter around the kitc...

Majestic and Poetic - an Outstanding Experience Published in 2007 by Picador Howard Bahr If you pick up The Judas Field give it about 30 pages. Up to that point I was fairly confused and lost. Then, it suddenly comes together and this book became one of the most powerful books I've read all year. The book features two story lines - one set approximately 20 years after the Civil War and one that consists of flashbacks about the Battle of Franklin. Both are interesting. Bahr's descriptions of the battle contain some of the most poetic descriptions of the most awful things that men can do to one another that I've ever read. Truly beautifully written. On top of that there is an ongoing discussion about the role of God in war. Does he take sides? Has he forsaken both sides? This discussion is not done lightly. These are not post-modernist characters - they believe in God but they must reconcile that belief with the awful experience of war - what they did,...

How to ruin an economy in 10 simple steps Arthur Laffer The End of Prosperity: How Higher Taxes Will Doom the Economy--If We Let It Happen is a well-written book, filled with charts and graphs, is a great introduction to the principles of the Laffer Curve , the dangers of high taxes and the folly of many of the proposals that the Democrat leadership in the House, the Senate and Mr. Obama (and some Republicans) are proposing. On page 261 these foolish proposals and policies are laid out in detail. Hopefully, after having read the rest of the book the folly of those policies should be clear. Prior to that, the book explains the wisdom of low tax policies. The authors go through the recent history of the United States (from Hoover to Bush43) and demonstrate their principles in action. A fantastic introduction to conservative economic policy for the layman. I rate this book 5 stars out of 5. This book can be found at Amazon.com here: The End of Prosperity . Revie...

Outstanding Published in 2008 by Wharton School Publishing. Islam: The Religion and the People   is, without a doubt, the single best academic introduction to Islam that I have seen. It covers just about every facet of the religion for the non-expert, from what happens in a mosque on Fridays to the split between the Shiites and the Sunnis to how the Muslim world deals with not being able to charge interest to rules concerning food and the question of jihad. This volume is short, well-written and thorough. It includes a glossary of terms mentioned in the book with more explanation (so the text does not bog down). Sidebars are included throughout the text with humourous notes that further illustrate the issues that are being discussed. I have not encountered a better book to introduce Islam to the curious Westerner. I highly recommend this one to anyone heading off to a Muslim country, who works with Muslims or who is just curious about this popular, controversial a...

A Viking book that's less of a "bash 'em, slash 'em" book and more of a legal thriller Published in 2008 by BookSurge Publishing. So, you pick up a book about Icelandic Vikings and what do you expect? Well, if you're like me you expected a lot of men with long hair brandishing swords and axes along with lots of blood and longboats, much like the Saxon Chronicle books of Bernard Cornwell. A Viking Longhouse Kari's Saga starts out with just that - a failed attempt to burn a rival's longhouse. But, there's a twist. Iceland is trying to limit the the amount of violence that plague the island (revenge killings and so on). The Icelandic Vikings are actively trying to be more creative in applying Viking laws and the legal system to limit this violence. Notice I said limit, not end it - these are, after all, Vikings. Throw in the threat of political change (invasion from Viking kings back in Denmark - Iceland had no king, just a loose co...

Batman, super-villains and the insanity of life in Gotham from the point of view of the police Published in 2007 by DC Comics. Ever wonder how Batman and his cronies seem to the cops? Ever wonder how cops deal with super-villains, super heroes and the insane amount of crime that Gotham City generates? Gotham Central is a great twist on the Super hero tale. Told from the perspective of Gotham's Major Crime Unit, this series puts a different point of view on the super hero story. Besides that, many of these cops are involved in super heroics of their own. Imagine NYPD Blue or Law and Order SVU with the occasional super villain and super hero and you've got the idea. Gritty, tough, action-packed and good. I rate this graphic novel 5 stars out of 5. This graphic novel can be found on Amazon.com here:  Gotham Central Vol. 5: Dead Robin . Reviewed on November 29, 2008.

A simple but profound piece of science fiction Originally published in 1938. I have not read any Ayn Rand before Anthem . I know this may seem strange for a person that enjoys politics, leans heavily to the right politically, and enjoys science fiction, but it is true. The reason is quite simple - the people at the Ayn Rand Institute are so enthusiastic about Ayn Rand and her ideas on talk shows and in interviews that they seem like a religion to them. I feel similarly creepy about the postage paid information card that is included in my book. Plus, let's face it, her most famous works are L-O-O-O-N-G and I was not sure I wanted to invest that much time into Rand. But, I decided to give Anthem a try because it is very short (105 pages) and my local bookstore had it on clearance. So, what did I think? There was a stretch of time before and after World War II, when the collectivization political movements were gaining momentum (fascism and communism) when some great nove...

An interesting look at the 1850s in the Kansas Territory through the eyes of a young woman . Read by Mare Winningham. Lasts about 5 hours. Abridged. John Brown I purchased the abridged version of The All-True Travels and Adventures of Lidie Newton on tape (5 hours) and found it to be quite enjoyable. The listener is treated to a ground level view of the politics of slavery in the 1850s and how violence based on the 'goose question' (code for the slavery issue) swept through households, towns and eventually the entire Kansas Territory. Smiley's characters are not simple cardboard cutouts - some of the pro-slavery people are quite nice, some of the anti-slavery people are quite insane (she mentions 'Old Brown' and his atrocities and his actions cause some dissent in Liddie Newton's household). Many readers have complained of the plodding pace. Although my version was abridged, there were still some plodding moments. However, the superb ...

Revealing. Fascinating. Educational. A valuable experience. A+++ Winner of the Nebula Award for Best Novel in 2003. Have you ever wondered what it might be like to see the world through the perspective of someone whose mind works much different than your own? How different? Do you want to visit a mind that has different opinions and points of view? What about someone whose mind works in a fundamentally different way than yours? How about someone whose mind perceives the world differently than almost everyone you have met in your entire life? The wonderful thing about a work of fiction is that the reader can be transported into the mind of anyone and see the world as it might be seen from another's point of view. There are no constraints. Elizabeth Moon has done just that in her novel The Speed of Dark . Elizabeth Moon As it proceeds, The Speed of Dark does bring up many important themes and holds its own on matters such as the rights of the individual to be...

Great introduction to Lincoln for children Published by Walker Childrens in 2008. Where Lincoln Walked is a wonderful little history mostly about Lincoln's pre-Presidential life. Lots of beautifully shot full color pictures of such places as Lincoln's mother's home in Kentucky, Lincoln's boyhood home in southern Indiana and his law offices in Springfield. The author, Raymond Bial, took most of these pictures himself. He has a good eye for photography and does a great job with the text and the captions. Recommended for budding young history buffs, classrooms and the hardcore Lincoln collectors. I rate this book 5 stars out of 5. This book can be found on Amazon.com here: Where Lincoln Walked . Reviewed on December 6, 2008.

Race is an issue in this great mystery Published by Hachette Audio Read by Dick Hill Duration: 10 hours, 55 minutes. Unabridged Michael Connelly Angels Flight , an early installment in the Harry Bosch series, is as good as the rest in the series meaning, at least in my mind, it is a proud member of one of the best set of detective novels currently being produced. Michael Connelly 's books are usually deep and gritty and this one is no different. The lead character is Harry Bosch, the leader of a 3 detective team in the LAPD that is assigned an unusually sensitive case. A well-known civil rights attorney that has successfully sued LAPD over and over again for violations of federal civil rights laws has been murdered on the eve of an especially notorious case against the LAPD. Of course, everyone inside LAPD and out believe that a police officer killed him in a fit of revenge and the city is seething. Set just a few years after the Rodney King riots and t...

A slow start but don't let that deter you Although I am a history teacher, I have to admit that I am woefully under-informed on the Korean War - at least when compared to our other wars. Sadly, I am not alone in this fact - there's a reason why the Korean War is called "The Forgotten War". Drury and Clavin start off slowly, in part because there is no context as to why the soldiers are marching around in the subzero weather in northern Korea. However, once they explain the purpose of this particular campaign in the war as a whole and show the reader a few maps I got a lot more comfortable with how they were telling the story and appreciated it a lot more. Marines during the Chosin Campaign in the Korean War The Last Stand of Fox Company: A True Story of U.S. Marines in Combat is not a fancy history - it is told from the ground level perspective of the the Marines on the hill and is full of tales of bodily fluids, men too young to actually join t...

Fascinating. Disturbing. Inspirational. Published in 2007 by Grand Central Publishing. The Overachievers: The Secret Lives of Driven Kids is a fascinating investigation into the lives of some of America's top students - the kids who want to do it all and oftentimes do, but at great personal cost and for dubious reasons. Alexandra Robbins befriends and follows several students from Whitman High School in Maryland through one school year as they try their best to score perfect 1600s and 2400s on the SATs, be accepted into Ivy League schools and pad their resumes to impress the admissions officers with tons of extracurricular activities (one student she interviewed had SIX typewritten pages of extracurricular activities!). Robbins intersperses research and interesting facts with her stories of the students and discusses the unhealthy obsession with perfection and how the true values of education (knowledge, exploration, wisdom, self-discovery to name a few) is often su...