DWD's Reviews

  Published by Macmillan Audio in 2021. Read by Mark Williams. Duration: 24 hours, 2 minutes. Unabridged . In my professional life I am a high school history teacher. I don't teach it now (I teach another subject), but in the past when I taught world history I taught that the origins of civilization in the traditional way and it always goes something like this: -At first there were wandering groups of people, probably based around 1 or 2 families. Things were fairly democratic because these groups had to talk things out to make decisions. -Somebody along the way figured out how to domesticate a few animals. -Somebody along the way figured out how to domesticate plants. Some small fields were started and left mostly on their own while the wandering continued with scheduled returns to the fields. -Eventually, the fields were so productive that it made no sense to leave them. -Populations grew, towns were developed and simple authoritarian government led by almost always by a man who ...

EXCELLENT! Unabridged Audio Edition  Published in 2016 by Hachette Audio and Blackstone Audio Read by Simon Prebble Duration: 10 Hours, 56 Minutes When Rome was at its height, it split itself in half and created a second capital for the eastern half in Constantinople (modern day Istanbul). The eastern half survived the official "Fall of Rome" in 476 AD and continued on for nearly 1,000 more years until it succumbed to the Ottoman Turks in 1453. It was the seat of the Orthodox Christian Church and oftentimes stood as the bulwark against Muslim military advances into Eastern Europe. From the time of the first formal attack against Constantinople in 674 AD until it finally fell in 1453, the capture of this city was, at the least, on every Muslim leader in this region's "to do" list, if not an active goal. Once the Ottoman Turks arrive on the scene the Byzantine Empire is clearly on its last legs. The city is still defended by one of the most elaborate set of ...

Published by Blackstone Audio in 2006 Translated by Caroline Mustill and E.H. Gombrich Narrated by Ralph Cosham Duration: 9 hours, 14 minutes Unabridged E.H. Gombrich (1909-2001) As the title states A Little History of the World is a small history of, well, everything. Sort of. This history was originally written in 1935. The author was an unemployed art historian and was asked to write a history of the world for children for an Austrian publisher. The first edition was written in six weeks and it sold well and has sold consistently ever since. Gombrich retained the rights and after World War II set out to keep it updated and translated it into multiple languages. He was working on translating it into English when he died in 2001 at the age of 92. The work was finished by others and no one is quite sure how exactly he was planning on ending it. The chapter on early man is quite memorable in that it gives early men and women a lot of credit for figuring out a lot of importa...

Published by ListenUp Audiobooks in September of 2014. Read by Brian Troxell. Duration: 9 hours, 14 minutes. Unabridged In many ways Trident's First Gleaming is a pretty typical special forces book. You've got a terrorist threat from somewhere in the Middle East, you have an elite group of American operatives who are scrambled to eliminate it, they discover it is worse than anyone has imagined and only they can somehow overcome these newer incredibly long odds and save America and the world. But, in other ways it is different. The main character, Chris Paladin, is more than just a really talented (but retired) operative - he is also an associate pastor of a church in Dallas, Texas. But, when a former colleague reaches out to him and requests his help. She has been assigned to recover a downed Switchblade Whisper, a new type of military drone that can be launched from a submarine. Its wings swing out and lock open when fired out of the submarine, like a switchblade...

Published by Recorded Books in 2011. Read by George Guidall Duration: 11 hours, 23 minutes Unabridged The Secret Soldier is my first John Wells book. For those not in the know, John Wells is a former CIA agent who is also a Muslim (if not a particularly devout one when it comes to all of the formalities). He now freelances, sometimes working with the CIA, sometimes not. The first part of The Secret Soldier deals with John Wells tracking down a former operative in Jamaica and bringing him back to the United States. I am unsure as to why this was included in the book - it had nothing to do with the rest of the story except to establish that John Wells is burned out and is unsure about the life of violence that he has led.  The heart of the story involves a plot against the royal family of Saudi Arabia. Wells is hired by the King  of Saudi Arabia himself to investigate a series of terrorist attacks within Saudi Arabia. As Wells investigates he discovers that the sour...

Not the best of Bernard Lewis Published January 24th 2002 by Oxford University Press, USA Hardcover, 192 pages I've read two other books by Lewis and found both of them to be much more comprehensive and satisfying than this one. My dissatisfaction stems from the title. The title What Went Wrong? implies a discussion of how the Islam world went from being the most advanced culture on the planet to one of the most insular and, in many ways, most backwards cultures on the planet. While such a discussion is implied, it is barely touched upon in the body of the book. Lewis finally gets to this general topic in his conclusion. He notes, "By all standards that matter in the modern world-economic development and job creation, literacy and educational and scientific achievement, political freedom and respect for human rights - what was once a mighty civilization has indeed fallen low." (p. 152) Bernard Lewis ...

Disappointed Anthony Pagden's Worlds at War: The 2,500-Year Struggle Between East and West was a book I was really looking forward to reading. It sat on my wish list for months and when I saw it just sitting there at my local library I greedily snatched it up and considered myself lucky to even have found it checked in. Thank goodness I did not waste my money buying it. I suppose the problem with a book of this nature is that it is bound to disappoint - some things will be "too" highlighted, some left out. Even worse for this book, niggling factual errors crop up that bother the careful reader and throw into doubt the validity of the more complicated interpretations of the work as a whole. Positives: The book is quite readable and you must give a tip of the hat to anyone who undertakes such a large and sweeping history. Negatives: The anti-religious comments taint large sections of the book: "...nor have I made any attempt...to disguise...

2000 years in 387 pages - A great effort but somewhat unsatisfying. Published in 1997. Don't get me wrong - I am came to The Middle East: A Brief History of the Last 2,000 Years as a true fan of Bernard Lewis. His book The Crisis of Islam: Holy War and Unholy Terror was one of the more thought-provoking books I read last year. However, this book is quite different than 'Crisis'. It's scope is massive, and it is a history book rather than a work of examination and informed conjecture. Lewis addresses these shortcomings in his introduction and admits that it will be a difficult undertaking to do it well. He acknowledges that whatever format he chooses to cover this history, it will be unsatisfying for some. I give him credit for doing it well, but not as great as the other books and articles of his that I've read. Bernard Lewis The book is broken up into three general sections. The first is a general overview of the Middle East over the last 2,...

I love this series   I teach history in a public school so using this Drive Thru History: East Meets West  in my classroom is not a viable option due to the contemporary religious references. However, if you are in a Christian school or homeschool with a Christian emphasis I can enthusiastically recommend this series. East Meets West has two 30 minute plus programs about Turkey and Asia Minor. Turkey is literally where the Middle East meets the West. In episode 1, Dave Stotts takes us to Cappadocia, a unique area with an underground city and roots in the Old Testament and in the post-Biblical era as a scene of anti-Christian persecution by both the Romans and the Muslims. Episode 2 is the stronger of the two. It covers the Emperor Constantine, the controversy that caused the creation of the Nicene Creed, the fall of Constantinople and the wonderful Hagia Sofia church turned to mosque now museum. Episode 3 is a "best of" for the first 4 volumes with a blooper reel...