DWD's Reviews

A decent little documentary about Indiana, its history and its people Filmed in 1991, this 63 minute production is the first work of two brothers, Jim and John Hilgendorf who were inspired after visiting relatives in Indiana. They learned how to make movies while filming this one and logged more than 10,000 miles covering the state. They have since gone on to make more than a dozen documentaries about such places as Mexico, France, Oregon and St. Petersburg, Russia. While the production values on Indiana: A Tribute The Hoosier State   are fairly low, the movie more than makes up for that with its thoroughness and its obvious affection for the Hoosier State. This native-born Hoosier cannot think of a thing that was left out, from James Dean to the Covered Bridge Festival to the Indy 500 to Tecumseh to Notre Dame to young Abe Lincoln to the architecture of Columbus to basketball to John Mellencamp...it's all here. Beautiful shots of the Indiana countryside abound a...

Very rarely does a book live up to the hype... Hannah Tinti You know how it is. You get a book because the blurbs on the cover tell you it is the most wonderful book since Stephen King was in diapers. This one has the audacity to have comparisons to Oliver Twist , Huckleberry Finn and Robert Louis Stevenson. To be honest, I picked up The Good Thief figuring it would be wrong and I would skewer it in this review. Well, I am pleased to say that I was wrong. This book DOES live up to that hype. It does belong in that august and lofty crowd. Somehow it pulls off being filled with literary allusions and homages to other works and being a unique work of its own. There are multiple literary allusions that I noted, including Treasure Island , Sleepy Hollow , Huckleberry Finn , Oliver Twist , A Clockwork Orange , Faust , Milton and Terminator 2 . So, in short, pick it up. This one is a unique winner. I rate this book 5 stars out of 5. Reviewed on August 18,...

A great piece of historical fiction - strongly recommended Originally published in 1948. When I teach world history I always give my students a project in which they are to read a piece of historical fiction and do a bit of research. This book is exactly the type of book I recommend for them to read and why I created the project in the first place. My Glorious Brothers is well-written and re-creates a little bit of the historical world for the reader. Set in 2nd Century B.C. Israel, this is a story of national liberation and freedom of religious expression. Many Protestants will be unfamiliar with the Maccabees since Maccabees 1-4 is not included in the Protestant Bible. This book is an ideal place to start to explore that time between the exile in Babylon and the Roman occupation that is featured in the New Testament. The main characters are 5 brothers and their father, descendants of the Tribe of Levi. They refuse to be "civilized" by Hellenized (Greek-i...

A bit of smartly done, high-tech adventure Michael Crichton (1942-2008) Michael Crichton is re-visiting some old stomping grounds in Prey . The 1970s sci-fi movie classic Westworld was written and directed by Crichton and it features technology run amok and set loose on a killing spree. Jurassic Park features the dangers of tampering with the gene pool with an ensuing killing spree. Prey , in many ways, is a combination of the two - the dangers of nanotechnology, specifically the dangers of using bacteria in combination with tiny, tiny bits of technology to create something new. The problem is, of course, the same problem that he pointed out in Westworld and Jurassic Park : Things never turn out the way you think they will. Is this a Pulitzer Prize winner? Hardly. But, it is a creepy thriller with some good points about science, the dangers of unintended consequences and some good thrills and chills. I enjoyed this one thoroughly. I rate this book 5 stars out...

It just didn't work for me Published in 2004 by Globe Pequot Liberty's Children is a collection of stories about the experiences of eleven children during the Revolutionary War (although one is 20 years old, which was definitely not a child in a time when many were married with children at age 16). The book is well-researched and accurate. I have no complaints with that or the ample bibliography that is sorted by the individual children. But, I just felt like I had to slog through parts of it and I love to read history. I questioned some of the choices as well. Five of the eleven went off to sea, one of them was 20 years old and one was just a baby. I found myself wondering about the decision not to include the most famous child that served in the Revolutionary War, Andrew Jackson. He served as a courier and had his face slashed by a British soldier for refusing to clean his boots. Or, how about John Quincy Adams, who accompanied his father to Europe during th...

Where were you when you discovered the world was flat? I 've taken a number of basic economics classes over the last 5 years and I've tried to tell people about what I have learned about globalization as a reality. Friedman likes to ask people when they learned that the "world was flat", meaning when they learned that the advent of cheap instantaneous technology coupled with lowering trade barriers, and the fall of many political barriers (like the Berlin Wall) has made the world a very small, very competitive place, indeed. Well, I learned the world was flat last summer when one of my econ classes visited a Subaru plant in Lafayette, Indiana. When I tried to tell people who have not taken economics lately about global supply chains and comparative advantage they looked at me like I was a babbling fool. Now, my mom has read this book and now she suddenly understands my economic babblings and we speak the same language. Thomas Friedman What kind o...

The Good News: It's a Robert B. Parker Book... The Bad News: It's not a particularly good one. However, Robert B. Parker's books remind me of those bumper stickers that say 'A Bad Day Fishing is Better Than a Good Day at Work.' A bad Jesse Stone book is still a fun read. In Sea Change , Stone's police department is investigating a woman's body found floating in the harbor. Along the way, Stone discovers lots of perversion, money, yachts and messed-up rich kids. Or, as his psychologist puts it, Stone is working on a case 'in which control and loveless sexual objectification is rampant.' Stone comments that pornography is fun for about the first 10 seconds and then it loses most of its appeal for him (he has to wade through hours of personal videotapes of the stuff in the search for victims and suspects) because it gets so repetitive. Unfortunately, this book has the same problem. Lots of sex parties and videotape. Lots of rich b...

Lots of fun and you learn a little about economics along the way Beloved YA author Gary Paulsen ( Hatchet ) shows a side I was not aware that he had: a madcap sense or humor (he may have lots of funny books, but the ones I am aware of are not particularly funny). I am not much of a reader of YA books, but my daughter was reading Lawn Boy and she was laughing out loud so much and begging to read passages to my wife and I that I decided to look into it. When I saw on the back o f Lawn Boy Returns that the series had been named a Notable Book by the National Council for the Social Studies I was certainly intrigued. I discovered a simple, fun book that just about any kid would love to read that could also easily be incorporated into an economics lesson (in fact, here's a sample I discovered online: click here ). The book follows a pretty simple idea - a 12 year-old boy is given his deceased grandfather's small lawn mower. He mows his family's tiny lawn just to try it ou...

Good introduction to the life of a true American heroine Originally published in 1997. Sojourner Truth has always been one of my personal heroes. She was willing to stand up for what was right in a time when being a woman and being black and being an illiterate former slave were three strikes that took most people out of the public arena. Sojourner did more than stand up for herself - she thrived confronting slavery, advocating women's rights and proclaiming the Gospel of Christ. Sojourner Truth: American Abolitionist does a pretty good job of telling her story, but it is not a particularly lively rendition. The facts of her life add punch on their own, but that is despite the writing. My favorite Sojourner Truth quote comes from the year 1851, which is in response to a man who doubted women had the "strength" to deal with the responsibility of voting and being an active citizen: Sojourner Truth (1797-1883) "That man over there says that women ne...

A look at the Revolutionary War generation Originally published in 1983. Theron Nelsen and co-author Doug Wead's What Price Freedom: The Adventures of Early American Heroes is a series of short biographies of 9 men and 1 woman of the Revolutionary War generation. None of the biographies is too detailed (vary from 7-17 pages) and none focus on the more controversial parts of their lives (like Jefferson and Sally Hemmings, for example). Nevertheless, the book is pretty well done and chock full of good quotes. The biographies included are: John Paul Jones (1747-1792) Benjamin Franklin, Nathaniel Greene Alexander Hamilton, John Hancock, Patrick Henry, Thomas Jefferson, John Paul Jones, Francis Marion, Deborah Sampson, George Washington. John Adams is left out, but then again, when this book was written, Adams was not as popular as he is today. If you are an Adams fan, he is quoted extensively in the book, which is one of the reasons I was surprised he was le...

Sex and kidnapping in 1957 Memphis Originally published in 1978. Shelby Foote is most famous for his massive history of the Civil War ( The Civil War: A Narrative ), but he was also an author of fiction. I have read several of them and they mostly qualify as Southern gothic - moody, dark and full of tragedy. September September fits that description perfectly, although it takes place later than his other novels. Set against the backdrop of the racial integration of Little Rock Central High School in September of 1957, the novel features two white men and a white woman who kidnap the grandson of a wealthy black Memphis businessman. They use the Little Rock incident as their cover to blame the kidnapping on racial strife when it is really a brazen attempt to get $60,000 from a man who will not expect much cooperation from the police. Shelby Foote (1916-2005) The problem is summed up in a line from one of the kidnappers: "Truth is, we're not very smart, those of us wh...

Up and Down Published by HarperAudio Read by William Dufris Duration: 12 hours, 27 minutes Unabridged Dale Brown knows how to write action very well. He certainly knows all about airplanes (sometimes he talks about them so much that it's quite easy to drift off for a while and then come back), he has created enough new technological gizmos to outfit an entire fleet and he does a solid job of creating dialogue that sounds good to the ear - from old men to teenage boys. But, the promised confrontation with militias in A Time for Patriots just sort of fizzles rather than pops. Lt.-General Patrick McLanahan is retired and living in Battle Mountain, Nevada on a remote air base safeguarding the last of America's spaceplanes in the hopes that the program will be re-developed in earnest when the economy picks up and the budget can allow for it. In the meantime, he and his son are flying missions for the Civil Air Patrol (CAP). Brown, who is also a member of CAP, spends a g...

This made for school DVD highlights an important and oft-ignored facet of history Any teacher of world history knows that some subjects have plenty of supplemental resources available. For example, the Ancient Romans and Greeks have literally thousands of DVDs, books, workbooks, programs, units, games and activities available as supplements, including whole weeks of programming on the History Channel. Equally influential eras, such as the Arab Trade Routes are often ignored or have scant materials available even though these trade routes were the source of medieval Islam's strength, wealth and intellectual flowering. The DVD Ancient Trade Routes of the Arab World  does address this topic, but only in a 3-star (ok, but not great) way. The DVD features three short films (12 minutes or so for a total of 38 minutes) about three trading hubs - Zanzibar in East Africa, Dhofar in the Arabian Peninsula and Ghadames in the Sahara. The movies show the modern-day versions ...

A solid bit of historical fiction Andrew Jackson (1767-1845) J ason Manning has written a series of novels about the Barlow family, starting with Lt. Timothy Barlow. The Long Hunters is set during the War of 1812 and the Seminole War and features Barlow, young Ensign Sam Houston, General Andrew Jackson and a Creek warrior/family man named Rook. The book covers the Battle of Horseshoe Bend and some of Jackson's Seminole Campaign in some detail, while we get a history book type overview of the Battle of New Orleans. Manning's books are always well-researched and I am always a bit surprised that his stuff is always marketed with the pulp fiction westerns. Not that I dislike a good Western, mind you, but Manning's stuff is a cut above. The next book in the series is The Fire-Eaters . I rate this novel 4 stars out of 5 and it can be found on Amazon.com here: The Long Hunters .  Reviewed on August 30, 2008.

Good action marred by laughable political conspiracies and a not-so-hidden message Eric Van Lustbader is better known as the author who has picked up the Bourne series since the death of Robert Ludlum. First Daughter has some similarities to that series in that we have vast government conspiracies, brainwashing and one man versus the system. Positives: The action in the book is strong. Negatives: The back story Van Lustbader told to introduce us to the main character, Jack McClure, is much more interesting than the main plotline. The politics in this book are laughable. The President is a thinly disguised clone of Bush43 (Iraq, 9/11, Patriot Act, Faith-based initiatives, etc.) except he has the paranoia and anger level of 3 or 4 Richard Nixons. The President makes new policy initiatives in his last week in office. With less than a month to go he has a major negotiation with the Russians, even though everyone knows that no one negotiates with a President with s...

This book had such potential and then... I really liked the premise behind Forced Out : a young baseball player hides from the New York mob by playing single A ball in Florida but he is discovered by a former Yankees talent scout. Soon enough, the mob is on the hunt again. But... (WARNING: Spoilers, sort of...) The book gets increasingly complicated (which is fine, life is complicated) and the only way Frey resolves anything with any character in this book is by having someone killed off. I expected lots of people to die (it is about the mafia, after all) but this story gets ridiculous. The book ends up feeling like Frey was either: a) under a tight deadline; or b) unable to figure out how to end this complicated book in a reasonable way so he just started killing everyone off. Either way, it was a very unsatisfying ending. In good conscience, I cannot recommend this book to all but the most ardent of Stephen Frey fans. I rate this book 2 stars out of 5 and it...

The "Forgotten" Founding Father Samuel Adams (1722-1803) George Washington. Thomas Jefferson. Benjamin Franklin. John Adams. All there at the founding of our country. All recognized for their unique contributions to the revolution. Author Gary Wills noted that Adams was "the most influential man at the first two Congresses." He was on the committees of correspondence that tied the colonies together in the first place and no one was on more committees in the Continental Congress. It is easily argued that Samuel Adams had as great a role, if not greater than any other member of the Congress. He had such an integral part to play that a local newspaper noted in his obituary that "to give his history at full length, would be to to give an history of the American Revolution." In Samuel Adams: A Life,  Ira Stoll tells the story of Samuel Adams. Called by some the Last of the Puritans for his strong religious faith and willingness to express it openly, A...

Sarah Palin, without the filter Published in 2011 by Thomas Nelson There is no one, and I mean no one that generates as much energy and as much anger in American politics as Alaska's former governor Sarah Palin. In The Quotable Rogue: The Ideals of Sarah Palin In Her Own Words ,  Matt Lewis has collected a number of Palin's quotes on a variety of topics from her speeches and interviews over the last 5 or 6 years. He has organized them into broad 32 categories ranging from abortion to Barack Obama to Gun Control to Tina Fey. He also has a category of quotes from others about Sarah Palin. I was interested in this book because so much of what I hear about Sarah Palin is filtered through the opinions of columnists or edited heavily for TV or radio. This book is just Sarah's comment with a brief note about where and when it was said or written. That's it - no spin one way or the other. Sarah Palin Being that it is a book of quotes, it really can only be judged on t...

Entertaining but too many errors. Published in 1996 by Presidio Press Mike Wright is a television writer. In fact, he writes a pretty entertaining book as well. But, his lack of training as a historian shows in What They Didn't Teach You About the Civil War .    Some of the facts things he writes about were not taught to you because they just are not facts. In other cases, they are factual, but not truthful. For example, the fact about Robert E. Lee not owning any slaves at the time of the Civil War (p. 23) is technically true - but ignores the fact that his wife owned the slaves and they freed them in 1862 (not "long before the Civil War" as the book asserts) because of a requirement of her father's will). Wright makes the comment that the Confederacy only had one good general (Lee) on page 40. Perhaps Wright meant to clarify his point and say that Lee was the Confederacy's only good commanding general because one cannot say that Stonewall Jackson was a bad...

A fun, breezy read about a normal girl who made it big Published in 2002 by Villard Motherhood and Hollywood: How to Get a Job Like Mine is not out to change anyone's life, but it is a funny, light look at one woman's meandering quest to be an actress. Also, it is quite reassuring to find out that there are people in Hollywood who are quite normal. Patricia Heaton's book is irreverent, sometimes serious, frank, cute, and her tales of a time when kids could run the neighborhood in suburban Cleveland without fear reminded me of my own fun in small town Indiana. She pokes fun at her own silliness and naivete and reminded me of my own way back when. The author, Patricia Heaton This is a weekend read (it also has great potential as a read-out-loud-to-your-spouse-in-the-car book), but it will be one that you'll pass on to friends so they can have a fun weekend as well. I give this one 4 stars out of 5. This book can be found on Amazon.com here:  Motherhood and H...