Born in a Small Town: John Mellencamp by Heather Johnson

A much-needed biography for Mellencamp fans

Published in 2007 by Omnibus Press.

Born in a Small Town: John Mellencamp makes use of a previous biography, American Fool: The Roots and Improbable Rise of John Cougar Mellencamp by Martin Torgoff, but that was published in 1986, before John's most successful era with the Scarecrow and Lonesome Jubilee and Big Daddy albums.

Heather Johnson's unauthorized, but nonetheless well-researched biography is based on the Torgoff book, interviews with 25 people over an eight-month period in 2006. These include band members, producers and even Elaine Mellencamp, but not John. There are 4 pages of sources, including magazine, newspaper and TV interview and even a letter Mellencamp wrote to Seymour Daily Tribune when he was in high school. But, the book lacks some credibility without having John's explicit involvement.

Positives:

Well-researched, as already noted.

John Mellencamp

The author, Heather Johnson, knows her way around the music studio, which is a credit to the book since that is where the music that Mellencamp fans is created and recorded.

Wonderfully detailed index.

Nice discography, including the unauthorized releases by the Main Man producers after John made it big.

Negatives:

-When I read Born In A Small Town there were times where I wondered if she has actually been to Indiana. She refers to an ancestor (Johann Herman Mollenkamp) that helped organize the White Creek Lutheran Church in Hamilton Township (Jackson County). Well, that church is in Bartholomew County (although not far away). Nitpicky, maybe, but this is a big deal to me because I grew up right in the heart of Mellencamp-land and I went to Indiana University. I learned to skate at the Rok-Sey roller rink (a Mellencamp family businesses where you could request John Cougar songs all night long.) and I can talk about all of the places in Seymour in the Small Town video.

-She refers to Vincennes, IN as being "nearby" to Seymour, IN (p. 5). Hardly.

-She claims John and his band performed 1,000 dates with the Kinks in 8 months in 1980 (p. 41). That would be 4 performances per day, every day. Wow. Also, highly unlikely.

-She calls Guns 'N Roses guitarist Izzy Stradlin an "Indianian". There is no such word, as any Hoosier will tell you.

At times her low-key writing style wears thin - too informal, too many repeated phrases.

**********

Okay, despite these nit picky negatives, I did enjoy the book. Johnson's details about the process of the creation of John's music are interesting. Mellencamp's songs are the soundtrack of my life in a lot of ways. I listened to American Fool, Uh-Huh, Scarecrow and The Lonesome Jubilee so many times that if you play me one of the songs, I can sing it, tell you the album and the songs that precede and follow it. If it is the same with you, go ahead and pick this one up.

I rate this biography 4 stars out of 5.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: Born in a Small Town.

Reviewed on July 19, 2008.

You Can Do It! by Tony Dungy

Tony Dungy scores big with this children's book (a dual review - DWD's 8 year-old daughter as co-reviewer)

Published in 2008 by Little Simon Inspirations.

Tony Dungy is a successful author, family man, public speaker, and a fine example of how to be a Christian gentlemen. Oh, he also manages to coach an NFL team in my city, the Indianapolis Colts.

In You Can Do It! Tony takes us back to his childhood in Michigan and tells the story of his little brother, Linden, who is a cut-up in class but can't seem to find his way. He can't figure out what is his "it". Tony is an athlete. His sisters take care of animals. What is his thing, his "it"?

To Dungy's credit, the story is simple, but not preachy and not so simple that it bores the adult reader. I read right to the end and was genuinely interested in seeing how it came out. The illustrations are perfect and really help tell the story.

My daughter, an 8 year-old and an excellent reader liked the story as well. She liked the way Dungy addressed the issue of Linden not knowing what he wanted to be when he grew up. What kid has not wondered what he or she will do when he or she grows up? (Right now she wants to be a combination waitress/veterinarian/race car driver with Danica Patrick) She also liked the fact that it mentioned prayer and God.

Tony Dungy

If this is the quality of work we can expect from Tony Dungy, I hope he comes out with many more books.

I rate this book 5 stars out of 5.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: You Can Do It!

Reviewed on July 21, 2008.

Martin Misunderstood (audiobook) by Karin Slaughter

Seinfeld's Wayne Knight's first foray into audiobooks

Published by BBC Audiobooks America in 2008
Read by Wayne Knight
Lasts 2 hours 30 minutes

Karin Slaughter's Martin Misunderstood is a short (2 1/2 hours) audiobook about a loser named Martin, his awful mother, his cruel co-workers and his miserable life in Georgia. Martin is framed for murder and his extensive readings of James Patterson, John Grisham and Patricia Cornwell are all he has to help himself.

Positives:

Wayne Knight did a great job of creating the voices, especially those of Martin's mother and Unique (You-nee-quay). Knight's comic timing was a big help with some weak material.

Negatives:

Karin Slaughter.

This is my second Karin Slaughter book (both this summer) and I am not going to read her anymore.

Wayne Knight

Slaughter spends nearly half of the book just setting up the characters and then she just wraps it all up like she was on a deadline and she just had to get some sort of ending on the story. This book just clunks to an end - sort of Twilight Zone-esque but not like one of the good episodes. More like one of those bad ones where you look at the person next to you and say, "That's it?"

Wayne Knight's performance turns a one-star review into two stars. I hope he reads a lot more audiobooks, just not Karin Slaughter's books.

I rate this audiobook 2 stars out of 5.

This audiobook can be found on Amazon.com here: Martin Misunderstood.

Reviewed on July 21, 2008.

Hero (Graphic Novel) by Stephen R. Lawhead and Ross Lawhead

This re-telling of the story of Jesus was just okay

Published in 2003 by NavPress Pub Group.

Written by Stephen R. Lawhead and Ross Lawhead.

Adapted from the original story by Eddie DeGarmo and Bob Farrell

I picked this one up yesterday. I was excited to see it was a near-futuristic re-telling of the last days of Jesus re-told by Stephen R. Lawhead. I am a giant fan of his book Byzantium, so I knew he'd re-tell this is a respectful and interesting way.

It was respectful and faithful to the Biblical version but very short. I read this one in about 20 minutes. It is a graphic novel version of a rock opera but this so you obviously can't include the songs. But, there was nothing else added either. No background on the disciples (except Maggie). You actually have to know the story from the Bible to read this and get what they are doing. There's no explanation about who Petrov (Peter) is and where he came from and why he follows Hero (Jesus). Jude Discariot gets the most treatment, which is not saying much.

So much more could have been done. At least no harm was done by straying from the original too much, but this one could have been easily 3 times longer without straying from the original.

I rate this graphic novel 3 stars out of 5.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: Hero.

Reviewed on July 25, 2008.

Tides of War: A Novel of Alcibiades and the Peloponnesian War by Steven Pressfield

Accurate, textured historical fiction that just failed to do it for me

Published in 2001 by Random House Publishing Group.

Before I get started let me say that I liked The Legend of Bagger Vance absolutely loved Gates of Fire: An Epic Novel of the Battle of Thermopylae. Pressfield is a master of Greek battle scenes, especially from the point of view of the grunt footsoldier in the middle of their deadly scrums.

Pressfield's mastery of battlefield scenes happily continues in Tides of War: A Novel of Alcibiades and the Peloponnesian War. His descriptions of the Athenian campaign against Syracuse was as good as anything in "Gates of Fire".

But, in between there was so much speech-making, reminiscing and quotes from Greek literature that I felt like I was having to slog through it all. On top of it all, the map of "Greece and the Aegean" in the front was insufficient, only listing some of the places mentioned in the book so that one had to guess where they were off to (or look them up in a separate source).

Steven Pressfield

The cover says it is "a novel of Alcibiades and the Peloponnesian War." That is not entirely accurate - I'd say it was just a novel of Alcibiades. If you know nothing of the Peloponnesian War before reading this book, you'll know precious little afterwards, except that there was a plague, a campaign against Syracuse in Sicily, Sparta won, Alcibiades switched sides and the Athenian legal system was fickle (to say the least).

A great companion book to go with this one would be A War Like No Other: How the Athenians and Spartans Fought the Peloponnesian War by Victor Davis Hanson. It explains the ships, armament and the Athenian plague in great detail. It lacks detail about Alcibiades so they dovetail together nicely.

In short:

While not without merit, this one was not as good as Gates of Fire.

I rate this novel 3 stars out of 5.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: Tides of War: A Novel of Alcibiades and the Peloponnesian War by Steven Pressfield.

Reviewed on July 30, 2008.

V: The Second Generation by Kenneth Johnson

From a casual fan of the original V mini-series

Published in 2008.

So, I'm reading V: The Second Generation based on hazy twenty-five year old memories. I thought the book held up pretty well and it was a fun, last blast of summer read for me. Nothing fancy, nothing I'd brag about and say, "Yes! I read that!" but also a good bit of sci-fi action.

That being said, it's not like this book is not without it's problems. There are continuity issues, too much happens with too few people. The secret "weapon" of the resistance is created so quickly that it boggles the mind as to why they didn't try this earlier. Clunky sentences abound. Strange phrases like, "people of both genders and sexes" are peppered throughout.

So, fun, but not perfect by any means. Much like my memories of the original series.

I rate this book 4 stars out of 5.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: V: The Second Generation.

Reviewed on July 31, 2008.

Double Image by David Morrell

Originally published in 1998.

No one, and I mean no one in modern fiction does a better job of creating the "man on the run" story line than David Morrell. He creates tension and paranoia in his stories that make the reader turn the page. This story is no different in that respect. But, it does have a horrible flaw.

Double Image features photographer Mitch Coltrane. He mostly does news photography but is also quite the talented artistic photographer. When the story starts, Coltrane is in Bosnia photographing Dragan Ilkovic, a war criminal whose men are digging up mass graves in order to more properly dispose of them. Coltrane gets his pictures, barely escapes with his life and decides that it is time to get out of the news business because the sights are starting to give him nightmares.

In the meantime, his pictures cause Ilkovic to become an international criminal. Ilkovic comes to Los Angeles to hunt down Coltrane and Morrell's strengths as an author come to the fore - Coltrane is on the run and death and destruction rain down upon the Los Angeles area as they play a cat and mouse game.  Vintage Morrell and it is only the first half of the book.

The second half is about a famous photographer that is dying from old age that Coltrane meets at a showing. Coltrane and this photographer decide to re-do a famous set of pictures that this man took in the 1930 featuring Los Angeles area homes (one of those "then and now" type of features). In an increasingly convoluted plot line, Coltrane ends up buying one of the homes (which was owned by the aged photographer who has since died), discovers a collection of hundreds and hundreds of photographs of a stunning 1930s actress, meets her granddaughter who looks exactly like her and ends up in another whirlwind of stalking, mayhem and death.

Like I said, lots of good action, but this story just went beyond all hope of credulity.

I rate this book 3 stars out of 5.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: Double Image

Reviewed on July 19, 2011.

46 Pages by Scott Liell

An important piece of the story of the American Revolution

Thomas Paine (1737-1809)

Published in 2003 by Running Press

Sad to say, this history teacher had never read Thomas Paine's famed pamphlet Common Sense until three days ago. I came across a stand-alone printing of the book and was prepared to buy it when I found 46 Pages.

The entire text of Common Sense (originally just 46 pages long, thus the title) is added as an appendix at the end of the book. I read the original text first and then proceeded to the first part of the book which consists of a short and pleasant combination of a biography of Paine, a history of Common Sense and little snippets of what several founders thought of the pamphlet at its author.

This is a solid addition to any American history buff's collection.

 I rate this book 5 stars out of 5.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: 46 Pages.

Reviewed on August 5, 2008.

Indiana: A Tribute The Hoosier State

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 and there's a solid bit of history thrown in as well.

I rate this documentary 5 stars out of 5.

Reviewed on August 10, 2008

The Good Thief by Hannah Tinti

Very rarely does a book live up to the hype...

Published in 2008.

NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY:

The New York Times Book Review

The Washington Post

San Francisco Chronicle

Kirkus Reviews

Winner of the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize

Winner of the American Library Association Alex Award

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. It can be found on Amazon.com here: The Good Thief by Hannah Tinti.

Reviewed on August 18, 2008.

My Glorious Brothers by Howard Fast

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-influenced) Syrians - they want to keep their old traditions and religion. They revolt against too many taxes, too many injustices and being forced to worship Greek gods. ("Thus they 'Hellenized' us, not with beauty and wisdom, but with fear and terror and hate." - p. 33)

Howard Fast (1914-2003)

I strongly recommend this one. Despite being more than 60 years old, this book can stand on its own among newer and more popular works about the ancient world such as Gates of Fire: An Epic Novel of the Battle of Thermopylae in both its battlefield descriptions and its cultural explorations.

Quote from the book I particularly liked this line based on a Bible verse from the Old Testament book of Micah: "What does the Lord require from a man, but that he should walk humbly and love righteousness?" (p. 142)

I rate this book 5 stars out of 5. It can be found on Amazon.com here: My Glorious Brothers. 

Reviewed on August 19, 2008.

Prey by Michael Crichton

A bit of smartly done, high-tech adventure

Published in 2002.

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.

Michael Crichton
(1942-2008)

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 of 5.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: Prey

Reviewed on August 20, 2008.

Note: This book turned up on a "banned book" list in Texas. Ugh.

Liberty's Children: Stories of Eleven Revolutionary War Children by Scotti Cohn

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 the war to secure supplies and allies and eventually travelled all of the way to Russia. At least Sybil Luddington, the 16 year-old female "Paul Revere" for Connecticut who is featured on Connecticut's quarter coin could have been included rather than another story about a boy gone off to sea.

Not that all of the stories were a chore to read, mind you. I enjoyed the stories of Frances Slocum, James Forten and Sally Wister in particular. If you have read this book and want to know more about Frances Slocum I enthusiastically recommend the novel The Red Heart by James Alexander Thom.

I rate this collection 3 stars out of 5.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: Liberty's Children.

Reviewed on August 23, 2008.