THE FORT: A NOVEL by Bernard Cornwell

Not Cornwell's Best Effort.

Published in 2010 by HarperCollins

Set in 1779 Massachusetts, Bernard Cornwell's The Fort tells the story of the Penobscot Expedition - a small scale invasion by British forces of a bay in what is now Maine.

The government of Massachusetts is determined to repel this invasion without help from the Continental Army. It calls up its militia and its fledgling navy. It does accept help from the American national Navy and its contingent of Marines. By far, the most famous American in this campaign is the commander of the Massachusetts' artillery unit, Lt. Colonel Paul Revere.

Cornwell does a decent job of developing the British officers as characters.  A young officer named John Moore gets his first taste of battle here. In the Napoleonic Wars, Moore was one of the architects of Napoleon's eventual defeat.

Cornwell's battle scenes are, as always, excellently described. He switches from naval battles to land battles with ease. I felt absolutely confident that I had a reasonable grasp of the strategy and tactics of the battle and the successes and failures of the various officers that led to the outcome of the battle.

But, this book has glaring weaknesses.

Paul Revere (1734-1818)

Cornwell never makes it clear as to why Massachusetts refuses to even ask for help from the Continental Army until it is much too late. My opinion is that Massachusetts was very interested in asserting its independence - not just from England but even from the Continental Congress. But, I am basing that on previous knowledge, not from anything that Cornwell provided.

Paul Revere is a star of the book even though he is actually a fairly minor character in the book when it comes to dialogue. He is not even in most of the scenes that refer to him - there are a lot of references to him not being present at locations where he certainly should be present because he is sleeping on a ship or he is waiting for his cook to prepare his breakfast somewhere. The reader just knows that he is a diva but there is no explanation as to why.

The reasons for the British invasion of this particular bay is also not even made clear. This is a fairly lengthy book, but if I were the editor I would have suggested the addition of a few more pages to make the historical context of the story a lot more clearer and make the importance of what is happening here give the story even more drama.

I rate this novel 3 stars out of 5.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: The Fort by Bernard Cornwell. 

READY PLAYER ONE (audiobook) by Ernest Cline

Published in 2011 by Random House Audio.
Read by Wil Wheaton.
Duration: 15 hours, 46 minutes
Unabridged

Ready Player One is a dystopian novel set in 2044 America. Things are not going well - there is an energy crisis, mega-corporations run everything and most of the country lives in poverty. Cities aren't particularly safe and the countryside between the cities resembles Mad Max more than Green Acres. The only relief comes in the form of The OASIS - a free virtual world that allows its users to avoid their depressing real lives and be part of something bright, shiny and new. You can become who you want to be and people of relatively modest means in the real world can become someone quite important online.

The book revolves around Wade Watts and his online persona Parzival. He, along with millions of others, is in the midst of an online treasure hunt for clues to a fortune. He is a "gunter", which is a contraction of "egg hunter", as in the Easter Eggs -hidden references to other movies or pop culture that are sometimes hidden within a movie. 

The creator of The OASIS was a Howard Hughes-type billionaire - brilliant but extremely eccentric. He has promised that the person who found found three keys and successfully opened three gates will win his real-life fortune and his shares in the massive video game corporation that administers The OASIS.

He loved the 1980s and geek culture. It is widely assumed that the keys are hidden in places that combine both. So, these "gunters" study the 1980s with an all-consuming passion. They know all of the movies, the video games, the music and especially role-playing games like Dungeons and Dragons.

Wade Watts is a true "gunter" - he knows that his only real chance of making it out of the desperate poverty of his real life is to find these keys. If only he can find a clue...

...and then one day he finds a clue and everything changes, both in The OASIS and in the real world.

The reader, Wil Wheaton.
Photo by Genevieve.

Wil Wheaton read this homage to All Things Eighties and did a great job of creating different voices and pacing for characters. There is a lot of description and narration (as opposed to dialogue) in this book and he kept it lively and interesting.

At first, I loved this book as it was a trip down memory lane for me. The references to John Hughes movies, Monty Python, the music, the video game arcades and Dungeons and Dragons reminded me of my own teen years.

But, it was also depressing. It was sad seeing that the culture of the 2040s was consumed by its fascination with the 1980s and had no cultural innovations of their own - just technological innovations that enable people to experience The OASIS better. Everything was an homage to the 1980s or to The OASIS. 

Was this a great story? No, but it was fun and I was certainly entertained for nearly 16 hours listening to it so I can't complain.

I rate this audiobook 4 stars out of 5.

This audiobook can be found on Amazon.com here: READY PLAYER ONE.

Note: this book was tagged with my MAGA Censorship List tag because a Florida school district permanently removed it from their district's shelves in 2023 after an activist parent turned in a list of hundreds of books. He had not read most of them. A school district in Michigan also had a problem with this book being a part of a book club.

In 2025 there was a challenge to this book in Gibson County, Indiana - my state. To their credit, the parents of Gibson County pushed back and spoke at the school board meeting where the board was going to vote take a vote about the book. 24 parents spoke in favor of keeping the book, 2 wanted to ban it. The board voted 4-1 to keep the book.

GO SET a WATCHMAN (audiobook) by Harper Lee

Published in 2015 by HarperAudio in 2015
Read by Reese Witherspoon.
Duration: 6 hours, 57 minutes
Unabridged

I waited for a while to take a chance with Go Set a Watchman. The blowback when it was released was formidable, so I decided to let it sit for a while and in the meantime stop reading the reviews.

Warning: spoilers ahead.

This book is set about 20 years after the events of To Kill a Mockingbird, in the 1950s. Jean Louise Finch (Scout) has come home to Maycomb, Alabama from New York City for a long visit. 

When she first arrives she falls into the familiar rhythms of a small town where she seems to know most everyone. She rekindles a romance with her father's young protege and soon enough returns to scandalizing her aunt with her forward ways. Atticus Finch has become a physically frailer man, but his mind is still spry.

Harper Lee (1926-2016)

Everything about the trip seems to be going well until Jean Louise discovers a racist pamphlet among some papers of Atticus. She decides that she simply must sneak into a meeting of the Citizens' Council - a group of white men who are concerned about the NAACP and the burgeoning Civil Rights movement.

The meeting is in the same courtroom where Atticus Finch defended Tom Robinson and Jean Louise sneaks into the balcony to watch her father, just like she did in To Kill a Mockingbird. In that novel she saw her father do his best to defend a black man in a town that already knew his client was guilty.

In Go Set a Watchman, she sees her father and her serious boyfriend colluding with men who spout racist nonsense. She sees the hero fall - and fall hard.

Jean Louise's reaction was amazingly similar to my own as I listened to an icon of American literature debase himself - shock and disbelief. In my case, I knew it was coming, but I still hoped that maybe it had been exaggerated.

Everything seems to be falling apart around Jean Louise. She flees to her childhood home only to find it has been torn down and replaced by an ice cream stand. Calpurnia, the only mother figure she has ever known, rejects her. Her childhood is gone, her hero is gone and she is totally alone.

Clearly, there is a large bit of autobiography in this book - every bit as much as there was in To Kill a Mockingbird. One can easily imagine a young Harper Lee taking a similar trip back to Alabama and struggling with two versions of her hometown - the idealized version that she remembered from her childhood and the reality that falls short once she looks upon it with the eyes of an outsider.

Despite it all, I found myself enjoying this book. It is, in many ways, a more mature book than To Kill a Mockingbird. That being said, it is certainly not a stand-alone novel. You must read To Kill a Mockingbird before you read this book.

Reese Witherspoon read this audiobook and her lovely voice was an excellent choice.

I rate this audiobook 4 stars out of 5.

See my review of To Kill a Mockingbird here.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: Go Set a Watchman by Harper Lee.

ONE YEAR AFTER (John Matherson #2) (audiobook) by William Forstchen

The Story Continues...

Published in Blackstone Audio in 2015
Read by Bronson Pinchot
Duration: 9 hours, 51 minutes
Unabridged

In this sequel to the bestseller One Second After, Forstchen continues to tell the story of what happens to a North Carolina community called Black Mountain after the United States is attacked by multiple EMP attacks from nuclear weapons. All of the modern technology is fried (computers, modern cars, the electrical grid, anything with a circuit board) and America reverts back to a pre-industrial technology level.

*********SPOILER ALERT*************

An Apache helicopter

This book starts one year after the ending of the first book which ended one year after the attack. The main thrust of One Year After is that the federal government has returned in the guise of an appointed administrator working out of Asheville, NC. It is unclear exactly who is in control of the federal government, but they are drafting most of the able-bodied soldiers of the communities that survived the chaos after the EMP attack. The largest cities, like Chicago and New York City, are in complete chaos. A leader of a cult has taken over giant areas of Chicago and has successfully resisted a federal invasion led by largely untrained troops. So, the idea is to recruit local militias into a million man army to re-take America - an army led, in part, by John Matherson, who would be promoted to General.

A main theme is a burgeoning federal vs. local conflict symbolized by this demand for most of Black Mountain's local militia. If the militia joins the national army the town of Black Mountain is left defenseless The federal administrator is a cardboard cut-out of a toady bureaucrat who does not really know how to lead people but uses his connections to bully them instead. He has the superior military hardware in the form of Apache helicopters, but no particular skill in using his advantage. In opposition we have John Matherson who has become his town's patriarch and is willing to have his town destroyed rather than submit.

The series of fights throughout the second half of the book were interesting but rather pointless. Why would this federal administrator want to destroy one of the few places that can actually feed and defend itself? His style is all wrong for a brown-nosing toady - those guys know how to manipulate people and this guy does not. Most of the conflict in this book could have been solved with two or three short-wave radio conversations that included John Matherson from Asheville to the new federal government location outside of Washington, D.C.

***********End Spoilers************

Bronson Pinchot read the book and, for the most part, he did a good job. However, the accent he created for the bad guy federal administrator kept going in and out and sounded at various times like he was from the midwest or the south. But, the character said he was from Boston. I don't know if it was a really clever intentional thing - something to emphasize the guy was a liar about everything, including his accent, or if it was just a series of mistakes.

In short, there is a large drop-off in quality from book #1 in this series to book #2. I will finish the series but I am expecting a lot less of the third installment. 

I rate this audiobook 3 stars out of 5.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: One Year After. 

ONE SECOND AFTER (John Matherson #1) (audiobook) by William R. Forstchen

A Review of the Audiobook

Published in 2009 by Blackstone Audio
Read by Joe Barrett
Duration: 13 hours, 21 minutes

Foreword by Newt Gingrich
Unabridged

When One Second After was first published, it made a sensation of sorts, which is pretty tough to do if you are a science fiction book. As the book's promoters are proud to point out, excerpts from this book were even read into the Congressional Record from the floor of the House of Representatives as a warning about the dangers of an Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) weapon to the United States.

An EMP happens as a by-product of the explosion of a nuclear weapon. In short, a nuclear weapon detonated high in the atmosphere can generate this pulse and fry almost all modern electronic circuits by overwhelming them much like a lightning strike will due when it hits someone's home. The pulse can be generated from high enough in the atmosphere that the bomb itself does not cause an explosion on the planet's surface or even cause a radiation danger. In this book, no characters saw the nuclear weapons explode, all they certainly felt the effects of the EMP.

In this book, three weapons disable almost every piece of electronics in the United States. The book demonstrates that America is remarkably vulnerable to such an attack. Almost none of our facilities are "hardened" to survive such an attack. In fact, almost none of our military facilities and vehicles are hardened to survive EMP attacks - the exception being the few bits of machinery that were survivors from the Reagan Administration. Sadly, the Reagan Administration was the last administration to take EMP seriously enough to take steps to survive it.

So, all vehicles from the mid-1970s forward are rendered inoperable due to their electronic controls. Power plants are wiped out. The phone companies are gone. Cell towers, television, computers, printers - all gone. Everything stops in its tracks right where it was all over the country. Planes crash. Trains stop. Cars stop all over the country right where they are.

America reverts back to its pre-electricity days and America is totally unprepared.

The strength of this book is the detailing of how America would fall apart after such attack but not its actual prose. There are lots of repetitive phrases and way too much detail about the nearby college (which also happens to be the where the author teaches). Lots of the story is told by way of discussion in the town council. The local doctor tells the council how horrible things will be once modern medicines are used up, etc. and then the narration goes on to say that it happened just like the doctor had predicted. It gets the story moving forward but it is not particularly compelling. Sometimes the book is just hamfisted and clunky in its approach.

But, I found myself intrigued by the story and I totally bought into the premise. I found myself listening whenever I could because I simply had to know what happened next. And, that is the mark of a good book, despite its faults. I was so intrigued that I immediately picked up its sequel.

The book was read by veteran reader Joe Barrett who does a solid job with a variety of accents. He did an especially good job with retired Army sergeant Washington Parker.

I rate this book 4 stars out of 5.

This audiobook can be found on Amazon.com here: One Second After by William R. Forstchen.

THE PRINCESS DIARIST (audiobook) by Carrie Fisher

A Review of the Audiobook

Published in November of 2016 by Penguin Audio
Read by Carrie Fisher and Billie Lourd
Duration: 5 hours, 10 minutes
Unabridged

Published just a few weeks before her death, Carrie Fisher's The Princess Diarist continues in her well-known tradition of tell-all books. This is my first Carrie Fisher book. If you have not read a book of hers before, be prepared for a frank and open discussion of just about anything that pops into her head. Every family has that older relative who means well but makes comments in front of the children that you just know will necessitate a subsequent discussion ("Why did Uncle Bob say...?). Carrie Fisher served that role in the world of Hollywood for many years.

The first half of the book is mostly devoted to the making of the original Star Wars movie, now known as Episode IV. There were a lot of factoids I had already heard or read before, but it was enjoyable listening to Carrie Fisher literally tell them again as she read her audiobook. She is frank about her family's struggles as she grew up and as I listened I was amazed.

A large part of the book is devoted to her on-set romance with the then-married Harrison Ford. She is kind to him and puts a lot of blame on herself being "the other woman" when her own childhood home was torn apart by a similar "other woman" scenario. 

She describes how this was her first real physical relationship and she took it much more seriously than Ford. Then, for reasons that I do not understand, she re-tells this story with an extensive series of poetry readings from her diaries that she wrote while on set with Ford 40 years ago. The poems aren't bad and you can easily follow along with her allusions because she had already so clearly described the relationship in prose just a few minutes earlier. But, I quickly lost interest in the poems because I had just listened to Fisher herself explain everything without all of the rhymes. In the audiobook version these poems are read by Fisher's daughter Billie Lourd.

The last section of the book is the most touching, especially considering Fisher's recent death. It is a tribute to all of the fans that come to see her at all of the conventions. She discusses how she really didn't want to do the conventions at first and then she moves on to talk about the fans. It starts out as commentary about some of the rather unique people you meet at conventions and moves on to becomes a long tribute to the importance of this film series to its fans. It is sad, warm and often very funny with lots of great accents. It is Carrie Fisher at her very best.

I rate this audiobook 4 stars out of 5.

This audiobook can be found on Amazon.com here: The Princess Diarist.

DRIVERLESS: INTELLIGENT CARS and the ROAD AHEAD (audiobook) by Hod Lipson and Melba Kurman

Published in 2016 by Blackstone Audio
Read by George Newbern
Duration: 9 hours, 57 minutes
Unabridged

Driverless cars have been the goal of engineers for decades, but the technology has simply not been there. Lipson and Kurman take the reader (or listener, in my case) through a history of driverless cars, artificial intelligence and make the case that driverless cars will be a common thing much sooner than most of us think.

Positives: 

Driverless: Intelligent Cars and the Road Ahead is written in mostly non-technical terms and simply explains the technical terms that it does use before using them.

The writers are very enthusiastic about their topic.

Negatives:

The writers are very enthusiastic about their topic - and sometimes they go into waaay too much detail. For example, they go into a long discussion of a intelligent road scheme that General Motors worked on for years that was a dead end. It could have been edited down by half. 

But, on the whole this was a very informative book that gives the layman a solid handle on why driverless cars will come and how our society is likely to adapt to them.

I rate this audiobook 4 stars out of 5.

This audiobook can be found on Amazon.com here: Driverless: Intelligent Cars and the Road Ahead.

ONE PERFECT SHOT: A Bill Gastner Mystery (audiobook) by Steven F. Havill

When Bill met Estelle...

Published in 2012 by Blackstone Audio
Read by Ray Porter
Duration: 10 hours, 31 minutes
Unabridged

In this prequel to the series, Bill Gastner is investigating the death of a road grader operator. He is found dead in the cab of the grader with a bullet in his brain, having been shot by a single shot straight through the front windshield. There are no witnesses so Bill starts to dig through the victim's past to find out if there are any potential enemies that might have wanted to hurt him.

As he starts to investigate the sheriff department's new hire, Estelle Reyes, a rookie straight out of college, goes along for the ride while Gastner tries to familiarize her with the department's procedures. And, of course, the more they dig the more they find secrets that most people would just prefer stay buried...

One Perfect Shot is a solid mystery - I sort of had it figured out about 2/3 of the way through but for all of the wrong reasons. But, the most interesting thing is the fact that we get to meet Estelle Reyes for the first time. The rich detail of the local community of Posadas County, New Mexico is explored in detail and I think that this only makes the story better.

I enjoyed it thoroughly.

I rate this audiobook 5 stars out of 5.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: One Perfect Shot by Steven F. Havill.

FINDING JESUS: FAITH. FACT. FORGERY: SIX HOLY OBJECTS that TELL the REMARKABLE STORY of the GOSPELS by David Gibson and Michael McKinley

Published in 2015 by MacMillan Audio.
Read by Peter Larkin.
Duration: 7 hours, 55 minutes.
Unabridged.

Finding Jesus is not a deep book theologically, but it does take a balanced look at 6 things that are associated with Jesus and a few related topics and is respectful of the faithful while doing its exploration. If you are expecting a book that is out to burst religious bubbles, this is not your book.

The topics are:

1) John the Baptist. Who was he? Is he in the historical record? Are the relics of John the Baptist in scattered across Europe actually him?

The James Ossuary.

2) James, the brother of Jesus. Who was he? Was he Jesus' half brother through Mary or a step-brother from a previous marriage of Joseph? Is the James Ossuary (a casket to hold bones) that was discovered a few years ago real?

3) Mary Magdalene. Who was she? Was she a disciple or simply a follower of Jesus? Why is she not mentioned after the four gospels? Was she the wife of Jesus? Was she really a reformed prostitute? Was she written out of the New Testament?

4) Judas Iscariot. Who was he? Why would an all-knowing Jesus pick a man to be one his disciples when he knew he would betray him? Was Judas actually a hero because he led Jesus to his death so that he would sacrifice himself for everyone? What about the gnostic Book of Judas? This section includes an excellent discussion of gnosticism.

5) The True Cross. There are dozens of dozens of artifacts that purport to be the true cross, but are any of them really that one cross? For me, this was the most boring of all of the topics.

6) The Shroud of Turin. This one was surprisingly interesting to me. Even if you doubt if the shroud is the actual shroud that Jesus was buried in (I know that I doubt that it is real) the discussion of crucifixion and the history of relics like the shroud were very strong.

This is a great audiobook. The reader, Peter Larkin, does a great job of keeping the text lively. A very enjoyable and informative listen.

I rate this audiobook 5 stars out of 5.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: FINDING JESUS: FAITH. FACT. FORGERY: SIX HOLY OBJECTS that TELL the REMARKABLE STORY of the GOSPELS.

ALL STAR SUPERMAN by Grant Morrison. Illustrated by Frank Quitely.

Published in 2011 by DC Comics.
320 pages.

I am a fan of Superman. Actually, he's my favorite superhero. All Star Superman started out as an intriguing take on the Man of Steel but it ended being a mish-mash of a mess.

This is a collection of multiple original comics and follows a story arc that is based on a dying Superman. In the first episode, he saves a scientific mission to the sun and ends up overloading his cells with the power of our yellow sun. There is no recovering and the overdose takes several months to kill him.

******Warning****** Spoilers*******

Superman responds by getting more serious about his relationship with Lois Lane and gives her a medication that gives her powers like his own for one day. This would have been a wonderfully interesting story line except for the arrival of two strong men from history that are now time traveling seeking adventure: Samson and Atlas. They decide they like Lois Lane, flirt with her incessantly and challenge Superman for her hand - like Lois has no say in the matter. The normally vocal and highly independent Lois just takes this. Who are these guys? Just two sexist creeps that sort of advance the plot, but mostly just make it seem like someone stole the plot of a 1930s movie.

It goes on that way throughout the book. Superman goes rogue when exposed to some bad Kryptonite, Superman travels through time to meet his father and the stories just don't seem to have enough heft to make me care too much. Too much bizarre stuff, not enough story.

Superman goes to Bizarro world and meets a sort of half-and-half Bizarro Superman who is doomed to stay on the planet - the only creature who can actually think straight. He was by far the most interesting thing in that entire story line, but only gets a few panels and, strangely, left behind by the real Superman.

I liked the Lex Luthor story line, but it makes no sense for a man of Luthor's talents to be given access to anything while waiting on death row, let alone technology to make superweapons. Nonetheless, it was the strongest part of the graphic novel.

******End Spoilers*********

Too many missed opportunities, too many convoluted story plots that don't hold up. I rate this collection 2 stars out of 5.

This graphic novel can be found on Amazon.com here:
All Star Superman.

THE FORGOTTEN FOUNDING FATHER: NOAH WEBSTER'S OBSESSION and the CREATION of an AMERICAN CULTURE (audiobook) by Joshua Kendall

Published by Penguin Audio in 2011
Read by Arthur Morey
Duration: 12 hours, 45 minutes
Unabridged

Referring to Noah Webster (1753-1848), the creator of the famed Webster Dictionary, as a Founding Father is generous, to say the least. He did live serve in the Connecticut militia, even deploying at one point, but he never saw much action. He did know many of the Founding Fathers and actually stayed in the homes of George Washington and Benjamin Franklin, but they had frequent guests so it would not be fair to characterize those friendships as particularly close friendships. He did advocate strongly for the adoption of the Constitution and for a short time was actively involved in partisan politics as a newspaper editor in New York City. But, when people think Founding Father they are usually referring to far brighter lights than Noah Webster.

A 1958 stamp featuring Noah Webster

If I were naming this book I would have dropped the Forgotten Founding Father angle and kept the rest of the title "Noah Webster's Obsession and the Creation of an American Culture." The impression left by this biography is that Webster was an obsessive and difficult man who often retreated to making lists when life became difficult. He had list of the numbers of homes in towns, distances between towns, how people died in cities - you name and he loved to categorize it, rank it, alphabetize it, write it down and stick it in a book, newspaper or magazine. In a way, his dictionary project became his ultimate list because it literally covered everything.

The Forgotten Founding Father: Noah Webster's Obsession and the Creation of an American Culture is frustrating for two reasons. The first is the subject himself. It is clear that Webster was a difficult man and this book reflects that. His letters, speeches and comments are often biting, even to his own friends and family. He creates detractors and even outright enemies throughout the book because of his obtuse ways. 

The second reason is the style of the book itself. It often dwells on obscure details and is written in a style designed drive people away from the book. Don't get me wrong, I had no problem following the book, but when you use to the word "impost" instead of tax, I'm not sure what your goal is, except to demonstrate the command of a large vocabulary. I hate to make this a jeremiad against the author, but then again he did use the word jeremiad many, many times throughout the book and I started to wonder if the author even had access to a thesaurus. According to the modern website of Webster's dictionary, he could have used much more common words like rant, tirade and harangue and made his point all the more clear to a greater part of the population. If a point could be made on one or two sentences, the author seemed bent to say it in 5 or 6 sentences instead. It was very easy to drift away from this audiobook for a minute or two and not worry about having missed much.

On a positive note, the book is well-researched and thorough. I don't regret having listened to it, but as I listened I was reminded of the David McCullough quote, "No harm's done to history by making it something someone would want to read." The obtuse nature of the book was a lot like Webster himself and perhaps that is most appropriate.

I enjoyed Arthur Morey's reading of the The Forgotten Founding Father. He added a nice touch by reading quotes from Webster and other recurring people with different voices.

I rate this audiobook 3 stars out of 5.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: The Forgotten Founding Father.

PROLONGED EXPOSURE (Undersheriff Bill Gastner #6) (audiobook) by Steven F. Havill

Originally published in 1998.
Published in 2008 by Books in Motion. 
Read by Rusty Nelson.
Duration: 9 hours, 46 minutes.
Unabridged.

I have been reading the Bill Gastner series off and on again for nearly 10 years. This is one of those series that never really took off and became bestsellers, but it certainly should have. If you enjoy Tony Hillerman's Leaphorn and Chee novels then you should give this series a try.

Prolonged Exposure is book #6 in a series that depends on the reader having some at least some prior knowledge of the characters. I have read some of the earlier books and some of the later books so that I wasn't lost when it came to the non-mystery part of the story.

Bill Gastner is a cranky old undersheriff, which is an office in New Mexico. Basically, the sheriff of a county is an elected position and is designed to be held by someone who is not a member of law enforcement. An undersheriff is a professional who works with the sheriff and makes sure that things operate they way they are supposed to. He works in a fictional county along the border with Mexico.

In this novel there are two main story lines. The first one involves Bill Gastner's property. While he was out of state recovering from a surgery with his daughter his elderly neighbor dug a marked grave for his wife and buried her on the edge of Gastner's land. At first, he is tolerant and looks upon it sympathetically but once he starts to look into it, it starts to look weird, even by the standards of his small town.

The second is the story of a three year old boy who goes missing during a family camping trip. A manhunt ensues and the whole department starts to become suspicious that things may not be quite what they seem.

Rusty Nelson's reading of this audiobook was excellent. He created different voices for every character and even managed a series of pretty decent Mexican accents.

I rate this audiobook 5 stars out of 5.

This audiobook can be found on Amazon.com here: Prolonged Exposure by Steven F. Havill.

HILLBILLY ELEGY: A MEMOIR of a FAMILY and CULTURE in CRISIS (audiobook) by J.D. Vance

Published in 2016 by HarperAudio.
Read by the author, J.D. Vance.
Duration: 6 hours, 49 minutes.
Unabridged.

Sometimes, I find it hard to write a review of an audiobook, especially an audiobook like this one. I find it hard - not because it is a bad book but because it is so good and I don't know how to convey my thoughts without giving a blow-by-blow book report of the book.

So, in short, J.D. Vance tells the story of his upbringing in Hillbilly Elegy. He calls his family hillbillies but also calls that same group rednecks or poor white trash. When I was a kid in southern Indiana, we called them poor white trash. His family came from eastern Kentucky (as did part of my own a hundred years ago) and was part of an exodus from the area in the 1950s. These hillbillies brought their culture with them and Vance spends the rest of the book telling a dual story - the story of his family and the story of how this Appalachian culture is struggling in modern America.

The title of the book tells you that this is often a somber book since an elegy is a sad poem or song to praise and express sorrow for the dead. Vance's family history is not a particularly happy one, but it is far from universally tragic. I think that Vance is expressing sorrow for working class whites as a whole. Their culture is leaving them poorly equipped for the America they are born into.

Vance touches on this at one point, but as a teacher in an urban school system, I found that a lot of what he was talking about applied to what I see every day at school. What he talks about in this book can certainly be extrapolated out to apply to other cultures. In this case, what is more important is not race but poverty. It reminded me of the little bit of training I have had with Dr. Ruby Payne and her insights into generational poverty and its own unique culture. 

What works best with this book is Vance's technique of telling his own story and using it to illustrate larger insights into his own culture of generational poverty. You learn precisely because you start to care for people like his profane and loving grandmother - a woman that should not have been the impetus for Vance's success based on her track record with family relationships but ended up being the one person that made all of the difference.

This audiobook was read by the author. That can be tricky, especially if the author is not particularly a good reader. Vance is hardly a professional reader but his accent and tone make it better than a professional reader really could have.

I rate this audiobook an enthusiastic 5 stars out of 5.

This audiobook can be found on Amazon.com here: Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis by J.D. Vance.

Note: I wrote this review 7 years before Vance became the MAGA Republican Vice Presidential candidate. Despite enjoying the book, I am profoundly disappointed in his politics since I am a Never Trump Republican, like Vance used to be. Why did he change? I can only refer you to this short book about another Republican politician: The Corruption of Lindsey Graham.

THE WRONG SIDE of GOODBYE(Harry Bosch #19) (audiobook) by Michael Connelly

Published by Little, Brown and Company in November of 2016.
Read by Titus Welliver
Duration: 10 hours, 21 minutes
Unabridged.

In The Wrong Side of Goodbye Harry Bosch is now completely separated from the LAPD and is keeping himself busy with a little detective work and volunteering as a reserve officer for the small city of San Fernando. San Fernando has less than 25,000 residents, covers less than 2 square miles and is completely surrounded by Los Angeles. But, they are cash-strapped and can use the help and Bosch needs to keep fighting crime - it just who he is.

Bosch has been digging around on a serial rapist case and has finally started to shake some things loose and the case is starting to break wide open. Out of the blue he gets a call from a former boss at LAPD who now works private security. A reclusive billionaire wants Harry to look for a possible heir from a former girlfriend that he was forced to break up with more than sixty years ago. He has no other heirs and the sharks from his corporation are already circling around in anticipation that he will die soon. Harry gets sucked in by this tragic story and starts to feel a real connection.

Harry tries to balance his commitment to this private investigation with his commitment to the San Fernando Police Department when things start to get very dangerous with both cases...

For fans of Mickey Haller (The Lincoln Lawyer), he makes several brief appearances.

This was an excellent audiobook. Titus Welliver reads this audiobook and he has an excellent feel for Harry Bosch. He ought to since he plays him on Amazon's television adaption of the series. He delivers the feel of urgency to catch the criminal and the patience that all hunters must display. I blew right through this audiobook, listening to it at every opportunity.

I rate this audiobook 5 stars out of 5.

This audiobook can be found on Amazon.com here: The Wrong Side of Goodbye. 

BATMAN: THE LONG HALLOWEEN written by Jeph Loeb and illustrated by Tim Sale

Published in 2011 by DC Comics.

Batman: The Long Halloween is a collection of 13 comics compiled into a single book that tells about the mystery of a serial murderer called Holiday. Holiday always strikes on a major holiday and is particularly fond of killing figures in Gotham City's network of crime families.

Batman, Gordon, and Harvey Dent decide to work together to solve the mystery but this triumvirate of crime-solvers has its own internal troubles as both Bruce Wayne and Harvey Dent become suspects.

Calendar Man is an immediate suspect since this sounds like his kind of crime spree. But, he is locked up in Arkham Asylum. But, lots of other super-criminals are sprung free and pretty soon Gotham is awash in their machinations on top of a serial killer. Plus, Catwoman is also on the prowl...

This was a great mystery - I thought I had it figured out and then I found out that I was entirely wrong - twice! Powerful story and Batman nearly gets taken out. Loeb and Sale are a powerful team.

I rate this graphic novel 5 stars out of 5.

This graphic novel can be found on Amazon.com here: Batman: The Long Halloween.

BIG HERO 6: THE JUNIOR NOVELIZATION by Irene Trimble

Published by Disney and Blackstone Audio in October of 2014
Read by MacLeod Andrews
Duration: 2 hours, 18 minutes
Unabridged

Big Hero 6 is, in my mind, one of the best superhero movies that has been made in this time of the renaissance of the superhero movie. It is fun and colorful, but it also has loss and shows the power of friendship and love. It also demonstrates how love can be twisted into something evil.

Hiro Hamada is a teenaged robot-building prodigy who competes in robot fighting contests. His brother attends the local university in the future city of San Fransokyo and also builds robots in a high-tech lab in the school with several other talented young engineers. When his brother dies in a horrible explosion at the lab, Hiro is thrown into a profound depression.

He re-discovers Baymax, a health care robot built by his brother, and he and Baymax discover clues that his brother wasn't killed in an accident, but was murdered instead. Baymax, Hiro and his brother's friends from the laboratory use their skills to create the tools they need to confront the villain.

This book closely follows the movie. It does add a few lines and take away a few lines here and there to make the book format work smoothly but it is very faithful to the movie. It perfectly captures the relationship between Baymax and Hiro and the narrator. MacLeod Andrews, absolutely nails the voice of Baymax, which I think was essential to the success of the audiobook.

I rate this audiobook 4 stars out of 5.

You can buy this audiobook on Amazon.com here: BIG HERO 6: THE JUNIOR NOVELIZATION.

A DISEASE in the PUBLIC MIND: A NEW UNDERSTANDING of WHY WE FOUGHT the CIVIL WAR (audiobook) by Thomas Fleming

Published in 2013 by Blackstone Audio.
Read by William Hughes
Duration: 11 hours, 42 minutes.
Unabridged

Thomas Fleming readily admits that he mostly writes about the era of the American Revolution (such as his excellent book Liberty! The American Revolution) but he felt compelled to make a long commentary on the origins of the Civil War by writing A Disease in the Public Mind.

Fleming's take on the causes of the war are based on a comment from James Buchanan's that the furor over slavery was a "disease in the public mind."

Fleming is quite confident that this disease was mostly caused by the North. Shelby Foote alludes to this, in a way, in the Ken Burns Civil War documentary when he notes that there was a war "because we failed to do the thing we really have a genius for, which is compromise...our whole government's founded on it and it failed."

An exhibit at the Lincoln Museum in Springfield, Illinois.
Photo by DWD

Foote meant that both sides had to give in to make an agreement. Fleming clearly identifies the North as the side that refuses to compromise and causes the crisis. He compares the North to the Puritans that prosecuted the Salem Witch Trials and Joseph McCarthy. The difference between the Salem Witch Trials and the Abolitionist attacks on slavery is that witchcraft and magic are not real so there were no witches but slavery, slaves and slave masters were all very, very real. 

Fleming excuses the fact that slave families were broken apart on a regular basis through estate sales by pointing out that Washington did not do this sort of thing. He goes on to use Washington as an archetype of what could have been if the Abolitionists had not started pressing the South. If you had to be a slave, being George Washington's slave was about as good as you could hope for. Washington refused to break up families or dump older slaves who couldn't really work. He also freed his slaves when he died.  Fleming writes at length about how Washington was pressed by his own personal abolitionist - his Revolutionary War comrade the Marquis de Lafayette. Lafayette's efforts were worthy and good but, somehow, the efforts of American abolitionists were the equivalent of the Salem Witch Trial.

Fleming tries to defend slave owners against the charge of taking sexual advantage of their female slaves, saying it was very rare. But, as his narrative continues he points out any number of slaves and former slaves who were mixed race. If it was so rare, how did these people exist? He also completely ignores the story of Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemmings. This "look at this Founding Father as a great example, but not at that one because he doesn't make my argument" type of cherry-picking is pretty typical throughout the book. 

What Fleming does best is point out that there was a genuine paranoia among Southern Whites about the possibility of a race war like Haiti experienced when its African slaves overthrew the French government. When you look at the political cartoons of the era, like this one that decries the evils of the Emancipation Proclamation, you see evil influences upon Lincoln: multiple representations of the devil, a picture of a sainted John Brown and a large painting glorifying the violence in Saint-Domingue (Haiti). Clearly, this was a worry and not without some justification. There were slave revolts from time to time and this was the stated goal of John Brown's raid on the arsenal at Harper's Ferry.

But, Fleming uses this fear to justify every action the South made to defend slavery, such as refusing to let people petition the Congress concerning slavery - a right established in the First Amendment of the Constitution. The First Amendment! Not one of those pesky rights with the bigger numbers that get lost in the jumble. Plus, the governments of the South searched the mail for newspapers that they did not like and destroyed them. Clearly, another violation of the First Amendment. But, he excuses it because the White Southerners were scared of the power of the Abolitionist press on its slave population.

Fleming never really formulates a thesis beyond that the Abolitionists were pushing the Southerners too hard. Many historians try to argue that slavery was on the way out in the South and that slave owners were searching for a way to safely end slavery. Fleming does not even make this argument. He acknowledges that there was an attempt to expand slavery to the territories and to new states, but he denies it was organized. He completely ignores the fact that Southern politicians (and even John Quincy Adams, for a while) openly proposed conquering Cuba for the express reason of making it a slave state to keep the balance of free state/slave state power in the Congress. James Buchanan himself authored a proposal to take over Cuba before he became President and had it as a goal when he became President in 1857. There were also proposals to take parts of Mexico and Central America and make them slave states. William Walker invaded both Mexico and Nicaragua with that goal. The pre-Civil War pro-slavery group Knights of the Golden Circle advocated making more than 25 slave states out of Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean islands.

There is more, but this is enough to demonstrate that this is a deeply flawed book, albeit an interesting one. Fleming's reminder of the deep-seated fear of a race war like the one in Haiti is an important one. Fleming's argument ends up leaving the American slave population in the untenable position of being involved in a never-ending, ever-expanding slave economy that was, as Fleming himself points out, evolving from a plantation-based system to a factory-based system in some areas and showed little sign of ending. But, if you protested this system from the outside you were in the wrong and most certainly caused the Civil War. These are the reasons that I rate this book 2 stars out of 5.

This audiobook was read by William Hughes. He did a great job of reading at a brisk, easy-to-understand pace. 

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: A Disease in the Public Mind.

MARVEL'S GUARDIANS of the GALAXY: THE JUNIOR NOVEL by Chris Wyatt

Published in 2014 by Disney.
Read by Chris Patton.
Duration: 1 hour, 39 minutes.
Unabridged (sort of).

Guardians of the Galaxy: The Junior Novel is the sanitized, unabridged version of the abridged book of the movie. That means that not all the movie is in this book, but the audiobook version that I listened to does have everything that the abridged book has in it.

We picked this up to listen to on a short family trip. We are all fans of the movie but we were interested in a version with no cursing and less sexual references when we were listening in the car. Some scenes are edited and lots of great dialogue has been added that was not in the movie. It makes me wonder if the author was working from an early script.

The reader, Chris Patton, does a good job of voicing each of the Guardians, especially Rocket and Drax.

But....despite all of these good things the book ends at just past the halfway point - the point where the Guardians just lost the Infinity Stone to Rona the Accuser. The story just ends at the low point of the movie and there is an epilogue that says something like this" "...and they go on to have lots of amazing adventures and save the day when they confront Ronan." It was longer than that but you get the idea.

So, I rate this audiobook 2 stars out of 5. What was there was good but it was not the complete story. It is my understanding that there is a longer audiobook version written by a different author. I have no idea if it has been rendered more "kid friendly" or not.

This audiobook can be found on Amazon.com here: Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy.

NEVER GO BACK (Jack Reacher #18) by Lee Child

Published in 2013 by Random House Audio.
Read by Dick Hill.
Duration: 13 hours, 43 minutes.
Unabridged.

Admittedly, I bounce around as a I read the Jack Reacher (so far I have read #8, #11, #14 and #18) but I was very pleased to note that #14 and #18 are tied together so that I had sort of a seamless experience while still skipping around.

In #14 Jack Reacher meets, via telephone, Susan Turner. Susan Turner has Reacher's old job in the military police and they make a connection. In Never Go Back, Reacher decides to hitchhike across the country to meet her only to find out that she has been arrested and he is not allowed to see her. To top it off, he has been recalled into the army so they can file charges against him - a person he investigated for selling stolen military weaponry in Los Angeles more than 15 years before has passed away from injuries that he claims Reacher inflicted during an interrogation.

Of course, Reacher won't stand for this kind of silliness and he starts his own investigation. Of course, he needs help and Susan Turner is just sitting there in the lockup...

This was a great "buddy" book. Lots of action, a lot of fun comments and it was well read by Dick Hill who perfectly catches the sardonic commentary placed in the narrative by Lee Child. This was an enjoyable whirlwind of a book.

I rate this book 5 stars out of 5.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: Never Go Back (Jack Reacher #18).