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.

The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century by Thomas L. Friedman

Where were you when you discovered the world was flat?

Originally published in 2005. 
Revised and updated versions released in 2006 and 2007.

I've taken a number of economics classes 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 of book is The World Is Flat? Well-written, often funny, well-researched, full of interesting facts and, perhaps, a glimpse at the future. I followed my wife around the house reading passages to her - and she didn't tell me to get lost! I must have told 15 people to get this book and read it.

Do I agree with everything in it? No. I think he fundamentally misunderstands George W. Bush (it's just two pages so don't let that offend you or thrill you - it really is not a big part of the book), which is surprising because he really, really understands the threat of Al-Qaeda and bin Laden and explains the rise of the Islamo-Leninists (a.k.a. Islamo-fascists in other circles).

This book is a chunk (469 pages of text) but it is very readable. Friedman makes the complex really quite simple (although this "world is flat" stuff isn't that hard once you get it) and usually doesn't over explain things. Once or twice I found myself skimming passages, but this is no dry textbook.

Couple this book with Jared Diamond's Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed and you have a lot of food for thought to mull over the rest of the summer.

I rate this book 5 stars out of 5 and it can be found on Amazon.com here: The World is Flat.

Reviewed on July 5, 2006.

Review updated on December 28, 2025.

Sea Change by Robert B. Parker

The Good News: It's a Robert B. Parker Book...

Published in 2006.

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 boys, easy girls and videotape. The problem is that the story just gets stuck in a rut for about a hundred pages or so. The dialogue is wonderful. The observations are witty. At one point, though, I realized that I was just reading for the witty dialogue and the observations - not for the plot.

Too bad. The last Jesse Stone novel I read was one of the best novels Parker had written, in my opinion. This one goes in the lower half of that long, long list of books.

As has been the case for several of Parker's books now, the book seems quite hefty when you pick it up. However, open it up and it reminds me of when a college student tries to pad the length of his paper by enlarging the margins and the font size. This book features large print, extra thick paper, lots of space between each line and full one inch margins. Each chapter also starts about 2/3 of the way down the page and there are 62 chapters, so that's a good way to stretch it out an extra 30 pages or so. Not that it makes any difference, but I wonder why they've done this. It weighs in at 296 pages and could have easily have been printed in a 200 page format without straining the eyes. This little one-day read is wider than most textbooks! This has to be more expensive, it adds to shipping costs and makes it harder for the stores to stock multiple copies...

I rate this book 3 stars out of 5.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: Sea Change (Jesse Stone Novels)

Reviewed on June 22, 2006.

Lawn Boy and Lawn Boy Returns by Gary Paulsen

Lots of fun and you learn a little about economics along the way

Published in 2009 and 2011.

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 of 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 out and he is offered the chance to get paid to mow a neighbor's lawn. He decides he needs some money to buy a new inner tube for his bicycle tire so he might as well  go for it. One job leads to another and because the local lawn service owner has recently left town with the wife of one of his customers there are a lot of lawns that need servicing. There are so many lawns that "Lawn Boy" has multiple adult employees, a stockbroker advising him and more money than he knows what to do with.

Gary Paulsen

When his stockbroker gets lucky with a couple of penny stocks and then accidentally invests in a prize fighter the fun really starts. As his stockbroker (my favorite character for his unabashed love of capitalism and his short, odd explanations) notes to Lawn Boy, "You have had a very groovy month..."

Of course, the ridiculous amount of money that "Lawn Boy" generates in just a few weeks is unrealistic, the beauty of the book is that it could happen if this happens and that happens and everything aligns just right. If...if..if.  Paulsen names most chapters after an economic (or business) concept. For example, Chapter 3 of Lawn Boy is called "The Law of Increasing Product Demand Versus Flat Production Capacity" (the chapter where he adds employees because he can no longer service all of the lawns by himself). What a chapter to introduce supply and demand and how business deals with excess demand!

Anyway, the economics teacher in me got all excited about Lawn Boy. The avid reader in me liked it even more - a book that is fun to read that actually teaches something!

I rate this series 5 stars out of 5. Both books can be found on Amazon.com here: Lawn Boy and Lawn Boy Returns. 

Reviewed on July 18, 2011.

Sojourner Truth: American Abolitionist (Heroes of the Faith series) by Terry Whalin

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 need to be helped into carriages, and lifted over ditches, and to have the best place everywhere. Nobody ever helps me into carriages, or over mud-puddles, or gives me any best place! And ain't I a woman? Look at me! Look at my arm! I have ploughed and planted, and gathered into barns, and no man could head me! And ain't I a woman? I could work as much and eat as much as a man - when I could get it - and bear the lash as well! And ain't I a woman? I have borne thirteen children, and seen most all sold off to slavery, and when I cried out with my mother's grief, none but Jesus heard me! And ain't I a woman?"

I give this book 4 stars out of 5, mostly because of the strength of her story, not the strength of its telling.


This book can be found on Amazon.com here: Sojourner Truth: American Abolitionist by Terry Whalin.

Reviewed on  June 21, 2006

What Price Freedom: The Adventures of Early American Heroes By Theron Nelsen and Doug Wead

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 left out.

I give this book a 4 stars out of 5. Solid introduction to many of the players in the Revolutionary War. It can be found on Amazon.com here: What Price Freedom: The Adventures of Early American Heroes. 

Reviewed on June 21, 2006.