Dead Weight (Bill Gastner #8) (Posadas County #8) by Steven Havill

Wonderful

Published in 2000.

I absolutely love the Bill Gastner series. I have read a few unsatisfying novels lately and Dead Weight was a real joy.

Gastner is the nearly 70-year-old insomniac sheriff of a small town in New Mexico. He consumes great quantities of coffee and very spicy Mexican food (even for breakfast!) while he juggles a homicide investigation, a mysterious accusation against one of his officers and a landlord/renter dispute. Small town politics and good police work don't necessarily go hand-in-hand, but Gastner makes it work anyway.

Havill's characters remind me very much of those of fellow New Mexican author Tony Hillerman. For me, this is very high praise since I absolutely love the Leaphorn/Chee novels. If Havill and Hillerman are par for the course in the world of New Mexican authors than I am going to looking for more of them. Truly a delightful read.

I rate this book 5 stars out of 5.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: Dead Weight by Steven Havill

Reviewed on October 18, 2006.

Dave Barry's Greatest Hits (audiobook) by Dave Barry

Audio Version a real treat

Published by Dove Entertainment, Inc. in 1996.

Read by John Ritter
Duration: 2 hours, 33 minutes

Abridged.

Dave Barry

Dave Barry's Greatest Hits was read by John Ritter who was one of the few people who could actually read Dave Barry correctly - he put the emphasis in the right places and pauses to make the jokes work perfectly.

On to the material -

Pulled from Barry's earlier material in the early 1990s, it was a bit up and down, but mostly up (even the downs weren't down very far). His time-share condo essay is a gem that should be

printed off and handed out to people before they go into any time-share condo presentation. His "Diplodocus" essay was funny and touching all at the same time. One of his best ever. The "Can New York Save Itself?" essay was a prime example of Dave taking a joke and running it into the ground. It was mildly amusing but it kept going and going and going and going and ... you get the point.

I rate this audiobook 4 stars out of 5. It can be found on Amazon.com here: Dave Barry's Greatest Hits. 

Reviewed on October 3, 2006.

The Course of Human Events (audiobook) by David McCullough

Lovely speech - a joy for any history lover

Narrated by the author, David McCullough
Duration: About 40 minutes

I am a high school history teacher - not the type of history teacher who got into it so he could also coach. I am a REAL history teacher. I love history. I read histories for entertainment. I go on trips to see historical places. History is exciting and important to me.

The Course of Human Events, McCullough's wonderful 40 minute speech on the Founding Fathers, history and great literature made my soul sing. I learned a lot but mostly I found the joy of listening to a kindred spirit discuss history and its importance and the joys of learning.  McCullough is a two time winner of the Pulitzer Prize and a winner of the National Book Award for his histories.

David McCullough

I also found myself being a bit envious of McCullough's wonderful speaking voice and the fact that he writes so well. However, I quickly recovered since McCullough is not stingy with either of these talents.

Do not let the relatively short length of this CD deter you from purchasing it - you will want to listen to it again and again over the years.

I rate this speech 5 stars out of 5.

This speech can be found on Amazon.com here: The Course of Human Events by David McCullough.

Reviewed on September 22, 2006.

A Means to Evil by John Trenhaile

Really, really bad

Originally published in 1993.

John Trenhaile lives in England - and this is an important fact for the rest of this review. He lives in England and he has written a mystery set in California.

Now, it seems to me that a mystery set in 1990s California should feature characters that sound like Californians, behave like Californians and follow Californian police procedures. Instead, in A Means to Evil Trenhaile has characters that speak like they live in England, they behave like the English and they follow insanely ridiculous police procedures.

By page 150 of this 388 page book I was sick of the meandering story and the unprofessional behavior of the psychologist. But then I started to fold over the pages that had silly comments, unlikely technical achievements and flat out use of non-American English. I ended up with well over 30 folded pages.

Examples of non-American English:

Police chief yelling at reporters before a press conference: "Give way!...Give way to the front there!"

One of the policemen mentions that he talked to someone a "fortnight" ago. Fortnight is never used in America!

A character mentions that she wants to move away. She says that they should just "move house."

Bad facts:

He refers to the reporter at a local CBS affiliate station as a CBS reporter - that is never done in the United States. Reporters who work for a network affiliate always say that they work for the affiliate (WTHR or KABC, for example), not the network. That is because they DO NOT work for the network!

He has the police talking about executing someone via the electric chair in Cailifornia - California only uses lethal injection.

Technical impossibility:

A CD player is playing a CD when the power is cut at the fuse box. After several seconds, power is restored and the CD player resumes playing right where it stopped!

At the very least, Trenhaile should have had an American editor read the book to see if the dialogue sounded even close to true. Also, anyone who has worked a CD player would know that his description, while certainly dramatic when placed in its scene, is impossible.

But even more unforgivable is the boring, plodding, dragging, annoying first half of this book. Do not buy this dog - read the back of a cereal box instead!

I rate this book 1 star out of 5.

You can find this book on Amazon.com here: A Means to Evil.

Reviewed on September 14, 2006.

You Know Me Al: A Busher's Letters (audiobook) by Ring Lardner

Keefe's "voice" captured perfectly on this version of the audiobook
 
Read by Barry Kraft
Duration: 3 hours.
Publisher: Book of the Road (August 1990)

You Know Me Al: A Busher's Letters consists of a series of rather detailed letters written by a bush-league ballplayer named Jack Keefe. Keefe has been called up from the Terre Haute team to join the Chicago White Sox. He is writing to one of his former bush-league teammates in Bedford, Indiana.

Ring Lardner (1885-1933)

Keefe is truly a country bumpkin, a rube, a bumbling fool who does not understand the more sophisticated world of the major leagues, but who still succeeds based on the strength of his pitching arm. The reader gets a kick out of seeing the world through his eyes but really understanding the situations he is in, similar to Forrest Gump, except that Jack does not have a disability - he is just ignorant.

The audio version I heard (Book of the Road's version) is wonderfully performed by veteran Shakespearean actor Barry Kraft. Kraft captures his self-confidence, Hoosier country-boy accent and innocence perfectly. To me, he will forever be the voice of Jack Keefe.

I rate this audiobook 4 stars out of 5. It can be found on Amazon.com here: You Know Me Al: A Busher's Letters.

Reviewed on September 5, 2006.

The Known World: A Novel by Edward P. Jones

How can I effectively heap praise on a book that has already won the Pulitzer Prize?

Originally Published in 2003.

What else can I do but chime in with my own little two cents worth of opinion and join the crowd?

The Known World is a complex, rich, frustrating, fascinating, compelling, comforting, detailed work that is filled with 3-dimensional characters that draw the reader into the complex, confusing, often brutal world of slavery on the Virginia frontier in the 1800s.

Set in a fictional county in Virginia, The Known World revolves around the Townsends, a family of ex-slaves. Henry Townsend is a former slave who owns a plantation replete with slaves. The irony of that situation strikes one his slaves who notes to himself that it is odd for a black man to own slaves, but really no odder than the very idea that one person may own another in the first place.

The author, Edward P. Jones, does not tell the story in a linear fashion. Instead, he bounces his readers along a timeline stretching from the early 1800s to the early 1900s, but mostly focusing on the 1840s and 1850s. At first this is quite confusing, but then it starts to seem natural. It reminded me of hearing family members talking about family histories - the way that the tellers often bounce along through time when telling those stories.

Symbolism abounds throughout the novel, especially with the names.  Examples include a slave/overseer named Moses and an unassuming ex-slave named with the pretentious name Augustus. Even the title of the book has multiple meanings. It is the name of a map in the Sheriff's Office (maps abound throughout the book) but I think that the title implies that this way of life - owning slaves - was the only thing that anyone knew. It was their known world - their only way of seeing how society could be structured.

Edward P. Jones

I would love to be part of a book club that seriously looked at all of the detail for hidden meanings, foreshadowing, etc. This is one book that I could easily read again and again and pick up something new every time. An earlier reviewer said that this should be used in schools - he is right! It is a rich, complex, satisfying read. It should lead to any number of wonderful discussions.

I rate this novel 5 stars out of 5.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: The Known World: A Novel by Edward P. Jones.

Reviewed on August 31, 2006.

Starship Troopers 2: Hero of the Federation DVD

The cover and the title make you think you're in for more than this movie delivers

Released in 2004.

As fans of Starship Troopers know, the very name Starship Troopers implies a galaxy-sweeping epic with lots of violence, gore, heroism, humor, drama and tons of big-budget special effects.

This one is limited to one location, his lots of gore but little in the humor, drama and big-budget special effects department.

One has to wonder at the thought processes in Hollywood. Starship Troopers was a big success. Sure, it was expensive, but it is also a regular staple on cable TV and it continues to sell well.

One would think that a Starship Troopers 2 would have been in the works for a long time - perhaps a final push to the bug home system. Instead, according to the director's commentary track, the special effects director of the original Starship Troopers came up with this simple, low-budget plot that he wanted to direct. Somehow sold it to the powers-that-be at Sony and they backed it, provided that he slash his already bare bones budget even more.

So, what do you get when you give Starship Troopers 2 a budget that is only 5% (yes - five percent!) the size of the original movie? A bad movie full of special effects tricks that you are most likely to see in 50s sci-fi cult classics. The movie's premise changes from being a war epic to being a haunted castle movie, a premise that the producers and director freely admit to on the director's track. They also admit to it being a "B movie" and that it was intentionally filmed to go straight to DVD. It is a poorly-lit movie. That was also intentional - poor lighting means that the movie's special effects can be of lesser quality. Unfortunately, one of Tippett's other compensations for a low budget is to add more blood to every scene in the last half of the movie. It gets silly after a while, rather than dramatic.

The movie is derivative of several other movies and TV shows including:

-Star Trek: TNG. Remember the plot that Picard uncovered in which aliens were physically inserting themselves into the brains of high-ranking members of Star Fleet? Well, I hate to write a spoiler, but...

X-Files. Same as a above

Aliens - there's a scene that just steals from the one in which the Paul Reiser character drops an alien into Ripley's sleeping quarters.

Alien - the dark sets with a creepy monster about.

John Carpenter's The Thing - the premise of being an outpost cut off from the rest of humanity while an alien takes people over one by one. The scene where the General is chased into the base steals from the one in which the dog in The Thing is chased to the Antarctic research lab by the helicopter.

Brenda Strong in both movies. The picture on the right is from
Starship Troopers 2.

Brenda Strong comes to this movie as a familiar face, but not as the same character. Her character in the original Troopers was a fleet captain who died a horrible death. In this one she is an army sergeant. No one is quite sure why they felt the need to have a face from the first movie but she does a good job and on the director's track they credit her with making this movie shoot a positive experience on a lot of levels. That makes it all the more bizarre that her name is not listed on the cover of the DVD or on the back cover credits. Too bad - her character was just about the closest thing that I found to believable in the whole movie.

I give this two stars rather than one because I found the director's/producer's track to be quite fascinating. Maybe it should only be watched with that track playing because it fails to deliver on the promise of the original in so many ways.

Reviewed on August 19, 2006.

This movie can be found on Amazon.com here: Starship Troopers 2: Hero of the Federation.