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).

OFF the GRID (Joe Pickett #16) by C. J. Box

Published in 2016 by G.P. Putnam's Sons

This installment in the saga of Joe Pickett starts out with a bear encounter in the mountains and ends up in a violent confrontation in Wyoming's Red Desert.

Joe Pickett's special relationship with the Governor is coming to an end in Off the Grid because the Governor's term is coming to an end. But, that doesn't stop him from going on one last special mission to the Red Desert area of Wyoming.

Meanwhile, Nate Romanowski has been approached by men from a secret group of government agents who are worried about national security issues. They know all about Nate and his delicate legal situation and promise to clear all of that up if he goes on a special assignment for them in the Red Desert area of Wyoming.

Also, Joe's daughter Sheridan goes for a weekend camping trip to volunteer to help an unknown activist group in (you guessed it) the Red Desert area of Wyoming.

As you know, if you follow this series, when Nate and Joe and Joe's family get involved in some sort of nefarious activity, there's bound to be plenty of action and drama.

Despite the obvious forced coincidence of having all of these characters show up in the same corner of Wyoming at the same time, the action and spending more time with these characters makes up for it.

I rate this book 4 stars out of 5.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: Off the Grid by C.J. Box.

GOOD TALK, DAD: THE BIRDS and the BEES and OTHER CONVERSATIONS WE FORGOT to HAVE by Bill Geist and Willie Geist

Published in 2014 by Grand Central Publishing.

Bill Geist has been a favorite of mine for years on CBS's Sunday morning show. His son, Willie is a relative unknown to me because I don't have cable or satellite television. They team up in this book to talk about the topics they, perhaps, should have spoken about while Willie was younger with a lot of humorous insights and commentary. 

They talk about "the birds and the bees" as the title suggests and they also discuss such topics as "what really happened at summer camp", how Willie lost a lawn mower while working on a mowing crew, Bill's love of Elvis, weird extended family, Bill's experiences in Vietnam, teenagers and alcohol and Bill's announcement that he has Parkinson's.

Full of cute stories, this book is fun if not particularly profound. 

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: Good Talk, Dad: The Birds and the Bees and Other Conversations We Forgot to Have.

I rate this book 4 stars out of 5.

UNHOLY NIGHT by Seth Grahame-Smith

Brilliant!

Published in 2012 by Hachette Book Group

Seth Grahame-Smith is, perhaps, most famous for his books Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter and Pride, Prejudice and Zombies, two books that I have never read and probably never will because I care not one wit for vampire or zombie tales. But, this book intrigued me and I am very glad that I read it.

As in the other books I mentioned, Seth Grahame-Smith has a talent to take an existing story and put a twist to it. Unholy Night takes the traditional Christmas nativity story and makes this little change: What if the Three Wise Men were actually not three learned scholars but three criminals posing as three learned scholars?

That's it - that's the heart of the book. But, what a twist!

Here is all anyone really knows about the the Three Wise Men from the Biblical account, from Matthew 2, verses 1-12:

In the time of King Herod, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, wise men from the East came to Jerusalem, asking, "Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews? For we observed his star at its rising, and have come to pay him homage." 

A 6th century mosaic of the Three Wise Men
 in Ravenna, Italy.

When King Herod heard this, he was frightened and all Jerusalem with him; and calling together all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Messiah was to be born. They told him, "In Bethlehem of Judea; for so it has been written by the prophet: 'And you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; for from you shall come a ruler who is to shepherd my people Israel.'" 

Then Herod secretly called for the wise men and learned from them the exact time when the star had appeared. Then he sent them to Bethlehem, saying, "Go and search diligently for the child; and when you have found him, bring me word so that I may also go and pay him homage." 

When they had heard the king, they set out; and there, ahead of them, went the star that they had seen at its rising, until it stopped over the place where the child was. When they saw that the star had stopped, they were overwhelmed with joy. On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother; and they knelt down and paid him homage. Then, opening their treasure chests, they offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. And having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they left for their own country by another path.

They are mentioned in one other verse in which King Herod is angered because the Wise Men do not report back to him and he proceeds with his plan to slaughter all of the male infants in Bethlehem. That's it. The traditional names (Balthazar, Gaspar and Melchyor) are not named. Their actual number of Wise Men is not named. 

This book covers all of these aspects without skipping a beat - so long as you look at things from a certain point of view.

In Unholy Night, Balthazar is a master thief and pickpocket who has no problem killing Herod's soldiers to stay out of jail. But, he is caught and brought to King Herod in Jerusalem for judgment. While awaiting execution he is held with Gaspar and Melchyor, two violent men awaiting execution for a variety of major crimes. Balthazar engineers a chance for a final meeting with three religious scholars in order to set himself right with God, overwhelms them, switches identities with them and escapes into the night towards Bethlehem with some goods that they managed to steal along the way: gold, frankincense and myrrh. 

Of course, they meet up with Mary, Joseph and the baby Jesus (the three criminals are looking in the stable for fresh mounts) and it does not go well. However, once Herod's men arrive to start slaughtering the infants these three criminals are moved to rescue this clueless family and the real adventure starts.

This book could have gone wrong on so many levels but, somehow, Grahame-Smith manages to change the story but yet maintain the commitment to the religious aspects of the story. It does treat faith and religion seriously. The Christmas Star is there. The virgin birth is there.  There are miracles and struggles with the concepts of faith and forgiveness. And, it does not all get wrapped up in a neat little bow in the end and everyone does not live happily ever after. And, I enjoyed it immensely.

Be warned, this book is often violent and gruesome, like the story that it comes from. Let's face it, if you are telling the story of a diseased old tyrant who orders the murder of babies, it's bound to be gruesome. 

I rate this book 5 stars out of 5.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: Unholy Night by Seth Grahame Smith.