BEHIND the BLUE and GRAY: THE SOLDIER'S LIFE in the CIVIL WAR by Delia Ray

Published in 1991 by Scholastic.
93 pages of text. 
9 pages of a bibliography, a glossary, an index and picture credits.

Behind the Blue and Gray is a simple introduction to what the average Civil War soldier. I would recommend it for grades 5 and above.

However, saying it is for those grades does not mean an adult interested in starting to study the Civil War would not find this book interesting. It is similar to the introductory books that are published by the National Parks that you can find at Civil War battlefields.

The book follows the progress of a few Civil War soldiers as they enroll in their respective armies, set up camps, train, march and eventually fight. It also explores what happened to prisoners and the injured. At the end, it discussed the aftermath of the war and ends with a photo of elderly former Union and Confederate soldiers at a reunion gathering.

There is not a lot about women in the war as a topic, but there are a few pages about Native Americans and African Americans.

The big names of the war get a passing mention, but they are not the focus.

I rate this book 4 stars out of 5. It can be found on Amazon.com here: BEHIND the BLUE and GRAY: THE SOLDIER'S LIFE in the CIVIL WAR by Delia Ray.

THE FIRST EMANCIPATOR: THE FORGOTTEN STORY of ROBERT CARTER the FOUNDING FATHER WHO FREED HIS SLAVES by Andrew Levy

Published by Random House in 2005.

Robert Carter holds a unique place in American history. He was a massively successful plantation owner in the Revolutionary War generation. He knew and worked with George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and James Madison in the Virginia legislature. He was not particularly effective as a politician, but he was effective at something that all of the above failed at.

He freed his 450+ slaves while he was still alive and managed to keep his fortune and his property.

He did it over a series of years, but he did it. Thomas Jefferson thought that it couldn't be done and often wrote about the quandary he found himself in. A good student of American history will remember that Washington freed his slaves - but that was after the death of Martha Washington. Carter did it while he was alive.

Carter's motivations seem to have been a combination of religious ideals and political ideals, motivated by such things as the soaring rhetoric of the Declaration of Independence.

The problem is that history has forgotten Robert Carter. There is only one little historical marker that marks where he used to live but doesn't mention the emancipation of his slaves. One-fourth of the marker is about a tutor he brought in to teach his children. It's almost like everyone wanted to forget what Carter did with his slaves.

This book was a difficult read - partially due to the lack of information about Carter and partially because Andrew Levy tried to stretch that scant information out far enough to make a book. The book looks bigger than it really is - it has 195 pages of text and 105 pages of acknowledgments, notes, a bibliography and an index.

The book itself was not particularly well-written. I was immensely interested in this topic and it still felt like it was a slog.

I rate this book 2 stars out of 5. It can be found on Amazon.com here: THE FIRST EMANCIPATOR: THE FORGOTTEN STORY of ROBERT CARTER the FOUNDING FATHER WHO FREED HIS SLAVES by Andrew Levy.

GONE TOMORROW (audiobook) (Jack Reacher #13) by Lee Child

Jack Reacher vs. The Patriot Act

Published by Random House Audio in 2009.
Read by Dick Hill.
Duration: 14 hours, 47 minutes.
Unabridged.

In Gone Tomorrow, Jack Reacher is in New York City, riding the subway after taking in a late night show in a bar. He notices a woman who is exhibiting all of the signs of being a suicide bomber that he learned years ago while being trained in Israel. When Reacher intervenes, he gets way more than he bargained for and gets sucked into a complicated mess and discovers that the powers granted to the federal government by the Patriot Act are not to be trifled with.

The audiobook was read by multiple award-winning reader Dick Hill. He is my favorite reader of the Jack Reacher novels. But, even Dick Hill couldn't save some of the convoluted dialogue that comes from the villain's mouth as the book progresses. I was reminded of the famous line from Harrison Ford as he was filming Star Wars. He told George Lucas, " George! You can type this s***, but you sure can't say it!" 

The villain's lines are so convoluted, so wordy and so long-winded that I can't believe anyone would actually hang around to hear them delivered. There was no way that the author, Lee Child, actually read those lines out loud to see if they worked. I felt sorry for Dick Hill getting ambushed with them.

Nonetheless, the story was good enough to justify 4 stars out of 5.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: Gone Tomorrow by Lee Child.

THE TIPPING POINT: HOW LITTLE THINGS CAN MAKE a BIG DIFFERENCE (audiobook) by Malcolm Gladwell

Original edition published in 2000.

Updated edition published by Hachette Audio in 2006.

Read by the author, Malcolm Gladwell.

Duration: 8 hours, 34 minutes.
Unabridged. 

Malcolm Gladwell's first book is about "tipping points" - that moment where an idea, a fad, a political candidate, a disease (or whatever) catches on and spreads like wildfire.

Gladwell looks into the human factors that contributes to spread of all of the things I mentioned in the first paragraph boils it down to three types of people that are needed. He details those personality types, describes why they are important and provides real world examples of those personality types. For example, he goes into a lot of detail into why Paul Revere was absolutely necessary for the success of his midnight ride. There was another rider, but he achieved little.

Paul Revere, on the other hand, was wildly successful for a number of reasons related to how well-connected he was. His ride resulted in the Minutemen coming out to fight and the victory of the Minutemen over the British in the Battles of Lexington and Concord. Without those early victories, there may not have been a Revolutionary War. Who Paul Revere was made him the tipping point. He delivered the same message, but it had much more of in impact coming from Paul Revere.

As with all social sciences, there is never a perfect answer to anything because human behavior is so hard to definitively quantify. But, this book is immensely interesting and there are lots of good things to think about. Plus, Gladwell's voice is quite pleasant to listen to.

I rate this audiobook 5 stars out of 5. It can be found on Amazon.com here: THE TIPPING POINT: HOW LITTLE THINGS CAN MAKE a BIG DIFFERENCE by Malcolm Gladwell.

TURTLES ALL the WAY DOWN (audiobook) by John Green

Published in 2017 by Listening Library.
Read by Kate Rudd.
Duration: 7 hours, 12 minutes.
Unabridged.

High School students Aza and Daisy are best friends living in Indianapolis, Indiana. They are also investigating the mysterious disappearance of a billionaire who lives on the other side of the White River - the rich side of the river that doesn't flood.

Well, they investigate when they aren't going to school, eating at Applebee's, studying, working (Daisy) or keeping appointments with the therapist (Aza).

Aza has obsessive thoughts - they crowd out everything else when they come, and lately they've been coming at her hard and fast.

It turns out that Aza knows the son of the missing billionaire and when she and Daisy run into him while they are investigating, it seems like there might be a spark between this boy and Aza...

John Green is one of my favorite authors, which is weird because I have only read two of his books (this one and The Fault in Our Stars). But, I've seen multiple interviews with him since his adopted hometown is my adopted hometown - Indianapolis. I love the fact that he lives here to be an anonymous dad in the crowd. I also love the fact that he puts out entertaining educational videos with his brother and I love the way that he conducts himself professionally. 

The author, John Green

And, I love the fact that he wrote this book about a character with a mental illness. He wrote it because he shares a lot of the struggles that his character Aza has.

But, reading about Aza is exhausting. It is informative, but sometimes a struggle to get through this book.

Also, this book seemed like a weird mish-mash. It is partly a mystery, partly a romance, partly a coming-of-age friendship book and largely seeing the world through the eyes of a person with obsessive thoughts. But, the mystery in the story seems forced - very contrived.

A real positive, though, are his accurate descriptions of Indianapolis and its geography. There really is an Applebee's where he puts it in this story. The White River really is in trouble because of sewage and Indianapolis is currently building a giant sewer overflow tunnel to deal with it. Also, his Star Wars references are spot-on. And, Aza's mom is a teacher and she always seems to be grading papers. This teacher appreciates that bit of reality in a novel.

Still, despite all of this positives, this one gets just 3 stars out of 5 from me. 

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: TURTLES ALL the WAY DOWN by John Green.

Note: This book showed up on a "banned book" list in Texas. Ugh.
Udpate: It also was placed on a banned book list in Florida.

THE LIFE and TIMES of the THUNDERBOLT KID: A MEMOIR (audiobook) by Bill Bryson

Published in 2006 by Random House Audio.
Read by the author, Bill Bryson.
Duration: 7 hours, 39 minutes.
Unabridged.

Bill Bryson's memoir of life in 1950's Des Moines, Iowa is a wonderful trip into another time and another place with a gifted storyteller.

There is nothing particularly amazing about this story. It's not a coming-of-age story with a profound climax - it is just a heartwarming reminiscence of the way things used to be - the good and the bad. It is often laugh-out-loud funny and reminds me a lot of the works of Jean Shepherd, even though they are set 20 years later.  You know Jean Shepherd if you are a fan of the movie A Christmas Story.

Downtown Des Moines in the 1950s. 

The author, Bill Bryson read the story. His incongruous English accent is a bit weird for a boy from Des Moines. My understanding is that Bryson spent so many years in the United Kingdom that he lost his American accent. Nevertheless, he did a great job.

Highly recommended.

I rate this audiobook 5 stars out of 5. It can be found on Amazon.com here: THE LIFE and TIMES of the THUNDERBOLT KID: A MEMOIR by Bill Bryson.

TALKING to STRANGERS: WHAT WE SHOULD KNOW ABOUT the PEOPLE WE DON'T KNOW (audiobook) by Malcolm Gladwell

Published in September of 2019 by Hachette Audio
Read by the author, Malcolm Gladwell
Duration: 8 hours, 42 minutes.
Unabridged

Malcolm Gladwell always writes an interesting book. When you listen to him as an audiobook, it can be frustrating as well because he throws so many ideas at you that you can't possibly write them all down (I couldn't if I wanted to anyway, I do a lot of my listening as I drive).

The general premise behind Talking to Strangers is that it is very hard for people to "read" other people - even people that we see every day. It is even harder for us to read strangers and even harder to read people from different cultures. The more different the culture, the harder to read.

Gladwell starts with the story of the death of Sandra Bland, an African American woman from Chicago who killed herself after a questionable arrest after a questionable traffic stop in Texas.

From there we wander far and wide - cold war espionage cases, policing strategies in Kansas City, Neville Chamberlin's meetings with Adolf Hitler, sociology experiments with participants trying to read facial expressions, judges who grant bail, Bernie Madoff, the affects of alcohol on judgment, famous authors who committed suicide...and more.

Eventually, Gladwell makes his point (some reviewers don't think he made it, but I think he did) - it just takes such a long, circuitous route to get there that, in the end, his final point is a bit underwhelming.

The audiobook was read by the author. He usually reads his audiobooks and does a good job. Lately, he has been doing a regular podcast and he brings the some of the techniques of podcasting to this audiobook. One of the best features is that he uses the actual recordings of people's voices as much as possible when quoting them. It is a great touch that I wish more authors used with their audiobooks.

Rating this audiobook is hard. I enjoyed almost all of it. It was very interesting, even compelling. But, the ending just was underwhelming as I already noted.

I rate this audiobook 4 stars out of 5. It can be found on Amazon.com here: TALKING to STRANGERS: WHAT WE SHOULD KNOW ABOUT the PEOPLE WE DON'T KNOW.