THE ADVENTURES of HUCKLEBERRY FINN (audiobook) by Mark Twain

Originally published in 1884 (U.K.) and 1885 (U.S.)
This audiobook version published in 2008 by Tantor Audio.
Read by William Dufris.
Duration: 9 hours, 44 minutes.
Unabridged.

I would feel silly writing a synopsis of this book. This is the book that Ernest Hemingway said is the source of all modern American literature. It is almost universally recognized as not only "a" Great American Novel, but is oftentimes acclaimed as "THE" Great American Novel.

So, I will skip all of that discussion and just move on to a review of the audiobook presentation and what I thought of the book.

The audiobook reader was William Dufris (1958-2020),  a celebrated voice over actor and the reader of dozens and dozens of audiobooks. He did a fantastic job of creating voice after voice after voice. It was quite impressive.

An original illustration by E.W. Kemble
from the 1884 printing of this book

As for the novel, well that was less impressive than I remembered. I read this book in elementary school and almost all of the satire and character growth went right over my head. I re-read it in high school for an AP Literature class. We had to write a lengthy paper that we literally worked months on. We even took a trip to a university library to dig through the stacks to find literary criticisms and cite them. It was, by far, more complicated and longer than any other paper I wrote in my college career.

All of that work writing about the same book soured me on re-reading the book until now, 38 years later. 

So, what did I think?

I was surprised at how many of the plot points I had forgotten. For example, Tom Sawyer is in this book a lot more than I remembered and he is really annoying. I know that is intentionally built in as a part of the book for thematic reasons - Huck is on his way to being a man and Tom is still a boy in many ways - but I still felt that it was tough going when Tom is in the story.

It took me quite a while to get through this audiobook. I could only go for 20 minutes or so at a time and then I had to leave it for a while. In comparison, I listened to a different audiobook today for more than 4 hours. Maybe it was because it was told in first person, I am not sure. 

Despite the importance of this novel, I honestly can't rate it any more than 3 stars out of 5.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: THE ADVENTURES of HUCKLEBERRY FINN by Mark Twain.

OF BOYS and MEN: WHY the MODERN MALE IS STRUGGLING, WHY IT MATTERS, and WHAT to DO ABOUT IT (audiobook) by Richard V. Reeves

Published in September of 2022 by Blackstone Publishing.
Read by the author, Richard V. Reeves.
Duration: 6 hours, 55 minutes.

Unabridged.

Men, as a group, are struggling in today's economy. The average male's income has falling in inflation-adjusted terms, especially so when you factor out upper class and upper middle class men.

Men are more likely to be arrested, be addicts, be homeless, and more likely to succeed at killing themselves.

Boys are struggling in today's educational system. They are far more likely to be suspended, expelled or placed in a special education program. They are far less likely to graduate from high school. They far less likely to attempt any sort of post-secondary education (a majority of all college students are female) or training and far less likely to complete that training or degree - even in the rare situations where the post-secondary training and/or education are essentially free.

Reeves, an economist with the Brookings Institutions, sees these trends as part of a larger problem and does not see it as a problem caused by women being part of the workplace, going to college or participating in advanced training. That is a reality and he has literally no interest in changing it. He makes this point several times. 

I highly recommend this book. It offers an honest assessment of where we are as a country and that assessment is often depressing. But, Reeves  doesn't just list a bunch of problems. He offers practical solutions that are based on policies that have already proven successful in other ways.

The audiobook is read by the author. He does an excellent job, which is not always the case when authors decide to read their own audiobooks.
 
I rate this book 5 stars out of 5. It can be found on Amazon.com here: OF BOYS and MEN: WHY the MODERN MALE IS STRUGGLING, WHY IT MATTERS, and WHAT to DO ABOUT IT by Richard V. Reeves.

SUCKER'S PORTFOLIO (kindle) by Kurt Vonnegut

Published in 2012 by Amazon Publishing.

Amazon collected 6 short stories, 1 essay and 1 unfinished sci-fi story and added yet another collection to the Vonnegut library.

Kurt Vonnegut (1922-2007) started writing during the Golden Age of sci-fi, when magazines were filling their pages with short stories. Some of these are sci-fi, some are just little human stories. 

Indianapolis native quoting fellow Hoosier author 
James Whitcomb Riley's poem "Little Orphan Annie"

I particularly enjoyed the first story, called "Between Timid and Timbuktu." It is a "Twilight Zone" type of story that I found satisfying in a gruesome sort of way. I also enjoyed the title story. It actually had a surprise twist that was pretty much out of character for a Vonnegut story. 

The seventh entry is an essay from 1992. Vonnegut was a prodigious writer of essays in the latter half of his career. I generally am more of a fan of his caustic and insightful essays than his fiction and this one did not disappoint. 

But, for me, the eighth entry was the surprise. It was an unfinished dystopian future story set in a small town after a human-robot war. It had a lot of zip to it and I was really intrigued right up to the moment it ended in mid-sentence.

I rate this e-book 4 stars out of 5. It can be found on Amazon.com here: SUCKER'S PORTFOLIO (kindle) by Kurt Vonnegut.

SHADOWS REEL (Joe Picket #22) (audiobook) by C.J. Box

 

Published in 2022 by Recorded Books.

Read by David Chandler.
Duration: 9 hours, 4 minutes.
Unabridged.

Synopsis:

Game Warden Joe Pickett investigates a report of a dead elk. Fearing that it is the victim of a botched attempt at poaching, he investigates. Instead, he finds a burned corpse and falls headlong into another murder investigation.

Meanwhile, Joe's wife Marybeth, the director of the local library discovers an odd package left at the library with connections to a prominent Nazi from World War II.

And...Nate Romanowski is in Denver hunting down an old enemy during the midst of an Antifa/BLM riot.

My review:

This is a book series about a game warden. Oftentimes, he is joined by a former special forces guy who is so into nature that he used to stand naked in a stream of water for hours at a time to get the feel of a river and its entire ecosystem - from the slime at the bottom to the fish to the birds that swoop down to the beavers that dam it up.

Antifa protest in Denver

There was almost no "game wardening" in this book and the man who is derisively called "nature boy" in this book spends 99% of this book navigating the urban world of Black Lives Matter and Antifa.

I have complained in my review of the 20th book in this series, Long Range, that Joe Pickett was getting involved in so many other types of police cases that it is easy to forget that the first books in the series - the books that made me start and keep reading a series - were mostly about game warden activities. Lots of searching for poachers. There was a book about eco-terrorists, one with survivalist weirdos and even a big forest fire.

This book seemed to be careening from one political commentary after another - BLM, Antifa, even Hungary. What does the author say? Antifa - irredeemably stupid. BLM - understandable, but over the top. Hungary, despite the popularity of its President in ultra-conservative circles, is linked in this book with violent reaction over careful consideration.

Is this what the author intended? I have no idea. He seems to be making a lot of political comments in his books lately in the Joe Pickett and the Cassie Dewell series. Some are subtle, some are not. I assume that is what he's pulling his characters out of the Wyoming countryside and placing them in cities all over the West, but maybe not. Maybe I am reading too much into it. Either way, I want Joe Pickett to get his butt back into the woods!

I rate this audiobook 2 stars out of 5. It can be found on Amazon.com here: SHADOWS REEL (Joe Picket #22) by C.J. Box.

LITTLE RICHARD: A LIFE from BEGINNING to END (kindle) by Hourly History

Published by Hourly History in January of 2023.

Hourly History publishes histories and biographies that you can read in about an hour. That can be a tough job for big topics in history like "The Industrial Revolution" or "The Roman Empire" but it is just about right for a short biography. 

Little Richard (1932-2020) was an early rock and roll singer with a series of top 40 hits from 1956-1958, including songs like "Tutti Frutti", "Lucille," and "Long Tall Sally." His style was raucous and loud compared to most singers, except maybe for Jerry Lee Lewis. He also was one of the first black artists to cross over to white audiences.  

Unlike most singers from that era, Little Richard never really disappeared from the public eye. He had a series of comebacks and kept on showing up with comeback tours, songs on movie soundtracks, live greatest hits albums and TV and movie appearances. 

Little Richard was known as a flamboyant showman. He wore a lot of makeup when that was an unknown thing and pulled off a combination being macho and feminine at the same time. It's pretty easy to think of him as the prototype for performers like Prince.

This short biography was pretty solid. I thought it did a particularly good job of catching Little Richard's struggles with drugs. It was interesting and more than a little sad to read about how poorly he dealt with a conflict between his seriously-held conservative Christian religious beliefs, his sexual orientation and other sexual interests. He spent a lot of his with deeply conflicted feelings.

I rate this short e-book 4 stars out of 5. It can be found on Amazon.com here: LITTLE RICHARD: A LIFE from BEGINNING to END (kindle) by Hourly History.

BURNING BRIGHT (Peter Ash #2) (audiobook) by Nick Petrie

 

Published by Penguin Audio in 2017.

Read by Stephen Mendel.
Duration: 11 hours, 55 minutes.
Unabridged.

Synopsis:

Peter Ash is a veteran of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. He has had trouble settling in to civilian life. Specifically, he has a fear of enclosed places. He is good with his hands and restored an old pickup truck. He drives the truck all over the place and explores America by hiking and camping.

The author, Nick Petrie

As Burning Bright starts, Ash is hiking in a forest of giant redwoods and stumbles upon a bear, climbs a tree, meets a girl in the trees, finds out she is being hunted by a professional hit team and that's when everything starts to really get interesting...

My Review:

I like this series, even though it suffers a bit of a sophomore slump in my opinion. This is not to say that it is a bad book - it's not. I am rating this book 4 stars out of 5. I flew through the first half of the book, but the second half of the book was just a bit too ridiculous in my opinion. That being said, I am going to happily continue with this series.

I think you have to start the series at the beginning (click here for my review of the first book in the series) so do not start with this book. 

I rate this book 4 stars out of 5. It can be found on Amazon.com here: BURNING BRIGHT (Peter Ash #2) (audiobook) by Nick Petrie.

GALLIPOLI CAMPAIGN: A HISTORY from BEGINNING to END (kindle) by Hourly History

 

Published by Hourly History in December of 2022.

The short histories produced by Hourly History are designed to read in about an hour. In some cases the size limit makes for a very incomplete history. In this case, I thought that topic and the size limit matched up pretty well.

The Gallipoli Campaign was an unmitigated disaster during World War I. Winston Churchill (yes, the famous one from World War II) was the head of British navy and thought up a plan to do three things:

1) relieve the pressure on Russia from the Germans and the Ottomans;

2) possibly knock the Ottoman Empire out of the war;
3) encourage the Germans to divert more troops away from the French front to support the Ottoman Empire.

The plan Churchill came up with was to land thousands of soldiers from France, Britain, Australia and New Zealand on the Gallipoli Peninsula at the edge of the Aegean Sea in a quick and bold attack.

Troops from Australia and New Zealand landing at 
Gallipoli - April 25, 1915.

What actually happened was bold, but certainly not quick. The attack was disjointed and so poorly planned that the Ottomans were entirely prepared for the invasion...

Normally, I really don't care much for studying up on World War I - it was started for rather silly reasons in my opinion and the United States had little reason to get involved (Yes, I know that the Gallipoli campaign was before the U.S. got involved.) 

That being said, I was glad to learn more about the campaign that is always referred to in the histories I have read, but never explored in any sort of depth. This book gave me enough information to fill in this gap in my knowledge to my satisfaction.

I rate this book 4 stars out of 5. It can be found on Amazon.com here: GALLIPOLI CAMPAIGN: A HISTORY from BEGINNING to END (kindle) by Hourly History.