DIFFER WE MUST: HOW LINCOLN SUCCEEDED in a DIVIDED AMERICA (audiobook) by Steve Inskeep

Published by Penguin Audio in 2023.
Read by the author, Steve Inskeep.
Duration: 8 hours, 57 minutes.
Unabridged.

It's been said that no American has been the subject of more biographies than Abraham Lincoln. I don't know if that it is true, but I do know that it is pretty tough to come up with a new angle on the 16th President. In Differ We Must, NPR reporter/host Steve Inskeep has managed to do just that.

Inskeep follows through Lincoln's life and sees how he dealt with people that he had disagreements with. Some of them were major, some were minor. Sometimes, Lincoln responded to these disagreements by befriending the people he disagreed with, sometimes by patiently arguing his point of view, sometimes by appearing to accommodate them only to slowly change their minds, and sometimes by arguing fiercely against his opponent.

And, sometimes, as in the case of Frederick Douglass, Lincoln realized he was wrong and changed his mind as was the case with Frederick Douglass (and other black dignitaries) and black men serving as soldiers and him dropping his insistence on sending freed slaves to Africa.

One is left to wonder, as always how Lincoln would have reacted to the end of the Civil War and Reconstruction - the ultimate test of his ability to work with people that he disagreed with. We know that his successor, Andrew Johnson, failed that test in a spectacular way, but we will always have to wonder how Lincoln would have done.

While this was a unique entry into the collection of Lincoln biographies, I found it to be merely an "okay" biography. I listened to the audiobook and Inskeep's pleasant reading voice didn't hold my attention particularly well. I rate this biography 3 stars out of 5. It can be found on Amazon.com here: DIFFER WE MUST: HOW LINCOLN SUCCEEDED in a DIVIDED AMERICA by Steve Inskeep.

THE JOURNEY in BETWEEN: THRU-HIKING EL CAMINO de SANTIAGO (Thru-Hiking Adventures book 1) (kindle) by Keith Foskett

E-book Published by Amazon Digital Services in 2010.

I have a real soft spot for books about travel - especially travel in odd ways. I have read a book about a guy who backpacked across Europe, a man who hiked across Afghanistan in 2002, a man who biked from England to India, two women who biked from Turkey to China, a man who hiked from Mexico to the Darien Gap in Panama, the same man hiked the length of the Nile River, a man who found a little dog while in a hiking competition in the Gobi Desert, a man who hiked all 48 mountains in New Hampshire with his little schnauzer dog, and more.

One of these travel stories was by this author, Keith Foskett. Last year, I read the story of his trip up the Pacific Crest Trail - from Mexico to Canada and almost all in the mountains.

This hike was much more sedate and featured less extremes in the weather. The Camino de Santiago is a well-established route. It has been an pilgrimage route for more than 1,000 years and in the last 30 years or so France and Spain have really promoted this trail for tourists.

Foskett was determined to do this event properly so he began it at a traditional place to begin in France. That surprised me because I have always heard of this pilgrimage as being entirely in Spain but at least 25% of this book takes place in France.

Foskett is not taking this pilgrimage as a religious endeavor. Instead, he is looking for adventure and an escape from the workaday grind and this hike fits the bill perfectly.

As I noted, this is the 2nd hike I've done with Foskett (in spirit.) I enjoyed the book about the Pacific Crest Trail more, but this one was interesting. I learned a lot about the Camino de Santiago and Foskett makes for an unusual but lively travel companion. 

I rate this e-book 4 stars out of 5. It can be found on Amazon.com here: THE JOURNEY in BETWEEN: THRU-HIKING EL CAMINO de SANTIAGO (Thru-Hiking Adventures book 1) by Keith Foskett.

FAHRENHEIT 451 (audiobook) by Ray Bradbury

 

Originally published in 1953.

I listened to the Tantor Media audio version published in 2010.

Read by Stephen Hoye

Duration: Approximately 5.5 hours

Unabridged

Synopsis: 

Guy Montag is a fireman in a future United States. Firemen in the future do not fight fires. Instead, they burn books, newspapers, magazines that people have hidden away. If you hide forbidden media in your home your home will be burned to make sure all of the books are gone and to serve as a warning to rest of the neighborhood. 

Montag is great at his job, but he has his doubts. Every once in a while he takes a book home. He hides them in the ventilation system of the house. No one knows, not even his wife. Those doubts are accelerated when his team witness a woman die in the fire with her books rather than live without them...

My review: 

This book has an interesting history. Bradbury started building the world that this book is set in with some short stories of a dystopian future where everyone is absorbed by personalized television screens. His publisher urged him to expand the ideas into a book. Bradbury knocked out Fahrenheit 451 in just 9 days on a rented typewriter that cost him 10 cents per half hour.

The book itself has action but it oftentimes felt like essays attached by plot points. It seems to me that the speed in which the book was written probably led to this sort of construction. The essays took the form of extended trains of thought by Montag or long speeches/rants from Montag's boss, Captain Beatty. These "essays" make all of the arguments of the story such as the justifications for mass censorship, the arguments against it, and the lack of human contact in a mass media world.

Bradbury accurately predicted a lot of the modern world in this book. When it comes to technology, he predicted the ATM, giant screen televisions, and earbuds. Culturally, he predicted the rise of sports TV, the inane reality TV shows like The Real Housewives, and the addiction to pop culture and electronic media that may be a factor in the high rates of depression among young people nowadays.

This has to be considered Bradbury's masterpiece. It is such a powerful manifesto against censorship. 

NOTE: If you appreciate irony, please read this bit about how THE anti-censorship novel of the 20th century was edited to remove or change controversial and offensive words and scenes without the knowledge of the author - FOR TWELVE YEARS!

NOTE: Also on the "if you appreciate irony" category - Fahrenheit 451 was put on a book ban list in Tennessee. The article has a searchable database because the list has more than 1,100 unique titles.

I rate this book 5 stars out of 5. It can be found on Amazon.com here: FAHRENHEIT 451 by Ray Bradbury.

MARCH: BOOK ONE (graphic novel) by John Lewis and Andrew Aydin

Published in 2013 by Top Shelf Productions.
Written by John Lewis and Andrew Aydin.
Illustrated by Nate Powell.

Winner: National Book Award

Winner: Will Eisner Comic Industry Award

Winner: Coretta Scott King Book Award

Winner: ALA Notable Books

Winner: Reader's Digest Graphic Novels Every Grown-Up Should Read

Congressman John Lewis (1940-2020) tells his life story in this graphic novel, focusing on his struggles in the Civil Rights Movement. This is the first book in a trilogy, covering the first 20 years of his life.

Lewis is interested in three things as a young man - education, preaching, and the Civil Rights movement. Lewis listens to the traditional African American leaders and he hears talk of moderation (or, even worse, nothing at all about Civil Rights.) He doesn't know what to do, but he knows this is not the way forward. 

Lewis's growing frustration and the moment when Lewis hears MLK.

One day, he hears Martin Luther King, Jr. speak over the radio and he knows the way to go: non-violent resistance.

The last half of the book goes into the effort to integrate lunch counters in several department stores in Nashville, Tennessee. He details the training, the cat and mouse tactics and the way the movement grew and grew to the point that it simply overwhelmed the legal system. 

So, the legal system withdrew and let vigilantes try to deter them. Anyone who has studied the time period knows about the violence and how it ended up in the end, but that doesn't stop the reader from being drawn in. 

This graphic novel can be found on Amazon here: MARCH: BOOK ONE (graphic novel) by John Lewis and Andrew Aydin.

Click here for my review of March: Book Two. 

DARK of the MOON (Virgil Flowers #1)(audiobook)(abridged) by John Sandford

 

Published by Penguin Audio in 2007.
Read by Eric Conger.
Duration: 6 hours, 5 minutes.
Abridged.

Synopsis:

Virgil Flowers works for the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension (BCA) and has been brought in to the small town of Bluestem, Minnesota to investigate a double murder. Flowers was picked for this job because he is a great investigator and he grew up in Bluestem.

On his way into town, he comes across a gigantic house fire. He recognizes it as the mansion of the richest man in town. The next morning, they discover that it is also the scene of a homicide.

As Flowers starts his investigation there is yet another murder and the list of suspects keeps getting longer and longer...

My Review:

This series was highly recommended to me. It's a spinoff from the much larger (30+ books) "Prey" series featuring Lucas Davenport. Davenport appears in this series as Flowers' supervisor. 

The author, John Sandford

This book is abridged and I do believe that the abridgment hurt the story. About 40% of the book has been removed and it leaves minor plot holes all over the book. Normally, I don't listen to or read abridgments, but my library only had the abridged version. I am rating this book 3 stars out of 5. Normally, I wouldn't bother to continue with a series that has a 3 star rating to start it off, but I am willing to listen to the 2nd book in this series if I can find an unabridged version. I figure the author included all of that extra stuff to make the story better. 

This (abridged) version of the audiobook can be found on Amazon.com here: DARK of the MOON (Virgil Flowers #1) by John Sandford.

BASS REEVES: TALES of the TALENTED TENTH, no. 1 by Joel Christian Gill

 Published by Fulcrum Publishing in 2014.

Artist and author Joel Christian Gill is writing and illustrating a series of graphic novels that look into the lives of lesser known, exceptional African Americans. His inspiration is this quote from W.E.B. DuBois: "The Talented Tenth rises and pulls all that are worth saving up to their vantage ground." In other words, some will rise up and inspire/lead the rest. This is Gill's way of providing inspiration.

Bass Reeves was a legendary lawman in the Old West. He was a Deputy U.S. Marshal that chased down bad guys who would flee into Indian Territory (Oklahoma and Kansas) to hide from law enforcement in the neighboring states. If you've seen either of the two versions of the movie True Grit, that is the exact situation. The character Rooster Cogburn would have been real-life Bass Reeves' co-worker if Cogburn were a real person.

The graphic novel tells about Reeves' childhood as a slave in Arkansas, how he escaped during the Civil War (he was brought along to work as a body servant for a Confederate officer) and eventually lived for a while with Indians in the Oklahoma and Kansas Territories. He was hired to help deal Marshals deal with Indians and eventually he was deemed to be so helpful and so good at his job that the local federal judge went against all of the normal conventions and made Bass Reeves a marshal.

It turns out that Marshal Bass Reeves was very, very good at his job - maybe the best.

The book addresses racial issues in a couple of clever ways. Whenever the word n***** is used, a stylized caricature of a man in "blackface" is inserted. Secondly, whenever Reeves is confronted by racists, they are partially or completely illustrated as crows with angry red eyes. There are crows fleeing the law, crows in court, etc.

The problem with this story is that although Reeves lived an interesting and amazing life, the book is kind of flat. 

I rate this graphic novel 3 stars out of 5. It can be found on Amazon.com here: BASS REEVES: TALES of the TALENTED TENTH, no. 1 by Joel Christian Gill.

See my review for a different book in this series HERE.

THE MAGA DIARIES: MY SURREAL ADVENTURES INSIDE THE RIGHT-WING (and HOW I GOT OUT) (audiobook) by Tina Nguyen

Published by Simon and Schuster Audio in January of 2024.
Read by the author, Tina Nguyen.
Duration: 7 hours, 23 minutes.
Unabridged.

Tina Nguyen is a mainstream reporter now, but she started out in the world of conservative media. How conservative? How about working for Tucker Carlson before he joined Fox News?

Nguyen had a boyfriend that connected her to the feeder system of conservative politics and media. Go through these high school programs and you get invited to college programs like the Salvatori Center for the Study of Individual Freedom at Claremont McKenna College and then on to think tanks, conservative media, or a staff position with a politician.

Nguyen broke up with the boyfriend and went into conservative media...until she realized it was all very small, very inter-related and, in the end, unsatisfying and unable to pay the bills. Also, she discovered that one of her mentors was a racist creep and so was the boyfriend that brought her into the movement. 

The author, Tina Nguyen

What this book does very well is show how the right wing side of American politics is pretty interconnected, and according to Nguyen, much more so than the left wing.

The pacing of this book is kind of hit and miss. Sometimes it drags, sometimes it skips ahead quickly. Mostly, I was bothered by the timing of the book. She calls the book MAGA Diaries, but really she was part of the Tea Party Movement. I consider the Tea Party to be the precursor of the MAGA Movement, but they are not the same.

Anyway, it's a mixed bag. Not without value, but not great. I rate it 3 stars out of 5. It can be found on Amazon.com here: THE MAGA DIARIES: MY SURREAL ADVENTURES INSIDE THE RIGHT-WING (and HOW I GOT OUT) by Tina Nguyen.