Review 73: Call Upon the Water

Call Upon the Water by Stella Tillyard
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This historical novel is set in the mid 1600’s in two locations, England and the New World. This book is told mostly from the point of view of a Dutch engineer Jan Brunt, writing, to you. Jan starts the book in New Amsterdam as he is writing in his diary. We soon find out who this you is, not to the reader, but one of the native fens woman, Eliza. They had a secret romance.

Water abounds and the Dutch engineer is there to control it, change the land, hold the water at bay, bend it to their needs. So these fens, the wetlands, will be drained made into the Great Level, so the land could be made useful for the English. The native, fens people had already sabotaged a prior attempt to alter the natural landscape.

Much of the book was enjoyable, but it was a slow paced novel. It is not long, but it took a long while to read it. The writing is good, the story is mainly interesting, but there is lingering. I wavered during the relationship parts, and that seemed to take over the entirety of the novel, yet not quite. There is a bit more.

It was an odd choice for the author, Tillyard, to only give the reader Eliza’s point of view towards the later part of the book. Then we return to Jan’s briefly once more, and it is odd that this back and forth wasn’t for the entire book. After completing the book entirely you can understand more of each character, yet part of me desires that the entire book was just one point of view. In any case, the choice didn’t ruin the book at all, just a little different with the structure. Also, I didn’t feel the voice of Eliza’s writing was much different from Jan’s, it is only the author telling us this is which character.

I did enjoy the historical aspect of the book, the turning of the city from the Dutch to British with New Amsterdam becoming New York. Even saw a different side to Virginia.

Book rating: 3.5 stars


Thanks to Atria Books and NetGalley for an uncorrected electronic advance review copy of this book in exchange for an honest review


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Review 72: Fall, Or Dodge in Hell

Fall, Or Dodge in Hell by Neal Stephenson
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I had high hopes for this next book of Neal Stephenson's. It takes the same world, some of the characters from Reamde but years later. (You don't need to have read the other book, but maybe you will feel more vested with the characters, possibly.) Anyway, the idea of having your brain scanned and uploaded to somewhere is interesting. It's a topic that computer scientists and others talk about a possibility for one day this to happen, so here is one writer's thoughts on what that may look like.

What it looked like was somewhat like the real world with some gaming tropes thrown in. Hopefully that didn't spoil it for you, but this is a long book and it comes up fairly early in the percentage-wise into the book.

In fact the book started out very strong. A good ways in and I thought to myself this is my favorite Stephenson book so far (this is the fourth, to give that statement some context). Then somewhere along the way the story gets lost into more detail and other aspects that honestly don't add to the overall book except page length. This seems to be quite a pattern for Stephenson, that he has to write these massive books, and probably 300 pages could be cut and not lose anything significant. So these books are marathons, and maybe that's Stephenson's way of things.

Anyway, I stuck with the book to see the payoff and I didn't find it. Maybe you will if you're a happier fan of Stephenson than me. I didn't like the gamification of the afterlife, at least the way it was portrayed. I also didn't like the whole creation myth recreated, that's about where it really stared it's downfall. Yes, there's much to gnash your teeth on for symbolism that's not that hidden, but it didn't do it for me. I'm sure it will get a good following of love from fans and some other folks.

Review 71: Walking

Walking by Henry David Thoreau
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Thanks to Dover Publications for the reprint of this lecture, by Thoreau that was published posthumously. The image they added to the text perfectly represents the mood of the book. Thoreau writes in a time when land was still being dominated and tamed, and here is the one voice speaking out that the wild nature has value as well. Not only has value, but we need it, as Thoreau writes: “in Wildness is the preservation of the World.”

There are many good quotes to pull out of this small book. I will refrain from quoting too many, but I must include another, “Life consists with wildness. The most alive is the wildest.”

Thoreau also states how his walking is like the wildness, to go without a purpose, to go without your head thinking of things you need to do. It is a walk to just be out in nature and walk.

The book is short enough to read in one sitting and perhaps it best when read in that manner. I did not have the fortune to do so, but did have some extended periods of time while reading, and broke away a little refreshed, with a new view, after each reading. Thoreau’s writing may not be fully accessible and easy, but once you dive in, you can see why his words are still relevant today, and will be for a long time to come.

Review 70: The Mind at Work

The Mind at Work: Valuing the Intelligence of the American Worker by Mike Rose
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I thought this book was going to be like the description, a bit like Ehrenreich's Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting by in America and Terkel's Working: People Talk about What They Do All Day and How They Feel about What They Do books, but that is not quite the case.

The book addresses the intelligence, the level of the mind while working at blue-collar type jobs. Society has not acknowledged the level of intelligence these people have that do these types of jobs. Mike Rose explains how people's understanding of intelligence has changed over the years, and this too is one area that needs to be modified. It takes the entire book to come to this conclusion, providing several long examples, and several briefly. A couple of the long examples come from his own family, while others from observing high school classes in vocational education. There are other examples as well, ranging from welder, hair dresser to a surgeon.

One of the later chapters delve into the education of students taking the two tracks of vocational verses academic. This part was unexpected for me. Rose explains how this does a great disservice as the students in vocational education route aren't challenged to their full extent and even come to believe their own intelligence is more limited than it may be, or they denounce intelligence as a way of compensating. Students get placed into programs often by income level backgrounds, or parental jobs. Other issues of how the two tracks differ and perpetuate problems are explained. This chapter felt like there were arguments that came before, for those in the education field may be better versed in the discussion. This chapter also felt like the thesis of the book, what the previous chapters were leading towards.

Mike Rose comes at this topic as a scholar in the field of education. He is a professor in education, yet he writes this book in a fairly approachable manner.

While the book was decent, and he took years in research and writing the book, it felt like there was missing quite a lot as well. Most of the book was about only a few job categories and only briefly mention others. It would seem the book would have been stronger with more details on more job areas, take those curiously mentioned and expanded upon, perhaps cutting down some other areas, or not. The book wasn't overly long.

After reading it entirely I would doubt the book would get a large audience outside of the academic world in the education field. I seem to have a large area of curiosity and love learning, so I continued the book where it veered from my primary interest. Certainly there are other people out there like myself, yet educators will likely gain the most from this book.

Review 69: Women Talking

Women Talking by Miriam Toews
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This book is based on something that happened, a true thing. The author fictionalized the response, well a little more than that was fictionalize, such as the size of the settlement. Yet knowing the basis of this story was fact made the book a harrowing read.

What was odd for me was why have an outsider tell the story? And why was the outsider a man?

The framing of the book had a male teacher, who was once excommunicated from the colony with his parents, write down the minutes of the women's meeting. He writes more than that, he write about himself. Sometimes it is acknowledged and other times it feels like the author forgot the frame of the story. A few parts of the story could not have been written down, yet we still have this in the book.

The women were portrayed, as almost simple. I think the author struggled with this aspect, their intelligence there, they are not stupid women, yet there were not allowed to be taught about the outside world, not reading and writing, not even the local language. This dichotomy comes across oddly, and it's hard to discern if it's due to the situation or the author struggling to find the right balance.

It's a short book and a quick read. There isn't much action of any in the book, it is as the title says, women talking, trying to decide how to proceed now they know their men drugged them and raped them, even the girl children. Should they stay and fight despite being pacifists, or should they leave, venture out into the unknown. There is a third option, to stay and do nothing, but for the women who believed in that option did not go to the barn to discuss what's next.

Often I found myself in disbelief how women continue to be abused, again and again in the name of religion. I loved that one of their topics was to be free; to be free from the patriarchy, to think for themselves.

Review 68: Coders: The Making of a New Tribe and the Remaking of the World

Coders: The Making of a New Tribe and the Remaking of the World by Clive Thompson
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This book was a mixed bag for me. Some aspects of it, was interesting and adding to my knowledge about computer programmers. But other aspects of the book irked me.

What I did like was learning about the computer industry, particularly the history that was provided, although it wasn't too deep. Thompson covered some personalities, and influences, such as computer programming in education. It's eye-opening how colleges can shape an industry, at least for a time. There was quite a lot about how women have been sidelined in the industry, and covering some of the scandals briefly. Overall there was a lot in the book, it is long, and sometimes felt meandering. I liked the breadth even though it wasn't expected.

Yet, there were too many generalizations as regards to the personality type of a true coder. Thompson used individual examples to extrapolate to the larger population. There wasn't any real studies or research done, it's cherry picking.

There were times when the language, the grammar was poor. For instance used this..."as Dropbox grew huger". Maybe huger is a valid word for very large, but there are better ways of getting to same point. In general it felt like sloppy writing, and sloppy research.

Another thing that bugged me was how Thompson used the word hacker interchangeably with coder or computer programmer. It wasn't until past the half-way point of the book, he explains that hacker is appropriate, as what many may think of "hacker" is actually termed "cracker". Generally "hacker" tinkers with systems to improve things, while a "cracker" breaks into systems for illicit motives such as personal gain or crime. Okay, well that information would have been better put in the beginning of the book, not in chapter 8 (out of 11).

Not to go on too long, particularly about what bothered me, but it is a mixed bag. Some readers may not be so picky, others maybe more so, it just depends on what you're looking for. This book is a generalization, but by no means definitive.


I listened to the audiobook from my local library. The narrator did a decent job of narration. Sometimes narrators, especially author-narrators, of non-fiction books end up sounding bored, happily that was not the case here. If interested in the book print or audio will work fine.

Reissue Review 67: The Life of the Skies

The Life of the Skies: Birding at the End of Nature by Jonathan Rosen
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Reissue Review #3: On occasion revisiting and reissuing reviews from the days before my blog postings. This is one to not miss.

A recent read: finished on September 02, 2016.

“what to make of a diminished thing”

This book isn’t so much about birding and birdwatching as it is a meandering of ideas that uses birding as the main focus. It’s tempting to call this a literary critique of birdwatching as literature appears almost as much as the birds.

Rosen frequently calls back to writers and poets, such as Thoreau, Whitman and Frost, but also those who may be more obvious such as Audubon, Darwin and Wallace. (Alfred Russel Wallace came up with the idea of evolution through natural selection at the same time as Darwin.)

The frame of the book is an attempt to find a bird that was claimed extinct but recently spotted – the ivory-bill woodpecker. This one bird can represent both despair and hope at the same time. The reason the bird went extinct was due to human logging of old growth forests. Hope is that it still survives, remained hidden all these years. Despair in that we have realized that our species can cause many other species to go extinct. Then hope in the attempt, or struggle to reverse that trend. Hope and despair is often found in the book.

The second half of the book Rosen goes to Israel for birding. Jewish heritage, history, religion, and of course the holocaust comes up. Perhaps the latter is brought into the book as a somewhat relation to the extinction of the ivory-bill and the attempted extinction of the Jewish people, both brought about by humans, albeit one consciously and the other unwittingly. This is just one example of the various connections Rosen brings up throughout.

There are some lines, some quirks to the book I haven’t seen before or extremely rare. At one point Rosen talks about lying and then reveals his story early in the book about how he started his habit of birdwatching is a lie. That’s curious. If you’re going to state it correctly why do that? You can edit. And occasionally there are moments that Rosen seems to think what the critics may say about his book and in this anticipation he brings up the idea and then answers it as well. Such as in the epilogue he writes: “Can a book about birdwatching sustain a reference to the horrors human beings inflict on each other?” The horrors he means specifically the holocaust. This oddness does remind me of a few authors who have written similarly. They think they know what people will say then dispute it within the same book. I don’t particularly like the tactic but can understand the motivation. They wish for a stronger argument within the book. But what is Rosen’s argument? That the environment is diminished for the birds?

“what to make of a diminished thing” This phrase comes up quite frequently. Rosen doesn’t quite answer it, as it is more a meditation, something to ponder rather than something to be fully answered. But if he does provide a hint of an answer for the reader it is found in the last pages: “We need to know that we are asking it about ourselves as well as the world around us.”

I really enjoyed the book, but not in the way I expected. I thought it would be more about birdwatching than a meandering of literary references and more. But I liked it. I’m sure some, who really are more interested in just the birdwatching aspect might find it tedious. There is a lot in this book, many digressions and sometimes the bird portion just seems like a thin veil to get to what he really wants to talk about. But it is interesting, there’s surprises on nearly every page, not knowing where this is going or where you’ll really end up.

Final note – didn’t like there isn’t an index, and this book really needs an index! Why this trend in non-fiction books to get rid of useful things such as references and indexes (indices)? At least he included notes on sources.

Book rating: 5 stars