Impressive....!

100 Questions – to get to know someone. 

31. Where would you bury hidden treasure if you had some? 

The very best place to ‘hide’ things is in plain sight. No one expects anything obviously on show to be secret, hidden or valuable. Well, at least it works in the movies & in books – at least until someone points it out (usually at the end). 

32. Would you ever strip or pose nude for a photo in a magazine? For a movie? 

Good GOD, No. I can KIND of understand nudity in films as long as it's important to the plot but think that 99% of the time it's pure fluff to keep people (usually men) interested in an otherwise poor plot/movie. The number of times I’ve seen them drop a ‘love scene’ into a film around the halfway mark and thought that even the director/producer knows it’s a bad movie at this point!     

33. What has been your best Halloween costume this far? 

Not something I’ve ever done. 

34. Are you stubborn? 

In the right circumstances I AM that immovable object. I think I get it (via my mother) from at least my Gran who took umbrage with the Catholic church for *decades* following a dispute with the local priest. She only relented (with gritted teeth no doubt) when she realised she was dying. 

35. Do you sing in the shower? In the car? 

Sure, plus when I have headphones on, just walking along.... Music is LIFE. 

36. Do you take vitamins daily? 

LOL – Just a few, yes. Actually, I take a variety. I started taking a standard multi-vitamin each day around 30(ish) years ago and then added what I called a ‘guest’ vitamin whenever something was on offer. Slowly the guests increased, and I started doing some research into things. Presently I’m popping around 10 pills per day – although some of them are repeats.    

37. Have you ever cried because you were so happy? 

No. 

38. Can you swim without plugging your nose? 

I never learnt to swim (bad I know) but on the few occasions I have been in the water – either pool or sea – I've never plugged my nose. I’m not sure why you’d want or need to. 

39. Have you ever won a contest? 

Yes, many. When I was younger, I used to do a lot of phone-in or write-in competitions. The radio station I listened to stopped taking my calls because I kept winning. I remember one contest where the question of the day was the population of Hawaii. I couldn’t believe that people were GUESSING. I just looked it up (in a book back in those days) and, naturally, won. The presently called me a smartarse for getting the number spot on..... [lol] 

40. Do you want kids? How many? 

I’ve never wanted children, not to any great degree anyway. Kids are OK (mostly), but I think they’re too much responsibility (for me) and I think I’d just spend my whole time worrying about them. Plus, to be honest, I don’t think I’d like to bring another mouth to feed into this world. I’m really not confident about the future. Plus (plus) I’ve never been with anyone long enough to even think about it.  

Just Finished Reading: Hip-Deep in Alligators by Robert Campbell (FP: 1988) [206pp] 

Nothing quite says ‘Mind your own business’ like being assigned to check on Chicago’s extensive sewage system. But Jimmy Flannery didn’t mind it too much. He knew his bosses would let him back into the fresh air eventually. It was just the price he had to pay for being a pain in the system's backside. What Jimmy didn’t expect was the body he stumbled upon – or should that be body parts. Two to be precise, apparently torn in half. What the coroner found surprised him even further. Embedded in the body was a tooth – of an alligator. Did that mean the urban legends were true after all? Did alligators and other critters flushed into the sewers by countless exotic pet owners survive down there in the dark and the effluent? Jimmy wanted to find out, for his own health as much as anyone else’s. But it seemed like he was on his own – again. The coroner's report had been sealed and the police were less than enthusiastic to spend resources and manpower looking for an urban myth. What really intrigued Jimmy was the growing pressure on him to look somewhere else and be somewhere else. Why were so many people apparently eager NOT to find alligators in the city's sewers. It was time for Jimmy to find out. 

After enjoying the first book in the Flannery series I was looking forward to this one. Unfortunately, it wasn’t quite as good as his previous outing. Flannery is a great character for a host of reasons and both he and the city he inhabits are well drawn. Equally well drawn are the lessor characters that fill out his life and the rest of the plot. The plot itself, however, lacked narrative punch this time. I think part of the problem is that the plot was a little too convoluted and contrived for an easy suspension of disbelief. Another problem was that the author seemed to get distracted from time to time and would suddenly seem to remember what the main plot was supposed to be. As I approached the end of the book, still without a resolution at hand, the narrative seemed to go into warp drive and, with the help of some lengthy exposition, come to a swift if reasonably satisfying conclusion. It all felt rather rushed. Overall, the story was still readable but, apart from a few flourishes from time to time, never really maintained much of an above average score. Reasonable. 

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The genes are STRONG in this one..........

Just Finished Reading: Life Everywhere – The Maverick Science of Astrobiology by David Darling (FP: 2001) [182pp] 

This interesting slim volume was written in response to my previous book on the subject [Rare Earth – Why Complex Life Is Uncommon in the Universe by Peter D Ward and Donald Brownlee] reviewed back in March last year and was, essentially a refutation of its conclusions and many of its underlying assumptions of the so-called special or unique nature of planet Earth where life is concerned. Contrary to the ideas in ‘Rare Earth’ the author here contends that life is common throughout the galaxy and that increased complexity is almost certain based on what we know about life on Earth. Of course, since we’re working with a single example here, extrapolation is difficult but not impossible. Even 20 years ago when this book was published, we had a pretty fair understanding about when and how life emerged on this planet. One thing that really stuck out was that it was QUICK. As far as we can tell the moment life could begin it did. That alone suggests that the start of life is comparatively easy given a reasonable set of starting conditions. What’s more, now we know about the number and range of extremophiles living quite happily in environments thought to be hostile to life, those conditions seem to be a lot wider and less benign than we first thought.  

So, we can say with a fair degree of confidence that, where a wide range of conditions allow, life will emerge quickly. Once life has emerged it will grow, expand and evolve. Part of that evolutionary process is to adapt to the local conditions and also quite naturally slowly increase in complexity. Earth in this sense cannot be unique. Contentions that for life to exist or evolve a planet needs a large moon or any other obviously Earth specific attribute is nothing more than special pleading and yet another defensive redoubt to protect the supposedly special place of Earth or (by extension) humanity in the grand scheme of things. With what we know of the Universe this simply won’t stand. 

The author contends (and I agree with him) that the prospect for the longed-for existence of life on Mars is possible – if only just. Life may have emerged independently there (indeed it's possible that life on Earth may have been at least partially seeded from Mars) in its warm wet period and then either become extinct or moved underground. We’ve found some tantilising hints so far but nothing definite at least yet! Much more likely (and I agree again) is the possibility of life under the ice on several of Jupiter’s moons. Knowing what we know of the ‘black smokers’ on our own seabed I think it’s entirely likely that not only bacteria exist in those oceans, but I fully expect our probes to find complex fish. If we do find life – proven as far as possible to have evolved independently of Earth – on any other body in this Solar System, it would indeed indicate that life is everywhere. I do hope so! 

Overall, despite its age, this was an interesting read and a good introduction to the ideas behind Astrobiology and the search for life elsewhere. If the topic intrigues you I can definitely think of worse places to start reading about it. Recommended. More current reading on this topic to come.    

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The inherent danger of New Year's Resolutions........

A matter of Influence-ah? 

As my regular readership will no doubt remember, I have a (very) long-term project to read some of the world’s influential or significant books of the last few centuries. Part of the (non-rational) reason for this is a vague sub-conscious feeling of educational inadequacy from going through the State educational system design, in large part, to produce working class factory fodder. The Comprehensive Schools I attended certainly had little room and no remit to produce scholars! So, I thought, if my education system didn’t do it, I’ll do it myself. Of course, being ME, I didn’t go at this ‘project’ directly but kind of sidled up to it like I was ‘hunting wabbits’. The list below is what I’ve managed so far (in the lifetime of this Blog) with new additions in BOLD. I’m not sure what (if anything!) I’ll be adding this year. I need to sort through my piles of books & dig something important out and dust it/them off....    

The Great Crash 1929 by John Kenneth Galbraith
A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush by Eric Newby
Fast Food Nation – What the All-American Meal is Doing to the World by Eric Schlosser
The Wretched of the Earth by Franz Fanon
Dune by Frank Herbert
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee - An Indian History of the American West by Dee Brown
Rock of Ages – Science and Religion in the Fullness of Life by Stephen Jay Gould
How Children Fail by John Holt
The Hidden Persuaders by Vance Packard
Suffragette – My Own Story by Emmeline Pankhurst
The Female Eunuch by Germaine Greer
The Old Straight Track - Its Mounds, Beacons, Moats, Sites and Mark Stones by Alfred Watkins
The End of History and the Last Man by Francis Fukuyama
Silent Spring by Rachel Carson
All The President’s Men by Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward
Lady Chatterley’s Lover by D H Lawrence
The True Believer – Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements by Eric Hoffer
The Rights of Man by H G Wells
The Economic Consequences of the Peace by John Maynard Keynes
The Two Cultures by C P Snow
The City by Max Weber
Down and Out in Paris and London by George Orwell
The War of the Flea – A Study of Guerrilla Warfare Theory & Practice by Robert Taber
Revolutionary Suicide by Huey P Newton
Seize the Time – The Story of The Black Panther Party and Huey P Newton by Bobby Searle
Testament of Youth by Vera Brittain
The Autobiography of Malcolm X with the assistance of Alex Haley
Achtung Panzer! – The Development of Tank Warfare by Heinz Guderian
Homage to Catalonia by George Orwell
The Medium is the Massage by Marshall McLuhan and Quentin Fiore
About Looking by John Berger
A Vindication of The Rights of Woman by Mary Wollstonecraft
War on Wheels – The Evolution of an Idea by C R Kutz
Ways of Seeing by John Berger
Design as Art by Bruno Munari
The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli
Why I am not a Christian by Bertrand Russell
The Captive Mind by Czeslaw Milosz
The Future of an Illusion by Sigmund Freud
The Myth of Sisyphus by Albert Camus
The Rebel by Albert Camus
Meditations by Marcus Aurelius
A Discourse on the Origins and Foundations of Inequality among Men by Jean-Jacques Rousseau
The Social Contract by Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Guerrilla Warfare by Che Guevara

Only 3 added this year which isn’t great but isn’t too bad. This year I’ll try for at least 3 again and do my best to find at least 1 of them that most other people will at least have heard of! Wish me luck....  

Just Finished Reading: Night Train to Lisbon by Pascal Mercier (FP: 2004) [436pp] 

Berne, Switzerland. It was, so it seemed at first, a normal day. Raimund Gregorious was walking his normal route to the college where he had been teaching Greek, Latin and Hebrew for as long as anyone could remember. He was crossing the bridge he had crossed a thousand times at this time of day, when he saw the women in front of him obviously emotionally disturbed by the letter she was reading. Gregorious thought little of it until he saw the woman slowing slip out of her shoes. Worried that she might be contemplating suicide, Gregorious did something completely out of character – he intervened. That was the day his life changed. He convinced her to follow him to his college and watched as she sat through his first lecture of the day. His students, long used to his familiar ways, hardly knew how they should react. Little did they know that this would only be the start of the surprises ahead of them that day. Still disturbed by his early morning encounter, Gregorious walked into town and found himself in a local bookshop. Almost unconsciously he picked up a discarded book and started to read, only to discover that the book was in Portuguese, a language he was unfamiliar with. The shop owner then translated a passage and Gregorious felt as if he had been struck by lightning. How was it possible that an author he had never heard of before, writing in a foreign language, could be speaking as if directly to him? Over the next few hours, the conviction within him grew. He would need to find out more about this author and how he came to his views on life and living. He would need to go to Lisbon – immediately. 

As usual with such things I picked this book up, a little over 10 years ago now, because it looked ‘different’. It certainly was that! I’ve actually been thinking over the past few weeks how I can possibly review this book. I know one thing – it's not going to be straightforward. One of the easiest ways to describe it is to portray the tale of a late middle-aged man going through a mid-life or existential crisis. There is something to that but there’s far more going on here. Gregorious is a man in crisis sure enough – except that, until the meeting on the bridge – he had barely recognised this to be the case. He was almost as shocked as those around him regarding what his quest forced him to do and forced him to consider about himself as well as the life he had lived and continued to live. Obviously his ‘quest’ was scripted by the author of this amazing novel, but it felt like Gregorious was being directed on a course of action he had little control over. It’s hard to describe but I couldn’t help but think that there was a “magical realism” ‘tint’ to the story as if everything was hyper illuminated or hyper-real. I felt like the ‘contrast’ of the images in my mind had been turned up to 11. The metaphor of his new glasses was a little ‘on the nose’ but I didn’t mind at all. I’ve had new glasses myself that have had a similar, if not quite so philosophical, impact. I really liked the metaphor of the chess games which I thought worked really well and then, naturally, the metaphor of train travel. All very well done. His adventures and encounters in Lisbon were endlessly fascinating. I was there, briefly, a little over 20 years ago and loved what I saw. The city and the people he met there – all amazingly drawn – completely absorbed me. It was probably some of the best character creations I’ve read in a very long time. A book filled with people you would want to know – even the supposed ‘difficult’ ones!  

But you may be asking about now, what was the book actually about? It was about regret and loss, it was about love and parental pressure, it was about loyalty and friendship, it was about forgiveness and duty, it was about realising how little we know other people and how we can be fooled into thinking we know ourselves – and that only begins to scratch the surface of this quite brilliant book. I’m finding it hard to imagine reading a better book this year – though I’m going to try because I do like a challenge! It was the kind of book that not only could you easily read it again and get more from it, but it was the kind of book that, once finished, you could start again from the beginning immediately and still derive both pleasure and insight the second time around. I think I’ll definitely be reading this again. Maybe at the beginning of every year from now on. That might sound a little crazy, but believe me, it’s not. Easily one of the best books I’ve ever read and, therefore, very, very highly recommended. 

Translated from the German by Barbara Harshav 

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Good to know that at least he's a *consistent* idiot......

Just Finished Reading: Night Trains – The Rise and Fall of the Sleeper by Andrew Martin (FP: 2017) [248pp] 

Sleep trains used to be common – in the UK, Europe, America and across the world. Even in Britain it could take a considerable time to travel between cities, so why not sleep your way to your destination and arrive fresh and fed? Some of the sleepers became culturally famous, like the fabled Orient Express, whilst others became notorious for questionable assignations and sought out by the rich and shameless. But all good things must come to an end and the few remaining sleeper trains may not be long for this world. The reasons are pretty obvious – trains are a lot faster than in decades gone by so there’s little time or opportunity to bed down, commercially sleeper coaches lose money and have always lost money so they’re no longer economically viable and, of course, long distance trains need to compete with airlines which are quicker and also tend to be cheaper. But the sleepers still have their fan base and that includes the author of this interesting little book. 

Travelling on a variety of lines including Paris to the French Riveria, the Nordland Railway in Norway, Paris to Venice, a cobbled together ‘Orient Express’ journey and the Berlin Night Express the author experiences (or at least in some cases tries to experience) what it was like to travel across Europe in a wheeled hotel. Looking at the history (and troubled future) of the sleeper the author delves into the dreams of railway enthusiasts and the complicated political maneuverings it took for sleeping passengers to cross borders in the dead of night. Within the EU such issues have long been overcome so his present-day travels were much easier although choosing to travel shortly after the notorious terrorist attack in Paris probably wasn’t his best idea.  

Told with self-deprecating humour and an obvious deep love of trains this was a fun and often fascinating read which I enjoyed a great deal. I’ve travelled on trains extensively in the UK – never having learnt to drive – and also in various parts of Europe (France and Italy) and have (largely) enjoyed the experience and have met some interesting people asnd had some interesting experiences along the way. I still chuckle about the street entertainer who showed his table a VERY large snake he was carrying much to the astonishment and sometimes horror of his fellow passengers, especially a bunch of school children from another carriage! More from this author (both fiction and non-fiction) and more train stories to come. 

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Reading Plans for 2023 and Beyond! 

I think that the only true things you can say about plans (well, except that no plan survives contact with the enemy) is that they change. I know mine certainly do – and they have. So, what am I ‘planning’ for this year? 

Following the Labels 

I’ve given up on the idea of working through my labels to construct a world tour. It just wasn’t working, at least not at the pace I was looking for. So, my labels plan for this year is to read at least one book from each book friendly label. At the moment there’s about 108 such on the list. I expect that 50 hits is more than achievable and my interim target will be 80. I’ll be more than impressed if I hit all 108. You may have noticed a tag below my book reviews regarding labels added/total. That’s to keep track of this plan. So far, so good I think. 

The ‘Knowledge Streams’   

I’m still intending to focus of my 3 ‘Knowledge streams’ - Britain Alone (1939-41), World War to Cold War and USA:WTF. I think I’m doing reasonably with Britain Alone and intermittently with Cold War (although this needs to be more focused on this year). My investigation into the USA is rather scatter-gun but I’m happy with it so far. More attempted unravelling of the WTF factor of the USA to come. 

The ‘Wild Cards’ 

My original wild cards have been put back in the pack. What I’m doing now is inserting a pair of matched books (usually one fiction/one non-fiction with a common theme or title) every 5 books or so. I’m enjoying the challenge of fitting books together without being on the nose too often – although that will happen from time to time!    

Finishing/Progressing Series 

This is something else I’ll continue working on. I don’t know exactly how many separate series or trilogy’s I’ve got ‘on the go’ presently except for the fact that there’s too many of them. I’ll definitely have at least one more Foundation and Dune book this year and maybe a couple more Sharpe novels. Naturally I might also START at least one new series too. 

Book length & the Review Pile 

My review pile is presently bumping along the rock bottom at 3. This isn’t good and means that if I want to maintain two reviews per week I can’t read 500+ page chunkers without the risk of having nothing to review. I am making more effort to read more pages per day (I am struggling to concentrate enough presently) but there will be an increase in the number of shorter books to add some fat to the pile so I can read some more substantial works from time to time. 

Other Plans 

I aimed at reading 6 Classics last year and managed around 10 – including a few books of short stories and some non-fiction classics. My aim for this year is 10. As I already have 1 under my belt I think that should be more than achievable. I think the ‘other’ theme for this year is: More. I want to read more Science, more History that predates Victoria, more about places, events and people outside Europe & the US, more Ancestry related books so I can understand more of what my research threw up on Ancestry.com, and so on. All rather vague, I know, but you have to start somewhere! Naturally, something or probably multiple things, will show up to prompt me to read about them. I’ll finally be digging into some books I picked up on Ukraine this year to gain some background to the present conflict. There should be some surprises in there for all of us. I do hope so. Let’s find out!   

Just Finished Reading: Tamed – Ten Species that Changed Our World by Alice Roberts (FP: 2017) [332pp] 

It has long been thought that the great break, the great leap forward, in human existence was the move from hunter/gathering to farming. We moved, so it was assumed, from basically being nomads to being sedentary, and everything that followed made us what we are today. But was it that clear cut? Apparently not – not by a long way. Of course, we should know by now that not much in human history fits into neat little boxes. Things happen and are then lost or abandoned and then picked up again later, somewhere else. Sometimes a really good idea (in hindsight) just doesn’t take off and another, technically worse, idea lives on way beyond its ‘sell-by date’. Such is the convoluted and meandering story of domestication. Before the advent of detailed genetic analysis, it was assumed (admittedly for some good reasons) that farming began in the Fertile Crescent and was so successful it swept across the rest of Eurasia in an unstoppable wave of progress. A more detailed picture shows a patchwork of casual pastoralism where animals are sometimes hunted and sometimes ‘managed’ and where naturally occurring grasses are ‘harvested’ periodically during variable term semi-nomadic ‘lay-overs’. Farming, as we think of it today, took a long time to ‘bed in’ across Eurasia with some people’s never adopting the idea and others dipping in and out of the idea as circumstances allowed or dictated. It certainly wasn’t either a smooth or an inevitable process. Domestication of both plant and animal species across the world depended on the availability of suitable species – horses rather than zebras for example – opportunities for the process to begin (beneficial to both sides of the equation as shown by the numbers of chickens in the world following their domestication), population pressures, and even climate change. Looking at dogs, wheat, cattle, maize, potatoes, chickens, rice, horses and apples – plus our self-domestication – the author delves into the origins of the domestication process (as much as possible considering those origins sometimes greatly predate historical or archeological evidence – as with the transition from wolves to dogs), when and where it occurred and the consequent impact on both humanity and the domesticated creature or plant. 

I’ve been looking forward to reading this for a while now and was not disappointed. The author has a wonderful ‘voice’ and explains the genetic, archeological and anthropological aspects of domestication very well indeed. Needless to say, I learnt a LOT from this book. Some of it, she freely admits, is still speculative at this point but the speculation, where it does occur, is both highlighted as such and supported by what data we do have. It is interesting to know, as I’d read before, that horses (for example) evolved in North America but went extinct there – probably by human hand/spear - long before the Spanish reintroduced them after Columbus. It’s interest (as always) to speculate how the Spanish would have done if faced by something like the Apache on horseback in the 15th century. Equally it's interesting to speculate how history would’ve played out if horses had been pushed to total extinction in Eurasia too! If you’ve ever wondered where the staples of the planet’s diet come from (plus DOGS!) this is definitely the book for you. Highly recommended. 

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From the BBC

Last year was the UK's warmest year on record, the Met Office has confirmed. The average annual temperature in 2022 was more than 10C for the first time, it said. The mean temperature across the 12 months was 10.03C - topping the previous all-time high of 9.88C in 2014.

It means 15 of the UK's top 20 warmest years on record have all occurred this century - with the entire top 10 within the past two decades. Dr Mark McCarthy, head of the Met Office National Climate Information Centre, said: "Although an arbitrary number, the UK surpassing an annual average temperature of 10C is a notable moment in our climatological history.

"This moment comes as no surprise, since 1884 all the 10 years recording the highest annual temperature have occurred from 2003. It is clear from the observational record that human-induced global warming is already impacting the UK's climate."

Just Finished Reading: Ape and Essence by Aldous Huxley (FP: 1948) [153pp] 

This is a bit of an odd one, so the review will be different too. I picked this up either last year or the year before in my favourite Indie bookshop. I picked it up for several reasons: it was a Huxley book I was unfamiliar with after only reading ‘Brave New World’ by him, it was a Classic and I’m trying to read more classics, it was thin and finally it looked like an interesting ‘take’ on the post-apocalypse sub-genre. 

The short novel started in a rather unexpected way with two script writers in California chatting about the state of the world and their places in it. During the conversation a truck drives past carrying rejected scripts on the way to have them pulped or incinerated. As luck with have it, one of the rejected scripts falls off the truck and lands, relatively intact, at their feet. With little else to do that day they decide to read it. Entranced by the story they track down the author only to discover that he had recently died. The rest of the novel is the recovered script... 

The year is 2108, 100 years after a devastating global nuclear war. Few places have survived unscathed, but one of them is New Zealand. With the effects of the war now diminishing, a team of scientists is re-contacting ‘lost’ countries and has landed on the Californian coast. Attacked by savages one of them – Dr Alfred Poole, a botanist and the focus of the narrative – is captured and taken to those in authority. He discovers that the new ‘civilisation’ in California is based on the worship of Satan as it could only have been Him who led the world to self-destruction and the misery they now must live with. Dr Poole spends the rest of the story discovering exactly how the new society functions (badly!) and has some interesting chats with the high priest/archbishop about the philosophical underpinnings of their way of life and religion. 

As you can probably imagine this was all rather surreal. The most obvious theme throughout – especially considering the world had only entered the Atomic Age 3 years previously – was fear of the bomb. The other two themes throughout, which presumably originated in the author himself, were sexuality and sexual repression and, of course, mother issues. Strange doesn’t really cover it. I can’t say hand on heart that I enjoyed this short work, but I did find parts of it interesting. The ‘End of the World’ was, according to the Satanic archbishop, caused by a mixture of Nationalism, Rationalism and Consumerism. I must admit that I did find myself nodding with agreement during parts of his monologue. Overall, I would probably have DNF’d this if it had been much longer. It was a strange read and, no doubt, much of its time. It did give an interesting insight into how British intellectuals handled (badly) the existence of the new Armageddon hanging over us Damocles' sword like, but apart from that? Only recommended for Huxley completists I think!  

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Happy New Year! Let's hope that 2023 is a GOOD one and one that brings you both things you want and things you need.