<i>Welcome to the Monkey House</i> by Kurt Vonnegut Jr.

I always find it very hard to write about collections of short stories. And for Vonnegut, I am finding it even harder---it has been more than two weeks since I finished this book that I am writing this down. Many of the stories in this collection were written prior to most of my favorite Vonnegut novels: Mother Night, Slaughterhouse 5 and Galapagos. As such, I can see many of the themes of those works in these stories: the future of the human race, sci-fi more generally, the meaning of life and human relationships.

I have spent some time thinking and can't identify a favorite. Two of them, though, made my skin crawl---always a worthy attribute in a short story. Those are: "All the King's Horses" and "Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow". "All the King's Horses" flashed me back to "Heart of Darkness" and "The Most Dangerous Game", but with a marginally happier ending. (On a side note: it is interesting that these types of human sacrifice stories stand out more as short stories than as novels. Maybe they are better---and creepier---if there is less said about them.) The skin crawling aspect in this one was based on the lack of free will of the individuals and the Captain's forced god-like power over them.

"Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow" has a similar theme of a lack of free will, but feels more possible. This one reminded me of My Petition for More Space, though with less order (bureaucracy?) and the bad side of Sax's quote which I included when writing up Blue Mars. It is a question, though, we will have to contend with as our life spans get longer. While I hope the solution is expand skyward, the cynic in my gut tells me we may be headed to something more like Vonnegut's future. That gives me the heeby-jeebies.

In general, these are all excellent stories. These leave a different feeling on your skin than a Ray Bradbury story, despite the similarities. With Bradbury, the extrapolation point seems too far out. Though Bradbury still captures the Twilight Zone feeling, Vonnegut is more visceral: that extrapolated point is very close, giving a tighter feel to my skin when I finish reading.

9/10

<i>How to Read a Book</i> by Mortimer J. Adler and Charles Van Doren

The first thing I noticed when I picked this book up to read it was that Charles Van Doren is one of the authors. He was involved in the game show scandals of the 1950's---what the Redford directed movie Quiz Show was based on. Other than that event, I knew he had a reputation as an "intellectual". As such I would expect him to be well read and able to offer a good opinion on the topic.

I was not disappointed. This book offers a structured and directed approach for reading. The author's split reading into four classifications: elementary, inspectional, analytical and syntopical and offers rules for doing each type. The rules start with four questions: what is the book about; what is being said and how; is the book true in whole or part; and what of it? Ther are detailed instructions for determining these answers, which I will leave as an excercise to the reader. Suffice it to say, I generally agree with what is said.

The authors encourage marking up books. I used to do this often, but had gotten away from it in college---probably because reselling books was much in my mind. I am going to start doing that again, as I do find (testing with this particular book) that the act of holding a pen in my hand ready to underline, makes me a more attentive reader.

The authors say that as a reader, one must read actively, asking the questions above for all books, modifying slightly for fiction and other genres and in intensity based on what is to be accomplished by reading the book. Just this is an interesting discussion, as one must know what and why one is reading something before starting. Will I need my pen to mark up pages? Should I retain this for later reference?

One thing they don't discuss is the social aspects of reading. Plenty of time is spent coaching you to come to your own opinion about books---a very important point: an opinion about anything is no good if you didn't arrive at it following considerable thought on your own---but I do not remember any notes about using these opinions to further discussion.

I suspect that many of the directions for discussing books would be the same as "talking" to authors: don't criticize some one until you can say "I understand", don't be contentious , and recognize and observe the difference between knowledge adn personal opinion. Really, be civil in discussions.

This is a book I will reference often as I read.

9/10

<i>The Blind Assassin</i> by Margaret Atwood

This book was suggested by a friend. Since I have read other Atwood (The Handmaid's Tail about 3 years ago and Cat's Eye in high school) and liked them, I was happy to return to her work, especially with a recommendation.

Atwood adeptly weaves together three stories: a book within the book, the memories of the protagonist and the clippings to support these memories. So, as readers we get an interpreted history through the book within the book, a personal history through the memories and an objective history through the clippings. These three aspects establish a rich story.

An additional layer is the sci-fi stories that were incorporated as part of the book within the book (I was reminded of the sci-fi aspects of Cat's Eye). These stories compounded the interpretation, creating caricatures of the main characters: a girl who couldn't talk and a boy who couldn't see. The caricatures were broad brush strokes, reflecting an inability to stand up for one's self and family and one's ability to navigate deftly through life without seeing anything.

I liked Atwood's writing. I especially enjoyed the voice of Iris as an "older" woman looking back on here life and writing to her estranged grand-daughter. The writing about her family's and her own more elegant past was enjoyable and the feeling of distress as that (and her family) slipped away over the years was palpable.

Overall, a very good read.

8/10

<i>Notes Towards the Definition of Culture</i> by T.S. Eliot

Dave and I spent some time discussing this book---indeed, Dave loaned it to me in the first place so we could do just that. We haven't had a final conversation about it since I finished. I have a few thoughts, though, that have been discussed to some extent about the content of this work.

Eliot contends that culture must have a religious base. I, rather flippantly, disagree with that. But, I cannot give an example of a culture where its people are not involved in a religion (i.e. a faith in the supernatural/divine). Even if, in the case of agnostics or atheists, it is only to speak against the 'common' understanding. For an atheist to say there is no god, there must be some cultural understanding to make that meaningful.

Eliot also claims that those who come to a religion through culture are just as entitled to call themselves of that religion as those who come to a religion through faith. I summarized this to Dave as: becoming Catholic for the art (or, in the Seinfeld tradition, Jewish for the jokes). Eliot's point is that the cultural results of religion will tend to reflect the same values as those held by the religion. As such, if you like the cultural aspects, the faith will fit you as well.

I find this hard to agree with. While I think people can come to faith by a variety of directions, I also think it is fair to be suspicious of the of those who have conversions based on cultural aspects that can be found in many religions or in society at large (see Jason's entry on Take This Bread). While a group of people who are in the local soup kitchen may share your desire to hep the needy, the conversion to a faith should rest on more than a single commonality, as faith, if one is serious about it, is a more encompassing than the single act to serve soup.

I agree with Eliot on his general view of culture: that cultures are intertwined and depend on each other; that you cannot have a middle-class culture without a lower class culture; when people forget the cost ties between cultures, wars breakout; the ideas of a world culture is meaningless without any counterpart to help define it.

Overall, I liked the book, Eliot sets his argument out reasonably. He keeps it short, which enables understanding. I enjoyed thinking about the ideas he presented.

8/10

<i>Stages to Saturn</i> by Roger E. Bilstein

It took me an extremely long time to read this book---over a year, I believe, with month-long periods where I didn't pick it up at all. It is a very good book, though easy to put down because it is dense and incredibly fact based.

I have read a few books on the US space program. This one was very different from the others. The others tended to concentrate on the human aspects---on the experiences of the astronauts. They were very good books (particularly Riding Rockets, which includes a very sober account of the bureaucracy of the Shuttle program), but this book offered a very different view: that of the technical project management required to get those few people to the moon.

Indeed, sections of this book should be used in project management classes. There are excellent examples of how to decrease overall time spans (the "all-up" test of the first Saturn V) projects and how to integrate external contractors into a project while maintaining communication to home base on critical issues (by assigning a local representative).

I enjoyed most, though, the various engineering solutions to problems encountered during design build and test. I learned about explosive forming and the fundamental operation of the engines with the "new" cryogenic fuels. Unfortunately, due to my protracted reading of this book, my memory is best for the last 200 or so pages versus the first part.

It is a book I will have to go back to at some point. Despite the dense fact-based nature of the topic, Bilstein does a reasonable job giving a story arc to each of the elements of the engines and stages. He is particularly good at including elements of the engineering story where things didn't go as planned and an interesting solution resulted.

It was a tough read, but worth it.

7/10

<i>Blue Mars</i> by Kim Stanley Robinson

...we stand on the brink of a---of a kind of golden age---which will only come to pass when our generation has died. We've worked for it all our lives, and then we have to die before it will come...it's---it's frustrating. I would rather see what happens then. Sometimes I get so curious. About the history we'll never know. The future after our death. And all the rest of it. Do you know what I mean?---Sax

Robinson continued the story of Mars in much the same way as he had in Green Mars. In this story, though, he focuses much more on the relationships between individuals, rather than the relationships between planets (the focus of Green Mars). The relationships on display are those between Michel and Maya, Sax and Ann, Art and Nadia and Nigral and Jackie. While there is still great concern among the characters about the place of Mars in the ever growing government of the solar system (there is even a rotating settlement on Mercury), Robinson puts this aside somewhat to display and examine how each character is dealing with the new order.

I was, again, strongly drawn to Sax. He desired to not accept the disorganization of his brain and the quick decline of his friends and instead applied his own ability and influence to solve the problem. I admire that dedication, loyalty and action greatly. I as a bit confused by his desire to get Ann to understand the "green" side, but once his interest---or past interest---in Ann is presented it made more sense. One can have odd relationships with those who once rebuffed one.

Maya annoyed me. Her shifts of moods were too volatile for my liking. It especially bothered me when those swings were taken in contrast to the manipulation she was capable of---shown most clearly in her interactions with Jackie on the canal trip. She was a very complex person---who I, like Sax, really didn't understand.

Nadia, on the other hand, shined more brightly in this book. I was better able to connect with her desire to build, construct and organize in this book than in Green Mars. I remembered why I liked her: she is a systems thinker and wants things to be set in order. Her relationship with Art made sense. As demonstrated in Red Mars, Nadia tended to end up with men who were friends or close collaborators before they were romantic partners.

In Green Mars Robinson only gave each character a single section. Here a few of the characters spoke twice. I found this very helpful, as the stories weren't as intertwined in this book---plus I really enjoyed reading from Sax's point of view twice.

The ending was good. Life continued. All who remained had meaning. One can't ask for much more than that. Overall, a good conclusion to the trilogy.

9/10

<i>The Country of the Pointed Firs</i> by Sarah Orne Jewett

I have read this short book before---some time in high school before I was keeping book notes. I didn't, though recall any of the story, just that it had included wonderful descriptions of the Maine coast, which reminded me distinctly of Winter Harbor. This time through, I took better note of the story (and was reading it while within Downeast, Maine, which helped cement it further to my brain).

The problem I often have with short books (and often short stories for that matter) is that the characters are restricted to a single scene or tale. In this case I would have liked to see Captain Littlepage further developed in other stories, as well as William (Mrs. Todd's Brother). I am left wanting more, which is my no means a bad thing, as it was that feeling that led me back to the book after a number of years.

Jewett, with each of the stories of a summer in Dunnet, ME, sketches a different aspect of coastal New England life in a manner that is not strongly romantic nor sentimental. She instead describes the coast in a manner where the reader gains a subliminal understanding of the isolation and hardship, but also the friendship and trust that a small, poor community has for itself. Being able to successful bring forth those aspects is an achievement in itself.