Stand By for Mars!

 

By Carey Rockwell

4 Stars

Science Fiction

Children/Young Adult

This was the first science fiction book I ever read. It was part of my parents' library at home, and I have no idea how they acquired it. I don't know why they had it. I don't know if anyone else in the family ever actually read it. The illustration at the beginning of this review is not the cover. It was the first illustration inside the book. The memory of that picture, for some reason, always stuck with me. The cover itself was blah.

This series of books is from an old TV/Radio series: Tom Corbett Space Cadet. This book is the first in a series of, I believe, nine books. This is the only one I've read. The author is a pseudonym, and the book was written by in-house writers, much like other more successful and enduring series like The Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew.

The story starts with three stock characters arriving at the Space Academy to train for and join the Solar Guard. Tom Corbett is the perfect leader/hero. Roger Manning is the brilliant but arrogant jackass. Astro is the big galoot. They have the talent for greatness and the personality friction to spice up the story. All the other characters come across as stock characters as well, and this is really my only complaint about it. The three main characters gain depth as the story progresses and end up being memorable. They eventually become the crew of their own ship, the Polaris. Without spoiling the story, which is a good one, this book is their first big adventure together. The adventure helps them overcome their differences and pull together as a team.

In the US, this book is in the public domain and is available for free here:

 https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/19526

It was kind of fun to find this and skim through it. It's amazing how much of the story I retain after almost 55 years. That's also probably the best endorsement I can give.

Mao's America A Survivor's Warning

 

By Xi Van Fleet

5 Stars

Political

Adult

I consider myself publicly apolitical, but I do have opinions and thoughts on the subject. I just choose to keep a lot of that to myself. This is my first review of a political book, and I will try to be objective. It is interesting and well organized. I had no trouble maintaining interest as I read. I appreciated the endnotes because personal-experience books usually don't include them. It gives a clear picture of how she comes to her conclusions.

Xi Van Fleet experienced the communist takeover of China and lived through the various stages of the revolution. She eventually came to America for schooling, married an American, and settled in the USA. She noticed parallels in leftist American politics that reminded her of her experiences in her native country. In many ways, she sees the same progression and thinks that they are leading to the same bad results. I think she analyzed those parallels very well and made a compelling case. I definitely believe it is worth reading and thinking about. 

One of the main things I draw from her account is the sheer level of corruption that exists in politics, both left and right. The dividing of people so that they can be manipulated. I see it on both sides of the political divide. 

Debt of Honor

 

By Tom Clancy

4 stars

Action/Adventure/Suspense

Adult

This is the second Tom Clancy book I’ve had the pleasure of reading. I will eventually write up a review of Clear and Present Danger when I get a chance to do a little reviewing of the book itself. Many of the characters recur in this novel, and it made it easy for me to get into the story. Jack Ryan, John Clark, and Domingo Chavez are central characters once again, along with others.

The primary bad guy is a Japanese businessman called Razio Yamata. He is a very powerful investment leader who wields a great deal of power behind the scenes. He has a plan to make Japan great again. He maneuvers to create a conflict between Japan and the United States. That conflict loosely follows a Pearl Harbor-type script. To save the day, our three intrepid heroes have to work very hard. Don’t want to give away anything.

It is a long book in the sense that it does require a significant time commitment to read. That is the pattern I see in most of his work, so I knew what I was getting into. I do appreciate that the author takes the time to explain everything. There are a lot of short forms used, and I imagine that I’ll get less confused on that count the more of his work I read. I do have to stop for a second sometimes to make sure I understand.

I do have a couple of quibbles. Someone in the story gets stabbed with a steak knife and dies instantly. That doesn’t strike me as believable. I know he needed to be gotten rid of to advance the storyline, but I’m sure the author could’ve come up with something better than that. The other issue I have is the buildup between fleets in the Indian Ocean. The climax to that thread in the story was a bit of a letdown. 

The story, of course, is pretty intense. I enjoyed it, and when I can find the time, I’ll read another one of his books with pleasure.

Three Cheers For Me

 

By Donald Jack

5 Stars

Historical/Humour

Adult

I discovered this book and the accompanying series while I was a student in high school. At that time, I devoured books at a phenomenal rate. I discovered quite a few great authors and read some terrific books. This series was my favourite. This book is the opening salvo in the series and won the Stephen Leacock Award for Humour. I’m not sure how popular The Bandy Papers were outside of Canada.

Bartholomew Bandy is an anti-hero. The son of a preacher, bland looking, physically and socially clumsy. He will make you laugh at some of the situations he gets into, but he is incredibly human and relatable at the same time. We meet him as he prepares to ship off to war in Europe. He starts WW1 as an infantryman in the trenches. Chaos follows him into the chaos that is already there. This book is top-notch comedy, but at the same time, it doesn’t minimize the war that is the backdrop of this story. He survives the trenches and joins the Royal Flying Corps. He proves to be a natural pilot. While training, his engine fails, and he makes a forced landing on an estate called Burma Park. He falls in love with the place and Katherine Lewis, the young woman living there. His encounter with the plumbing there is memorably hysterical. The rest of the book is split between flying at the front and then spending leave in England.

On reading the book a second time, I still heartily recommend it. I look forward to rereading the next four books in the series and eventually reading the four that I never knew about after graduating from high school.

Gray Mountain

By John Grisham
4 Stars
Legal Thriller
Adult

This book arrived in my library courtesy the local used book store. My daughter found it and knew that I had previously enjoyed one of his books. What she didn’t know was that I read a Reader’s Digest version of one of his novels if that actually counts.

This is a legal thriller. The heroine is Samantha Kofer a New York lawyer working for Big Law who starts the story getting furloughed for a year without pay because of a major economic crisis. She is told to work as an intern for free and after a year maybe she would get her job back along with all her benefits. She ends up finding an internship in a little hick village in the Appalachians, deep in coal country for a free legal clinic. She’s a big city girl and she’s a fish out of water, not sure of what she wants and not sure of her future.

The antagonists in all this is the big coal corporations. They are taking advantage of the little people. The story revolves around this conflict. She finds herself getting sucked deeper and deeper into a fight she doesn’t really want to get involved in. She is more of a people person than she gives herself credit for. She finds herself caring about the clients and what becomes of them.

Some of the reviews I read of this book were harsh. Outside of the main character’s vacillations which became a little wearisome, I liked the book.

When the Dikes Broke

 

By Alta Halverson Seymour

5 Stars

Historical Fiction

Children’s/Young Adult

I got a copy of this book through school before I was a teenager. I’m not sure if my copy survived all my changes of address. I had it in my personal library for many years. I am of Dutch decent and that is one of the main reasons I was interested in the story. The events are real. My parents, I believe, moved to Canada just before this happened. The flooding did not reach the areas where my family is from.

The story revolves around the van Rossem family. The family wakes up to find their house flooding. They are rescued but some members of the family get separated from the rest of the family. The story outlines the family’s ordeal.

Loved the book. Read it several times, even though I know how the story goes.

The Guns of Navarone

 

By Alistair MacLean

5 Stars

Action/Adventure/Suspense

Adult

Keith Mallory has been chosen to lead a small team of commandos to destroy an impossible target in an effort to clear the way for the Navy to rescue more than a thousand soldiers who are in peril. His team includes Dusty Miller, an explosives and sabotage expert, Casey Brown, an engineer, Andy Stevens, a mountain climber like Mallory, and Andrea, a seemingly indestructible Greek soldier who seems to get bigger and stronger as the story unfolds.

They encounter setbacks and obstacles at every turn. Physical barriers, enemy soldiers, and enemy spies. The author beats the crap out of his protagonists. Once it gets going, the book is a page-turner and is very hard to put down. For me, this is a reread. I read it when I was in high school. Now I have my own private copy for my personal library. 

This book made me a fan of Alistair MacLean. I would happily read all his books if I had the time. This one comes highly recommended.