DWD's Reviews

Considering the reputation of this author, I was quite disappointed In order to start with positive thoughts - What does Carr do right with this novel? 1. His vision of the future, published in the year 2000 about the year 2023, does correctly predict that Afghanistan would be a hotspot for the American military due to a fanatical, independently wealthy, international Muslim terrorist. 2. He predicted that the U.S. would become involved with Sadaam Hussein in Iraq over WMDs. (Ironically, in this book, Sadaam tries to nuke France in 2006) 3. Carr does an interesting thing by writing a sci-fi book that sounds Victorian. 4. His beginning themes of capitalism gone amuck are interesting, despite their misguided nature. What does he do wrong? 1. There is little or no character development. Even our main character is minimally fleshed out. He joins a group of anti-information age terrorists with little or no qualms, despite the fact that he knows nothing about them, h

I was so thrilled with this book - at least I was at first... I borrowed The Mother Tongue from my mom - I picked it up off of the shelf and after reading the first 3 or 4 pages I knew that I had to finish it. So, I borrowed the book and was happy with it and its light and humorous telling of the long and occasionally tortured history of the English language. But... Bill Bryson. Photo by Wes Washington. the mistakes and problems started to pile up. Bryson illustrates a lot of his points by showing the reader how other languages had similar developments. Most often he uses French and German, which is appropriate considering their close ties to English. On occasion, though, he uses Spanish, which is something that I am sensitive to since I teach Spanish. Mr. Bryson's assertions about Spanish accents and pronunciation were wrong more often than right. Too bad Mr. Bryson did not have a Spanish speaker actually pronounce a few of the words for him so he coul

Fantastic! Dinesh D'Souza D'Souza starts What's So Great About America with a thorough indictment of America. In a 30 page chapter entitled "Why They Hate Us" he honestly and thoroughly lays out all of the arguments about why America is reviled by so many. By the end of the chapter the reader begins to wonder if there really is anything so great about America. The balance of the book is spent answering every charge leveled in the first chapter. I have rarely read a book on contemporary politics in which I agree so thoroughly with his analyses. I may be just a high school history teacher but I do a lot of thinking about history and a lot of reading. The big ideas such as those of Locke, Rousseau and Jefferson fascinate me and I like to think about what their philosophies mean for us if implemented in the real world. D'Souza's comments on the West being an inheritance from both Athens and Jerusalem (pp. 60-61) closely mirror a conclu

Very good, wonderful historical detail Hernan Cortes (1485-1547) In my mind, the Aztecs have been short-changed by modern authors. There has not been enough attention to them and their interesting story. And Cortes! If ever anyone should get high marks for having ambition and bravery in spades, it's him. Anyway, the historical details are well done in the book. Falconer almost makes you feel like you are there with the Spanish as the arrive at the Aztec city of Tenochtitlan. He has created a multi-dimensional Cortes, rather than the stereotypical 'evil conqueror' Cortes (although, at the end I lost the feel for Cortes - I don't know if Falconer lost interest or he also lost his feel for the man). In most books and texts Cortes is portrayed as a gold-crazed, land-crazed conqueror - but his motivations are far more complex - including a complete disgust with the Mesoamerica's fascination with human sacrifice and the cannibalistic consumption of t

The best description that I have for this book is that it is like a roller coaster Stephen R. Lawhead Why a roller coaster? A roller coaster is slow when it starts out and climbs that first big hill. Byzantium is also slow while Lawhead lays the groundwork and has the reader join with an enterprising group of 13 monks from Ireland and Britain that head off for a pilgrimage to Constantinople. Like a roller coaster, once this book finally gets moving (around page 90 or so) the pace never stops and the reader is drawn into a wonderful world and is exposed to four cultures (Irish, Viking, Byzantine, Arab), as the main character is taken into slavery, lives the life of luxury, suffers from religious doubt, climbs to the heights of faith, fights corruption, is betrayed and also travels the world in a whirlwind fashion. This wonderful story, based on a composite of Irish monks from the 9th and 10th centuries, is a joy to read. Bravo! This is my first Lawhead book but it wo

Pretty good small budget movie While not the best movie I've ever seen, this movie does what it sets out to do - draw the viewer in for some thriller action. 2 friends and a little brother have travelled to Wisconsin for an evening of booze and girls at a backwoods bar in the winter. After a barroom brawl a 1950s Cadillac menaces them and eventually persues them - but our 3 protagonists have no idea why. Randy Quaid as the local yokel good ol' boy sheriff is the only actor you're likely to recognize but, in my mind, young, pez-consuming Josh Hammond steals the show The guys in the cadillac I am unwilling to be a spoilersport, so I won't go into great details, but you can imagine the tension that develops with car chases in the winter on twisty country roads, a hitchhiking sheriff in the backseat spouting off platitudes and asking pointed questions and a general feeling that things are spinning out of control make the movie work. The DVD commentary is intere