Posts

IS SCIENCE RACIST? (DEBATING RACE) by Jonathan Marks

Image
Published by Polity in March of 2017. If you have ever had the misfortune to run across one of the alt-right's pseudo-scientific webpages that discuss the genetics of race and how science proves one race is smarter/better/nicer/whatever than other races you will see the need for this book. Sadly, an author I used to Tweet back and forth with a little re-Tweeted some posts from one of these sites and I got my fill of them during one long evening. They are the internet's version of those young men marching in Charlottesville with the white polo shirts and khaki pants. Like those men, on the surface these sites were pleasant enough until you pay attention to what was being said. They wrap themselves in pseudoscience that, unfortunately, is twisted around to sound reasonable. It is these types of people that Jonathan Marks is talking about when he notes: "Every science has had its own set of ethical issues - chemistry and poison gas; physical anthropology and grave-robb

JUST MOVE!: A NEW APPROACH to FITNESS after 50 by James P. Owen

Published in September of 2017 by National Geographic The author, James P. Owen, was 70 and realized that he was horribly out of shape. By out of shape I do not mean that he was fat. I mean he was walking around like a stiff and brittle old man - more content to sit and watch the world go by rather than get up and be a part of it. Rather than go to the gym and try to become buff, he decided that he needed to combat aging by becoming "functionally fit". Instead of bulging biceps he would pursue these 5 goals in an effort to be more mobile and become less likely to injure himself in his everyday life: -Core stability and strength -Flexibility -Balance -Muscular strength -Cardiovascular endurance And he succeeded. He claims that at age 75 he is the most fit shape of his life. There is nothing really shocking in this book, but he gives tons of practical advice to make things happen more safely and more quickly, especially if you have a few extra bucks to pay for a

RETROGRADE by Peter Cawdron

Image
Published in September of 2017 by John Joseph Adams/Houghton Mifflin Harcourt A Mars colony has been established by four separate factions: China, Russia, America and Eurasia (Europe, India, Israel, Japan, and more). The groups work together, but not always smoothly but they are building a successful colony. Suddenly, everything is thrown into a tailspin when the major world powers begin firing nuclear weapons at one another and 15 cities are obliterated - and each faction of the colony has suffered losses. And...there's little chance that there a re-supply ship coming any time soon. The colonists have to figure out if they can trust one another despite the nuclear strikes back on Earth and they need to figure it out soon because Mars is a tough enough place to live when everything and everyone is working well, it's really tough when no one trusts one another. And, it gets even tougher when they finally figure out what is really going on... This is a throwback kind of s

V-S DAY: A NOVEL of ALTERNATE HISTORY by Allen Steele

Published by Ace in 2014 Alternate histories always deal with a what if...? moment in history and how things might have been. In the case of V-S Day , the moment is what if Nazi Germany decided to throw the resources that it was throwing into a its buzz bomb program into an actual space program led by Wernher von Braun? The Germans are building a a primitive space shuttle like device that can take off from the Reich, circle the globe and drop bombs on New York City from a low earth orbit, far above the reach of America's anti-aircraft guns. And, it can do it again and again with no hope of a defense. Fans of NASA know that in the real world, Wernher von Braun was brought back to America after World War II and helped develop America's space program. In this world, rocket pioneer Robert Goddard leads a team to develop an American space fighter "plane" to go up and take out the German space bomber. Most of the book details the space race between the two powers, whic

MIKE TYSON SLEPT HERE by Chris Huntington

Image
Published in 2011 by Boaz Publishing Company First - a confession. I know the author of this book. However, the last time I spoke to him was most likely in December of 1989. We had one class together in high school and 3, maybe 4, classes together at the School of Education at Indiana University where we discussed movies, a mutual love of reading and Roy Orbison. But, I've kept track of Chris as a writer in magazines and newspapers - mostly essays about his new family and his globe-trotting life teaching in all sorts of places, including ten years at a men's prison in Indiana - the subject of this book. The book Mike Tyson Slept Here is set in and around the Plainfield Correctional Facility, where Mike Tyson served nearly three years for rape from 1992 to 1995. Tyson does not appear in the book, but he was its most famous resident, seeing as how he went in at the height of his career. Mike Tyson Slept Here is not an autobiography, but there are semi-autobiographical elem

CAPTAIN to CAPTAIN: STAR TREK LEGACIES, BOOK 1 (audiobook) by Greg Cox

Image
Published by Simon and Schuster Audio in 2016 Read by Robert Petkoff Duration: 9 hours, 40 minutes Unabridged Number One from the original pilot of Star Trek This book is part of a series marking the 50th anniversary of Star Trek. Captain to Captain features Captain Una, better known as Number One in the original pilot episode of the Original Series ("The Cage") and the regular cast of the Original Series. Captain Una, a legendary Starfleet officer, comes to the Enterprise on a surprise visit for vague reasons and promptly steals a secret object that captains of the Enterprise keep hidden away from even the Federation. Kirk isn't even sure what it is exactly, but he knows it can't fall into the hands of the Klingons, the Romulans and maybe not even the Federation because what he does know is that it is the key to more power than anyone should be able to control.  Now Kirk has two questions: Why did Captain Una steal the object? Why is Captain Una heading