2022 is over. In December, I read 9 books--a record for me. How did I manage that? A. When you can't sleep in airplanes and have 27 hours to kill while in flight, a person can actually read a few books. B. Don't read too many long books. C. Nothing by Tolstoy. D. I'm a very fast reader. E. Haven't watched anything on Netflix the past 6 months and used that time for reading instead. If you follow my rules, you can get lots of reading in too. And this year, I set another personal record: In 2022, I COMPLETED 70 BOOKS. That's a big target, and I wouldn't expect anyone else to try to reach that summit, but maybe this year, you can plan to read one book a month--that's a pretty cool goal too.
One more note. This review is my last one ever and this feature will not continue. Two different months this year, not a single person opened up and read my book reviews. Other months only one or two people opened the reviews, probably because I don't really read popular books or ones that cater to a wide audience. So, I have decided to use my time on other projects. But, if you like books, you may or may not be happy to know that I will be starting a different feature on The Periscope: Book of the Month. On my blog, I will feature the one book I've read each month that I think you might enjoy, rather than review all of them. Regardless of what I write in my blog, I encourage you make it a resolution to do a little reading, even if only one book a month--it's exercise for your brain and will help you be a bit more cosmopolitan too.
So, below are this month's books, including the first book I've ever given a ZERO star rating. They are listed in my order of preference, favorite book of the month first. Here's my rating scale for your reference:
***** An extraordinary book: one of my Top 15 all-time favorites
**** An outstanding book: highly recommended
*** A good book: worth the read
** An OK read, but you'd be better off finding something else
* Not worth the read; avoid at all costs
ZERO Beyond simply bad--a text that is fundamentally horrible or evil in some way
How Democracies Die, by Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt (****)
In 2018, midway through Donald Trump's presidency, two Harvard political scientists, horrified by the erosion they were seeing in American democracy, decided to find out how and why democracies had collapsed during the 20th and 21st Centuries. They discovered that most democracies that collapsed suffered a gradual and predictable death that had many characteristics in common. This book examines these characteristics and how Trump and his minions followed the frighteningly predictable path toward exterminating American democracy.
The two authors concluded their book by making recommendations on what U.S. society/institutions could do to bolster democracy. Guess what? None of these recommendations were instituted before the 2020 election. Guess what else? With no positive action taken to preserve democracy, the U.S. suffered through the January 6th insurrection and almost lost its democracy completely on that day. Guess another thing? We've still instituted very few of the recommendations needed to preserve U.S. democracy. You want to make a final guess? If you're like me and want to guess the future of U.S. democracy, it's not an optimistic future ahead of us.
Of course, every American should read this book as should all people who are interested in preserving or creating democracy in their own nations. One of the most essential books I've read this past year. It's what I would call: URGENT READING !!!
Slow Horses by Mick Herron (*** 1/2)
The three of you who read my book reviews regularly know that I tend to read literary fiction, as opposed to popular fiction like spy novels, romances, westerns, and the like. Well, here's an incredible spy novel that I loved. Slow Horses is about a group of MI5 British spies who have failed in their jobs in one way or another have been relegated to an office building in London where they are assigned menial and clerical tasks in the hope they will quit in frustration with their new, reduced roles. These spies are mockingly called the "Slow Horses." One day, one of the "Slow Horses" stumbles onto something astonishing and the entire group takes on the regular MI5 establishment to solve a case of espionage.
Slow Horses is the first of several novels in this series. It's funny, quickly-paced, and surprising. I enjoyed it so much, I've picked up the second in the series: Dead Lions. Highly recommended.
Systemic Racism 101: A Visual History of the Impact of Racism in America, by Living Cities with Aminah Pilgrim (*** 1/2)
This book is a complete history of racism in America. What makes it unique is that it also contains more than 30 full-page infographic spreads which take the history and break it down into graphic charts and maps which provide easy-to-understand and specific numerical data on how racism has had a concrete impact on African-American populations. For example, one of the infographics has detailed charts on the racial disparity of electoral power in America and really makes it clear on how Black electoral power (voting rights) has been intentionally diminished by the White power structure.
Systemic Racism 101 is a clear, fact-based presentation that demonstrates both qualitatively and quantitatively how racism is built into the American system across many dimensions. This book might a bit elementary for those who know a lot about the topic, but for most of us, it's an eye-opening and valuable discussion on how racism permeates America life to this day.
An Elegy for Easterly, by Petina Gappah (*** 1/2)
This powerful novella (long short story?) was written by an international lawyer and writer born in Zimbabwe. It chronicles the lives of the poor who were gathered from their townships and forced into remote slums, so that Queen Elizabeth wouldn't counter any unsightly communities during her state visit to Zimbabwe. The tragic fate these slum-dwellers experience seems inevitable from the beginning and is riddled with irony and sorrow. The poor residents of Easterly haven't a chance and this story is a call for justice, which seems impossible to attain. Powerful and brilliantly written.
Classic Krakauer, by Jon Krakauer (***)
John Krakauer is one of the world's premier writers chronicling mountain climbing and outdoor adventures. He's most well-known for two of his works: Into Thin Air and Into the Wild (which later was made into a hit movie). This book is a collection of his stories/essays from as far back as the early 1980s. Whether he's covering surfers riding waves that transport them to the edge of death or the scandalous practices of outdoor wilderness schools created to reform undisciplined youth, he presents fascinating narratives that always inform the reader.
These are great essays, but there's one big problem. Many of the essays were written more than 30 years ago and the reader has no idea what has happened in the following years. For example, the essay on wilderness schools ends by telling us about the trial for manslaughter that some of the school operators will be facing in the coming year--which happens to be 1996. Were they convicted? Acquitted? Was the wilderness school industry reformed as Krakauer advocates for? The book leaves all these questions unanswered. I had to do a Google search to find out what had happened and to learn that the industry continues to operate today as usual, recklessly putting youth's lives at risk. The book would be improved considerably if a paragraph or two could have been added at the end of each essay, informing the reader of how each issue had been resolved or not.
It's a good book, but I would recommend Krakauer's Into Thin Air, if you are interested in great outdoor writing, as that book has a definite ending that doesn't require Google searches to figure out what happened in the end.
I hope this finds you well: poems, by Kate Baer. (***)
This is an odd, but very interesting book of poetry. Kate Baer, the author, became a sensation after her first book of poetry, What Kind of Woman, was published. It was a book of poetry with a decidedly feminist perspective, which caused the author to be constantly under assault by numerous trolls and vile people who would harass her online and with their E-mail communications. These trolling message upset Baer at first, until she decided to turn them into poetry. Below is a photo that shows and example of how she created her poems.
On the left page is the trolling she received. She would then take and use some of the words of the "troll," in the exact order in which they were written and then would create her own response to the troll in the form of a poem, and then give it all a title.
These poems are great in that Baer has taken the cruel texts she's been assaulted by and transforms them into messages that are positive or enlightening. There are so many evil right-wing trolls in the world, at least Baer does something good with this evil. It's not a substantial book, but it's a fine testament to how we should respond to right-wing Trumpists, misogynists and other goons.
What's Left & Other Poems, by Taufik Ikram Jamil (***)
I always like to read one Indonesian text each month and this is the one for December. This collection of poems by Taufik Ikram Jamil is hard to describe because I don't possess the knowledge of Indonesia that's required. Taufik's poetry is filled with references to Malay geography, history, and classic literature, which I don't have sufficient knowledge of. But, a few of the poems are interesting discussion of the limitations of language and how difficult it is to transcend that, especially in our communication with our romantic partners. Taufik's poems are subtle and mysterious and worth digging through.
This collection is another from the Lontar Foundation BTW imprint which publishes works of Indonesian writers who haven't been widely published. This imprint is almost impossible to find outside Indonesia, but individual volumes can be found at Books Kinokuniya-Jakarta at 100,000 Rupiah. I've read eight books from this series now and I can say that they have all been very worthwhile. Even more interesting, is that each volume is tri-lingual with the original Indonesian text as well as full translations in English and German.
The Daily Stoic, by Ryan Holiday (**)
Actually, I've been reading this book all year. The author takes quotes from various Stoic philosophers and assigns one to each of the 365 days of the year, then adds his personal interpretation of the quote. Therefore, the reader, in this case me, gets to read a quote and interpretation each day of the year.
You would think this would be a dream for a lover of Stoic philosophy like me, but I found this volume quite tedious. The philosophers' quotes were great, but I found Holiday's little interpretations to be very preachy and condescending. Soon, I was dreading my daily dose of The Daily Stoic and would often skip days at a time. Damn, I was so glad when the year was finally over, just so I wouldn't have to open this book ever again.
There are so many good books on Stoicism, don't waste your time on this one. How to be a Stoic, by Massimo Pigliucci (**** 1/2) remains the finest book on Stoicism I've encountered, so I would strongly recommend picking up Pigliucci and avoiding The Daily Stoic, if you are interested in learning about this powerful and insightful philosophy for living.
The Haddith, The Sunna of Mohammed, by Bill Warner (ZERO STARS)
The one thing I dislike about Indonesian bookstores is that they wrap all the books tightly in plastic wrap, as part of their anti-theft efforts, that a person can't open a book before they buy it. They say you can't judge a book by it's cover, and they are right. Indonesian bookstores force you to do that anyway, much to my irritation.
I have been on a journey of studying Islam for the past couple years, so I wanted to learn about the Hadith. That's why I purchased this book--the cover looked harmless enough. But I was wrong.
When I got the book home and finally started reading, I realized something was amiss. It turns out this book was written by an Islamophobe whose purpose is discrediting Islam. If I could have opened up this book before I purchased it, I could have figured it out without wasting my money and supporting this nonsense.
After I Googled the author, I learned he was from Tennessee and that he isn't an expert in Islam, but a political agitator out to stir up people against Islam. He's even agitated to prevent the building of mosques in his home state. So, don't purchase any books by Bill Warner (whose real name is Bill French) or anything published by the Center for the Study of Political Islam, which is the terrible group that sponsors this junk.
One good thing resulted from my horrible purchase. After my discovery, I marched down to the bookstore, found the manager and showed him passages from this book and told him that he should remove the remaining copies from the shelves so that others wouldn't be fooled like I was. He agreed. So, at least my favorite bookstore no longer sells this book. The world doesn't need any more disinformation or the creation of more religious disharmony, so I am glad it's off the shelves--it was the least I could do. And I now I don't purchase any books in Indonesia unless I am certain of what they contain.
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What a wildly diverse month of reading: from outdoor adventures to spies and espionage to Indonesian poetry to political science to the racist history of America. Wow! Hope you have some future reading adventures too!
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