Missive #80 Published 30 May 2023
It has taken 70 years for Vonnegut's dystopia to come to pass — almost. Today in the United States all those machines have been moved to some other country where they still require human labor but it is cheaper. For those jobs that can't be sent out of the country the plan seems to be to allow cheap labor to come into the country. A very good book, I'll be reading more of his novels. Read the rest
Missive #78 Published 26 May 2023
The author received high marks from The New York Times but did not score as well with goodreads.com reviewers. There were some that thought it was great and some that thought she didn’t write the all encompassing business book that she should. The book is about ‘people’ and how globalization has destroyed their lives. It is also about John Bassett III and his family but that was about people as well. I liked the book and recommend it. Read the rest
Missive #77 Published 24 May 2023
This is a much better book than what Dos Passos produced in his early career. It may be a collection of prior articles but they fit together to make his point. It is also a mild mea culpa regarding his early support of socialism and communism . Read the rest
Missive #74 Published 16 May 2023
I have now finished the two books and have also finished the coding. There may be some more cosmetic coding to be done but it is WORKING. It has taken me a long time to accomplish this. But, considering the fact that I do not know what I'm doing and it has all been done using the "Try again. Fail again. Fail better." coding method, I'm rather proud of what I have done. Read the rest
Missive #73 Published 14 May 2023
Herman Melville's classic novel Moby-Dick immortalized the idea of a mammoth sperm whale roaming the seas, wreaking havoc on all that crossed its path. But could such a creature actually exist, then or now? To find out, the acclaimed adventure writer and explorer Tim Severin set off to the islands of the South Pacific in search of one of our most iconic modern myths.This is a good read but not as adventurous as Severin's earlier books. Read the rest
Missive #72 Published 12 May 2023
This book uses a lot more geography than just the 'bootheel' of New Mexico for the story setting. It covers an area from Reserve, New Mexico in the north to near Durango, Mexico is the south. From east to west; all the border crossings from Palomas, Chihuahua to Naco, Sonora, Mexico. What made it very enjoyable for me was the mention of the many places in that overall area where I have been. The story line is very similar to the first book in the Border Trilogy. There is also considerable character conversation in Spanish so be prepared to do translations if you do not speak the language. There is also more philosophical musing in this second book that there was in the first; that made it a more difficult read for me. Read the rest
Missive #71 Published 9 May 2023
This book did not get the number of stars that I thought it deserved. Most of the poor reviews were looking for a continuation of Flashman books. Those were comedic historical fiction and very entertaining. This book was serious historical fiction and a much better book than any of the Flashman tales. Flashman did make a cameo appearance in this one but he played it reasonably straight. Read the rest
Missive #70 Published 7 May 2023
The Conquerors is a difficult book. The book deals with a very specific time in history — in the chaos of pre-civil war China, just after the death of Sun Yat-sen, and just after the Shameen Incident of June 23, 1925, during the Canton-Hong Kong strike. If all of that is familiar to you, then most, if not all, of the difficulty involved in reading this book will disappear. — Edited customer review Read the rest
Missive #69 Published 5 May 2023
This is another good sailing-based thriller by Cornwell; retitled in the United States as Killer’s Wake. The only character in this book that was also in the first one was the policeman. I'm going to consider these books to be a series and will show this as being the second one in the series of five books. Read the rest
Missive #68 Published 2 May 2023
I have to agree with the Customer Review; a very good travel book. Also the best Huxley book that I have read so far, much better than his early novels. A recommended book. Read the rest