AK47
Author: Michael Hodges 2008 208 pp
My rating: 1*
Started May 27 2008, Finished May 29 2008
If this annoying, unpersuasive and tendentious book had been much longer, I wouldn’t have finished it. I was hoping to find a straightforward history of the weapon’s development, distribution and usage, but the author, a British journalist, is more interested in its semiotics. Frustration with the book, particularly a lack of technical detail and illustrations, caused me to spend fifteen minutes perusing Wikipedia and Youtube entries about the AK, research that taught me more about the gun than this book. There are two primary reasons why the AK is so widespread, the weapon of choice among what I call Non Governmental Militaries --terrorists, insurgents and personal armies throughout the third world: based on a simple, unexacting design it is extremely reliable and durable (qualities for which it sacrifices long range accuracy) and probably more to the point, it was licensed to many export hungry Soviet states and thus produced in enormous quantities and sold at relative bargain prices to any customer, no matter how ill reputable, who had cash.
After Hodges glosses over the nuts and bolts, he argues that the weapon’s ubiquity lead it becoming emblematic of the uses to which it is put and of those who use it. His basic thesis is that the AK has “joined soft rock and Coca-Cola in the list of internationally successful products that were sought for what they represented as much as for what the actually were or did.” (pp192-3) In his conclusion, he expands the scope of his argument well into abstract nebulousness, writing that “Previously, globalization had been about the imposition of American products on a worldwide market. The Kalashnikov has changed that. It is the world’s first truly global product, operating on its own terms” (p209) While Hodges’ contention is that these are the reasons the AK is so widely used, he never persuaded me. Instead, I came away feeling that its ready availability and lack of affordable competition are the real reasons for its “marketplace dominance.”
The book starts with a pointless, arbitrary “timeline” of the weapon. The first two chapters are the story of the eponymous Mikhail Kalashnikov and how he came to create his enduring legacy; though like most of the book’s chapters it is heavily padded, it is still probably the most worthwhile. Chapter three spends 40 pages describing the life of a North Vietnamese soldier in order to repeat the dubious allegation that he shot down a B52 with an AK. Chapter four explores the lives of Palestinian terrorists/resistance fighters in the West Bank and doesn’t serve much purpose except to create sympathy for them. The next chapter, a tale of African child soldiers, is perhaps both the most irritating and illuminating – while it makes a provocative point that the “AK went from being a tool of the conflict to the cause of the conflict”, its diatribes against Western rock stars who stage benefits to raise money for African relief are particularly half baked and distracting. The next chapter, in which the author interviews a couple of would be British Jihadis of Pakistani extraction, most successfully makes his point that the AK47 has become the embodiment of revolutionary resistance; however, despite scoring some points, Hodges still manages to undermine one of his points – that the AK is the sine qua non of NGMs with the following quote, the likes of which I’d been anticipating throughout the book: “They train you to use a Kalashnikov, but what they really want you to do is blow yourself up on a bus or a tube. You don’t need an AK for that.” (p159)
The final chapter, conflating almost all modern day American street violence with the universal brand of the AK47, particularly rubbed me wrong. When Hodges writes that by 2004, “On the streets and television screens of America, the AK would combine the imagery and association of its previous incarnations into one overwhelmingly powerful cultural package” (pp 188-9), I found myself thinking nonsense – most Americans probably could not even differentiate the AK from other, similar looking, assault rifles.
The book is sloppy, hyperbolic and laden with unsustainable conclusions:
“Pick up any broadsheet or tabloid newspaper and you will find at least one photograph on an AK47” (p6)
Mehdi Army (p18) also spelled Mahdi army
[African child]”soldiers invariably had Mikhail Kalashnikov’s gun in their hands when they went into battle.” (p109). [Italics added]
“Emmanuel was the real deal, an actual Kalashnikov kid who lent the album the kudos of actual conflict.” (p 130, italics added, the word he wanted was something like credibility or bona fides.)
“… Pakistan … a country where the Kalashnikov dominated life.” (p 140) Really that weapon, which is rarely present in news photos or footage from that country, has more of an impact that Islam or poverty?
“Implicit in all of Faisal’s preaching – indeed its central message -- was the need for young Muslim men to learn to use a Kalashnikov. [A Faisal sermon stated] ‘Islam was spread by the sword, Today it has got to be spread by the Kalashnikov.’” (p150-1, italics added, Faisal explicitly cites this need in this quote and without any other examples of Faisal’s preaching one has to imagine that learning to use the weapon is not its central message, but instead ancillary to fighting for Islam. )
Hodges claims that US military planners should have anticipated a formidable insurgency because the Iraqi population “had enough weapons to mount a fierce and punishing resistance … the Kalashnikov … had inveigled its way into every level of society …” (p162. Saddam’s despotic regime was perpetuated by a strong state security system (secret police) whose primary goal, if not only, objective was eradication of any potential resistance to Saddam. Such a system would hardly have allowed widespread spread of assault rifles from the military into civilian hands. It seems to me more than likely that the Iraqi population did not become significantly armed until after the war, the abandonment of the Iraqi military armories and the disbanding of the Iraqi army.)
“Black Hawk Down leaves the viewer in no doubt that the AK was the best weapon in Somalia.” (pp194-5) My conclusion about the combat in BHD had nothing to do with the strengths of specific weaponry, but instead on the advantages of overwhelming numbers suicidally applied in a close urban environment.
“Desperate for foreign currency, governments in the newly capitalist eastern European exported the only thing they had that Americans wanted: cheap guns.” (p 198) First of all, based on evidence that Hodges implicitly provides, virtually all AK47 sales went to the third world, or at least not to the US. Second of all, saying the AK is the only thing those countries had that we wanted is more than a gross exaggeration.
Thursday, May 29, 2008
Friday, May 23, 2008
The Ten Most Beautiful Experiments
The Ten Most Beautiful Experiments
Author: George Johnson 2008 158 pp
My rating: 2.5/3*
Started May 22 2008, Finished May 22 2008
This slight book was a nice change of pace from my usual fare, but its orientation towards scientific detail indicates why I gravitate towards that usual fare – I often don’t understand the scientific detail. For any of the experiments, the author does at least a decent job of stating the history and significance of the issue the investigator was trying to resolve, and I generally understood the resulting ingenious experiment, but for some of the earlier experiments I tended to lose the thread during the discussion of the results and how and why the lead to the conclusion that they did. Perhaps Johnson could have belabored the final phases of his discussions for those slow on the uptake such as myself. Another problem I had was that to illustrate the procedural details or important equipment used in each experiment, Johnson includes either the scientist’s original drawings and notes or a newly commissioned drawing apparently taken from a photograph; in the former case, the experimenters turn out to be anything but skillful artists and in the later, a copy of the photograph itself would have been clearer. As a result, I often could not visualize exactly what was being depicted and my understanding of the experiment was muddled.
A noteworthy feature of this book for me was its substantial overlap with one of my all time favorites, The 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential Persons in History by Michael H Hart: Gallileo, Harvey, Newton, Lavoisier and Farraday were generally famililiar to me from upper half of Hart’s ranking, though it was enjoyable to see aspects of their work examined in much greater detail.
The chapter on Newton, the preeminent figure in the history of science (#2 in Hart’s list) provides a stunning example of the power of serendipity. The great one’s first epochal contribution to science, his early work on optics, were basically a result of the Great Plague of 1665 which forced him to hole up with his family in the country. In this rural isolation, Newton had the time and absence of distraction to fully contemplate issues that had intrigued him, leading to his investigation of the composition of light and its monumental results. One wonders how different Newton’s life, the history of science and thus the entire course of world historical development, if not for this forced retreat and the investigation it engendered, the success of which must of done wonders for Newton’s confidence and spurred him on to his even greater work.
I was torn about whether to give this book 2.5 or three stars. Its biggest problem is its lack of heft – low page count, small pages, lots of white space and a fair amount of biographical padding indicate that the author and publisher had to stretch to justify its existence as a book – result in a faint impression on the reader. On the other hand, all of the experiments that I understood were really quite cool, inspirational examples of human ingenuity and often genius at work; e.g. though Gallileo’s method of determining the time required for different size objects to fall was in itself quite interesting, the historical legwork that was required to determine that he actually conducted the experiment as well as the deductive process used to develop a plausible theory of how he conducted split second timing before clocks that could measure such intervals existed, was even more intriguing. The evolution of Joule’s attempts to identify what eventually came to be termed energy, from setups so complicated and kludgey that his contemporary scientific audience did not really understand what he was on about to a very elegant, almost self explanatory experiment was somewhat awe inspiring. The final two experiments, measuring the speed of light (not theoretically calculating it) and “weighing” individual electrons (this experiment illuminatingly recreated by the author) were breathtaking in both their audacity and success – I would have considered both feats beyond the realm of possibility.
I also liked this book for reminding me of how benighted scientific thought was for much of human history, a point that seems to be driven home by any wide ranging scientific history e.g. The 100 … or The Discoverers. The two thousand or so years between the fall of Rome and the renaissance were such an intellectually stagnant time that as late as Joule’s time, the mid 19th century, people still adhered to theories concocted by the ancient Greeks with no tangible basis (cf phlogiston). Of course the utter invalidity of accepted scientific wisdom throughout most of human history leads one to wonder how much of what we currently hold as gospel (western medicine comes to mind) is completely nonsense. Example: which seems more ridiculous, or Pythagoras’ speculation that fire “is made of twenty-four right-angle triangles, surrounded by four equilaterals, which are made in turn of six triangles.” (page xiii) or modern day superstring theory, “which posits that matter is ultimately generated my mathematical snippets vibrating in ten-dimensional space” (page xii).
Author: George Johnson 2008 158 pp
My rating: 2.5/3*
Started May 22 2008, Finished May 22 2008
This slight book was a nice change of pace from my usual fare, but its orientation towards scientific detail indicates why I gravitate towards that usual fare – I often don’t understand the scientific detail. For any of the experiments, the author does at least a decent job of stating the history and significance of the issue the investigator was trying to resolve, and I generally understood the resulting ingenious experiment, but for some of the earlier experiments I tended to lose the thread during the discussion of the results and how and why the lead to the conclusion that they did. Perhaps Johnson could have belabored the final phases of his discussions for those slow on the uptake such as myself. Another problem I had was that to illustrate the procedural details or important equipment used in each experiment, Johnson includes either the scientist’s original drawings and notes or a newly commissioned drawing apparently taken from a photograph; in the former case, the experimenters turn out to be anything but skillful artists and in the later, a copy of the photograph itself would have been clearer. As a result, I often could not visualize exactly what was being depicted and my understanding of the experiment was muddled.
A noteworthy feature of this book for me was its substantial overlap with one of my all time favorites, The 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential Persons in History by Michael H Hart: Gallileo, Harvey, Newton, Lavoisier and Farraday were generally famililiar to me from upper half of Hart’s ranking, though it was enjoyable to see aspects of their work examined in much greater detail.
The chapter on Newton, the preeminent figure in the history of science (#2 in Hart’s list) provides a stunning example of the power of serendipity. The great one’s first epochal contribution to science, his early work on optics, were basically a result of the Great Plague of 1665 which forced him to hole up with his family in the country. In this rural isolation, Newton had the time and absence of distraction to fully contemplate issues that had intrigued him, leading to his investigation of the composition of light and its monumental results. One wonders how different Newton’s life, the history of science and thus the entire course of world historical development, if not for this forced retreat and the investigation it engendered, the success of which must of done wonders for Newton’s confidence and spurred him on to his even greater work.
I was torn about whether to give this book 2.5 or three stars. Its biggest problem is its lack of heft – low page count, small pages, lots of white space and a fair amount of biographical padding indicate that the author and publisher had to stretch to justify its existence as a book – result in a faint impression on the reader. On the other hand, all of the experiments that I understood were really quite cool, inspirational examples of human ingenuity and often genius at work; e.g. though Gallileo’s method of determining the time required for different size objects to fall was in itself quite interesting, the historical legwork that was required to determine that he actually conducted the experiment as well as the deductive process used to develop a plausible theory of how he conducted split second timing before clocks that could measure such intervals existed, was even more intriguing. The evolution of Joule’s attempts to identify what eventually came to be termed energy, from setups so complicated and kludgey that his contemporary scientific audience did not really understand what he was on about to a very elegant, almost self explanatory experiment was somewhat awe inspiring. The final two experiments, measuring the speed of light (not theoretically calculating it) and “weighing” individual electrons (this experiment illuminatingly recreated by the author) were breathtaking in both their audacity and success – I would have considered both feats beyond the realm of possibility.
I also liked this book for reminding me of how benighted scientific thought was for much of human history, a point that seems to be driven home by any wide ranging scientific history e.g. The 100 … or The Discoverers. The two thousand or so years between the fall of Rome and the renaissance were such an intellectually stagnant time that as late as Joule’s time, the mid 19th century, people still adhered to theories concocted by the ancient Greeks with no tangible basis (cf phlogiston). Of course the utter invalidity of accepted scientific wisdom throughout most of human history leads one to wonder how much of what we currently hold as gospel (western medicine comes to mind) is completely nonsense. Example: which seems more ridiculous, or Pythagoras’ speculation that fire “is made of twenty-four right-angle triangles, surrounded by four equilaterals, which are made in turn of six triangles.” (page xiii) or modern day superstring theory, “which posits that matter is ultimately generated my mathematical snippets vibrating in ten-dimensional space” (page xii).
Sunday, May 18, 2008
Death In Venice & Seven Other Stories
Author: Thomas Mann 1992 461 pp
My rating: 3*
Started May 6 2008, Finished May 17 2008
I originally checked out this book with the intention of reading only “Death In Venice” and “Tonio Kroger”, works that seemed to be in the short story pantheon and which online opinions indicated contained most of the pleasures of The Magic Mountain without most of the challenges. Well, don’t believe everything you read on the Internet. Not only were those two stories nowhere close to the class of TMM, they were probably my two least favorite stories in this collection.
“Death In Venice” is probably, at least in the US, the most well known of Mann’s works e.g. it shows up in crossword puzzles and was the most prominently mentioned of the works Alvy Singer recommended to Annie Hall in order to raise her cultural IQ. I don’t know what all the fuss is about unless that it was the first work by a major artist to feature a pederastic stalker. It was however worthwhile to read DIV so soon after TMM, as doing so made me more aware of some repeated themes pertaining to a holiday which from which little is expected but soon gets indefinitely extended for reasons of romantic obsession and general pleasure in the new environment:
“He was quick to fall in with the pleasing monotony of this manner of life, readily enchanted by its mild soft brilliance and ease.” (46)
“The term he had set for his holiday passed by unheeded; he had no thought of going home.” (54)
Due to a rock musician stage-named TonioK who amused me in high school, the pseudonym inspiring “Tonio Kroger” had long been on my radar, though actually reading it had made it past the level of velleity until I’d experienced TMM. Now I’m left to wonder how this slight tale ever developed a reputation as a significant work. Its theme – how the artist tends to be disappointed by the lack of artistic sensibility in his models – again for me echoed Annie Hall, to whit the scene where the semi-tormented Alvy approaches a beautiful, smiling couple on the street and asks them how they are able to get along so well and the woman replies “I’m very shallow and empty and I have nothing to say” and the man adds “I’m the same way.” Compare this with moment in “Tonio Kroger” when the protagonist realizes that the objects of his affections “live free from the curse of knowledge and the torment of creation, live and praise God in blessed mediocrity!” (p145)
In general, the stories in this collection project Mann’s class awareness (if not snobbishness) and his interest in the place of the artist in society. With the exception of the too long and literally named “A Man and His Dog”, an 80+ page paen to the author’s dog, I found the other stories in the collection more engaging and more vital, than “Death …” or “Tonio …”. In particular I was struck by the iconoclastic and impudent “Felix Krull”, which Mann later expanded into a novel and the unexpected page-turner, “Mario and the Magician” which manages to draw a lot of suspense from its mere title. However, I would advise anyone who takes these musings seriously to seek out one of Mann’s major novels: Buddenbrooks (which since I haven’t read, I recommend on reputation alone) or The Magic Mountain. With the exception of Jack London’s, I find short stories, no matter how well crafted, to be somewhat disposable – I enjoy them but they don’t make much of an impression; call them the Chinese food of literature, an hour later I’m hungry again.
Author: Thomas Mann 1992 461 pp
My rating: 3*
Started May 6 2008, Finished May 17 2008
I originally checked out this book with the intention of reading only “Death In Venice” and “Tonio Kroger”, works that seemed to be in the short story pantheon and which online opinions indicated contained most of the pleasures of The Magic Mountain without most of the challenges. Well, don’t believe everything you read on the Internet. Not only were those two stories nowhere close to the class of TMM, they were probably my two least favorite stories in this collection.
“Death In Venice” is probably, at least in the US, the most well known of Mann’s works e.g. it shows up in crossword puzzles and was the most prominently mentioned of the works Alvy Singer recommended to Annie Hall in order to raise her cultural IQ. I don’t know what all the fuss is about unless that it was the first work by a major artist to feature a pederastic stalker. It was however worthwhile to read DIV so soon after TMM, as doing so made me more aware of some repeated themes pertaining to a holiday which from which little is expected but soon gets indefinitely extended for reasons of romantic obsession and general pleasure in the new environment:
“He was quick to fall in with the pleasing monotony of this manner of life, readily enchanted by its mild soft brilliance and ease.” (46)
“The term he had set for his holiday passed by unheeded; he had no thought of going home.” (54)
Due to a rock musician stage-named TonioK who amused me in high school, the pseudonym inspiring “Tonio Kroger” had long been on my radar, though actually reading it had made it past the level of velleity until I’d experienced TMM. Now I’m left to wonder how this slight tale ever developed a reputation as a significant work. Its theme – how the artist tends to be disappointed by the lack of artistic sensibility in his models – again for me echoed Annie Hall, to whit the scene where the semi-tormented Alvy approaches a beautiful, smiling couple on the street and asks them how they are able to get along so well and the woman replies “I’m very shallow and empty and I have nothing to say” and the man adds “I’m the same way.” Compare this with moment in “Tonio Kroger” when the protagonist realizes that the objects of his affections “live free from the curse of knowledge and the torment of creation, live and praise God in blessed mediocrity!” (p145)
In general, the stories in this collection project Mann’s class awareness (if not snobbishness) and his interest in the place of the artist in society. With the exception of the too long and literally named “A Man and His Dog”, an 80+ page paen to the author’s dog, I found the other stories in the collection more engaging and more vital, than “Death …” or “Tonio …”. In particular I was struck by the iconoclastic and impudent “Felix Krull”, which Mann later expanded into a novel and the unexpected page-turner, “Mario and the Magician” which manages to draw a lot of suspense from its mere title. However, I would advise anyone who takes these musings seriously to seek out one of Mann’s major novels: Buddenbrooks (which since I haven’t read, I recommend on reputation alone) or The Magic Mountain. With the exception of Jack London’s, I find short stories, no matter how well crafted, to be somewhat disposable – I enjoy them but they don’t make much of an impression; call them the Chinese food of literature, an hour later I’m hungry again.
Tuesday, May 13, 2008
Vertigo
Vertigo
Author: W.G Sebald 1990 263 pp
My rating: 3*
Started May 9 2008, Finished April 12 2008
??? Huh ??? This book, which raises plotlessness to new heights, might appeal to the most elevated of literati, of which I am apparently not one since I felt like it went over my head. Even though almost nothing happens in this book, it is still hard to follow, as the prose is characterized by subtle transitions in time, setting and protagonist’s mental state between reflection, remembrance, dreaming and envisioning events that happened to other people.
The gist of the plot, as near as I could make out, is as follows:
The first section summarizes the adult life of a soldier in Napoleon’s army who once after the wars are over, becomes a renowned author beset by syphilis. This section, which apparently is based on the life of Stendahl (I learned this from a review of Vertigo), had, as near as I could tell, no direct connection to the rest of the book. The author states that the protagonist of this section spent his adult life trying to answer the question “what is it that undoes a writer?”; after reading Vertigo, I feel like I know what undoes a reader.
The rest of the book is concerned with a German expatriate (whose biographical details match Sebald’s -- again I learned this from a review) who travels to Europe to conduct “research”. In the middle section of the book, the research is about a Dr. K (who turns out to be Kafka – a fact which again eluded me). The rest of the book covers the protagonists return to his hometown of W where he reminisces. The ending captures the general evanescence and arbitrariness of the narrative: the narrator is in a subway, when he starts to dream of a chalk mountain which segues into Samuel Pepys’ remembrance of the apocalyptic aftermath of the Great Fire of London.
In general the book could be characterized as a meditation on memory or a real time dream journal, the later because while what’s happening at the present time makes perfect sense, it often does not seem connected to what came before or went after. In its disconnectedness of narrative and generally bleak tone, the later epitomized by the narrator’s recapitulation of a grade school lesson in which the teacher presented a “history of calamity” of W, enumerated the many catastrophes which had befallen W over the centuries, Vertigo faintly reminded me of The Waste Land, although without the resonant music of that work.
I should also mention that Vertigo is the sort of book that tends to run 25 pages with a single paragraph break and that it includes various photos and illustrations which depict something the narrator has been describing, a touch I found helpful and helped a bit to ground it.
Author: W.G Sebald 1990 263 pp
My rating: 3*
Started May 9 2008, Finished April 12 2008
??? Huh ??? This book, which raises plotlessness to new heights, might appeal to the most elevated of literati, of which I am apparently not one since I felt like it went over my head. Even though almost nothing happens in this book, it is still hard to follow, as the prose is characterized by subtle transitions in time, setting and protagonist’s mental state between reflection, remembrance, dreaming and envisioning events that happened to other people.
The gist of the plot, as near as I could make out, is as follows:
The first section summarizes the adult life of a soldier in Napoleon’s army who once after the wars are over, becomes a renowned author beset by syphilis. This section, which apparently is based on the life of Stendahl (I learned this from a review of Vertigo), had, as near as I could tell, no direct connection to the rest of the book. The author states that the protagonist of this section spent his adult life trying to answer the question “what is it that undoes a writer?”; after reading Vertigo, I feel like I know what undoes a reader.
The rest of the book is concerned with a German expatriate (whose biographical details match Sebald’s -- again I learned this from a review) who travels to Europe to conduct “research”. In the middle section of the book, the research is about a Dr. K (who turns out to be Kafka – a fact which again eluded me). The rest of the book covers the protagonists return to his hometown of W where he reminisces. The ending captures the general evanescence and arbitrariness of the narrative: the narrator is in a subway, when he starts to dream of a chalk mountain which segues into Samuel Pepys’ remembrance of the apocalyptic aftermath of the Great Fire of London.
In general the book could be characterized as a meditation on memory or a real time dream journal, the later because while what’s happening at the present time makes perfect sense, it often does not seem connected to what came before or went after. In its disconnectedness of narrative and generally bleak tone, the later epitomized by the narrator’s recapitulation of a grade school lesson in which the teacher presented a “history of calamity” of W, enumerated the many catastrophes which had befallen W over the centuries, Vertigo faintly reminded me of The Waste Land, although without the resonant music of that work.
I should also mention that Vertigo is the sort of book that tends to run 25 pages with a single paragraph break and that it includes various photos and illustrations which depict something the narrator has been describing, a touch I found helpful and helped a bit to ground it.
Saturday, May 10, 2008
Martin Cruz Smith’s Arkady Renko novels
Ever since being riveted by Martin Cruz Smith’s Gorky Park when it first was published in the early 80’s I’ve been a fan of Smith and his protagonist, gloomy, brilliant, incorruptible Moscow based detective Arkady Renko and have read every subsequent chronicle of Renko and his investigations. While reading the last book in the series, Stalin’s Ghost, which was published in 2007 and set about then, it occurred to me that Renko has must be getting on in years and has suffered an enormous amount of physical abuse in his time. So, in an attempt to fix Renko’s age and ascertain exactly how much punishment he had received, not to mention revisit some old pleasures, I decided to reread all the books in the series. Note: apparently considering it foolish to mess with success, Smith has never deviated from the basic Gorky Park formula:
The central investigation is a no-win endeavor, more than just a simple murder case which his superiors, who despise Renko, respecting his abilities but disdaining his principles, assign Renko to for reasons that have nothing to do with actually solving the crime. While the power’s that be at best do little to help Renko solve the case, he usually has a loyal assistant who doesn’t’ survive the book.
There is a love interest who initially has contempt for Renko but eventually fall for him in a flash, swayed by the fact that he seems to be the only competent, morally upright man around.
Renko is haunted by interactions with or memories of his father, a bitter brutalist better known as “Stalin’s favorite general".
Exotic aspects of the Soviet Union or Russia and life therein are explored, mainly through Renko’s attempts to understand and survive in that ever-changing milieu.
Especially compared to other books in the detective/thriller genre, the books are quite well written.
Gorky Park 1981 365pp 4*
Started January 18 2008, Finished January 19 2008
Along with Presumed Innocent, Gorky Park is the favorite of my (limited) readings in the detective genre. Informative, literary and supremely suspenseful, this first and best of the Renko books, kept me fully engrossed – awake late into the night -- during the rereading. All elements of the formula are used to strong advantage here.
(By way of establishing the indestructible Renko’s age, a friend from college is in her mid 30’s and the book is set in 1977.)
Renko Abuse:
beat up in Gorky Park (p 64)
clubbed with sap, kicked in stomach (p 181)
knifed deep in abdomen, p254 “penetrated colon, stomach and diaphragm … knicked liver” (p 265)
knocked to ground with rifle butt (p 287)
shot in upper body and through thigh (pp360-4)
Polar Star 1989 386pp 2.5*
Started January 20 2008, Finished January 21 2008
As a general rule, the odd numbered books are much the better of the series, Polar Star being no exception to this rule. The central mystery is only mildly engaging; the plot is marred by several ridiculous coincidences; Renko’s status in the world, normally marginal, is pathetically, even absurdly lowly; it understates the case to say the love interest is tacked on; finally, the exotic milieu, a giant fishing trawler cruising the Bering Sea, is to confined and particular to be of much interest and not really of a piece with the rest of the series.
Renko Abuse:
hit in stomach, bound & gagged w/ gas soaked rag (p 151)
locked in deep freeze (p 157)
beaten with rifle, kicked in stomach, generally pummeled, trapped in bunker of fire (p 238)
wrist is whacked by dull edge of axe (p 359)
ice pick in chest (p 371)
beat up
Red Square 1992 418pp 3.5*
Started January 29 2008, Finished January 31 2008
Red Square did not make too much of an impression upon me when I first read it some years ago. On rereading, however, I found it was faithful reprise of the winning Gorky Park formula. On the down side, the villains are much less vivid than GP’s and the incidence of blatant plot contrivance is considerably higher but on the favorable side of the ledger the prose itself may be Smith’s best, both the love interest and Renko’s dealings with and memories of his father have the most resonance of any of these books and I found the to-the-barricades finale quite stirring.
The book is set during the final death throes of the Soviet Union, when the never very functional Soviet consumer economy has completely collapsed and nearly all goods are unavailable through normal distribution channels. Smith’s research and sense of detail reward the reader with many illuminating nuggets:
Thrift stores sold burned out light bulbs for three kopeks, the intended usage being to replace the one in your office which you then took home for use there since the state economy no longer provided bulbs.
Even police cars have guard dogs leashed to their bumpers to prevent gas siphoning
“… the bureaucratic mind saved everything. Why? Because we might need it, you know. In case there was no future, there was always the past.” 48``
Arkady knew from experience that there were two types of investigation: one that uncovered information and the more traditional type that covered it up.” 140
Renko Abuse:
Narrowly avoids being blown up when informer’s car explodes moments after AR leaves it.
Barely avoids stepping on landmine left inside flaming toy box by fleeing suspect.
Just avoids being run over by limousine
Gun pressed to head.
Jumps in pit of lime
Soccer ball kicked in stomach
Sucker punched and stabbed
Kicked to floor, shot at.
Havana Bay 1999 329pp 2*
Started February 1 2008, Finished February 5 2008
The least of the Renko books primarily due to its confusing plot; maybe I wasn’t paying close attention, but it was never clear to me why so many people had it in for Renko. The only part of the formula that really works is the depiction of how people get by in a disastrously managed communist economy, in this case Cuba’s. (Renko dating: in this book, set roughly 20 years after Gorky Park, Renko is said to be in his 40's – time appears to be compressing on him.)
Renko Abuse:
Fends off knife blade attack, inadvertently killing attacker. (p32)
Smashed in leg, hit in head with baseball bat. (p 78)
Spear gun arrow through forearm (p 324)
Wolves Eat Dogs 2004 336pp 3.5*
Started March 10 2008, Finished March 15 2008
Probably the second best of the Renko books, primarily due to its exploration of the “exclusion zone” around the ruins of the Chernobyl nuclear plants, an area where human habitation is forbidden and ghost towns abound, but which has become because of this perhaps the most thriving nature reserve in Europe -- “normal human activity is worse for nature than the greatest nuclear accident in history” (p137)
Renko abuse:Repeatedly exposed to high doses of radiation, attacked by men with hockey sticks, endures several low speed motorcycle crashes, jumps through window, beat up by two hockey players, gunwhipped.
Stalin’s Ghost 2007 332pp 2.5*
Started June 21 2008, Finished June 25 2008
With its Dickensian reliance on coincidence, unremarkable setting, rote antagonisms between Renko and his boss, a vague villain who never really engages our animosities – his sidekicks must do so, an unconvincing romantic plotline and the increasingly implausible powers of recuperation bestowed upon the ever more time defying and indestructible Renko, who according to the timeline established in Gorky Park, must be in his 60’s, this should be the worst of the Renko books. However, despite all these flaws, at this point in the series, the dedicated reader is glad just to have Arkady around and the book goes down much more easily than it should. The highlight is probably the fleshing out of AR’s relationship with his father which helps explain Renko’s resilience and calm in extreme situations.
Renko abuse:
By page three, AR has already gone 36 hours without sleep and won’t sleep for another 12. Garroted with harp wire, stabbed in neck (134). Shot in head (162). Hit in face with shovel, buried alive (309-10). Grabs double edged knife, slices hand. (323)
The central investigation is a no-win endeavor, more than just a simple murder case which his superiors, who despise Renko, respecting his abilities but disdaining his principles, assign Renko to for reasons that have nothing to do with actually solving the crime. While the power’s that be at best do little to help Renko solve the case, he usually has a loyal assistant who doesn’t’ survive the book.
There is a love interest who initially has contempt for Renko but eventually fall for him in a flash, swayed by the fact that he seems to be the only competent, morally upright man around.
Renko is haunted by interactions with or memories of his father, a bitter brutalist better known as “Stalin’s favorite general".
Exotic aspects of the Soviet Union or Russia and life therein are explored, mainly through Renko’s attempts to understand and survive in that ever-changing milieu.
Especially compared to other books in the detective/thriller genre, the books are quite well written.
Gorky Park 1981 365pp 4*
Started January 18 2008, Finished January 19 2008
Along with Presumed Innocent, Gorky Park is the favorite of my (limited) readings in the detective genre. Informative, literary and supremely suspenseful, this first and best of the Renko books, kept me fully engrossed – awake late into the night -- during the rereading. All elements of the formula are used to strong advantage here.
(By way of establishing the indestructible Renko’s age, a friend from college is in her mid 30’s and the book is set in 1977.)
Renko Abuse:
beat up in Gorky Park (p 64)
clubbed with sap, kicked in stomach (p 181)
knifed deep in abdomen, p254 “penetrated colon, stomach and diaphragm … knicked liver” (p 265)
knocked to ground with rifle butt (p 287)
shot in upper body and through thigh (pp360-4)
Polar Star 1989 386pp 2.5*
Started January 20 2008, Finished January 21 2008
As a general rule, the odd numbered books are much the better of the series, Polar Star being no exception to this rule. The central mystery is only mildly engaging; the plot is marred by several ridiculous coincidences; Renko’s status in the world, normally marginal, is pathetically, even absurdly lowly; it understates the case to say the love interest is tacked on; finally, the exotic milieu, a giant fishing trawler cruising the Bering Sea, is to confined and particular to be of much interest and not really of a piece with the rest of the series.
Renko Abuse:
hit in stomach, bound & gagged w/ gas soaked rag (p 151)
locked in deep freeze (p 157)
beaten with rifle, kicked in stomach, generally pummeled, trapped in bunker of fire (p 238)
wrist is whacked by dull edge of axe (p 359)
ice pick in chest (p 371)
beat up
Red Square 1992 418pp 3.5*
Started January 29 2008, Finished January 31 2008
Red Square did not make too much of an impression upon me when I first read it some years ago. On rereading, however, I found it was faithful reprise of the winning Gorky Park formula. On the down side, the villains are much less vivid than GP’s and the incidence of blatant plot contrivance is considerably higher but on the favorable side of the ledger the prose itself may be Smith’s best, both the love interest and Renko’s dealings with and memories of his father have the most resonance of any of these books and I found the to-the-barricades finale quite stirring.
The book is set during the final death throes of the Soviet Union, when the never very functional Soviet consumer economy has completely collapsed and nearly all goods are unavailable through normal distribution channels. Smith’s research and sense of detail reward the reader with many illuminating nuggets:
Thrift stores sold burned out light bulbs for three kopeks, the intended usage being to replace the one in your office which you then took home for use there since the state economy no longer provided bulbs.
Even police cars have guard dogs leashed to their bumpers to prevent gas siphoning
“… the bureaucratic mind saved everything. Why? Because we might need it, you know. In case there was no future, there was always the past.” 48``
Arkady knew from experience that there were two types of investigation: one that uncovered information and the more traditional type that covered it up.” 140
Renko Abuse:
Narrowly avoids being blown up when informer’s car explodes moments after AR leaves it.
Barely avoids stepping on landmine left inside flaming toy box by fleeing suspect.
Just avoids being run over by limousine
Gun pressed to head.
Jumps in pit of lime
Soccer ball kicked in stomach
Sucker punched and stabbed
Kicked to floor, shot at.
Havana Bay 1999 329pp 2*
Started February 1 2008, Finished February 5 2008
The least of the Renko books primarily due to its confusing plot; maybe I wasn’t paying close attention, but it was never clear to me why so many people had it in for Renko. The only part of the formula that really works is the depiction of how people get by in a disastrously managed communist economy, in this case Cuba’s. (Renko dating: in this book, set roughly 20 years after Gorky Park, Renko is said to be in his 40's – time appears to be compressing on him.)
Renko Abuse:
Fends off knife blade attack, inadvertently killing attacker. (p32)
Smashed in leg, hit in head with baseball bat. (p 78)
Spear gun arrow through forearm (p 324)
Wolves Eat Dogs 2004 336pp 3.5*
Started March 10 2008, Finished March 15 2008
Probably the second best of the Renko books, primarily due to its exploration of the “exclusion zone” around the ruins of the Chernobyl nuclear plants, an area where human habitation is forbidden and ghost towns abound, but which has become because of this perhaps the most thriving nature reserve in Europe -- “normal human activity is worse for nature than the greatest nuclear accident in history” (p137)
Renko abuse:Repeatedly exposed to high doses of radiation, attacked by men with hockey sticks, endures several low speed motorcycle crashes, jumps through window, beat up by two hockey players, gunwhipped.
Stalin’s Ghost 2007 332pp 2.5*
Started June 21 2008, Finished June 25 2008
With its Dickensian reliance on coincidence, unremarkable setting, rote antagonisms between Renko and his boss, a vague villain who never really engages our animosities – his sidekicks must do so, an unconvincing romantic plotline and the increasingly implausible powers of recuperation bestowed upon the ever more time defying and indestructible Renko, who according to the timeline established in Gorky Park, must be in his 60’s, this should be the worst of the Renko books. However, despite all these flaws, at this point in the series, the dedicated reader is glad just to have Arkady around and the book goes down much more easily than it should. The highlight is probably the fleshing out of AR’s relationship with his father which helps explain Renko’s resilience and calm in extreme situations.
Renko abuse:
By page three, AR has already gone 36 hours without sleep and won’t sleep for another 12. Garroted with harp wire, stabbed in neck (134). Shot in head (162). Hit in face with shovel, buried alive (309-10). Grabs double edged knife, slices hand. (323)
Monday, May 5, 2008
The Magic Mountain
The Magic Mountain
Author: Thomas Mann 1924 706 pp
My rating: 4.5*
Started March 2008, Finished April 28 2008
Immensely, almost indigestibly rich, this “novel of ideas”, a ten-pound literary beef Wellington, makes Tree of Smoke seem like a John Grisham trifle. The above hopefully conveys the idea that this book is a long, serious and challenging read with very little in the way of plot to sustain the reader. Essentially the plot is as following: in the decade before WWI, a young, conventional German just out of university, Hans Castorp, joins his cousin at a tuberculosis sanitarium in Switzerland for what is intended to be a three week visit but ends up lasting seven years. Though Hans initially perceives the sanitarium with its comfortable trappings and five substantial meals a day as an indulgent country club for indolent malingerers he soon gets caught up in and completely surrenders to the idyllic atmosphere of what for him becomes a mountain retreat conducive to contemplation of the less tractable eternal questions. Some drama is provided by Hans’ infatuation with a slinky Russian patient, though the pace of book is conveyed by the fact that 300 pages pass before they even have a conversation. I would give the book five stars for its numerous witty and insightful apercus and its complete, uncompromising and masterful exploration of Hans immersion in his new existence and his ultimately very affecting transformation from narrow minded and conventional to open minded and individualistic, but I have to dock it for many very lengthy and impenetrable monologues and debates by and between two local theoreticians, one a liberal humanist and the other a traditional Jesuit, vying for control of Hans’ impressionable mind; though these outpouring probably constitute the intended intellectual centerpiece of the book, delimiting the poles of pre-war European thought, I got very little out of them.
A sampling of representative quotes:
“I don’t understand,” Hans Castorp said. “I don’t understand how someone can not be a smoker – why it’s like robbing oneself of the best part of life … But a day without tobacco – that would be absolutely insipid, a dull, totally wasted day. And if some morning I had to tell myself: there’s nothing left to smoke today, why I don’t think I’d find courage to get up, I swear I’d stay in bed. You see, if a man has a cigar that burns well – and obviously it can’t have any breaks or draw badly, that’s really terribly annoying j—what I’m saying is, that if a mad has a good cigar, then he’s home safe, nothing, literally nothing can happen to him.” 47
“You see, a man should always wear a hat … so that you can tip it whenever the occasion demands.” 52
“If someone doesn’t make sure that the best, most expensive wines are served at his dinners, people simply don’t go, and his daughters end up old maids. That’s how people are.” 195
“But we are not about to let our knowledge of what happened disrupt the deliberate pace of our narrative; instead, we shall give time the honor it is due and not rush into things – perhaps we shall even draw these events out a bit.” 318
“The liberalization of Islam,” Naphta scoffed. ”Excellent. Enlightened fanaticism – how fine.” 373
“… if left on our own without external clues, we are totally incapable of even approximate reliability when estimating time” 533
“He would sit, his watch open in his hand … [and] gaze steadily at it, trying to slow and expand a few minutes, to hold time by the tail.” 535
Naphta discourse “aimed at proving in dismal fashion that all life’s intellectual phenomena are ambiguous, that nature is equivocal and that many grand concepts abstracted from her are strategically useless, and at demonstrating how iridescent are the robes that the Absolute dons on earth.” 684
“Ideas, simply because they were rigorous led inexorably to bestial deeds, to a settlement by physical struggle?” 690
Author: Thomas Mann 1924 706 pp
My rating: 4.5*
Started March 2008, Finished April 28 2008
Immensely, almost indigestibly rich, this “novel of ideas”, a ten-pound literary beef Wellington, makes Tree of Smoke seem like a John Grisham trifle. The above hopefully conveys the idea that this book is a long, serious and challenging read with very little in the way of plot to sustain the reader. Essentially the plot is as following: in the decade before WWI, a young, conventional German just out of university, Hans Castorp, joins his cousin at a tuberculosis sanitarium in Switzerland for what is intended to be a three week visit but ends up lasting seven years. Though Hans initially perceives the sanitarium with its comfortable trappings and five substantial meals a day as an indulgent country club for indolent malingerers he soon gets caught up in and completely surrenders to the idyllic atmosphere of what for him becomes a mountain retreat conducive to contemplation of the less tractable eternal questions. Some drama is provided by Hans’ infatuation with a slinky Russian patient, though the pace of book is conveyed by the fact that 300 pages pass before they even have a conversation. I would give the book five stars for its numerous witty and insightful apercus and its complete, uncompromising and masterful exploration of Hans immersion in his new existence and his ultimately very affecting transformation from narrow minded and conventional to open minded and individualistic, but I have to dock it for many very lengthy and impenetrable monologues and debates by and between two local theoreticians, one a liberal humanist and the other a traditional Jesuit, vying for control of Hans’ impressionable mind; though these outpouring probably constitute the intended intellectual centerpiece of the book, delimiting the poles of pre-war European thought, I got very little out of them.
A sampling of representative quotes:
“I don’t understand,” Hans Castorp said. “I don’t understand how someone can not be a smoker – why it’s like robbing oneself of the best part of life … But a day without tobacco – that would be absolutely insipid, a dull, totally wasted day. And if some morning I had to tell myself: there’s nothing left to smoke today, why I don’t think I’d find courage to get up, I swear I’d stay in bed. You see, if a man has a cigar that burns well – and obviously it can’t have any breaks or draw badly, that’s really terribly annoying j—what I’m saying is, that if a mad has a good cigar, then he’s home safe, nothing, literally nothing can happen to him.” 47
“You see, a man should always wear a hat … so that you can tip it whenever the occasion demands.” 52
“If someone doesn’t make sure that the best, most expensive wines are served at his dinners, people simply don’t go, and his daughters end up old maids. That’s how people are.” 195
“But we are not about to let our knowledge of what happened disrupt the deliberate pace of our narrative; instead, we shall give time the honor it is due and not rush into things – perhaps we shall even draw these events out a bit.” 318
“The liberalization of Islam,” Naphta scoffed. ”Excellent. Enlightened fanaticism – how fine.” 373
“… if left on our own without external clues, we are totally incapable of even approximate reliability when estimating time” 533
“He would sit, his watch open in his hand … [and] gaze steadily at it, trying to slow and expand a few minutes, to hold time by the tail.” 535
Naphta discourse “aimed at proving in dismal fashion that all life’s intellectual phenomena are ambiguous, that nature is equivocal and that many grand concepts abstracted from her are strategically useless, and at demonstrating how iridescent are the robes that the Absolute dons on earth.” 684
“Ideas, simply because they were rigorous led inexorably to bestial deeds, to a settlement by physical struggle?” 690
Thursday, May 1, 2008
The Reluctant Communist
The Reluctant Communist
Author: Charles Robert Jenkins with Jim Frederick 2008 225 pp
My rating: 3*
Started April 29 2008, Finished April 30 2008
An interesting sidelong view into what life is like inside North Korea. Jenkins was a US soldier stationed in South Korea in 1964 who, more or less to avoid being sent to Vietnam, abandoned a patrol along the DMZ and deserted to North Korea, believing he’d soon be returned to the US, spend a few months in the brig and then be discharged. Instead, the North kept as something of a prize which they didn’t know exactly what to do with, establishing a life for him in various enclaves with a few other American deserters and other random foreigners, such as some Japanese women, one of whom became Jenkins’ wife, who had been kidnapped by the NK government to train spies. While Jenkins’ unique and relatively privileged status as well as the distance his handlers tried to maintain between him and ordinary North Koreans preclude a true view of the desperation of life in that nuthouse of a country, one still gets a strong sense of what a bleak and drab existence life there is. A few observations of note: 1. During the 40 years covered, while the first and much of the 2nd world underwent a period of unprecedented growth and prosperity, the North Korean economy actually contracted to the point where existence was much more difficult at the end of Jenkins’ stay than at the beginning; by the end, even for Jenkins, food was very difficult to procure 2. Theft was a constant concern for everyone. School children were required to stand regular night watches at the school lest starving soldiers (though military spending was the government’s top priority) loot the school. 3. NK is so insular and lacking in foreign residents that Jenkins and his three fellow American deserters were often cast in propaganda movies, playing whatever Caucasian roles the scripts required 4. Though Jenkins’ relative simplicity is partially responsible for this, life in NK was so primitive and lacking in interesting events, that Jenkins is able to provide only 110 uncrowded pages of reminiscences about the 40 years of his life between his desertion and the diplomatic maneuvering that eventually resulted in his family being relocated to his wife’s native land.
Author: Charles Robert Jenkins with Jim Frederick 2008 225 pp
My rating: 3*
Started April 29 2008, Finished April 30 2008
An interesting sidelong view into what life is like inside North Korea. Jenkins was a US soldier stationed in South Korea in 1964 who, more or less to avoid being sent to Vietnam, abandoned a patrol along the DMZ and deserted to North Korea, believing he’d soon be returned to the US, spend a few months in the brig and then be discharged. Instead, the North kept as something of a prize which they didn’t know exactly what to do with, establishing a life for him in various enclaves with a few other American deserters and other random foreigners, such as some Japanese women, one of whom became Jenkins’ wife, who had been kidnapped by the NK government to train spies. While Jenkins’ unique and relatively privileged status as well as the distance his handlers tried to maintain between him and ordinary North Koreans preclude a true view of the desperation of life in that nuthouse of a country, one still gets a strong sense of what a bleak and drab existence life there is. A few observations of note: 1. During the 40 years covered, while the first and much of the 2nd world underwent a period of unprecedented growth and prosperity, the North Korean economy actually contracted to the point where existence was much more difficult at the end of Jenkins’ stay than at the beginning; by the end, even for Jenkins, food was very difficult to procure 2. Theft was a constant concern for everyone. School children were required to stand regular night watches at the school lest starving soldiers (though military spending was the government’s top priority) loot the school. 3. NK is so insular and lacking in foreign residents that Jenkins and his three fellow American deserters were often cast in propaganda movies, playing whatever Caucasian roles the scripts required 4. Though Jenkins’ relative simplicity is partially responsible for this, life in NK was so primitive and lacking in interesting events, that Jenkins is able to provide only 110 uncrowded pages of reminiscences about the 40 years of his life between his desertion and the diplomatic maneuvering that eventually resulted in his family being relocated to his wife’s native land.
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