Book Reviews: Honorable Mentions List (Fiction and Science Fiction)

In my most recent personal note from last Sunday, July 23rd, I mentioned that I wanted to try occasionally posting an "Honorable Mentions" list, with only short descriptions of a number of items at once, rather than a longer review of a single book or show. Let's try it today! There's no time like the present for trying new things, is there?
 

American War (2017). Omar El Akkad.

This is a dark dystopian tale of a young woman growing up in a refugee camp in the 2070s in what remains of the American south, and becoming a fanatical warrior for another lost cause as a result of the traumas of her life, suffered in an America torn by a second civil war, the ongoing disasters of climate change, sea levels rising, and a pandemic caused by a bio-terrorism attack.

As in the nineteenth century Civil War era, the south is again the center of misery, ignorance and bigotry, but in a drastically reduced nation where no one has escaped the pain or moral conflicts growing out of multiplying political and ecological crises. 

It's thought-provoking, and definitely captures a lot of the fears and zeitgeist of our own times, particularly in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic and the recent Trump presidency and its turbulent aftermath. Recommended.

 

The Anomaly (2021). Herve Le Tellier.

This is a science fiction thriller and philosophical exploration of the contemporary theory popular in tech and gaming circles that life and "reality" may be a computer simulation.  The plot is set in motion when a commercial passenger jet passes through a violent storm, and then emerges safely to land – twice – but four months apart.

In the story, when this mysterious event happens, we then have two sets of the same people aboard, with a four-month difference in their experiences (the later arrivals would have missed what the other ones had been doing in the meantime). 

The rest of the story explores many aspects of the chaos such an event would create.  Among the passengers and flight crew, who is the "real" person? How would the discrepancies be resolved about who is really who, and who owns what? How would people in various types of human relationships and organizations with the two sets of survivors contend with the sudden appearance of apparent almost-duplicate people? And how would governments and the public deal with a logic-defying problem of this magnitude?

An interesting and well-told "thought experiment" story, with a philosophical and logical exploration of the "simulation" theory of reality. Recommended.  

 

The Circle (2015). Dave Eggers.

The Circle is a science fiction novel that focuses on the cultish behavior and seductive powers of social manipulation exercised by our major tech companies. In this telling, "The Circle" is a giant Facebook-like tech company that creates inexpensive networked micro-cameras that can easily be placed anywhere, to surveil anything, anyone and any place.

Along with its ubiquitous spying and secret-smashing technology, The Circle has a founder and leader with a charismatic hold on the tech company, a compelling utopian vision of a society seemingly based on a radical form of honesty and truth-telling, and personal growth objectives for employees (and ultimately for all of society) that are being sold as positive and beneficial, but which contain a dark potential for ultimate control by the few leaders at the top. 

This book, told through the experiences of a naive young woman recruit to The Circle, was the basis for the 2017 movie of the same name starring Emma Watson. It is a very nice literary companion piece to various "big data" and "four big tech companies" nonfiction books I have read about the risks posed by the dominance of Facebook, Apple, Amazon and Google in our high tech modern world. Recommended.
 

Exhalation (2019). Ted Chiang.

I read this excellent collection of science fiction short stories on the recommendation of the New York Times columnist and podcaster Ezra Klein, who interviewed the author on one of his podcasts. Checking the book listing on Amazon, I discovered that it has an A-list of other celebrities, starting with President Obama, who have also read it and given it outstanding reviews.

The short stories were indeed remarkable, beautifully written and explored deep philosophical topics. I find that my retention of the details of the plots of a number of different short stories like this is shorter than with a novel, but it wouldn't add anything to this review to go into those details anyway. Better to just get the book and read it yourself! 

It was definitely an enjoyable read, and time well spent. Recommended.


Station Eleven (2015). Emily St. John Mandel.

Station Eleven is a powerful end-of-the-modern-world dystopian novel, seen through the eyes of a small cast of characters whose lives are connected through the events of a world-wide plague that ends civilization and kills off 99% of humanity.

In addition to imagining what that world would be like, where modern technology is gone but the memory of it remains, the story focuses on a set of curious personal connections and events that tie the characters and their lives together at different times and in different places.  

This book has now been made into an HBO Max mini-series, which was also good, and which I will review at some point. The book and its author have also become somewhat legendary, for the book's seemingly prophetic exploration of the kinds of personal isolation and changes to social relations that might result from a massive pandemic, written shortly before the less catastrophic yet still profoundly disruptive COVID-19 pandemic that struck the world in 2020. Highly recommended.

 

The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August (2014). Clare North.

This book contains a time-travel plot device that is quite like the one in my longtime favorite novel of this genre, Replay (1986) by Ken Grimwood. The story of Harry August again poses the question of what it would be like, and what you would do, if you got the chance to live life over and over again, starting in the same young body and identity, in the same family, and in the same time period and circumstances, but where each time you started over again, you carried with you the memories of your previous lives.

What things would you change about yourself? What would you do to try to achieve better personal outcomes than previous times? Would you actually be able to improve your outcomes, or would the endless possibilities of every lifetime simply lead you to a life that was different, but not necessarily better or worse than the others?

Could you actually alter the course of human events and history? Would you end up with God-like powers of prediction, and the ability to shape events, or simply be endlessly frustrated by your inability to change the course of what is to come? And are you alone in this strange cycle of lives lived repeatedly, or are there others to be found out in the world who are on the same treadmill? 

All these endlessly intriguing themes, and more, are explored and woven into the fascinating story of the many lives of Harry August, in a plot that moves quickly and maintains interest and suspense throughout. Highly recommended.

TV Review: Conversations with Friends (2022). Hulu.

This is the second mini-series on Hulu based on a novel by Sally Rooney. I previously did a brief review of the mini-series Normal People, based on Rooney's second novel, which follows a bright young woman and her sometimes boyfriend in Ireland as they find their way through an emotional and sexual journey of discovery at the end of high school, and then through their university years together and apart.

Conversations with Friends is based on Rooney’s first novel of the same name, and follows two young women at the university in Dublin (nicely played by Alison Oliver and Sasha Lane), who share interests and affection for each other, and who were previously lovers but are now just close friends. Like most young people, they are making mistakes, trying things out, and attempting to discover who they are and what they want to do, while dealing with the usual family, school and roommate challenges that are typical of this early adult stage of life.

Into the mix comes a sophisticated somewhat older married couple, a successful writer (Jemima Kirke) and her handsome but introverted actor husband (Joe Alwyn), who befriend the pair, hosting them at parties and taking them on an exotic vacation. What could possibly go wrong? Of course, there are new attractions in the quartet, and an affair, and a lot of complex emotions to be experienced and resolved.

I’m pretty sure this is not everyone’s cup of tea, but I found it an intriguing look into the challenges of being a young adult in this era. It sensitively explores issues of complicated sexual identity and attractions for young women, the appeal but also the problems with polyamory, the emotional risks inherent in ubiquitous electronic communications, and the challenges of maintaining friendships when sexual feelings and jealousies cloud the relationships.

The story is slow-moving, and all the characters seem on some level to be struggling with depression, and a perceived lack of fulfillment in their existing life situations, despite some measures of success and recognition in their personal and professional lives. But it’s all still interesting, and very easy to relate to experiences and feelings most of us had when we were young adults, or at least to stories of people we’ve known. Recommended.

TV Review: Tehran, Seasons 1-2. Apple TV+.

This was a recent find we tried on the recommendation of several different friends. And what a fortunate discovery! This is definitely one of the best shows we’ve seen in recent months.

Tehran is a very intelligent Israeli spy thriller, with sub-titles, although much of the show is in English. The main character is Tamar (played superbly by Niv Sultan), a young woman Mossad agent and childhood Jewish refugee from Iran, who is on her first mission. 

Tamar is working with a small team of fellow agents and Iranian resistance figures in Tehran to take out the radar system protecting a new nuclear fuel refining installation, so that Israeli fighter-bombers can reach their target and destroy it before the fuel is loaded into the centrifuges.  Given the recent history of real-world Israeli relations with Iran, and their attempts to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, this is a very believable plot.

Initially, Tamar’s main role in this dangerous operation seems to be as a super-hacker, whose job it is to break into Iran’s defense computer systems as part of the complex plan to destroy the nuclear site. But despite her computer programming brilliance, and the help of a young Iranian dissident hacker, things end up going sideways, and Tamar has to quickly go out on her own, and use the full range of her secret agent skills to stay alive and operational.

Meanwhile, on the other side, a canny older Iranian counter-espionage officer and his tough young sidekick are hunting for the Israeli team, especially Tamar, and are frequently one step ahead, or else just behind but on the trail of Tamar and her team at every step. In these characters, we see the personal and professional stresses they face in trying to do their jobs, in the context of the constant risks, politics and treachery within the authoritarian religious government and ideology they serve.

A whole cast of other Israeli agents, Iranian police and civilians, politicians, dissident young people, and innocent bystanders support the greater story throughout, as Tamar finds her way through an unending minefield of surveillance, betrayal, plot and counter-plot. It will keep you on the edge of your seat throughout each show.

This show is strongly reminiscent of Homeland, in its portrayal of a strong, incredibly bright and unorthodox young woman agent using every trick, skill, connection and plausible lie at her disposal to continue the mission against impossible odds. Highly recommended.

Personal Notes: Progress and Changes at The Memory Cache blog.

Today’s post is a personal note about the state of the blog after nearly six months of daily reviews and articles.

I’m very pleased with the quantity of hopefully interesting information and opinion that I’ve shared with readers in this first half year, and am looking forward to continuing onward into the indefinite future! However, a half year into this project, it seemed like a good time to take stock of what I’ve done so far, and what I want to do with The Memory Cache blog going forward.

Several friends who read the blog have expressed surprise at the amount of writing I’ve done, and the sheer number of cultural items (books, movies, TV shows) I had to consume in order to have something to write about, day after day. And it’s true – I’ve just passed my 200th post, or more than one per day, for every day since I started the blog in February.  That's a lot of reading and TV watching, not to even mention the writing part!

However, as I think I mentioned at the beginning, I actually consumed much of this content, and compiled my notes and reviews over a seven year period, going back through the pandemic years, and all the way back to 2015. Over this first five+ months of the blog, I curated that back content, rewrote and added to many of those existing reviews, and also added plenty of new reviews of things I was enjoying this year. But it was a mix, with many of the written reviews almost ready to post, straight out of my back files, rather than needing to be written now.

Happily, most of that back information and content has now appeared, and is tagged and available by category for anyone to search and check out. The downside, though, is that I’m now (as I say whenever I catch up with a live broadcast while watching something on the DVR) “marooned in real time”.

In the blog context, that means for me to report on anything – book, movie or TV show – I now have to actually consume the content (read the book, or watch the show), then write a new review.  I can't just pull it out of the back files on a slow day.

This is exactly where I wanted to be, and planned to be when I started, after about this much time had passed. But what this means is that from this point on, almost all reviews and articles posted will be “just written”, or “hot off the press” so to speak, and they are much more likely to be about content that was recently released, and issues or topics which are currently being widely discussed and reviewed.

This doesn’t mean I won’t continue to discover new content from earlier years that I think is interesting, fun or important, and write about it. I certainly will. But it does mean that my posts are probably going to be at least somewhat more consistently relevant and timely than some of the ones thus far.

The other important consequence of finishing with the prior reviews, though, is that I can, and indeed must slow the pace down from this point on. I can’t dependably find and enjoy enough new content, and have the time to think and write about it on a daily basis (particularly while I'm also writing, recording and producing new music and video). Therefore, starting today, I’ll be aiming to post only 2 to 3 times per week, without a fixed schedule. This should allow me the time to find, enjoy and review items of wide interest, and of high quality and importance, to share with you.

I am also thinking of adding a couple of new features. One type of post I want to try occasionally will be called “Honorable Mentions”. These posts will include a short list of good books or shows of a particular type, where I will simply provide a brief description for each one, rather than a full review. This way I can note items I’ve read or seen that seemed worthwhile or interesting, but perhaps not exceptional (to me, anyway). Readers can then take note of the reference information, and check them out if they’re interested. Everyone has different tastes, so this seems a helpful way to offer suggestions without going into depth in reviewing every item.

Another area I want to explore is reviewing some other types of media. Like many of you, I read a number of major periodicals, and listen to some podcasts too. I could name the publications and podcast show names, but that wouldn’t be that useful – most busy people don’t have the time or the interest to keep up with the constant torrent of information out there. My thought instead was that occasionally, when I come upon a specific article or podcast episode that provides information that is new and startling, or perhaps puts an interesting or unusual spin on a current topic or event, I would love to share short reviews of these types of items too when I come upon them, and pass along the references.

One other option I am exploring is starting a mailing list for the blog. The idea would be to allow interested readers to subscribe, to receive periodic notices with news about recent posts, and a reminder and link to go check out the blog if you haven’t been there recently. If I do this, I promise you would never be receiving more than 1 or 2 emails per month. No one needs a ton more emails in their inbox, but it can be useful as an occasional reminder of something you want to follow regularly. I'll have more news on this idea soon.

So there we are. To sum up, the blog is in good shape, I’ve finished the “phase one” populating of the site’s reviews collection from my back files, and I'm moving to a 2-3 posts per week schedule, rather than posting 7 days per week. I’m also planning to add some new types of content, and perhaps an occasional informational mailing for subscribers.

If you can think of any other things you’d like to see, or have any other comments you’d like to share with me about the blog, please feel to write to me at info@wayneparkernotes.com.  I'd love to hear from you.  And if you have books or shows you think are fantastic, particularly ones that aren't on the bestseller or blockbuster lists, send me a note -- I'll take a look, and see if they might be a good subject for a review.

I hope you continue to enjoy the blog, and if you like it, please let your friends know about it too! And have a great week.

Book Review: Old Souls: The Scientific Evidence for Past Lives (1999). Tom Shroder.

In previous reviews I discussed the research and books by two successive University of Virginia psychiatrists over the past fifty years who have done extensive research around the world into the strange phenomenon of small children who appear to remember significant details about previous lives recently lived.   

These two doctors are the late Dr. Ian Stevenson, who started the ongoing study at the University of Virginia in the early 1970s, and Dr. Jim Tucker, who was a student and the eventual successor to Dr. Stevenson.  Both of these doctors have written books about their careers, their research, and the many "solved" and "unsolved" cases in their case files.  

Old Souls, written by a career journalist with long tenures at the Washington Post and the Miami Herald, is an "outsider's" account of his own investigation into Stevenson's work and research methods, which he pursued by accompanying the 79-year-old Stevenson on his last two major foreign research trips, first to Lebanon after the civil war there, and then to poverty-stricken rural parts of India.  

 

It's a  fascinating journalistic account by a skeptical observer, who by the end was forced to a very similar position regarding these cases of children's memories of past lives as that expressed by both Stevenson and Tucker: that is, that there is an overwhelming amount of evidence that this phenomenon is real and not fabricated, that Stevenson's and Tucker's research methods and protocols are scientifically sound, repeatable and appear most likely to be evidence of reincarnation, but that we may well never be able to understand or scientifically prove it, or understand it, unless we can somehow learn far more about the scientific nature of consciousness and of reality itself. Recommended.

Movies: Livin' Right Now (2005), and Love, Pain and the Whole Crazy World Tour (2008). Keith Urban.

Hello! It’s Rock and Roll Friday again here at The Memory Cache, the fourth Friday of each month, where for the past few months I’ve been posting reviews of books and shows about music, its history and some of my favorite artists and bands as a fan as well as a musician.

This month I don’t have any major new book or TV reviews, so instead today I’m going to talk about a couple of outstanding concert videos which are among the favorites on my bookshelf. These might be available from the library; otherwise they can probably still be found for sale on Amazon. I know that releasing full-length feature concerts on DVD is probably becoming a thing of the past for most music stars (along with DVDs!), but I want to share a couple of the best from my concert video library.

Today I want to talk about two concert DVDs from earlier in the career of my current favorite major rock star, Keith Urban. Keith Urban is technically considered to be a country music star, but his extensive catalog of music crosses over and includes influences from many strains of popular music, definitely including country and rock, but also folk and blues, pop, and in recent years, hip-hop, R&B and electronic dance music too.

I first discovered his music in 2016, already almost 20 years into his brilliant (and ongoing) career, when I took a listening foray into the world of modern country music after a family trip to Nashville. This was toward the end of Tom Petty’s career and life (my previous favorite), and I was feeling a need to explore some new music, and see if there were contemporary artists in country music that I might like, since there didn’t seem to be a lot new going on in rock music anymore. I actually listened to music from a half-dozen or so of the top country stars of the moment, including Blake Shelton, Thomas Rhett, Chris Stapleton and Brad Paisley, and liked several of them, but Keith Urban’s music stood out as utterly unique among them. It immediately caught my attention.

His songs had plenty of country elements, particularly during the early part of his career, like the sound of banjos and mandolins mixed in, but the songs were more complex in structure than most 3-chord country songs, the lyrics told emotionally appealing and relatable stories, Urban’s wonderful voice and delivery were captivating, and the lead guitar playing (also Urban) was absolutely thrilling to hear.

After I started collecting his albums, and becoming more familiar with my fast-expanding library of his amazing, memorable and addictive songs, I became aware of two full-length movies he had made of earlier concert tours, as his career was on the rise and gathering momentum. The first, Livin’ Right Now, was from 2005; and then he released another one, Love, Pain & the Whole Crazy World Tour, in 2008. I immediately ordered them both, and they were a revelation to see.

The thing I’ve come to believe about Keith Urban is that he is perhaps the most completely realized male rock star of my lifetime, in that he is the whole package of rock star skills and abilities in a single individual. If all we had were the large catalog of his songs and his studio recordings, we would already have more memorable and well-loved music than we have any right to expect from an artist or band. But to see him in a live concert performance setting is even better (even if on a DVD), because then you see the full range of the tools he has as a performing artist with which to work his magic on adoring crowds.

He is a charismatic showman. He is the riveting (and yes, very attractive) front man and leader of the band, generous and sharing with his audience, full of joy, funny, and energetic, running around the stage and out into the crowd, giving off so much warmth and fun, and singing those great songs, with his fans singing along to every word. That in itself should be enough to satisfy any rock fan or concert goer.

But then you see him playing his stunning guitar solos, like on the records but even better, often while he is also singing the lead vocals. I can’t remember ever seeing any other lead singer and front man for a great band who could also seemingly effortlessly play such dazzling guitar parts at the same time he was singing. It is awesome to behold, and I only realized that he could actually do that when I watched these two excellent concert videos.

A lot of folks by now are content to hear the classic songs from their youth (whenever that was), and maybe don’t believe there’s much new out there worth hearing or seeing. But I don’t agree. I believe that some of the greatest performing and recording musicians today, like Keith Urban and Taylor Swift, in fact put on much more amazing shows, and have much higher levels of individual artistic talent across a wider variety of media than the rock stars of decades ago, precisely because they are standing on the shoulders and the achievements of those great artists and music creators of earlier generations.  It also helps that they have far more and better technology at their fingertips, technology they've also had to learn to master.

Keith Urban regularly continues to deliver new bestselling albums, wonderful singles, and YouTube music videos, and continues to play sold out tours around the world. But for a time-capsule view of his live concert performances as a young breakout star, these two concert videos, Livin’ Right Now and Love, Pain and the Whole Crazy World Tour, are a treat. Highly recommended.

TV Review: The Crown. Seasons 1-4. (Netflix).

For those few who aren’t already aware of it, The Crown is Netflix’s recent somewhat fictionalized depiction of the reign of Great Britain's Queen Elizabeth II. 

Thus far, over the first four seasons, it has covered the period from her youth growing up during World War II during the reign of her father, the popular King George VI, through her ascension to the throne in 1952, her marriage to Prince Phillip, and many of her better-known personal and political experiences as the sovereign of Great Britain and head of the Royal Family from the early 1950s, through the 1960s and 1970s, and into the era of Margaret Thatcher and the young Princess Diana in the 1980s.

The actors in all the principal roles changed after season 2, in order to put older faces and personalities on screen that would better reflect the real-life characters as they aged and changed over time. However, what has been consistent is the quality of the actors in the leading roles, particularly Claire Foy and Matt Smith as the youthful Elizabeth and Phillip, and Olivia Colman and Tobias Menzies as the middle-aged Queen and Prince, all of whom turn in impressively authentic and convincing performances.

It makes for fun entertainment, especially for those who just can’t get enough of the lives of English royalty, but there has been a growing uproar around the show's historical accuracy and perspective in season 4, perhaps because the plot timeline is moving closer to our own times, where many of us already have well-formed memories of some of the actual events, and opinions about the personalities from mass media and news coverage.

The portrayal of Prince Charles' behavior toward Diana and of his character, which is fairly odious in the show in season 4, has particularly come in for sharp protests. Many reviewers have now added their caveats that this series should not be taken at face value in terms of the truth of its presentation of the times, the events, the various personalities and their relationships. 

Nevertheless, if seen as art, interpretation and entertainment rather than a slavish portrayal of historical lives and events, it’s a very interesting and enjoyable series. Recommended.

TV Review: The Good Fight, Seasons 1-5 (CBS TV series).

The story of high-powered lawyers in large firms in contemporary Chicago that began in The Good Wife continues, with the focus now on senior attorney Diane Lockhart (played by Christine Baranski), and two of her younger proteges. It begins right after the 2016 presidential election, with a Madoff-type Ponzi scheme scandal and the wreckage it leaves behind.

This series has been both attacked and praised for its overtly liberal sympathies and its portrayal of legal and social life in the Trump era. As with The Good Wife, many of the story lines, particularly with respect to the destabilizing effects of new technologies on personal and social lives, and on laws and the legal system, were up-to-the-minute with the show’s dramatic spin on breaking news stories in real life.

Both The Good Wife and The Good Fight are among the best legal drama series I've ever seen, with consistently interesting plots, engaging characters, fine writing and acting, plenty of outrageous dark humor, and "torn from the recent headlines" legal and ethical issues. Whether they will hold up over time as the social and political issues they explored fade from the news remains to be seen. Recommended.