Things That Matter, by Charles Krauthammer

Charles Krauthammer is one of the bright lights of political commentary today.  He has written a Washington Post column since 1985, for which he won a Pulitzer Prize, and appears on Fox News as a commentator.  In Things That Matter: Three Decades of Passions, Pastimes, and Politics, he has collected a variety of his columns and other writings, giving a nice glimpse into his thinking.

As the subtitle suggests, these columns span three decades, so a few of them seem dated, but for the most part he has selected writing that stands the test of time.  For example, he writes about Winston Churchill, on whom the 20th century hinged.  Krauthammer praises Churchill's traditionalism: "It took a 19th-century man--traditional in habit, rational in thought, conservative in temper--to save the 20th century from itself." 

Another figure from history who gets a bad rap: Columbus.  In spite of the obvious problems of conquest, "after 500 years the Columbian legacy has created a civilization that we ought not, in all humble piety and cultural relativism, declare to be no better or worse than that of the Incas.  It turned out better.  And mankind is the better for it.  Infinitely better."

Several of the essays are very personal, such as his tribute to his brother and his praise for baseball.  Others are more in depth, such as an extended essay on embryonic research.  All are thoughtful and thought provoking.  Yeah, it's a lot to take in on a wide array of topics.  Things That Matter is probably best enjoyed as originally written, reading one column a day, like in the Post, rather than straight through.  However you approach it, it's worth your valuable reading time.

Loving Your Spouse When You Feel Like Walking Away, by Gary Chapman

Gary Chapman long ago established himself as a leading expert on marriage and relationships.  His 1992 book The Five Love Languages continues to be a popular and helpful resource, influencing couples and marriage counselors everywhere, and creating a cottage industry for Chapman.  His recent book Loving Your Spouse When You Feel Like Walking Away: Real Help for Desperate Hearts in Difficult Marriages covers a variety of marital conflicts and offers help to couples.  (This is an update of Chapman's 2008 book, Desperate Marriages: Moving Toward Hope and Healing in Your Relationship.)

Chapman wants couples, even those who feel like they have no option but to leave, to reject some myths and accept some realities.  He writes that people can change, that couples do have options, that each spouse is in control of his or her responses, and each can influence the other with his or her actions. 

I have to be honest, Loving Your Spouse is not fun to read.  Each chapter covers some difficult-to-live-with characteristic: irresponsible, workaholic, depressed, controlling, abusive, sexually abused or abusive, uncommunicative, unfaithful, addicted.  Chapman draws from his many years of marriage counseling and conference speaking for detailed stories of couples who have dealt with each of these and how they overcame (in most cases he tells a happy ending).  Reading about these struggling marriages isn't exactly happy reading. 

If a couple is dealing with one of the above troubles, this can be a great resource to get started on the journey toward reconciliation.  In summary, Chapman says spouses should "embrace the positive actions that one individual can take to stimulate constructive changes in a relationship."  Don't give up on marriage and be an agent of change.  It's never to late.


Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the complimentary electronic review copy!

Waking Gods, by Sylvain Neuvel

Sylvain Neuvel continues what he started in Sleeping Giants in book two of The Themis Files, Waking Gods.  The giant robot that scientists recovered and put together in book one was incontrovertible evidence of extraterrestrial beings with intelligence and technology superior to man's.  In book 2, the aliens show up.  Without prior warning, another robot appears a decade later, this time fully assembled, in London.  Attempts at a peaceful welcome failed, and a large slice of London is vaporized by the robot.

Themis, the earth-assembled robot, takes down the robot, but then additional robots appear in major cities around the world.  Themis's crew has their hands full, trying to figure out the teleportation feature and being reunited with their test-tube baby daughter they didn't know they had.  Their plan for confronting the newly-arrived robots sounds crazy, but it just might work. . . .

Neuvel continues his documentary story-telling style, advancing the narrative through journal entries, interview transcripts, event logs, etc.  While I enjoy his method, in this case it serves to downplay the scope of the events of the book.  Tens of millions are killed by these robots, and it seems as if the characters can barely bring themselves to care.  He gives only a distant, detached understanding of world events as he focuses on the personal perspective of the characters.

I thought he had a pretty good cliffhanger at the end of Sleeping Giants.  That cliffhanger became an important element of Waking Gods.  But the cliffhanger at the end of Waking Gods is even better.  I can't wait to read Only Human!

Greater Love, by Robert Whitlow

Greater Love concludes Robert Whitlow's "Tides of Truth" series about Tami Taylor.  The first two books brought Tami through her summer internship with a law firm in Savannah.  In Greater Love, she is finishing up law school and is faced with deciding whether to take a position where she interned, an established firm that will pay her very well, or to join a start-up firm with a former DA and a fellow intern.  Once she felt certain about joining the big firm, Sister Dabney gave her a prophetic word that she should join the women in the new firm.

Figuring out which man to commit to is not as easy a task.  She has been courting Zach, but she senses some distance and wonders if he's the one.  Her fellow intern has taken a job with Zach's firm, and proves to be a faithful friend, so maybe he's the one. . . .

As she gets settled back in with her landlady from the summer and reconnects with Sister Dabney, her first assignment from the county is to defend a runaway named Jesse.  Sister Dabney had been helping her, and together she and Tami have to unravel Jesse's stories about her past and try to defend her.  When mysterious people show up and Jessie disappears, things become more complicated.

Whitlow has written a nice trilogy, keeping a balance between suspense and legal matters, and the romance and growth of a young lady.  Tami may not be the most likable heroine ever, as her stringent legalism sometimes seems to sap the joy of following Jesus.  But I have to admire her steadfastness and her determination to honor her parent's wishes in all things, and to maintain her Christian convictions in the face of challenges in her career and her personal life.   Greater Love is a satisfying finish to a very enjoyable trilogy.

The Color of Justice, by Ace Collins

Ace Collins takes us back to a bitterly divided South in The Color of Justice, a novel about a young black man accused of murdering the teenage daughter of a prominent white family.  When the young man's mother tearfully seeks the assistance of Coop Lindsay, a young white attorney whose family has deep roots in their small Mississippi town, Coop is just intrigued enough to consider representing Martin.  It doesn't take long for Coop to figure out that the evidence against Martin is fishy.

Nevertheless, the whole town, at least all the white people in town, are convinced that Martin is guilty.  As word gets around that Coop will be defending him, the town turns against him, even burning a cross in his yard.  Coop finds an unlikely ally in a local millionaire, whose old money runs the town. 

The Color of Justice takes a jarring turn about two-thirds of the way through.  The trial concludes, but Collins jumps forward from 1964 to 2014, when Coop's grandson, also named Coop, comes to town.  His purpose is to look into the 1964 murder case, but he gets drafted to assist with a new murder mystery.  We learn that the first Coop, along with Martin, disappeared as soon as the trial ended.  That mystery and the new mystery end up mingling, and young Coop has to use his insight, just as his grandfather did, to come to unpopular conclusions in the name of justice.

By linking these two stories, a half century apart, Collins adds a level of interest to The Color of Justice, which otherwise would have been a pretty straightforward murder mystery.  I enjoyed it, with some reservations.  The whole culture of the South theme seemed artificial, for some reason.  I felt like Collins may have cribbed a bit too much from To Kill a Mockingbird and the like.  I don't know if a story about justice in the South in the 1960s can avoid stereotypes and easy categorization.  Also, I'm not a lawyer, but it seemed like Collins played fast and loose with court procedures, especially in the 2014 trial.

Overall, The Color of Justice is entertaining.  Coop is easy to cheer for, and Martin and his mother are well-written as the justice-seeking minorities with all the odds against them. 


Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the complimentary electronic review copy!

Treknology, by Ethan Siegel

The classic TV and movie series Star Trek, in its many manifestations, is very entertaining on the story-telling merits alone.  But the minds behind the stories weren't just weaving fantasies.  The technology in Star Trek, even the most fanciful, anticipated and inspired technology that is in our grasp.  In Treknology: The Science of Star Trek from Tricorders to Warp Drive, astrophysicist Ethan Siegel demonstrates how dozens of Star Trek technologies have either come into common use, or are being developed.

One of the most ubiquitous is, of course, the cell phone.  The original flip phones were modeled after the communicators first used in the original Star Trek series.  At the time the series aired, the concept of using a hand-held device for two-way communication over great distances was fantasy.  Today we take it for granted.  Another iconic show element is the automatic sliding doors.  When they appeared on the show, they were amazing.  Today we walk through so many of them we rarely notice.  We regularly use computers that far surpass anything the show's creators imagined.  We use tablet computers that exceed the PADDs on the show, and our devices have so much memory and computing power we don't know what to do with it all.

Some of the other technologies in the show are quite a bit further from everyday usage.  The transporter beam, another iconic Star Trek staple, is still almost in the realm of fantasy, but scientists have been developing the ability to transport matter.  The warp drive and impulse engines are well out the reach of current application, but are imaginable based on current usage.  Other Star Trek technologies, like artificial gravity, antimatter containment, and the Holodeck still seem way out of reach, but Siegel writes that even these fantastic-sounding technologies are in the infancy of actual development.  He writes, "We might not have achieved the dream of Star Trek just yet in every regard, but given that it's been just more than a half century since it first envisioned our world three hundred years into the future, our progress isn't too shabby."

Treknology is a fun book, chock full of references to various episodes and movies, with screen shots and scientific illustrations.  It's a reminder that phrases and scenes fans know and love, like "What is the nature of your medical emergency?," "Set phasers for stun," and the introduction of transparent aluminum are more than just throwaway plot points, but, like much of the series, are harbingers of things to come.


Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the complimentary electronic review copy!

Zero Limit, by Jeremy K. Brown

I enjoy a variety of sci-fi, but I think my favorite is the near-future, highly believable, hard sci-fi style.  Jeremy K. Brown's Zero Limit is a great example of this.  He tells a thrilling story that is wrapped up in the science and politics of a tomorrow that people living today could experience.

Caitlin Taggart is a war hero, having acted with bravery in the Middle East.  Through a variety of circumstances, include anti-Moon prejudices and anti-immigration policies that have stranded her on the Moon, she is the head of a mining crew scraping the Moon's surface and processing H3 to be shipped back to Earth for energy production.  When the flamboyant owner of a mining company asks her to lead an expedition to rein in an asteroid that is mostly platinum, the promise of a chance to return to Earth and her Earth-bound daughter is too much to turn down.

Upon arrival at the asteroid, a fuel explosion destroys her ship and alters the path of the asteroid to a collision course with Earth.  Cait and her rag-tag crew of miners are the Earth's only hope to avoid apocalyptic devastation.  Working with crews on Earth, they dredge all the technology they can access to push the asteroid to a path that will miss the Earth.  Brown pays close attention to the use of science and technology, building a very believable story, in many cases using examples of technology that exists in real-life 2018, or is close to reality.

As you might expect from a story like this, Brown includes plenty of melodrama and edge-of-your-seat close calls.  Of course the first solutions they attempt won't work out that great, and there will be some major flubs and terrible losses along the way.  But that's what makes this a page-turner, an exciting, old-fashioned and forward looking action-packed story that will keep you up reading at night.


Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the complimentary electronic review copy!