Flashman - George MacDonald Fraser

1969; 252 pages. Genre : Historical Fiction. New Author? : Yes. Book #1 (out of 12) of the "Flashman" series. Overall Rating : 4½*/10.

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Harry Flashman is a decorated hero of various wars and military debacles of the 19th century. He's also a vain, womanizing, bullying coward who wrote his memoirs (the Flashman series) to "set the record straight" about his supposed exploits. In this, the first book in the series, he recounts his adventures in what is called the First Anglo-Afghan War.

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What's To Like...

If you like anti-heroes, Flashy's your guy. He has very few redeeming qualities, other than being able to spot a dangerous enemy and an incompetent ally. He also picks up the native lingo quickly, and has a way with the ladies. Usually.

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Flashman is a historically-accurate account of the disastrous British retreat from Kabul in 1842. You can read the Wiki article about it here. Our protagonist will later also take part in Custer's Last Stand and the Charge of the Light Brigade. Good luck shines on him alone; everyone around him gets shafted.

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There's lots of action, lots of wit, sex aplenty, and some kewl Indian and Afghan vocabulary to supplement the "British" text. (Fraser was Scottish) There are also some timely lessons for NATO and the US about occupying Afghanistan. Don't do it!

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OTOH, to call Flashman a scoundrel would be an understatement. He deserts his military friends, tries to bed every woman he meets (single or married), thinks only of himself, and on one occasion commits rape. There is also prolific use of the N-word, which grates my teeth. Flashman of course escapes every crisis (well, there are another 11 books in the series, you know). If there's a moral to this story, I'm not sure I like it.

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Kewlest New Word...

Gommeril : a fool. (a Britishism/Yorkshire-ism)

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Excerpts...

...for the true talent for catastrophe - Elphy Bey stood alone. Others abide our question, but Elphy outshines them all as the greatest military idiot of our own or any other day.

Only he could have permitted the First Afghan War and let it develop to such ruinous defeat. It was not easy: he started with a good army, a secure position, some excellent officers, a disorganized enemy, and repeated opportunities to save the situation. But Elphy, with the touch of true genius, swept aside these obstacles with unerring precision, and out of order wrought complete chaos. We shall not, with luck, look upon his like again. (pgs. 98-99)

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I recognized the handwriting, and my heart gave a skip; when I opened it I got a turn, for it began, "To my most beloved Hector," and I thought, by God, she's cheating on me, and has sent me the wrong letter by mistake. But in the second line was a reference to Achilles, and another to Ajax, so I understood she was just addressing me in terms which she accounted fitting for a marital paladin; she knew no better. (pgs. 154-155)

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"What difference does it make whether you die like an Englishman or like a bloody Eskimo?" (pg. 199)

I kept waiting for Harry to get his "just deserts", but it never happened. There is a hint of a comeuppance at the very end; but it's left as a loose end. Perhaps it's a teaser to make me read the next book.

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If you can overlook Flashman's boorishness and the use of the N-word every time an Indian or Afghan is referred to, you will find this book to be an excellent piece of historical fiction.

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Alas, I couldn't. My only hope is that Flashy "evolves" into a decent human being (well, at least not an utterly reprehensible one) as the series progresses. I will give George MacDonald Fraser another chance. There is one more Flashman book on my TBR shelf. 4½ Stars, but that rating could go up if Flashy starts to self-improve.

The Reality Dysfunction - Peter F. Hamilton

1996; 1,094 pages (whew!). New Author? : Yes. Genre : Space Opera; Horror. Overall Rating : 9*/10.

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It's the 27th century. Mankind is exploring the galaxy and colonizing all sorts of inhabitable planets and asteroid systems. Bioengineering means most people live for more than a century; and something called an "affinity gene" can be implanted (to those who want it) which allows a "mind meld" with others with the gene; or even with a spaceship or an entire spaceport.

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But on a backwater, 3rd-rate planet called Lalonde, something has been unleashed. It takes over people's bodies and has incredible (but not infinite) powers. It overruns Lalonde and is now spreading to other planets. The ancients had a name for it : The Reality Dysfunction.

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What's To Like...

With 1100 pages to work with, Peter F. Hamilton gives you a vast, incredibly detailed, complex, and picturesque array of worlds. There is also a timeline at the beginning to cover the major points of the years 2000-2600 AD. That is a big help in getting acclimated to his universe.

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He also has time to develop a bunch of great characters. Even the bad guys are 3-D and a bit "gray". Best of all, a number of the developed characters get killed along the way, which makes it hard to guess whether they will survive a given crisis. I really like that.

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TRD is the first book of a trilogy, and most of it is focused on the good guys investigating the Reality Dysfunction - learning what it is, what its aims are, what its origins are, and (most importantly) how to combat it. The ending reminded me of the first Star Wars movie (Episode 4) - there is a climax of sorts, but on a grander scale, the stage is set for more epic things to come. Neither the Forces of Good nor the Forces of Evil are of one accord, which makes the conflict quite complicated.

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Be forewarned : there is a lot of sex (apparently a requisite for Space Opera), as well as a lot of graphic violence and gore. This is not one for the kiddies or anyone who's sensitive to these kinds of things. It is also not a stand-alone novel.

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Kewlest Word...

Shambolic : disorderly or chaotic (a Britishism).

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Excerpts...

"I wish I could stop you from feeling so much guilt," Peter had said. That was the day they had left the planet, the two of them waiting in the officers' mess of a navy spaceport while their shuttle was prepared.

"Wouldn't you feel guilty?" she asked irritably. She didn't want to talk, but she didn't want to be silent either.

"Yes. But not as much as you. You're taking the blame for the entire conflict. You shouldn't do that. Both of us, all of us, everyone on the planet, we're all being propelled by fate."

"How many despots and warlords have said that down through the centuries? I wonder," she retorted. (pgs. 11-12)

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Like most scavengers, Joshua thought he knew the Laymil well enough to build up a working image. In his mind they weren't so much different from humans. Weird shape, trisymmetric: three arms, three legs, three stumpy serpentlike sensor heads, standing slightly shorter than a man. Strange biochemistry: there were three sexes, one female egg-carrier, two male sperm-carriers. But essentially human in basic motivation; they ate and shitted, and had kids, and built machines, and put together a technological civilization, probably even cursed their boss and went for a drink after work. (pgs. 59-60)

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"I'm a futurologist ... on a one-way ride to eternity. I just get out of my time machine for a look round every now and then." (pg. 239)

You measure a Space Opera by how vibrant and believable its world is. You measure a Horror story by how much you feel the terror, which is no mean feat, considering you're simply sitting there reading the book. By both these criteria, The Reality Dysfunction is a first-rate story. Book 2 ("The Neutronium Alchemist") is on my TBR shelf. I'm sure it won't be long before I tackle it. 9 Stars.

Three Men on the Bummel - Jerome K. Jerome

1900; 207 pages. New Author? : No. Genre : Claasic Lit; Humor. Overall Rating : 8*/10.

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Three Men on the Bummel is the sequel to Jerome K. Jerome's incredibly successful Three Men in a Boat, which was reviewed here. This time our intrepid trio, instead of boating up the Thames, go bicycling around the Black Forest region of Germany. This precludes the dog from accompanying them, but the usual humor, mayhem, and narrator's insight are here.

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Bummel is a German word, and doesn't really have an English equivalent. Jerome gives his definition late in the book. "Stroll" is close, but implies walking and of a short duration. This outing lasts more than a week, and involves riding on bicycles.

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What's To Like...

Besides the entertaining wit, 3MotB again offers an enlightening glimpse of life in Europe at the dawn of the 20th century. Transportation entails horses, trains, or walking; but now bicycling has become a recreational craze, and leisure time is increasing. Even an average British citizen can afford to cycle around Europe.

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3MotB spotlights Germany, and was written after Jerome and his wife spent some time there in 1898. Jerome gives us a lot of commentary on the German psyche, some of it eerily prescient of their World War One (and WW2) mindset.

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But for the most part, Jerome speaks kindly of the Deutschlanders. And he still has his self-deprecating ways - our trio get into countless pickles - especially ones involving language and directional issues - when the natives often have to help them out.

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Kewlest New Word...

Droshky : an open, 4-wheeled, horse-drawn carriage.

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Excerpts...

"If nobody ever tried a new thing the world would come to a standstill. It is by-"

"I know all that can be said on that side of the argument," I interrupted. "I agree in trying new experiments up to thirty-five; after thirty-five I consider a man is entitled to think of himself. You and I have done our duty in this direction, you especially. You have been blown up by a patent gas lamp-"

He said: "I really think, you know, that was my fault; I think I must have screwed it up too tight." (pg. 34)

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Your German likes the country, but he prefers it as the lady thought she would the noble savage - more dressed. He likes his walk through the wood - to a restaurant. But the pathway must not be too steep, it must have a brick gutter running down one side of it to drain it, and every twenty yards or so it must have its seat on which he can rest and mop his brow; (pgs. 97-98)

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Shakespeare and Milton may have done their best to spread acquaintance with the English tongue among the less favoured inhabitants of Europe. (...) But the man who has spread the knowledge of English from Cape St. Vincent to the Ural Mountains is the Englishman who, unable or unwilling to learn a single word of any language but his own, travels purse in hand to every corner of the Continent. One may be shocked at his ignorance, annoyed at his stupidity, angry at his presumption. But the practical fact remains: he it is that is Anglicizing Europe. (pg. 164)

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...if a woman wanted a diamond tiara, she would explain that it was to save the expense of a bonnet. (pg. 24)

Three Men on the Bummel is a light, fun, wit-filled book; which almost, but not quite, measures up to its acclaimed predecessor. Some think this is due to the dog being absent; or that it lacks a unifying theme, such as the Thames was in Three Men in a Boat. It is always hard for a sequel (except for the Mad Max movies) to measure up to the original.

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Personally, I thought the problem is that Jerome's focus is now external. Before, he poked fun at his own English culture. Now, he's critiquing someone else's - the Germans. If I laugh at myself, everone laughs with me. If I laugh at others, someone will no longer find it as humorous.

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Anybody who loved Three Men on a Boat will also like Three Men on the Bummel. But if you are going to read only one of these, choose 3MiaB. 8 Stars.

Little Fuzzy - H. Beam Piper

1962; 174 pages. Genre : 50's Sci-Fi. Laurels : nominated for the Hugo Award in 1963. New Author? : Yes. Overall Rating : 7½*/10.

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Q. : If you landed on another planet, and encountered something that, say, looked like a Wookie or an Ewok, how would you know whether to make friends with it or shoot it for its meat and fur? A. : By determining whether it's a sapient being.

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Fair enough. But how would you define "sapient"? Well, the Zarathustra Company uses the guideline of whether it can talk and build a fire. And they have a charter to develop and exploit the natural resources on one particular planet, provided it has no sapient beings. That's an important clause, because if sentient creatures are found, they are the rightful owners of the planet, and Zarathustra Company's charter instantly becomes null and void. And wouldn't you know it, Jack Holloway has just crossed paths with a family of Hoka-looking "Fuzzies".

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What's To Like...

Little Fuzzy is a short, cute, easy-to-read, Sci-Fi story from the early 60's. Its target audience is young boys, yet it addresses some serious issues. Is it okay to do environmental damage to an ecosystem, as long as the creatures in it are non-sapient? How is sapience determined, and who makes that decision? What if a species is "almost" sapient? Are there any consequences if you kill a native creature prior to its sapience being determined? If something is good for the company that employs you, but unethical, can you still do it?

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For adults, the storyline might be a bit unbelievable and simplistic. Faced with a suit-&-countersuit, a judge decides to simply hold both trials simultaneously. And there's no need to determine whether a witness is telling the truth, we have a handy-dandy, infallible, lie-detector-type thingy called a Veridicator. How convenient.

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All characters are either black or white, and the story shows its age by the fact that drinking and smoking cigarettes are portrayed as normal daily activities for all adults, good or bad. Not the sort of thing you want influencing a kid reading this.

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Kewlest Word...

Colloquy : a formal conversation or conference.

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Excerpts...

"They don't talk, and they don't build fires," Ahmed Khadra said, as though that settled it.

"Ahmed, you knw better than that. That talk-and-build-a-fire rule isn't any scientific test at all."

"It's a legal test," Lunt supported his subordinate.

"It's a rule-of-thumb that was set up so that settlers on new planets couldn't get away with murdering and enslaving the natives by claiming they thought they were only hunting and domesticating wild animals," he said. "Anything that talks and builds a fire is a sapient being, yes. That's the law. But that doesn't mean that anything that doesn't isn't." (pg. 36)

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"They will have a nice, neat, pedantic definition of sapience, tailored especially to exclude the Fuzzies, and they will present it in court and try to get it accepted, and it's up to us to guess in advance what that will be, and have a refutation of it ready, and also a definition of our own."

"Their definition will have to include Khooghras. Gerd, do the Khooghras bury their dead?"

"Hell, no; they eat them. But you have to give them this, they cook them first." (pgs. 97-98)

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If you don't like the facts, you ignore them, and if you need facts, dream up some you do like. (pg. 15)

Little Fuzzy's straightforward plotline won't challenge an adult reader, but that wasn't the target audience. OTOH, at the end of the book, H. Beam Piper launches into a 5-page diatribe giving his own definition of sapience (it was a subject near and dear to his heart), which will probably be over the heads of young readers.

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So what? This was a delightful, light story that will nevertheless leave readers of all ages pondering issues such as corporate greed, destructive environmental practices (even when they're NIMBY), animal rights (sapient and otherwise), gun rights, and capital punishment.

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Little Fuzzy is one of those rare books that I thought should have been twice as long as it is. 7½ Stars.

Infinite Jest - David Foster Wallace

1996; 981 pages (plus another 96 pages of notes). New Author? : Yes. Genre : Modern Literature. Laurels : Time Magazine calls it one of the 100 best English-language novels since 1923. Overall Rating : 8*/10..
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Infinite Jest takes place in a slightly-alternate universe and slightly in the future. Most of the book is set in the greater Boston area - either at a teen Tennis Academy, or the halfway house for recovering addicts just down the hill therefrom..
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The main protagonist is one Hal Incandenza, an 18-year-old tennis prodigy; and we follow his whole family and a bunch more characters from the two aforementioned institutions, plus a pair of Quebecois terrorists (or are they double agents?) who for most of the book are in the desert night, just outside Tucson.
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Let's get the negatives out of the way first. Infinite Jest is bodaciously long; with a nebulous plot and a random ending point. It's hard to keep track of all the characters, and the storyline is non-linear. The writing style is atrocious. The book is over-cluttered with acronyms and profusely wordy. One run-on sentence runs a full five pages. Countless sentences begin with phrases like : "But yes so", "But and so", "Plus then", "And so but", etc. The 367 notes, all hundred pages of them, are a PITA, but sometimes whole chapters are hidden in them. For the record, I skipped most of the notes, and was (presumably) none the worse for it.
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And so yet...
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What's To Like...
Infinite Jest is a wonderful exposition on American culture. The teenage tennis phenoms are under mind-boggling pressure and treated like show dogs. There is a whole sub-culture of drug addicts (recovering and otherwise), crooks, and other assorted low-life. The Incandenza family is impressively dysfunctional.
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Northern New England is turned into a giant toxic dump, and canisters of waste are catapulted into it, with giant fans blowing the noxious fumes into Canada. For that matter, all of North America in now a single country, the USA having coerced Mexico and Canada into being weak sisters in the union. The government has long since gone broke and among other things now sells naming rights of individual years to corporations. For example, this year is called The Year of the Depend Adult Undergarment ("YDAU").
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There are a slew of existential episodes to enjoy. The Quebec terrorists are all in wheelchairs and use giant mirrors to sabotage nighttime motorists. The academy kids play a great game called "Eschaton" which is like the board-game Risk played on multiple tennis courts. There is a "Cult of the Veil" which both men and women can join.
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All the characters are 3-D, complex, and "gray". I found reading the Wikipedia entry on Infinite Jest beforehand helped me grasp how the seemingly unrelated plotlines tied together.
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Kewlest Word...
Koan : a paradoxical anecdote or riddle which defies logical reasoning.
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Excerpts...
In the eighth American educational grade, Bruce Green fell dreadfully in love with a classmate who had the unlikely name of Mildred Bonk. The name was unlikely because if ever an eighth-grader looked like a Daphne Christianson or a Kimberly St.-Simone or something like that, it was Mildred Bonk. She was the kind of fatally pretty and nubile wraithlike figure who glides through the sweaty junior-high corridors of every nocturnal emitters's dreamscape. (pg. 38).
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"So tonight to shush you how about if I say I have administrative bones to pick with God, Boo. I'll say God seems to have a kind of laid-back management style I'm not crazy about. I'm pretty much anti-death. God looks by all accounts to be pro-death. I'm not seeing how we can get together on this issue, he an I, Boo." (pg. 40)
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"Katherine, I will tell you a story about feeling so bad and saving a life. I do not know you but we are drunk together now, and will you hear this story?"
"It's not about Hitting Bottom ingesting any sort of Substance and trying to Surrender, is it?"
"My people, we do not hit the bottoms of women. I am, shall we say, Swiss." (pg. 776)
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Poor me, Poor Me, Pour Me A Drink. (pg. 839)
Life is like tennis; those who serve best usually win. (pg. 952)
At its core, Infinite Jest is a work of Modern Absurdism. The terrorists are absurd; the addicts are absurd; the tennis prodigies are absurd; the dysfunctional Incandenza's are absurd (papa I. commits suicide by nuking his head in a microwave). And like any piece of existential literature, the storyline is subsumed in the pointlessness of the lives of the characters.
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In that respect, it is a masterpiece. Yes, it's a slow, difficult read, but I kept coming back for more. It took me just over a month to read Infinite Jest, but IMHO it was a worthwhile trek. 8 Stars.

A Letter Of Mary - Laurie R. King

1996; 315 pages. Genre : Mystery. Sub-Genre : Sherlock Holmes. Book #3 in the "Mary Russell" series. New Author? : No. Overall Rating : 5*/10.

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The third book in this series finds Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes now married and still sleuthing. A Letter Of Mary opens with a cantankerous lady archaeologist paying a visit to get their opinion of an ancient papyrus scroll that seems to have been written by Mary Magdalene. That would seem to be an obvious hoax, until someone murders the archaeologist and ransacks the Holmes/Russell abode in an apparent search for the scroll.

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What's To Like...

Mycroft Holmes is back, as is Inspector Lestrade. Russell and Holmes make for a fascinating couple. Particularly Mary, who is an anachronistic feminist. Some people were put off by this, but I thought it was a unique and worthy twist. Plus, Mary is left-handed, a sure sign of genius.

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The descriptions of 1923 London are neat, and some obscure tidbits of historical trivia are sprinkled throughout. For example, I got to learn about Abishag and Shunammism. Thank you, Wikipedia! The wit runs the length of the story and is quite entertaining.

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In the end however, any book that name-drops Sherlock Holmes will inevitably be compared to Arthur Conan Doyle's works, and in that respect, ALOM falls flat. There are very few Holmesian feats of observation, and when the breakthrough finally comes, it feels like an arbitrary turn of events. Far too many pages are filled with dead-ends (although I suppose you could claim they were red herrings), and the titular letter has almost nothing to do with the story.

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Kewl New Word...

Tutrix : a female tutor. (is that a kewl word, or what?! and I've changed the format of this section - from now on it will be one KNW per book, max.)

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Excerpts...

"Shall we see her?"

"We? My dear Russell, I am the husband of an emancipated woman who, although she may not yet vote in an election, is at least allowed to see her own friends without male chaperonage.:

"Don't be an ass, Holmes. She obviously wants to see both of us..." (pg. 7)

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Actually, I am not against the killing of foxes, being a farmer myself and having lost numerous poultry to them over the years. What I dislike is the unnecessary glorification of bloodthirstiness. We no longer execute our criminals with the prolonged agony of stoning or torture, and I cannot see why we should grant a wild creature any less dignity. (pg. 210-211)

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Cor, stone the crows, as my granfa' used to say..." (pg. 186)

This is the second book I've read from this series (the other one is reviewed here), and both left me muttering "meh". I almost think Laurie King would've been better off developing Mary Russell as a free-standing character. The feminist and theological angles could be more fully addressed, without being overshadowed by the unavoidable and distracting comparison to Conan Doyle's stories.

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OTOH, with some additional effort, A Letter Of Mary really could've been a fine Sherlock Holmes tale. Add in some more Holmesian deductions, tie in all the tangents, make the breakthrough a "Cold Case" type clue that would be easily overlooked at first glance, and give the purported ancient letter some relevance, even if it turns out to be a forgery. Arthur Conan Doyle would have done as much. 5 Stars.