Being Ram Dass - Ram Dass

    2021; 405 pages.  New Author? : Yes.  Genres : Biographies & Memoirs; Philosophy; Meditation.  Overall Rating: 9½*/10.

 

    Back in my college days, there was a “way cool” book that all the hip students were reading.  It was titled Be Here Now, by a guy named Ram Dass.  Okay, that wasn’t his real name, his birth name was Richard Alpert, and he was a Harvard Professor of Psychology.

 

    Be Here Now was an easy book to read.  It had lots of drawings and the text was compact.  In a nutshell, it urged the target audience, Westerners, to travel to India, to practice Meditation, and to lose your sense of attachment to Self.

 

    Being Ram Dass is a memoir of that Self named Ram Dass, nee Richard Alpert.

 

What’s To Like...

    After a Foreword and an Introduction, both of which are worth reading, Being Ram Dass is divided into six sections, namely:

Part 1: Learning and Unlearning (14 chapters)

     Growing up, Academics, Psychedelics

Part 2: Pilgrim of the Heart (8 chapters)

    Travels to India; Meditations and Pure Love

Part 3: Service Center (6 chapters)

    Seeing God in Others

Part 4: The Wheel Turns (5 chapters)

    Growing Older

Part 5: Ocean View (3 chapters)

    Final Thoughts

The Next Chapter: Ram Dass Here/Not Here (6 pages)

    An Epilogue by a Friend

 

    Richard Alpert/Ram Dass’s life is presented chronologically—he grew up in a well-to-do family, attended Tufts University, got a PhD in Psychology, and became a professor at Harvard.  He met Timothy Leary, got turned on to LSD, and spearheaded a Harvard-sponsored research project to see if taking psychedelics could enable convicts to turn from their criminal ways.  Which got him fired from Harvard, something that hadn’t happened since Ralph Waldo Emerson taught there in the 1800s.

 

    I loved his “warts and all” approach to writing this memoir.  Enlightened gurus are common in India, and jealousies between them sometimes arise.  A mystic’s diet is quite austere, so Ram Dass and friends would occasionally sneak into town to munch on M&Ms.  Becoming One with God does not preclude making out in the backseat of a car.  And while Love is all you need, once in a while a hit of acid or psilocybin is a fun excursion.

 

    The main message, of course, is that if you give yourself totally to an enlightened guru, he will teach you to love everyone unreservedly, render service to mankind, and become One with the Cosmos by shedding all of your earthly attachments.

 

    There is a lot of name-dropping, which is not a criticism.  A few of the celebrities who came to see, hear, talk with, and/or assist Ram Dass include: Aldous Huxley, Maynard Ferguson, Charles Mingus, Ken Kesey, Timothy Leary, Wavy Gravy, Steve Jobs, Michael Crichton, George Harrison, Jerry Rubin, John Lennon, Yoko Ono, Stokely Carmichael, and Robert Redford.  I’m in awe.

 

    Late in life, Ram Dass suffers a stroke, which leaves him unable to speak, unable to write, and wheelchair-bound.  It was touching to read how he dealt with this, and battled through depression and a lot of physical therapy to finally accept this.  For enlightened beings, Birth and Death are not starting and ending points; they are two depots in a cosmic journey propelled by Reincarnation.

 

Kewlest New Word ...

    Pellucid (adj.) : translucently clear

 

Ratings…
    Amazon: 4.8*/5, based on 1,039 ratings and 96 reviews.

    Goodreads: 4.57*/5, based on 1,747 ratings and 184 reviews.

 

Excerpts...

    Wavy Gravy helped keep things light with a pair of tacky clown glasses with Groucho Marx eyebrows.  If anyone uttered the word “serious”, also known as “the S word,” the meeting came to a complete stop while the offender donned the funny glasses.  We avoided taking ourselves too seriously, even as we addressed deep suffering.  (Wavy and his wife, Jahanara, named their son Howdy Do-Good Gravy, although as soon as he was old enough, he changed it to Jordan.)  (pg. 293)

 

    From a Hindu perspective, you are born into what you need to deal with, your karmic predicament.  If you try to push anything away, whatever it is, the reaction against it creates more attachment, just like getting pulled into it.  It’s got your mind.  It was no accident that I was born into a Jewish family, and I finally was able to appreciate its mark on me.  Only when you honor your karma fully can you begin to be free.  (pg. 330)

 

“If a pickpocket comes to see a saint, all he sees are his pockets.”  (pg. 182)

    There’s only a smattering of profanity in Being Ram Dass; just 11 instances in the whole book.  Most of it was direct quotes of others, but frankly, I was surprised there was any at all.  I didn’t note any typos.

 

    If you’re homophobic, be aware that Richard Alpert was bisexual.  He doesn’t make a big deal of this in his memoir, but he doesn’t try to hide it either.  He worries that it will hinder his quest for Enlightenment, and is blown away that his guru Maharaj-ji, accepts him as he is.

 

    The only nit I have to pick concerns the criticism Ram Dass’s Harvard colleagues had with his (and Timothy Leary’s) tests, results, and evaluations of the psychedelics-for-inmates investigation.  Ram Dass felt their criteria was too objective and scientific-oriented, and not humanistic-oriented and subjective enough.  I found their criticisms valid, but hey, I’m a scientist, so that's not surprising.

 

    For me, Being Ram Dass was a thought-provoking, fascinating memoir.  Ram Dass was born in 1931, and died in 2019, which puts him a generation older than me.  But a lot of his experiences and insights resonated, and it was interesting to read a memoir where Eastern mysticism is a central theme, yet the text never becomes preachy.  We can debate the theological validity of Ram Dass’s spiritual beliefs, but we can’t dismiss the huge positive effect they had on his life.

 

    9½ Stars.  One last thing.  At one point, late in his life, Ram Dass relates a bad trip he experienced with a hallucinogen called “toad slime”.  He records that he took “a big hit” which induced a ”brief, intense trip” where he “turned into a large black woman surrounded by beings who were children, all suffering, hungry, frightened, sick.”   Wowza!

Starship Ass - Of Donkeys, Gods, and Space Pirates - Ethan Freckleton and J.R. Frontera

    2019; 264 pages.  Book 1 (out of 3) in the “Starship Ass” series.  New Author(s)? : Yes, and yes.  Genres: Humorous Science Fiction, Space Opera.  Overall Rating : 8*/10.

 

    Say hello to Buddy.  He’s an ass.

 

    I don’t mean that in a crude way; Buddy’s a donkey.  And if you say hello to him, he’ll probably say it back to you.

 

    Well okay, Buddy won’t say hello to you; but Harry will.  Harry’s a symbiont tick that uses Buddy as a host animal.  If you’re unfamiliar with the word ‘symbiont’, its definition is given below.  In effect, Harry/Buddy is a talking ass.

 

    Is this confusing?  Don’t worry.  The crew of space pirates who are about to attack the starship that Harry and Buddy are on will also find it quite weird.

 

What’s To Like...

    The title says it all: Starship Ass – Of Donkeys, Gods, and Space Pirates features donkeys, humans (which donkeys would deem to be gods), and space pirates all making their entries into the storyline by 6% Kindle, along with a sentient starship computer named “Node”.

 

    The action starts immediately—the space pirates quickly take over the freighter starship and take inventory of their newly-won cargo.  Sadly, it’s a rather meager haul: mostly cows, chickens and other edible animals, whose resale value is diminished by the need to keep them fed until a carnivore market can be found.  But the talking ass might be the most valuable find, since there’s a “Running of the Donkey” contest coming up soon on the nearby planet Irrakis.

 

    I liked the character development of both the good guys and the baddies.  Each one has his, her, or its individual quirks and personality, and the moral difference between “law-enforcing” and “outlaw” is delightfully blurry.  The pacing is good and there’s plenty of wit and humor to chuckle over, thanks mostly to Harry trying to fathom the ways and words of humans.  For instance, the phrase “I’m going to make you a star” completely mystified our protagonist.

 

    I enjoyed the literary nod to David Foster Wallace’s Infinite Jest, and the television nod to Deep Space Nine.  The vocabulary inclusion of words like rickrolled and jonesin’ also made me smile.

 

    Tension builds as our motley crew of space pirates strive to stay one step ahead of the authorities and still compete for the prize money in the Donkey Race.  They are mostly successful, although one plot thread remains open, presumably to be resolved in the sequel, Starship Ass – Of Donkeys, Dogs, and Rogue Bits, which waits for my attention on my Kindle.

 

Kewlest New Word ...

    Symbiont (n.) : an organism living in symbiosis, which is a close and interactive relationship of organisms of different species.

 

Ratings…
    Amazon:  4.4/5 based on 188 ratings and 49 reviews.

    Goodreads: 4.25/5 based on 117 ratings and 35 reviews.

 

Excerpts...

    Harry’s ears turned out sideways as he quickly got lost in the conversation.  But one word stood out as the strangest yet.  “Uckin’?”  He repeated the odd word.

    “Yarr,” answered Redbeard.  “The “F” is silent, cuz to say otherwise would be profane."  He paused to hurl a string of expletives that ended with “Uckin’ Feds” and spat.  (pg. 46)

 

    It was the strangest spaceship he’d ever seen . . . not that he’d seen many spaceships in his life.  But this one looked as if it had been constructed of pieces of other ships, all cobbled together to make one nonsensical whole.

    On top of that, instead of a dull gray hull like most spaceships had, it was painted a dizzying design in bright colors.  Antennas and radar dishes covered its uneven and patchwork surface.  In short, it looked like a hippie shack, if hippie shacks could fly in space.  (pg. 146)

 

Kindle Details…

    Starship Ass – Of Donkeys, Gods, and Space Pirates is presently FREE at Amazon.  The other two books go for $2.99 and $3.99 respectively.  I think this is a completed series.

 

Just focus on the job at hoof.  (pg. 62)

    The profanity in Starship Ass – Of Donkeys, Gods, and Space Pirates is moderate; I counted 10 instances in the first 20% of the book, a majority of which were of the eschatological variety.  Two cusswords were spellings in the “British Vulgar” ilk, which I always enjoy.

 

    The editing was good—just a couple of missing commas-in-dialogue, and a few typos such as feel/fell, fair/fare, etc.  Some reviewers were disappointed that there was no backstory as to how Harry/Buddy came to be on a spaceship bound for a meat-eating marketplace.  That’s a valid point, but see below.

 

    This is not an “epic sci-fi” tale; the good guys—as well as computers, droids, and ticks—live to see another day a pair of sequels.  I’d label this instead as a “beach read”, provided the beach is on the planet Dune or somewhere similar.  And within that context, I found this to be a fascinating, humorous, page-turning novel.

 

    8 Stars.  One last thing.  It turns out there is a prequel to this book, titled Starship Ass – Of Sporks, Overlords, and Moon Worms.  It’s written by the same authors and carried by Amazon in Kindle and Paperback formats., but for some unknown reason, is not listed as part of the Starship Ass series.

Go Dwarf Yourself - Martha Carr & Michael Anderle

    2022; 259 pages.  Book 1 (out of 12) in the Dwarf Bounty Hunter series.  New Author(s)? : Yes and Yes.  Genres : Urban Fantasy; Dwarves; Humorous Fantasy.  Overall Rating : 6*/10.

 

    Let’s be clear.  The dwarf Johnny Walker, bounty hunter par excellence, has been retired for fifteen years, and has no intention of changing that status.  He lives in solitary life in the Everglade Swamps of Florida, accompanied only by his two coonhounds, Rex and Luther.  Visitors are NOT encouraged.

 

    He has good reason to shun the bounty hunting vocation.  Fifteen years ago, his young daughter Dawn was brutally murdered during one of his jobs.  He still grieves.

 

    Now Agent Tommy Nelson, government liaison to monsters and magicals, wants to coax Johnny into unretiring.  He’s got a job that he thinks even Johnny won’t refuse.

 

    Three members of a family in New York City have been brutally murdered, apparently in gangland fashion, and a fourth member of the family, a daughter named Amanda, has been kidnapped.  And you can count on the gangsters to kill her in a most painful manner.  And here’s the kicker.

 

    Amanda is the same age as Johnny’s daughter Dawn was when she was slain.

 

What’s To Like...

   Go Dwarf Yourself is the opening volume of a 12-book fantasy series by co-authors Martha Carr and Michael Anderle.  To no one’s surprise, Johnny and his two coonhounds are talked into taking the case presented above, along with an agent of the government’s Bounty Hunter Division, Lisa Breyer.

 

    Johnny has just invented a pair of devices he calls “translating dog collars” which, when placed on Rex and Luther, allows them to communicate with him.  This instills a tinge of humor into this gritty Urban Fantasy, which I very much liked.  Agent Breyer rapidly becomes a worthy member of the bounty hunter team thanks to her half-elf lineage.

 

    If you like it when there’s a wide variety of magical creatures in your Urban Fantasy (and I do), you’re going to love Go Dwarf Yourself.  There are dwarves and elves, wizards and witches, plus gnomes and shifters.  And those are just the familiar species.  The authors also conjure up Willens, Kilomeans, Azrakans, and Oricerans, none of which I was familiar with.

 

    The first third of the book is a bit slow-paced, although that’s probably unavoidable as there is world-building to do.  Johnny, his dogs, and his new associate (Johnny gets irritated when she refers herself a "partner") arrive in New York City in search of information and contacts related to Amanda’s kidnapping.  But once they get a couple of leads, the pacing pick up nicely.

 

    The ending is a two-stage affair: the rescue of Amanda —hey, c’mon now; you know Johnny’s going to save her—and what to do with her once she's been freed.  Johnny agrees to take on a second job for the Feds, which I confidently predict will turn into eleven more jobs.

 

Kewlest New Word ...

    Ruched (adj.) : gathered into folds or pleats (as of clothes)

 

Ratings…
    Amazon:  4.5/5 based on 1,961 ratings and 191 reviews.

    Goodreads: 4.28/5 based on 1,355 ratings and 162 reviews.

 

Excerpts...

    Johnny glanced at the witch, who was still choking and holding her half-crushed throat.  A dark red light bloomed beneath her palms and he aimed the wizard’s gun at her.  “Whatever you’re tryin’ to do, don’t.”

    ”Johnny,” Rex snapped at the shifter.  “What do we do with this one?”

    “I can take him,” Luther nodded.  “He’s slow.”

    “Keep him there for a sec.”  He stepped toward the witch.  “Can you talk?”

    She sneered at him.  “Boneblade’s gonna rip you apart!”

    “That’s a yes.”  (pg. 59)

 

    “Check out the poodle,” Luther said.  “Man, she’s lookin’ twice at me.  Hot dog.”

    “Don’t even try it with city types, Luther.  We’re country hounds.  Doesn’t work.”

    “The way she’s waggin’ her tail says otherwise, brother.”

    “Trust me.  I saw a documentary by that historian.  That, uh . . .that Walt Disney guy.  Lady and the Tramp."  Rex snorted as his brother barked at the poodle.  “That was the one exception, man.  Not gonna work for you.”  (pg. 91)

 

 

Kindle Details…

    Go Dwarf Yourself currently sells for $5.99 at Amazon.  The other eleven books in the series have that price as well.  Alternatively, you can pick up this series in two 6-volume bundles, each of which costs $24.99 right now.

 

“False intelligence doesn’t look good on you, but I suppose we all have to work with what we have.”  (pg. 184)

    I counted 39 instances of cussing in the first 10% of Go Dwarf Yourself, which I frankly thought was excessive.  The R-rated theme of children being sold into slavery is also present.  In short, this is not a book you want little Timmy or Susie to read.

 

    It was fun to cross paths with new magical beasties, but there was little or no describing of them.  Perhaps that will be addressed in subsequent stories.  Some reviewers also criticized the lack of backstory as to how our world came to be infested with oodles of magicals, but that didn’t bother me.

 

    The big problem was the storytelling.  It is devoid of twists, and the combination of Johnny’s weaponry and Lisa’s spellcasting easily wins all the fights, no matter how many evil baddies get thrown against them.

 

    But maybe Go Dwarf Yourself was simply meant to be an introductory tale to the series.  Meet the recurring characters, get a glimpse of the magic systems, and be prepared for greater challenges for Johnny and his teammates as the series progresses.  I’ve got Book Two, Don’t Give A Dwarf, on my Kindle.  We’ll see if the baddies put up more of a fight in that tale.

 

    6 Stars.  One last thing.  Johnny Walker prefers his pizza “New York Style with Extra Pineapple”.  So do I, Johnny, so do I.

Triggerfish Twist - Tim Dorsey

    2002; 286 pages.  Book 4 (out of 26) in the Serge Storms series.  New Author? : No.  Genres : Florida Crime Noir; Dark Comedy; Stoner Humor.  Overall Rating : 8½*/10.

 

    Well, there goes the neighborhood!  Serge Storms and his stoner pal Coleman have just rented a house of Triggerfish Lane.  And where those two weirdos go, mischief and mayhem always ensue.

 

    To be fair, there are plenty of odd people already there.  Like the guy that cuts his lawn with a pair of scissors.  There’s a group of college students in another house, whose partying far outstrips their studying.  And there’s H. Ambrose Tarrington III, who must be a billionaire with a name like that.  About the only “normal” people are the Davenports, who just moved here to Tampa from Indiana due to the dad changing jobs.

 

    They all have one thing in common — each of them is renting their house here on Triggerfish Lane.  Someone’s been buying up lots of houses on this street and turning them into rentals.  That’s been driving the house prices down, causing lots of longtime residents to sell before the home value plummets even further.  Which creates more rentals for the unknown investor.

 

    But that sounds like a money-losing investment.  Why would anyone buy up homes that he knows will quickly go down in value?

 

What’s To Like...

   Triggerfish Twist is the fourth book in Tim Dorsey’s “Serge Storms” series. It’s my 12^th read from that series, although I’m not reading them in any particular order.

 

    The book starts with the Davenport family moving from Logansport, Indiana to Tampa, then breaks up into various plotlines that follow the lives of people already living on Triggerfish Lane.  Many of the plot threads interconnect, and there’s an overarching one that details the antics of our psychopathic protagonist, Serge, and his stoner buddy, Coleman.  They are joined by Sharon, whose drug usage puts even Coleman to shame.  I don’t recall her from any other books in this series, but I haven’t read Book Three yet, Orange Crush, and suspect she was introduced there.

 

    As always, the story is set in Florida, and also as always one of the sidelights is some self-improvement effort by Serge.  Here, he decides it’s time to give up his violent ways and learn to live the calm, respectable lifestyle that he sees in his neighbors.  Good luck with that, Serge.

 

    Tim Dorsey packs the text with lots of historical trivia, usually courtesy of Serge, and always fascinating.  Here we learn about things like Levittown suburbs, Crispus Attucks, and how Led Zeppelin’s Stairway to Heaven hit song allegedly has the phrase “pass the butter, Satan” in it when you play it backwards.  The author also manages to sneak 18 musical band references into the tale, along with quoting several song lyrics.  Take it from me, his musical tastes are awesome.

 

     Everything builds to an over-the-top, exciting set of climaxes, with a couple of neat twists added to keep you on your toes.  An Epilogue in a “whatever happened to” format closes things out, which I thought was perfectly done.

 

Ratings…
    Amazon:  4.4/5 based on 1,053 ratings and 179 reviews.

    Goodreads: 4.11/5 based on 5,588 ratings and 375 reviews.

 

Excerpts...

    “You ever get that weird feeling where you see a car exactly like yours?” asked Jim.

    “What do you mean?”

    “You know—you’re not really paying attention, daydreaming about stuff, and you see the same car coming the other way.  And for a split second you think it’s your car, and maybe you’re inside it.  But then who’s inside this car?  Like a mirror universe thing.  Know what I mean?  Ever get that feeling?”

    “We’re switching to decaf.”  (loc. 1079)

 

    Coleman stood at the dairy case and grabbed an aerosol can of whipped cream.  He stuck the end in his mouth and sprayed.  For some reason, regular aerosol doesn’t work with whipped cream, and they have to use nitrous oxide instead.  And, sitting of a grocery shelf, the laughing gas separates and rises to the top of the cream.

    “You again!” yelled the night manager.  “I told you to stay out of my whipped cream!”  (loc. 3452)

 

 

Kindle Details…

    Triggerfish Twist currently sells for $5.49 at Amazon.  The rest of the books in the series range in price from $1.99 to $14.99.  Generally, the newer the book, the higher the price, although there are a couple of exceptions.

 

“Bachelor number three, if you could be any kind of cheese . . .” (loc. 3054)

    There’s plenty of cussing in Triggerfish Twist.  I counted 17 instances in the first 10% of the book, which is about normal for a Serge Storms tale.  Thanks to Coleman and Sharon, references to drugs run rampant, with mescaline, coke, and even ‘shrooms getting mentioned.  References to adult situations and anatomy are also plentiful.  This is the norm for this series, and contributes to its humor.

 

    I only spotted two typos: Porches/Porsches and Simeon/Simian, and there were several paragraph breaks in the middle of sentences.  Al]so, if one of the reasons you read Tim Dorsey’s books is for Serge’s penchant for conceiving "exotic executions", there are a pair of those here.  I think that's a bit below the usual amount; but hey, Serge is trying to fit in with the rest of the quiet, middle-class neighborhood.

 

    Overall, Triggerfish Twist is another fine story in the Serge Storms series.  The pacing is fast, the humor and wit is abundant; the historical details are interesting, and the storytelling is top-notch.  If you’re a veteran Tim Dorsey reader, Triggerfish Twist will not disappoint.  If you’re new to the series, this is as good of a place to start as any, provided R-rated stuff doesn’t offend you.

 

    8½ Stars.  One last thing.  One of the main roadway links between Triggerfish Lane and Tampa is Dale Mabry Highway.  What?  You say you’ve never heard of Dale Mabry?  Me neither.  Wiki him; he’s real.  I’dd also never heard of the titular “Triggerfish”.  They’re real too, so wiki them as well.  Just don’t go putting your hand in an aquarium full of triggerfish.