Category Archives: book reviews

America, book reviews, History, memories

Book Review: The Yellowstone Story

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Volume 1 went from boring to overbearing, but managed to get the story across.

It was probably in 2008, during our last trip to Yellowstone National Park, that I dropped in a bookstore outside the park and bought two books, The Yellowstone Story, Volumes 1 and 2. I read the first chapter of Volume 1 right away, got busy with other things, and set it aside. When we got home I picked it up again, read the next four chapters, and laid it aside, wondering if I’d wasted my money.

You see, the first five chapters were, to the best of my recollection, boring. They were about the years before the creation of the park, and were essentially: This party came to Yellowstone from this direction, saw this and that, and left by that direction. Chapter after chapter. No wonder I put it down.

But several months ago, I was in The Dungeon, looking for things to get rid of, and my eyes landed on a short stack of books that had been damaged by water maybe fifteen years ago. I figured I would read these (if the water hadn’t rendered them unreadable), then sell or donate them. One was The Potter’s Wheel—it was very readable. Another was Christ and the Inheritance of the Saints—it was more badly damaged and deteriorated by age, and unreadable. Two others were the two volumes of The Yellowstone Story.

Volume 1 is lightly damaged, whereas Vol 2 severely damaged. Remembering how boring Vol 1 was at the start, I still decided to read it so that I could discard it. So after finishing What If Jesus Was Serious, I opened Vol 1 to chapter 6, about 1/3 into the 326 page book, and began reading. It was the story of the formation of the park. And the story was quite interesting—for a while.

As the story of the early years of the park unfolded, the book bombards the reader with names of people and places. I found keeping them straight was impossible. Buckskin Jim, Yellowstone John. Bill the Hunter. Whatever they were, they all ran together very quickly.

If you could get through the names, the story was good enough. This was the USA’s first national park, and no one really knew how it should be run. Local folks from nearby Montana and Wyoming began poaching game and stealing timber. The railroads fought over which one could run a spur into the park. Visitors had poor accommodations and brought bad reports home. But somehow, the park survived the encroachments and ineffective leaders.

Volume 1 ended with the ending of civilian leadership, around 1885, thirteen years after the park was formed. Volume 2 must start with the first government leaders. I finished Vol 1 yesterday, but will hold off on Vol 2 (if it is sufficiently readable) a couple of weeks while family things are front and center. Vol 1 was extremely well researched, with numerous endnotes making reference to park records, letters, newspapers, Congressional and Territorial records. I started reading them but quickly gave up as being too time consuming. The book is truly written on a scholarly level. It is far from the typical souvenir book you buy at tourist sites.

So how do I rate this book, will I ever read it again, and what do I do with it? Despite the boredom of the early chapters and name bombardment from cover to cover, I give it 4-stars. I don’t think I will ever read it again, unless I read some in the early chapters to see if my seventeen-year-old judgement is the same. I’ll hang on to it until I get past however much of Vol 2 I can read, then I will dispose of them in whatever way seems best.

book reviews, Christianity, Wesley

Book Review: “The Journals of John Wesley”

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For the second time in just a few months, I ended finished reading three books at about the same time—in this case just a day apart. I finished The Potter’s Wheel one day, What If Jesus Was Serious the next, and The Journals of John Wesley, Vol 2 the day after that.

I bought a full set of the Wesley Journals, the edition edited by Nehemiah Curnock about twenty years ago when I was thinking of writing a small-group study about Wesley. The writing project died, and the journals sat on a shelf in the basement, all eight volumes. Sometime about three or four years ago, I decided it was time to read it, and pulled out and read Vol. 1. As best as I can remember, I kind of enjoyed that volume. Then, early last year, I pulled out Volume 2 and decided to read it for my morning devotions. I quickly found out that this journal, maybe especially this volume, didn’t real work well as a devotional.

I could find only one set of the Curnock edition for sale on Advanced Book Exchange. Mine will be $80 chapter than that one.

The book really consists of a mix of Wesley’s journal and his diary, along with many notes by editor Curnock. I tried to read the diary and journal chronologically. I was able to do that, but found it tedious. The diary had entries pretty much every day, whereas the journal had entries maybe every few days. Keeping track of where I was was tedious. As was reading the diary. There wasn’t much devotional about the diary, which was bland entries on what Wesley did those days. Both would be of great interest to a biographer, but they didn’t make for inspirational reading.

A typical page in the journal, where the reader has to juggle the diary, the journal, and the copious footnotes.

Actually, there wasn’t much devotional about the journal either. During the period of this volume, 1738 to 1742, Wesley was in the early days of the Methodist movement. He visited the Moravian Church in Germany, then got into disputes with them about worship practices and the fine points of salvation doctrine. He started field preaching at the suggestion of George Whitefield, then got into disputes with him over salvation doctrine. He also disputed with some early Methodists, who came to believe something different about salvation. It’s hard to take inspiration from a man who is mainly disputing with everyone.

Toward the end of the volume was a change. The diary ceased (Wesley’s biographers figure Wesley still kept a diary volume, but that a books of it is missing). The journal seemed to expand and deal more with the inspirational moments of the growing Methodist movement and less about disputes. It became much more pleasurable reading. It makes me wonder how the next volume is.

But I’m not sure I’ll find out. I’ve decided I won’t read the rest of them. I have too many things to read to think I’ll ever get to Volumes 3 through 8. Right after I post this, I’m going to put an ad up for selling the set, for a pretty penny of course. But while waiting for them to sell, maybe—just maybe—I’ll read a little of Vol. 3.

But how do I rate this series? For devotional purposes, 1-star. For historical purposes, 5-stars.

Bible study, book reviews, Christianity

Book Review: “What If Jesus Was Serious?”

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Interesting but simple doodles helped Jethani illustrate his points;

Over a year ago, our pastor did a sermon series based on concepts in the book What If Jesus Was Serious by Skye Jethani. The book is based on the Sermon on the Mount. Up until that series, I had never heard of the book or of the author. Pastor Jeni’s sermon series was very good. So when the pastors of our church put together a space where we can borrow some of their books. I checked, this one was available, so I borrowed it. And I’m glad I did.

The book consists of seventy-two chapters, each two pages long, dealing with a small part of the sermon. Jethani’s point is that, if Jesus was serious in what he said, and we really think about what each point means, we will have to change our lives. Each chapter includes a sketch—a doodle—at the start that illustrates the point.  A number of these doodles are on the book cover.

The Sermon on the Mount is worth studying over and over. To see it from different eyes, hearing a little different take on it, is good. Jethani brought out points I never thought of, so that’s good. I found only one area I disagreed with him on. In Chapter 21, he said that guardrails (i.e. self-imposed barriers to our behavior) are good, but living at such a higher plane that you don’t need guardrails is better. I’ve read too many accounts of Christians in the limelight have benefitted from having established rigorous guardrails for themselves to agree with Jethani. At the same time, stories of Christians who haven’t established and lived by guardrails have had moral failures. Maybe Jethani is right, and not needing guardrails is superior to living by guardrails, but I’m not convinced.

The main thing I didn’t like about the book was the short chapters. I think I’d have liked 3 or 4 page chapters with a little more examination of the scripture point. On more than a few chapters, I was left a bit confused at Jethani’s point. Some more explanation would have benefitted me.

Oh, and I must say that Pastor Jeni’s sermons were much better than the book. Of course, she had more time to go into each point than the books did. And, no, the sermon series was not seventy-two weeks long.

My rating? If I could put 3.5-stars, I would. But, sticking to whole numbers, I give it 4-stars. Since I read this in a borrowed book, whether or not it’s a keeper isn’t a question. But I won’t be acquiring a copy for my library.

book reviews, Christianity

Book Review: “The Potter’s Wheel”

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Printed in London in 1897. But other books have the same or similar titles.

In the further interest of decumulation leading toward downsizing, I’ve been looking for books in the house that look like they would be good reads but which I wouldn’t likely read a second time, or want to keep. I found several right in The Dungeon that meet the criteria. One I finished a few days ago is The Potter’s Wheel, a 1897 book by John Watson, D.D.

This book falls into the category of not knowing where I got it. The book I have was printed in 1897 and may be a first edition. It’s also severely water damaged. How did that happen, and where did I get this book? Did I buy it used with this water damage? Was it on one of the four bookshelves that took some water damage when our hot water heater sprung a leak while we were on vacation? Don’t know. I thought I got this book about ten to fifteen years ago from Lynda’s cousin whose father-in-law had been a pastor. But the book doesn’t have his name in it, nor any markings you would expect to see in a pastor’s study book. So where I got it will remain a mystery.

The water damage isn’t real obvious in this photo, but it’s real.

Another mystery is what this book is about. I mean, it’s a book about the Christian religion, but toward what end? As I read it, it was somewhat good as a devotional book but not as a discipleship book. What was Watson’s intent? What did he hope readers would take away from reading this? I found this discussion at a place where a used copy was for sale.

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work…Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

Well, after reading that, I feel rather stupid at not recognizing the apparent brilliance of this book. At another site where the book is for sale, I found this.

One of Canada’s foremost early philosophers instrumental in the Hegelian movement that dominated Canada until WW1 and one of the most influential academic figures in Queen’s University history, introducing the disciplines of Psychology, Economics and Political Studies to the curriculum.

Now I’m confused. But to add to the confusion I found this description at yet another site.

The Potter’s Wheel is a novel written by John Watson and published in 1897. The story revolves around the life of a potter named David Grant, who lives in a small village in Scotland….

Except that last one is actually a modern novel by a man named Jeremy Benson, and the selling site did a poor job listing the book.

So yes, I’m confused. The book talks about the Christian life, with little hints of how God, as the skillful potter, will mold us from lumps of clay. Except that purpose for writing didn’t come through clearly in my read. And I read this on my noon reading time, in an undistracted way.

So how do I rate this book? Very readable. But loses points for failure to achieve a clear purpose. Overall, only 3-stars. I wish I could rate it higher, because I feel like I’m missing something that I should have gotten. But this is not a keeper. It goes up for sale tonight.

book reviews, History

More On The Bounty Trilogy: It’s A Lie

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1790 depiction of the Bounty’s launch being cast off with Bligh and those loyal to him.

As I said in my last post, I really enjoyed reading The Bounty Trilogy, especially reading it as I did, switching between the three volumes to get the story chronologically. I liked the way the story in Volume 1, Mutiny On The Bounty, agreed with my memories of seeing the 1962 movie and the comic book (graphic novel) I had. That book followed the story of Roger Byam, an upper class Brit who shipped on the Bounty for the purpose of putting together a grammar/dictionary of the Tahitian language.

Byam took no part in the mutiny, but did not leave the ship with Captain Bligh due to the Bounty‘s launch being overloaded. He was one of a dozen or so non-mutineers who went back to Tahiti on the ship and were left there when the Bounty sailed on in search of a hiding place. Byam and the others were captured a couple of years later when the Brits sent a ship to hunt down the mutineers. He faced a court martial and was found guilty, in part due to a certain sailor’s absence, a sailor who had witnessed a conversation that worked against his defense. That witnessed finally arrived back in Britain, testified on Byam’s behalf, and the conviction was reversed.

I enjoyed the book so much I wanted to read more. I went first to Wikipedia and read there, but I still wanted more. One problem with the Wikipedia article is that Byam was not listed as being part of the ship’s crew. I searched some more and found several items at JStor, a site I’ve registered at to have access to scholarly articles. The first article I read was “Nordhoff and Hall’s Mutiny on the Bounty: A Piece of Colonial Historical Fiction”. Charles Nordhoff
and James Norman Hall wrote The Bounty Trilogy. The article was written by Sylvie Largeaud-Ortega, of the University of French Polynesia. It’s not really an article, but rather a chapter in a 2018 book titled The Bounty from the Beach: Cross-Cultural and Cross-Disciplinary Essays. Here’s what I learned from reading that:

It’s all a lie! The one book Mutiny on the Bounty can barely be considered historical fiction, and it certainly isn’t history. The point-of-view character, Byam, is fictional. No such man shipped on the Bounty, there was no linguistic mission on the voyage. The book, alleged to have been taken from Byam’s recollection, had no such recollection to draw from.

Oh, I am so angry about this! Ms Largeaud-Ortega has destroyed, for me, a 60 year-old memory and ruined a recent pleasurable read. I’ll have more to say about her article/chapter in my next post.

I suppose I should have known that it’s likely that a novel, and a movie made from the novel, might not be faithful to history, but in my interaction with Bounty dramatization it never occurred. And now I’m disappointed.

Don’t get me wrong. I enjoyed reading the book and I’m not sorry I devoted the time to it. The movie was good. The old graphic novel was good. But, man, I sure was taken in thinking it was history.

book reviews, History

Book Review: The Bounty Trilogy

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I’m really glad I found this on the shelf of legacy books of my family.

Many years ago I saw the 1962 movie Mutiny on the Bounty, starring Marlon Brando and Trevor Howard. Young as I was at the time, I thought it was a great movie. I remember that I also had a comic book (a graphic novel?) of the Bounty story. But it followed a different story with a different end. I have good memories of both the movie and the comic book, remembering details of what the characters did and what happened to them.

On our living room bookshelf was a book The Bounty Trilogy, containing three novels in one book. I knew it had to be about the Bounty adventure, but didn’t know what it contained. Once I started listing our legacy books for sale, I saw The Bounty Trilogy on the shelf, listed it on Facebook Marketplace, and wished I could read it before it sold. I finished whatever book I was reading sometime last month, and decided, “Why not start it?” At an advertised price of $20, I figured it might not sell quickly. if I could read 10 pages a day, it would take me over two months to finish. I took the book from the sale shelf and started, not being sure whether I hoped it sold or didn’t.

I suppose I’m a sucker for sea exploration stories.

The three novels are

  • Mutiny on the Bounty, covering the Bounty‘s sail from England, landing at Tahiti, start of the return trip, the mutiny, the lives of some of the men who went back to Tahiti, including the capture of some and their court martial in England. It is told from the point of view of Roger Byam, an educated man who sailed for the purpose of putting together a grammar and dictionary of the Tahitian language. This is the POV that was in my graphic novel so many years ago.
  • Men Against the Sea, telling the story of those sailors loyal to Captain Bligh that were put in the Bounty‘s launch to fend for themselves. Rather than land at some nearby island that was inhabited by people hostile to European boats, Blight sailed the open boat 3,600 miles to the island of Timor, where he knew there was a European colony.
  • Pitcairn’s Island. This is where a large number of the mutineers, including Fletcher Christian (2nd in command who led the mutiny), landed to hide out. The island was mis-charted on all British maps. It was almost 20 years before an American boat found them, and another six years before a British ship. By that time all but one of mutineers had died at the hands of others.
5-Stars for this sea story. Multiple points of view were not hard to follow.

The mutiny took place on pages 98-112 of the book. I reached that point after about eight days of reading. The cast of characters split into two points of view: the mutineers and a few loyal men sailing east in the Bounty’s launch sailing west. I decided to read the two POVs simultaneously. That was easy enough, as the open launch reached Timor a couple months, and the Bounty’s contingent reached Tahiti in a similar time frame. It was only a month before those people split up, some remaining on Tahiti and taking their chance that no British ship would visit there soon, and some sailing in the Bounty in search of an isolated place to hide. At that point, I began reading in three places in the volume. That got somewhat complicated, but I think I was able to keep the three POVs straight and chronological.

The book included a few color plates.

The book was exceedingly well written. Maybe I’m a sucker for sea exploration, but I devoured this book, finishing it in less than a month. I found the story of Byam’s life faithful to the comic book. Every detail I remembered from all those years ago were in the first book, do that pleased me. Except they talked a lot more about Byam’s dictionary and grammar than I remembered.

One sad part of the book was the death of Byam’s mother, perhaps brought on by an ugly letter Bligh wrote her. She died while Byam was enroute to England to face a court martial.

Toward the end, I was reading at the rate of 50 pages a day. It’s been a long time since I’ve found a book interesting enough to devote this much time to reading. I give the book 5-stars. But is it a keeper? Alas, no. I’ll keep it listed for sale. I hope it goes to someone who really wants to read it.

But, having said all of this, look for my next post, which is a follow-up to this, telling more that I’ve learned.

book reviews, C.S. Lewis, Christianity

Book Review: C.S. Lewis and the Bright Shadow of Holiness

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This 1999 book is likely of interest only to the staunchest of Lewis students.

In June we made a trip to Lake Jackson, TX to first watch two of our four grandkids and family pets, then to pick up grandson Ezra to spend a week with us. While there, I went through their shed and found books gathering dust. I brought two back with me: The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis and the Bright Shadow of Holiness by Gerard Reed. I’ve always intended to read The Hobbit, and have put it in my reading pile. I have other Tolkien items to read first. The other I couldn’t resist, being a Lewis fan. It came to the top of the pile in late October, and I finished its 177 pages in about 15 days.

I’m not sure that I got everything out of this book that I hoped to. It was kind of hard to understand the author’s purpose, and so I didn’t think that helped in my understanding.

This won’t be a long review. I’ll return this to my son-in-law on the next trip to Texas. I don’t plan on reading it again. I give it 3-stars. On to my next Lewis read, which will be an attempt at The Allegory of Love.

book reviews, poetry

Book Review: William Wordsworth

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This not a keeper. I kept falling asleep as I read it.

Some time ago, I pulled out Dorothy Wordsworth’s Grasmere Journals, read them, and reviewed them on the blog. I knew I had a book of William Wordworth’s Poetry, and thought it would be a good time to find and read it. I was pretty sure it was in a certain place, my bookshelf in the storeroom, and sure enough it was there.

So I dusted it off, brought it up to the sunroom for my noon reading, began reading it every day, and promptly fell asleep. The book was boring! Boring in the extreme.

I’ve another poetry book I found I couldn’t read. It wasn’t boring, but it just wasn’t enjoyable. It wasn’t my kind of poetry. But Wordsworth’s was closer to what I wrote and the type I like to read. So I can’t really explain my aversion to Wordsworth’s poems.

Or maybe I can. In the preface to Lyrical Ballads, Wordsworth explained his philosophy of poetry: that it should in the common language of the day, with meter added. I guess that’s what he did. His poetry is in very plain language, heavy on scene description, short on words that want to keep me reading.

The book of poetry that I didn’t like, I was determined to stick with it until I had read 20 percent of the book. I tried to do that with Wordsworth’s but couldn’t. I stopped at about 12 percent. No, I’m not going to pick this book up again and finish it. In fact, I plan on taking it to the next meeting of my critique group and see if anyone there wants it. If they don’t, it goes straight into donation pile.

Oh, yes, I give it just 2-stars.

book reviews, books

Book Review: “The Letters of Virginia Woolf, Vol. 3”

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This was a good read for me, but probably of little interest to most readers.

A few months ago, when looking for the next book I wanted to read. There’s no shortage of bookshelves in the house, plus a couple of dozen e-books on my phone. I wanted to read something I was fairly sure I would enjoy yet wouldn’t want to keep. I was in an obscure part of our basement, where we had a few dozen books on a shelf, and I spied the perfect book: The Letters of Virginia Woolf: Vol. 3.

I have no idea where we picked up this book (at a used bookstore or garage sale, no doubt) nor when (at least eight years ago). When I bought it (and it had to be me—Lynda wouldn’t have spent even 50¢ on it. And I knew next to nothing about Virginia Woolf other than a vague notion that she was a writer.

Pulling her letters off the shelf and diving into them caused me to do a little research on her. She was a British author of novels and prose. The period of the letters in this volume, 1923-1928. During this time Woolf wrote three of her novels: Mrs. Dalloway, To The Lighthouse, and Orlando. She was also writing articles and reviews for literary magazines and, on occasion, giving lectures.

And writing letters. The book includes 637 letters. That’s one letters every 3.5 days—and that’s just the letters that have been collected. No doubt she wrote other letters that the recipients didn’t preserve.

The letters were more personal than business. Many were to Woolf’s sister,  Vanessa Bell. Many others were to a good friend from adulthood, Vita Sackville-West. Much of the contents we would consider gossip. Woolf was part of what is known the Bloomsbury Set, a group of authors and critics that met in the Bloomsbury section of London. Their heyday was 1905-1920 or so. Thus, this volume is after the days of Bloomsbury.

But Bloomsbury still played a part in in Woolf’s life. Many of the letters are to those who had been part of the Bloomsbury set. They talked about their writings and thoughts, but also about each other and about others in their set. Yes, gossip. And Woolf admitted as much in her letters. I read the book over July to Nov 2024, with an interruption of about a month due hospital stays and illness.

So I come down to my usual questions. How do I rate this book and why do I rate it thusly, will I ever read it again, is it a keeper, and do I recommend it to others. I give it 4-stars, mainly because I like to read letters as unfiltered history. I would have to say, however, that I’ve enjoyed other collections of letters more. I got through all 575 pages, but at times I would read a paragraph, and wonder what I had just read. Was it distracted reading by me or material in the letters that failed to hold my attention.

I don’t see myself ever reading this again, thus it isn’t a keeper. I also don’t recommend it. That is, unless Virgina Woolf is a literary study for you, or you just like reading letters—any letters.  One warning if you do want to find and read this letter. My copy was a trade paperback, and it fell apart in two pieces as I rea it. So be gentle with it if you do read it.

 

Bible study, book reviews, Christianity

Book Review: Astronomy and the Bible

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A good, short read, I highly recommend it.

Lynda and I are in the process of selling books. Not books I’ve written, but books in our personal inventory: books we inherited from parents or bought though the years. One man who bought one book from me wanted to browse what we had. In a box tucked away in our basement storeroom was a book Astronomy and the Bible. It was published in the 1980s, but I don’t remember seeing it before.

The author, Donald B. DeYoung, is a scientist and university professor of physics and astronomy. In his years of teaching and speaking at many events, both academic and Christian, he’s had to answer many questions. How are star distances measured?  Has the earth’s tilt changed? What is a quasar? What is the Anthropic Principal? The book consists of these questions and DeYoung’s answers.

I found the book fascinating, and easy reading. The format of questions and answers facilitated quick reading, DeYoung’s answer style also made for easy reading. I was able to finish the book before the buyer came to pick it up.

Since the book was published in 1989, the two deep-space telescopes have been implemented by NASA. We know a lot more about the universe than we did at the time of publication. A few of his answers would be somewhat different in 2024 than they were in 1989. But except for that, the book seems accurate even today.

DeYoung is a professing Christian, and a believer in a young earth. He says there is some evidence in the cosmos for creation about 10,000 years ago. But he does a good job of presenting both old earth and young earth evidence. The reader can decide, taking DeYoung’s answers with other works, both scholarly and popular, and come to their own conclusions.

I give this book 5-stars. It’s a short read, and a good read. But it is sold, so I will likely never read it again. If you’re interested in the subject, and happen to find a used copy of this 35-year-old work, go ahead and read it. I recommend it.