Bob's Books

Why this book: I’ve had it on my shelf for decades – probably bought at a used book sale.  I’ve found biographies great to listen to, and so when my wife and I were going on  a long road trip, I suggested we listen to a biography, I offered her a number of options, and she picked this one. Having the print version to refer to with the pictures and maps was a nice-to-have.

Summary in 4 sentences: By many regarded as one of the best and probably the most famous biography of one of  America’s most famous heroes of the 20th century.   This biography begins with his father, recipient of the Medal of Honor for actions during the Civil War, Douglas MacArthur’s youth, and ascendancy thru the ranks in the Army, to include multiple awards for heroism in WW1, until he’s become the senior officer in the US Army in 1935.  Then the final two thirds or more of the book recounts his leadership in WWII, concluding with a detailed look at what led to Truman firing him as the leader of the US and UN’s efforts in Korea, and then the final decade and a half of his life – in which old soldiers just fade away.   Impressive in this book is Manchester’s editorializing and commentary on MacArthur’s great successes and failings throughout. 

My Impressions: MacArthur has been an often reviled figure in American history – and certainly he deserves some of that antipathy.  But this book reveals that indeed he was an extremely gifted and talented leader – he didn’t get to be a 5 star general simply by being arrogant and self-serving.  I am much more impressed with him now than I was before, when basically all I knew about him was that somehow he failed to defend the Philippines at the onset of WW2, vowed “I shall return,” and was humiliated and fired for defying President Truman’s injunctions during the Korean War.  Indeed he was a vain, and somewhat pompous prima donna, and self-righteous in his views of how to fight wars.  But there was much more to the man than that. 

I can honestly say after reading American Caesar that Douglas MacArthur one of the the most fascinating men I’ve ever read about. He is a mixture of so much good, which interestingly enough is the up-side of his flaws – egotism, vanity, not just the courage but also the arrogance of his convictions.  His reputation in the US today is that of a self-important prima donna who disobeyed President Truman and was justifiably fired – the first and only 5-Star flag officer ever relieved of command.   

Indeed MacArthur was all of those things BUT that may well be the least important part of the story.  There is little disagreement about his brilliance as a Fighting General, and apart from some poor judgment in preparing the Philippines for Japanese aggression at the onset of WWII, his decisions as the lead strategist for Allied forces in the South Pacific are almost universally regarded as brilliant; his performance and decisions as Pro Consul ??? of the Philippines after WWII are still revered in the Philippines, and he is universally praised as the architect of Japan’s post war transition to democracy and affluence in the world.  Also, until he was relieved by Truman, his performance overseeing the Korean War has been studied and admired by generations of military leaders.  

MacArthur was certainly a flawed man, but what great man isn’t!   Churchill once said “Good and Great are seldom in the same man.”   Throughout this brilliant biography, Manchester editorializes on MacArthur’s actions, decisions, behaviors, offering insightful and cogent criticism of some of what he said and did, but balancing these comments with different perspectives and his and other’s praise for his unusually brilliant accomplishments, often for decisions he made against the recommendations of other less creative, less decisive leaders.  Given that his most controversial decisions frequently, almost always, yielded the results he promised,,it is perhaps understandable that he would usually disregard objections to his ideas from his staffs, his contemporaries, his superiors. That lack of humility and willingness to occasionally question his own convictions was however, eventually his undoing. 

But the book starts at the beginning – actually with MacArthurs father.  Arthur MacArthur was a young enlistee from Wisconsin in the Union army and was awarded the Medal of Honor for his role in the spontaneous (no officer directing) charge uphill to take a seemingly impregnable Confederate position on Missionary ridge in the battle of Chattanooga during the Civil War.  Arthur MacArthur stayed in the army after the Civil War and Douglas grew up on remote army posts all over the country until he went to West Point himself.  His father rose to be a Lt General in the Army, at the time, the highest rank in the army, was idolized by his son Douglas, and set an example for courage and conviction that Douglas would live up to and surpass in his lifetime.

Manchester’s writing is superb – a master of the English language and his commentary on MacArthur and his times was so articulate and masterful that it sometimes took my breath away.  

A couple of the more interesting human-interest sides of this bio, apart from the more high profile military and political aspects of his life, include that as manly and heroic as MacArthur was, he was deeply devoted to his  mother, and she to him.  While at West Point, he apparently was engaged to be married to several women at the same time, and his mother helped disentangle him from that complexity.  As a field grade officer he  had a mistress – a kept woman that he secretly supported in an apartment in DC for quite some time.   He eventually had a short term marriage to a high society flapper, which only lasted a couple of years, but he did eventually marry a woman who idolized him and he took good care of her, though she did call him “My General.”  They had a son who MacArthur doted on, but who after MacArthur’s death changed his name and disappeared into obscurity. 

The biography of Douglas MacArthur follows his career from his time at West Point, where he was the Brigade commander and graduated with an exceptional  record.  As a junior officer he distinguished himself in fighting in the Philippines against insurrectionists, in Mexico when we almost went war with Mexico at the beginning of the 20th century, and during WW1 where he was awarded numerous awards for exceptional courage and bravery.  He led an incredible life until his passing at the age of 84 in 1964.  His biography is chronological, and I’ll briefly list the chapters in the book, with a note or two on each:

1. Ruffles and Flourishes 1880-1917 – About his father’s service in the Army during and after the Civil War, his family background and childhood, his time at West Point and early years as a Junior Officer in the pre WW1 Army.
2. Charge 1917-1918  His experiences in WW1. He distinguished himself with bravery and leadership that was extraordinary, one of the few officers who led his men out of the trenches to assault the enemy.  His men loved him and he was awarded seven Silver Stars for bravery and rose from the rank of Major to Brigadier General in the few years he served in that war. .
3. Call to Quarters 1919-1935 -Charted his rise in rank and prestige eventually becoming at age 50 the youngest man ever to be appointed Chief of Staff of the Army.
4. To the Colors (1935-1941) HIs appointment to Field Marshall of the Philippine Army.  His father had also been the senior US military officer in the Philippines after the Spanish American War – when MacArthur was a young man.  This chapter covers Douglas MacArthur’s futile efforts to prepare the Philippines and gain support from the US to prepare for expected Japanese attack on the Philippines. 
5. Retreat (1941-1942) The final years prior to the Japanese attack, then the debacle during Japan’s attack, his retreat to Bataan and Corregidor, a fortress Island in Manila Bay and eventually being ordered to leave the Philippines for Australia where he was assigned Supreme Allied Commander of US forces South Pacific..
6. The Green War (1942-44) As the Supreme Commander of US and Allied Forces in the South Pacific, his strategy and actions pushing back and retaking islands the Japanese had taken and protecting Australia.  His generalship here is widely regarded as brilliant and a key to US victory in the Pacific.
7. At High Port (1944-1945) This period covers the last years of the War, his return to the Philippines, his re-establishing of a government in the Philippines, the island hopping campaign toward Japan,  and how he worked together with Nimitz and the Navy to secure the victory. Apparently he was not privy to the planned bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
8. Last Post 1945-1950) This fascinating section is about how MacArthur as Supreme Commander Allied Powers in defeated Japan resisted calls to punish Japan; rather he made sure that they retained their dignity and helped establish a democracy in a society with no such tradition.  He had almost absolute power and he was at his best here. 
9. Sunset Gun (1950-1951) This section covers the Korean War – MacArthur simultaneously running Japan and being the supreme commander of the UN efforts to stop the North Koreans and eventually the Chinese in Korea.  His decision to land at Inchon, against the advice or everyone, including the Joint Chiefs was his crowning achievement, but the follow-on is where his vision and Truman’s and the UN’s parted ways. 
10. Recall 1951) A detailed look at the events and misunderstandings that led to Truman firing MacArthur.  Manchester clearly believed Truman was justified; he is also very critical of the way it was done.  
11. Taps 1951-1954) MacArthur’s life after he was relieved in Japan and Korea by Truman.  When he returned to America he was hailed as a hero and got more positive attention than Eisenhower – and MacArthur thrived on this adulation.   Manchester is quite critical of MacArthur’s behavior after the famous firing, his parading around the country arguing against Truman’s and the government’s foreign policy.  He mellowed in his later years and continued to be regarded as an American hero, consulted by Eisenhower and Kennedy administrations. 

This is a great biography of one of the most complex and compelling figures in American History and his life is fascinating lens through which to look at American history, especially the US Army and American policy in Asia prior to during and after WWII.  Many of the issues he wrestled with and warnings he gave 70 years ago, are still relevant today. 

An excellent and more thorough review of American Caesar by Nathan Eberline can be found here  https://www.nathaneberline.com/blog/american-caesar

Why this book: Strongly recommended by Tim Ferriss and Mike Rowe.  I’d also read Gaiman’s The Ocean at the End of the Lane and found Gaiman’s magical realism not only enjoyable but stimulating.  I was inspired to read something different, and so finally got around to ordering this book.

Summary in 3 Sentences: A toddler unwittingly escapes a brutal murder of his family, by simply wandering out of the house and down the street at night and into a cemetery, while the family’s murderer was at his grisly work.  The child encounters the ghosts of those buried in the graveyard, and they hide and protect him from the murderer who comes looking for him, and then they decide to raise him, since he no longer has parents of his own. The rest of the book is a coming of age novel, with the bizarre twist of coming of age in a graveyard, being mentored and taught by “people” long dead, teaching the child parapsychological skills and tricks, introducing him to a different reality and preparing him to enter the world of the living.

My Impressions: Neil Gaiman’s specialty is magical realism, and this book is some of that, but a little bit different.   Its target audience is youth – 8-12 years old with life lessons appropriate to young people approaching puberty.  But it also an enjoyable and interesting read for adults with a vivid imagination.

The story begins with our young toddler wandering out of his house, up the street and into a graveyard while his parents were being murdered, by a Man Jack, and he is saved from a similar fate by those in the graveyard deceiving the murderer.  The graveyard was many centuries old, nearly abandoned and over-grown by weeds in a small town in England.  Its “inhabitants” had died in some cases hundreds of years before – and their perspectives on life and the world were also frozen in time.   They chose to keep the now orphaned  and unassuming toddler and raise him in the graveyard, and they gave him the name Bod -short for Nobody. 

The book is about Bod growing up, coming of age, maturing into young adulthood.  Gradually Bod rebels against the restrictions placed up on him by those in the graveyard and begins interaction with the world of the living.   Bod is a normal little boy anywhere, quiet and curious, intimidated by authority, but also a bit bold and adventurous.  But he is growing up in a different world,  one without other children, and with only the ghosts of the deceased residents of the graveyard for company.  The graveyard has its own hierarchy which reflects the status of its residents in life, which is of course comical among the dead, and there is indeed a quasi-social life among the deceased.   Bod is assigned guardians – who he refers to as his parents – and a tutor to share his wisdom and teach him about the world and to keep him out of trouble.  His tutor, his parents and other ghosts advise him to stay safe in the graveyard, and avoid contact with the living, in order to avoid being polluted or otherwise mislead or deceived.  They also teach him how to do things that ghosts can do, but people can’t – to disappear, to move through walls, and other such supernatural tricks that come in handy later when he matures and has more interaction with the world of the living.

As Bod grows up, and becomes a young boy, he becomes more curious about life outside the walls of the cemetery, and befriends a little girl who enjoys wandering into the cemetery for peace and quiet. This is the beginning of his realization that he is not like other living people and that he lives in a unique world.  As he gets older, against the guidance of his parents and mentor, he wanders outside the graveyard and has more and more interactions with the living, and is exposed to greed, dishonesty, and  beligerence.  When Bod stumbles into the “ghoul gate”in the cemetery Bod descends into another dimension of reality here evil lurks, where good and evil are at odds, in a supernatural world that we do not see. After stumbling into that terrifying world, he barely escapes to return to the peace and quiet of the cemetery.

Eventually his guardians and mentor decide that Bod needs to go to school with other children.  He is a good and diligent student, but he keeps to himself and doesn’t fit into the social activities of the other children.   As a quiet loner, he becomes an easy target for the school bullies.  He is small and shy, but clever, and has a few tricks up his sleeve as well as a few powers that other children don’t have which put the bullies in their place.   Eventually he decides school is not for him.

Toward the end of the book this battle between good and evil bring home why he is in the graveyard, and he confronts why his parents were murdered when the murderer returns to find him and finish the job of murdering the entire family.    We learn that this murder which brought him into the graveyard to begin with, is part of a bigger battle between good and evil.  In the end Bod has to decide whether to live in the world of the living, where good and evil coexist, a world of order and disorder, chaos and predictability, or whether to remain in the graveyard, where nothing changes, but it is peaceful, safe and comfortable.  He chooses life – with all its hazards. 

The Graveyard Book reminded me of Lincoln in the Bardo which also takes place in a graveyard with the ghosts of the deceased sharing views on what they were observing while President Lincoln was visiting the grave of his son Todd.   The theme of fate also arises – was Bod “fated” to escape the murder of his family? And was the attempt by the murderers to find him and finish the job also a futile attempt to outwit fate? 

This is a fun book – clever and short – it would indeed be fun to read it to or with a young person and then discuss it.  But also a fun and interesting book for adults.  I enjoyed Gaiman’s creativity and his clever story telling.  

Why this Book: Gifted to me by my friend Doug W, and I’d read a couple of Elliott Ackerman’s other novels which I liked.  Also, I have been impressed with Adm Stavridis over the years. 

Summary in 3 Sentences: The authors create a very realistic scenario regarding China’s dispute with the US over their claim to the Spratley Islands and their territorial waters, and the US commitment to freedom of navigation through those waters.  China continues to push the issue until a small  confrontation leads to China taking military action against the US Navy, which makes the US aware of the degree of sophistication of Chinese cyber capabilities to blind and disable a very computer-dependent military and US economy.  Additionally Iran, and Russia get involved supporting China, while India plays a key role as a semi-neutral player, as tensions increase in a 21st century version of a bipolar cold war and escalate to a tragic confrontation.

My Impressions:  Very well done and realistic, and those watching the news will be afraid that some of this might come true well before 2034.  The two authors create a novel with realistic characters representing the numerous cultures and entities in this tense scenario, to include senior White House officials, senior US military officers, Iranian militants, Chinese military and political leaders, Indian diplomats, as well as Russian military.  

Key Characters include the female Admiral in charge of the US Naval task force which confronts the Chinese in the South Pacific, a US Admiral and senior civilian political appointee on the White House staff,  a US naval aviator, a Chinese admiral working in the political apparatus for the PRC who becomes a Chinese Carrier Battle Group commander, an Iranian senior military officer at the end of his career running terrorist operations against the West, who finds himself in the middle of this great power conflict.   In this short book, the characters are not able to be fully developed, but they are realistic and compelling,  though only two dimensional.  Each of these characters plays a role in providing valuable perspectives and insights into the human dimensions of the miscalculations that led to this complex and multi-faceted international conflict.

I suspect that in this collaboration, Elliot Ackerrman provided the primary literary and novelistic structure and input to this novel, while Admiral Stavridis provided insights into how the US National Security apparatus works (or doesn’t). and brings his extensive experience to bear in how countries interact at the strategic and diplomatic level under crisis, in the international arena.

This is a powerful short book – all the more powerful because it reflects possibilities and potential outcomes of what is playing out in the news today between the US and China, and Russia and Iran.  Well written and highly relevant. 

Why this book: Selected by the SEAL reading group I’m a member of. I’d had a copy for years, which inspired me to finally read it. 

Summary in 3 Sentences: After dramatically losing his Bull Moose Party run for President to Woodrow Wilson, Teddy Roosevelt accepted an invitation to do an exploratory first run down a tributary of the Amazon into unmapped, uncharted territory.  He did not know what he was getting himself into, hired the wrong people to organize it and almost paid for his negligence with his life.  It ended up being a fight for survival in the most hostile of jungle environments,  losing several men, and succeeding only by a narrow margin, and only because of the leadership of his Brazilian co-leader.

My Impressions:  An impressive book in so many ways.  Obviously, the story is compelling – an American Hero president takes on a huge physical/mental challenge after the prime of his life, suffers dramatically and almost dies, but becomes one of the heroes of Brazil and the world toward the end of the last great age of discovery.  In addition to  the amazing story of courage, heroism, and  discovery, Ms Millard adds a fascinating summary of  research she did into the natural history, ecology, and  anthropology of this remote and previously uncharted part of the Amazonian jungle and river network. 

She beautifully combines the adventure and suffering of exploration and discovery with the biographical picture of Teddy Roosevelt,  with the dynamics within a mixed culture team of characters, with a curious scientist’s-eye look at the many facets of the world they had entered.  Indeed, one of the main goals of the expedition was scientific, not simply geographic discovery.  It could be compared to an International team exploring a new planet, with some similar and many very different rules from the world we live in.  In retrospect their expedition is referred to as the Roosevelt-Rondon Scientific Expedition.

She begins with a brief biography of Teddy Roosevelt and how throughout his life, when confronted with mental and emotional hardship, he broke off and took on a physically and mentally challenging adventure – he had done that many times and she gave examples.  In 1914, after he lost his Bull Moose run for president against William Howard Taft he accepted the challenge to lead this expedition of discovery down the uncharted Rio da Duvida (River of Doubt – later renamed Rio Roosevelt) – without doing much research or preparations for the rigors of living in the jungle. He delegated that to others,  and that was a serious mistake. 

MIllard outlines the poor preparations, poor selection of people to go on the trip, the disorganization that plagued the preparation for the early phases of the expedition.  Indeed it appeared that Roosevelt believed that this would not be much different than his rather comfortable expedition to Africa a few years earlier.  This assumption had significant costs to the expedition, and can be compared unfavorably to how well Shackleton prepared for his trip to Antarctica.  Eventually Roosevelt’s relieved and sent home two key organizers of the expedition before embarking on the river itself, because of their incompetence or unsuitability for the effort that would be required. 

Though Roosevelt was the titular leader of the expedition, the true leader and real hero of this expedition was Col Candido de Mariano de Silva Rondon of the Brazilian army.  The book provides a fascinating story of Rondon’s background and how he indeed was a highly experienced expedition leader and was one of the most knowledgeable men in Brazil about the area they were entering and challenges they would be facing. Most importantly, he was the strongest member of the expedition with regard to mental and physical resilience, and character, and indeed was the backbone of the expedition.  He was ahead of his time as a great proponent of the rights of indigenous tribes, and protecting their Amazonian world.  Roosevelt did not always agree with Rondon, but admired and respected him, usually acceded to his desires.  Eventually, Roosevelt became so weakened and debilitated during the expedition, that he delegated all decisions to Rondon.

One of the sub-stories of this expedition was Teddy Roosevelt’s relationship with his son Kermit who accompanied him on the expedition.  Kermit lived in Brazil at the time and spoke Portuguese,.  Roosevelt had taken Kermit with him on his big game hunting expedition in Africa, was impressed with his performance and wanted to give his son this opportunity as well.   Roosevelt’s wife wanted Kermit on the expedition to look after his father, who at the time was 55 years old, overweight, and she knew that he was no longer as strong and resilient as he believed himself to be.  Kermit turned out to be a strong and resilient team player, performed his role in the expedition well, and served admirably as his father’s keeper.

The only Americans on the expedition were Teddy and Kermit Roosevelt, and George Cherrie a renowned naturalist who would be taking samples to add to the body of knowledge. The others on the expedition were Rondon, his principle assistant Lyra, a doctor, and the sixteen young, strong men referred to as “camaradas” who did the most difficult physical work, and probably suffered the most. 

The expedition was brutal. Given that they were in completely new territory, they had no idea how far down the river they were, or how far they still had to go – only that it eventually flowed into the Amazon.  The bugs, snakes, animals, piranhas, jaguars, caymans, the daily downpours and humidity, and the unpredictability of the river were daily challenges.  They faced numerous rapids and waterfalls, and often had to unload and portage their boats and all equipment through the jungles to the next navigable part of the river, sometimes thousands of yards through very rough terrain – when they were weak with malnutrition and fever.  They ran out of the food they brought – in part due to the poor preparations of Roosevelt’s team,  in part because of losses on the river of boats and cargo in the rapids.  Food in the jungle was scarce, and starvation was a distinct possibility, as they resorted to eating almost anything that could provide the least bit of nutrition. They simply didn’t know how to survive in the primeval jungles that extended on both sides of the river.  Weakness due to malnutrition was a serious problem – especially for the camaradas who were doing most of the paddling and the most arduous physical work.  Eventually all-hands, including Roosevelt had to pitch in with all tasks. .

They also knew that they were being watched by indigenous peoples – they saw signs, and abandoned villages, heard them occasionally, but never saw them. At one point a dog who was with them was killed by arrows, reinforcing their sense of vulnerability.  But the tribes knew how to move and hide without being detected – the expedition simply lived with their sense of vulnerability – which increased, the weaker they got.

The expedition lost several of the camaradas – one drowned in the rapids, one killed another over a dispute, and the expedition left the killer in the jungle – where he was either killed by the natives or died. It was said that the jungle consumes all that enter it. The expedition was struggling to get through it before it consumed them.  

Roosevelt himself became very ill, with malaria, dysentery, and a seriously infected cut, and in spite of all the doctor’s efforts, it appeared that he would die. Roosevelt himself expected to die, and when things became most dire, he requested that they leave him behind and save themselves. Rondon refused.   He almost did succumb, but he survived, barely, until they reached civilization and could get him good nutrition, medical care and a chance to recover.  When the expedition finally reached civilization,  all of of its members were malnourished and weak, Kermit was sick with malaria and half of the camaradas were so sick with fever and malaria, they couldn’t work.  In the epilogue, we learn that upon return to the US, Roosevelt got right back to work lecturing and campaigning passionately for his causes, but it appeared that in spite of his best efforts, he never fully recovered.  He was weaker,  and was never able to sustain that characteristic Roosevelt optimism and energy again.

MIllard concludes this amazing story with an epilogue which describes Roosevelts remaining years and what happened to the other key characters in the book after the expedition. Rondon went on to become one of the great heroes of Brazil, nominated by Albert Einstein for the Nobel Peace Prize, and who outlived everyone else on the expedition, dying at the age of 92 in 1958.   Roosevelt continued to be plagued by issues stemming from his time on the River of Doubt, lived another five years and died at the age of 61 in 1919. The saddest story was Kermit’s.  Though strong on the expedition, he never found his footing after his father died, was idealistic but not practical, and of a melancholic disposition. He became an alcoholic and eventually committed suicide at the age 53. 

 I was impressed with Millard’s research, which included being escorted into the jungle to meet with the descendants of the Cinta Larga indigenous tribes who live in the territories through which the River of Doubt flowed, to talk to them about Roosevelt’s expedition.  Indeed, that expedition and how the tribes responded to it over a century ago is still alive in their oral tradition – these were the first westerners to venture into their world.  We learn that Roosevelt and Rondon were more vulnerable than they knew. The tribes debated killing them all, and stealing their valuable supplies – which made complete sense in their world – since these were unknown and uninvited intruders into their territory.  But apparently there was dissension within and among the various tribes, and in their culture,  key decisions required consensus.  Since the expedition was moving through and not staying,  pretty soon it became irrelevant. The expedition survived in part because the indigenous tribes could not agree on what to do about them.   A future expedition into that area disappeared without a trace. 

I’d put Millard’s River of Doubt into the great literature of exploration and suffering, out-on-the-edge, along with among others, Shackleton’s expedition described in Endurance by Lansing, and the de Long expedition to the Arctic as chronicled in Kingdom of Ice by Hampton Sides.  Another review of this outstanding book that I would recommend is  Big Stick in the Jungle from the Washington Post. 

For those interested in this topic, PBS has an excellent documentary available on Amazon about this expedition entitled American Experience: Into the Amazon, just shy of two hours long, produced in 1988 before Candice Millard wrote River of Doubt.  It is an excellent representation, complete with photographs and even a few videos. The story is the same, well-depicted, and I highly recommend it.

Why this book:  The author Jim Jewell is a good friend of mine, and he’s been sharing with me his process of writing and publishing this book. I was anxious to read it.

Summary in 3 Sentences: Jim Jewell was the Executive Officer (XO – 2nd in command) of the USS Yosemite in 1983-84 when it was selected to be the first Navy ship to make a long deployment with a mixed crew of men and women.  This is his story of being the XO during a deployment to the Indian Ocean and the Arabian Sea,  about the standard and routine challenges of being XO of a large deployed Navy ship, and some of the new challenges as well as advantages of having women as part of the officers and crew. Additionally, Jim was newly married at the time and he shares the  loneliness of being in a key position of responsibility for seven months, away from the support of loved ones, in the days when letter writing with long delays was the primary means of communicating between deployed ships and home.

My Impressions:  As a retired Navy Officer, I really enjoyed this retrospective look at life at sea on a Navy Ship from nearly 40 years ago.  But it was also the life of an XO – one of the most demanding jobs in the Navy, and in this case, in a particularly challenging environment.  Jim had previously had extensive as-sea experience and numerous deployments on combatant ships.  The Yosemite however was a very large destroyer tender, with a crew of nearly 1000, whose mission was to provide shipyard-like maintenance and repair services to deployed combatant ships, complete with sophisticated repair and engineering capabilities and expertise.  They also provided enhanced medical, dental and other administrative services that are not available on many smaller combatants. His narrative explains how being on a tender was an additional challenge for him, since he’d never served on a tender before, and tenders rarely deployed –  most of his crew were making their first long (7 month) deployment.

The book is full of stories and anecdotes from this deployment, and to provide context, Jim often goes back and shares stories from earlier deployments in his career on different ships.   But this was new – a different, larger ship, and now with the new challenge of having women on board.  He shares stories of what the XO had to deal with to prepare the crew of men and women for “liberty” in such ports as Mombasa, Kenya;  Diego Garcia;  Palma, Majorca;  Chismayo, Somalia; Rota, Spain. And he tells us some interesting and entertaining stories of what happened in these liberty ports.  He also shares interesting stories about the impact USO shows had, coming to entertain the troops.

It is also a book about leadership.  Jim describes how he had to balance his commitments to his ship’s mission, to the ship’s crew, to his Commanding Officer (CO,) and to his own personal values and well-being. Usually, these commitments were in alignment, but occasionally they weren’t and Jim had to weigh priorities, do some soul searching and decide.  All of these challenges were amplified by being isolated on a ship, with 24/7 responsibilities, only rare opportunities to get away and unwind, the loneliness at the top with few to share frustrations with, and navigating the uncharted waters of men and women isolated and working together on a US Navy ship for weeks and months at a time. 

  But for me, most interesting and enjoyable, were Jim’s very candid and personal perspectives on dealing with these daily XO challenges, anticipating and preventing problems and crises, and at the same time, taking care of his personal needs and dealing with his loneliness and separation from Maureen, his new bride.  In addition to his great memory, Jim saved and shares much from that deployment, including some of the Plans of the Day (PoD), some official guidance, and congratulatory messages to the ship.  Maureen, his confident, saved his letters, and Jim quotes liberally from them to provide insight into what he was really thinking and feeling, including a couple gems (p 164 and 189,) in which the normally positive and upbeat Jim spews forth to Maureen in colorful language, his anger and frustration at the nonsense he has to deal with as XO.  Jim Jewell himself is the star of this book, and his challenges, struggles, and successes as XO during a tough deployment is the real story.  And he brings the reader along for the ride.

Women in the Navy.  The “glass ceiling” aspect of the book is Jim and the ship dealing with the new challenge of having young men and women working and living alongside each other, isolated from other company, friends and family, for seven months on a US Navy ship.  This was an important sub-theme of the book, but was not THE theme of the book. It was simply one of the challenges, and a new one,  that he and the ship had to step up to meet.  The Navy’s strict “fraternization policy” prohibits intimate relations between men and women who serve together in the same unit, to prevent the fallout of personal romantic relationships impacting the work or the morale of the crew.  Jim knew romantic or intimate connections were impossible to prevent, and he strongly suspected that they were occurring, but his focus was on the readiness of the ship, and not letting such things impact the ship’s performance of its mission. 

So practically speaking, his focus was on preventing the negative impact that the appearance or knowledge that such pairings-up could have on readiness and the crew.  He gave strict guidance against “Public Displays of Affection” onboard, or on or near military activities ashore, such as MWR tours or fleet landings etc. guidance which he indicates was generally followed. Jim shares his discussions with his CO about their specific concerns, and what steps they took to anticipate and prevent problems. 

The CO’s policy was that as far as possible, men and women would be treated the same, that there would be no “female” sailors, no “male” sailors – just sailors, and Jim and the CO endeavored to reflect that policy in all their decisions.  According to his memoir, it seemed to work – no significant incidents, women integrated well, and in fact he’s convinced that the significantly increased numbers of Yosemite sailors who chose MWR tours over drinking and carousing, and the dramatically reduced number of liberty incidents ashore, were due to the male sailors choosing to go on liberty with their female colleagues, rather than getting soused together, and then seeking local female company in the seedier parts of the ports they visited.  

Jim notes several times how senior officers in the Navy were less than enthusiastic about the Navy’s Women at Sea initiative to integrate genders in ship’s crews.  In fact he sensed that many Navy leaders had hoped this experiment would fail, to give them ammunition to curtail this unwanted, and forced experiment.  The CO and XO were convinced that the record proved that this first long deployment with women as part of the crew went very well, and that the experiment was an unqualified success.  My impression, and I believe most readers will agree, that the CO’s and Jim’s leadership were key to that success. To the Navy’s credit, the Yosemite was rewarded and publicly recognized for their outstanding performance while undertaking this experiment, and achieving a highly successful deployment under arduous conditions with a new, mixed gender crew.

At the conclusion of the book Jim states (and explains) “The female officers and enlisted aboard Yosemite not only did their part to meet the ship’s mission, but in many ways improved our performance, because they were women.”  (“Because they were women…” I assume is because women joining the men on liberty seemed to moderate the behavior of young men, and significantly reduced  liberty incidents.)

Quibbles: As XO, Jim’s primary interactions with ship’s women were with the six female officers, and he shared how impressed he was with their performance. Several of the female officers appear regularly in his narrative, and in some cases, their voices are heard.   The book would have been better had we learned more about the experience of the 90+ enlisted women, and to have heard their voices in this narrative.   We don’t learn what Yosemite’s women thought – were they as enthusiastic about the success of the experiment and the deployment as the CO and XO?  What might have been their recommendations? 

Also, I suspect Jim knew about incidents during the deployment that may have run counter to the “everything worked great” narrative.  I’d like to have heard about those.  I wonder if there were any marriages later between Yosemite crew members (not necessarily a bad thing, but…) or divorces that may have resulted from deployment romances.  None are mentioned.  I’m always a bit skeptical of “everything was great” narratives.

One other shortcoming: There are numerous editing errors – typos, misspellings, grammatical issues -that should have been caught before publishing. Jim is aware, and a bit embarrassed.  Not sure how he’s going to take that up with his publisher.  

Those quibbles aside, this is a fascinating look at the Navy of forty years ago, and how this particular deployment was a key first step in the successful integrating of Navy ships’ crews with women.  The Navy has come a long way in 40 years, but my Navy women friends assure me that there are still challenges, and I suspect probably always will be.  I thoroughly enjoyed this opportunity to share this key phase of Jim’s life and career, his leadership lessons, and the key role he played in this important period in the evolution of our Navy. 

I’d strongly recommend Steel Decks and Glass Ceilings as reading for Surface Warfare Officers getting ready for deployment, or for any XO of a deploying unit in any branch or service, or anyone interested in understanding what it’s like being deployed on a Navy ship for seven months.  I believe it also is an important addition to the literature on integrating the genders on military deployments.  

Why this book:  Selected by my SEAL/SWCC candidates reading group to read as preparation for basic SEAL/SWCC training.  Also this is a key book in the canon of Stoic literature that has helped Ryan Holiday bring Stoic values to the attention of many Americans. 

Summary in 5 sentences: The premise of this book is that obstacles, challenges, problems should be viewed not simply as inconveniences that stand in our way,  but as MEANS to grow stronger, wiser,  more resilient, more successful.  This process begins with the right attitude and seeing the challenges clearly for what they are, which he describes in the first section of the book, entitled Perspective. Secondly we must take action appropriate to our clear vision and attitude, a process which he describes in a the second section entitled Action.  And finally we must have the wisdom to see and accept the world as it is, to persevere and endure with the course of action we have chosen, but also to know when to change course and try something new,  which he describes in a section entitled Will.  His message is that how we respond to challenges not only reveals our character but more importantly enriches, shapes and strengthens it.

My Impressions:  The message of this book is in its title – whatever may appear to be an obstacle that may stand in the way of achieving what we want, a challenge, a problem, a seemingly insurmountable barrier, beckons us to not only overcome it, but also to make us better,, challenging us to develop our creativity, resilience, insight, wisdom and strength.  It is a short book – 186 short pages – divided into three sections, each of which provides often well known, occasionally lesser known examples of people who have achieved great things BY overcoming, not in spite of overcoming obstacles in their way.

The Obstacle is the Way is divided into discussions of Perception, Action, and Will and each of those sections has chapters that address different aspects of that main idea.   Though there is a strong overlap between the sections and the chapters, the ideas reinforce each other from different perspectives and give Holiday a variety of venues to tell different stories with different nuances to support his thesis.

PERCEPTION: This section basically advises the reader to take the long view, keep the big picture in mind, and not to get too caught up in the immediate challenges and problems that may seem insurmountable.  He says that the right perspective has a strange way of cutting obstacles and adversity down to manageable size.  He advocates attempting to minimize one’s emotional and personal responses to a problem and instead,  to seek to be as objective as possible.  We can defeat emotion with logic he argues.  He suggests we place things in a broader perspective,  to focus on the present and what we can control right now, to help us steady our nerves.  He says “there is the event itself, and the story we tell ourselves about what it means… WE decide what story to tell ourselves.”

He points out that perspective has two key parts – Context – seeing and looking at the larger picture, and Framing – our own way to look at a problem and how we understand and interpret it.  Part of perception is to see that burdens and blessings are not mutually exclusive.  He then segues into the next section by noting that perception precedes “action,” and “right action” follows “right perception.” 

ACTION:  The main point of this section is that a great and positive attitude is just the beginning.  If obstacles or challenges are to make us stronger, wiser, more resilient, we have to take action, and act with deliberation, boldness, and persistence.  He often repeats the Stoic mantra of “No excuses. No exceptions.  It’s on you.” It doesn’t matter what happens to you, or even what happens.  All that truly matters is how you respond – YOUR action.   He emphasizes that we must not be afraid of failure, noting that action and failure are two sides of the same coin, and that boldness means not being afraid of failure.  When we fail, we learn – we find out what we didn’t see, what we did poorly, what doesn’t work, what isn’t the way.  It is up to us to turn disappointment into opportunity.

WILL This was my favorite section -as it emphasizes the individual’s responsibility to maintain the big picture as we implement our Stoic Perspective and Action.   He says, that “If Perception and Action were the disciplines of the mind and the body, Will is the discipline of the heart and the soul…Will is fortitude and wisdom…gives us ultimate strength…to endure, contextualize, and derive meaning from obstacles we cannot simply overcome.”  Will is more subtle- he lists a number of qualities that include managing expectations, accepting what we are unable to change (and the wisdom to know the difference.)

He has a whole chapter in this section on the wisdom of anticipating and preparing for failure or disappointment – this balances  the positive attitude and belief in oneself we read in Perception. He points to the wisdom of conducting what he calls a premortem – if our plan doesn’t work, what probably went wrong, and how do we anticipate and better prepare for these challenges (military planners do this, sometimes to excess.)  He distinguishes between acceptance, and giving up.  Not the same – the Stoic sage knows when good judgment says it’s time to move on,  or to pivot, and try something else. 

In this section he has a chapter with a title he borrowed from Nietzsche “Amor Fati” Love your fate and all that happens.  He has a chapter focussed on perseverance, which he distinguishes from persistence. “Perseverance. Force of purpose. Indomitable will… traits uniquely part of the American DNA.” And he offers us a chapter advising us of the wisdom of mediating on our own mortality.

——–

Throughout the book Holiday provides anecdotes and stories to support his points, providing examples and inspiration from people who most Americans have revered and been inspired by.  We learn from the lives of such well known figures as Abraham Lincoln, Ulysses Grant,  James Stockdale, Thomas Edison, Erwin Rommel, Amelia Earhardt, Tommy John, George Clooney, Hurricane Carter, Teddy Roosevelt, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Marcus Aurelius, Epictetus, others.  

This book is full of wisdom and useful epigrams and aphorisms, backed up with examples.  The distinctions he makes between Perception, Action, and Will are to me somewhat artificial:  As I was reviewing this book to summarize those three parts, I found so much in each that would fit in the other two.    But that doesn’t take away from the value of reading the same point made several times, reinforced in different contexts and in different sections. 

Much of what he offers is also available in different form and tone in Michael Manson’s clever book: The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*cK (my review here) written primarily to appeal to Gen X and Gen Y young adults.   Holiday’s The Obstacle is the Way will appeal to a more mature audience, in a more didactic style, and more easily lends itself to being picked up and opened to a random spot and extracting a bit of wisdom – which is what one would expect from the author of The Daily Stoic.  

“You will have far better luck toughening yourself up than you ever will trying to take the teeth out of a world that is  – at best – indifferent to your existence.”  p137  In this little book, he provides a prescription for how to do that – beginning with attitude, then action, then wisdom and perseverance.  

Why this book:  Selected by my literature reading group. I had read it before, but wanted to read it again and advocated for it. 

Summary in 3 sentences:  Okonkwo is a prominent leader in an indigenous village in the upper Niger valley in Africa, and we get to know him, his family, the customs and culture of his village.  Various challenges befall him, his family and village and through how they deal with them, we get to know him and the world he lives in.  When English Missionaries arrive to spread the word of Christ and the values of the Church and Mother England, we are witness to the collision between two cultures and systems of values.  

My Impressions: My second time reading it – this is a classic for a number of reasons.  It was first published in 1959 and provides what appears to me to  be an unvarnished, un-romanticized look at an African (Nigerian) indigenous culture before, during, and after contact with clumsy though perhaps well-meaning missionaries.  It is a classic because it is an African perspective on the cultural imperialism that took place throughout the African continent under the guise of Christianization and civilization, but what in the process disrupted and destroyed the social order that had been working more-or-less effectively for generations, perhaps millennia, and caused untold suffering in a heavy-handed paternalistic effort to civilize and “improve” these people. 

The protagonist of the story – both hero and anti-hero – is Okonkwo who we get to know as a child growing up as the son of a ne’er do well in his village, how he overcame that stigma and rose up to be one of the leading men of his village. He would not be seen as virtuous by our Western standards – but he met the standards of his time and place – not a bad man at all, but powerful, a courageous warrior, an ambitious man, who took his obligations to his immediate and extended family and kin and his village seriously..  Okonkwo was hardly an ideal father or husband by our standards – to his multiple wives and many children –  but he was a man of his time and context.  He provided for them, took care of them, and expected complete obedience, which was a cultural norm.  

The first 2/3 of the book is a series of stories and incidents that show his evolution from a young strong hero into an influential, well-respected and powerful leader of his community, with rank and titles,  until due to an accident, he was banished from his community for seven years, as was the custom of his community.  Never one to violate the customs and traditions of his community,  he complied without complaint, and took his family to live in another village, where he did well in farming and as a new member of that community, until he was allowed to return to his own.  At this point he is close to 40 years old.

During the time of his exile, Christian missionaries began proselytizing in the various villages of that part of Nigeria, arguing that people should give up the primitive gods and customs of their ancestors and accept the one Christian God and the values of Western civilization.  Okonkwo and many others in the native community were deeply offended by this presumption of superiority of a white religion and culture,  and were especially angered that some in their community chose to give up their own religion and values and follow those of the white missionaries and their black converts. The tension between the traditional customs, religion and values and those imported by the whites and adopted by many of otherwise disenfranchised from the native community, came to a head, with predictably unpleasant results.

We get to know Okonkwo and some of his wives and children within their own context and as real human beings with whom I could relate, not as cut-out aboriginals playing symbolic roles in this conflict between cultures.  Though many of the customs that they had in their community I found distasteful, eg, twins were considered unnatural and were put out in the forest to die, and women were clearly subservient in a patriarchal society.  But the villages had their own effective means for settling disputes and there was a stability that seemed to work. All that was upset at the forcible imposition of outside values on the community.

The first of the white missionaries was relatively enlightened, as he seemed to respect differences and found compromises between Christian values that seemed to work with the indigenous customs and values.  When he left, he was replaced by an uncompromising, my-way-or-the-highway, us-against-them minister who chose to rule with the heavy-handed authority of the Church and the Queen. That’s when things started falling apart. 

This simple little book is thought provoking and deserves its status as a classic of Western interaction with indigenous African cultures. I recall reading that Things Fall Apart inspired Barbara Kingslover to write The Poisonwood Bible, another great novel about missionaries in Africa, which I’ve read twice. 

Things Fall Apart is part of what is referred to as Achebe’s African Trilogy.  I have not yet read the follow-on book written by Achebe a couple of years later, No Longer at Ease, which features Okonkwo’s grandson. 

Why this book: When I asked my friend Alison what book in the past few years she’d read that had impacted her, she responded immediately with this book. I mentioned it to my friend Luke, an avid Sci Fi reader who responded “Fantastic book.”  Reviews on line are mixed, from very positive, to strong down checks. 

Summary in 3 sentences  The novel is written from the first person perspective of a paid universe traverser who travels to different versions of Earth that simultaneously exist in parallel, to gather information.  We also learn about the version of earth that she lives in, which is a dystopian future vision of the America we live in today.  In traversing these multiple realities, our protagonist is learning not only about other versions of our earth in parallel universes, but also about herself and her world of friends, enemies, relations, and trusted confidants,  and she and the story evolve from confronting different versions in different realities, of the people she knows in the world from which she is travelling. 

My Impressions: Very imaginative book – a Sci Fi novel which includes a lot of different and creative ideas and content.  Frankly, I was confused for the first 70 or so pages and considered putting it down – but chose to read on, out of curiosity to see what came next, and with the assumption that somehow,  it would all come together. It did, finally.  Though especially in the early scene-setting stages, I was more confused than entertained or inspired,  the author had a fascinating idea, which became more compelling as I read on,  and as more details fell into place, it came together quite well at the end, with a satisfying and morally relevant conclusion that helped me understand why Alison may have found The Space Between Worlds so impactful. 

In a future world, a genius has developed a capacity for people in his world to travel to different versions of our reality, BUT with the caveat that, if in the visited parallel reality, there is a version of the travelrser living in that reality, the traverser cannot co-exist in that visited reality with the a different version of themselves.  One of them must either be already dead or the traverser will die upon entering it.  In this future world, the novel’s protagonist Cara, is hired by the controller of this multi-verse travel mechanism to travel between multiple parallel versions of his reality and gather data about things that have happened, or have been developed that would be of value in the reality from which she is traversing.  Her job is to bring valuable data and information that will help the corporation that is paying her for making these trips.

Additionally, and adding a different dimension to this novel, the Earth reality from which and to which our protagonist traverses is a dystopian version of our own – well into the future.  “Civilization” has subdivided itself into the “haves” – living in Wiley City –  with all the current and future advantages of our civilized welfare state, and the “have nots” – living in “Ashtown” –  a primal hell-scape of pollution, gang violence, controlled by a brutal warlord. These two worlds are kept separate with a border which in order to cross it, requires permission and passes.  The analogy that occurs to me is San Diego and Tijuana.  It also reminds me of the dystopian future sci-fi novel Void Star, by Zachary Mason (my review here.) Cara grew up in Ashtown, and is now living and working in Wiley City and her greatest aspiration is to become one of the Wiley City privileged by acquiring  citizenship.

And to add another human dimension to our story, there is a tense and complicated love story between Cara, our protagonist, and Dell, her handler and mentor within the Eldridge corporation that is conducting the research based on the multi-verse travel. Dell is a native and pure Wiley City person, and manages Cara’s schedule of assigned travels and responsibilities.

It took me a while to figure all this out, as slowly throughout the novel, the pieces to the  puzzle started falling into place, one piece at a time, answering my questions, and slowly dissipating the confusion I was experiencing.

Why did I struggle with this book?  First, I didn’t particularly care for Cara, the book’s protagonist in whose first-person voice the book is written. During much of the book, she is angry, with a chip on her shoulder the size of Idaho (where I finished reading the book.)  Having grown up in Ashtown, with a broken, dysfunctional family, mother a sex-worker and addict, she has gotten a job in Wiley City and feels very lucky, but also struggles to adapt.    She is VERY keen on fitting in and ultimately gaining citizenship in Wiley City, where all the disadvantages and challenges of poverty and lower-class vulnerability she had experienced growing up in Ashtown are taken care of. She is tough, angry, bitter, and ambitious, but also vulnerable and even a bit paranoid.  

As a traverser, Cara travels from Earth Zero which it seems is the baseline reality for the novel, into various versions of Earth-reality that are given different numbers (Earth 22, Earth 175, etc) where her task is to study and report on differences she finds in the versions of the reality she visits, different from where she lives in on Earth Zero.  I got confused between characters who appear in multiple versions of Earth reality, but indeed are either somewhat or radically different in each reality – which eventually I realize, is part of the message of the book. 

The story is told from Cara’s perspective, and she is the only character who is truly well developed.  The other characters are less so, partly because we get to know different versions of each of them in different realities – again, part of the message of the book. We only really get to know Cara’s love interest Dell in Cara’s Earth Zero reality.  

As this complex story progresses, there are a number of surprises, twists and turns that keep the reader a bit off-balance.  The story culminates in a power struggle between the leaders from Cara’s life in Ashtown and her life in Wiley City – a power struggle with origins not only in their Earth-Zero lives, but also influenced by events and occurrences in other earth realities that Cara has visited – and Cara is a key catalyst in precipitating this power struggle. 

If all of this sounds confusing, it is – but as one moves through the novel, the various themes develop and come together:  the Wiley City – Ashtown tension, the goals of the Eldridge – the company that controls the multi-verse traversing, the love story between Dell and Cara, the good-vs-evil theme behind the separation of Wiley City and Ashtown, not only in Earth Zero but in the 352 (or so) other Earth realities.  And ultimately, and what I found most interesting in the book, all this has an effect on Cara, and we see how from her experiences in multiple dimensions, the evolution of Cara’s character, her goals, dreams and ambitions.  And finally through Cara, we gain insight into what all these multiple realities may mean in practical terms, to someone (each of us?) who is living in one of the multitude of realities that may exist. 

In The Space Between Worlds, Micaiah Johnson creates a novel which explores the implications of some of the quantum multiple universes theories that theoretical physicists have proposed.  It also begs many metaphysical questions about “reality” and whether there is such a “one” thing.  If you google “quantum theory multiple universes” you’ll see a multitude of entries discussing this intriguing idea.  To the question “Can you live in a parallel Universe?”  Google responds:  “Those alternate universes are completely separate and unable to intersect, so while there may be uncountable versions of you living a life that’s slightly – or wildly – different from your life in this world, you’d never know it.” In The Space Between Worlds, that assumption is set aside and we play with an imagined future scenario in which it may be possible to get to know a different version of oneself in different situations and contexts, good bad, evil or spiritually transcendent.

Cara: “Maybe I’m not the only one who feels the tugs of my other lives. Maybe they hover over us, steering us, constantly.” p 220

The Space Between Worlds is not a book I’d recommend to most of my friends, few of whom read Sci-Fi.  But I found it clever and intriguing, and the conclusions were worth the effort to get there.   

Why this Book:  Selected by my SEAL reading group as our June 2022 selection, based on input from several who had read it.

Summary in 3 Sentences:  Project Hail Mary begins with our narrator waking up on a gurney, covered with sensors,  with numerous tubes attached, and not knowing who he is, where he is, or how he got there. As his memory slowly returns he realizes that he is on a spacecraft, no longer in our solar system, and begins recalling the events that led to his current situation, as well as realizing that he has a crucial tasks to fulfill. The story of the book bounces back and forth between his memories of what was happening in his life on earth that led to finding himself alone on a spaceship, and then forward to being on the spaceship, trying to figure out what he has to do to fulfill his mission, which is critical to the future of planet earth. 

My Impressions: Very creative and clever Sci-Fi novel.  I listened to it on audible and enjoyed the hypothetical story, the characters, the audible version, and the way it was told.  If you liked The Martian and the main character Mark Watney, you’ll like Project Hail Mary and the main character Ryland Grace.   They are both avatars of Andy Weir – practical engineers and scientists who systematically and dispassionately look at the most perplexing and seemingly hopeless problems to come up with solutions that I, a decidedly non-scientific thinker, could never imagine.  Not having a strong background in science and engineering, I couldn’t judge whether his logic and solutions indeed made sense, but if not, they fooled me. 

Project Hail Mary begins with Ryland Grace waking up, not knowing where he is, but slowly realizing that he’s strapped into a bed, alone in a spaceship, with two dead people strapped into beds near him, and he doesn’t know why.  The initial part of the book is him slowly getting pieces of his memory back to help him figure out, not only who he is, but what he is doing there, who are these other dead people and what it is he is supposed to be doing.  As his memory slowly comes back and he begins piecing things together, we are taken back to his life on planet earth before this strange space ship ride.  

The book bounces back and forth between Grace’s emerging memories of events prior to and leading up to finding himself alone on a space ship, and Grace sharing what he’s thinking, seeing, doing and problem solving on the space ship – figuring out how it runs, where it is, where it’s going and why.

Slowly we learn that he has been sent into space on a mission to find what may be a possible solution to the problem of our sun cooling rapidly, due to an infestation of a unique microbial bio-phenomenon called “astrophage.”  If the cooling of the sun by astrophage is not reversed, planet earth itself will cool over the next several decades enough to endanger most current life, bring on another ice-age, and perhaps eventual death of all life on earth.  So Grace is on a pretty important mission, and as the book is named, he and this mission are a last desperate attempt by a Manhattan Project-like effort to find a solution to this problem.

There are several amazing things that Weir includes in the book.  This hypothetical bio-phenomenon offers hints at the potential of fusion as an energy source.  Also, astrophage itself is vulnerable to another microbial bio-phenomenon which Grace names taumoeba, for reasons explained in the book.  Taumoeba can be and is, both a friend and an enemy, depending on context, and Grace has to figure out and test the properties, strengths and weaknesses of each of these two bio-phenomena, which are key to his mission.

Perhaps most interesting is that Grace, alone in his spaceship trying to figure out his mission and role, finds that he is being approached by another space vehicle, and we are treated to an inter-stellar/extra-terrestrial cross-species communication experience, as Grace and the being in the other space vehicle overcome numerous obstacles and differences in their make-ups to communicate and eventually work together. Grace names the other being Rocky (for reasons he explains in the book) and Grace learns that Rocky is on a similar mission from his planet in a different solar system, also under threat from their star cooling, due to the influence of astrophage. 

The collaboration process and the various efforts, solutions, challenges, catastrophes they face together become the focus of the second half of the book, while we continue to regularly revisit Grace’s memories which help him (and us) understand how and why he was put on a space ship and launched on this mission of such importance.  It is enjoyable and interesting to read about the international Manhattan project-like effort to save planet earth – and it all sort-of makes sense.  Grace himself is an interesting character in this drama – a sort of nerdy everyman – a humble one-time middle-school science  teacher – who somehow finds himself in the center  of arguably the most important project in the history of the world.

Between these two settings – the leading minds on earth trying to solve the cooling of the sun, and Grace alone on his space-ship with an extra-terrestrial, we are treated to practical example after practical example of the scientific method being used to solve problems, explore possibilities, solve problem, question results, and move on to the next steps.  In this, Project Hail Mary is similar to The Martian.  But then Weir introduces the extraterrestrial, another intelligent and sentient being, he gives us insights into our own limitations and strengths and unique qualities as human beings.  

Rocky is made of different stuff, has 5 legs which also serve as hands, and has many capabilities that we don’t have. As Grace and Rocky connect and get to know each other, they question each other about each other’s worlds, cultures, values etc. And we are introduced to a VERY different versions of sentient creatures which have adapted to a different environment.  For example, in Rocky’s culture, one must always be watched and protected when sleeping, because in sleeping Rocky and his species essentially go completely catatonic and inert, and are vulnerable to a whole host of problems.  They couldn’t live in our atmosphere, nor we in there’s.    Rocky shares with Grace how they get their energy – what we would call calories – very different from us.  Rocky and Grace both believe (and I assume this reflects what Weir believes is worth considering) that life in various solar systems, and perhaps galaxies, has evolved from a common source….which Grace and Rocky believe may explain the similarities – as tenuous as they may seem – between how the human and Rocky’s species evolved.  And how astrophage and taumoeba have evolved.  

Over the course of the book, and especially at the end, we see a transformation in Ryland Grace as he rises to the challenges he finds himself confronting, and truly takes his responsibilities seriously. There is a moral development piece to this book which simmers in the background, until the end. But it is definitely worth mentioning.  

Fascinating book – highly recommended as a combination scientist-engineer’s and astrophysicist’s Sci- Fi fantasy which has a fascinating and believable human element.  

Why this book:  Selected by my literature reading group – strongly advocated for by Janar.

Summary in 3 sentences:  A man hunting out in the outback in South Texas stumbles upon a number of shot up vehicles, a bunch of dead men and a satchel full of money – and figures out quickly that this was a drug gang war, and so absconds with the money, expecting to never get caught. That sets off multiple bad guys trying to find him to recover the money, and a lot of killing which includes not just bad guys, but no shortage of innocent bystanders. Meanwhile throughout the story, the local Sheriff, the key protagonist in the book, is on the trail of both the man who found the money, as well as the multiple bad guys who are committing murders and mayhem in their efforts to track him down and recover what they believe is rightfully theirs. 

My Impressions:  I listened to this book, so my impressions are colored (positively!) by the excellent rendition the audible reader gave representing the various characters in the book.  The story takes place entirely in South Texas, and nearly all of the characters are working class, down-to-earth Texans and their voices and accents bespeak the region and their origins.  I could also argue that the book is largely about small-town Texas and its people, and how their culture of simple courage and hard work is being corrupted by the influence of the traffickers who are moving through their world, who do not share their values – in fact whose values directly oppose those of the people who settled and live in that space. 

There are two main characters who represent both sides of this cultural divide: Sheriff Ed Tom Bell and narco trafficker hit man Anton Chighurh.  Sheriff Bell’s voice and perspective begin each chapter – he is a WWII veteran (the book takes place late 70s/early 80s) whose grand father had been a sheriff and whose influence led to Ed Tom becoming a sheriff – which at the time of the story, he’d been for nearly 30 years. Chigurh is an extremely intelligent, cold-blooded, socio-pathic killer, who works for the big money players in the narcotics trade. He has no qualms at all about killing anyone who might compromise him or his purpose, and he does ALOT of killing in No County for Old Men. 

A third major character is Llewelyn Moss, who early in the book, happens upon the scene of a shootout between rival drug gangs.  He finds numerous dead bodies, a van full of heroin, as well as an unclaimed valise full of over $2 million in cash.  He believes he’s hit the jackpot – takes the money, and makes a plan for himself and his young wife to disappear and live happily ever after.  Obviously, it turns out to be not that easy, as the “bad guys” are pretty resourceful and intent on not only finding that money,  but also in punishing the individual who took it. 

In the midst of all this, Sheriff Bell is trying to solve the crime of so many dead bodies in his jurisdiction, with very few clues to go on – though it’s clear to him that it’s all drug related – no IDs on the bodies, mostly Mexican, lots of bullet holes in the vehicles without valid license plates.  And then more bodies start turning up as he tries to put the pieces of the puzzle together. 

Meanwhile Chigurh is on the trail of the money and is tracking Moss, as is separately, one of the fat cats who is now out his $2million plus.  Bodies keep piling up, while Sheriff Bell is a couple of steps behind.  We are seeing the situation evolve through Moss’s eyes,  and separately Chigurh’s, as well as the Sheriff’s.  As we accompany the Sheriff on his investigation, we already know the answers to his questions, because we are privy to Chigurh’ and Moss’s thoughts and actions.   Pretty much all the way to the end. 

Both Bell and Chigurh are great characters – Chigurh is extremely intelligent in a diabolical way, consistent in his evil logic and actions, and extremely effective at covering his tracks.  Sheriff Bell is very sharp in a practical, everyman/commons sensical way, and figures things out pretty quickly.  Sheriff Bell is also a man of principle and a dedicated public servant,  who cares for the people in his community, his friends, and his country.  He has seen a lot of bad in his 30 years on the job, but also a lot of good and has empathy and appreciation for the hard working, poor people in his community. Moss is likewise a good man, practical and smart,  but not as smart as he thinks he is. 

We see in the book that it’s hard to defeat an enemy who has no moral scruples.  Sheriff Bell shares his frustration at what his job has evolved into, what his county and South Texas have become as a result of the drug and gang wars, and what America’s new generation has become.  Chigurh  has no such concerns.  Moss is basically a good guy, who is just trying to take advantage of what looks like a really good break, at stumbling upon this ill-gotten money.  In some ways, this story reminds me of the movie A Simple Plan with Billy Bob Thornton

I can’t say that I enjoyed all the evil and killing in this book, but the story is very well told.  I thought the story had almost religious overtones – Chigurh is the devil, and Sheriff Bell is a good man, struggling to believe in a God who would let someone like Chigurh do what he does, struggling to have faith in a good God when so much evil seems to continue to occur, and to go unpunished.   The battle between Good and Evil taking place in South Texas is difficult to watch, especially when Evil seems to have so much power and so much influence.  Sheriff Bell has the unpleasant feeling that perhaps Evil is winning.

I really liked Sheriff Bell’s voice and insights at the beginning of each chapter.  He represented the practical wisdom and humility that is the best in the American character.  He is quite vocal about how important his marriage is in his life and how much he admired and needed his wife Loretta.  It was easy to empathize with him when he expressed his despair, to admire him for his courage, and to like him as a protagonist in this story.

I haven’t seen the movie yet – but I will.  I hear it’s quite good and I want to see how Hollywood portrays these interesting characters.