Book Review - Blink

When my friend Kim said that she owned The Jungle, I asked to borrow it. She showed up at my desk with The Jungle, Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim and Blink, the Power of Thinking Without Thinking by Malcolm Gladwell.

Blink is sort of one of those self-help books, though it doesn't tell you what you need to do, just what you need to know. I tend to avoid self-help books at all costs. Usually they are common sense and second, reading them indicates that you are not perfect and I confidently know that I am perfect.

Blink begins with a powerful story where someone had a hunch, but didn't trust that hunch. In fact, this person ended up participating in a big ruse, only to learn several years later that the hunch was right. It was a big embarrassment.

The book is filled with interesting and powerful stories that demonstrate how your initial thought, that split-second first impression, is often correct. This throws the old cliche' of 'don't judge a book by its cover' right out the window. There are many times in your life where it pays to trust that gut instinct. Gladwell backs up his theories with many psychological studies and some medical facts.

My gut instinct when I first started reading this book was that it was mostly common sense. And after reading this book, I'm trusting that split-second thought, that decision that is made as quick as a blink. Yes, this book is mostly common sense. However, it is an interesting book and it only took me 5 days to read it, which for me is really quick.

I recommend this book, if not for the self-help aspect of it, for the pure entertainment value of it. The stories are interesting and I'm sure you will agree.

11 Days in December

The Battle of the Bulge is considered by many historians as one of the biggest battles of Europe during World War II. Hitler had hoped that it would be the turning point of the war after months of being driven back across France following the D-Day invasion. The battle raged for nearly two weeks during Christmas 1944.

11 Days in December, Christmas at the Bulge, 1944 is a collection of stories about different units and how they spent Christmas, from fighting in the trenches, to hiding in farm houses, to being behind enemy lines and under heavy fire. I picked up this book at Barnes and Noble in the discounted books section. I think it was only $5.00.

The battles main characters are Generals Patton, Eisenhower, and Bradley from the American side, and the bitter and uncooperative General Montgomery from British front. Montgomery was displeased that he was pushed aside as commander of Allied forces in favor of Eisenhower and made it a point to prove that he was right. Unfortunately for him and his own history, Eisenhower was celebrated as the brilliant general who guided the Allies in Europe to victory.

The stories in this book are mostly unconnected though interesting. It is certainly a different perspective of the war than most history readers are used to reading. The book was short, only 224 pages. Perhaps if I had a greater knowledge of the Battle of the Bulge I could have had a greater appreciation for this book. Instead, I often felt disconnected and eager to get to the end of the book and onto my next book.

If you are looking for something that is not tried and true, you may find this book interesting. If you're looking for deeper stories about World War II that are non-traditional in nature, then this book may be for you.

Book Review - Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim

In a conversation with one of my friends I mentioned that I wanted to read The Jungle by Upton Sinclair, which I previously reviewed. This friend said she had the book and would lend it to me. When she brought it to me she also brought Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim by David Sedaris and she also brought Blink by Malcolm Gladwell. I have yet to read Blink, but it's on my list.

I packed both books for my trip to the beach, but for some reason packed them separately and my wife left the bookbag with her magazines and books and Blink behind on the livingroom floor when we left for the beach. But it was my fault that we left it behind.

I started reading DYFCD on Friday, our first day there. And in 3 days I was done. The book is a collection of funny essays about growing up with his family in North Carolina. Much of the book ties back to an opportunity they once had at buying a vacation property on the Outer Banks.

We all have quirky families and we all know that we are the only normal one in the family. I'm sure my brother and sister say the same thing, even though I know I'm the only normal one. (hi guys!) This is a book that totally espouses that theory. You will read this book and start thinking about your own family and how you could write your own book.

The book is very funny and very much fits with my style of humor. And for those of you that don't know (because I didn't), David Sedaris is gay. I kept thinking that some of the things that he was doing were a bit odd - until I figured this out. One situation is when he was a kid making another kid sit naked on his lap as punishment for losing a card game. Once I figured this out I thought it was funny. Yes, I'm a little slow.

Having read this book I'm ready to read more of his books. In fact, I have several friends pushing his books on me in addition to my wife's cousin. And to think - 3 months ago I had never even heard of this guy.

I recommend this book - especially if you have an open mind.

The Jungle

I have wanted to read this book for years, but with all of the history books that I bought sitting on my bookshelf, I thought it more prudent to read them first.

Then I went out and bought The Jungle and put it on my bookshelf. Then I forgot that I bought it. Then a friend loaned me a copy of The Jungle. And I read it. Then I found the copy that I bought. It's tough getting old.

The Jungle was written by Baltimore native Upton Sinclair in 1906 and focuses on an immigrant family from Lithuania who move to Chicago to improve their lives. They get jobs with the meat packing companies and quickly buy a house. They think that they are moving up quickly, only to have their lives crushed by the brutal reality of political and business corruption in Chicago.

The book is most famous for its detailed descriptions of the meat packing industry including the slaughter and processing of the animals, and the horid working conditions. This book is to the meat packing industry what Moby Dick was to the whaling industry. Lots of details.

As a result of the book there was a public outcry about the quality of meat and the conditions that the workers were made to endure and meat sales tumbled. This outcry led to the passing of the Meat Inspeaction Act and the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906, in addition to the creation of what would eventually become the Food and Drug Administration.

While the premise of the book is simple - the absolute ruin of a family, I found the facts about the writing of the book absolutely fascinating. Sinclair, a card-carrying Socialist, set out to expose the labor conditions of the industry. He disguised himself and got hired by one of the companies and worked there for 7 weeks in order to gain insight and eventually wrote his book.

Though his objective was to expose the working conditions and the labor strife, he actually did little to help that, but was the catalyst to a revolution in food processing. Years later in an interview he joked that he was aiming for the heart, but hit the stomach.

I enojoyed 97% of the book. The last 2 chapters Sinclair must have been smoking the whacky weed because he goes off into this tangent about a speech given by a socialist. This goes on and on. And on and on. Did I mention that it also goes on and on?

The speech blithers about how workers can take control of the means of production and everyone will be happy. Everyone will be equal. The collective will determine what needs to be produced and will determine the best means to achieve the goals of production. His argument is unrealistic and he fails to understand the basic human desire to compete. No one will be equal.

Additionally, with competition, bad products will not be purchased and these companies will fail (unless, of course, the Obama Administration continues to save them). Competition, when allowed to operate freely, but fairly, will better a society. We can all observe the sucess of Socialism\Communism throughout Eastern Europe during the post-World War II era. It didn't work.

So my recomendation is to read this book, but stop reading once he gets to the chapter where he goes to listen to the speech by the Socialists. It will drive you nuts. Or, on the other hand, read it and realize what a screwball Sinclair really was. He truly believed the stuff he wrote.

The Jungle can be purchased on Amazon.com or at any bookstair for very little money.

Valkyrie - the book

As anyone who reads my movie review blog (FromZekesCouch), I watch movies from both Netflix and the library. At Netflix I have the 1 movie at a time plan. New releases come out on Tuesdays, but if you get your movie into the mail by Saturday before the mail lady gets the booty, Netflix will get your movie on Monday and send you a new release. Normally I get one new release every week. My second movie of the week is always something that's been decaying in the queue for a couple weeks. It is what it is, so I try to manage it wisely.

In addition to getting movies via Netflix, I also get movies from the library. The library also gets new releases, but there are about 8 copies, so, for example, when Gran Torino got released today there were already about 100 people who had put the movie on reserve. Sometimes I get lucky and I'm like 15th, meaning I should get the movie next week.

Recently the Tom Cruise movie Valkyrie was released. I normally would not patronize a Tom Cruise movie because he's an arrogant lunatic. But this movie is about the assassination attempt of Adolph Hitler, something that I had briefly read about and have seen on the History Channel, which was more commonly known as the Hitler Channel back when they actually showed history.

Not getting Valkyrie from Netflix the week it was released I quickly added it to my queue at the library. To my surprise I got notice that it was ready for me to pick up 2 days later. You should have seen the look on my face when I picked it up and I had not reserved the movie, but rather a book of the same name. So instead of Tom Cruise I got Philip Freiherr Von Boeselager, Florence Fehrenbach, Jerome Fehrenbach, and Steven Rendall.

Not wanting to look like a fool, I checked the book out from the library with deliberate actions. And since I was going to Dover for the race in a few days, I decided that I could take it with me and read some of it. Fortunately for.....the book, the wait in the parking lot was long and I completed the entire book in a matter of several hours.

I will admit that the book is not exactly what I was expecting. It was the story of 2 brothers who were a small part of the plot to assassinate Hitler. They were not the main conspirators, those in the cabin with Hitler on that fateful day. Nonetheless, the book was interesting and focused mostly on their battles through France and eventually to Russia and back.

The book was short, only 224 pages. And though it was a good book, it totally did not meet my expectations. I equate it to my wife hollering from upstairs that there's a little surprise in the bed for me, only to find out that someone spilled potato chips on the covers.

I would not recommend the book unless you are really interested in the minutia of war details. The conspirators in the assassination attempt were not well-known and it would not be like reading a familiar story. In the meantime, let's see if I can reserve movies correctly next time.

Manhunt: The 12-Day Chase for Lincoln's Killer

Whenever I get a chance to buy a book and meet the author I jump all over it. Actually, I just attend the event. I don't want to damage my book.

Anyway, the Carroll County Public Library system hosted an Abraham Lincoln series of events a while ago. One of the events was to have the author of Manhunt: The 12-Day Chase for Lincoln's Killer come and speak to the patrons about his book and his personal journey to write the book.

The book was written by James L. Swanson, a man probably in his late 30's, early 40's (hopefully I'm giving him the benefit of being on the favorable side of my estimate). He is an attorney by trade, but an enthusiastic speaker and writer, impassionate about Abraham Lincoln, who shares his date of birth and home state. And I still can't believe that I didn't think about bringing my camera. I called my wife to tell her I forgot my camera. She laughed and hung up the phone. Arg.

Furthermore, I arrived at the library only 15 minutes before the speech began and he was swamped with patrons wanting him to sign their book. There was no way I'd be able to purchase my copy and get an autograph before he began his speech. So I purchased my soft-back cover copy (all of the hard-copies were gone) and sat down.

The lady selling the books asked what I wanted him to write. I hadn't thought that far ahead. What should he write? How about something enthusiastic? Powerful? Meaningful? Something that my children will appreciate! Their children! Something that would be relevant to my own pursuit of history. I stammered, "How about 'Enjoy'". What an idiot I am!

An administrator for the library informed the crowd that Mr. Swanson would continue to sign copies after his speech. I was thrilled, not to the point where my shiny purple and pink shirt glistened with excitement, but thrilled as much as a conservative soft-spoken married guy who doesn't really own a shiny purple and pink shirt could be.

I found his speech to be really interesting. I think he was equally excited to be in Maryland, the birth place of John Wilkes Booth, who incidentally attended the same high school as me (Bel Air High School, though obviously not the same building, but the same educational institute that has survived through the years).

Additionally, after carrying out his assassination attempt, Booth fled out of Washington, D.C. and into Maryland, then south through Prince George's and Charles County.

The speech was nearing completion and I begin to scout out where the signing would be. There were numerous empty tables in this area of the library. I moved to the front of one of the tables just as the previously mentioned librarian walked by. I asked her confidentally, "This is where he's going to sign the books, right?" She paused, looked around, and said, "Yeah, I guess so. Let me go get a chair for him." Score one for being assertive! I'm the first in line!

Mr. Swanson sits down in the chair in front of me, pulls out his quill, opens my book and says, "You want me to write 'enjoy'? How boring is that?" I told him that I couldn't think of anything more inspiring at the moment. "Leave it up to me then", he declared.

He signs my book, then hands it to me. We part on friendly words and I walk out. I open my book and what has he written?

For Eludius,
Fellow traveler in pursuit of John Wilkes Booth.
Best Wishes
James Swanson

Now surely this must be a joke. Perhaps a funny one. Anyone interested in history, or even an educated person, knows that a fellow traveler was an underground term for a communist. Did he just call me a communist? Maybe this was his way of comically telling me, "This will teach you to have an author write something stupid in your copy of the book." I took no offense. In fact, I now think it's great!

As for the book, it's a great chronicle of the events leading up to and following Lincoln's assassination. It contradicted many of the stories that I have heard over the years, such as the innocence of Dr. Samuel Mudd. I thoroughly enjoyed the book and highly recommend that you read it.

The book can be purchased at Mr. Swanson's website or on Amazon.com.

Elmer Gantry

I just finished reading Elmer Gantry by Sinclair Lewis this week for the simple reason that Frank DeFilippo referenced it in one of his opinion articles on WBAL.com and I had no idea what he was talking about.


If you have never read a Sinclair Lewis book, you are in a good situation. When I informed a coworker that I was reading the book he told me to put it down and just go watch the movie. This is one of the few cases where the movie is WAY better than the book. I haven't seen the movie, but I already agree.


Sinclair Lewis' style of writing is not very literary. It's more sequential and matter of fact. And the sequence is not fluid. In one chapter I read about Gantry in college in great detail. The next thing you know he's hob-nobbing with important people. Then a couple chapters go by that elapse many years of his life. Then all of a sudden we have several chapters dealing with the same era. It's like only 5 different years of Gantry's life were important and there is no need for much transition between the years.


So if you are wondering who Elmer Gantry is, he is a arrogant religious zealot with dreams of running the world in his ultra-conservative style, yet he is ultimately flawed with the characteristics that he condemns, especially his sexual appetite for young ladies. That's really all you need to know. Now you can tell all your less-educated friends that you know all about Elmer Gantry.


To use him in context, if you hear about Obama endorsing abortion or liberal social agendas, you can say, "Boy, Elmer Gantry would not have agreed with that." All of your friends will will turn to look at you with awe and respect you for your well-rounded educated opinion.