Brad's Book List

These are some of the books I've read recently, or not so recently if they were memorable. Of course, most if not all of these are available through amazon.com. The pictures of the Christmas elf in the sides of this introduction are the front and back of a bookmark I have had for a number of years, according to the date on the back, I've had this since 1979. It was battered, bent, and ink stained, and I didn't use it for all books, until it finally broke in 1998. People gave me new ones, but I went back to this one.

The authors in this list:

Doyle, Sir Arthur Conan

Abe, Kobo

Woman in the Dunes (Jul 99)

The village lies along the shore in a dune field, the problem is the huts were there before the dunes came. Every night the inhabitats have to dig out the sand that falls in during the day, tens of feet down. The main character is an insect collector that gets trapped, "kidnapped", in one of the holes. The village elders plan is that he will help dig with the woman who lives there. In the beginning he struggles to get out, but eventually the way of life there is just what he does, and he learns to accept it and love the woman. Strange what people adapt to and conform: what we do is just the burden of life. I've heard that there was a movie made out it.

Batchelor, Stephen

Buddhism Without Beliefs (Feb 2000)

The book covers what is the core of Buddhism, if you take away the religious Buddhist trappings. There are "four ennobling truths: those of anguish, its origins, its cessation, and the path leading to its cessation. Anguish, he says, is to be understood, its origins to be let go of, its cessation to be realized, and the path to be cultivated". Anguish is caused by cravings. Cravings for things, cravings for the world to be different than it really is.

Another element is the concept of self. What you consider to be your "self", what is "me" or "mine", is a habit, a product of years of experience in the world. The world is constantly changing, and so are you. There is no fixed, unchangable "me", only the product of experience in the world. What you experience and how you respond to those experiences is up to you.

Bronte, Charlotte

Villette (Nov 1997)

Lucy is the main character, and she set out to make her own life. It didn't matter where, so she headed to London and soon after that, France, where she became a school teacher, teaching English to (primarily French) girls. She didn't have much with her or many skills, but she made a life for herself. In that way it's a book about a woman standing up for herself and taking on the world, even if it's just to get by. This is while the young women around her are brought to life by, and their live revolve around, the men in their lives.The book was about friendships. Friendship between a "stiff upper lip" English woman and her (mostly French) associates in Vilette. There's how she feels and what she shows. The relationships were between Lucy and those around her. There was no real plot, sure events unfolded, but the people and how Lucy was affected by them was more apparent. Her friendship with M. Paul was transformed during the course of the book, and was tainted by the conflict he, and his society, had because of their difference in religions: he Catholic, she Protestant. Of course, I thought that part was silly, but quaint. She dealt with her feelings towards Dr. John and M. Paul and jealousy and how she felt unattractive compared to other women. The build-up of her friendship with M. Paul toward the end was a surprise, considering how they started. You never know how things are going to turn out. Overall I liked the book, sometimes it was a little slow, but it is a Victorian novel. It was pretty upbeat for a Bronte novel as well. She had her heartbreaks along the way, but the book wasn't depressing or oppressive with the weight of the dark, windy moors or anything.

Jane Eyre (Sep 99)

A love story. The pains we put ourselves through to build and maintain our character. At the time it was written, the concept of a strong woman, such as Jane was more "novel", it is a period story because of that. I could have done without all the God stuff, but aside from that, the her moral considerations of her relationship with Edward were important. When reading about the lightning hitting the tree, I knew that was a symbol of something bad coming up, but didn't expect the actual fire. Their happy life together grew out of the ashes of the lives they left behind.

Conrad, Joseph

Heart of Darkness

When Kurtz went to Africa, he left went into the darkness of Africa, but also away from his society. What is left of man when you strip away the surface, his society and all that is left is the man in nature? A heart of darkness. Man is evil in his heart. This is also what the book is about. I don't agree that one has a dark interior if stripped of one's society and culture. What is left? A person, I don't know, but I think at the heart of a person is just a mind. In some cases an evil one, but not necessarily so, as he is saying in "Heart of Darkness".

Coupland, Douglas

microserfs (96)

Gives a good picture of life here on the Peninsula, where many people are involved in the development of computer "whatever". Is this case the characters do software, and they do things with computers that software people do. Reflections on life and relationships in the modern world. I've also read his "Life After God" (Mar 99) and "Generation X" (Oct 97), which were... not as good. His best is "microserfs".

Girlfriend in a Coma (99)

Wierd and strange, can't believe I read the whole thing.

Cunningham, Michael

Flesh and Blood, Home at the End of the World

I read these books back to back, "Home..." first. They are books about "modern" people and their relationships. In that they are both about being human (only flesh and blood): you can't be more or different than what you are. In the case of these stories, the main characters (not all the characters) are men, their families dealing with the fact that they are gay, and the relationships they form with other people, and also AIDS. I picked up a copy of "Home..." after a friend from work showed me a review/interview with Cunningham in a magazine. Both books have an passion on every page that makes reading the books intense. In a sense the two books are similar because they deal with some of the same issues (gay men and their relationships), but they have a different quality. There were some parts of each that appealed to me, but overall I liked "Home..." better. As I mentioned, after reading Cunningham's books, I wanted to read more fiction that dealt with modern relationships, not necessarily gay, in a similar way.

Hours (Jul 2000)

I have to put this quote here, rather than on the quotes page:

"What lives undimmed in Clarissa's mind more than three decades later is a kiss at dusk on a patch of dead grass, and a walk around a pond as mosquitoes droned in the darkening air. There is still that singular perfection, and it's perfect in part because it seemed, at the time, so clearly to promise more. Now she knows: that was the moment, right then. There has been no other."

There are four stories going on in the book: Clarissa getting ready for her party, Richard's present life as seen as part of Clarrisa's story, Richard's childhood, and historical fiction of Virginia Woolf's life. Clarissa is, of course, living a parallel, modern version of Clarissa Dalloway's life, but this time in New York City. This story is different because Clarissa did not marry Richard, but lives with her partner Sally. The idea is the same: we live our lives in moments and that's how we pass, or get through, the days. Those moments determine the many ways that our lives can go.

Dick, Philip

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (Mar 00)

This book was published in 1968, if I had read it before seeing the movie based on it, "Blade Runner", I would have been disappointed. I guess you could say it's the same story, but it's very different. World War Terminus has left it's fallout behind, and few people remain on Earth. Those that do are deteriorating due to the radioactive dust. The men wear lead codpieces. One of the men is Rick Deckard, who lives with his wife in an apartment building in San Francisco, their electric sheep lives on the roof, with the other tenents' animals, false and real.

The book is about empathy. Humans have it, the androids don't, not even the latest model: Nexus-6. The androids were built to work for the emigrant humans on the colonies, Mars. Some "andy"s escape back to Earth because they don't like the toil. Meanwhile on Earth, the humans undergo false toil with Mercer through the empathy boxes just to feel with the other people connected to the boxes. Andys don't have/feel empathy and can't share their strife.

Deckard has sex with Rachael, the Rosen representative of the Nexus-6, making him the 8-9th bounty hunter she/they have tried to change, but he doesn't run off with her in the end as in the movie. He takes his car out in the "wild", climbs a hill (mostly to see what it's like), finds a toad (electric) and returns to his wife.

Doyle, Sir Arthur Conan

Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes (Apr 99)

When in London in 1998, I had to drop by the Sherlock Holmes museum, and picked up a book, this one. Star Trek: The Next Generation, had a number of episodes where Data played the role of Holmes and had dealings with Moriarty, so I asked the clerk which books had Moriarty in them. He didn't really know. After reading this collection, I see why. There was only one with Moriarty in it "Final Problem", which is told as a first and last dealing with Moriarty: he was a menace to London throughout Holmes' career, but only written of in this one story. Disappointing after the ST:TNG stuff. Anyway, I was also disappointed with the stories as well. He was supposed to have had great powers of observation, but without actually being on site, the tales lose something in the translation to text. The things he notices are interesting, but usually told after the fact and I think "you had to have been there" to appreciate the scene.

Duane, Diane

Spock's World (Feb 2000)

I picked up this book because there have several ST:Voyager episodes recently where a Vulcan character, Tuvok, was featured, actually him and 7of9, who also has a logical character. On the web, this book is associated with what is Vulcan philosophy: logic, IDIC (Infinite Diversity, in Infinite Combination), Surak. It has that, but more.

In this book, Vulcan was voting on seccession from the Federation, so Kirk, Jim, Spock, and Sarek went there to testify. In the process, we learn a lot about Vulcan prehistory and history. Historical (science) fiction. During the "trial", they were arguing the "best" points of Vulcans and humans. Not letting emotions govern one's thinking and thinking logically, is a good thing, but emotions and illogic has a place in IDIC. In looking up Vulcan on the web, I found some people who consider themselves as Vulcans, they practice mastery of emotions and logic as "a Vulcan" would, strange, when follow a non-religious Zen Buddhist philosophy would be the same without evoking science fiction.

Sarek's wife, Amanda explains the Vulcan concept of cthia: "It's the modern Vulcan word which we translate as 'logic', but what it more correctly means is 'reality-truth'. The truth about the universe, the way things really are, rather than the way we would like them to be. It embraces the physical and inner realities both at once, in all their changes. The concept says that if we do not tell the universe the truth about itself, if we don't treat it and the people in it as what they are -- real, and precious -- it will turn against us, and none of our affairs will prosper.

A puzzling part of this book is the repeated mention of "the Other". The Other is an "entity", like a god, that Vulcans are aware of directly because they are telepathic. There was no mention in the book of Vulcans communicating information to, or receiving any communication from, the Other. The Other is just a presence of which they are aware.

Eliot, George

Mill on the Floss (Jun 99)

I have a quote from this book on the quotes page. This passage takes the reader from the wide landscape with little detail and no mention of humans, and zooms in as it goes, down to the bank of the stream and the ground on which the narrator is walking. The narrator is Maggie Tulliver. The book is about Maggie and her brother, Tom, and their family. The two of them each follow their own paths which leads them into and conflict and separates them from each other. Maggie was more going with the flow and Tom followed rules and led a more structured life. In the end they were together again with a common problem, and it made no difference how they lived out the previous part of their lives: it all comes down to that moment when they are reduced to who they are and remember how they used to be in harmony when they were young.

Fischer, Tibor

Collector Collector (Apr 99)

Until I was about half way into the book, I thought it was good, entertaining, and often funny/amusing, then it started to get long. Frozen iguanas, Gorgon vases, and pickled beets are featured in this book. The concept of a sentient, immortal bowl that is watching, cataloging, and commenting on the strange happenings in Rosa's flat was getting old. Then I saw the book as a collection of short stories interspersed with the daily life of Rosa and Nikki, her strange "guest", as the bowl shares its history with Rosa, an art authenticator. We never learn how Rosa can read the history of the bowl and other art items, and we never learn the truth about the bowl: this is an interesting piece of ceramic, but what is it besides a shape-shifting piece of pottery that collects collectors throughout history?

Gibson, William

(Cyberspace books:) Neuromancer, Count Zero, Burning Chrome (Sep 94)

Gibson coined the term "cyberspace" and developed it in these books. His cyberspace is not sitting in front of a computer using virtual reality gear, it is more of a complete emersion into an world, or space (cyberspace, of course). In one of these he says people can relate better if you give them celebrities that you look like.

Difference Engine (Sep 94)

This one was based on an interesting concept: Babbage's difference engine, steam-power mechanical computer not only was successfully built, but electricity didn't take off, so everything is steam-powered, and the computers are BIG and take lots of power. Interesting concept as I said, but I didn't get much out of the story itself.

Idoru

Does a celebrity have to be a real person? Gibson's idoru is a virtual person or entity that is a media, similar to the one (or those) in Japan today (e.g., Kyoto Date), but in a Gibson-world, cyberspace is real, like a "plane of existence" that the mystics talk about. The book is science fiction and part adventure, like most of his books, where the characters chase after the one with the "goods".

Mona Lisa Overdrive

Virtual Light

Graham, Philip

How to Read an Unwritten Language (Dec 96)

A man whose mother was a different person after his father went off to work. She was a different woman every day. She was a large set of women. Not multiple personality disorder. He and his brother and sister learned to read the subtle signs in her that meant she was switching characters. When he was older he started collecting objects that had stories behind them. He bought them at auctions and learned their stories from the people who were selling them. He collected stories, until he gave the objects away to someone who could relate to the story and use the object to cope with their similar problem. He tried to read the people's behavior to determine their problem. The book was about this, and his relationship with his family and the two women he married in turn. At one point he goes to an art gallery with Japanese calligraphy where he encounters the character "yume" (dream). I thought of that character, because it's an interesting concept of a word evoking the idea the word represents.

Herbert, Frank

Dune series

I have read them all (six), but I like the first three better, and especially "Children of Dune". This is probably because I was reading them when I was in high school and was fascinated by "strange powers" (the Bene Gesserit), so was reading mostly science fiction and fantasy. Most people like the first book, "Dune" better. The books take place tens of thousands of years from now. One element in the books is where is humanity headed. A long term plan for our future in the galaxy. In the latter three books this is a (relatively) more central issue. Humans now are only still struggling to survive, where we will be in even a thousand years is anyone's guess, and I don't think anyone has planned this out. Even political leaders don't think past their own term in office.

Irving, John

Widow for One Year (Jul 99)

The picture on the (softbound) cover is a picture hook in the wall, with no picture on it. Before the story opens, the family's two boys were killed in an auto accident (never turn the wheel until you actually start making a left turn). When it opens, their replacement child, a disappointment because Ruth was a girl, is four. The book is the story of her life and her mother's lover (Eddie), the boy Ted hires as his assistant. The empty picture hooks were left behind when Marion left, and Ted never removed them. Ted writes disturbing children's stories. Eddie becomes a passable writer of autobiographical fiction. Ruth becomes a nearly autobiographical novelist. Marion becomes a writer too, and is autobiographical too, because she is still troubled by the death of her boys. Ruth writes books with two woman: one that is quiet and unadventurous, someone who is not what she could be. The other is someone, a full person (Hannah). That is a "sickness" through the book: the main characters each have some hangup that twists their lives. Throughout Eddie's life he continues to have relationships with older woman, trying to find something he had with Marion. Ruth is not what she was supposed to be and writes that way.

McEwan, Ian

Enduring Love

Out for a picnic on a Sunday afternoon and main character's (Joe's) whole life changes due to one incident, or, rather, due to meeting a nut. The incident revolves around a hot-air balloon, or helium balloon, pilot and his grandson. The pilot is reckless, in that he's flying in a gusty wind, and while he managed to get out, he can't get the balloon anchored. Five men, including Joe run to grab the lines, but, eventually, fail against the wind and are carried away. The last to let go dies because he tried too hard. The incident triggers de Clerambault's syndrome in Jed, the nut. This makes him a homoerotic nut, but he's already a religious nut. The syndrome means he's in love with someone who he feels is leading him on and otherwise signaling returned love, but the object denies returning the love. The object in this case is Joe. Joe is married, and the incident and the harrassment from Jed are tough on their marriage. Not much happens in the rest of the book, but moves around the relationships and Joe's thoughts. Joe does some of his work as a science writer and researches Jed's problem as he tries to figure out the situation he's in.

To me the "enduring" is Joe and Clarissa's love enduring through the harassment by the nut. My wife reminded me that enduring has two meanings: to last and to suffer through. I didn't think of Jed's love for Joe as "love". I liked the book because it was interesting to read about the characters, I didn't like what one nut can do to lives. They separate, but in the appendix it says they get back together and adopt a child.

I read a review which said the book had a surprise ending, which apparently McEwan's books do. One of the details wrapped up differently, but it's wasn't central to the book or anything.

Morrison, Toni

Beloved

I didn't care for the "ghost" part of the story, so that affected my perception of the book. I still think I appreciated the mother-daughter bond and the freedom from slavery parts of the story, which I thought was the main part of the book. The setting is post-Civil War, so the book is about freedom and dealing with the past under slavery and what people will/can withstand.

Song of Solomon (Oct 97)

I liked this one much more than "Beloved", while the characters had communication with "spirits", these encounters were not as overpowering as in the former book. A story of a man coming to terms with himself and learning about who he is and his family's roots as one treasure hunt turns into a hunt for his past.

North, Freya

Chloe (May 99)

This was an entertaining book. The book begins after Chloe's "godmother" died and left Chloe with basic instructions and maps to the four countries of the United Kingdom. Jocelyn wanted to pass on her love of the Kingdom and its seasons, the people in her life, and the former love of her life to Chloe, in the form of his son. She has interactions, unknowing, with the son, throughout her travels, and finally meets him where Jocelyn had planned. Chloe and Jocelyn both also liked a painting by Thomas Gainsborough, "Mr and Mrs Andrews", which Chloe takes with her, in portable form, so this is with her throughout her travels as well. It's a love story, of course, but the love of people, places, and a person.

Rice, Anne

I've read more than just these of Rice's books, for example, her vampire books, but they became increasingly gory, I increasing lost interest. The witch books I have not touched.

Cry to Heaven

Feast of All Saints

Interview with a Vampire

Rosen, Jonathan

Eve's Apple (Aug 99)

Ruth is anorexic and Joseph is her boyfriend who is trying to understand her constant hunger and desire to be thin. It's a book about body image and understanding yourself and your partner.

Sagan, Carl

Contact (Jul 97)

Don't tell me the movie was long. Seriously, the book is much better than the movie. The movie has some very nice space graphics, but is a watered down version of the book. The book doesn't have as much about the conflict between religion and science. It's about science, truth, and evidence. I see why the book ending wasn't the movie ending. Too much for a movie, though I have to say I liked the movie ending better. The Machine is there, we can improve our recording (and shielding) and try again. That's my response to the science v. religion argument. By repeating the experiment they can get try to get evidence.

No such "luck" in the book: the Machine will not work. Their experience was just like a religious experience, complete with no (or little, if you count the sand and material stress on the dodec) evidence. They even spoke to "angels" or some of them spoke to "spirits" of dead loved ones. It was good that they looked for measurable or theoretical evidence that the things the Caretakers talked about were actually real, or at least possible. The part about a message in pi was interesting. The circle in the ones and zeros of pi was fascinating, leading to the anticipation of more message "out there" in more digits. That is evidence of some "it" that designed the universe. That's the kind of proof that is needed to show there is a greater intelligence at work in the universe. Carl wouldn't have been an agnostic if he had a circle in the digits of pi. I'm stating the obvious. I also liked the summary part about how she spent her life looking outside and ignoring what was around her and inside herself. She didn't have much family, but she practically ignored relationships in her life.

Demon Haunted World (Jan 97)

Very good book. Sagan's essays on science and pseudo-science and its attendant superstitions as related to literacy in general in our society as well as skeptical thinking. As a science educator he also has an interest in scientific literacy, and he pushes for science education.

He talks about visions and demons and UFO's. Space aliens are today's demons. In the middle ages people had visions and believed they saw and felt different things, and attributed these things to demons. Today people call them aliens. In an altered state of consciousness, like a semi-sleeping state, people can experience many things in this state, including visions, physical sensations (weight on their chests), and sexual arousal. Many alien abductions, and demon stories, have a sexual component.

As for belief itself, people want to believe they are somehow special. (The findings of) Science tells us otherwise. There is nothing special about our position in the solar system, or in the galaxy. There is nothing special about our mind. The mind is our experience of our brain functions. There is no evidence for a god, devil, heaven, or hell. Even if a hoax is discovered, people will still believe that the events were real and the people who PROVE it was a fake are lying or simply ignored.

Pale Blue Dot (Dec 96)

The history, present, and future of human exploration of the solar system. In the beginning he talks about things like the problems Galileo faced with the church, because his findings didn't correspond to the teachings of the Catholic Church. In talking about the exploration of the moon, he talks about the Apollo program. He brings up something I hadn't thought about. Sure the Apollo program was intended to get a person on the moon before the Russians, but what does that mean? The country that was first had the better rockets, and could launch nuclear warheads better. It was a military demonstration, the science advisor at the time wouldn't support it if the president tried to push it as a scientific mission. It wasn't. The only scientist that went to the moon was on the last landing mission. Though it laid the ground work for later missions to other planets. The later chapters deal with ideas about exploration of the other planets, and how a space station makes sense if we sent "manned" missions, however, as the recent Mars Pathfinder mission (after the publication of the book) shows, people aren't needed on these missions. Supporting a few, or one, human for an extended journey is a huge investment on space (for life support needs) and energy.

Saramago, Jose

Blindness (Oct 99)

"it even used to be said there is no such thing as blindness, only blind people, when the experience of time has taught us nothing other than that thre are no blink people, but only blindness."

What would the world be like if everyone was blind? That is the question that is explored here. Actually not everyone, one had be able to see the events of the book. If there are only a few blind people in a population, then they are not really noticed. There are may more people to help them. If there are only a few people who can see, then it is entirely different. Who will see that the power continues? The food? The water? The cleaning? People think of the idea of "heaven" as white. When everyone has the white blindness, it is hell because of the smell and the flith. No names were given during the book, and the conversation was not structured as it usually is, but flowed as part of the prose, no quotes. The name thing was discussed in the book: what do names matter when you can't see the person to which the label would apply?

What things do people fail to see even if they can see? That is another issue. The blind people in the book don't "see" blackness they see whiteness. Total whiteness, unvarying. It's like they are getting input but no discrimination. Inablility to see what is in front of their faces, is the idea. The characters kept quoting proverbs and sayings. Generalizations that made sense in the old, seeing world, but the sayings are like stereotypes: you don't have to think about things if you can categorize quickly. You look, but don't see.

These concepts were interesting to think about, but the book itself seemed overly long.

Tolkein, J. R. R.

Hobbit

Excellent tale a of world and time where humans share the world with a number of different races, like dwarfs, hobbits, elves, etc. The story of a hobbit with a very settled life, as most hobbits have, who one day, inspired by a wizard, goes on a wonderful adventure, there and back again. This is, of course, a fantasy, but Bilbo certainly added some color to his life in going on this trip. You never know the wonders of the world unless you go on a little adventure.

Lord of the Rings

A more serious sequel to the Hobbit. Much longer, making it somewhat of an epic tale. These three books are more of an adult story, because it has more serious concerns than in the "Hobbit".

Wharton, Edith

Touchstone (2002)

A good example of what lack of communication can do in a marriage, and how that can change. Glennard is the main character and he publishes the (love) letters written to him by a famous author, Margaret Aubyn, to get himself established and, in his eyes, worthy of marrying. He marries Alexa Trent, but is not sure if he loves her. It's only when they finally discuss the book that he understands love and giving through the gift of Mrs. Aubyn's love and letters.

Woolf, Virginia

Mrs. Dalloway (Feb 2000)

I started this book once before, but gave up. It's not book to be rushed and I was not in the right mood the first time. The book is primarily about Mrs. Dalloway (Clarissa), Peter Walsh, and the circle of people around them on one day as Mrs. Dalloway prepares for a party. They are in their 50s and Peter had this to say:

The compensation of growing old, Peter Walsh thought, coming out of Regent's Park, and holding his hat in hand, was simply this; that the passions remain as strong as ever, but one has gained -- at last! -- the power which adds the supreme flavour to existence, -- the power of taking hold of experience, of turning it round, slowly, in the light.

A good deal of the book involves looking at, that is, thinking about, the experiences they have had. That's why it's a book that is experienced, not just read.

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Last updated: Nov 2002