book blog

Sorry to have been silent so long! Putting a house on the market does take the energy out of a person. As do the constant whinings of three small very bored children. When does school start again?

I've actually gotten through a surprising number of books, though, for all that. Starting with:

Noble Brutes: Camels on the American Frontier, by Eva Jolene Boyd. A history of the ill-starred camel experiment of the mid-nineteenth century. Then-Secretary of War Jefferson Davis devised and put into motion a plan to bring camels over to work in the American West. This admittedly biased pro-camel account makes it seem that military small-mindedness and the unfortunate eruption of the Civil War (along with the taint of the project having been started by the Confederate President-to-be) killed the camel experiment before it had a chance to prove what a stellar program it could be. Most, if not all, of the camels and their descendants have died out of the West, but they are remembered fondly. The book, however interesting, wasn't that well written, was a little too pro-camel, and I'm just not interested enough in the topic to keep it.

Against the Odds, a book of short stories by L.M. Montgomery. A mixed bag, but a little repetitive, this collection really pointed up the similarities in Montgomery's basic choice of protagonist. Other than "The Strike at Putney," which is a masterful example of Montgomery's basic genius, most of the stories are eminently forgettable. But sweet!

Erle Stanley Gardner, The Case of the Deadly Toy and The Case of the Daring Decoy. Deadly Toy was certainly a departure from the usual formula ... but I was left feeling a bit of dissatisfaction with the resolutin of the "B" plot. Just a loose end getting wound up in what felt like an unnatural way. And Daring Decoy had a lot of interesting twists and one really great character (Myrtle Bailey, the elevator operator), but otherwise didn't strike me as all that special.

Richard Wheeler, Sherman's March. Much like the wagon trains book of a previous review, this book was a compilation of contemporary accounts of the March to the Sea. Very complimentary towards Sherman himself, it relied heavily on a few sources, and gave unquestioning credence to the commentary of the people from the areas the army passed through—chiefly outraged women. For all that, though, it was an interesting read and valuable for a glimpse at the perspectives of the people involved in the event. I'd have liked to see the civilian accounts balanced a little more by the soldiers' accounts, but I suppose you can't have everything!

Thomas D. Clark, Pills, Petticoats, & Plows. I'd had this book on my shelves for probably a decade before it popped up in the rotation recently, and I was thrilled to sit down with it. Definitely not a polished work—it could have used some reorganization, some clarification in places—it was still a very intreresting read, detailing the history of the Southern country store from its birth shortly after the end of the Civil War up to the early 20th century when cars and catalogs began to take over the country store's place in the lives of the people it served.

Finally, When the Century Was Young, by historian and author Dee Brown. This was a fascinating memoir of Brown's childhood and experiences as a young man. The tidbits and anecdotes that filled it were rich and varied, and Brown's life as he describes it involved him in a lot of the major experiences of his era. The entire section on his World War II service was a lesson in and of itself. If you can ignore the constant derogatory references to the way the world has clearly gone to hell in the modern era (the book was published in the early '90s, and Brown was not a fan of the '80s or the people in them, to say the least), it's a very good read.

Whew! All caught up for now.