BOOK REVIEW: Don't Shoot, It's Only Me

If you have a less than perfect understanding of some of our most recent wars, may I make an unusual suggestion to you? Entertainer Bob Hope, with some help from Melville Shavelson, has written DON'T SHOOT, IT'S ONLY ME. This is a history of The United States at war through the eyes of someone who was there.

Bob Hope experienced battlefields from the South Pacific to the Persian Gulf. He had been shot at and bombed on in North Africa, Europe, and Vietnam. He was there at every vital point during the last half-century of America’s history. Mixed among the jokes in this book are vignettes of the people and politics involved. He may have played down the danger he was in, but never what the troops were facing.

Watching the televised USO shows, we had no idea how much danger was there for the cast and crew . The book tells of several incidents where snipers got within shooting range of the stage. More than once he put himself at risk taking helicopter trips to get closer to the troops.

At every opportunity he did special shows for the men and women who were in military hospitals. Some of the most touching scenes in the book involve these visits.

I am old enough to appreciate the human interest stories about the public personalities and celebrities in the book. Bob Hope knew ten presidents and though each of them was a target for his humor, his respect for each of them is evident. His list of friends included some of the biggest names in entertainment. I particularly enjoyed his reminiscences of George Burns and Gracie Allen.

Bob Hope’s humor could take a dangerous turn. At a time when most of Hollywood was afraid of the McCarthy trials and their hunt for Communists, Hope was telling jokes about Senator McCarthy.

DON'T SHOOT, IT'S ONLY ME is truly Bob Hope’s comedy history of the United States, but as it makes you laugh, it might bring a tear to your eye for all of the brave men and women who have fought on the front lines for our country.

BOOK REVIEW: Acorna: The Unicorn Girl

Because our daughter is very fond of author Anne McCaffrey I bought McCaffrey’s ACORNA: THE UNICORN GIRL series for her. I had tried the Dragonriders of Pern, but could not get involved in them. Out of respect for our daughter, I thought that I would give the author another try. I am enjoying them so much that it may be awhile before these books get to our daughter’s house.

Three prospectors are mining the asteroids far from any inhabited planet when they find an escape pod drifting through space. In it, they find an unusual little girl. She has a tiny little horn in the center of her forehead, funny-looking feet, beautiful silver hair, and they are to learn that she also has some curious powers. They name her Acorna because of her resemblance to an unicorn and because the asteroid that they are mining starts with an “A’.

Gill, Calum, and Rafik have not filled their hold with precious metals so they take care of the infant on their own for several months. Acorna grows more rapidly than a human child and they find that she has the ability to purify water and air and to heal.

The men decide that Acorna has grown to the point that she needs to be with other people so they land on the planet Kezdet. Here they find that the planet has its own secrets. Acorna is in danger from men who want to add her to their collection of unusual species or who want to use her for scientific research.

Acorna learns that the great wealth of the planet comes from the cruel use of child slaves and she endangers her life to rescue the children. These children capture the reader as they capture Acorna’s heart.

The book comes to a satisfying conclusion, considering that it is the first in a series. The characters are well done and we start to care enough to see what will happen to them in future books. The second book in the series is titled Acorna’s Quest and in it she has left her friends behind and gone to find her own people. I am already in the space craft with her as she faces new dangers.

I am just not too sure when the books will get to our intended daughter. Thankfully our family understands the necessity of reading a gift book before it is passed on.

BOOK REVIEW: Water For Elephants

The “Best Seller” list gets to be little a boring. I read the books listed and notice the same old names each week. The fact that the same authors appear so frequently makes me suspicious. It is hard to be that prolific without losing some originality.

That is why when I do find a favorite author; I feel that I have met an old friend. Sara Gruen is an old friend. Her WATER FOR ELEPHANTS is one of my all time favorite books and it is at the top of the Trade Paper Best Seller list again. I am guessing that the fact that the movie will be coming out is the reason for the new interest. Because it is still on my Best That I Have Read list, I want to remind you why I liked it so much.

The narrator of WATER FOR ELEPHANTS is either ninety or ninety-two. He tells us that age is not as important as it was when he was younger. He has not really forgotten, just lost track. From his wheelchair in the nursing home he watches a circus set up across the parking lot. This starts the story of how he became a part of a traveling circus in his youth.

Jacob Jankowaski is about to take his final exams at Cornell and then join his father’s veterinary practice. This is during the Great Depression and at the sudden death of his parents he finds that there is no business for him to join.

From this point Jacob takes us into the world that adopts him, a world of freaks, glamour, sleaze, and unusual friendships. Jacob is an innocent, by his own word, “the oldest male virgin on the face of the earth.” The tough, hardened people of the circus do not accept him at first and life becomes a fast lesson in survival. Along the way he makes friends with an old man who has become paralyzed from drinking “jake”. This is a time of illegal booze and not all of what is available is safe.

Once it is discovered that Jacob has some training and skill with sick animals, his place in this tight society is established. The animal trainer, August, and his wife, Marlena, take Jacob under their wing. We watch as August becomes more and more unstable and as a relationship develops between Marlena and Jacob.

The story is full of interesting characters. Each is richly developed although none is as fascinating as Rosie. Rosie is large, gray, very wrinkled, and difficult to train. Her former owners gave up on using her in an elephant act because they felt that she was too stupid. When we learn that she has been using her trunk to pull up the stake holding her, stealing the lemonade, and then returning the stake in the ground, we get an idea of how intelligent Rosie is. In fact, she is a large part of the plot of the book.

Gruen based her facts on old photographs and interviews with circus people. The book is full of actual pictures that add to “seeing” the characters. In the interview with the author Gruen explains that many of the incidents were based on fact---including the lemonade stealing scene.

This is an excellent read. The feel for the Depression as well as for the gritty life of a traveling circus is well done. Here we have dark secrets which involve a murder or two, a love story, and a very large, mute heroine. It also has an ending that I absolutely loved.

Read WATER FOR ELEPHANTS. We can never depend on Hollywood to get it right.

BOOK REVIEW: A Young Adult's Guide To Safety In The Digital Age

From the moment we were born parents and teachers have given us lessons on how to keep ourselves safe. We are told practical things like to look both ways before we cross a street, or to wash our hands after playing with something that is probably covered with germs. As we get a little older the lesson includes not talking to strangers. All of these bits of advice are for our own protection and for the most part we obey.

The popularity of computers and other electronic toys has opened new ways to keep in touch with each other, but it has also opened new areas of concern. Local author, Jeff Sechler, has written a small book titled A YOUNG ADULT'S GUIDE TO SAFETY IN THE DIGITAL AGE to help us navigate the new pitfalls.

Each chapter takes us through a specific danger. Among these dangers are sexual predators and identity thieves. Most of the information has been available in other sources, but Sechler has condensed his advice into a small reference book of one hundred pages.

The one thought that was new to me, and remember I did not grow up in the digital age, was how your social sites can be used in a negative way if you apply for college admission or for a job. The pictures of you at that party may have seemed funny and a little risqué at the time, but the office of admission or of human development may see you as someone not reliable or of not presenting the image that they are looking for.

The author gives no information concerning his expertise on the subject, and I would have felt better knowing something of his background. Although it is well footnoted with examples of what can happen if we get careless, most of the examples have been documented in other publications.

Most of the warnings contained in this small book are common sense, but sometimes we need that reminder to look both ways before we cross a street that may be very busy with cars full of strangers who deliberately are planning harm to us.

BOOK REVIEW: The Bride Quartet

Last week the weather and a bug put me on the couch for several days. The only thing I could do was lie there and read. I had been waiting for all four of Nora Roberts’ Bride Quartet to be published  -- and for time to read the four books together. This was my time.

Four little girls, Parker, Emma, Laurel, and Mac, loved to play Wedding Day. They took turns being the bride, the groom, the best man, the maid of honor, the clergy, etc. If needed, they married the kittens, puppies, and big brothers. Sometimes the latter were part of the game under protest.

Years later, Parker formed a company called Vows that brought each of her friends’ unique talent to the business. Each friend’s story is highlighted in one of the four books.

When the girls were still very young, Mackenzie had been given a camera as a birthday gift. She discovered that she takes great pleasure in capturing the right moment. Laurel can turn out the most fantastic cakes, Emma has a way with flowers, and of course, Parker is almost anal when it comes to details. Vows quickly becomes The Place to hold weddings in that part of Connecticut.

The special thing about a series is that the characters become familiar and we are given four books to get to know these women and their families. Roberts has always been excellent at developing people, especially her male protagonists. Each person in these books comes alive.

What I liked best about this series was the portrayal of friendship. The girls had grown up together and over the years their relationship had helped each of them to overcome personal problems and to become stronger women. The books are worth reading for this angle alone.

VISION IN WHITE, BED OF ROSES, SAVOR THE MOMENT, and HAPPY EVER AFTER take us back to Nora Roberts, the Romance writer. In recent years she has become as well known for her futuristic mysteries and her supernatural novels. The Bride Quartet shows us how this bestselling author got started.

BOOK REVIEW: The Redemption of Micah

THE REDEMPTION OF MICAH by Beth Williamson may be an excellent example of how a book with good possibilities can go wrong.

In 1875, in Plum Creek, Colorado, Micah has been keeping watch by Eppie’s bed. Eppie has been in a coma for three years from a gun shot wound. Micah has been talking to her, reading to her, and several months into the coma, has helped to deliver their baby girl, Miracle.

Waking up, Eppie is confused by the strangers around her and with no idea of who she is. She can not feel anything for this little girl that she had never met, and she can not trust this man, Micah, who says that they had been deeply in love before the accident.

Several situations show that the feelings from the recent war still run deep and as outsiders start visiting, we learn that Eppie had been born to a freed slave. Because of Miracle’s mixed blood, some of the good people in town decide that the little girl should be in a more stable home.  She is kidnapped and placed with a family who had lost their children.

THE REDEMPTION OF MICAH has a good story line. The people are easy to like -- or dislike, and some of the touches involving race, motherhood, and enemies from a past war are subtle, but they make the author’s point.

The actual dialogue was well done, keeping fairly well to the time and place. Eppie surprised everyone after the coma by speaking like Micah, a cultured, educated Southerner. I was able to go along with that, after all, he had been reading and talking to her for three years while she was unconscious. It was the only voice she heard.

My problem was that too many times the author felt obligated to use modern, vulgar language for some of the love scenes. That such usage was disturbing may sound petty, especially from a reader who has certainly read those words before,  but it bothers me on two levels. First, I want authors to be consistent with their characters, and secondly, I will be glad when authors stop insulting us by thinking that vulgarities will sell books.

It was a shame that the language jolted the reader out of the mood and setting that the author was trying to creating. So many other things were right with this book.

BOOK REVEIW: Discovering the Parables; An Inspirational Guide for Everyday Life

Fairy tales, fables, allegories, oral folk tales, and parables have been with us probably for as long as man has been able to speak. This was the way man passed stories and lessons on to other men before the birth of the printing press and computers.

Parables were the stories that Jesus told to help his early followers better understand the lessons that He had to teach. To help those of us today to have a better understanding of these stories, Henry G. Covert has written DISCOVERING THE PARABLE; AN INSPIRATIONAL GUIDE FOR EVERYDAY LIFE.

Jesus was a master storyteller. If some of His contempory listeners had trouble understanding all of his message, the same can be said for most of his modern “listeners”. We, today, have the disadvantage of not living at the time the stories were told. The references to seeds, fig trees, and vineyards are not in our experiences.

Reverend Covert takes time to give us the background of each of the parables and why it would have made sense to the people at that time.  Reverend Covert then goes into more detail about the message contained in each parable.

Even the parables I thought I knew and understood were given a deeper meaning. The parable of the mustard seed is one that most of us know. To me, it has always been a story to show that even a small amount of faith will grow. Reverend Covert takes it a step beyond the simple and the obvious. I loved his using the seed growing in Mary as something else to think about in reference to the growth of the mustard seed.

Each parable takes on its own importance in this book. The book is written in an easy style that flows well. Each chapter ends with a section with reflection questions and thoughts.

Henry Covert is an ordained minister with the United Church of Christ. He has served in the military, as a police sergeant and as a county detective in a district attorney’s office. He served as a state prison chaplain and as an adjunct faculty member at Penn State University. He is the author of four books.  His fifth book, The Crucifixion of Jesus, to be released this year.

From reading his books, the fact that he had been the chaplain for Pennsylvania’s first execution in thirty-three years made a lasting impression on him.

No matter what your faith, DISCOVERING THE PARABLES would be a good study guide. Whether you are Christian or not, the life lessons in the parables are worth reading.  Reverend Covert will certainly help you to walk through them.