(Drivebycuriosity)
- As usual at the beginning of a year I write about my favorite books from
the past year.
Fiction:
There were 2 books that were outstanding and belong to the best I read in decades:
Hilary Mantel´s
novel Wolf Hall is set in England
in the begin of the 16th century - a horrible place, ruled by a
ruthless & sophomoric king - and lives were cheap. The book is the
first part of a trilogy that fictionalizes the rise of Thomas Cromwell (
amazon). Cromwell, being the son of a blacksmith & brewer, was considered as a
low birth in the world of aristocrats, but he was smart, eloquent, well
read & traveled - and he made himself useful for the mighty. Today we
would call him a lawyer, economist, administrator & counselor.
Mantel seems to like Cromwell´s character - and how he dealt with his
family and those who depended on him - and casts some flashlights on his
steep advance in the world of high born gentlemen and the reader gets
an impression how Cromwell became the favorite of Henry VIII - against
all odds. Mantel`s Cromwell even expressed solidarity with those who
fell into disgrace, without regard to his own person. And I enjoyed the author´s style and her elegant descriptions of events, place & environments.
Bret
Easton Ellis`novel "The Shards" ( amazon) is written in first person - a fictionalized memoir.
"Bret", who is now in his fifties, recalls his life as a 17 years old
in the year 1981. Then he attended an exclusive school in Los Angeles and was part of a
bunch of spoiled über-rich kids who enjoyed their privileged lives in
Los Angeles with driving the Jaguars & Porsches of their negligent
parents, having sex, using a lot drugs, partying, boozing and watching
movies. "Bret" was driven by his "overactive" imagination as ongoing writer, lust and mental issues. Almost continuously stoned he got increasingly bewildered by ongoing reports about a bizarre & grizzly murder & home invasion series in his L.A. neighborhood and developed a growing interest in a dubious newcomer at his school.
There
are intense spooky parts with a hitchcockian atmosphere and creepy
& violent episodes that Hieronymus Bosch could have painted on a
horror trip. And we learn a lot about "Bret", his mental problems, his
obsessions and his various - mostly gay - sexual experiences & longings, which are explicitly and elaborately described. It is hard to escape this vertigo
of "fear mingling with lust", drug abuse, lies, control loss &
insanity.
But the rest of the 2024 harvest was also worth the time, including Patricia Highsmith´s "Ripley`s Game", the third book in
her Ripley series ( amazon). This
Ripley had aged a bit, he lives now in France; and he is well-off, totally
straight and married with a beautiful woman. Ripley became a more
cunning and seasoned criminal. He starts a psychological game, a revenge
for a petty insult, that creates great dangers for him and others. The
novel is a drama, diving deep into the psychology of twisted persons -
typical for Highsmith. After a slow start the book is gaining speed and turns
into a thriller with nail-biting action.
Michel Houellebecq`s novel "Serotonin", a fictional memoir, told by a 40 something man (amazon ). The protagonist is educated
and intelligent, but self loading, depressive and a misogynist. He laments about his flubbed live and his ruined partnerships
and wallows in self-pity. Houellebecq is a master of describing complex political & economic situations. Some
parts are brilliantly written and justify the author`s fame. For
instance: "The whole point of bureaucracy is to reduce the possibility
of your life to the greatest possible degree, when it doesn`t simply
succeed in destroying them; from the bureaucratic point of view, a good
citizen is a dead citizen". Being
educated as an economist I enjoyed the educated musings about the complex and diverse European agricultural politics. The were more smart
observations, for instance about General
Franco`s influence on the Spanish hotel industry, animal torture in chicken farms, the
appropriate way to
perform blowjobs, the phenomena of
shore fishing, the beauty of Deep Purple´s
"Child in Time live in Duisburg", outlandish and very obnoxious
gang-bangs and so on and on. His sexual descriptions are very graphic
and not always tasteful. Houellebec likes to provoke.
Fredéric Dard´s "The Gravedigger´s Bread" is a quick read. The
protagonist meets a woman, the wife of a grave digger, which
leads to serious consequences. The short novel is macabre - as the title suggest - and comes with twists (amazon ).
I also enjoyed some nonfiction:
"China. A History", by John Keay (amazon
), reads like a thriller.
The author describes the ups and downs of a gigantic nation, filled with action, homicides, revolutions, treasons, intrigues, heroes &
villains, blood and thunder; and explains why China´s rise, the awakening "of the dragon", is just a
comeback, a reawakening. In the 16th century China was already the largest and
wealthiest nation on Earth. And the Asian giant had many "golden ages" before then. The Han Empire (202 BC till AD 220) was as large as the
coeval Roman empire, and China`s brightness lasted until the end of the
millennium, not just half way through it. But after each
"golden age" came a deep fall. The history of China is as colorful as a Chinese New Year Parade. It´s also a tale about fights, and a permanent struggle about power. Keay describes the many battles between the "Kingdom of the Middle" and her neighbors, the clashes between emperors and their usurpers or families about dominance. Very often the rulers struggled with the bureaucrats, who were very powerful eunuchs. Most of the time the administration was the true ruler of the vast empire.
Lawrence
Osborne known for "Hunters in the Dark", "The Glass Kingdom", "Beautiful
Animals" and other novels visited the grape
growing regions of Italy, California & France. The book "The
Accidental Connoisseur: An Irreverent Journey Through the Wine World"
(published 2004 amazon) presents his insights. Osborne
talked with a lot of vintners, from small artisan producers to
California`s wine Cesar Robert Mondavi and visited "Opus One ", a joint
venture by Mondavi and Philippe de Rothschild, the ne plus ultra of
high-technology wine making and "the most expensive winery ever built in
Napa, or indeed in the world". Some of the winters are Marxists, others are part of global capitalism. Osborne tasted zillions of wines and spiced his reports with descriptions of landscapes, wineries, villages and restaurant dinners. I learned a lot about the wine business,
its chemistry, politics & economics: "Because France is such a
potent exporter, she cannot afford to ignore the dictates of her
customer tastes, and Anglo-Saxon tastes, are not necessarily her own".
Janek Wasserman describes in his book "The Marginal Revolutionaries: How Austrian Economists fought the war of ideas" ( amazon). The movement began in the early 20th
century some Austrian economists used to meet at Café Sacher and other
famous coffee houses in Vienna and debated the trends of their genre.
Albeit these economists differed in many things, they shared a common
belief in the rights of the individuals and in free markets and
disputed socialists. Friedrich Hayek (1899 -1992 ) is the most famous of them. He
was an opponent of John Maynard Keynes and objected the Brit´s recipes
of fine tuning the economy through government measures. Hayek explained
that consumers & entrepreneurs know best what they need. He
described that free markets are the most efficient way to satisfy the
needs the consumers and to allocate scarce resources. Ludwig von Mises
(1881-1973) was a sharp critic of governments attempts to control the
economy, either from the left (Socialists, Marxists) or the right
(Nationalsocialists, known as Nazis). According to Mises the economy
functions best when it is left alone. He described how the unregulated decisions
of consumers, inventors & entrepreneurs (capitalism) lead to the best use of scarce resources (rational allocation of resource). Carl Menger
(1840-1921) focused on the individuals and their preferences and explained
how markets function and how everybody benefits
from free trade. Fritz Machlup
(1902-1983) emphasized the importance of information for the
functioning of markets and the economy and explained the relation
between exchange rates and the balance of payments. Gottfried Haberler (1900-1995) focused on comparative advantages in international trade. Josef Schumpeter
(1883-1950 ) became famous for his stylish elegant "Capitalism,
Socialism and Democracy ( a pleasure to read in German) and coined the
term "constructive destruction", describing the relationship between
innovation and economic development - Mark Zuckerberg`s: "Move fast and
destroy things".
"Waterloo Sunrise - London from the Sixties to Thatcher" by John Davis (amazon ) describes over more than 500 pages the social, economic, political & legal
developments in the British Capital. The
book is very densely & dryly written and staffed with a huge amount
of information.
There were some remarkable Biographies, especially Peter Ackroyd´s The Tudors", the second book of his series: "The History of England " (amazon ). The family ruled England for 118 years and shaped the country`s history, almost as much as William the Conqueror and
his Norman relatives did 5 centuries earlier. The book focuses on four
of the five Tudor monarchs, ignoring Henry VII, who lived from 1457
through 1507. Ackroyd starts in the year 1507 when Henry VIII reached the throne. The King is well known for being a monster and for his erratic adolescent
behavior. The brutality, willfulness and the fate of his unfortunate six wives are well documented in so many books, plays and movies. But it is hard to feel sorry for Anna Boleyn, who was an intriguer and did what everything she could do to outmaneuver her predecessor Catherine of Aragon. Monster or not, Henry changed England forever. He released the country from the yoke of the Catholic Church and the rule of the Popes. The monarch did not intend to become a religious reformer, the reform was just a means to an end. Henry´s son Edward tried to continue his fathers reform, but did not live long enough to make any impression. The death of his almighty father - and his youth & frail health - seemed to invite rebellions and unrest all over the country. Henry´s daughter Mary, a radical and fundamentalist Catholic, tried to turn history back and bring England again under the Catholic yoke and hoped to import the Spanish inquisition. No wonder, she was known as "Bloody Mary". Fortunately for the English Mary`s terror regime ended with her early death.
Akroyd gave Elizabeth I about half of the book, more than he dedicated to Henry. Rightly so. The Queen continued her father´s religious reform and made the separation from Catholic fundamentalism and the regime of the Popes definitive. Thanks to her caution England avoided ruinous and messy wars. She helped to convert the country into a democracy - at least a bit -and laid the foundation of England becoming a sea power, with the help of many others, like Sir Walter Raleigh and Sir Francis Drake, who strengthen England´s Navy. During Elizabeth´s regency the industry of England advanced as strongly as its commerce. The Tudor epoch saw the rise & fall of men like Thomas Wolsey, Thomas Cromwell, the Duke of Norfolk and many others, who where sometimes in the favor of the king or the queen and sometimes not.
Philip Norman´s biography "Mick Jagger" gives a good introduction into the complexity of giant of 20th century culture (amazon ). The author tells how Jagger met Keith Richards and started the
Stones. He depicts how the band turned from a blues cover band into top hit creating engine, but stayed poor for years and reports why Jagger & Richards got arrested. We learn Jagger´s role at the infamous Altamont concert and about his failed attempts to make a career in the movie business. I was impressed how Jagger prepared physically for the
stress of hours of extensive shows: intense
weight training, karate, squash and daily seven-mile runs and - after the year
2000 - a strenuous fitness regimen with daily running, swimming,
cycling, gym work, yoga and Pilates, combined with a diet of whole-grain
bread, rice, beans, pasta, chicken & fish. Norman also covers the rumors about Jagger´s alleged bisexuality and the gossiped menage a trois with David Bowie and Bowie´s
wife Angie Barnett.
I also read a biography of another pioneering rock band: "God save the Kinks" by Rob Jovanci ( amazon). The group was controlled by the brothers Ray Davies, the
composer and lead singer, and Dave Davies, the lead guitarist. Ray´s diverse creativity (hard and soft rock) and Dave´s guitar technique helped to define
rock music and influenced countless other composers & performers. Dave was probably the first who used distortion in an amplifier, today the trademark of heavy metal (x.com ). Over
their whole career the Davies brothers behaved sophomoric, aggressively and
erratically. There
were fist fights on the stage during gigs, they performed boozed,
ruined their hotel rooms, suffered nervous breakdowns and more. The
anecdotes about fights, sexual experiments, divorces, accidents &
incidents and about "paranoia, depression, heavy drinking and living on
the edge" make the book really interesting.
Normally I write only about books printed in English, but Frank Schmidt´s autobiography "Unkaputtbar" is worth to make an exception ( 216 pages in German amazon ). Since 2007 (!) Schmidt is the coach of FC Heidenheim, a soccer club located in a small city in Southern Germany. Even armed only with a tiny budget Schmidt lead the club from Germany´s Oberliga (fifth tier) to Bundesliga (first league). He describes his philosophy and explains how he shapes the team; and how he chooses and motivates players. According to Schmidt the mentality to never give up can be exercised and can be exemplified by the coach. If you want to know how an outstanding soccer coaches works and you do understand German this is the book for you.
Science Fiction:
Alastair Reynolds`space opera "Revelation Space" (published in 2000 amazon) could
be seen as an explanation for the Fermi Paradox (why we did not find
another civilization even though the sky is full with stars). Over more than 400 pages Reynolds shapes cosmology, particle physics,
Einstein`s relativity, quantum mechanics, information theory and other
sciences into an exciting futuristic opera.
The book "Hiero`s Journey" by Sterling E. Lanier, (published in 1973 amazon) is a modern fairy tale and another response to the Cold War, when people feared that a possible nuclear conflict between the West and the Soviet Union would lead to an atomic holocaust.
The plot is set about 5,000 years after the disaster. The nuclear
strikes had changed everything and more than 5 millennia of radical
radiation had extremely altered the genetics on earth and created bizarre
new life forms. Like in Walter M. Miller Jr`s "Canticle for Leibowitz" there are some
abbeys which are oases of civilization and try to recover humanity, but
in this novel also science blends with telepathy and precognition, as a
result of the genetic alterations. The protagonist is a kind of priest, but also a highly educated killer; very smart and possesses growing telepathic powers. He gets the order to travel south to discover machines from the pre-Armageddon era which could help to rekindle civilization. The book advances like a computer game: The challenges are getting more and more severe, and the protagonist learns from his encounters, he adapts to them and is getting stronger. I had a lot of fun because the author has a rich fantasy and develops bizarre environments & life forms.
Yoon Ha Lee´s short story "Counting casualties" narrates about a far future war where humanity faces a superior enemy (20 pages, published as Kindle book amazon). The plot follows some humans who are fighting a war against technologically superior aliens. The humans are supported by
a hyper-intelligent but strange spaceship (AI). The enemy´s intentions &
technologies are beyond human imagination and the damages it does have
never been known before. The
story is told in first person by the commander of the human war fleet,
who finally discovers the secret of the enemy. The story is smart, crispy, but also philosophical and I was
fascinated by the author´s prose, speculative ideas & bizarre locations.
Stanislaw Lem´s "Tales of Pirx the Pilot" contains 5 short stories & novellas which follow a young man, named Pirx (amazon ). The protagonist
is a dreamer, full of hopes & ideas, but has a weak self esteem and
is not well regarded by
his superiors. On the other side he is mentally strong, cunning and he
never gives up. So he survives very challenging situations caused by
technical problems, physical phenomena and other calamities. Lem
interwove physics, engineering and cosmology into thrilling adventure
stories, spiced with humor, psychology and a bit of philosophy.
If
the earth would get hit by a catastrophe that makes it suddenly
uninhabitable some people might try to escape into space and seek to
survive there. How would this be possible? Neil Stephenson gives the
answer in his book "Seveneves: A Novel" (published 2015 amazon
). Over more than 800 pages he elaborates how some humans start to
settle in space stations and similar habitats in close orbits around the
world. "Seveneves"
belongs to the most scientific scifi novels I ever read. About 2/3 of
plot are set in contemporary times and the author uses already known
sciences and technologies. He describes painstakingly how the refugees
from earth create habitable places in space, endangered by vacuum, hard
radiation, extreme temperatures, meteors and many other perils. Stephenson
immersed deep into space flight technology, orbital mechanics,
chemistry, genetics and many more branches of knowledge. The last third of the book describes an very advanced human civilization 5000 years into the future.
"The Collected Stories of Arthur C. Clarke" ( amazon). The tales are chronological sorted, showing the development of the author. Clarke was not only a talented story teller, he also was a scientist and used his deep and profound knowledge to interweave physics, engineering, evolution, cosmology and more science into exciting tales.In his foreword Clarke declared: "The science fiction writer does a great service to the community. He encourages in his readers flexibility of mind, readiness to accept and even welcome change - in one word, adaptability."
The anthology "Nightfall and other stories" contains 20 stories by Isaac Asimov, selected by the master himself (amazon ). Asimov is still ahead most of the contemporary scifi writers.
The Mammoth Book of Extreme Science Fiction" edited by Mike Ashley is a collection of 25 short stories & novellas ( amazon).
The collection covers a wide spectrum o topics, including space opera,
time travel, internet of things and more.
