Hitler at Home

Hitler at Home (Despina Stratigakos)


I got this book as a gift, and I'm glad I did as it's the kind of thing I would never pick for myself, but ended up enjoying quite a bit. The author explores Hitler's, uh, homes, using this as a base to explore the difference between the way Hitler really lived and the image that was projected in propaganda. This is really interesting stuff, and the only complaint I have is that reading about chumps like Hitler decorating their palaces with stolen art can really get your blood boiling. (Of course, on the other hand, reading about all of his chalets and hideouts getting bombed into the ground, looted, and paved over is good for a giggle.) I'd recommend this to anyone, even people with WW2 fatigue - the subject matter is so off the beaten path I couldn't help but be interested.
My one caveat is that if you, like me, take your books out to read while you're eating, you might want to take the dust jacket off this one; fellow guests at TGI Fridays aimed a couple hard stares at me while reading this.


Grade: A-

"No Picnic"

No Picnic (Julian Thompson)

A personal history of the Falkland Islands conflict from the commander of the English forces there. I enjoyed this book well enough, but the author assumes familiarity with the conflict; I strongly recommend reading something like The Battle for the Falklands first or you'll be totally lost. This book is much shorter than that one, and I might recommend reading this one right after it as a nice little chaser.

Grade: C+

Mastering the West: Rome and Carthage at War (Dexter Hoyos)

On reflection, my assessment of Carthage Must Be Destroyed has cooled; Luckily, my second attempt at the material was this book, which I quite enjoyed. This one covers covers the dispute between Rome and Carthage starting with the Mamertines in Sicily asking both cities for help down through Carthage being razed to the ground (spoiler alert). Parts of the military history can be slightly dry, but that's really my only complaint; in general this is an excellent history of the entire conflict.

Grade: A-

"The Secret Ministry of Ag. & Fish"

The Secret Ministry of Ag. & Fish: My Life in Churchill's School of Spies (Noreen Riols)

I'm really torn about this book; the author's story working in SOE during World War II is very interesting, but the book really seems to need a good editor. The raw material of the author's story is fascinating and she has a great voice, but it reads like a tape recorder was put in front of her and she told a bunch of interesting stories; I think the book could be vastly improved if it was set in chronological order, or at least had a stronger main narrative. As it is it's like spending an afternoon hearing the author reminisce, and while that's no bad thing, in its current form I ended up reading it in an afternoon and then forgetting most of it.

Grade: B

"The Devils' Alliance"

The Devils' Alliance: Hitler's Pact with Stalin, 1939 - 1941 (Roger Moorhouse)

Kind of the European version of Japan 1941. As you can guess from the title, this book covers the strange period of time where Nazi Germany and Stalin's USSR were allies, starting just before the pact was signed and ending with the German sneak attack in June 1941. This is obviously a pretty depressing book, but as a look at a often-ignored period of time, it's fascinating; I guess I shouldn't have been surprised at how cynical Hitler and Stalin both were given that they both agreed to the titular devil's alliance, but here we are. My only caveat is that this is something of a niche title. I found the book very interesting, but a 432-page history of two years about World War II where World War II isn't happening between the subjects is kind of a hard sell. That said, this is probably an excellent appetizer to read before a solid history of the European front in WW2.

Grade: B+

"A History of Britian in 36 Postage Stamps"

A History of Britain in 36 Postage Stamps (Chris West)

This was an interesting book to read; I know basically nothing about postage stamps, and not a great deal about the period of British history covered (1840 - the modern day). I enjoyed reading it, but the history is very basic, and it mostly just left me wanting more. I can easily recommend this for school kids, history novices, and people with an interest in postage stamps; otherwise I'd probably give it a miss.

Grade: B-

"City of Ambition"

City of Ambition: FDR, La Guardia, and the Making of Modern New York (Mason B. Williams)

I feel bad giving this book a negative review, but I found that my attention kept drifting while reading it. It's a little difficulty for me to put why that was into words, but it seems to boil down to the book's main theme getting quite muddled. The opening material, sketches of FDR and La Guardia, is pretty interesting, and I enjoyed the book during this part, but when the author starts running through a detailed history of the politics of New York state in the interwar years, it's just not very gripping. I would suggest the author either needs to take a higher level overview of this material or dive in even deeper and really fill out the history; as it is, the level of detail has the reader see a lot of characters come and go without making much of an impact, and it turns into kind of a muddle. It also stirs the dreaded "Why am I reading this" feeling - I can't help but feel that a lot of the pages in the book could be condensed down to "La Guardia was in the political wilderness for a few years" without following the fruitless narrative thread about what the ultimately meaningless mayors and governors of New York were doing at the time.
For all that, though, I don't think this is really a bad book - it's just one I didn't personally enjoy. It's a bit tough to recommend; if your local library has it, I'd try the first hundred pages (I made it to 125).

Grade: :/

"Marie Antoinette"

Marie Antoinette: The Journey (Antonia Fraser)

Until recently I haven't been a big biography fan; I guess I read some bad ones and was scared off by the boring parts of life even the most interesting among us have. Lately, though, I've come to enjoy them quite a bit, and this one among a few in particular. Fraser's biography (like any good one I suppose) is more than just a history of its subject; it's also a history of the times they lived through, and Fraser brings them to life in sometimes stomach-churning intimacy. (Want to read all about Marie Antoinette and her sister's periods? Here you go!!!!)
Perhaps surprisingly, Marie Antoinette herself comes off as probably the most likable person in the book; I'll admit that by page 100, I was actively rooting for most of the French court to get guillotined. (The nadir for this probably comes on page 102 where ambassadors are giving diamond necklaces to the palace's pets.) That being said, the second half of the book is just as grim as you're probably expecting, and I identified with MA enough that I was uncomfortable reading about life kicking her around. I'd recommend this book heartily, just be prepared for a good cry near the end.

(Bonus out of context quote: "The spanking pace caused much merriment among the waiting crowds of his erstwhile subjects.")

Grade: A-

"The Adventure of English"

The Adventure of English: The Biography of a Language (Melvyn Bragg)

I was a little let down about this book; I'm not sure what I was expecting, but this seems more like a book for a middle school student. I didn't really learn much; Bragg's writing keeps things moving briskly, perhaps too briskly. At times I felt like a passenger on a train going too fast past some interesting landscape I wanted to stop and check out. This is easy to recommend if you're just starting with this subject, but I had the sinking feeling that I knew more than the author about the subject through most of the book.

Grade: C+

"The Cuckoo's Egg"

The Cuckoo's Egg: Tracking a Spy Through the Maze of Computer Espionage (Cliff Stoll)

This is a real-life detective story that I had a really hard time putting down. The book kicks off when the author notices a seventy-five cent billing discrepancy in his mainframe system (this is back in the 80's when people were paying for computer time), and a little digging ends up turning up, well, I'm not really sure I should say.
I can say that I really liked this book; it's mostly about computer crime, but I wouldn't worry about it being too esoteric (I mostly find it charming - the mainframes these guys are chasing each other through have a faction of the power of your phone.) I would recommend skipping the back cover, which gives away the mystery, but otherwise I have nothing but good things to say.

Grade: B+

"Lincoln at Gettysburg"

Lincoln at Gettysburg: The Words that Remade America (Garry Wills)

I'm surprised at how little I liked this book. Honestly, I don't know how this won the Pulitzer; it's about a fifth very technical dissection of the Gettysburg Address itself, and the rest is a wandering hodgepodge (I found myself flipping page after page of information about then-contemporary cemetery design philosophy). Some of this is interesting - the author's rundown of the two hour long preceding Gettysburg Oration went into a lot of detail about public speaking in the mid 1800s that was surprisingly interesting.
But this is the exception - most of the non-Address material is both boring and puzzling in that I'm not sure why it was included. I almost muddled through the whole book, but then I started running into this (from pages 116-117):

Psychobiographers, as we have seen, claim that this demonstrates Lincoln's oedipal compulsion to "kill" Douglas as a sibling rival.

I don't really think I need to say any more than that. Don't bother with this book.

Grade: F

"An Astronaut's Guide to Life on Earth"

An Astronaut's Guide to Life on Earth: What Going to Space Taught Me About Ingenuity, Determination, and Being Prepared for Anything (Col. Chris Hadfield)

A pretty interesting book that's easy to recommend, if not quite demand that you run out and pick up now. The book is mostly a autobiography of Hadfield's life, mostly centered on his last mission to space on the International Space Station. Mixed in is almost comedically Canadian common sense advice (make sure you're doing your own job well, etc). I don't really know that I have much more to say about this; I liked reading it, and the advice isn't bad. Um, I guess this review's a small bite.

Grade: B

"Under the Loving Care of the Fatherly Leader"

Under the Loving Care of the Fatherly Leader: North Korea and the Kim Dynasty (Bradley Martin)

I'm torn about this book; it's divided roughly into thirds, with one being very good, one being interesting but dry, and one being pretty boring and pointless. The first third is a biography of Kim Il-Sung, covering from his birth up to his son taking over most of the power in Korea, and this part's easy to recommend as the author gives a interesting and informative history of both Kim and the development of North Korea. After this the book goes into the second section, which is a large batch of interviews with defectors. This kind of primary source is pretty interesting at first, but between the sheer volume of them and the fact that the author just presents the interviews without any kind of narrative thread eventually made me start skipping pages. 

This comes to the last section of the book, which I just recommend skipping; the author speculates on the future of North Korea, and it seems like the book's editor didn't read this far as it's quite disjointed. A large part of it also deals with the question of who will succeed Kim Jong-Il, which was a good question in 2006, but has been answered pretty definitively at this point. 

All of this makes a book that's difficult to recommend. I would say get it out of the local library, read the first half, and return it.

Grade: B

"Faith and Treason" & "God's Secret Agents" two-fer

Faith and Treason: The Story of the Gunpowder Plot (Antonia Fraser)

Apparently I forgot to ever review God's Secret Agents; since it covers some of the same territory as as Faith and Treason, I guess I might as well talk about them both.
Not knowing anything about either one of these books, I lucked out by reading God's Secret Agents first; this book is much larger than the other, and happily it does a lot of scene-setting. It mostly covers the Elizabethan age, with James coming in at the epilogue. Faith and Treason is much smaller, and picks up about where God's Secret Agents leaves off, dispatching Elizabeth in the introduction, and is almost exclusively about James assuming power and the Gunpowder Plot itself. I recommend both books, as they really do work well together, and the story they tell is quite interesting (if incredibly grim at times). That being said, Fraser assumes enough knowledge that I'd probably feel lost without having read God's Secret Agents first. My only caveat is that both these books go into gory detail about the caught Catholics getting tortured; reading about them getting dismembered was no less wince-worthy the second time, unfortunately. Still, I recommend both books, although you might want to slip a palette cleanser in between.

Grades: A

"History's Biggest Blunders"

History's Biggest Blunders (Ian Whitelaw)

I had a bad feeling about this book as soon as I started reading it; the first "blunder" is "Humankind domesticates plants and animals," which I think most people would agree has turned out pretty well, civilization wise. I chalked this up to the book not being titled "History's Most Nuanced Looks at Societal Development" and went on to the second "blunder", which is Pharoh not letting Moses and the Jews go free, even as the author mentions multiple times that God explains to Moses that he hardened Pharoah's heart. So is that really a blunder?
Eventually I got the sense that I know more than the author about most of these blunders (Did Alexander the Great really "push too far"? He won the Battle of Hydaspes and his army made him turn back; how is that one of "History's Biggest Blunders"?). This makes it a little tough to recommend, but it is fairly entertaining, and it's divided into two to three page chapters that are the perfect length for a bathroom break. Pick it up if you see it in the bargain bin, otherwise I can't recommend it too highly.

Grade: C-

"Empire of Liberty"

Empire of Liberty: A History of the Early Republic, 1789 - 1815 [Oxford History of the United States] (Gordon S. Wood)

For a massive history book I really enjoyed, I'm not sure I have much to say here aside from a strong recommendation; The core of this book is a why-didn't-I-learn-this-in-school exploration of the early clash between the Federalists - trying to make America into a European-style Power complete with landed aristocracy - and the Democratic-Republicans under Jefferson, attempting to mold America into a republic full of small farmers. This might not sound that interesting, but if so I'm not doing it justice; some of the truly bizarre ideas (including an attempt to completely outlaw commerce) are really staggering, and this is an easy recommend to anyone even casually interested in American history. Don't let the size scare you off from this gem.

Grade: A

"American Savage"

American Savage: Insights, Slights, and Fights on Faith, Sex, Love, and Politics (Dan Savage)

I had an eerie feeling reading this book; Savage's voice comes through so strongly that I couldn't help but hear him reading the text. This is not necessarily a bad thing, although I guess it removes the need for an audiobook.
Aside from that, I liked it; Savage's positions seems pretty sensible to a liberal dupe like myself (although I was left wanting to hear more about his collection of Catholic kitsch).
My only two caveats are that I'd recommend skipping the gun control chapter, which is a real downer and doesn't look to be getting better any time soon; and this is probably a book to get out of the library (I polished it off in two sittings).

Grade: B+

"You're Only as Good as Your Next One"

You're Only as Good as Your Next One: 100 Great Films, 100 Good Films, and 100 for Which I Should Be Shot (Mike Medavoy)

A pretty interesting look at Hollywood from the agent's and producer's side (Medavoy being an agent and then a producer). If you're hoping for juicy Hollywood gossip or dirt, this is a book to skip; Medavoy sticks to his own career and the changing nature of the movie buisness. I learned a lot, and I was entertained the whole time. There's better (and meaner) books about Hollywood out there, but this is worth picking up if you see at the used bookstore.
One caveat is that I'd advise keeping your bullshit detector on high alert; Medavoy claims that "The 6th Day" is a very intelligent movie, which I guess reasonable people can disagree about, but when he ventures into taking credit for the Adams Family movie because it spawned a trend of successes like the Beverly Hillbillies movie, well, that's the kind of thing I wouldn't want to unquestionably read and then start repeating in public.

Grade: B

"One Hundred Days"

One Hundred Days: Napoleon's Road to Waterloo (Alan Schom)

This one you can judge by its cover. I guess I'm kind of starting at the end with Napoleon here; spoiler alert. What I liked about this book is that the author didn't just cover Waterloo - in fact, the entire military campaign makes up maybe a fifth of the book. This leaves the rest to what I really wanted to see, namely
Napoleon's governance of France and to a small extent planning for the future (it's to a small extent as he doesn't seem to have thought much past battling the rest of Europe, and of course he never got the chance after that).
That would make it an easy recommend (for history nerds), but there is one warning I'd issue: Schom stops to drop in biographies of all the major players as we run across them. This is puzzling for two reasons; one, I would assume that most readers had the sense (unlike me) to read other books about Napoleon first instead of starting at the end, and would already have this information. Two, the biographies are largely pointless as most of the characters get so little screen time that their introductory biographies are longer than all the rest of the text featuring them put together. I'd say just skip 'em.
Other than this issue, and probably recommending reading this as a endcap, the bulk of the text covers an area of study that's esoteric enough that this is the only book I've seen covering it, and that makes it pretty easy to recommend.

Grade: B+

"Dividing the Spoils"

Dividing the Spoils: The War for Alexander the Great's Empire (Robin Waterfield)

I'm torn on this book; it does a very nice job of summing up the fallout from Alexander the Great dying young, stopping to touch on Greek social and political ideas in addition to who fought whom. But I also struggled with it - there's a ton of new unusual Greek names, and I never got a really solid grip on who was who as the story played out. In the end, this is probably not for the casual reader; I think I'd recommend this as a quick endcap (it's barely 200 pages) after a nice meaty Alexander the Great biography. (Speaking of which, can anybody recommend a nice meaty Alexander the Great biography?)

Grade: B-