March Read/John3

Title: Dune

Author: Frank Herbert

Genre: F

John’s Read:

            Dune is a work of science fiction. The fantasy parts (if one wishes to call them that) come from having to imagine oneself in a different time in a different place. The human aspects, the universals, are already there for people with which to amply identify. Be it politics, war, attraction, love, or what have you, the experiences are easy to take as one's own. 

The war strategy, the tactics, the human emotions in conflict or in love, the political aspects, the ideals of honor, these are all there. Presented in a believable way with discriptive verse, the story unfolds with humor, teaching and learning, and with adventure. For sci-fi fans, it is a classic. To be read in 2015 might prove a hinderance to some because the desert setting and fight for freedom may remind one of the conflicts in our Mid-East. To others, however, the characters' struggles for liberty will be all that more poignant. A definite recommend. 
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March Read/John2

Title: ALL I REALLY NEED TO KNOW I LEARNED IN KINDERGARTEN: Uncommon Thoughts on Common Things

Author: Robert Fulghum

Call Number: 128 F963A 2004

Subjects: Life

John’s Read:

            This is more a complilation of writings to "...friends, family, a religious community, and myself..." that became published. It was a result of it being "...sent home from school in the knapsack of a child whose mother is a literary agent..." who asked if he had any more things he had written. Since the author has worked as a cowboy, parish minister, bartender, salesman, folksinger - as a few examples - the writings reflect his vast life experience. When asked he "...usually replies that he is a philosopher.." who expresses "...what he thinks by writing or speaking or painting, whichever seems appropriate."  

He extracts thoughtful ideas from everyday life experiences in a way to make people take time to reflect on their own experiences. To take his stories as a parallel course as a way to compare one's own with his so that each may glean that which is wise from our own rather than just going through something, then tucking it away as simply some personal event with little meaning. In other words, rather than, "Okay, I've been through that", to "Wow, why didn't I think of that?!" It is both worth a read and to be passed on. 

March Read/John1

Title: IT WORKED FOR ME: In Life and Leadership

Author: Colin Powell;  Tony Koltz

Call Number: B P882P 2012

Subjects: Leadership; Quotations

John’s Read:

            In this book although autobiographical in nature, the retired general goes beyond the usual facts of his life to give us more the reasons he is the way he is. Explaining the normal "I was here and I went there and this is what happened as a result" is present of course, but so too the rules he made for himself because of what he went through. They constitute the way by which he commanded. The why he lead the way he did. And in the many circumstances in which he lived; that is, in military life at peace or in war, and in civilian life in its different aspects. For instance, chapter one, part one lays out rules for living. In short, they are:

1. It Ain't As Bad As You Think. It Will Look Better In The Morning, p 4-6
2. Get Mad, Then Get Over It. p 6-9
3. Avoid Having Your Ego So Close To Your Position That When Your Position Falls, Your Ego Goes With It. p 9-11
4. It Can Be Done, p 11
5. Be Careful What You Choose: You May Get It. p 11-12
6. Don't Let Adverse Facts Stand In The Way Of A Good Decision. p 12-14
(General Eisenhower's decision on D-Day to go in spite of the weather.)
7. You Can't Make Someone Else's Choices. You Shouldn't Let Someone Else Make Yours. p 15-17
8. Check Small Things. p 18-20
9. Share Credit. p 20-22
("When something goes well, make sure you share the credit down and around the whole organization. Let all employees believe they were the ones who did it. They were.")
10. Remain Calm. Be Kind. p 22-23
11. Have A Vision. Be Demanding. p 23-25
12. Don't Take Counsel Of Your Fears Or Naysayers. p 26-27
13. Perpetual Optimism Is A Force Multiplier. p 27-28

Note that I included some examples in a few of them. All in all, there are 44 chapters and an Afterward in this book full of ways to become not just an enlightened leader but also a better person. There is wisdom here. Want more than just a few examples? Read the book. 
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March Read/5

Title: The Murder at the Vicarage
Author: Christie, Agatha
Genre: Mystery
Book Description (from amazon.com):
     The Queen of Mystery has come to Harper Collins! Agatha Christie, the acknowledged mistress of suspense—creator of indomitable sleuth Miss Marple, meticulous Belgian detective Hercule Poirot, and so many other unforgettable characters—brings her entire oeuvre of ingenious whodunits, locked room mysteries, and perplexing puzzles to Harper Paperbacks. The Murder at the Vicarage was Christie’s very first mystery to feature her most popular investigator—as a dead body in a clergyman’s study proves to Miss Marple that no place, holy or otherwise, is a sanctuary from homicide.
My Read:
     I enjoyed reading this Miss Marple mystery very much. It's plot is a bit different from other books by Ms. Christie. The two murderers were pretty bold and their plan was close to perfect. Miss Marple had figured out from the onset who the murderer(s) might be but she got confused by the confession(s) of her suspects. Piece by piece, Miss Marple gathered the knowledge and the puzzle was fixed. Though no direct evidence, thanks to the trap Miss Marple set up for the culprits, the murderers were caught.
     The way Miss Marple solved the mystery is ingenious. It's all about human nature; she couldn't repeat enough. 

March Read/4

Title: A Caribbean Mystery

Author: Christie, Agatha

Genre: Mystery

Number of Pages: 221

ISBN: 9781579127381

Book Description (from inside flap):

            Stricken with arthritis, Miss Jane Marple has packed herself off, at the insistence of her nephew, for some rest and relaxation at a resort in the Caribbean. The sea is sublime and the weather is fine in this quiet paradise so far away from bustling St. Mary Mead. But suddenly the calm is interrupted by the death of Major Palgrave, one of her fellow guests at the hotel.

            Miss Marple finds herself quite disturbed by this turn of events. She’d just spent the previous evening speaking with the major, who’d seemed to her to be in perfectly good health. He’d been telling her about a photograph that he had-“a snapshot of a murderer…” he’d claimed. Convinced that the major’s death was not at all natural, she begins to ask difficult questions. It soon becomes clear that a murderer is lurking among her companions at the hotel, and it is up to Miss Marple to root out this person before he or she can strike again.

My Read:

            It’s another good read of Agatha Christie’s mystery books. There are characters that would be repeatedly featured in her other books, though not served as a sequel.

Personally, I usually could find some words, if not phrases, replete with wisdom in Ms. Christie’s books. Here is one that I remember.

“Well, well. I know all we medicos hand these things out freely nowadays. Nobody tell young women who can’t sleep to count sheep, or get up and eat a biscuit, or write a couple of letters and then go back to bed. Instant remedies, that’s what people demand nowadays. Sometimes, I think it’s a pity we give them to them. You’ve got to learn to put up with things in life. All very well to stuff a comforter into a baby’s mouth to stop it crying. Can’t go on doing that all a person’s life….I bet you, if you asked Miss Marple what she does if she can’t sleep, she’d tell you she counted sheep going under a gate.”-page 174

March Read/3

Title: Nemesis
Author: Christie, Agatha
Genre: Mystery
Number of Pages: 271
Book Description (from inside book flap):
"Our code word, my dear lady, is Nemesis."  Miss Jane Marple sat in the big armchair by the fireplace in her house at St. Mary Mead, and repeated the sentence softly under her breath. It was par of a letter-an unusual letter from an unusual man. The man who had written the letter was dead. She had read the announcement of his death more than a week ago.
     Nemesis...The word brought a picture before her eyes of tropical palms-a blue Caribbean sea-and of herself running through the warm fragrant night on the island of St. Honore to ask for help. To get help in time so that a life could be saved.
     She had insisted on-had demanded-help, and the word that had come to her lips had been Nemesis.
     Now she herself was being asked for help-for a reason she did not know-in a matter of which she was ignorant! The whole thing was impossible, quite impossible-and yet...What possible qualifications could she have? Again a certain sentence came back: "You, my dear, have a natural flair for justice. I want you to investigate a crime. I see you in my mind's eye, as I saw you once one night as I rose from sleep disturbed by your urgency, enveloped in a cloud of pink knitting wool! Miss Marple looked down at her knitting.
     The letter had ended with a quotation from the Book of Amos:
Let justice roll down like waters
And righteousness like an everlasting stream
"It doesn't sound at all like me," said Miss Marple doubtfully.
My Read:
     In this book, the murders were committed because of love, not revenge nor hatred or the usual causes one might surmise. Here are the conversations between Miss Marple and one of the three sisters, Anthea.-pages 236-237
"But of course it's murder," said Anthea. "All I wonder is who wanted to murder her? I should think probably some pupil of hers at the school who always hated her and had it in for her."
"Do you think hate can last as long as that? asked Miss Marple.
"Oh, I should think so. I should think you could hate anyone for years."
"No," said Miss Marple, "I think hate would die out. You could try and keep it up artificially, but I think you would fail. It's not as strong a force as love," she added.
Love is, sometimes, frightening, said Miss Marple.
I agree.

March Read/2

Title: Dangerous Personalities: an FBI Profiler Shows You How to Identify and Protect Yourself from harmful People

Author: Navarro, Joe

Call Number: 613.66 N322D 2014

Subject(s): Crime Prevention; Criminals: Crime; Psychopaths; Antisocial Personality Disorders

Number of Pages: 242

ISBN: 9781623361921

Book Description (from amazon.com):

            We seem to wake up to a new tragedy in the news every day—Newtown, Boston, Aurora, Columbine. So often the reporters say that “there were some signs, but nobody acted.” the scary part about these tragedies is that less than 1% of criminals are incarcerated for their crimes, meaning that for every headline, there are millions of dangerous situations in which average people find themselves. On top of that, how can ordinary people identify threats from those who may not hurt them physically but can devastate their lives on a daily basis—the crazy coworkers, out-of control family members, or relentless neighbors?
In Dangerous Personalities, former FBI profiler Joe Navarro shows readers how to identify the four most common “dangerous personalities” and analyze how much of a threat each one can be: the Narcissist, the Predator, the Paranoid, and the Unstable Personality. Along the way, readers learn how to protect themselves both immediately and long-term—as well as how to recover from the trauma of being close to such a destructive force.

My Read:

            Did you ever wonder why, instead of taking home joy and satisfaction after work, you went home with extreme fatigue, sagging shoulders, and dryness of energy? Plenty of books I have read stated that it would take 5 times of energy and power to overcome negative forces and energies. Negativity could come from events, things, or people you are surrounded.

            The most helpful tips coming from this book are the checklists provided at the end of the chapters. One could assess not only people around self but also take a good look at the self. From mild, average, to the extreme, the check points tell a lot about a person.

            The next most resourceful part from this book is the “Words that describe the personalities” in each chapter. For instance, “bully, selfish, superficial, arrogant, controlling, etc” are used to describe a narcissist. The titles begin the chapters also serve as tells: “It’s all about me-the narcissistic personality;” “Fasten your seat belt-the emotionally unstable personality;” “Trust no one and you’ll never get hurt-the paranoid personality;” “What’s mine is mine-and what’s yours is mine-the predator.”

            Personally, I found it helpful at assessing myself and as a reminder of how imperfect human beings are.

February Read/Kirsten

Title: The Great Divorce

Author: Lewis, C.S.

Book Description:

Good morning y'all !!

I finally finished that book by C.S. Lewis, The Great Divorce. I say finally because every single word I didn't know, I looked for it in the dictionary. And it's 20 pages of my small notebook... But I'm cheating, there are some words I looked 3 or 4 times for... I will let you guess which ones...

Here's the summary. It's the story of C.S. Lewis (he says "I") in a strange world. At the beginning he is queuing to take a bus. During that time he discovers "the grey town". A place where you can get everything material you need or want, but where people are quarrelsome. So you are often lonely. In that city, it's an everlasting after-sunset gray light.

Some people renounce to take the bus, but Lewis eventually takes it. The journey with other people from a gray light to a radiant blue light is the instant to whimper about the gray town and its rules. It's also the moment to be afraid of what's coming: a bright land where everything is tough and so heavy that you couldn't bear a leaf...
At the arrival, some people from the bus, who in fact are transparent as Ghosts, meet Spirits from that luminous land. But many of them experience the meeting with someone they knew on Earth and don't want to see anymore. It becomes hard to repent and believe the joy you can see when that's asked by a friend of yours that you call a murderer. It's hard to "just" believe when you used to be a Protestant earthman and to like discussing the Bible ... One woman is asked to renounce "taking in charge" her husband in Heaven (that means renounce trying to change her husband's way of life). To "go to Heaven",  you need to change, you need to trust, you need to be yourself, as the man who was acting during his life, represented as a Tragedian character clutched through a chain by a Dwarf, and who disappears when he doesn't renounce his tragic appearance ...
This fable is about the discovery of Heaven,  a wonderful land with plain joy and mirth, but where you change and leave grumbling and whining, lust, jealousy in the grey town, which is finally a very small place in the crackles of  Heaven's ground.

I liked very much this book. Because ideas are not given dry nor complicated. They are given as fables, like stories for the child I am. I discovered a wonderful land, with deep colors as crimson, radiant blue or golden apples, with flowers as heather and hawthorn, covered with dew. I also went through the different human characters (and characteristic sounds): grumbling, whimpering, whining, sulkily, wicked, but also mirth, joy, in love and mere.

I looked on Wikipedia about The great divorce, and I learned that the original title was "Who goes home?". That's interesting when you read about people who created their own Hell on Earth. You choose your home as you can choose to truly love and to be happy before the death.

And you? Did you read The Great Divorce? Would you recommend me another reading?

The reading Frog

March Read

Title: 4:50 From Paddington

Author: Christie, Agatha

Genre: Mystery

Number of Pages: 286

ISBN: 9781579126933

Book Description (from amazon.com):

            The Queen of Mystery has come to Harper Collins! Agatha Christie, the acknowledged mistress of suspense—creator of indomitable sleuth Miss Marple, meticulous Belgian detective Hercule Poirot, and so many other unforgettable characters—brings her entire oeuvre of ingenious whodunits, locked room mysteries, and perplexing puzzles to Harper Paperbacks. In 4:50 From Paddington, a woman in one train witnesses a murder occurring in another passing one…and only Miss Marple believes her story.

My Read:

            Another good read of Agatha Christie’s mystery featured Miss Jane Marple.

To explain herself that it’s not guesswork, Miss Marple said the following: “My own process of reasoning was not really original, it’s all in Mark Twain. The boy who found the horse, I just imagined where I would go if I were a horse and I went there and there was the horse.” The inspector said, following her saying, “You imagined what you’d do if you were a cruel and cold-blooded murderer?” –page 113-114

            To Miss Marple, the human nature is ubiquitous. Though she lived in a small village, the human nature that she came into contact and had witnessed is the same. She said: “It is so helpful, I always feel, when people remind you of other people, because types are alike everywhere and that is such a valuable guide.”-page 180.

            Reading Agatha Christie’s mystery books is like reading some succinct and well-described reports: they are straightforward, brief and to the point. Another classic mystery read.