5 comments about The True Adventures of the Rolling Stones.

1. To book eventually goes from a chapter to chapter switching from the old days (interesting) to the 1969 tour and back. I skip over any parts that don't have to do with the Stones directly and that helps keep it interesting. Entirely too much time spent on the question "Will I get the rights to do this book?". Want to just get the stories. He runs hot and cold but generally when he talks about the Stones (or quote Keith), it is a good read, especially if you read it while listening to old Stones records.



2. There is no stronger, clear-minded, and focused writer of American Music Culture than Stanley Booth. He never writes from a distance. In fact, sometimes he writes from too close, within firing range, as with The True Adventures of The Rolling Stones, also published under the title of Down & Out With The Rolling Stones. Booth says it took him years to recover from the experience. I say he hasn't recovered yet. When you are from Georgia and live in Memphis, you learn to survive, but you don't recover. The True Adventures of The Rolling Stones is a historic, deep panorama of a different violent time in America. In order to create, you have to go through the fire. Stanley Booth has done just that.
   
   And when you finish with The True Adventures of the Rolling Stones, pick up a copy of Rythm Oil, I think his best book, and then Keith.
   
   There is no one writing about music with the grit and guts of Stanley Booth. All others, with the exception of damn few, are just playing.
   
   



3. STANLEY BOOTH HUNG OUT AND PARTIED WITH THE STONES. HE BECAME FRIENDS WITH AND WAS A KINDRED SPIRIT TO KEITH RICHARD. THIS IS AN EXCELLENT ACCOUNT OF THE MONUMENTAL 1969 STONES TOUR. HE ALSO SEEMED TO HAVE GOOD INSIGHT INTO BRIAN JONES AND THE STONES DYNAMICS WHILE HE WAS IN THE BAND.
   HIS EYE MAGAZINE ACCOUNT OF BRIANS 1968 DRUG BUST WAS A MUST READ CLASSIC.



4. It is not often that any writer/biographer is given such unlimited access to his or her subject as Stanley Booth was given in 1969 to the Rolling Stones. As an invited insider with the world's greatest rock and roll band at their musical apex, Booth ate, drank, took drugs, and traveled with the band and its entourage. What great interviews he could have done! What amazing revelations about the Stones and their often oppositional creative processes he could have shared with Stones fans!
   
   Granted, most people who have reviewed this book have really liked it. Maybe I missed the point, but I did not come out of this book feeling like I knew the Stones any better, and certainly did not learn any more about the dynamics of their musical collaborations and clashing personal and creative styles. What I got was a good look at a writer hired to write a book about the Stones who ended up writing a book about himself writing a book about the Stones, and five hundred pages of insider gossip, most of which doesn't even border on historically significant or interesting.
   
   C'est la vie.



5. This book is pretty much on the same level as something you would find in People Magazine, but loaded with literary pretensions. That said, it was good read. He does manage to show the hypocrisy of the Stones who deplore authority and the police. Then they find themselves at the Altamont concert with a brawling, disorderly mob and little to no security. His background research is pretty good, but he is mostly interested in Brian Jones and we don't get as much about the other Stones.

5 comments about The Wit & Wisdom of Winston Churchill.

1. Have if you're like me and have a lot of friends that don't read (but love Blue Collar Comedy Tour...) then you can start using quotes right out of this book and they will think you just came down from the mountain of knowledge and wisdom. Hey you can even use this for those fun quotes at the bottom of your email! Look how global you can become, yes you!
   
   Great book, very well organized and really a lot of fun to read. Winston Churchill was truly a clever man and would be on my top 10 list of Dudes I would like to have a Newcastle with.
   
   Robb Boyd from Cisco's TechWiseTV is number one on the beer list...



2. A delightful book. I thought the author a little too sycophantic for my taste (I am an Australian after all) but the contents are very entertaining. You can dip into it at any place and read for two minutes or two hours and have a good chuckle.



3. The book is entertaining. It's the kind of book you don't just read through, but pick it up read a few sections at a time.



4. A compact book with more than 1,000 quotations and anecdotes you can enjoy at any time.
   
   Here are just a few:
   
   Violet Asquith, the irrepressible daughter of Prime Minister Herbert Asquith, found a kindred spirit in Churchill, who served in her father's Cabinet.
   
   Once, in a flight of philosophical gloom, she turned to her dinner partner and said, "Winston, in terms of infinity, we are cosmic dust - we are just worms."
   
   "Perhaps, Violet", Churchill replied, "but I am a glowworm."
   
   * * *
   
   If "Franglais" has been only recently coined to describe the bastardizing of the French language by English words, Churchill may have been the sire of this hybrid argot. Sometimes his additions to the noble Gallic tongue were even more attrocious than his accent.
   
   During some delicate negotions at Casablanca, the stubborn Charles de Gaulle denounced an Allied plan to fuse him and his rival, French general Henri Giraud. Churchill, glaring at the Gaulle, delivered this concoction: "Si vous m'obstaclerez, je vous liquiderai!" (If you obstacle me, I will liquidate you!) A bewildered de Gaulle backed off.
   
   * * *
   
   In 1900, the twenty-six-year-old Churchill, after just being elected to Parliament, made a speaking tour of America. In Washington, he was introduced to a majestically endowed woman from Richmond, Virginia, who prided herself upon her devotion to the "lost cause of the Confederacy." Her family were Democrats who had opposed the Repubican policy of Reconstruction.
   
   Anxious that Churchill should know her sentiments, she remarked as she gave him her hand, "Mr. Churchill, you see before you a rebel who has not been Reconstructed."
   
   "Madam," he replied with a deep bow that surveyed her decolletage, "reconstruction in your case would be blasphemous."



5. In this book, James C. Humes gives his audience an excellent opportunity to conjure up a mental picture of Winston Churchill and his legacy. As a renaissance man, Churchill was more than a skilled politician and a gifted soldier. Perhaps more importantly, Churchill was a man of inspired words, whose work was ultimately crown by the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1953. Churchill often was far from politically correct and did not hesitate to say, write and do what he thought was right. Churchill's bluntness did not make him dear to everybody.

   Humes first brings to light many of the great thoughts of Churchill in "Observations and Opinions." Humes classifies key words alphabetically without giving context so that readers can easily find a quote of their liking about a specific subject. Some readers might get frustrated about it if they are not familiar with the key milestones in the life and career of Churchill. These readers can read books such as "Churchill a Life", "Churchill a Study in Greatness", "Clementine Churchill The Biography of a Marriage" or "Winston and Clementine The Personal Letters of the Churchills" to fill in the gaps in their knowledge of Churchill for that purpose.

   Humes forges ahead in a similar way in "Orations and Perorations", "Coiners of Phrases", "Saints and Sinners" and "Escapades and Encounters." In these sections, Humes is usually very good at giving his audience the context so that readers better understand where Churchill was coming from. Hours of fun and laughter are virtually guaranteed, especially in "Escapades and Encounters."

   Churchill's witticism, wisdom and oratory probably reached their climax in the faithful summer of 1940 when Britain stood alone against the Nazi monster. Churchill galvanized by his words and actions the civilized world to soldier on when the horizon seemed hopelessly bleak. As President Franklin Roosevelt said to his aide Harry Hopkins after listening to one of Churchill's radio broadcasts during that period: "As long as that old bastard is in charge, Britain will never surrender." The words of Churchill will continue to resonate for a long time in the heart and soul of humanity. Churchill's words will further shine like diamonds in the night when humanity loses hope from time to time.

5 comments about Shakespeare: The World as Stage (Eminent Lives).

1. My wife and I picked this one to listen to together and talk about. Call me ignorant, but I was surprised to learn how little is/was known about Shakespeare (the man). The things I learned from this book are what it was like to live in 16th/17th Century England and how a series of improbable acts provide us the library of Shakespeare's work.
   
   Having read or listened to two of Bryson's other books (A Walk in the Woods, A Short History of Nearly Everything), I have gained a respect for the diversity and complexity of topics he takes on.



2. Bill Bryson has become one of my favorite writers. Whether he is writing about his travels, the English language, or the world of science, he writes with wit and enthusiasm. Here, he applies his typical humor and zest for knowledge to a person about whom we know very little: William Shakespeare. I learned more about Shakespeare's age than about the writer himself, but that's not Bryson's fault. There's just not that much that we know about the Bard of Avon. The last chapter, in which Bryson debunks the "alternative author" theories, is the worth the price of the book alone.



3. As Bryson points out repeatedly throughout this book, there is surprisingly little we really know about the life of William Shakespeare, apart from his writings. As a result, a fairly sizable amount of the contents of this book amounts to filler. Granted, it is interesting filler, providing plenty of detail about London, the theatre, politics, religion and much more during Shakespeare's lifetime. This information helps us understand what his life might have been like, but ultimately, as Bryson clearly points out, we simply can't know.
   
   For the most part this book is competently written, but Bryson's usual wit seems to be lacking here. I found much of the historical information interesting, but ultimately I don't know much more about Shakespeare than when I started. The last chapter, which covers the various claims that Shakespeare's works were, in fact, written by others is well argued, relying on the principle that the simplest explanation is usually the correct one.



4. Bryson says that Shakespeare's lasting tribute is his love of language, and while one certainly senses his love and mastery of language, I think the lasting tribute is Shakespeare's characters, as other scholars such as A.C. Bradley and Harold Bloom have touched on. Bryson's own writing is accessible and erudite, which makes for pleasant and engaging reading, if not passionate dedication, except for the last chapter, entitled "Claimants," at last something amidst the fog of Shakespeare that Bryson can approach with clarity, and it sends the book out in a blaze of personality.
   
   In the last chapter Bryson defends Shakespeare as the author of Shakespeare. If you've been curious about the playwright, I'm sure you've encountered theories about someone else being the author of the plays. Bryson levels them all, using many of his best lines in the book to do it: "Shakespeare 'never owned a book,' a writer from the New York Times gravely informed readers in one doubting article in 2002. The statement cannot actually be refuted, for we know nothing about his incidental possessions. But the writer might just as well have suggested that Shakespeare never owned a pair of shoes or pants. For all the evidence tells us, he spent his life naked from the waist down, as well as bookless, but it is probable that what is lacking is the evidence, not the apparel or the books" (182). And again on page 192 about Mary Sidney, one in a long line of potential Shakespeares: "All that is missing to connect her with Shakespeare is anything to connect her with Shakespeare."
   
   But Bryson doesn't just show there is no evidence for a different author of Shakespeare, he gives evidence of Shakespeare's humble beginnings appearing in his plays and his existence as a "country boy." And one senses a personal connection here that Bryson bristles to defend. It's fitting that the book ends not only with more of Bryson's personality, but also with the eccentric men and women on the fringes of Shakespearean scholarship, as they are peculiar people with often beguiling personalities. And when one reads Shakespeare, personality exhilarates--it can be contagious, even maddening.



5. Full disclosure - I buy anything Bryson writes. Few writers have his ability to make me laugh and learn in equal proportion. He achieves that again with this brief journey into the world of Shakespeare. It is brief because ryson makes it clear we know so little! I give this only 4 stars because Bryson has done better (Mother Tongue, A Short History..., Notes from a Small Island) but this is still definately worth the read. But if you have never read Bryson before I would not start here.

5 comments about Amazing Grace: William Wilberforce and the Heroic Campaign to End Slavery.

1. "Amazing Grace," Eric Metaxas' biography of British MP and abolitionist William Wilberforce, is a fantastic narrative on one of Britain's greatest heroes. Metaxas takes the readers back to that fateful time in Britain's history, when Wilberforce and just a few men and women took a stand to end English involvement in the transatlantic slave trade from 1787-1807. From beginning to end, the author crafts a narrative that presents facts in a fascinating, truly memorable way, serving as the perfect companion volume to the powerful motion picture Amazing Grace. If you're interested in learning more about the life of William Wilberforce, then this book is for you!
   Grade: A



2. I've read several books on William Wilberforce and watched the movie as well. His life not only intrigues me, but inspires me! This book makes for good reading and will give you a detailed look at the life of William Wilberforce, a man who worked hard to end slavery in the British Empire.
   
   While the movie tends to downplay Wilberforce's Christian faith, Metaxas clearly documents his conversion to Christianity as the catalyst that led him on his quest to end slavery. As he became a changed man, he could no longer ignore the sufferings of the slaves.
   The author also does a fine job in portraying the suffering Wilberforce endured for the sake of this cause and the danger the fight for abolition put him in.
   
   The story of William Wilberforce is one that must be remembered throughout history...and this book makes his story come alive.
   This a must read for everyone interested in making changes in their sphere of influence.



3. Much is lost in history that is useful. William Wilberforce is one of those that begs for our world to relearn of. The recent movie elicited this read, which I am truly thankful for. In the story of this small man with the eloguent oratory, we find a man for all ages.
   
   What is not brought out clearly in the film is in the book: Christ having invaded his darkness and brought him into the light changed his life and world. And how it changed, with the political and cultural fight he engaged with for the rest of his days for the cause of morality, abolition and other wonderful humanitarian causes, all motivated by his faith.
   
   The utter horrors of colonial expansion and thus cheapening of the human African lives is truly appalling. The timing with the independence of our own country and our unfortunate history with slavery is as well abominable. What an indebtedness we owe to this small man of physical stature but a giant of soul.
   
   Great read with excellent,captivating style which will have most of us running to dictionaries to learn of all the Middle English vocab that we do not know.



4. This was so full of information that I sadly didn't know about William Wilberforce and his accomplishments in England against the slave trade. He was an amazing man and I feel it was so worthwhile to learn about him. What he accomplished in his lifetime while suffering numerous health problems puts most of us to shame.



5. Very good book. I knew little about the England of that day. I wanted to learn more.

5 comments about The Lord God Made Them All (All Creatures Great & Small).

1. I think we've all heard of ALL CREATURES GREAT AND SMALL. The book was brilliantly written in every way, and I thought that was that. But then he wrote a sequel, and I marveled that it was at least as great as the original. Then he did it to me again with a third book. The titles come from a famous poem or hymn, by the way. He used the second verse, for the creatures, then the first, then the third, and now we're at the fourth.
   
   I'm going to say it again. I believe I'm enjoying this one most of all. All the humor, all the spot-on accurate observation of animals, of both the four-legged and the two-legged variety. And, I'm feeling this time, a maturity in the veterinarian, the author, and the person. He still has the ability to write a chapter so touching or sad that I stop and wipe my eyes, and then read a few more so I can laugh before I put the book away for the evening.
   
   So I've read four in a row by this guy, and they all get five stars. I ordered all of mine from Amazon, but you in "the west" can probably just swing by your local library. Do so.



2. I read his books as a teen and loved them. Bought the whole set for my grandsons, [teens]. They laughed until they cried. [so did I].



3. I was verey satisfied with the whole process of ordering
   on-line and I will continue buying books this way.



4. As an animal lover, if I were to be restricted to a single author on my bookshelves, it would be James Herriot, hands down. All four books by James Herriot, The English Country Veterinarian, comprise a collection of stories that remain unsurpassed in all animal literature.



5. In this fourth edition you will have everything you are use to in a James Herriot book. Eccentric pet owners, nutty business partners, fun loving animals, and the author who reveals his heartfelt love and admiration for the animals he cares so deeply for. Only the souless few won't be touched by these humorous stories of animal and human interactions. Mr. Herriot shows just how much better the world is because of the animals who inhabit our daily lives.

3 comments about Elizabeth & Leicester: Power, Passion, Politics.

1. With the primary documents basically known and castles and historic sites fully documented, 21st century writers are providing general readers with more focus on specific aspects of Tudor history and more interpretation. Recently I've read : The Pirate Queen: Queen Elizabeth I, Her Pirate Adventurers, and the Dawn of Empire, Edward VI: The Lost King of England and After Elizabeth: The Rise of James of Scotland and the Struggle for the Throne of England These books, like this one, are devoted entirely to a particular aspect of a Tudor reign (or as in the case of one, the end of the Tudor reigns).
   
   Gristwood zeros in on the unique relationship of Elizabeth and Leicester who has been euphemistically called her "favorite". Griswold explores what this might be a euphemism for. There are lots of possibilities, but the author sticks with what is documented and what is credible. She also sticks with her focus, and brings in issues and people only as they relate to her main subject.
   
   I did not know of Leicester's role in sending Mary of Scotland her second husband, nor his role in Elizabeth's French flirtations. I knew of the death of his wife, Amy, but not of the spouses of the other two women in his life. While I had assumed his motives in this royal romance, I never considered his emotional state as he waited for Elizabeth with whom he had shared the experiences of having a beheaded parent. Gristwood, who has obviously poured over every word related to these two as a couple, interprets her findings in a wonderfully readable way.
   
   I eagerly await the many more of these focused Tudor histories, that I presume are in the works. I'm guessing that the next generation of writing will provide more psychological analyis. Some of the topics are suggested by this book. They could be how the royals and their courtiers respond to the socially repressive dangers of the times or how their behavior or political posture results from the trauma in their respective families. One such interesting history could be a serious study of the Essex revolt through a psychological lens.



2. Sarah Gristwood's new book is good, especially for understanding Elizabeth's relationship with her chief favorite, Robert Dudley, later Earl of Leicester.
   
   Gristwood tells the familiar story of Elizabeth's background and upbringing, and the not-so-familiar one of Dudley's. His father and grandfather were supporters of Edward VI and Henry VII, and were executed for their pains. The narrative picks up with earnest at Elizabeth's accession and appointment of Dudley as Master of the Horse. Rumors soon began about the queen's relationship with him, and Dudley's wife died in mysterious circumstances not too long after. Gristwood evenhandedly examines the possible explanations for her death, and with plenty of hedging, suggests that Cecil was the main beneficiary.
   
   Immediately after his wife's death, Dudley fell out of favor with Elizabeth for some time. Reconciliation followed, as did many more fallings out and reconciliations. Her many suitors were a source of conflict (and Dudley was one of them), as were the ladies at court who caught his eye and that he secretly married or promised to marry. Nevertheless, Dudley was at Elizabeth's side through most of her reign, influential and supportive, resented and admired.
   
   But this book is also disappointing in some ways. There are passages where so many rhetorical questions are used that the implications aren't clear; and awkward modern phrases occasionally intrude (e.g., regarding the birth of his long-awaited heir: "emotionally he must have been in the money"). Charts of family connections would also have been useful, especially for the Dudleys and Elizabeth's maternal relations.
   
   This subject is timely, what with all the recent interest in Elizabeth I and her favorites (Leicester and Essex respectively in the two parts of the HBO miniseries with Helen Mirren, Elizabeth I; and Leicester and Raleigh in the two movies with Cate Blanchett, Elizabeth (Spotlight Series) and Elizabeth: The Golden Age). For an introduction to Elizabeth's life and reign, I prefer Christopher Hibbert's The Virgin Queen: Elizabeth I, Genius of the Golden Age. I recommend Sarah Gristwood's book for thorough collectors of Elizabethan material, or for people specifically interested in Leicester himself (books about him are somewhat hard to come by, but Derek Wilson's The Uncrowned Kings of England: The Black History of the Dudleys and the Tudor Throne is an alternative).



3. Fun-to-read book about the romance of Elizabeth I and the Earl of Leicester. There seemed to be a lot of information compiled from many sources to make this a fascinating "tell-all" which is no small feat considering the limitations of digging up such old records which were often all but scarce. This book not only showed Queen Elizabeth I as a woman who could love, but also showed her intelligence in using her head as well as her heart to make her relationships work also to her advantage as queen and for love of her country and able to keep Leicester loyal to the crown until his death. The author did a great job.

5 comments about Too Close to the Sun: The Audacious Life and Times of Denys Finch Hatton.

1. Sara Wheeler's "Too Close to the Sun" is as much a biography of a place and of an era as it is of a man. The author went looking for Denys Finch Hatton and found East Africa as well as her elusive subject.
   
   The man, himself, was once a nearly mythical East African figure. Finch Hatton is best known today as Karen Blixen's long-time inamorata in the film version of her book "Out of Africa." In life, he was a privileged Englishman who often worked as an African guide and professional hunter and who flourished and died during Kenya's colonial period. He was also a reluctant soldier, a glad aviator and a man who loved theatre, photography, dance, books and women.
   
   Ms. Wheeler says that her aims in writing the biography were: "to depict a figure in the landscape, to explore the universal themes threaded through his story, and to find out why he was an engine of myth." Other than a few personal letters and some newspaper articles, he wrote little. Because of this, and because she writes so many years after his death, Ms. Wheeler is left with little more than trace evidence and the words of others with which to develop her theme and achieve those goals. Fortunately, she's an able writer and tenacious researcher. She also uses the words of Teddy Roosevelt, H. Rider Haggard, Ernest Hemingway, Siegfried Sassoon, Elspeth Huxley, W.B. Yeats and Evelyn Waugh, among others, as sources to help her develop her African story.
   
   Karen Blixen is, perhaps, her most famous source for direct Denys Finch Hatton information. Karen Blixen (aka Isak Dinesen) wrote about Finch Hatton as her lover and used her version of him as an element to drive her own story. Sara Wheeler, on the other hand, is a graduate of the same Oxford college as Finch Hatton and seems more in sympathy with him as a human being.
   
   Beryl Markham, an aviatrix, writer and renowned wild child, is another useful source. Martha Gellhorn (Hemingway's third wife) described her as, "Not your ordinary Circe." Beryl says of Denys, "As for charm, I suspect that Denys invented it." Those may be the final words on Denys Finch Hatton. In two-hundred-fifty-two pages of text, author Wheeler can't find anyone to say a bad word about him.
   
   Sara Wheeler certainly charmed this reviewer when she quoted Anthony Blanche, a character in Evelyn Waugh's "Brideshead Revisited." Antoine, as he's known, warns another character about the danger of English charm, stating that it blights anything it touches. Ms. Wheeler believes that Finch Hatton's own charm nearly destroyed his ambition.
   
   Ms. Wheeler's writing skills are (to say the least) fully developed. She calls the disastrous British 1916 offensive in France the "Apocalypse on the Somme." In one chapter, she describes the deteriorating relationship between Finch Hatton and Karen Blixen by saying, "They were living in different mental worlds...coexisting like the twin beaters of a rotary whisk." In passing, Ms. Wheeler notes what she calls "the spiritual journey at the heart of all great literature."
   
   She's made some interesting choices in her own life, both as an author and as a person. By her own reckoning, she spent three years researching and writing "Too Close to the Sun." She also traveled to three continents (Europe, Africa and America) doing research. She's also written "Terra Incognita: Travels in Antarctica," and "Cherry: a Life of Apsley Cherry Garrard." She spent six months in Antarctica paying part of the personal tariff for creating these two works. She paid another similar price to research her South American book, "Travels in a Thin Country."
   
   There's a theme here: Much time and energy spent on projects with a limited market potential. That may be crass, and those of us who are interested in any of her subjects do have reason to be glad that she invested the time as she has. Considering her enormous writing ability, however, had she devoted the same amount of skill and effort in another direction, she might well have become the new James Michener or the next Donna Tartt or A.S. Byatt. Instead, she's chosen to forgo the probability of huge literary or popular success and with such success, big bucks and big acclaim. Perhaps this is too American a perspective about writing or living, but Ms. Wheeler's choices do remain interesting questions. In his day, Denys Finch Hatton was already becoming an anachronism. Sara Wheeler, who refers to modern-day Istanbul as Constantinople may also fit into that category. Bless them both.
   
   The bottom line on the book is that for anyone with even a drop of Walter Mitty blood, "Too Close to the Sun" is a splendid read. James Joyce has given Daedalus his modern day due. Let's hear it for the new Icarus.



2. So this book is definitely not for everyone. There has been a lot of criticism regarding the content and whether the author provides any novel insight into the life and times of Denys Finch Hatton. On a personal level though, I found the book intriguing from multiple standpoints. For those of us who seem to be eternal wanderers this book provides valuable insight into the perils and rewards of pursuing your own dreams and wandering off the beaten path. Success is defined differently by each individual and while Denys may have appeared to lack direction, his constant quest for knowledge and experiences were the driving force for the many and varied initiatives and ventures he took up in his lifetime. He was a romantic and was perhaps better suited to an earlier time. His non-conformity and unwillingness to change with the times may have lead some to perceive him as being unsuccessful, but in reality he marched to the beat of his own drum. In the final analysis the only definition of success that matters is an individual's own.



3. Too Close to the Sun, The Audacious Life and Times of Denys Finch Hatton is as much a detailed history of British East Africa--the country known today as Kenya--as it is the story of Denys Finch Hatton's life. In other words, the focus is keener on the times than on the life.
   
   Finch Hatton, a notorious and romantic character portrayed in Out of Africa (Modern Library), the book of stories by Isak Dinesen (Karen Blixen) and the in the film played by Robert Redford, didn't keep a journal or, for that matter, write many letters. As a result, a great deal of the exhaustive research on him compiled by dedicated author, Sara Wheeler, is derived from Dinesen's fiction and other contemporary, Beryl Markham's autobiography, West With the Night. Generally well written, a bit on the formal side, the prose wavers between colorful and descriptive and textbook laborious. (Have your dictionary nearby!) The subject, Finch Hatton, might have been better left to the material written by his former lovers than the subject of an entire biography.
   
   What I enjoyed most about this book was the trip to Kenya and the stunning visuals it provided. Having spent time there, including a visit to the town now known as "Karen," and a tour of Blixen's house, the pages of this book gave it a living history quality. Wheeler also clarifies Finch Hatton's character as more than the uncommitted lover of Karen Blixen ("Tania")--"They were living in different mental worlds, as unhappy lovers do, coexisting like the twin beaters of a rotary whisk, spinning in time by never touching"-- but also notes he was one of the first to point out the dangers of uncontrolled hunting on safari endangering Africa's wildlife. "For the first time in his life, he had found something he believed in, a cause that was worth commitment." Hence, his legacy as "an eternal wanderer on a perpetual quest for knowledge and experience," which is the main thrust of this dissertation.
   
   From the author of I'm Living Your Dream Life: The Story of a Northwoods Resort Owner, McKenna Publishing Group.



4. I picked up this book after finishing Isak Dinesen/Karen Blixen's OUT OF AFRICA and Beryl Markham's WEST WITH THE NIGHT. When I found out that a biography about Denys Finch-Hatton had just been published, I thought it was too good to be true - he is so fascinating, and so mysterious, in Blixen and Markham's memoirs that it's hard to read them without wanting to learn more.
   
   It turns out it WAS too good to be true.
   
   Finch-Hatton left little to no record of his own life. There are no diaries and very, very few letters. My burning questions were: What is the interior world of a charming, dashing adventurer like? What is he thinking while he's busy making life brighter, sweeter, and more exciting for others? Wheeler has no more idea than anyone else. Finch-Hatton has left no record of what his life was like, from his own point of view.
   
   Aside from Blixen and Markham, whose portraits of Finch-Hatton are already well known, his nearest and dearest didn't sit down to describe his character, his thoughts or hidden sides. I recognized huge sections of OUT OF AFRICA and WEST WITH THE NIGHT rephrased here, with additional comments pulled from research into Blixen or Markham's life, plumped up with (generally fascinating) cultural and historical context and (generally very clever) anecdotes and asides. But this was an enhanced reading of Blixen or Markham's life, nothing new, and at a real distance from the actual subject of this biography.
   
   I learned a lot about a particular moment in the history of British East Africa. I learned some things that I didn't know about Blixen and Markham and, yes, even a few things that I didn't know about Denys Finch-Hatton - a bit about his family history, where he went to school, where he was during the war and how he became involved in big game hunting and conservation.
   
   Wheeler writes beautifully; she has an exquisite style. She clearly hopes that if she can plump up her scanty material with lots of dazzling imagery, we won't notice that this lengthy description of the English countryside or that lengthy description of the Serengeti actually isn't telling us anything at all about Denys Finch-Hatton. This felt like sleight of hand to me, like a trick, and I resented her for it. I want to see gorgeous style used to make good, solid research come to life. I don't want to see it poorly masking the author's failure to gather enough material to justify a book.
   
   In short, even though I generally enjoyed reading TOO CLOSE TO THE SUN, I disliked it.



5. I visited East Africa and while in and around Nairobi took a chance on visiting the public museum that is now entrusted in preserving Karen Blixen's original home and a few acres that remain the last remnant of the Karen Coffee Plantation. On the tour I came to learn of Denis Fitch Hatton, the early days of colonization of British East Africa
   ( World War I in East Africa) and the likes of Lord Delamere, Count Blixen, Beryl Markham, Kermit Roosevelt and Prince Edward. Although much has been written by and /or about Isak Dinesen, Beryl Markham, Blix (and the others) so very little was available to learn more of the elusive Finch Hatton as early flyer, big game hunter, East African land speculator, conservationist, herdsman, nature photographer...and here again the author admits that accurate personal historical information remains sparse. Nevertheless the author is to be commended and this book can be highly recommended as a worthy presentation of an unusual life "well lived" in the context of his time and place. Admittedly it is not all "easy reading" and the author does perhaps over indulge in the "who's who" and "who's title is the umpteenth earl of somewhere....but I can accept all of that as necessary and essential to that time and place in history.
   The book especially captures the land,it's colonists, it's native people, the animals and Denis Finch Hatton's place within East African history. Thoroughly enjoyable and informative reading.

5 comments about The Last Lion: Winston Spencer Churchill, Alone 1932-1940.

1. Finest biography on Churchill ever written. A pity Manchester died before completing the third book of the trilogy.



2. The Last Lion, Alone covers the history of Europe from the time Hitler first came to power in Germany to the time that Hitler invaded the Low Countries and World War II began. During this period Churchill, who continually fought against the appeasement policies of Chamberlain, rose from Back Bench irrelevance to become Brittan's Prime Minister.
   
   The history of this period is a gripping saga of one man's malicious attempt to dominate Europe and another man's noble efforts to stop him - a classical case of good vs evil - told as an almost unbelievable story in the words of a master story teller.



3. William Manchester informs and entertains in this excellent historical account of the critical years leading up to WWII, juxtaposing the appeasement practices of predecessors Baldwin and Chamberlain with the unwavering belief in the principles of freedom held by Churchill. The book (along with Manchester's first volume) gives terrific insight into the transition from the glory days of the British Empire to the Post WWI apathy that beset the British public. As well, the work provides delightful commentary on the characters surrounding Churhill's life including his colorful mother Jennie, his wife Clementine and his nemesis Adolf Hitler.



4. After the fall of France in June 1940, Winston Churchill was begging USA President Roosevelt for military aid (in fact, all sorts of support was then needed) as no one knew what would the 'fate' of the French fleet was going to be.
   Churchill kept reminding the American president that Britain would not surrender even if left alone.
   Churchill was defiant despite the fact that the two 'key' American ambassadors, in France and Great Britain, were pro Hitler (or at least they were not anti-Nazi).
   Joseph Kennedy (USA Ambassador to GB) openly cautioned his fellow Americans against entering the war because the 'allies' would soon be beaten.
   However, I would have liked to see more comments about the position and reaction of the king - king George VI.
   Was he indifferent?
   We should remember that Hitler had been addressing the King as the man whom the British Government circles have loathed, and as the only 'hope' for a reconciliation between the Third Reich and GB.
   In this context it is true that Churchill was indeed ALONE



5. I was adrift when I finished this volume.
   grasping at pathetic things to read for a while - nothing satisfied - Manchester can set the stage, his historical background is so rich that you'll find yourself spouting about it to your friends.
   
   You'll learn more from this book than a two semester course in 20th century history.
   
   Churchill himself is the lead player in a panapoly of exciting elements. But manchester never lets the reader forget the place in history - the man was a masterful writer.

4 comments about The Last Princess: The Devoted Life of Queen Victoria's Youngest Daughter.

1. Princess Beatrice gave up her private life, her health and most of her happiness in order to be the secretary, confidante and companion of her widowed mother. Starting with the death of her father, Prince Albert, when she was only four years old, her life was a constant reminder of funereal gloom. As her older sisters married and moved away, Princess Beatrice became the Queen's slave in most matters public and private. Such was the Queen's paranoia that her youngest daughter might grow up and want a life of her own, she forbade all talk of marriage in front of the Princess, and punished the girl by not speaking to her for eight months when she dared to fall in love and announced her wish to wed. The marriage was only allowed to go forward, and the Princess forgiven, when the couple agreed to live with the Queen for their married life, with very limited travel (their honeymoon lasted only five days, and the Queen visited for two of them).
   
   I don't think I'd realized just how selfish Queen Victoria was until I read this meticulously researched volume. Princess Beatrice was a far more forgiving and patient woman than I could have ever been, and I veer between being in awe of her, and pitying her.
   
   Matthew Dennison's writing style takes a while to get used to - sometimes he moves back and forth in eras and you have to go back in order to determine just what time frame he's referring to. The text is at times dangerously close to "scholarly" and for this alone I give the book four stars instead of five. I do recommend it, however, for the insights it gives into this complex, frustrating relationship.



2. beatrice was last child of queen victoria and prince albert.after her father death,beatrice became a emotional phsycial slave to a self center and demanding mother .she was not allow to from freidship with people her age or talk of marriage .beatrice did finally find love with prince henry but had to fight her mother who did not talk to her for 6 month to married the man she love.lucky prince henry could put up with his demanding mother-in-law.they share happy marriage for 10 years and 4 childern until his death.beatrice return to being her mother secretary/companion until queen death.even after that she was in charge of her mother papers until her own death.



3. Princess Beatrice was the youngest and least well known of the nine children of Queen Victoria. Born just four years before the death of her father Prince Albert, she did not experience the full rigour of an upbringing and education under her father's control, the only one of the family to escape what seems to modern eyes less raising a child than overwhelming it. Beatrice also seems to have avoided her parents' well known tendency to over criticize and over correct their other children. But Beatrice, as the youngest child, was the one chosen by her incredibly self-centered mother to be an eternal comfort and assistant after Albert's death and the marriage of her siblings. Forced into the role of secretary/confidante (and at times psychologist) to her mother when barely out of her teens, Beatrice developed a personality which was quiet, patient, and undemanding throughout the years during which her peers were getting married and raising families. She seems to have rebelled against her mother only once, when she fell in love with and insisted on marrying Prince Henry of Battenberg, who fortunately was also patient enough to agree to be part of Queen Victoria's household rather than establishing his own independent life. Prince Henry died after a decade of marriage, and Beatrice continued to be Victoria's secretary/companion until the Queen died in 1901. Even then Beatrice was not free from her mother, because she had been given the task of editing/censoring the Queen's journals, a task which took her many years and probably resulted in the loss of much valuable material about Victoria's true thoughts and activities, since Beatrice loyally destroyed the originals after making her copies.
   
   This nice, self-effacing lady would not have merited a biography had she not been born royal, but its good to have this one because it sheds light on a life which was lived in the shadow of a more forceful personality. Matthew Dennison writes well, if somewhat archaically (I do not recall running across the word "munificent" even once in a modern book, let alone twice!) There are many photos and reproductions of portraits that I had never seen before, and there are some good descriptions of Beatrice's four children: three sons who were to be even more obscure than their mother (one was a hemophiliac, a tragic reminder of the curse genetics placed on Victoria's descendants) and a daughter who became Queen of Spain (and the mother of two hemophiliac sons.) The Last Princess will make an excellent addition to any collection of royal biographies.



4. This is pretty much what you'd expect - but no new information on the princess. Nothing I didn't know before, no new pictures I haven't seen before. Slow reading at times - I had to make myself finish it. A good effort, but nothing spectacular, and the writing style is dry and not very exciting. Princess Beatrice needs a good bio about her - but this isn't it.

5 comments about Memoirs of the Second World War (An Abridgement of the Six Volumes of the Second World War).

1. Since this book was updated, there are new facts have come out about the statistics of WWII and the roles the Allies and the Axis played in it.
   That's to be expected.
   It is one sided with Churchill at times believing in his absolute right and his problems getting his view across to the Americans and the Russians.
   At times he lays too much emphasis on the fact that Britain won the war with the "help" of the Allies. And at other times he states that without the Allies Britain would have been sunk.
   As confusing and horrible as that time was, reading another book about the American side would be also helpful as we had to fight the Japanese also and it was our POW's on the defensive there. It seems to downplay the effect the Japenese had on the war which was not trivial at all.
   
   Though he seems to describe the battle of Leyete and Midway fairly well.
   It's a good read, and it's interesting to see the other "side" of the war from a great man and you won't be sorry to read it.



2. I read this good book, here in Brazil.Among the World War II great leaders, only Churchill wrote a book about that war.
   About american eugenics , race and gender relations, there isn't a single word against or about, in this big book, with more than 1,000 pages.There's some maps inside.This book isn't only about World War II, but also about the war's roots and fruits, includind about Cold War.
   This book is very biased.The Churchill's mistakes in World War II, were enormous.About France's battle in 1940, seems that Churchill was in another planet then, not as England's leader then.Ever big Churchill's or England's failure, has almost nothing or no place at all, in this book.About war production and military weapons, there's almost nothing.
   Secrets about Colossus computer and the breaking of german Enigma code machine or "purle" japanese code,were war secrets and also had no place on this book.
   Even with so many bias and other failures, this book remains good and easy to read.



3. Winston Churchill was a man of destiny, and he came to realize that, although he seldom hints at it. Without him Western Civilization would be drastically different today, for the worse.
   
   Somehow he makes the day-to-day machinations of world governments read like a suspense novel. Yet he is concise, reserved and free from hyperbole. I think this is possible because he so clearly saw the Big Picture and knew deep down what really was at stake. The story didn't need to be enhanced for those who could understand, and those who couldn't . . . oh well.
   
   This made the early decades of the Twentieth Century come alive for me. I now feel like I lived through those times.
   
   I loved the book, and I love the man!



4. Churchill was not only a participant, but an excellent observer of this period. There are some good maps and pictures.



5. I find it indeed difficult to assess this book by Winston Churchill. I have read it with very mixed emotions. Nonetheless, I firmly believe that for any serious student of the history of World War II Winston Churchill's "Memoirs of the Second World War" is a must reading - unless he or she decides to study the full fledged, six volume, "The Second World War" itself.
   
   However, if one is to base his entire knowledge of the war on this writing alone, treating it as the history book per se, one is likely for a big disappointment. The value of this book as a source of historical facts is questionable; its value, in my view, lies in that it is the first hand, direct, presentation of the views and ideas on the war politics by one of its biggest actors. Churchill wrote himself: "This is not history, this is my case." I agree. It is, at the same time, the best source of information one can probably get on the "state of competence" of one of the "Big Three". For in this writing Winston Churchill reveals to a large degree what he himself knew, or did not know, about various aspects of the unfolding events. However, the objectivity of his writing is to a certain degree weakened by his concerns for relations with some of the other big players in World War II. The name of Dwight Eisenhower immediately comes to mind here. At the time of this book's publication Eisenhower was the president of USA. Whatever disagreements Churchill may have had with him in 1944 and 1945, and the many he had indeed, he went long ways to smooth his criticism to not in the smallest way offend his former ally and the sitting president of the country with which he practiced the policy of "Grand Alliance". That this may have distorted the whole picture seems beyond much doubt.
   
   I am in no position to evaluate Churchill's ideas and beliefs and confront them with the facts, in their entirety. Whether, for instance, his explanation of the fall of Singapore is correct or not is beyond my expertise. But on two subjects: Joseph Stalin and the Soviet Union and the so-called "Polish Question" I do have opinions of my own.
   
   We now know quite well who Joseph Stalin really was and what was the true nature of the Soviet regime in those years. From that perspective Winston Churchill's assertions about Stalin himself seem rather disconcerting. Especially so, since Churchill seem to have been reasonably well versed in matters relating to the Soviet Union and its foreign policies. Unlike many left-leaning politicians both in USA and Western Europe at the time he apparently had no illusions about the character of communist experiment in Soviet Russia. This was particularly true with regard to Stalin's foreign policies. Churchill realized Stalin was "de-facto" ally of Nazi Germany all the way until the day Hitler invaded the Soviet Union.
   
   But with the Hitler's invasion of the Soviet Union on June 21, 1941, virtually overnight, this hideous man becomes Great Britain's ally in the fight against Germany. And now that Stalin was on the same side of the barricade he became more than an ally. He, in the eyes of Churchill, seemed to have transformed into a better man. Politically and morally. Churchill spares no effort to present Stalin as an extremely intelligent man, not without sense of humor, a man with whom one can reason, negotiate and settle. On several occasions Churchill underlines importance of maintaining friendly relationship with the Soviet leader as if attempting to convince the reader, and possibly himself, that personal relationship could significantly alter the outcome of negotiations. Did he believe this or was he merely trying to justify his own conduct vis-à-vis Stalin? At any rate, I do not subscribe to a notion that just because someone finds himself on the right side of a political cause - and in the case of Stalin this was not his own choice, Hitler put him there - it makes him automatically a better being. Whoever Stalin was before German invasion he retained that character afterwards. And that simple fact demanded appropriate conclusions be drawn and remembered.
   
   Poland, and "Polish Question", receives mixed treatment by Winston Churchill. It might even be more instructive to recognize what Churchill does not write about in the case of Poland than what subjects he dwells upon. The name of the general Wladyslaw Sikorski, Prime Minister and Commander in Chief of the Polish Government in Exile right from the Polish defeat in September 1939 until his death in the airplane accident in 1943 is not mentioned even once, not even in passing. And it is worth remembering that Poland was Great Britain's first, and for some time practically the only, ally in the war against Hitler right from the beginning till the very end. Not a single word is dedicated to the role of Polish airmen who fought with such distinction during the famous Battle of England. They were the heroes of the day then and Churchill knew perfectly well they were the best "scoring" fighters whose contribution to the victory was substantial if not decisive. More disturbing still is his complete silence on the subject of Katyn massacre. In April 1943 the Germans discovered mass graves in the forest of Katyn near Smolensk in then occupied Russian territory. Poles were inquiring with the Soviets since June 1941 about the faith of about 15,000 officers listed as Soviet prisoners of war only to be told they must have had "escaped to Manchuria". The German discovery of some 4,000 murdered and Sikorski's subsequent request for independent investigation by the International Red Cross was the pretexts for Stalin to break relations with the Poles and that was the beginning of all the subsequent troubles around the Polish Question. The truth of the Katyn massacre got swept under the carpet for years.
   
   It is not until the summer of 1944 when the Soviets advanced to the territories of the pre-war Poland that this subject starts looming high on the agenda. Churchill apparently then realized that Stalin had his own plans concerning Poland where creation of a subservient government toped the list. To be fair Winston Churchill deserves credit for writing (and acting at the time) extensively about the Warsaw Rising of 1944. For two months the 50,000 Home Army soldiers armed with ammunition to last for just a few days fought valiantly inflicting great casualties on the Germans while the Red Army stood on the east bank of Vistula River doing practically nothing. Churchill was sincerely horrified at Stalin's refusal not only to come to military assistance himself but even to allow the Allies' planes attempting to drop supplies to land on the Soviet airfields. Churchill desperately tried to help. But Stalin had a much different agenda and for this purpose he didn't mind to allow almost a quarter million of Varsovians to perish. Roosevelt meanwhile apparently did not care. Churchill's exasperation over this issue is clearly visible and the pages dedicated to Warsaw Rising are some of the most emotionally charged in the entire book.
   
   But it is Churchill's position on the question of new Poland's frontiers that causes most of my dismay. He openly agreed that the Soviet Union deserved additional territory at their Western frontier to boost their external security against any future threat from Germany. This was agreed in principle right from the start. It is true that in those territories ethnic Poles never constituted a majority. But that's a very poor argument. Neither Russians were a majority there. These were Belo-Russians, Ukrainians, Ormians, Jews, in short a multitude of ethnic groups who for centuries lived under the Polish-Lithuanian rule. The Russian rule they knew only since the partitions of Poland at the end of XVIII century. If anything, there would be a legitimate "border dispute", if you will, between Poland and Ukraine or Poland and Belarus. But there was not even a hypothetical question of national independence for these two nations. As it turned out, therefore, a double standard was employed: Poland was to be a one-nation, one ethnic group state while it was all right for (Soviet) Russia to be a multinational "federation". In the end Winston Churchill agreed to legalize Soviet annexation of Polish territories invaded on September 17, 1939 the basis of which was (now infamous) Molotov- Ribbentrop Secret Protocol of August 23, 1939.
   
   With everything in the book read and digested the final impression of this, no doubt very remarkable, statesman I get, is one of a man visionary at times, perseverant, man often times of principle and yet also of a man who for the purpose of "higher good" would bend or re-interpret the facts falling victim to illusions. The same man who so forcefully condemned policies of appeasement towards Germany up until Munich agreements of 1938 would practice his own appeasement policies towards Stalin later on, clearly as a result of his own fallacies about the character of Joseph Stalin and the nature of the Soviet system. But this very same man retained the ability to disillusion himself and change own stands thus proving quite remarkable degree of intellectual and political flexibility. Unfortunately for him, as well as for the world, it is rarely sufficient to change ones mind. For if the circumstances have also changed it is usually too late. It was another matter to exact certain commitments from Stalin when the outcome of the struggle with Hitler's Germany was up in the air, quite another when Stalin's armies were approaching Vistula river. There clearly was a chance to block aggressiveness of the Soviet Union and prevent Iron Curtain from descending upon Central Europe and spare the Europe and the world Cold War - if both Churchill and Roosevelt acted firmly early on. But the many illusions about the man and the system they dealt with and lack of sufficient foresight, prevented them from achieving desirable political arrangements, namely independence of Poland and other Central European countries, something that soon afterwards became to haunt the Western Democracies for nearly half the century.
   
   While Churchill as a politician remains controversial, Churchill as a writer, and his book, fall very close to being a masterpiece. Rich, eloquent language, clarity of point, all-in-all good balance between detail and generality and, above all, passion with which he writes about subjects he was so intimately involved with - make for terrific reading experience. If not for the certain obstructions in his "pursuit of truth", the want not to offend then still living former allies and the apparent want to justify own conduct, that all resulted in certain distortion of the picture, I would give the book highest score of 5 stars.