1 comments about Harry S. Truman: The American Presidents Series: The 33rd President, 1945-1953 (The American Presidents Series).

1. Harry S. Truman's life story in a short, accessible biography. That's the premise of The American Presidents Series, and this is one of the most recent entrants in the stable. The late Arthur Schlesinger, Jr. was the series editor. In his introduction to each book in this series, he says (Page xvi): "The men in the White House express the ideals and values, the frailties and the flaws, of the voters who send them there. It is altogether natural that we should want to know more about the virtues and the vices of the fellows we have elected to govern us. As we know more about them, we will know more about themselves."
   
   The book begins by noting that, traditionally, the 20th century presidents deemed to be great or near great include: Teddy Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, Franklin Roosevelt, and Harry Truman. The "Preludes" section notes that (Page 1): "On the face of things, Truman's high standing is surprising. . . . Truman was notable for his ordinariness."
   
   The book begins with his family background, his early years, his service in World War I, his early (failed) effort at a haberdashery business, and his decision to move into public life. The book well describes his moral dilemmas at one point: the corrupt Pendergast organization was willing to sponsor him for elective office. What would he do? Eschew the support of the machine? Or use its support and still try to stay clean? He did the latter and his political career began. By the way, to give a sense of The American Presidents' series, we come to see how and why FDR selected Truman as his Vice-Presidential partner by page 15!
   
   Truman's time in the White House. . . . We see him reflecting on whether or not to use the atomic weaponry against Japan. We see him trying to adjust to the Post-World War II Cold War/Iron Curtain era. We see him trying to navigate between left and right in domestic politics, and sometimes seeming to drift. One intriguing line (Page 37): "And yet Truman was disinclined to confront the country with the emerging dangers he saw from Soviet aggression. . . ." This is a subtheme of the book, with the author, Robert Dallek, noting that on a number of occasions, Truman seemed to back off confronting difficult issues. It creates, in fact, a tension within this volume between the author commenting that Truman warranted his high rating by historians and then noting his occasional avoiding tough issues.
   
   The story of his unexpected victory in 1948 over Thomas Dewey, the Berlin Airlift, the Korean War, and his rapidly deteriorating public approval. . . . It's all here, including his active post-presidential career.
   
   A very nice brief introduction to Henry Truman. This book has motivated me to consider buying one of the larger biographies of the subject and exploring his life more deeply. . . .

5 comments about Drawing the Head and Figure.

1. This book is not expensive, but is the most useful book on figure drawing I own. I have consulted it so many times that it is dog-eared. A thing that sets this book apart is the way the author uses easy to remember rules of thumb and anatomical "landmarks" to aid in drawing. While not getting too detailed, the author enables you to avoid the gross mistakes that cripple a drawing. For example, the book shows how to successfully draw a quarter view of the head and shoulders, and explains the natural tendency to draw this view incorrectly. This is, without a doubt, the best art book I own.



2. Two weeks ago I couldn't even draw a stick figure with the correct proportions, now, I'm actually drawing males/females quite nice ... for a beginner of course !
   
   This books is awesome ... even though I haven't really paid attention to the 1st part of the book, concerning faces (which really don't generate enough interest at the moment for me as a 3d modeler) the second part, concerning anatomy and proportions was pure gold !
   
   So easy, so nice ... drawing made easy in all possible ways ! I'm still thrilled ! Although at first I was a bit discouraged, after reading the book and getting familiar with it, drawing became so fun. I usually spend about 1 hour per day, and use this baby every time...
   
   I plan in buying my girlfriend a copy of this book in the near future ...
   
   Conclusion: If you're a beginner ... this will be wonderful help ... and best of all it's cheap !



3. This book seems a bit old-fashioned in it's exercises and drawing suggestions. Even the examples of women's faces look like heads of women from the 50's. Maybe it is from the 50's originally. Anyway, it is dated.
   
   The layout is messy and the faces cartoonish.
   I am hoping to find some helpful tips on drawing the human figure but I am not too optimistic so far.
   
   I'd say skip this book as I am sure there are much better ones out there.
   
   If you don't have it check out Drawing for Dummies, it is a MUCH BETTER instructional guide than this one.



4. This is an excellent book, written by a man who was an absolute master of drawing. His depth of knowledge is extraordinary, as is the clarity, simplicity, and comprehensiveness of his approach. As an artist and illustrator I own many books on painting and drawing, and this is one of the best.



5. I grew up reading and using Jack Hamm's "How to Draw Animals", like it was a bible. As a professional illustrator, relying heavily on realism for all my work, his books are a great introduction in learning to see correctly, to gain insight into proportion and drawing skill. Anyone who doesn't get anything out of it isn't putting the time and effort into studying the material. It will help you if you take the time to read it. I just bought this book, as a refresher, as he always has something to teach, no matter what stage of art skill you have. I recommend his books to my students all the time. Art school basics in a book.

No comments about Lion of Jordan: The Life of King Hussein in War and Peace.

No comments about American Lion: Andrew Jackson in the White House.

5 comments about On Gold Mountain: The One-Hundred-Year Odyssey of My Chinese-American Family.

1. This is a history of the family of Authoress Lisa See. It reads like a good novel. Her grandfather came to the United States in the early 1900s and met and married a white woman and had several children with her. The story goes back and forth between California and China. It is a must read.



2. It is difficult for me to say whether or not I liked this book. While I am drawn to its narrative, which covers several generations of Asian Americans, I had a hard time stomaching the author's style at certain points. For example:
   
   "'This is a terrible idea!' Eddy yelled, whacking his hand through the air like a karate master trying to split a pile of bricks."
   
   "Why did one child, one husband, and no job create such a crushing burden for Stella? Because she had already been crushed by her childhood... [B]ecause her hopes, her expectations, her dreams had been crushed."
   
   Overall, I'd recommend this for anyone interested in Asian American history, but I personally would not purchase it for my library.



3. I enjoyed this book very much. Amazing to read about one man's dreams and hard work from 4 generations ago still leaves a legacy and a still-running store to this day. I was broken-hearted reading about the treatment of the Chinese during the railroad building era of the West. Bigotry and racism are not new to America, and not limited to just Africans. I got confused sometimes with all the names, and had to refer to the family tree in the beginning of the book, but it was a wonderful story.



4. There's not much magic realism or mystic exoticism about this blunt, detailed, multi-generational history of an immigrant family. If you're looking for a novel, you'll find that Lisa See has written several. I repeat, this is a history, and it will be of interest chiefly to historians and other social scientists, professional or arm-chair.
   
   Ms. See's great-great-grandfather arrived in America in 1867. The shabby treatment that he and other Chinese immigrants received is part of American history, but here in this book it becomes more vivid because See includes the reader in her "family album." Suffice it to say that the Fong/See family shrugged off indignities, worked hard, brought kinfolk to share the work despite arbitrary and unfair hurdles, took root in America, and succeeded more or less to the measure of their immigrant dreams. So it was with my mother's immigrant family from North Europe, and so it has been with every immigrant complement to America's cultural universality. Quite a few of the Fong/See second-comers spent time at the detention center of Angel Island, as described in the book "Island" which I reviewed a few days ago.
   
   The drama in this history of the branching See family - what makes this book memorable - is a love story, the secret and perilous marriage of Fong See, the son of the 1867 immigrant, to a woman of European heritage, Letticie Pruett. Interracial marriage was illegal for decades in California, as in many states, and the penalties were a lot more severe than mere annulment. The Fong See clan ran the risk of deportation, and the couple had reason to fear ostracism and personal violence.
   
   There's a sheaf of family photos in the center of the book. There's a snapshot of Richard See - fourth generation, I believe - with his buddies in Levis and Pendletons, getting ready for a fishing trip. Then there's Lisa herself as a girl in Chinese silks, but gasp! Lisa has wide European eyes, long blonde hair, and freckles!
   
   My mother's sister and her Norwegian-American husband Jim, the last of my Minnesota kin to live on a homestead farm, came to visit me in San Francisco in the 1970s. One evening I took them, with other relatives and friends, to a Chinese restaurant. Jim is not what you'd call loquacious; he was sitting with his back to the room and paying more heed to the talk at other tables than to us. Just behind him, a family was talking about visits to colleges, arguing the merits of Cal Tech versus MIT. Jim got curious and turned around - discretely? oh yeah! - to see what the family looked like. Then he gaped at me and whispered "them folks are Chinese!" "Well," said I, "what do you expect in a Chinese restaurant?" "But they're speakin' English!" quoth he.
   
   The heart and soul of Lisa See's history of her extended family is exactly what my uncle didn't understand. The Chinese who came to America were not insidious strangers and inscrutable menaces to European American culture. They were just plain folk.



5. I had read "Snow Flower and the Secret Fan" and just loved it. This book is just as absorbing. The reader is transported to another time and place. I enjoy historical fiction. This is a good story based on the history of Lisa See's family. It was obviously a labor of love for her. I would recommend it especially to those who are interested in West Coast history, from the late 19th century to WWII-era.

No comments about Our Lincoln: New Perspectives on Lincoln and His World.

5 comments about Queen Isabella: Treachery, Adultery, and Murder in Medieval England.

1. I will admit to not being an expert on Queen Isabella. I have never read a biography on her before, so when I picked up Alison Weir's book in the store I had nothing to compare it to and enjoyed it immensely. There is wonderful period detail here, especially in the beginning, and I think the reader feels a measure of sympathy for Isabella, whose husband wasn't interested in her sexually (or emotionally it seems). My favorite part of the book was when Isabella (finally) took a lover and decided to make a stand against her husband with him. Part slighted young woman, part Lady Macbeth, Queen Isabella is a very interesting read with a few theories about Edward II's "death" I hadn't heard before (whether or not they could be accurate I can't say).



2. This is a History book. So it has just the facts, M'am. A very good History book and therefore lots of niggling details...and every detail has multiple perspectives gathered from letters and writings of the time and are based on the authors religious or nationalistic views. It is a slow read that you can put down and easily pick up again, as you will want to work your way through this beautifully written and richly informative history as seen through the mind of a very interesting queen. It covers the period of English History from the late times of Edward I (late 13th century) to Edward II and the the beginning of the reign of Edward III (mid 14th century. There is no plot so the fun is in the interesting details and analysis of those Medievil times.



3. I really tried to like this book. Inasmuch as I am an avid student of history and enjoy the tangled web of early to mid twentieth century English history, this book seemed right up my alley.
   
   I can't say that it is a bad book, but upon reflection, perhaps the most telling fact is that it took me so long to finish it. A book of this size generally takes me about a week to finish, reading for an hour or so each night before bed. Most nights, however, found me nodding off in less than half the time. Weir's style can best be described as a dry recitation of historical facts with frequent asides in which she injects her own analysis. Hardly scintillating entertainment and simply not lively enough to keep me awake.
   
   From the standpoint of substance, I can't say that I agree with her efforts to rehabiltate the universally condemned Queen Isabella, the wife of Edward II of England. Isabella conspired against, overthrew, cheated on and likely participated in the murder of her husband and sovereign. According to Weir, she was simply misunderstood and unfairly judged. To my knowledge, she is the only one that believes so.
   
   In order to back up her position, Weir not only spins facts to the benefit of the Queen, but she weaves many out of whole cloth and disregards the numerous facts which clearly implicate her in the crimes for which history has condemned her. In an attempt to absolve the Queen of the crime of murder, she even trots out the old, roundly rejected canard that Edward II escaped from his captors and lived the remainder of his life as a hermit in France. This despite the public, state funeral in which the body and face of the King were clearly displayed and visible to thousands. As if an escape somehow lessens the crime of ordering the murder in the first place.
   
   Even in the cases where she concedes guilt on the part of the Queen, such as her adulterous relationship with Mortimer, she pardons the Queen, holding her to current standards as opposed to those in which she lived. In this regard, she clearly states that were Queen Isabella alive today, she would be viewed as a strong, independent woman, deserving of praise and not scorn (You go, girl). Nice theory, except for the fact that she didn't live in current times. In her day, regicide was perhaps the greatest crime and sin of the day, and adultery by a royal woman was universally punishable by death.
   
   I've read several of Weir's works and to date am not impressed. She seems to be on a personal crusade to rehabiltate the reputations of various women of the Middle Ages that for some reason or another have been judged harshly by history. I've never been a fan of revisionist history and particularly when the revisions are politically or socially motivated. This book is not only not particularly entertaining, but it's not even good history.



4. The book is heavily laced with facts to establish a place in the Medieval World. While the character of the heroine stands out clearly, sometimes the factual context surrounding events is daunting.
   It's a good read although a little too heavy on historical detail particularly in lists of "guests" or of "persons in attendance."



5. This was a great read. For those who have read the author's other books on British monarchy this one will not disappoint. It is a compelling and engaging narrative that sheds light on a historical character I knew very little about. The story of Queen Isabella's reign in England is well worth the effort.

5 comments about American Eve: Evelyn Nesbit, Stanford White: The Birth of the "It" Girl and the Crime of the Century.

1. Like a few other reviewer's here, I'd never heard of Evelyn Nesbit, Stanford White or Harry Thaw, and only picked up this book on a fluke. What a pleasant surprise to read about one of the first "trial of the centuries" and the "girl in the red velvet swing".
   
   Paula Uruburu has done a spendid job of making the reader feel the gilded age, the stuffy social scene and didn't bore this reader with an endless account of the trial like so many other true crime novels.
   
   Highly recommended!



2. On June 25, 1906, wealthy millionaire Harry K. Thaw killed his wife's Evelyn Nesbit's, former lover, the famous architect Stanford White, at Madison Square Garden. Evelyn, age 20, had spent the past five or six years of her life in the public eye as a model in Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, and New York, but nothing could have prepared her for the publicity that occurred in the aftermath of the killing.
   
   American Eve is primarily about Evelyn's life, and not quite so much about the murder and subsequent trial. Evelyn was born outside of Pittsburgh in 1885. After her father's death, her mother tried to make ends meet by hiring Evelyn out as an artists' model (as long as the artists were female or elderly men). Because of her timeless beauty, Evelyn soon found herself modeling in Philadelphia and New York, where she met much-older Stanford White, who set himself up as her father-figure and protector. Soon, however, he became much more.
   
   Evelyn met her future husband Harry K. Thaw "of Pittsburgh" in 1903. Thaw was known for his erratic, almost sociopathic behavior, but she married his anyways two years later. Thaw was obsessed with Evelyn, to the exclusion of everything else. He was especially obsessed with Evelyn's old relationship with White, whom Thaw considered the original exploiter of young, impressionable, virginal girls. Then, one sultry evening in the summer of 1906, Thaw shot White point blank, in front of hundreds of witnesses in the rooftop garden at Madison Square Garden. It led to "the trial of the century," as Thaw was tried for the murder under the plea of insanity.
   
   Uruburu tells the story from a feminist point of view, though Evelyn is protrayed as a victim of circumstance rather than architect of her own fate. Every now and then, as in the chapter which discusses the selection of the jury, Uruburu puts in a little aside like, "...and women were excluded, of course." Another thing I didn't like about the book was the opening chapter. The author begins with a discussion of Gilded Age society, whereas I believe she should have begun with the murder, in order to grab the reader's interest right away. And though I liked the photographs of Evelyn, I feel that there should be more of Stanford White (there's only one reprinted here). Also, I wish that more had been said about Evelyn's life after the trial.
   
   But aside from these points, I really enjoyed Evelyn's tragic story. Since Evelyn's life was so public, a lot was known (and speculated) about her life, and Uruburu does a wonderful job sorting out the fact and fiction. The narrative is also easy to follow, which is also another major plus. Even without Uruburu's contribution, Evelyn, the original "Gibson Girl," and the girl for whom the term "je ne se quais" should have been coined, remains today an interesting and compelling persona.



3. The pictures from the era are fantastic--The United States first super model, whose face even today could stop traffic. Fame she had, but fortune was nil until she married Henry K. Thaw. A modern day Letitia who was used by everyone around her, including her insanely jealous husband.
   If you are into "peeping Tom-ism" clothed in minute detail AMERICA EVE is the title for you.
   The research into the period, the individuals and their culture is superb, but the minute details recorded on every page lead to boredom. Evelyn Nesbit's story was shocking in 1900 and pathetic by the time she died in 1967.
   Writing as a Small BusinessSins of the Fathers: A Brewster County Novel



4. Neither of the names in the title were familiar to me, but I was intrigued that the Gibson Girl had been a real person.
   
   Using up the youth of pretty young girls is not a new thing. Evelyn Nesbit lived it in 1900. The book is sometimes a bit flowery, but the story is gripping.



5. When a historically minded person speaks of the "trial of the century", meaning the 20th century, several come immediately to mind: O.J., Leopold and Loeb, Nuremburg, Sacco and Vanzetti, Scopes, among others. However, the trial of Harry Thaw for the cold-blooded murder of Stanford White was the first of the century (1906), and perhaps the one with the most drama. That was because the chief witness was Evelyn Nesbit, the wife of Thaw, and the former seductee and mistress of White. The author gives us a thorough review of Evelyn's lfe, and her rapid rise to fame as a young girl. This rise is even more remarkable when you consider it happened in the first decade of the last century, before radio, television, the Internet, and supermarket tabloids (although there were some trashy papers in existence). It's a remarkable story, and moves through the high society world of New York, Pittsburgh, and cities in Europe. These people lived quite a different lifestyle than we do today, at least those of us who are not multimillionaires or celebrities famous for being famous. Evelyn had quite an eventful life, and it is retold in a breezy fashion that it easy to read. Occasionally the language gets a bit overblown, but that's often how things were in those days; sometimes events took on a larger-than-life appearance. To anyone interested in social and legal history in the early part of the last century,I highly recoimmend this book.

5 comments about Galileo's Daughter: A Historical Memoir of Science, Faith, and Love.

1. I had expected a fictionalized narrative following the daughter of the famous astronomer. What I got was a detailed biography of Galileo himself. However, I still continued reading to the end.
   With more warmth and humanity than your average historical account, Sobel's story weaves the life and family of its subject in among the facts of his life. Such things as his recurring illnesses and his struggles with the church authorities are brought to life and made more interesting.
   I recommend this book to anyone who is interested in the life of Galileo, or anyone who is interested in the day-to-day activities of Italy in the 17th Century.



2. I've got a secret. This book is not really about Galileo's daughter, Virginia. It is about Galileo and his life and times as seen through letters from his daughter to him (the letters from him to his daughter were destroyed). As a book about Virginia, it is largely uninteresting and unenlightening. As a book about Galileo, it is terrific. Dava Sobel captures the essence of Galileo's work and his fight with the religious authorities. My emotions as I read the book were: enlightenment in that it shows Galileo to be a far better person than I had given him credit for; sadness because of how he was mistreated; amazement for the honor he showed in all his dealings; and frustration at how much science was held back by religious authorities. And it puts into perspective how little my own daughter actually demands from me. I strongly recommend this book and I look forward to reading other of Sobel's works, including Longitude.



3. GALILEO'S DAUGHTER
   By
   Dava Sobel
   (Penguin Books 2000)
   Sour Marie Celeste was the illegitimate daughter of Galileo Galelei - the eldest of his three, and only, children At the age of 13 her father had her admitted to the convent of San Mateo in Arcetri, where she would remain until her death at the age of 34 in 1634. Once admitted, or shortly thereafter, she started writing letters to her father - the most loving, beautiful, intelligent letters I have ever read. There aren't too many of them, but they have been preserved and form the excuse (if that is the right word) for this book - which is a part history of the life of Galileo, part comment on his times and a setting to publish the letters chronologically along with and in tune with events in his life.
   Every school child knows something about Galileo - whether it was his "invention" of the telescope (he didn't invent it; he improved it immeasurably) or his "discovery" of the fact that it was the earth which revolved around the sun rather than vice versa - and this too was wrong, He didn't "discover" this. The sun-centered universe (heliocentered) had been discovered and described by Nicholas Copernicus (1473-1543) in 1543, 21 years before Galileo was born in 1564. Using Copernican theory Tycho Brahe (1545-61) had fixed the positions of may stars both as to distance and location and Johannes Kepler (1591-1630) had established the planetary motion of the planets - or most of them. So it wasn't what he invented or what he "discovered" that eventually got him into trouble with the Catholic Church, it was the fact that he was by far the most gifted and the most prominent man to have advocated - or thought to advocate - the heresy of a heliocentered universe.
   He had been a star from the start, one of the most gifted mathematicians of his age or any other, one of the few who, instead of taking things as they are said to be, tried to find out how they really are. And thus was one of the first true scientists, a man who dropped balls of different weights from the tower of Pisa, who rolled balls of different weight and different sizes down inclines of different pitches, who measured the tides, floating bodies - always studying motion and/or the laws of motion - and almost all of modern physics is the study of motion whether it's string theory - action at a distance - or general relativity or the measurement of the effect of a collision of protons in the CORE tunnel in Switzerland this summer.
   He was always an academician, teaching mathematics at the University of Pisa or Padua or being the resident mathematician and experimenter for one of the Medici's. And on retainer to the same. He was always ill. He never married. His work was his spouse. However, he recognized his three children by his liaison with the beautiful Marina Gamba of Venice. Domestic life was not for him. To the end he worked and thought, living as a guest or retainer in many ducal palaces in Tuscany and Rome. He lived as an untitled man at the highest level of worldly or ecclesiastical aristocracy. He made enemies - many of them - but he persevered and died in a kind of house arrest at the age of 72, still working and under banishment for daring to support the idea that the earth moved about the sun which the Catholic Church, relying on Aristotelian and Pythagorean thought and on the literal word of Holy Scripter believed as holy writ that it was the sun which revolved about the earth.
   I have just spoken of his many enemies and of the ducal residences in which he often made his abode: and the book is full of this detail - too full in my opinion. It would have been better if much of this had either been omitted or if Ms. Sobel had taken the time to tell us something about the governance of his time, I would have been much better informed had I known something of the Medici's or the Doges of Venice or the politics of the Popes who were involved in his life. And I would like to have known more about how people lived in his time.
   Similarly I would have liked to know more about convent life. There is enough in the book to indicate that it was perfectly dreadful -cruel, inhuman by our standards. Hared work, cold water, bad food, no rest, small quarters, iron discipline and no sleep. The Hanoi Hilton in San Matteo. Why would anybody lived this way? And why did Galileo put his daughters "away" at age 13. He robbed them of a life! (The excuse given by Sobel is that he learned he had known enemies in court because of his success and wanted to protect them; but this doesn't wash with me. All he had to do was to acknowledge them and, as his heirs, they would have properly evaded his enemy's attempts to take his property. I think he put them away because he was selfish. He didn't want three illegitimate children to be staining his record as he surged his way upward, buoyed by talent and reputation.)
   As Galileo stepped through his professional life he wrote to Sour Marie Celeste, but his letters did not survive. Her replies and her spontaneous letters to him did survive, however, and manly of them are quoted here. Would that all children would love their father so much. Would that any one of us would have a child as intelligent, as articulate as she. Would that she were here today - or those like her - to call our attention to enduring love as contrasted to the conditions in which we live.
   There are a couple of other comments I want to get down here on paper before I quit. First - about Galileo's "Trial". It is covered accurately and well in the book. In brief Galileo had published in Dialogues the essence of Copernican thought spoken through the mouth of a neutral that was just saying what it was. Then there were two characters, one of which was Galileo under a false name, who discussed it. Thus he never on paper espoused the Copernican heresy. He just said what it was. He thought he had a deal with Cardinal Bellarmino (later Saint Bellarmine) that as long as he didn't teach or espouse it he was not in conflict with Church teaching. However, 15 years later he fell out of favor with Pope Urban VIII. His enemies in the Vatican called on the Inquisition to question him and it was as the result of this that he was sentenced to house arrests.
   The trial is well covered in the book, but I wish Sobel had told us more about the Inquisition, how long it lasted, what it did, what procedures were followed, how it was independent (if it was) of the Vatican. What was the Index? What happened to people who wrote things that made their way to the Index of banned books? What kind of books? How many?
   I also wish she had told us more about the thirty Years War because it is frequently mentioned and apparently played a direct role in the attitude of the Catholic Church at the time.
   Woven through out this history of Galileo's life and the beautiful love expressed by his daughter (who was every bit as bright as he was) is the conflict between science and religion. Sobel never addresses it. But it's pretty clear to me. Religious belief cannot overrule, change or ignore true scientific discovery. And the greatest conflicts in this area have been the Galileo incident with respect to the heliocentered universe and Darwinism. God made the world and He made the rules of nature and God doesn't bend, break or ignore His rules because they are contrary to the ideas of His people



4. This book must be read if not for the depth of the actual telling, then for the elegant writing itself. The intertwining of primary source material and the author's own pen is done beautifully. The story's theme of the supposed clash between faith and reason/ science is as relevant today as it was in Galileo's time. Food for thought.



5. At sixty-eight years of age, Galileo, a Catholic, was sentenced to three years imprisonment for writing a philosophical story in support of the Copernican sun-centered universe theory. Unfortunately for him (and the truth), it was in conflict with the wording of the bible (p 62):
   
   "O lord my God, Thou art great indeed....Thou fixed the Earth upon its foundation, not to be moved forever.[103:1,5]
   
   The actions leading up to that event make up the majority of the book, which distinguishes itself from other biographies by its inclusion of the content of letters written by his elder daughter, Virginia, who was born in 1600 and "adopted the name Maria Celeste when she became a nun" at age thirteen. Because Galileo's letters were destroyed, the majority of what we learn about him is through her writings, which is both the book's strength and its weakness. In fact, it might more aptly be titled, Galileo's Daughter's Letters: a view of his life from behind the walls of the nunnery. Because there are no letters before she became a teenager, little is known about that part of her life. And although it is reader friendly, even for the non-scientifically minded, it could have been shortened by a fourth to a half of its 420 pages without losing much in readability and coverage of the most important aspects of Galileo's life.

5 comments about A Rumor of War.

1. Caputo's account as a combat officer is the best book on direct experience in Nam. It ranks up there with Normen Mailer's The Naked and fhe Dead and Audie Murphy's WW2 account of his combat experience in To Hell and Back superbley written--gripping. Maurice



2. I thought this book was the best book on Vietnam that I have ever read. Its a facinating look into life as a line officer in a front line Marine Infantry batallion during the early part of the war. Caputo holds nothing back when it comes to describing life on the front line and what goes through the minds of these young, too young Marines who fought on the front line. An excellent read and I highly reccomend it.



3. Its a page turner from start to finish. A very unique view of the war.



4. Caputo wasn't much of a marine. He started complaining about Vietnam before he arrived. Every page is filled with criticism, cynicism, griping, complaining, and self-serving tripe. He wanted to be a hero, but he didn't have what it took to be anything but a whining wimp. Certainly he writes well. But writing well and living well are entirely different. He doesn't understand honor or duty. Sure the war was politicized, but so is every war. Sure the rules of engagement were stupid, but a soldier serves. Caputo did not serve; rather he whined. Many of us who served in Vietnam believed there were many things that made no sense. But we didn't turn tail and run. We served. For those who want to understand what is was like to be a soldier in Vietnam, read "We Were Soldiers Once... and Young" or "Steel My Soldiers' Hearts". If you want to know what is was like to be useless in Vietnam, read this book.



5. I assigned this book to my college students for a closer glimpse of the Vietnam Conflict. I had not read it before, but had done research and study on the subject. I found Caputo's book to be insightful, controversial and thought provoking. He doesn't glamorize the war but explains how it effected soldiers and one of the many reasons it was such a mess. Throughout the book, Caputo shows how the conditions changed the average American teenager into a robotic killer and how their experiences stayed with them. In the end, he speaks against the war, but not in the normal Jane Fonda version of bashing the military and labeling them rapists and baby killer. Caputo talks about how the government was at fault and created the situations that lead to PTSD and other issues for returning soldiers.
   
   A must read to understand the war and its effects on our soldiers.