CurlyShavings

This was Patrick O'Brian's 9th book in the Aubrey/Maturin series and the title just about says it all. Most of the time is spent with some scent of treason threatening our heros' actions in one way or the other.

It was a good read but certainly not O'Brian's best. The ending left me scratching my head and wondering if I was missing some pages. A few points seemed contrived: the emphasis on Aubrey's men practicing their small arms and the repeated emphasis on how Aubrey had sounded the entire harbor in his youth. Both are important details but didn't need to be singled out quite in the ways that O'Brian accomplished.

On another note, this was the first book (in my editions of the Aubrey/Maturin series) that included a map.

Swallows and Amazons is Arthur Ransome's first book in the Swallows and Amazons series. It is not his best but it certainly sets the stage for all the others and so shouldn't be missed. Please don't be discouraged by that statement; Ransome is an exceptional author and if you're looking for a book about children sailing for a child (8-16 comes to mind), I cannot recommend anything more highly. It's simply that Ransome is still working on his form in this book and what passes as "not his best" far exceeds that of many, many other authors.

Put another way, this is a great book and very well-written; his subsequent ones are even better! Here's a brief synopsis:

A quartet of children (plus Mom, baby and nurse; Dad's away at war) arrives at a lake in England's Lake District for summer holiday. They spy this glorious island, just begging to be discovered. It turns out they already have a beautiful boat, Swallow and the oldest already knows a fair amount about sailing. They obtain permission to sail to and camp on the island and the adventures begin. Turns out the children who crew Amazon lay claim to this island. Throw in a retired pirate, some friendly natives, some very detailed descriptions and explanations of sailing and you've got a fine story with an excellent setting, some terrific characters and a wild ride as the Swallows and Amazons spend their summer holiday.

So wonderful, in fact, that they don't want it to end. Toward the end of the book, Mrs. Dixon (a friendly native) suggests:

". . . But perhaps you'll be coming again next year."
"Every year. For ever and ever," said Titty.
"Aye," said Mrs. Dixon, "we all think that when we're young."

Indeed, I wanted the book to go on, "for ever and ever". The series doesn't go on for ever but there are others and they are even more delightful.

If you'd like additional information on Arthur Ransome's Swallows and Amazons, check out The Arthur Ransome Society home page.

This was Patrick O'Brian's 11th book in the Aubrey/Maturin series and while I prefer to be sailing one of the seven, I did enjoy this book. My frustrations are two-fold: not enough sailing and Captain Aubrey's bad luck. Yes, I feel for Stephen's bad luck, too, but he functions more as plot device than character, I'm afraid.

O'Brian writes about the (largely landlocked) incidents in a traffic-accident sort of way: vivid, terrible and peeking-between-your-fingers-"can't watch" addiction. I hope that O'Brian gets Jack away from this lee shore and gives him some sea room soon.

I don't own the next one (yet), so it may be some time before I'm able to write about it.

This was Patrick O'Brian's 10th book in the Aubrey/Maturin series and if you're going to read it because its title is the subtitle of the movie, then don't. The two storylines have little in common. If you're going to read it because you want great sea-going, Napoleonic war fiction, well, that's a much better reason. The movie replaces an American warship with a French one, the subplot about Hollum being a Jonah is toned down considerably and the movie's final twist bears no resemblance to any of the books I have read yet. (The book's final twist is quite something else completely and far superior.)

Still, it is a good read and an important one of the series. We grow to love the HMS Surprise even more than in other books. We get a startling view of Jack's devotion to Stephen when he saves Stephen's life (again). And this time Stephen's second career doesn't dominate every scene with improbables.

Oh, and why (you may ask), does the review of the 10th book get done after the 11th? Something to do with only being 24 hours in a day.

At the moment I'm reading Charles A. Lindbergh's autobiographical Spirit of St. Louis as sort of a preview for my 6th-grader. We homeschool and some of the recommendations on our curriculum's list are somewhat strange. This is a great book (so far) and is likely to make a huge (and positive) impression on our son. The reason for the pre-read is Lindbergh's introduction to some other book (I forget which, it was about Apollo 11?) in which he gets really spacey (metaphysically, not NASA) and we wanted to make sure this one wasn't full of nonsense but really discussed his building of the Spirit of St. Louis team and his attempt to fly nonstop across the Atlantic (NY to Paris) and so far, it does so quite well.

Also being read are several back issues of Messing About in Boats. Waiting to be blogged about are Tinkerbelle and The Children of Hurin.

This was Patrick O'Brian's 12th book in the Aubrey/Maturin series.

First off, I enjoyed it. There were still contrived details (i.e., Aubrey just happening to have completed the soundings of some distant harbor while he was blockading it in the distant past) yet overall things fit together.

There is one odd bit about Maturin, though. In the preceding books, he is presented as not having a clew about sails, ships or sailing and yet in this edition, O'Brian has him finding his sea legs (or "sea brain"), at last.

On pages 80-81, he discusses schooners and masts with Martin, apparently being able to identify some boat as a schooner based on its mast arrangement. He goes as far as comparing his skill with identifying birds based on "size, eye-stripe and voice", yet in other books Stephen frequently must correct him in this matter. Has he mastered one term and then allows Martin (who appears to know of these matters if not actually know them) to flounder without the actual answer?

On page 109, he goes as far as venturing to give his opinion of he desired approach to St. Michael's. Does all of this come about due to his ownership of the Surprise?

On page 136, Stephen has supper with Sir Joseph and we are told that when Blaine asked to hear how the Surprise captured her prizes, "Stephen fought the battle over again in the usual naval way, with small pieces of bread on the table-cloth". Yes, it is important to note that Stephen was not stuffed down in the hold awaiting broken bodies and splinters to extract (as he normally would have been found). I simply find it hard to believe that he is lubber (and duffer) in one book and highly nautical in the next.

All of these criticisms are minor overall. The book is soundly written, it has an engaging plot, some old wrongs are righted (with satisfying results) and we get a deeper understanding of Maturin and his love (one of the more cardboard aspects of the book). Of course, if you're this far (over halfway) in the series, you've got too much invested to not keep reading!

I do not yet own the next one (yet), so it may be some time before I am able to write about it.

Aubrey/Maturin

I came across references to The Dip, by Seth Godin while reading an entry on GapingVoid, a blog by Hugh Macleod, the book's illustrator. The cartoon in question spoke volumes to me since at the time, I was in the dip phase of my current gig at work.

Since Hugh's licensing terms are "pretty open", I have this cartoon on my wall at work (cube art) and also on a really nice coffee mug from Cafe Press.

The premise of the book is very simple (Even Seth confesses that.): Real winners, those who are the best in the world at something, quit often. And frequently. And early. And without remorse. The idea is that by quitting the wrong things, projects, jobs, etc. early and often, we save ourselves from dead-end tasks and focus on those that we can emerge as the best in the world in. Seth does define the term "the world" in rather limited ways; it can be so small a group as to be nearly meaningless (e.g., this is the best book I read yesterday) or as vast as the cosmos (e.g., of all the books I've ever read . . .).

The "dip" itself is that period of time, of low energy, when/where we want to quit what ever it is we are doing. When the going gets tough. Mile 20 of a marathon. The third week of a new job. The seventh year (I'm told) of a marriage. The trouble is, we've invested a ton of energy/money/time/emotion into whatever-it-is up to this point. So if we're going to quit now, we should have never started. And unless we're willing to put in the energy/money/time/emotion/etc. to be the best-in-the-world, we should never have started. The "dip" is a barrier to entry in that market. It's what keeps the other competitors to your title of best-in-the-world away. So if you really wish to be the best in the world at whatever you're attempting, you should keep going.

Much of the book is conventional wisdom. Or common sense. Jesus tells us to "count the cost". Lucy tells Mr. Tumnus that he's the nicest faun she's ever met, to which he responds that she's had a rather poor sampling (he's the first she's ever met, i.e., small-world problem). The book The Discipline of Market Leaders: Choose Your Customers, Narrow Your Focus, Dominate Your Market tells us much the same things. GE and Welch tell us to get out of any market that we can't be #1 in. We're spending too much time on things we can't excel at. Seth asks us (pg 23) if we "have the guts to pick a different, smaller market to conquer?"

The Bard reflects that we must

See first that the design is wise and just: that ascertained, pursue it resolutely; do not for one repulse forego the purpose that you resolved to effect. (emphasis mine)

Maturin observes (on page 85 of The Letter of Marque) that "He who wishes to grow rich in a year, will be hanged in six months." Seth tells us that it is easy to be rich but hard to become rich. The effort involved in getting to our worthwhile and immense goals should, naturally, be immense.

What does this say about my boatbuilding? I'm not sure. I don't want to be the best in the world, or even in my block. I want a boat I can take some of my family in and go sailing on my local bodies of water (Lake Erie, LaDue, etc.). I decided long ago not to build a show boat but a sail boat. Does that make my effort lukewarm, mediocre, a cul-de-sac (Seth's dead-end)? I'm not sure.

A good book and one that I'll likely read again.

The Children of Húrin (pronounced HOO-rin) is one of J.R.R. Tolkien's posthumously published books (edited by his son and literary heir, Christopher Tolkien). I won't go into great detail about where, when and how it fits into The Lord of the Rings, mostly because I'll get it all wrong but also because it does and doesn't fit.

If you're a Rings fan, it's hard to say if you'll like it. I would recommend it just because it's Tolkien but it certainly adds to the richness of the world that he created. The characters (Frodo, Bilbo, Gandalf, Gimli, etc.) are not present, the story is much too early/old for that. If you're not a Rings fan, I'd still recommend it. It's a neat story. At times you might think you're waiting for Beowulf to show up. In some ways, it is written in much the same way (excluding the lyrical poetry).

There are several pages of family trees that are quite helpful (in the back). They're not advertised and so if those things matter to you, go read them first. Only a couple of names will be familiar to you so if that sort of thing matters to you, go find and read them. They help in placing the story in its proper context.

I found the first few chapters someway pedantic since we get an overview of how we got to where Tolkien wants us to be. After the plot gets going, though, it was quite difficult to set down. Something of a cross between a history and a tragedy, I felt sorrow with and for the character and his family on a number of occasions.

There are a number of drawings by Alan Lee and they add to the book rather than detract. They're not Tolkien's line art, but they are pleasing.

I don't think it sold very well; Border's frequently has it on sale for 30% off and here's a coupon (that always seems to be refreshed/current).

In The Shadow Party: How George Soros, Hillary Clinton, and Sixties Radicals Seized Control of the Democratic Party, Dave Horowitz and Richard Poe construct a well-documented and chilling description of a real-life Bond Villain, toppling governments, rigging markets and inflicting his will, not through democratic means but rather funding revolution by buying his results. (See Cosmo in the film "Sneakers" .) Many sources are documented and the few I checked on stood up to scrutiny.

My first response to the book was one of despair. While trying to understand that, I was reminded of the sovereignty of God and the importance of remembering that, believing that and most importantly, resting in that fact. I was also struck by how we don't always get the elected official that we want quite so much as we seem to get the one that we deserve.

I don't appreciate the meddling, posturing and influences that appears to be going on today in our politics. Two or three people (or more) should be able to declare that they are running for such-and-such office, take turns standing on some stump somewhere, let us hear what they have to say about the issues, interact with them by asking meaningful, relevant questions and hearing the responses. It used to be called civil discourse, even debate.

What seems to be lacking in today's politics is the ability to be a good loser or even a good winner.

The message I'm hearing today is that if "we" don't win it will mean the end of society as we know it (regardless of who "we" is). When "we" do win (and why wouldn't "we" since "we" are the only ones who are right), we beat our chests, talk about moral supremacy and "mandates" and destroy the losers by humiliating them with our hatred. When "we" do lose, we cry "Foul!", discredit the winners by any possible means (real or false) and destroy them with our hatred. Not a very enlightened way to run a system.

It's the need to win at any and all costs. To the point of destroying the opponents in any way possible. I am so not looking forward to our current election cycle.

I was able to pick up O'Brian's The Thirteen Gun Salute while at the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum in St. Michaels, Maryland. While I hope to finish soon and provide more on this book, here's a quote that really needs to be reproduced here.

It had always appeared to [Jack], that one of the purest joys in the world was sailing a small, well-conceived, weatherly boat: the purest form of sailing too, with the sheet alive in one's hand, the tiller quivering under the crook of one's knee and the boat's instant response to the movement of either, and to the roll and the breeze. A more stirring, obvious joy, of course, in a moderate gale and a lively sea, but there was also a subtle delight in gliding over smooth water, coaxing every ounce of thrust from what light air there was: an infinitely varied joy.

I read John le Carré's classic, The spy who came in from the cold while staying at a relative's house in Annapolis (10/5-11/2007). Much of le Carré's newer stuff is post-Cold War and simply doesn't resonate with me, even things that take place in Central America, my old stomping grounds. Having only been in former East Germany twice, this inversion strikes me as strange but perhaps that simply means that le Carré should stick with what he knows and does well (Cold War) and that he should leave the present alone.

This book takes place in le Carré's native element and is a classic. His choice of colors is appropriately dimmed, the reader is marvelously left in the dark and the twists and turns of the story's landscape are expertly driven.

Patrick O'Brian's 13th in the series, the Thirteen-Gun Salute is a bit disappointing. I felt as if I had stepped into the middle of a book rather than entering into a new one. In many real ways, I did. We meet our captain and his crew shipwrecked on an island (where we left them in the previous book). And at the end, well, I won't spoil it but I didn't get the feeling that we'd finished anything.

Yes, there were several bright spots of really good writing and overall, the book just doesn't seem to stand on its own the way some of the earlier ones had.

E.F. Knight chose a very effective writing style, stuck with it and ended up with quite a readable travel narrative. The book, The Falcon on the Baltic, isn't widely available and you might want to try reading it online (and here). His was a simple goal, a summer's cruise in the Baltic. That's it.

He writes very well and makes all his stops interesting to the reader, even when the harbor or city or canal wasn't very enjoyable.

I have attempted to collect some of the placenames from his book into a Google Map and also as a Google Earth KML file. They are, by no means, authoritative. Nor are they even in order. I may yet get to improving them over the holidays.

Two in a Boat: The True Story of a Marital Rite of Passage is an interesting read about a couple, oddly paired, who take on the adventure of cruising down to the Mediterranean from England. One of the things that makes it a good read is that the author (the wife in this pair) readily admits that she's fairly "messed up" (my term, not hers, she would be much more clinical about it). I bought the book 1) because it was at half-price books, 2) I usually like sea-going stories and 3) I'd like to go cruising with my wife someday and thought I'd learn something.

I did learn some things, both what to do and what not to do. The book ends tragically enough but before you get there, one realizes just what corporate America (or England, or anywhere) can do to a person's soul. You get a real glimpse into this couple's marriage and how things work and don't work. It's easy to empathize with both sides in this adventure and that helps make the book likable.

[11/27/2007 Update: Turns out the author's got a whole web site to herself and a page just for this book.]

O'Brian's The Truelove is a well-crafted story of intrigue, a screwed-up relationship, some healthy ones and lots of sailing.

I use the word "crafted" intentionally; the book feels a bit less organic than some of his others. Perhaps "architected" would be a better word. The reader is led along and there's little chance of the story getting away from the author. "Scripted"? Would that be better?

Still, it is a very fun book to read and it is easy to get caught up in the action.

I'm going to play around with Google Maps and see if I can get some of Jack's Journeys to be mapped out.

View Larger Map

I started O'Brian's The Wine-Dark Sea a couple of days ago and expect I'll finish it this week. The edition I'm reading is a hardcover first that my wife picked up for a song at our local book-selling, empty-your-basement weekend event. I don't know if it's the hardcover or the words on the page that make this one a good read, but it is. Better than some of his preceding ones, perhaps he just got back into the groove.

View Larger Map
(If this map doesn't show a sailboat near Hawaii, view this entry by itself. The entry for The Truelove must still be showing on this page.)

I'm not finished with the book yet and doubtlessly will have more to say about it later on.

Number 17 in the Aubrey/Maturin series, The Commodore starts well, builds well and even has a dramatic finish. The last fifteen pages, however, almost appear to be O'Brian's attempt to finish the book as quickly as possible and fit the whole thing into some predetermined length. The fleet action that fills these pages seems distant, as if we were watching from some captain's logbook (which we probably are).

There's plenty of small-boat sailing when the Doctor discovers that he must leave the Bellona (Jack's flagship, now that he's a Commodore), rush into London to pick up some people and two huge chests of gold and rush down to Portugal. Small-boat for O'Brian but not truly small. Knight would call it a small yacht.

Anyway, a good story and quite satisfying. There's a little bit of landlubbering and some domestic surprises to round things out.

The fifth book in C.S. Lewis' Chronicles of Narnia, The Horse and His Boy is the only one of the seven that doesn't add much (that is significant) to the whole. It's just a story, while the others are vast theological works and each contribute to the larger theme that is Narnia. (OK, I'm exaggerating slightly, but not much.)

You may find that some editions of the series will have this book as the third in the series (Magician's Nephew, Lion-Witch-Wardrobe, then Horse). Please note that Lewis wrote them in a particular order, published them in that order and I truly believe that he wished them to be enjoyed in the original order (through his dying day). With the New Revised Order (Magician's Nephew first), one can never encounter the lamp in its proper setting as Lucy finds it first in Lion. It just wasn't made to be that way.

Regardless of that debate, there are a number of interesting quotes in Horse. Here's my favorite:

They were now in the palace garden which sloped down in terraces to the city wall. The moon shone brightly. One of the drawbacks about adventures is that when you come to the most beautiful places you are often too anxious and hurried to appreciate them; so that Aravis (though she remembered them years later) had only a vague impression of grey lawns, quietly bubbling fountains, and the long black shadows of cypress trees.

Which is why, when Erika and I were fighting the wind, with little battery power left for the kicker, trying to get back to port in a big blow before sundown, I had her stop and look at the Cleveland skyline on the starboard side and the sky-meets-lake horizon on the other. May she remember it always.

I am re-reading The Hobbit at the moment. Work has been, well, work, recently and I wanted something that I could enjoy without expending too much effort. And then, I found myself thinking about this passage:

     'Then what is Durin's Day?" asked Elrond.
      'The first day of the dwarves' New Year,' said Thorin, 'is as all should know the first day of the last moon of Autumn on the threshold of Winter. We still call it Durin's Day when the last moon of Autumn and the sun are in the sky together. But this will not help us much, I fear, for it passes our skill in these days to guess when such a time will come again.'

This is from The Hobbit, Chapter III, "A Short Rest", pg 56, emphasis added. Winter begins at the Winter Solstice, on or around December 22nd each year (in my hemisphere, anyway). The sun and moon can appear in the sky together in a number of different ways, but if we assume that a "moon" starts at the new moon (i.e., when there is no moon), then the first chance that this new moon and the sun have at being in the sky together is at the sunset after the new moon, when the sliver of new moon trails the sun just a little. Tolkien reinforces these details with another passage, later in the book, in Chapter XI, "On the Doorstep", pg 179.

     'Tomorrow begins the last week of autumn,' said Thorin one day.
     'And winter comes after autumn,' said Bifor.

All day Bilbo sat gloomily in the grassy bay gazing at the stone, or out west through the narrow opening. He had a queer feeling that he was waiting for something.

     If he lifted his head he could see a glimpse of the distant forest. As the sun turned west there was a gleam of yellow upon its far roof, as if the light caught the last pale leaves. Soon he saw the orange ball of the sun sinking towards the level of his eyes. He went to the opening and there pale and faint was a thin new moon above the rim of the Earth.

So we've confirmed so far that it is late autumn, the new moon has just taken place and we're looking west toward the sunset at a sliver of a moon chasing the sun toward the horizon.

     Quickly Bilbo explained. They all fell silent: the hobbit standing by the grey stone, and the dwarves with wagging beards watching impatiently. The sun sank lower and lower, and their hopes fell. It sank into a belt of reddened cloud and disappeared. The dwarves groaned, but still Bilbo stood almost without moving. The little moon was dipping to the horizon. Evening was coming on. The suddenly when their hope was lowest a red ray of the sun escaped like a finger through a rent in the cloud. A gleam of light came straight through the opening into the bay and fell on the smooth rock-face. . . . There was a loud crack. A flake of rock split from the wall and fell. A hole appeared suddenly about three feet from the ground.
. . . .
     Then Thorin stepped up and drew the key on its chain from round his neck. He put it to the hole. It fitted and it turned! Snap! The gleam went out, the sun sank, the moon was gone, and evening sprang into the sky.

The clues we can get from these passages are many. We confirm that we're looking for the last new moon in late autumn. The clues about looking west confirm for us that this is a sunset event and the sequence ("the sun sank, the moon was gone") helps us place things precisely. We're to watch the sunset on the evening of the new moon or the evening after the new moon. Why the imprecision in our precision? Because, depending on your longitude and the time of day for the new moon, not everything may appear on the first sunset.

We are currently on the threshold of winter (begins about 12/22/2007). The last moon (of Autumn) starts this weekend (Sunday afternoon, December 9th at 1241). On that day the moon sets at 1634, while sunset for my location (near N 41° 30' 36.4212" W 81° 34' 44.1588") is twenty minutes later, at 1657. I'd like to see that moon if it were possible. On Monday, the sun sets at 1657 and the moon sets at 1726, So as I read it, we just might be able to see the moon and the sun at the same time at sundown Monday, December 10th, 2007.

That would be Durin's Day.

I'll be watching.

From The Hobbit (Chapter XVIII, pg 243):

'. . . . There is more in you of good than you know, child of the kindly West. Some courage and some wisdom, blended in measure. If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world. . . .'