Review: Elodia's Knife: Book One of the Visigoth Saga

Elodia's Knife: Book One of the Visigoth Saga by Robert S. Phillips
My rating: 1 of 5 stars

Book: *
Performance: ***

There Is So Much Wrong Here

To start … it is poorly written in passive voice with way too much descriptive text making it nearly impossible to actually put yourself into the story. Instead, the reader remains on the outside looking in, reading/listening to the third person narrative describing what happened, broken up by extremely awkward/unnatural dialog.
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There are zero sympathetic characters in this story. I uniformly disliked them all, not finding any of them to be even remotely believable. I don’t think there was a single relationships that was not extremely dysfunctional

There is way too much detail that doesn’t advance the plot … probably because the plot is MIA making this something of a rape fantasy that for some reason over uses the euphemism “bumping” as if that makes it all okay. This is even more aggravating because most of the historical details are just wrong … the roman military didn’t work like that, roman river patrol boats didn’t work like that, roman weapons and armor didn’t work like that, roman disciple and law didn’t work like that, roman christianity didn’t work like that … and all of these weird anachronisms might be hidden for most readers because the overarching history (the conflict between Rome and the Goths on the Danube) is at least correct in broad strokes. I found the poor research so ubiquitous that it was hard to ignore and I almost DNF.

I was given this free advance review/listener copy (ARC) audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.

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Review: The Edith Wharton Collection

The Edith Wharton Collection by Edith Wharton
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Book: ***
Performance: ****

A Nice Way to Enjoy a Classic

First off … this is not my typical fare; in fact, I don’t usually care for relationship drama, but I am on a bit of a classics kick and this seemed like an easy way to move outside my comfort zone … and for the most part that is true. The Narration on this collection was great and made it all very enjoyable. In “The Age of Innocence,” we get a Hallmark love triangle set in the NYC socialite scene that now has a bit of a nostalgic feel to it. I am not sure why “The House of Mirth” was not first, but they are remarkably similar stories to my mind, with perhaps a more stinging critique of social expectations and obligations of the time found here. Enough to make me happy to not be living then (while every age has its issues, I would like to believe that there is more freedom and opportunity today for many folks that traditionally had little or none). Granted this is all first world issues … but is still progress. The last piece, “Ethan Frome,” is the weakest of the three and explores an even darker side of human social relationships. All in all, it was worth the effort, but such stories remain a bit of a struggle for me to enjoy much.

The chapters and sections in this work are:

“The Age of Innocence”
Book 1 (5:47)
Book 2 (5:45)

“The House of Mirth”
Book 1 (6:41)
Book 2 5:32)

“Ethan Frome” (3:14)

I was given this free advance review/listener copy (ARC) audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.

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Review: Henry David Thoreau Bundle: Walden, On the Duty of Civil Disobedience, and Walking

Henry David Thoreau Bundle: Walden, On the Duty of Civil Disobedience, and Walking by Henry David Thoreau
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Book: ****
Performance: ***

Great Bundle, Poorly Organized

A collection of classics that most Americans probable encountered at some point in their education (I certainly did) and it was interesting to come back to them many … many years later to contemplate how my perception and understanding of them may have changed. In this case, I definitely enjoyed them more, especially thanks to the excellent narration (I still think he was a loon). As might be expected, the bulk of the bundle is taken up by Walden, with several chapters devoted to certain aspects of Thoreau’s experience. The treatise on Civil Disobedience remains the most interesting IMHO, but it was all good and recommended. The only criticism I have is with the organization … there are no labels to the chapters and entire chapters are devoted to Title and the Words “The End” (You can tell these because they are only 3 seconds long). In light of that, I have tried to outline what is what below.

The chapters and sections in this work are:

Chapter 1 “Walden”
Chapter 2,3,4 - Economy (3:09)
Chapter 5 - Reading (22)
Chapter 6 - Sounds (35)
Chapter 7 - Solitude (20)
Chapter 8 - Visitors (27)
Chapter 9 - The Bean-field (24)
Chapter 10 - The Village (12)
Chapter 11 - The Ponds (54)
Chapter 12 - Baker Farm (15)
Chapter 13 - Higher Laws (25)
Chapter 14 - Brute Neighbors (27)
Chapter 15 - House Warming (33)
Chapter 16 - Former Inhabitants and Winter Visitors (28)
Chapter 17 - Winter Animals (21)
Chapter 18 - The End in Winter (31)
Chapter 19 - Spring
Chapter 20,21 - Conclusions, The End

Chapter 22,23,24 “On the Duty of Civil Disobedience” (53)

Chapter 25, 26, 27 “Walking” (1:12)

I was given this free advance review/listener copy (ARC) audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.

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Review: David Hume Collection: A Treatise of Human Nature, An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals, Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.

David Hume Collection: A Treatise of Human Nature, An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals, Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion. by David Hume
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Book: ****
Performance: ***

Audible Missing the Principles of Morals book

There really is not much to say about a collection of classic philosophy by such a famous personage. As a classic, it has already stood the test of time and is well worth the effort to explore the concepts and ideas within. It is, however, fairly typical of the genre, so if you struggle with the language typical of the genre, you will struggle here as will (it is not written for the plebeian audiences such as I). Normally that would leave the narration, which is perfectly fine for the task, as the determine factor for my rating; unfortunately, it appears that one of the four books advertised is missing from the audible edition (it is in the kindle edition, which suffers from formatting issues).

The chapters and sections in this work are:

“A Treatise of Human Nature” (21 hrs)
Book 1 - Of The Understanding
- Part 1: Of ideas, their origin, composition, connexion, abstraction, etc.
- Part 2: Of the ideas of space and time
- Part 3: Of knowledge and probability
- Part 4: Of the skeptical and other systems of philosophy
Book 2 - Of the Passions
- Part 1: Of pride and humility
- Part 2: Of love and hatred
- Part 3: Of the will and direct passions
Book 3 - Of Morals
- Part 1: Of virtue and vice in general
- Part 2: Of justice and injustice
- Part 3: Of the other virtues and vices

“An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding”
Section 1 - Of the different species of philosophy
Section 2 - Of the origin of ideas
Section 3 - Of the association of ideas
Section 4 - Skeptical doubts concerning the operations of the understanding (in two parts)
Section 5 - Skeptical solution of these doubts (in two parts)
Section 6 - Of probability
Section 7 - Of the idea of necessary connection (in two parts)
Section 8 - Of liberty and necessity (in two parts)
Section 9 - Of the reason of animals
Section 10 - Of miracles (in two parts)
Section 11 - Of a particular providence and of a future state
Section 12 - Of the academical or skeptical philosophy (in three parts)

“An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals”
** Seems to be missing from this collection **

“Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion”
Part 1 - After I joined the company …
Part 2 - I must own …
Part 3 - How the most absurd argument …
Part 4 - It seems strange to me …
Part 5 - But to show you still more inconveniences …
Part 6 - It must be a slight fabric …
Part 7 - But here …
Part 8 - What you ascribe to the fertility of my invention …
Part 9 - But if so many difficulties attend the argument a posteriori …
Part 10 - It is my opinion …
Part 11 - I scruple not to allow …
Part 12 - After DEMEA's departure …

I was given this free advance review/listener copy (ARC) audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.

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Review: Religious Appeals in Power Politics

Religious Appeals in Power Politics by Peter S. Henne
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Book: ***
Performance: ***

An Interesting Look at the Use of Religious Appeals for Political Persuasion

This is primarily an academic exercise that looks at the use of religious appeals in three (3) specific instances and draws a few inferences from that. As such, the material is fairly dry, but interesting if you actually enjoy political analysis in any form. Generally we are first given some context of the situation from which the religious appeal is used, followed by how the religious appeal was constructed and finally an analysis of how effective the religious appeal was. In some respects, the targeted view here makes it difficult to make any over arching generalization outside of sometimes it works as expected and sometimes it doesn’t, but such appeals can’t be ignored within the political process. There primary explanation for this is a combination of source credibility and target material gain … which seems somewhat intuitive to me where such things a proof texting is used to justify already existing inclinations … in other words, religious appeals are primarily used to allow people to do what they already wanted to do without any guilt or moral condemnation. As such it seems that such appeals are purely machiavellian.

The chapters and sections in this work are:

Preface (4:06)
Introduction (42:40)
Chapter 1 - Why, How, and When Religious Appeals Matter in Power Politics (1:09:15)
Chapter 2 - Religious Appeals in a Middle East Rivalry: Saudi Arabia and the Islamic Pact (1:33:37)
Chapter 3 - US Engagement in the Global War on Terrorism (1:29:27)
Chapter 4 - Russia: Undermining Western Opposition to the Russky Mir(1:19:10)
Chapter 5 - Expanding the Analysis (45:32)
Conclusion (1:11:09)

I was given this free advance review/listener copy (ARC) audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.

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