Wednesday, March 13, 2024

“The Three Investigators”, by Multiple Authors

 

Random House

Along with the Endless Quest series of books (reviewed on November 11th, 2021), I was enamored with The Three Investigators…er, not how you think. Every month my grade school – first Einstein Elementary and then later, when Fraser Public Schools closed it to turn it into a nursing home, Walt Disney Elementary – my class would get a catalog from Scholastic Book Club and we were all given the opportunity to shop for the books we wanted. And I always wanted the latest Three Investigators mystery. I’m sure I ordered other books, too…but I can’t remember what they were. But you better believe I remember my Three Investigators. And just who were The Three Investigators I hear you ask? Cretin:


Jupiter Jones – the leader of the crew and a former child-actor previously known as “Baby Fatso”, a nickname he understandably disdained, who never hesitated to strut his endless intellectual prowess and curiosity

Pete Crenshaw – the closest of the three to resembling a Hardy Boy, with good looks and natural athleticism, he always had the others’ backs, even when the three found themselves over their collective head

Bob Andrews – the smaller-framed academic with a father who was a newspaperman, he often proved to be the source for much-needed background information, earning him the title of “Records and Research”

Each of the books was ostensibly presented by Alfred Hitchcock (although in reality he had nothing to do with the series), introducing and concluding each volume. When he died in 1980, Random House had a dilemma: should they continue The Three Investigators series with Hitchcock, or find a replacement for him? They ultimately decided on the latter, and Hector Sebastian was born while Hitchcock’s profile on the books was replaced with a keyhole logo, beginning with The Three Investigators #31. In 1984, Random House revised the first 30 titles (the ones I collected), replacing Hitchcock with Sebastian in all – except for the very first book, Terror Castle, which features the fictional movie producer, Reginald Clarke.

The Three Investigators were originally published between 1964 and 1987 and through into the mid-90s, ultimately running to nearly sixty titles, although only the first 43 books are considered to be the original series. While each book is a unique mystery, they do share similarities with one another in that Jupiter, Pete and Bob are shown invariably battling nobly against the world while being dismissed by the stupid adults that consistently underestimated them, meaningfully relatable to their target audience of pre-to-pubescent boys. I, for one, was always enraptured by their perils and enthralled by their adventures and couldn’t wait for the Scholastic Book catalogs to come out each month so I could see what lay in store for Jupiter, Pete and Bob.

But make no mistake: The Three Investigators were uncool and not a little geeky. Obviously there was Jupiter, what with his husky physique and standard issue Hawaiian shirt, and Bob as the very definition of a prototypical nerd of the era, being a library rat who never stopped researching this or that; as for Pete, rather than hanging with the jocks he played sports with at school, he would inevitably be found at Three Investigators HQ, an abandoned RV buried under a mountain of junk in Jupiter’s uncle’s junkyard. Three friends with a shared love of adventure and problem-solving who just happen to find themselves at the center of one mystery after another. And they managed to do it over 20+ years and almost 60 books.


“The Secret of Terror Castle (#1)”, by Robert Arthur Jr.
192 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0394864013
“The Mystery of the Stuttering Parrot (#2)”, by Robert Arthur Jr.
174 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0394864020
“The Mystery of the Whispering Mummy (#3)”, by Robert Arthur Jr.
180 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0394864037
“The Mystery of the Green Ghost (#4)”, by Robert Arthur Jr.
179 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0001601475
“The Mystery of the Vanishing Treasure (#5)”, by Robert Arthur Jr.
160 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0394864051
“The Secret of Skeleton Island (#6)”, by Robert Arthur Jr.
160 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0394864068
“The Mystery of the Fiery Eye (#7)”, by Robert Arthur Jr.
164 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0394864075
“The Mystery of the Silver Spider (#8)”, by Robert Arthur Jr.
176 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0394864082
“The Mystery of the Screaming Clock (#9)”, by Robert Arthur Jr.
168 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0590303309
“The Mystery of the Moaning Cave (#10)”, by William Arden
176 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0394837734
“The Mystery of the Talking Skull (#11)”, by Robert Arthur Jr.
179 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0394837741
“The Mystery of the Laughing Shadow (#12)”, by William Arden
157 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0394864129
“The Secret of the Crooked Cat (#13)”, by William Arden
168 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0394864136
“The Mystery of the Coughing Dragon (#14)”, by Nick West
166 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0394864143
“The Mystery of the Flaming Footprints (#15)”, by M.V. Carey
175 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0394864150
“The Mystery of the Nervous Lion (#16)”, by Nick West
143 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0394923086
“The Mystery of the Singing Serpent (#17)”, by M.V. Carey
146 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0394864174
“The Mystery of the Shrinking House (#18)”, by William Arden
145 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0394864181
“The Secret of Phantom Lake (#19)”, by William Arden
141 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0394842578
“The Mystery of Monster Mountain (#20)”, by M.V. Carey
142 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0394864204
“The Secret of the Haunted Mirror (#21)”, by M.V. Carey
160 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0001600225
“The Mystery of the Dead Man’s Riddle (#22)”, by William Arden
145 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0394864228
“The Mystery of the Invisible Dog (#23)”, by M.V. Carey
145 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0394844923
“The Mystery of Death Trap Mine (#24)”, by M.V. Carey
145 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0394864242
“The Mystery of the Dancing Devil (#25)”, by William Arden
134 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0394864259
“The Mystery of the Headless Horse (#26)”, by William Arden
144 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0394864266
“The Mystery of Magic Circle (#27)”, by M.V. Carey
143 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0394864273
“The Mystery of the Deadly Double (#28)”, by William Arden
140 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0394864280
“The Mystery of Sinister Scarecrow (#29)”, by M.V. Carey
151 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0394864297
“The Secret of Shark Reef (#30)”, by William Arden
181 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0394842493

As for me, I never collected all of the books in the series, stopping with The Secret of Shark Reef, the last that the Scholastic Book Club offered, to my recollection; by then I had moved on to Endless Quest, Choose Your Own Adventure and histories and biographies. But I will never forget the thrill I had in following Jupiter, Bob and Pete as they solved crimes, researched mysteries and thwarted adults, book after book after book.

Thursday, March 7, 2024

“Things That Matter: Three Decades of Passions, Pastimes and Politics”, by Charles Krauthammer

 

400 pages, Crown Forum, ISBN-13: ‎ 978-1770496538

God, I miss Charles Krauthammer; oft-times, he was the only reason to watch “Special Report” on Fox, and when he died in 2018 a great deal of my interest in that one-time Conservative NewsChannel passed, as well. Which is why I snatched-up his 2013 book Things That Matter: Three Decades of Passions, Pastimes and Politics (from Clinton-Macomb Public Library for $1.00), a compendium of his articles and pieces from the many publications he wrote for – his voice may have been silenced, but the man’s words live on. And what words, too; few writers have the knack to cut through fancy rhetoric and partisan bullshit and get to the heart of a subject through incisive writing and cutting intellect. Krauthammer could and did, which makes his loss, after finishing this book, even harder to bear.

But his is a book about things that matter, and a great many things mattered to Krauthammer outside of politics, like art, math, music, chess, science and sports, and he used these differing, non-political fields to explain his politics in his usual forthright manner (some of his more pungent observations had me bursting out loud with laughter). While this book cannot be described as Deep Reading – they are, after all, articles designed to be consumed in a few minutes – the prose is addictive and the “chapters” are brief, typically two-and-a-half pages or so (so brief, in fact, that you’ll find yourself saying “okay, just one more and I’ll close the book” – only to read a half-dozen more before you realize it). Any of you bleeding-heart liberal commies wanting an insight into the Conservative Mind could do worse than start with Things That Matter.

Friday, March 1, 2024

“The Civil War: An Illustrated History”, by Geoffrey C. War, with Ric Burns and Ken Burns

 

426 pages, Alfred A. Knopf, ISBN-13: 978-0394562858

If you live long enough and buy enough books you end up with a collection that bounces all over the place but also with several books that reflect your core interests and desires – like the American Civil War, for example, my starting-off point for All Things Historical. Which is why this book, The Civil War: An Illustrated History by Geoffrey C. War, with Ric Burns and Ken Burns (yes, the guys responsible for the PBS Civil War documentary to end all documentaries) came into my possession. Because…why not? Can never have too many books, can you?

This work is essentially a companion to piece to that show, and if you’ve seen it multiple times, as I have, then many of the photographs will be familiar to you. Which should be the principle selling point of this book, for while there is a ton of information contained within, it is the pictures – and maps; wicked-awesome maps, likewise taken directly from the show – that is the selling point. Indeed, I found myself rewatching the show with this book on my lap, following along with what was happening on-screen with what was happening on-page.

This is thus not an exhaustive tome on the Civil War, but rather a primer that, hopefully, will whet one’s appetite to learn more, an illustrated history aimed at the general public that was inspired to seek out more by the PBS series. For all that it is an excellent resource on this most awful of conflicts that shows, through its images and maps, just how deadly and inhumane the Civil War actually was. With the political climate as it currently is, one can only hope that reading and watching all we can on the Civil War will convince everyone to step back from the abyss.

Wednesday, February 21, 2024

“The Roads Between the Worlds”, by Michael Moorcock

 

 

390 pages, White Wolf Publishing, ISBN-13: 978-1565041813

 

Over the course of the mid-to-late 90s, White Wolf Publishing produced this massive omnibus collection of Michael Moorcock’s “Eternal Champion” stories, a recurrent aspect in many of his tales. The Roads Between the Worlds was the sixth in this series featuring the characters Professor Faustaff, Alan Powys and Clovis Becker, and includes the tales The Wrecks of Time, The Winds of Limbo and The Shores of Death. None of these books are related to one another; rather, they are three independent novels written by Moorcock collected in this volume for that reason (I assume). The Wrecks of Time was first published in 1971 and solidified (as if he needed it) Moorcock’s status as a writer of unique breadth and creativity. What is this story about? Best let the man speak for himself:

 

There they lay, outside of space and time, each hanging in its separate limbo, each a planet called Earth. Fifteen globes, fifteen lumps of matter sharing a name. Once they might have looked the same, too, but now they were very different. One was comprised almost solely of desert and ocean with a few forests of gigantic, distorted trees growing in the northern hemisphere; another seemed to be in perpetual twilight, a planet of dark obsidian; yet another was a honeycomb of multicoloured crystal and another had a single continent that was a ring of land around a vast lagoon. The wrecks of Time, abandoned and dying, each with a decreasing number of human inhabitants for the most part unaware of the doom overhanging their worlds. These worlds existed in a kind of subspacial well created in furtherance of a series of drastic experiments…

 

There. But just who has done this? What being has the ability to create Earth after Earth as so many trifling playthings only to discard them in the backwaters of the space-time continuum? Why would any sentient creature maliciously create and then destroy these less-than-perfect worlds and their human inhabitants? To what end? Professor Faustus and the loyal men and women dispersed on these alternate Earths have dedicated their lives to eradicating the demolition teams and the Unstable Matter Situations the D-squads create. As they soon discover, much more is at stake, as they fight a seemingly losing battle with the very pattern of the Universe in the balance. Thought-provoking and full of surprises, The Wrecks of Time weds science, religion, myth and history into a page-turning narrative, a grand concept tale that has proven to be one of Moorcock’s most innovative science fiction works.


Next we have The Winds of Limbo (originally published in 1965 as The Fireclown), based in a future where the majority of the human population live underground. Alan Powys works at the transport department; his grandfather, Simon Powys, is the minister for space transport and is the presumptive nominee for his party to succeed the current president. Alan’s cousin Helen Curtis is leader of the Radical Liberal Movement, the government’s opposition. The arrival of the Fireclown in the lower levels of the underground city and his performances featuring fire captivate those who see it; he is thought by Simon Powys to be a dangerous rebel, his niece thinks conversely that the Fireclown is there to reignite people’s passion for democracy. But when a fire breaks out in the lower levels the Government shuts them off, and the people revolt and the Fireclown flees. Unconvinced by his grandfather’s, and the Government’s, assertion that the Fireclown is a terrorist, Alan sets off to find the Fireclown for an explanation. Helen accompanies him providing a ship and desperate to believe the Fireclown is a great healer. The Winds of Limbo covers many themes common to science fiction, such as Man’s relationship to and reliance on technology, the role of Government in regard to Truth (and the role of the media in distorting that Truth), along with other, various philosophical points, mainly by the Fireclown, regarding humans and their intelligence and whether that intelligence is really a necessity for survival. Again, more atypical and deep stuff by Moorcock that entertains as it provokes. 

Lastly we have The Shores of Death in which powerful aliens, searching for the end of the universe, happen upon the Earth and take from it what they need before moving on – only to cause the Earth to cease rotating on its axis. Oops. The human race now finds itself divided, with some living on the cold night side and some the sweltering day side, with yet others surviving in the thin twilight between the two regions. Living a life of pleasure and decadence in this middle region between light and dark, Valta Becker impregnates his daughter (!) who dies shortly after giving birth to Clovis, last of the Twilight Children. Neglected by his father, Clovis leaves home for the more technologically and philosophically sophisticated daylight region, where lifespans stretch to hundreds of years and the marvels of future science still flourish. He makes a name for himself in politics, rising to almost god-like stature but, when catastrophe strikes, rendering the daylight people sterile due to an after-effect of the aliens’ strange energies used in halting the planet’s rotation, Clovis Becker must find an answer or the human race will perish. Thus begins a taut adventure filled with warring political ideologies, End of the World parties, flower forests and floating carriages, shadowy figures attempting to shape mankind’s destiny for their own ends and a love story for the ages as Clovis and Fastina Cahmin (the last born of the daylight people) seek immortality…but at what cost to humanity?

Thursday, February 15, 2024

“Shipwreck! A Comprehensive Directory of over 3,700 Shipwrecks on the Great Lakes”, by David D. Swayze

 

260 pages, Harbor House Publishers, ISBN-13: ‎ 978-0937360125

America’s Third Coast (otherwise known as the Great Lakes of North America) refers to HOMES – that would be Lakes Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Erie and Superior (any of you who were born and raised in the Great Lakes region knew this already). These interconnected bodies of water are the largest group of freshwater lakes on Earth by total area and are second-largest by total volume, containing 21% of the world’s surface fresh water by volume with a total surface of 94,250 square miles and a total volume of 5,439 cubic miles. Because of their sea-like characteristics, such as rolling waves, sustained winds, strong currents, great depths and distant horizons, the five Great Lakes have long been known for their treacherousness, something that is brought home in David D. Swayze’s Shipwreck! A Comprehensive Directory of over 3700 Shipwrecks on the Great Lakes.

Le Griffon was a sailing vessel built by Ren̩-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle, in 1679 and was the first European ship to sail in the Great Lakes Рit was also the first European ship to sink in the Great Lakes, doing so in Lake Michigan sometime that same year. The Edmund Fitzgerald, meanwhile, was the last but largest freighter to sink on November 10th, 1975, in Lake Superior with the loss of 29 men, while the Lady Elgin accounts for the largest loss of life on the lakes when she sunk in 1860 in Lake Michigan with 400 lives lost. Those are just three examples of the (as the title states) over 3700 ships that have sunk in these, truly, Inland Seas. We here in the Great American Midwest know all about these wonderful waters, but this reference guide is a one-of-a-kind resource for anyone wanting to know about this grand natural resource.

The set-up is as basic as can be: while containing a series of brief essays and historical sketches of the types of boats that have sailed these seas, the book lists each and every vessel alphabetically along with such details as type of ship, length, gross tonnage, when and where it was sunk, the circumstances of its sinking and how many lives were lost; there is even an accompanying silhouette of the boat in question. All pretty basic stuff, but just keep in mind that this is not an exhaustive study of these phantoms of the lakes but merely a record of loss; I, for one, after perusing this book found myself Googling the hell out of these ships, just to see if there was more info to be had (you know Google: sometimes yes, sometimes no). Overall, a fantastic resource for tragedy on the Lakes and an opening to search for more on these wrecks.

Friday, February 9, 2024

“The Beatles: The Days of Their Life”, by Richard Havers

 

320 pages, Chartwell Books, ISBN-13: ‎ 978-0785835042

Say, shouldn’t the title of Richard Havers’ The Beatles: The Days of Their Life in fact be “Days of Their Lives”? I certainly think so, being as that is proper English, wot. Not that it matters, for this is a typical Chartwell Book in that it is chock-full of photographs (drawn from Mirropix, the library of “The Daily Mirror”) of everyone’s favorite Lads from Liverpool and a day-by-day account of what the Fab Four were up to from their formation, through their heyday at the height of Beatlemania until their dissolution. This is by no means an in-depth or piercing biography of The Beatles, but it is a visual feast for any fan who lived through their rollicking days or wish they had done. From officially-sanctioned events like record launches or movie premiers to holidays abroad and family events, The Days of Their Life covers the LIVES of the most successful pop band ever and gives a glimpse as to what it must have been like to be a Beatle.

Saturday, February 3, 2024

“Archangel”, by Robert Harris

 

373 pages, Random House, ISBN-13: ‎ 978-0679428886

Archangel is the second Robert Harris novel I have reviewed (the other being Fatherland, reviewed on January 3rd, 2024), and involves more speculative history, although of a different sort. British historian Christopher “Fluke” Kelso is met by an old man named Papu Rapava while attending a conference in Moscow; the old man claims to have been present at the death of Joseph Stalin and further states that, immediately after Stalin’s death, Lavrenty Beria – chief of the People’s Commissariat for Internal Affairs (NKVD) – supposedly took measures to secure a certain black notebook which is believed to be Stalin’s secret diary. When Rapava wouldn’t divulge the location of the book, he was exiled to the Kolyma region of the USSR, but has steadfastly refused to reveal the book’s location, fearing that shadowy agents are still watching him in case he goes near the MacGuffin. From there it is a chase after the mysterious lost diary and its shrouded contents, and what all of it could mean for the fate of modern Russia and the world.

Overall, Archangel was a serviceable thriller with some interesting information on Stalinist Russia and those would-be Stalinists who still revere the sonovabitch. The prose is serviceable, the structure, plotting and characters were professionally and skillfully wrought and I was interested in the whole from beginning to end. I even learned a couple of Russian words, like taiga (a boreal forest) and verst (a unit of measurement equaling 3500 feet), along with some colloquial sayings, such as “We are born on a clear plain and die in a dark forest” or “Gratitude is a dog’s disease”, attributed to Stalin himself (figures). But perhaps its greatest achievement is to show how differently two of history’s greatest monsters – Hitler and Stalin – are perceived in their home countries: in Germany Hitler is rightly shunned and despised, while in Russia Stalin is inexplicably honored and praised (indeed, seeing how this novel exposes the Russian desire for a Strong Man to bring order and make everything right, Putin’s popularity should come as no surprise).

So while Archangel is technically a work of speculative fiction, in today’s cultural and political climate – especially in Russia – it is all too terrifyingly plausible.