Review--WHOSE NAMES ARE UNKNOWN

Whose Names Are Unknown

By Sanora Babb

ISBN:0-8061-3712-6

A 2004 trade paper release from

University of Oklahoma Press

It’s 1938 and a young talented, adventurous woman from the Oklahoma panhandle lands a job with the Farm Security Administration in California, working with the refugee farmers from her home state. These were the people of the high plains who saw their farms and their lives blown away in the horrendous dust storms of the nineteen thirties. The camps in California were one legacy of the Dust Bowl.

Out of that experience, those associations, Sanora Babb fashioned this novel, a first-hand up-close story with intense empathy and understanding for the people. The novel has an interesting and unfortunate history. In 1939 the author submitted her manuscript to New York publisher, Random House. The publisher’s editor, Bennett Cerf called the novel an exceptionally fine piece of work and planned to publish it. A few months later, publication was halted in the face of the huge success of John Steinbeck’s “Grapes of Wrath.”

Sanora Babb went on to a strong literary career, authoring five books and numerous shorter pieces published in the top literary magazines of the Twentieth Century. Now finally, sixty-five years late, this moving, intimate novel is seeing daylight. Is it as good or better than Steinbeck’s? Read it for yourself and judge. This is no grand pronouncement to illuminate the scope of what we know as the Dust Bowl Years, “Whose Names are Unknown” looks poverty and deprivation in the face and deals with the lives and deaths of those most materially affected.

Babb’s writing is clean, she wastes no words and the narrative voice brings her fascinating characters to the pages in a way that will remain with the reader for some time. This is truly a novel to savor.

Review—THE RIVER WE REMEMBER

 By William Kent Krueger

 Published by Atria Books, 2023

978-1-9821-7921-2

Mr. Krueger is well known and celebrated in the reading communities for his Cork O’Connor mystery series, and for   THIS TENDER LAND and ORDINARY GRACE. This long novel is another penetrating look into the lives of a group of small Minnesota town residents. The town of Jewel, apparently a county seat, is home to a fascinating and varied group of residents, including war veterans, foreign-born and other citizens, as well as firmly implanted Americans. The novel explores how events, history and memory influence our every-day lives.

When a prominent if not beloved wealthy farmer and land-owner is found dead on the river bank that flows near town, the circumstance of his death roil the waters of the river and the many rivers of memory and life that are found in the minds and souls of a range of characters.

The cast of this novels is large and wide-ranging from a Dakota veteran marine married to a Japanese woman, to fourteen-year old boys to a town drunk, an unmarried mother with a fraught past, to ordinary passersby. All are burdened in some way, large and small, with rivers of memory that have the constant ability to affect our actions. While the unraveling of the questions regarding the citizen’s death and discovery in the Alabaster River and the many associated events of that summer propel the narrative, it is the gentle speculation regarding the personal rivers we readers will remember that generate the adhesive of this fine novel that helps carry us to the final surprising and satisfying conclusions.

As always, the author’s attention to detail, to character and setting, to careful weaving of the net of plot, to rational thoughtful connections, will draw in readers and secure our interest to the very end.

Review--EVERYONE IN MY FAMILY HAS KILLED SOMEONE

 

Everyone in My Family has Killed Someone

By Benjamin Stevenson

U.S. Edition by Mariner books, 2023

 

Most of us have probably experienced a medium-level stand-up comedian’s act. Here’s one in print. It is a crime novel containing several asides from the author. The author’s asides to readers are amusing, distracting and help him maintain his adherence to the 1929 “Rules of Detective Fiction,” as articulated by British author Ronald Knox.

The narrative tells the story of his family’s gathering after the release from prison of one of the younger members of the family. The family, in several generations has gathered in a remote Australian mountain resort, in part to celebrate that release. In a blinding snowstorm, a murder occurs with a host of ripples that affect each of the family members, as well as the host owner of the resort.

Good descriptions of the snow storm and effects of the murder an search for the culprit do engage the narrative, as do some of the characters. But while the author adheres rigidly to Knox’s rule, he has not enhanced the attraction of the novel, nor do the several factual and typographical errors.

 

FAIL DEADLY--Review

 

Fail Deadly                       

By John Baird Rogers

ISBN: 9798986244204

A 2023 release from

Gotuit Publishing

 

Even with the scientific and cultural advances we’ll experience in coming decades, the future, according to this author, will be far from calm and peaceful. Fortunately creative literary talent abounds in our future reading. In this third adventure with Louise (Weezy) Napolitani and Joe Mayfield, that jewel from the author’s mind, Olegarten rises ever higher. Here is a creation of a fine mind, a group of cyber experts loosely organized to help protect the United States against computer hackers who would destroy the nation. It is an organization with strict rules of engagement.

Weezy is a brilliant computer specialist who often thinks outside the box. Her companion and lover Joe Mayfield is a financial whiz, Together, they form an active protective duo against a complex foreign threat to the nation. It is not a task they look for but are thrown into the conflict by circumstance and proximity.

The thread of this well-written and carefully organized novel take Weezy and Joe up and down the East Coast and through the twisted halls of Washington. The story, from page one, moves apace and will often leave readers breathless. From the careful descriptions of action sites travelers would never visit, through the logic of complex communications system and computer uses, the story never flags. The plot thread never descends so deep into technology that readers will become confused, nor does it ever fray into loss of direction.

This is an excellent novel in every sense and will engage any reader who enjoys good thrillers and intense emotional roller-coaster rides. The autocar awaits.

 

I SUPPORT UKRAINE

MISTAKES, MISAPREHENSIONS, MISUNDERSTANDINGS AND LIES

 Kudos to Mary Coady and the MinnesotaStrib for publishing what she wrote in Friday's 2/21 paper. She addressed a word in our language which is too often underused. "LIE" is the word. People, including politicians, lie, sometimes, you know. We all know that. Often the subject of a reporter's question mis-hears, misses an important phrase, or simply doesn't know. And sometimes when manufacturing an answer, the subject simply lies. But its too often reported as something else; "mis-information," or  "alternate facts." We try to teach our children to tell the truth. Never to lie! But we allow adults, particularly those in positions to be reported in the media to lie constantly, covered up by euphemisms. It needs to stop. Well, the lying ought to stop, of course. But lets label lying for what it is. Lying.

What do you think, readers?You can respond here, you know, or you can email me.

DANGER IN THE OFFING

 As King Trump and his Prince, Musk, continue to wield mace and broadsword against the federal structure, here' s something to consider. A young couple, both employed by the Federal government until last week are leaving the rural state where they had a home and careers. They'll move to Europe where relatives will help them establish new citizenship.

The rural community and the state where they spent their incomes and paid their taxes will lose those taxes and that income spent for schools, for groceries, for all the other things people in rural communities buy. Many businesses in town will suffer income losses. And whatever jobs the two adults performed for our government may be lost. Now multiply the number of terminated employees by the taxes and purchases from the retail markets. The effect on our economy by the loss of millions of federal employees has not been calculated, but it is not insignificant. There is more effect to our life than has been posed by the in-artful swing of axe and sword.

THE REAL NATIONAL ANTHEM

Congratulations to the AIR FORCE  Tech Sgt who sang our national anthem at the opening for the Dayton 500 Race, today, 2/16/25. It was a rare offering. I am so tired of the personal interpretations so many "singers" make in public performances. They butcher  the original melodic line and the intent of the notes, by adding their own flawed interpretation. He sang it as it was written and intended. Good!