“War Dog’s Coin”

Vox Day fighting evil. Vox Day may singlehandedly save Fantasy as a genre. While this is obvious hyperbole, this short story is a great addition to Fantasy, as is the whole world it represents. Rather than try to reinvent the wheel, Day uses the various fantasy races that we already know and love. (Although only a mother would love an Orc.)

The first story, "War God's Coin," revolves around a grizzled sergeant who wants to survive the next battle, even though outnumbered more than usual. What makes this story work is the good characterizations of the people. Each one “comes to life.” Too many times the characters in Fantasy are all the same and bear a striking resemblance to the author.

I do not picture the Demon Cats this way, but you try to find menacing were cats. The second story is called “Qalabi Dawn.” While some have critiqued Day for stereotyping of Elves, Orcs, Goblins, and so on, I have liked this aspect of the series. But in this story Day has taken the concept of lycanthropy (ability to change into a animal-like creature—as in werewolves) and given it life. In fact, the culture of these desert peoples is so interesting and believable that I am hesitant to call them were-creatures since they are children of demons, just as others in Selenoth are children of angels. Maybe it would be best, although I have great reluctance to call them this, to call them Cat People-or possibly Demon Cats. The creatures are so alien that they are difficult to quantitify and that is a great part of thier appeal. (I was hoping for some wereseals in Selenoth, but I guess I will have to wait for them.)

I am looking forward to reading more about the tribes of the Qalabi and about the conversion of the Sergeant to the priesthood, if I am reading the story correctly.

Note that I received a review copy for this review. 

Blood Sugar Solution

Here is my Amazon review of The Blood Sugar Solution by Mark Hyman.

This is a difficult book to review as, in my opinion, it hovers between three and four stars.

If this is your first foray into the "eating bad carbs will kill you" school of dietary advice, then I do recommend it. There is a lot of truth in that school and this book is a reasonable presentation of that theory.

I have wondered for some time about the value of various artificial sweeteners. Am I setting myself up for failure? I want to thank Hyman for the best presentation I have yet seen about the problems associated with these products—even sugar alcohols promoted by many. He has convinced me to dramatically reduce these products in my diet.

Here is a quote from his book:

In another alarming study, rats offered the choice of cocaine or artificial sweeteners always picked the artificial sweetener, even if the rats were previously programmed to be cocaine addicts. The author of the study said that, “[t]he absolute preference for taste sweetness may lead to a re-ordering in the hierarchy of potentially addictive stimuli, with sweetened diets… taking precedence over cocaine and possibly other drugs of abuse.”

This is really thought provoking.

Why then so I only with reluctance give this book 4 stars? There are three reasons.

I do use some supplements. But most are a waste of money. If eating the diet he recommends is so good, why do we need to buy his expensive supplements? I suppose if one believes in the diet, yet for some reason does not follow it, then these supplements might be needed. I suppose that our food infrastructure is so messed up we need supplements. I suppose that his expensive products are better than everyone else's. I suppose. (I have used some of his products.)

I also felt that some of his statistics seemed a little suspect. He said that the average TV viewership was 9 hours a day. A quick google showed that a BLS government estimate is 2.8 a day. I have seen higher estimates of 4 hours. But when you see such an overestimate that fits the narrative the author is promoting you have to wonder what other "facts" he is massaging.

He begins one section by talking about the distortions in the food business caused by government subsidies and interference in the food marketplace. He is quite correct in this. It should be abolished. He then points out the marketing power of the food giants, as well he should. His solution is to increase government interference in the market. It made me wonder if he had actually read the earlier information he wrote in that same chapter.

So while I so modestly recommend this book, I suggest reading it with caution-but then again isn't that true of any book?

Luther

I have had the movie Luther (2003) for a long time but only recently watched it. (I’m sure Netflix considers me an ideal customer.) It is a movie that makes you think. I noticed that the people in the movie were trapped in the established doctrines of the age. I am familiar enough with Luther's work to know he was trapped too. In particular the superstition of the age was well represented. Luther's early internal religious life was portrayed as well as a movie could, and it was not pretty. But from my reading Luther outgrew this. While the movie said and showed he outgrew it, his later internal life was not well portrayed, but to be fair, I cannot see how this could easily be done. 

As an aside, the representation of Andreas Karlstadt as a revolutionary did not seem to represent the Karlstadt I know from reading his work on the day of rest. He was more radical than Luther, but opposed the Peasants Revolt. The movie implied he was a revolutionary. This is far from the truth. In his book on the day of rest he has a big emphasis on servant's obligation Andreas Karlstadt in the Movieto serve their masters even on the day of rest.  In the Ten Commandments the Sabbath command of rest is actually directed to employers/masters and their obligation to provide rest to their property and servants. If Karlstadt had been the radical the movie portrayed, this would have been a major emphasis in his book. It was not. 

The church at the time of Luther was corrupted by false superstition and greed. Luther preached against the corruption. As he said at his trial, "Here I stand, I can do no other."

While each of us is also trapped in Babylon, we can rise up and leave it in our hearts. We may not be able to rise up against the system, but each of us can, in our own way, leave it behind. 

We too are trapped by the superstitions and corruption of our age. Can we rise above the myths of our age? The first step is to think about it. I suggest that you watch the movie and think.  

Throne of Bones

As a long time reader of fantasy, I look on the current fantasy field and do not like what I see. I have tried and failed to read anything by the prolific Robert Jordan. I may try again as the first book in his long series, the one I could not get through years ago, is available on Amazon Kindle for $1.

So, being familiar with Vox Day's other works, I approached his newest book, Throne of Bones, with a guarded optimism. I found the book good enough that it may reignite my interest in the fantasy genre. Picture a Roman type government in the south, a medieval style government to the middle north of the world, Vikings to the north, with scattered pockets of elves, dwarves, and goblins. Of course there is magic, and, surprising for such novels, most humans are "Christians." If you can picture all this you can picture this world.

The main thing I liked about the book was the good characterizations. Rather than all characters being variations on a theme, most being alike, each of the characters has a unique perspective--the elves are elves and the dwarves are dwarves, for example. The "Roman" characters in conflict each try to do best by their country in their own way, with their own individual personalities.

Except for the occasional demon, there is little stereotypical evil in the book. A personal pet peeve is such characters. Even the semi-demonic Nephilum are not "evil" so much as trying to achieve their goals with a total lack of concern for ethics. This is, of course, what evil is all about, achieving good for yourself by unethical means, as Augustine pointed out centuries ago.

Even the evil human characters have redeeming qualities, just like the real world. The good that evil men do has always been an interesting aspect of humanity, and Throne of Bones, has plenty of this.

I did not like the multiple perspectives. For a novel of this scope, I can see the author had little choice in the matter. I personally prefer smaller stories, less epic in scope. (Thus the four stars I give it, rather than five. There is no way to give it 4 1/2 stars, about where I place the book.)

So if you like fantasy, I would certainly recommend this book. The Kindle price of $5 is very fair.

Collapse

While I do not expect a collapse, it is not impossible. I do not think most of us understand the fragility of our current economic system. The decentralization of the market has been replaced with centralized corporate control. I think the market will keep a collapse from occurring. Of course, the market may be hobbled by government action. 

With this in mind I thought I would put on the blog my Amazon review of a book I just read called Collapse by Richard Stephenson. I rated this book three stars. 

Because of our economic malaise there are many books on the market that portray a quite dystopian future. The popularity of such books is based in part on the fears we have that things might get worse. As we read such works we can feel thankful that such a world does not yet exist. 

I find the characters interesting, especially the grizzly police chief of a small Texas town and the world's richest, smartest man who is quite dysfunctional. All the various characters were quite good and believable. 

Even Video Games Are Predicting Collapse. I am perfectly willing to suspend credulity when a read a novel of the future, but you need to at least have a plausible plot to explain how society became so dysfunctional. The proposed "bogey man," Iran, is a very unlikely superpower. How does Stevenson explain the lack of response of Israel to this? He proposes that Israel only had one nuclear bomb, which Iran somehow manages to steal. In addition, five separate hurricanes hit Florida at once. Give me a break. These plot details I found so implausible that it hurt my enjoyment of the novel. 

While I can live with bad editing, the editing here was very bad, especially the huge paragraph margins--large enough to hurt readability. The frequency of short paragraphs also was an issue. As a blogger who writes about economic issues at my blog at prophecypodcast, I understand the difficulties of editing. I spend almost as much time editing as writing. 

Can I recommend this book even at the reduced price of $2.99? While I got it for free on a special deal, I would not pay $3 for it. I doubt I will finish the series.