Category: Books

Review: Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

I mentioned a couple of weeks ago that my wife and I were trudging through The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams. We finished it last week and I am still struggling with my thoughts on it.

While it was an entertaining book and quite humorous at times, I have a feeling of having wasted a couple of hours of my life reading it. The number of books I have read more than once are very few. This will not make it onto that list.The story is about Earth being destroyed to make a new intergalactic highway. Actually, that is just the spectacular thing that gets the story going. It does play a minor role in the events to follow. The last surviving Earth-man, Arthur Dent, is taken on an adventure by an alien, Ford Prefect, in which they hitchhike on a couple of ships (one intentionally and the other by a strange twist of improbability) and learn something about life, the universe and everything.

One of the caveats I was given by a friend is that I “had to overlook the whole evolutionary theory talk” that was in the book. I am strongly against the theory of evolution but was not at all offended by what was proposed in the book. I actually found humor in the way the author talked about evolution and thought it was actually a fair mockery of the whole thing. I am not sure what Douglas Adams’ thoughts were on evolution, but I am not sure he was a supporter.

Frustratingly typical of fiction books, it has its share of vulgarity. Since my wife and I were reading out loud to one another (and neither of us uses that kind of language) we had to do some creative speaking to keep the flow of the book going without uttering certain words. As this was written by a British author, there were some words which were unfamiliar to me. My wife is much more well read than I and therefore she kindly informed me each time I cursed in the Queen’s English.

If you told me you read the book, I think we could appreciate a good laugh at some of the events and passages, but I definitely would not recommend it as a “must read.” Well written? I guess. Humorous? Mostly. A good story? No, not really. Kinda lame.

I think my opinion counts for something (otherwise I would not have written anything here), but you also have to take into account that this is being written by someone who reads very little fiction.

Vacation Bible School

One of the local churches is having a vacation Bible school that our children are attending this week. They have had a blast. The times of the classes are 5:00 to 7:00 in the evening. It has been good for us too.

We have dropped them off and gotten to go do some shopping without putting them (and us) through the hassle. Shopping yesterday consisted of going to Costco and doing some research on a new printer. Then, we sat in the little café out front and ate a frozen yogurt. Today we went to Sam’s and purchased the printer we looked at last week and had pretty much decided on back then. We were just doing comparison shopping to see what else might be available.  We also spent a good bit of time enjoying a frozen cappuccino in their café.

Yesterday we started reading a book together. We continued that today. So far we are 3 chapters into The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. I fall into the geek element of human population. My wife has serious leanings that way. This book is supposedly a must read for geeks. I don’t really read much fiction, but am giving it a try. Not too bad so far. Review to follow when it is done.

Book Review: Duel in the Sun

I had seen this book last summer when it was new. Since I knew nothing about Dick Beardsley nor Alberto Salazar, I was not really interested in reading it. When I heard about the book through a recent episode of Phedippidations, I really wanted to read the book.

I picked it up last month on my trip to California. Unusual for me, I paid full price for the book at Borders Books.

One of my joys in reading a book is to read it to those around me. Most of the time my wife just endures the book along with me. This time though it interested her in reading the book herself. It could also have to do with the fact that we started on a 3 week trip and she did not have a book to read of her own. Our reading tastes are so different that the only time we read the same book as the other is when we are reading books to our kids. However, she picked up this book and enjoyed it as much as I did.

While the book was well written most of the time, I had a couple of complaints about it. There were times when the author was writing about one of the runners, but the description really seemed like he must be talking about the other. I could not fit those two sections into the full story properly in my mind. I finally decided that there was either poor editing going on and something got moved to the wrong spot, or that I just was not following the story as closely as I should have.

The book jumps from the ’82 Boston Marathon to the lives of the two runners both before and after the race. While I did not have a problem with the concept, I did have some trouble following the time line. It would have been a great help if the author had included a few year numbers in the text. Many times he would say things like “three years later…”, but you would have to go back several pages to find out when the current events were taking place so that you could add the three years. Sometimes I was not sure if the events in the story were before or after the marathon.

I also did not like the use of profanity. I have complained about this in many reviews through the years as I have read books and write about them. The argument has always been “Well, people really talk that way.” While I dislike it, I do agree that there are some people who talk that way. Unfortunately that is becoming more and more common. But this book went too far in my opinion. Not only was the cursing included in the dialog, but it was part of the descriptive text as well.

Finally, I thought the book was very unsatisfying. I finished the book feeling like there was much more to the story. Had the story just been about the marathon, then there would be a specific conclusion to the events. But the book was more about the lives of the runners themselves, then we don’t know what the conclusion is or will be. I would have been much more interested in the book had it just been about the race.

As a whole the book was very interesting but dissatisfying. I now know about the lives of the two protagonists, about which I knew nothing before. I don’t feel I learned much about the race though. In fact, the book never says directly who won. It only tells you who did not lose. Also, the official time of the “one who did not lose” was never stated, only that he was 2 seconds faster than the one who did not win.

If Border’s had a 100% money back satisfaction guarantee on their books, I would be glad to return this one and get my money back. It was not a horrible book, but I was not completely satisfied either.

Duel in the Sun, John Brant, 2006 Rodale Press. 203 pages.

Book review: God’s Secret Agent

One of the podcasts I listen to was offering the book God’s Secret Agent as a free gift back in November or December last year. I took them up on their offer and had them send me the book. It is written by Sammy Tippit. Though I feel like I know the big names in conservative fundamental religious circles, I had never heard of Sammy Tippit.This book is an autobiography. It shares his spiritual quest from his salvation to his opportunities to stand on some of the world’s largest stages and present the Gospel of Christ. It is quite remarkable the places that God led him during the cold war. He was in the USSR during the 1980s when it was hard for Westerners to get in, let alone Christians.

It is inspiring to see how God led him and his team into some wonderful, and often scary, preaching opportunities. Sometimes, in ways that would not be considered rational. Though I personally shy away from “shock” evangelism, he shows how God used it during times and situations that was very effective. He even admits in the book that there are some things that he did in the past that were right for the times he did them, but he would not participate in them today.

Lest you think this is an autobiography of an old man telling about what great things God has done in the past, let me assure you that the book comes right up to the present. Mr. Tippit is not yet an old man looking back on the past from a rocking chair on the porch. As a man in his 50s, he possibly has another 20 to 30 years to take a stand for God.

The book ends with him talking about places where he will soon be preaching (the book is 6 years old now) where God is working. He was not even able to name the countries to which he would be going. Though he has not been involved primarily in Bible and tract smuggling, he has gotten into countries to share the Gospel under some pretty clandestine ways.

Again, I know nothing about the man or where he stands doctrinally. Perhaps I would not agree with him on many issues. But it appears to me, from reading this book, that we can agree with the fact that God has a work for us to do and that each one of us needs to seek God’s guidance in our daily lives.

Even if you are not of the same religious persuasion as I (Why not? Don’t you know I am right?), I think you could enjoy the suspense and intrigue in this real life story of a man who wants to be wholly given over to God.

God’s Secret Agent: An Autobiography, 296 pages, Tyndale House Publishers, 2001, Sammy Tippit and Jerry Jenkins