Do Not Believe All You See or Read!

Seife, Charles.  Virtual Unreality: Just Because the Internet Told You, How Do You Know It's
      True?  New York: Viking, 2014.  ISBN: 9780670026081.

 Based on his own experience as a journalist and a professor, Charles Seife provides a readable account of having to live with the Internet run amok.  He opens with an interesting warping of reality, the case of the Muppet Bert's affiliation with the terrorist Osama Bin Laden.  What had started as a joke with the  "Bert is Evil" website was transformed in to strange reality when someone made up posters using images off the Internet.  This segues into eleven chapters and three half chapters that covers a lot of ground regarding the effect the Internet has on your life (the half chapters provide a longer look at specifics covered in the previous chapter).  He then finishes with a Top Ten list for the Internet skeptic.

Seife provides plenty of material for information literacy discussions with his discussions of the interaction of information versus knowledge versus wisdom, the problem with authority (citing sources and proving sources), trolling, fake people, interconnection rather than communication, copyright issues, etc.  He also discusses the problems of too much information with noise drowning out signal, the dumbing down of intelligence, and the use of public/private information being used for private gain by companies and individuals.

Charles Seife packs a lot of information in a small book with the unfortunate result that it feels like a collection of essays rather than a coherent argument.  The coverage of multiple and divergent topics and some of the examples used will leave this book feeling dated in a few short years.  That being stated, the author has provided many coherent arguments that should be examined and discussed not just by librarians, information literacy specialists and academics, but by the public as a whole.

Ethan Allen and the Formation of the Republic of Vermont

Bennett, David.  A Few Lawless Vagabonds: Ethan Allen, the Republic of Vermont and the
          American Revolution.  Havertown, PA: Casemate Publishers, 2014.  ISBN:
          978-1-61200-240-8.

In A Few Lawless Vagabonds, David Bennett provides plenty of background and details regarding Ethan Allen and his cronies involvement in the formation of the Republic of Vermont before, during and after the American Revolution.  My earliest impression of this time and place was from the book I Was There With Ethan Allen And The Green Mountain Boys which glossed over the details to tell a decent story.  And the details are what makes A Few Lawless Vagabonds such an interesting read.

David Bennett opens with a reconstruction of the problems facing the New Hampshire Grants settlers in relation to New Hampshire, New York, Massachusetts, and Connecticut.  The British Crown only confused matters.  Ethan Allen became involved in opposing the enforcement of New York claims in the region, raising the Green Mountain Boys as a militia.  That same militia was used at the beginning of the American Revolution to seize Ticonderoga, Crown Point and the invasion of Canada in 1775.  After Ethan Allen was captured in 1775, the focus of the book switches to Ira Allen and others involved in the forming of Vermont as a separate state/colony/republic.  Bennett carefully documents the involvement of the state in the destruction of Burgoyne during the Saratoga campaign.  He also documents the cease fire and neutrality practiced by Vermont's government and the case that can be made that Allen and his cronies would have been willing to rejoin Britain to gain their independence from New York.  In the end, after a few years as a independent republic, Vermont became the fourteenth state of the United States.  Ethan Allen and his cronies did succeed to that extent.

David Bennett provides a readable, yet scholarly look at the background and formation of Vermont as an independent entity while providing an in-depth look at the characters and events that made this possible. 

What is Matter Made of?

Miodownik, Mark.  Stuff Matters: Exploring the Marvelous  Materials That Shape Our Man-Made  
        World.  Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2014.  ISBN: 978-0-544-23604-2

Writing for a general audience, Professor Miodownik shares his knowledge of materials in this readable look at the composition of materials.   He opens each of the eleven chapters with the same photograph, but labels a different material each time.  This mnemonic device provides continuity among the diverse materials such as chocolate, metals, concrete, porcelain, etc., that he chose to focus on.  He freely admits that the choices he made are arbitrary and chosen to illustrate concepts.

When reading the book, the reader is struck by the mastery Mark Miodownik has of  material science and by the joy he brings in describing our interaction with the "stuff" that makes up our world.  Stuff Matters reads quickly, one chapter being easily consumed in a sitting or the whole book over a long weekend.  Appropriate illustrations are provided within the book.  And for those readers whose appetite has been whetted for more on the topic he provides a title list for further reading.  

Anyone wanting to know about the materials that make up our world will profit and likely enjoy reading Stuff Matters.

A Kaleidoscopic Examination of Movie Musicals

Barrios, Richard.  Dangerous Rhythm: Why Movie Musicals Matter.  New York: Oxford 
         UP, 2014.

Not satisfied with just writing about the birth of musical films (A Song in the Dark - 1995), Richard Barrios looks at the importance of movie musicals of all types via a kaleidoscope of lenses.  In twelve short chapters, an introduction, and epilogue, he discusses the past and future of movie musicals, the origination of the concept of the musical, who have been the stars, the role of music versus plot, etc., not neglecting animated musicals and television musicals.

The book and the chapter titles all come from song titles or lyrics sung in a movie musical  which is an example of how Barrios infuses a quirky viewpoint into this series of essays.  He also provides informative footnotes that add interest without slowing the reader with extraneous information.  Each chapter is a different lens on movie musicals with focus on a specific aspect such as animated musicals or musicals on television; the reader is not compelled to read the chapters in sequence, but is free to skip to what interests them.

Dangerous Rhythm reads easily and has appropriate and interesting illustrations.  Barrios writes well for the general reader, providing a list of his sources but not documenting enough to be considered as a serious scholarly tome.  He has his own lists of movie musicals he like and dislikes.  As is often the case in these types of books, he does miss certain musicals.  How important that is depends upon your love for that musical. 

In the end, Dangerous Rhythm provides provides plenty of fodder for discussions.  Read it, and start yours!

York and Lancaster equals Tudor

Weir, Alison.  Elizabeth of York: A Tudor Queen and Her World.  New York: Ballantine Books,
          2013.  ISBN: 978-0-345-52136-1

How well do you know your English history?  Can you name the Princess of the House of York that united with the House of Lancaster to help found the Tudor dynasty?  If you can't or even if you can, you will enjoy Alison Weir's telling the tale of Elizabeth of York.  One caveat, the subtitle is key to the book.  This is not just a biography of Elizabeth, it is a telling of her story in the world she lived in.

Alison Weir writes precisely the tale of Elizabeth, providing plenty of background on the time and locations.  She details and documents settings, costs, clothing, food, and actions.  She speculates in relation to Richard the III in regard to his motivations and actions, but appropriately labels what is known and what may be inferred from the evidence.  She is not afraid to discuss controversial material, specifically regarding the Princes in the Tower of London, although she does follow convention in regard to the description of Bosworth Field. 

Overall, this birth to death examination of Queen Elizabeth produces a rounded picture of a woman that helped launch the modern world by bringing legitimacy to Henry VII, birth to Henry VIII, and giving a name to two English monarchs.  Enjoy reading Elizabeth of York: A Tudor Queen and Her World.

Are you bad at math?

Bennett, Jeffrey.  Math for Life: Crucial Ideas You Didn't Learn in School.  Updated Edition.  
        Boulder, CO: Big Kid Science, 2013.  ISBN: 978-1-937548-36-0

Do you consider yourself "bad" at math?  Did you do well in math while in school?  Well, it does not matter what answer you give to those questions as Jeffrey Bennett demonstrates in Math for Life.  You are using math in your daily life whether you realize it or not, although it is generally not algebraic equations.  Dividing a pie evenly, cutting a pizza to fit the number of folks around the table, baking with its use of proportions, etc. all these tasks have you using math unconsciously. 

What Jeffrey Bennett does is have you think about math outside the classroom.  The best chapters are the early ones ("Thinking with Numbers" and "Statistical Thinking")  which concentrate on your interaction with numbers in the real world (not the artificial world of the classroom).  Later chapters focus on money, taxes, deficit spending in the USA, energy, politics and growth.  These later chapters get more esoteric in their focus and reveal authorial bias (conscious and unconscious) in regard to the premise of the question asked or the answers he suggests as correct.

Overall, despite issues with regarding authorial leanings and suggestions in various chapters, Jeffery Bennett does provide sound advice in regard to the importance of math in everyday life and gives generally sound advice on how to improve.  Just remember to ignore advice with which you disagree.

Why Verdun?

Jankowski, Paul.  Verdun: The Longest Battle of the Great War.  New York: Oxford University
        Press, 2014  ISBN: 978-0-19-931689-2

Many books are written about individual battles in World War I, especially Verdun. For a variety of reasons, Verdun is emblematic  of the fighting on the Western Front in the Great War.  However, Paul Jankowski has not written a normal battle history in Verdun, but rather a meditation  on what many consider the longest battle of World War I.  Rather than a detailed description of the action tracing units involved, personalities, terrain, etc., he opens with a discussion on the place the battle holds in the memories of Frenchmen, Germans and historians.  He explores why the German forces attacked at Verdun, then why the French decided to make a hold-at-all-cost defense there.  He examines the evidence regarding what part the concept of offensive tactics  and rates of attrition played in the battle and how prestige (French and German) controlled the length of the battle.  He looked at what French and German troops thought of the battle and how they viewed each other.  The other major area he covered is why the forces involved continued fighting this battle.

If you are looking for action, consider other titles on Verdun. But if you want a revisionist synthesis on why the battle happened, read on.