How Well Do You Know Your Family?

Kuehn, Christine.  Family of Spies: The Untold Story of the Attack on Pearl Harbor and One 

         Family's Rise as Nazi Spies.  New York: Celadon Books, 2025.  ISBN: 9781250344465

  

How well do you know your family's history?  Can you trace back your family tree to when your ancestors's first came to America?  Do you know all about the black sheep that may be hidden in the past?    In 1994 Christine Kuehn got a letter from a screenwriter wanting to contact her father regarding the role Nazi spies had played in the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.  He had to have gotten the wrong address, hadn't he?  

 

Unfortunately, Christine Kuehn learned from her dad Eberhard Kuehn that it was not a wrong address.  His father, his mother, his sister Ruth had all been part of a spy ring that collected intelligence on the facilities, ships and aircraft at Pearl Harbor that they passed on to the Japanese.  As to why, well that is a complicated story that Christine Kuehn put together over time through research, new-found relatives, and Freedom of Information inquires.  She traces the family's involvement in the Nazi party, Otto's missed opportunity to head the counterintelligence division of the SS (Reinhard Heydrich got the job), Ruth's affair with Joseph Goebbels, and the revelation of Ruth's father being a Jew which led the family to find work outside Germany.  That work was the opportunity to be paid by the Japanese to live in Hawaii and provide intelligence that the Japanese could not otherwise obtain.  However, Otto and Friedel were not the type to keep a low profile, and neither was Ruth.  The FBI had a team watching them, but not the quite the evidence for an arrest. The attack on Pearl Harbor led to the arrest of most of the family and eventual deportation of most back to Germany - except Eberhard who chose to remain in the US, graduate high school and then join the army to fight at Okinawa.  He never returned to Germany.  But Christine Kuehn did venture there to meet the relatives she was just getting to know.

 

Christine Kuehn  provides an interesting trip through her father's family history entwined with her journey of discovery.  If the reader is interested in the back story of Pearl Harbor, Family of Spies would be the book to help scratch that itch! 

Earp and Holliday - Warts and All!

Gardner, Mark Lee.  Brothers of the Gun: Wyatt Earp, Doc Holliday, and a Reckoning in 

        Tombstone.  New York: Dutton, 2025.  ISBN: 9780593471890

 

 

How well do you know the tale of the Shoot-out at the OK Corral?  How many versions of this tale have you read?  Well, get ready for another ride in the Earp vs Cowboys saga with Mark Gardner's Brothers of the Gun!  But do not let the subtitle fool you, this books is about so much more than the shootout in Tombstone!

 

Mark Gardner lays the groundwork for the tale by digging up all the background on Wyatt Earp and his family along with similar attention to detail on Doc Holliday.  The reader travels with the pair as they move west from Illinois and Georgia to Kansas and then on to New Mexico, Arizona, and California with stints in Colorado.  And the reader learns about their employment or lack thereof along with their myriad family relationships.  But Gardner's major focus is on the friendship between Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday and the impact that friendship had on those around the pair whether that be Big Nose Kate, the other Earp brothers, or the Cowboys gang of thieves.  

 

Mark Gardner's Brothers of the Gun provides a look into the Old West through the lens of the Earp - Holiday partnership.  The reader gets to time travel to the past and find not a black and white world of heroes and villains, but rather a world of gray where actions and men could be good or bad depending on one's point of view.  If you are interested in visiting, do pick up a copy of Brothers of the Gun and enjoy! 

Words, Words, and More Words!

Zafarris, Jess.  Useless Etymology: Offbeat Word Origins for Curious Minds.   Philadelphia: John 

          Murray Press, 2025.  ISBN: 9781399809184

 

 

Are you a word nerd?  Do you enjoy learning new words or maybe finding out the meanings of old words and then using them in your conversations?  If so, Jess Zafarris's Useless Etymology could be a book for you!  Inside this tome you will find word origins for all types of words for your perusal! 

 

Jess Zafarris divides the book into three sections.  Part 1 covers the oddities of English etymology in 6 chapters - delving into words about perspective, time, logic and illogic, debunking word origin myths, folk etymology, and wordatorium.  Part 2 dives into the twists and turns that may surprise and delight when looking into the origins of everyday words in 10 chapters.  This section is the meat of the book with chapters that look at how meanings of words change over time, eponymous words, literary and rhetorical terms, words used in making books, words that have animals hidden in them, edible terms to snack on, the language of colors, of science, of space, and of time.  Part 3 wanders around whimsical and humorous words as the author presents words that play and enchant in 6 chapters.  Here you will find silly words or words with silly origins, word games, word gaffes, strange origin stories, antiquated words you might like to use and finally the longest words you never knew!

 

So, if you have time to spare and want to use that time exploring word origins, pick up Jess Zafarris's Useless Etymology and put your curiosity to work! 

SF Legends on The Pulps and More!

Wolinsky, Richard, Richard A. Lupoff, and Lawrence Davidson.  Space Ships!  Ray Guns!  Martian                    Octopods!: Interviews with Science Fiction Legends.  San Francisco, CA: Tachyon 

        Publications, 2025.

 

Are you interested in science fiction?  Especially early science fiction.  If so this might be a book for you, especially if you want a first person view!  Wolinsky, Lupoff, and Davidson were hosts on a series of radio programs and podcasts that interviewed science fiction and fantasy authors and editors.  Richard Wolinskey has taken snippets of those interviews on certain topics and compiled them into this tome.

 

So what would you find when you crack open this title?  You would hear the likes of Paul Anderson, Isaac Asimov, Robert Bloch, Algris Burdrey, Philip K. Dick, Frank Herbert, Ursula K. Leguin, Fritz Lieber, Jane Roberts, Theodore Sturgeon, A. E. Van Vogt, Kurt Vonnegut, and Roger Zelazny talking shop about fellow authors, pulp magazine editors, and fan culture from the 1920s to the 1950s.  Chapter 1 covers the birth of SF&F in pulp magazines with Hugo Gernsback and Amazing Stories.  Chapter 2 focuses on Weird Tales, H. P. Lovecraft, Robert E. Howard, Fritz Leiber, and Robert Bloch.  Chapter 3 looks at the effects of the Depression on the growth of pulp magazines along with authors such as C. L. Moore, Fletcher Pratt, and Stanley Weinbaum.  Chapter 4 does a deep dive on John W. Campbell and Astounding.  Chapter 5 examines World War II and beyond with authors A. E. Van Vogt, Leigh Brackett, L. Ron Hubbard and others.  Chapter 6 brings in the 1950s and the rise and fall of Galaxy, The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, If, and others alongside William F. Nolan, Marion Zimmer Bradley, Jack Williamson, and Philip K. Dick.  Chapter 7 finished off the book with a focus on the Science Fiction League and the Futurians followed by a couple of appendixes with some origin stories and a list of all the interviews.

 

If you have an interest in hearing what SF authors have to say on a variety of subjects, Space Ships!  Ray Guns!  Martian Octopods! gives you that opportunity.  Take a chance and you might learn something you never knew you needed! 
 

Which is Smarter - MI or AI?

Raebsamen, Lynn.  Artificial Stupelligence: The Hilarious Truth About AI.  n.p.: Lyra Press, 

       2025.   ISBN: 9783952622308 

 

Is Artificial Intelligence (AI) an oxymoron or a "contradiction in terms" which is what many folks say about military intelligence (MI) or is AI just an overly broad term that covers so much territory that almost anything can be shoved in?  Lynn Raebsamen does not weigh in on MI, but she does cover most all the fronts of the ongoing war AI enthusiasts insists on waging on common sense with a nice blend of facts and anecdotes.

 

 Lynn Raebsamen opens the book with an overview of where AI came from and how we got to the present day.  She covers voice controls ordering doll houses; self-driving cars and their quirks; crazy issues with facial recognition and their ethical implications; chat bot mishaps, missteps, and hallucinations; AI crashing markets; IBM Watson misdiagnosing patients; AI running amok in HR; AI trying to "create" art; content moderation, cybersecurity, and image recognition; as well as AI visiting the classroom, politics, and "saving" the environment.  She finishes the book with a visit to virtual reality and then a few success stores of AI actually working as designed.

 

If you want something more then the AI hype found in most news stories, check out Artificial Stupelligence for a chance to laugh as you learn!   
 

The Long Road to the Medal of Honor!

Davis, Paris.  Every Weapon I Had: A Vietnam Vet's Long Road to the Medal of Honor.  New York: 

        St. Martin's Press, 2025.  ISBN: 9781250387653 

 

 

So how much do you know of the Green Berets' operations in Vietnam during 1965?  Just the movie?  Well, settle yourself down and follow Green Beret Captain Paris Davis on his most harrowing time on a knoll in Binh Dinh Province on 18 June 1965!  And stay seated as he describes his journey to finally being presented the Medal of Honor by President Biden on 3 March 2023.

 

Paris Davis sets the stage with a brief description of the action on 18 June 1965, but takes the reader to his family setting in Cleveland (OH) and the circumstances that led him to attend Southern University (LA) where he joined the ROTC which lead him to an Army career,  He joined Airborne and jumped out of planes, then Ranger School before heading to Korea in 1960.  In 1962, Davis attended Q School to become a Green Beret and had his first tour in Vietnam, after which he got married to his college sweetheart.   In 1964, he went to Okinawa to lead an A-Team in the Green Berets which led to him leading the team into Vietnam to train indigenous residents in counter-insurgency operations.  It was on a training mission to take out what was that to be a North Vietnamese company that led Capt. Davis, members of his team, and trainees into the firefight on 18 June 1965.   His commanding officer put in the paperwork of a Medal of Honor award (the paperwork disappeared).   Later that year, Capt. Davis was severely wounded in an ambush and sent home to recover.  Davis went on to serve at the Pentagon and eventually as commander of the 10th Special Forces Group that would handle counter-insurgency operations in Europe if war broke out there. Col. Davis retired in July 1985 due to medical issues and eventually started a paper in the Washington, DC area.  But he kept wondering what had happened to the Medal of Honor paperwork that had been submitted multiple times, but no records of the paperwork could be found.  Finally, with the assistance of multiple people and the assistance of several congressmen, Col. Davis was awarded the Medal of Honor by President Biden in March 3, 2023.  

 

If the reader is looking for an engaging story of courage, endurance, and grit, pick up Col. Davis' Every Weapon I Had!

Mars on Our Mind!

Baron, David.  The Martians: The True Story of an Alien Craze that Captured Turn-of-the-
       Century America.  n.p.: Liveright Publishing Corporation, 2025.  ISBN: 9781324090663

 

"Why Mars?" is the question asked not only by the author, but of the reader.  Why this fascination with the red planet, one of Earth's closest neighbors?  And why was there this fixation on canals and intelligent life on Mars?  Where did that come from and what has it spawned?  Those are some of the questions that David Baron seeks to answer in The Martians.

 

David Baron divides his tale into three parts - Part One - Century's End - 1876-1900, Part Two - A New Civilization - 1901-1907,  and Part Three - The Earthlings Respond - 1908-1916.  David Bruce brings in all of the big guns of the day - Percival Lowell who became enthralled with the Far East before he turned his vision onto the heavens,  the Widow Guzman who funded the Pierre Guzman prize for communication with another planet, or star, Camille Flammarion, a French astronomer,  and color-blind Italian astronomer Giovanni Schiaparelli who mapped Mars and drew in the canali or channels that he saw on the surface which caused much confusion when the term migrated into English as "canals."  Later on Nicoli Tesla makes his appearance along with H. G. Wells who brings a Martian invasion to his local village.  A whole host of British and American astronomers who argue both for and against the concept of Martian life spend decades going back and forth over the evidence that Lowell and others produce until newer and better telescopes clarify the view of Mars from Earth.  David Baron not only tells the tale of the Martian craze, he also provides the context in which it occurred giving the reader a feel for the popular culture that existed alongside it and the consequences and influence the craze had on American and world culture. 

 

If a well-written true science tale mixed with popular culture is what you crave, pick up David Baron's The Martians and be prepared to enjoy yourself!