The American West as Revealed Through Four Men

Hutton, Paul Andrew.  The Undiscovered Country: Triumph, Tragedy, and the Shaping of the 

         American West.  New York: Penguin Random House, 2025.  ISBN: 9781524746131

 

How up are you on the story of the American West?  Do you think that the story of western expansion only started when folks moved west of the Mississippi River?  Paul Hutton offers a correction to that view in Undiscovered Country by starting with the movement over the Appalachian Mountains in the 1700s and carries the story on until the closing of the Frontier in the late 1800s through the lenses of four men who helped open up the West for white settlers.

 

Paul Hutton starts his tale of the American West with the first of four men he focuses on - Danial Boone in the 1750s.  The first third of the book places Daniel Boone and his exploits in relation to the events of the French and Indian War, the settlement of the the Ohio River Valley, and the American Revolution and beyond.  The events of the American Revolution and the conflict with the Creek and Seminole Indians introduces the reader to the family of  Davy Crockett - the 2nd focus of this book.  Davy Crockett gained fame for his exploits of fighting Creek Indians and his hunting prowness which led to becoming a politician.  His fame also led to him  being the subject of plays and books.  Then, at the height of his fame, he decided to go West to Texas and ended up at the Alamo where his death just added to his notoriety. 

 

The third man in this book is Kit Carson - known for his bravery, his compassion for various Indian tribes, and his knowledge of the West.  He was involved in the beaver trade,  led John C. Fremont on various of his trips around the West, led troops in New Mexico against the Confederate invasion under General Sibley, then led scouts and troops against the Apaches and Navajos. William "Buffalo Bill" Cody was the final focus of the book.  Buffalo Bill Cody gained his name by hunting buffalo for the Kansas Pacific Railroad.  He also spent time as a scout for the Army, being involved with Kit Carson at times and being called to lead hunts for important folk such as  James Gordon Bennett, Leonard Walter Jerome, and the Russian Grand Duke Alexis, the 3rd son of Czar Alexander II.  Planning out these hunts came in handy later when the Buffalo Bill Wild West Show toured the East, Great Britain, and most of Europe.  Cody was not just a showman, he was also known as a brave scout by both the US Army and the Sioux and Cheyenne tribes.  He became friends with Sitting Bull and had him in his traveling show for a year along with Annie Oakley when they visited England and had opportunity to meet Queen Victoria and other nobility.  Paul Hutton closes the book with the 1893 Chicago World Fair and the meeting of the "World's Congress of Historians and Historical Students" where Frederick Jackson Turner presented his paper "The Significance of the Frontier in American History."  

 

If you would like to refresh your knowledge of the push west from the East Coast or are just interested in any of the four men Paul Hutton focused on, The Undiscovered Country is a good place to start. 

Testing to Destruction, Sometimes!

Davies, Alex.  Kobuk the Destroyer and Other Tales from the Wild, Unseen World of Test 

        Engineering.  New York: W. W. Norton, 2026.  ISBN: 9781324051299.   

 

What do you know about Underwriters Laboratory (UL)?  Or the Interagency Grizzly Bear Committee (IGBC)?  Or how jet engines are tested against bird strikes? These are just some of the groups  and products that Alex Davies presents in his examination the role test engineers play in keeping us safe in so many ways!

 

Alex Davies opens with Kobuk the Destroyer taking part in the IGBC testing of "bear-proof" products which he uses as a leading to the rest of the book.  He discusses the Limits that test engineers such as those at Underwriters Laboratory use on safes, elevators, and a host of other products.  Then he delves into the never-ending chore of Fool-Proofing a product so that an ordinary person can use it with out damage to themselves or others, hopefully. The chapter entitled Disintegration highlights how Boeing tested a new model plane on the ground to see how much force it could take before the wings came off.  Unfortunately, the software was not tested to the same degree.  In Scale, the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers got highlighted with their scale map of the Mississippi River and Missouri River basin created to help with flood control.  The Dynamics of products let loose in the wild provides real-world impacts on what happens in real life and how that affects testing.  The penultimate chapter - Intention - focuses on The purpose of the product and what effect that has the testing process.  Then, in the final chapter, Alex Davies takes the products into The Total Test Environment and brings all the concepts covered together.

 

For an enjoyable and enlightening look at the unknown world of test engineers, do pick up Alex Davies' Kobuk the Destroyer!  

 

Scientists Causing Trouble!

Kaplan, Matt.  I Told You So!: Scientists Who Were Ridiculed, Exiled, and Imprisoned for Being 

        Right.  New York: St. Martin's Press, 2026.  ISBN: 9781250372277

 

 

Science is supposed to be a process governed by logic and evidence.  A hypothesis is presented, evidence is gathered and folks try to disprove the idea.  If they can't disprove it,  the hypothesis is accepted as fact.  That is the idealized view of science. But Matt Kaplan's latest title - I Told You So! - focuses on the contrast between how science is supposed to work versus how science is practiced in the real world.   

 

Matt Kaplan opens the book with a description of him attending the 72nd meeting of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology in North Carolina as the science correspondent for The Economist (he had been paleontologist before becoming a journalist).  There he encountered numerous scientists in an uproar because a PhD student named Allison Moyer had the gall to present a poster session that challenged some semi-deeply held beliefs about dinosaur color and how we could know what color the dinosaurs were.  Luckily, Alison had Mary Schewitzer and Jack Horner, two established scientists backing her up.  As Kaplan goes on to state in the opening, this is not an isolated occurrence, rather, this is almost normal because scientists are people before they are scientists and people let emotions, cherished beliefs, and prestige shape their responses to challenges.

 

Kaplan looks at issues of bullying, bias, fabrication, sexism, personality conflicts, and other issues that plague science by interweaving the stories of a number of scientist, doctors, and other researchers (both historical figures and more recent scientists) into a coherent story.  Among those discussed is Ignaz Semmelweis who advocated the use of carbolic wash to prevent puerperal fever in Austria, Alexander Gordon, who was chased out of Aberdeen, Scotland, for suggesting that medical staff was spreading puerperal fever, Pierre Louis who created the medical trial by accident while investigating bloodletting in France during the 1800s and one of his students Oliver Wendell Holmes (the father of the Supreme Court justice) who got chased out of medicine because of his views on puerperal fever.  Holmes got his revenge on his critics by becoming a teacher of anatomy and physiology at Harvard who helped train the next generation of doctors on his theories. Then there is Louis Pasteur who played fast and loose in regard to his claims and would go out of his way to sabotage those he felt might claim his fame.  Carl Woese changed the classification of bacteria.  Katalin Kariko created mRNA which led to the Covid-19 vaccine and other possible vaccines but faced numerous challenges as immigrant scientist  before she found success.  Joseph Lister was another who used a microscope to start to identify bacteria in the 1850s.  Then there is Charles Darwin and Galileo Galilei who each had strong allies that helped defend them from attack.  Kaplan rounds off the book with brief discussions of authorship, power dynamics, and funding in relation to how science currently practiced.

 

So if you have an interest in science, read this title!  I Told You So! will get the reader thinking about how science could work if scientists were not people first.  A highly recommended book!  

Is It Just a Pain in the Head?

Zeller, Jr., Tom.  The Headache: The Science of a Most Confounding Affliction --- and a Search for 

         Relief.  New York: Mariner Books, 2025.  ISBN: 9780358507758

 

Do you ever have headaches?  Since the answer is likely, yes, Tom Zeller then wants to know if you ever have had not the normal run-of-the-mill headaches that can be cured with an aspirin, an Excedrin, or Tylenol, but rather the head-splitting pain of a migraine or head-banging pain of a cluster headache since these are the focus of The Headache.

 

Tom Zeller, an American journalist and cluster headache sufferer, opens with his own personal struggle with cluster headaches and his search for relief.  He then launches into a quest to discover why he has this debilitating reoccurring headache problem. He explores the science of headaches, focusing on the confusing and confounding science of the head.  Over centuries folks have been searching for cures and causes behind these head pains with limited success.  All sorts of reasons are suggested as to how the pain starts and what may cause it to die away for awhile, but the best minds in science are still acting like blind men examining an elephant and arguing over their findings.  Since each person experiencing these head pains are unique, what may be a trigger for one person does not bother another.  Likewise a cure for one can be a dud for another.   And often over time the seemingly wonderful cure stops working for particular individuals.  To compound things more, since the science of headaches is not a highly regarded field of study, funding for research is limited.  In all, this adds up to a very frustrating mess for headache sufferers  who are still desperately hoping for some relief.

 

If you suffer from migraines or cluster headaches, know someone who does, or are just interested in exploring aspects of neurological science, pick up The Headache and join Tom Zeller on his journey!  

 

Talking Marines!

Davis, Scott.  The Last of the Old Breed: An Oral History of the Final Marines From World 

        War II.  New York: St. Martin's Press, 2026.  ISBN: 9781250429933 

 

How much do you know about the Marines in World War II?  Besides the Marine Monument In Washington, DC, which celebrates Marines raising the Stars and Stripes on Iwo Jima.  Well, if you want to hear from actual WW II Marines, Scott Davis has a volume for you in The Last of the Old Breed.  He spent ten years interviewing veterans and their families and then weaving their individual tales into this book.

 

Scott Davis opens the book with what various individuals were doing before World War II came to American soil at Pearl Harbor and the reaction to this attack and the preparation by the Marines to get into action.  There are chapters on Guadacanal, New Georgia, Tarawa, New Britian, Kwajalein, Saipan, Guam, Peleliu, the Philippines, Iwo Jima, and Okinawa interspersed with chapters on Marines spending time in Samoa, Australia, New Zealand, and the home front.  Scott Davis would provide the individual's name, age at the time of the interview, and their unit and then a snippet of their tale relevant to the particular chapter.  He closes the book with three chapters - "Home Alive by '45," "Life After War," and "In the Shadow of War" which provides context for the veterans' lives after they came home and what they did along with some interactions with family members.  At the tail end of the book is an appendix listing all the Marines who contributed to the book, an appendix of various awards given to the Marines in the book, and an appendix discussing the 121st Naval Construction Battalion - the Seabees - attached to the Fourth Marine Division.

 

If you are looking for first-hand accounts of WW II Marine veterans, pick up Scott Davis's The Last of the Old Breed and listen to their tales.  

Hunting for Traitors!

Harding, Stephen.  G. I. G-Men: The Untold Story of the FBI's Search for American Traitors, 

         Collaborators, and Spies in World War II Europe.  New York: Citadel Press, 2026.  

         ISBN: 9780806544137 

 

How much do you know of the FBI's role in hunting down spies during World War II?  Did you know of the FBI's activities in South America and the Caribbean islands early in the war? Did you know that Director Hoover had an obsessive belief that the FBI was the best tool to root out American traitors in Europe instead of the Oh-So-Social (OSS) that President Roosevelt favored?  In G.I. G-Men, Stephen Harding lays out the story of what Director Hoover managed to extract from the President and what they accomplished.

 

After the United States joined the fighting in World War II, the FBI sent some agents over to England to liaison with the British on  domestic and foreign security practices.  It was brought to the FBI's attention that there were certain American individuals such as Ezra Pound who were aiding and abetting the Axis powers against the United States.  Since the FBI was the domestic lead for counter-intelligence within the USA, and had been authorized by the President to work covertly in Central and South America in 1940, why not allow a small group of FBI special agents to be embedded with the US military to assist with the apprehension and processing of any Americans found aiding the Axis powers who had been indicted by the Department of Justice while also investigating those other Americans who had stayed in occupied Europe to see if they merited an indictment.  So the Army Liaison Unit (ALU) was formed and operated in France, Italy, Austria, Hungry, and Germany from 1943 until 1945.  They helped capture Ezra Pound in Italy, investigated W. Dawson who had ties to both Teddy Roosevelt and FDR, hunted for dirt on Florence Gould, the wife of one of the richest Americans, and a host of others.  Some were indicted, others were not ultimately charged due to lack of evidence.  The ALU worked diligently until the OSS and the US Military Forces in European Theater intelligence chief managed to get their authorization revoked at the end of 1945.  Harding ends the book with a discussion of what the ALU accomplished and what the agents did after the war.

 

G.I. G-Men provides a look into a part of World War II history and FBI history that is not well known.  If you have an interest in the nuts and bolts of World War II history or of the FBI, do pick up this book!  

The Creator of the Skunk Works!

Dean, Josh.  The Impossible Factory: The Remarkable True Story of Kelly Johnson and the 

        Lockheed Skunk Works, America's Innovation Machine.  New York: Dutton, 2026.  

        ISBN: 9781524745516 

 

So how much do you know of aviation history?  Can you name any American airplanes form the 1930s, 1940s, 1950s, or any recent ones?  Have you heard of "The Skunk Works" and do you know where the term originated?  Even if you can name the airplane, can you name the aircraft designer?  If any of this catches your eye, pick up and read Josh Dean's The Impossible Factory which tells the story of Clarence "Kelly" Johnson, a poor boy from Michigan who fulfilled his dream of creating and building iconic airplanes!

Kelly Johnson was an iconic airplane engineer who graduated from the University of Michigan and moved out to California to work for Lockeed in 1933 and helped launch the Lockheed Electra.  During this time Kelly Johnson helped build planes for Jimmy Doolittle, Charles Lindbergh, Wiley Post, and Amelia Earhart.  He also worked with Howard Hughes to build the Constellation passenger plane for TWA which was used as the C-69 by the Army Air Corp during WWII.  Then England came calling and Kelly Johnson sold them the Hudson anti-sub/bomber plane which he redesigned over a weekend. This achievement was followed by the P-38 Lightning - a twin-engine design that was a radical departure from current aircraft, but was a great fighter plane that made history, especially in the Pacific campaigns.  And the Skunk Works was born when Kelly Johnson got the go-ahead to create the first American jet fighter in  June 1943 and the prototype flew in January 1944 as Lulu Belle (aka P-80 Shooting Star).  In 1953, Kelly Johnson and Lockheed built the F-104 Starfighter for the US Air Force.  Then in 1954, Lockheed and Kelly Johnson got involved in creating spy planes.  They did the U-2, then in 1961, the A-12 Blackbird which morphed into the SR-71.  The final project that Kelly Johnson was involved with at Lockheed was another secret project - the F-117  - a design he did not like it could fly but worked due to its mathematically created shape.  Josh Dean includes the interesting details that bring the stories he tells to life.

 

In The Impossible Factory, Josh Dean provides a look into aviation design history embodied in one man, Clarence "Kelly" Johnson who helped shape some of the most iconic aircraft for the United States and Lockheed!  Read and enjoy! 

Where is a David When You Need One?

Kemp, Luke.  Goliath's Curse: The History and Future of Societal Collapse.  New York: Alfred A. 

        Knopf, 2025.  ISBN: 9780593321355

 

Are you ready for another book about how civilizations collapsed in the past?  Maybe you are ready to move beyond Jared Diamond's Germs, Guns, and Steel.  If so, Luke Kemp has a tome to weigh down your reading pile in Goliath's Curse.  

 

Luke Kemp opens with in into to terms - a Goliath is used as a synonym for civilization and just as we use civilization to mean specific cultures and the concept of culture, Kemp does the same with"Goliath."  Next Kemp gets into a disagreement with Thomas Hobbes and his "social contract" theory of government followed by a number of chapters dealing with how early hunter-gathers and early farmers dealt with authority figures.  Then Kemp spends several chapters looking at various "Goliaths" such as China, Rome, Greece, Egypt, and the like.  Kemp then moves into the endgame where we dwell and looks at how we have to deal with a global goliath that may or may not spell the end of civilization as we know it when it collapses.  But he does end with some hopeful scenarios.  We will just have to see if he is overly optimistic.

 

So if you are in the mood for some heavy reading that presents a different light on the past, pick up Luke Kemp's Goliath's Curse and settle in. 

Just Read the Title - Hollywood vs Nazis!

Benson, Michael.  Hollywood vs Nazis: How the Movie Studios Took on Nazis Infiltrating Los Angeles.  New York: Citadel Press, 2026.  ISBN: 9780806544786

 

Welcome to the land of greed and glitter where the dream factories reside - AKA Hollywood!  In the 1930s, the movie studios were very big in Hollywood making pictures that were shown world wide.  Hitler and the Nazis wanted into that action so they sent folks over to California to infiltrate the movie studios and shift their focus to movies more to their liking.  Michael Benson takes the reader along for the ride into this bit of little-known history in Hollywood vs Nazis!

 

In twenty-four chapters, an epilogue, and an interesting appendix, Michael Benson sets the stage of Los Angeles in the 1930s where corruption, oil, and movies ruled.  When Goebbels sent folks to America they did not quite know the ground rules in play.  The Friends of New Germany started meeting in 1933 and opposition to these meeting started soon after.  In Hollywood, a Jewish lawyer named Leon Lewis started an organization to infiltrate the infiltrators and spy out their secrets to be revealed at an opportune time.  Lewis also got together with Jewish organizations and various movie moguls such at the Warner Brothers who provided monetary support for the spies.  Lewis's organization uncovered Nazis plans for harassment, armed uprisings, and general mayhem.  At various times the organization worked with the LA cops, the California government, and occasionally the U.S. House UnAmerican Activities Committee to thwart the Nazis plans and derail various white supremacist organizations as well.  In the end, Hollywood won and the Nazis never did get the foothold they wanted in California.

 

So, if you are interested in a popular telling of the little known history of Hollywood during the 1930s to early 1940s, pick up Michael Benson's Hollywood vs Nazis and be entertained while learning.

 

 

 

Two Authors Talking Science Fiction and Fantatsy

Walton, Jo, and Ada Palmer.  Trace Elements: Conversations on the Project of Science Fiction and 

         Fantasy.  New York: Tor Publishing, 2026.  ISBN: 9781250372604

 

Take two award winning authors who are friends and turn them loose on the broad definition of science fiction and fantasy (SF&F).  What comes out is Trace Elements - a compilation of previously published and newly written essays, genre reflections, poems, and biography that lets the reader peek behind the curtain and watch a bit of sausage-making.

 

Jo and Ada divided Trace Elements into three sections.  Section 1: Genre, Or the Modern Proteus has thirteen essays and poems dealing with the contract between the author and reader,  the history of science fiction, definitions, why science fiction or fantasy might pretend to be the other genre, plus the role of robots, and the interaction of SF&F with romance, manga/anime, and mysteries.  

 

Section 2: Anyone Who Says Differently is Selling Something provides the reader a glimpse into how each author works and how they became the author that they are over the course of five essays.  

 

Section 3: Craft contains twelve essays and poems on the purpose of writing science fiction and/or fantasy, why reading, the necessity of diversity in protagonists, the issue of censorship and writing around it, and a very interesting look at The Princess Bride (both the book and the movie). 

 

So if you are looking for different approaches to science fiction/fantasy or you just enjoy reading well crafted essays on a variety of topics, do pick up this volume and delve into it yourself.  Your time will be well spent! 

Uncovering Hitler's New Friends and Fellow Travelers!

Mathias, Christopher.  To Catch a Fascist: The Fight to Expose the Radical Right.  New York: 

         Atria Books, 2026.  ISBN:  9781668034767

 

So how much do you know about various radical organizations in the United States?  You might have heard of the Proud Boys, or Aryan Nation.  Maybe the Ku Klux Klan or one of the host of white supremacist groups sprouting up like dandelions across America.  But how much do you know of the myriad groups that have sprung up in opposition to these radical right-wing mobs?  If you want to know more, then To Catch a Fascist is the book for you.

 

Christopher Mathias opens the book with his introduction to this conflict - the "Unite the Right" rally of 8/12/2017.   He lays out his experience that day and how that lead him to spend the next several year exploring and learning about the modern anti-fascists who courageously seek to lay bare the plans of a host of radical organizations and the people behind the masks.  He spends a decent amount of the book relating the tale of "Vincent" who infiltrated a West Coast white supremacist group.  Vincent managed to thwart a number of actions they were trying to take on the west coast and gathered information to identify the individuals in this local group.  He also managed to go from this group to a national group and was able to relay information on a Washington march to other anti-fascists that caused that march to be a bust that blew up and exposed a number of members to the public.  Besides Vincent,  Mathias also took the time and space to briefly discuss the history of anti-fascist and anti-white supremacy actions across American history while focusing on recent events.  

 

If you are looking for an exciting non-fiction read, Christopher Mathias's To Catch a Fascist will give you that!   

 

We Were There the Whole Time!

Stohl, Margaret, Jeanine Schaefer, & Judith Stephens.  Supe Visible: The Story of the Women of 

       Marvel Comics.  New York: Simon & Schuster, 2025.  ISBN: 9781982134617

Everyone knows (or at least has heard of) Marvel Comics!  Spider-Man, Captain America, The X-Men, She-Hulk, Black Widow, and The Mighty Avengers, right!? And of course Stan Lee!  But how much do you know of the writers, the colorists, the letters, the cover designers?  Pulling back part of the curtain on those unsung workers is what Super Visible does.

 

As the authors are quick to show, women were on scene and working at Marvel back in the 1960's and before.  Stan Lee would not have been able to function without Flo Stanberg among unnamed other women who inked the comics, did lettering, drew the art, and the like. And over the years as Marvel grew in size, so has the number of women involved and  so has has their impact on Marvel comics and the broader pop culture.   Super Visible is an outgrowth of the podcasts and panels that talk about the role of women in the Marvel Comic Universe - comics, books, movies, and television.  As they state at the beginning of the book, this is an examination of the role of women in the history of Marvel Comics told by the women in the room.  So there is straightforward narrative sections intermingled with oral history interviews.  Plus plenty of visual elements to highlight those present and bring the reader inside.

 

Super Visible provides a side of comic book history not often discussed with the story of women in comics being front and center.  If you want to explore Marvel Comics's full history, you will want to peruse this title! 

Multiple Reasons to be Reading!

Hwang Boreum.  Every Day I Read: 53 Ways to Get Closer to Books.  Tran. by Shanna Tan.  New 

         York: Bloomsbury Publishing, 2025.  ISBN: 9781639737796

 

 

Do you enjoy reading?  How often do you read?  Are you like me,Hwang Bo-reum asks, that you read every day?  Or would you like to read more but are not sure how to find the time and the space to do so.  No matter how you answered those questions, you might find answers here to assist your reading journey.

 

In Every Day I Read, Hwang Bo-reum provides both hear reasons why she reads, how she got in the habit of reading, and then provides 53 descriptive ways to choose what to read, when to read, and where to read.  She recommends reading a variety of types of books (novels, short story collections, poetry, non-fiction), locations (commuter train, car, on walks), and using different mediums (hard-copy, ebooks, audiobooks).  Other advice she gives includes always having a book or books with you, not having to finish every book, using a timer so that you focus on reading, and keeping a list of what you have read.  All seemingly mundane advice, but handy to have in one package.  

 

I had read Welcome to the Hyunam-dong Bookshop earlier this year so I was interested in this title when I saw that it was coming out in December.  It was interesting to find out that Hwang Bo-reum wrote this title before Welcome to the Hyunam-dong Bookshop.  Reflecting back on that title in light of what she writes in Every Day I Read, I can see how she used some of these ways for her characters to appreciate reading and make it a habit.  

 

In Every Day I Read, Hwang Bo-reun provides seemingly simple advice that can help  jump-start someone's reading journey and/or increase the pleasure in one's trip! 

 

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!