Soldier Dogs - Maria Goodavage

I love dogs. They're wonderful creatures, and my little heart melts when I see them. I've been blessed with having two great dogs during my life.

This book explains the training process and lives of soldier dogs. It doesn't just tell stories of particular dogs. While there are specific stories in the book, that's not the main focus. It was interesting to get an in-depth look in their lives.

There is a glaring omission in the book I would like to point out. The book is so well researched, I was surprised with the gap. The author mentions seeing surgery for dogs who are getting ready for retirement. She is glad the heroes aren't forgotten. But they are.

Once those dogs go into retirement, all costs for medical care fall on the owner. Some of these dogs live out their lives fairly normally, but others have issues. The government is no longer responsible for their care, so the owner (many times the former handler) has to choose between costly care and their best friend's life. It is the reason groups like Project K9 Hero, Mission K9 Rescue and The Warrior Dog Foundation (among many others) were created. Sometimes they're even able to save a dog from being euthanized. 

This book was well researched, and the author had access to many areas the general public will never see. I was almost crying multiple times reading this book. It was published in 2012, and I'm happy to say that in 2013, the law changed so these heroes were no longer considered equipment. In 2018, President Obama signed a law that allows overseas MWDs to come home to retire. Steps are being taken to recognize these heroes, but they still aren't allowed to receive medals intended for "humans." I mean, dogs are people, too!

Overall, I liked this book. It was well written and informative. If it hadn't had the glaring omission in it, I wouldn't have anything negative to say. But I'm passionate about K9s, so if you love dogs, appreciate working dogs, and want to show some appreciation, find a charity. Donate. Buy a shirt. Everyone looks good with a dog on their shirt! Help those who have been helping us for centuries. Good Book!

The Crystal Shard (Icewind Dale #1) - R. A. Salvatore

Recently, I remembered we had purchased a ton of Drizzt books through Humble Bundle. I decided to track them down and see how far behind I was. Answer: so far behind...

The Ten-Towns are under attack by the barbarians of the tundra. They've been warned by Drizzt, the drow elf that very few trust. Since they were forewarned, the people come out on top, but one of the barbarians is spared and taken in by Bruenor the dwarf to learn the ways of their world. There's something about this barbarian...

As this is going on, Akar Kessel is amassing an army. He's under the influence of the Crystal Shard. He's got a demon by his side, and he feels invincible. His army is made up of races and tribes that don't normally work together, but the crystal gives him the power to keep them in line.

I got sucked into this book early on. It's broken up into three parts with an epilogue on each part, but it's simply a continuation of the story. The characters were easy to sympathize with, and the action easy to follow. I could put the book down, and I wouldn't have a problem remembering what was happening when I picked it back up. Sometimes that's a problem when you have this many different threads in one story.

Salvatore's a pro at what he does. There's a reason he has so many books under his belt, and I think a lot of it has to do with the character building he does. Something that really stood out to me in particular were the fight scenes. Those are really difficult to write, and making them engaging and easy to follow is hard to master.

Drizzt is an intriguing character, and now he's on his way with Bruenor, Wulfgar and Regis to find Mithril Hall. Next up is Streams of Silver, and I'll be reading that one soon. Good Book!

Desert Encounter - Knud Holmboe

This book was one of the oldest on my TBR pile, and I'm not sure what prompted me to put it on there.

Knud is a man from Denmark, but he's no ordinary European. He's embraced Islam and wants to drive from the west side of Africa to the east and then on to Mecca. This is 1930, and a war is raging between the Italians and the native people of the lands Knud has to pass through.

Along the way, he picks up and drops off a few traveling companions, gets lost in the desert and has various dangerous encounters - with both the natives and the Italians. He also witnesses the harsh realities of what the Italians are doing to the people. In areas as remote as the ones Knud is going through, it's all too easy to get away with cruelty and evil.

I can't really explain why this book intrigued me so much. I couldn't see any of the pictures. For some reason, they were so washed out, I couldn't read the captions or tell what most of them were. The story itself wasn't uplifting, and Knud didn't accomplish his goal. He was imprisoned and left Africa before he could make it. Honestly, with the amount of times his car broke down, I would've quit long before he did. If there's a chance I'm stuck in the middle of the desert, I'm not going. 

Anyway, I did like this book. I appreciate everything Knud went through, and it was a once in a lifetime experience. The book was published in 1931, and later that year, he tried to make his way to Mecca again. This time, though, he was attacked and killed while on the journey. Rumors claim the Italians ordered the murder, but no evidence was ever found. Knud's book was highly controversial and banned in Italy, so it's plausible they are responsible for his death. Either way, the world lost a good writer and explorer. Good Book!

Years of Wrath: A Cartoon History: 1931-1945 - David Low (Chronology and text by Quincy Howe)

This book is a collection of political cartoons created by David Low. He started making political cartoons early in life and eventually made his way to the Star, a paper in London. He was given free rein, so even though his views didn't mesh with those of his editor, he wasn't censored. The cartoons in this collection cover the lead up and duration of WWII.

Full confession: I hate political cartoons. I've never understood them, so I've always avoided them like the plague. I saw this had text with it, and I figured maybe I could get some understanding. Each panel has a paragraph with it explaining what was going on in the world at the time and inspired the cartoon. It was helpful, and I really appreciated it.

At the end of the book, there is a chronology of the events of the war. There was so much going on at the same time, having it broken up into smaller chunks like this was super helpful. The only thing I would point out is this was published in 1946, so some of the information doesn't appear to have all the details that later investigations provided.

The other thing I noticed was the quality of the cartoons. Digitally, they were okay for the most part, but many of them had parts where the text inside was hard to read. I ended up reading this on my laptop, and I had it blown up where the cartoon took up the whole screen. I still couldn't read some of them. I initially tried to read it on my Kindle, but they were way too small. Overall, with the explanations, I didn't hate the political cartoons. I was able to understand and learn more about the government side of the war, and all the text was short and to the point. I'll easily give this a Good Book! review. If you aren't fond of the cartoons and are just looking for a chronology of significant events of WWII, check this book out. I found it on Internet Archive.

 

The Trumpeter of Krakow - Eric P. Kelly

This book was solely on my radar because it entered public domain this year. I don't remember if I read a synopsis.

Joseph is traveling with his mother and father to Krakow. Their home has been destroyed, and they're on their way to find some family in the city. Unfortunately, their relative has died, and their name needs to be changed for safety. The father is also hiding something in a pumpkin.

At the Church of Our Lady St. Mary, a trumpeter marks the hour by playing a tune at each of the four windows of the tower. Joseph's father ends up in the position, and Joseph will become part of the tradition. Back at their lodgings, the alchemist upstairs prevents some thieves from acquiring the contents of the pumpkin, but it doesn't turn out the way you'd expect.

This story was pretty wild. Apparently, the story takes inspiration from an actual historical fire that destroyed a lot of Krakow in 1462, so that was pretty neat. I also liked the background story for the trumpeter. I played the trumpet, so I have some boas there.

In a time when superstition and science were both led to accusations of black magic, I can well believe a huge crystal could cause this much chaos. The best books I've read are the ones where I can't tell when it was written. I feel like this one showed its age in a few places, but it wasn't bad. I don't know that I'll remember it in a few months, though. It's unique for what it is, and I appreciate that. At the end of the day, I wouldn't recommend it to my kids (it's a young adult book), so I suppose it doesn't merit the stamp of approval. But it's close.

Never Turn Your Back on an Angus Cow - Dr. Jan Pol

Dr. Jan Pol is a character. If you've ever seen his show on TV, you won't forget him. He shows the life and death struggles of the patients in his country veterinary practice.

In this book, we start with Jan's roots and work our way up to the show. It's also a collection of stories and it almost feels like a print version of the show. The conversational tone was engaging and easy to read.

I love critters, so I was on board with this book. I have to say, I struggle with the parts of the show (and the book) where the animals don't make it. But, it is part of the circle. I appreciated this book and ate it up. Finished it in two days and recommend it! Good Book!

The Leavenworth Case - Anna Katherine Green

I believe I was put on the track of this book when I read the autobiography of Agatha Christie. She mentioned this book was influential in her own work. This is the first book I've read by this author.

Horatio Leavenworth has been murdered. His normal lawyer is out of town, so the task of watching out for his nieces falls to Mr. Raymond. Raymond is entranced by one of the women, but all the evidence is pointing at her. Will he be able to unravel the mystery and save her?

The plot for this story was very well laid out. It became a bit repetitive at the end, since the same information was told by multiple people. Other than that, I really did like this book. It's in the public domain, so anyone can find a copy of it. I got mine from gutenberg,org.

I didn't want to say much about the plot, so this review is short. If you're a fan of Agatha Christie, I think you'd enjoy this book. The other amazing thing is this book was written in 1878. I would never have guessed that by the writing. Good Book!

Why We Fought - Jerry Borrowman

This is a collection of seven stories from WWII. Individuals covered are Viriginia Hall (SOE/OSS), William Sebold (helped expose German saboteurs in USA), Marlene Dietrich (actress), Juan Pujol (double agent) and Carl Lutz (saved approximately 72,000 Jews). Additionally, the book covers the Ghost Army (deceived German army of troop locations) and the Battle for Castle Itter (Americans and Germans fighting together to save VIP prisoners being held by the SS at the end of the war).

The book is well researched, but with the length that it is, you can't really expect a deep dive on any of these topics. Personally, I was already familiar with most of them, but I still learned a few things. I appreciated the notes at the end of the chapters, so I could easily connect which books related to which topics in case I want to read into a subject further. The chapters also had enough breaks in them that it was easy to pick up the book, read a section, and put it down without spending an hour doing it.

I liked the writing style used in this book, and the topics weren't dragged out longer than they needed to be. Each of these were pretty surface level examinations, and that was what I was expecting. If you're interested in some really neat stories from WWII that aren't normally talked about, I would recommend this book. It easily earns a Good Book! review from me!

The Crimson Cipher - Susan Page Davis

It's been a while since I've read one of these. By that I mean a Christian romance. The subject matter of this one appealed to me, so I decided to give it a whirl.

Emma's father has died. He's been murdered, and she now has nowhere to go. A job offer gives her the door she believes God has opened for her, and she moves off to perform cryptography work for the government. All the while, a group of German sympathizers is sabotaging significant locations, even though America hasn't yet entered the war (WWI).

So, I have personal issues with this book. The way Emma handled her father's death (or not) bothered me. She never even found out who murdered him and wasn't really trying that hard. I realize this is a personal parallel issue that I've attributed to this story, but it still bothered me. If I push that aside, I still found it a bit strange the way Emma and John thought so much about themselves when there were lives at stake. I get this is a romance story, but the sabotage/cipher portions of the book were more interesting to me.

The other thing, and it's a minor thing, is the religion. It's not saturated to the point where I couldn't read a page without being smacked in the face with it, but there were a couple spots where I was tempted to roll my eyes. For example, one of the girls is happy to have a friend who believes the same way because she may be friends with the other girls, but it's not the same as having a friend that shares her religion. Or something.

Anyway, the notes at the end were neat. Learning what was based on facts that happened and what were fictitious was helpful, and the reading suggestions were interesting. The story itself was okay, but I wish there had been more focus on the matters at hand. People were blowing up ships and factories, and these two are worried about their next date. It also would have been nice to have more stakes with Kobold (the mastermind). He just pops up here and there and yells at people. Add that to the "daddy issue" I personally had, and I was on the fence with this one. I don't think it was written super poorly. It just wasn't for me.

The Sandman - Neil Gaiman

I've been working on this series for a while now. I saw first season of the show on Netflix, and I read in multiple articles about how good the overall story was. I've been drawn to the graphic novels lately, so I was happy to see what the hype was all about.

The Sandman is following the story of Dream, one of The Endless. He has some brothers and sisters, and together they have responsibilities they take care of. The story begins with Dream being the prisoner of a man. Once Dream escapes, he has to put his realm back in order and his life after. It's hard to describe the plot, since it covers 13 issues.

The box set has 14 books, but one of them is a duplicate title. The Dream Hunters was published with two different art styles. I preferred the more graphic novel art, but the other is beautiful as well. The books themselves were not too heavy and easy to pick up and read. It was harder to put them down!

I really enjoyed this journey. There are a lot of deeper emotions and thoughts explored that I wasn't expecting. The art was beautiful throughout, and I appreciated it. Endless Nights is a collection of short examinations of the Endless, and I'm glad it was in there. The Dream Hunters was more of a single story, but it was one of my favorites. The final book was something of a risk in my opinion. It's an end and a beginning, thus the infinity instead of the number on the spine. Making a series competently circle around is difficult and takes a great deal of talent. But it happened here. 

The Sandman made me happy, and it made me sad. I almost cried a couple of times, and I wanted to be able to rejoice at a happy ending. But it wasn't that simple, and it wouldn't have made sense to end that way. It's hard to describe, but with all that said, this series definitely gets a Good Book/Series! review. I'm hoping in the future to read more from Gaiman.