Dead Wake - Eric Larson

Sub-title: The Last Crossing of the Lusitania

I've enjoyed many other books by this author - in fact, I've read this one before, back in 2015! I'm just adding some notes from reading this time around.  I have to go look for his latest writing!

Quotes/Comments

"Lothrop Withington was on the ship, an authority of genealogy with a special expertise in Salem, Massachusetts."

"Elbert Hubbard, author of an inspirational essay..." A Message to Garcia."

"Wilhelm Uno Meriheina, a race car driver...had been born in Russia in the Duchy of Finland (which became independent in 1917)"

Published: 2015  Read: April 2024  Genre: History

Brand Luther - Andrew Pettegree

I enjoy reading non-fiction and learning about things I knew very little about.  This is a different twist on the history of Martin Luther, the founder of the Protestant faith.  The author describes the life of Luther and the rise of his movement as the evolution of a "brand" - a recognizable symbol for a product or service. He suggests that the success of Luther's teachings were attributable to the popularity of the pamphlets and other publications written by Luther that were printed and published across the German empire in the language of the people and recognizable by the title page design that was tightly controlled and overseen by Luther himself.

 To start with, I didn't know it was so far back in time, the later 1500's.  It was fascinating to me how the popularity of Luther's writing created a printing industry.  The geography of the area also influenced the spread of the writings. As a marketing major, I found it a worthwhile read.

Published:  2016  Read: May 2016  Genre: non-fiction

Dead Wake - Erik Larson

Subtitle: The Last Crossing of the Lusitania

I read this for one of my book clubs, though it seems I've been on an "oceans" kick of late.  I really enjoyed the author's earlier books: In the Garden of the Beast, Isaac's Storm and The Devil in the White City.  This one did not disappoint.

The Lusitania was an ocean liner in the early 1900's that was sunk on a voyage from New York City to Liverpool on May 17, 1915, during World War I, before the Americans joined the fighting.  Almost 1200 people died and two years later America joined the war.

The story goes back and forth between the passengers on the ship, President Woodrow Wilson's state of mind after the death of his wife earlier in the year and its effect on his response to the tragedy, and the German U-boat captain and crew.  It's a fascinating slice of history and a fresh reminder of the atrocities that are committed when countries wage war.

I was expecting to find a list of the passengers and where they were from but it was not included in the book.  I found one at a site dedicated to the ship---had to check for ancestors!

Published: 2015  Read:  January 2016  Genre: History

update: re-read in 2024

City of Women - David R Gillham

This novel was the suggestion for one of my reading groups for December.  It is a thriller that tells the story of the mostly female population left in Berlin at the end of WWII and how they struggled to survive.

There is a lot of detail on the city of Berlin, impressing me with the research that the author apparently did to be authentic to the time.  It became tedious as the book went on, however.

There was not a character in this book that I really liked.  The main character, Sigrid, is a middle aged woman married to a German soldier with a nasty mother-in-law and suspicious neighbors.  Everyone is reporting and turning on each other.  Sigrid befriends a young woman in her apartment building who turns out is assisting with smuggling Jews out of the country and enlists Sigrid in the effort.  Sigrid is taken in, partly due to her passionate affair she'd had with a Jewish man she meets in a theatre.

Our group had a long discussion on the effects of war and the mentality of a population that would allow the annihilation of a people.  It was instructive to discuss how the economics of Germany after WWI paved the way for the hatred and fear of Hitler's regime. I was impressed with the need to understand history in the long term perspective.  Most of all, I found myself asking, "What would I have done?"  Would I have been brave? Would I have tried to stay uninvolved?  Would I have resisted?

Published: 2012  Read: December 2015  Genre: Historical fiction

All the Light We Cannot See - Anthony Doerr

This bestseller was chosen for the September pick in one of my book clubs.  It's the story of two young people - a blind girl from Paris, Marie-Laure, who is detained in Saint-Malo, Brittany, France near the end of WWII and Werner, a mechanically gifted German boy swept up in the war.

The introduction advises that the walled city of Saint-Malo was bombed almost to oblivion after the Normandy invasion to root out the last of the German army.  Right away, I'm dreading an entire story that's going to end in a city, and presumably it occupants, being destroyed,  But then, we're taken on a hop scotch of time between the two characters building to...the inevitable meeting and tragedy.

I thoroughly dislike the writing style that goes back and forth each chapter between two stories. It's contrived to keep you reading to get to whichever story you prefer.  The author skips around in time too, making us keep track of multiple vignettes that eventually begin to come together the last 50 or so pages.  It's like reading a mystery or a thriller.

The prose *is* lyrical ...but there's an adverb for every verb and an adjective for every noun,  My greatest complaint is that by writing beautifully the author minimizes the horror of the war. It's as if he paints a wash over the reality and defaults to stereotypes of the besieged French and the cruel Germans so he can write a pretty story.  It's just too touching to have a blind girl lose all she loves and too predictable to have a German boy become a mindless solider that does one heroic gesture.

The book jacket has praise from fellow authors, not critics, a warning in my experience.  Too say the least, I didn't like this one.

To complicate things further, there's a sub-plot of a cursed jewel that Marie-Laure's father is given and a German officer is determined to find.  The officer is a caricature of every Nazi soldier.  That's the problem with all the characters, they are too simple, too flat, too predictable.

If you want to read something about living in Europe during a German occupation and the soldier's on both sides, I'd recommend The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society.

Published:  2014  Read: August 2015  Genre: fiction