My Philadelphia Inquirer Review of 'Chasing the Last Laugh: Mark Twain's Raucous And Redemptive Round-The-World Comedy Tour'

Malcolm Muggeridge, the late British journalist, author and editor of Britain's late, great weekly satirical magazine, Punch, once said that he never tired of reading Mark Twain, or reading about him. 

Although I don’t always agree with Mark Twain’s worldview, I share that notion. Mark Twain is one of my favorite writers.

So I was pleased to be able to review a book about Mark Twain, Richard Zacks' Chasing the Last Laugh: Mark Twain's Raucous and Redemptive Round-the-World Comedy Tour, for the Philadelphia Inquirer.

When I was a teenager, I read Mark Twain's Following the Equator, and I reread it a few years back. Richard Zacks' Chasing the Last Laugh essentially covers the same material the master himself wrote about in his 1897 book - greatly augmented by Zacks' excellent research.

From Equator, we get Twain's opinions on colonialism, imperialism, class warfare, British arrogance, and decimation of native peoples. Zacks adds passages from Twain's letters and notebooks, as well as photos and other material at the Mark Twain Project at the University of California, Berkeley, and the Clifton Waller Barrett Collection at the University of Virginia. There is also a local connection: Zacks was advised on 1890s bankruptcy law by University of Pennsylvania professor David A. Skeel.

The result is an interesting, often funny book about a traumatic and fascinating time in Twain's life. Twain (Samuel Langhorne Clemens) was the highest-paid writer in America in 1894, but he was also a terrible investor. He lost most of his fortune from his books on inventions and investments that didn't work out. His wife, an heiress, was horrified. She insisted Twain pay back his investors. So, at age 59, he traveled across America and embarked on a world public speaking tour, which had never been done before. 

You can read the review via the below link:

http://www.philly.com/philly/entertainment/20161016_Mark_Twain_s_world_tour_comes_to_life_in__Chasing_the_Last_Laugh_.html

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North To Alaska: My Philadelphia Inquirer Review Of 'The Alaskan Laundry'

My review of Brendan Jones' The Alaskan Laundry appeared in today's Philadelphia Inquirer.

So what's a nice, South Philly Italian girl doing in Alaska?

Tara Marconi leaves her boyfriend, family, and job in the family bakery to venture to Alaska. She is 18, independent, angry, and tough, a Golden Gloves boxer. She decides to go to Alaska after her strict Sicilian American father kicks her out of the house.

Father and daughter have issues relating to her mother's recent death. And she is wrestling with memories of a trauma she has kept secret from her family. "She wanted to disappear, like the dot when she turned off the TV, reduced to a point," Jones writes, "to reanimate on some different planet, find some new sun to orbit."

Her cousin worked in Alaska on a fishing boat during a couple of summers, and his stories of Alaska, which he calls "the last frontier," inspire her to travel there. "Place is huge," he tells her.

In this coming-of-age story, Marconi travels to "the Rock," a remote island governed by the seasons and the arduous, foul, often dangerous work of commercial fishing. She works first at a hatchery, then a fish processor, and then signs on as a deckhand on fishing boats.

... With ponytail threaded through the back of her Eagles ball cap, she perseveres, thanks to strength of will, the discipline and ability gained from boxing, the companionship of an adopted dog, the help of a few Alaskan friends, and the ever-present dream of owning and repairing that old tugboat.

You can read the rest of the review via the below link:

http://www.philly.com/philly/entertainment/20160710__Alaskan_Laundry___Philly_woman_goes_where_you_can_wash_out_your_past.html

Note: I’ve never been to Alaska or worked in the fishing industry, but like Tara Marconi, I’m from South Philly. Like Tara and the author, I went to sea in my late teens (in my case, on an aircraft carrier). Like Tara and the author, I boxed a bit in my youth. And like Tara and the author, I lived on a tugboat (in my case, a Navy tugboat at the old submarine base in Scotland). I found Jones’ descriptions of things I know - South Philly, the sea, boats and boxing - to be accurate and vivid.

My Philadelphia Inquirer Review Of Mark Bowden's 'The Three Battles Of Wanat And Other True Stories'

My review of Mark Bowden's The Three Battles of Wanat And Other True Stories appeared today in the Philadelphia Inquirer.

As I wrote at the top of my review, I saw Mark Bowden at a Center City book store some years ago when he was promoting one of his books.

I recall that he spoke of his pleasant surprise that military people and their families were willing to open up to him. He noted that he didn’t serve in the military and previous to his Philadelphia Inquirer series on Black Hawk Down and his subsequent book, he had never covered the military.

As a Navy veteran, a former Defense Department civilian employee, and a writer who covers the military for The Journal of Counterterrorism & Homeland Security Int’l, I’ve associated with sailors, soldiers, marines and airmen nearly all of my life. For some years now I spoken to a good number of current and former armed forces members who very much like Bowden’s Black Hawk Down, Killing Pablo, Guests of the Ayatollah, and his other books on the military.

Although Bowden may not share their mostly hawkish views, most believe he is a fair reporter. Military people want their story told and fairness is all most of them ask for. That Bowden is also a fine storyteller is a plus.

You can read the review via the below link:

http://www.philly.com/inquirer/entertainment/20160327_Bowden_s__Three_Battles_of_Wanat___Continuing_a_great_tradition.html

Or below:

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My Philadelphia Inquirer Review Of 'The Letters Of Ernest Hemingway, 1926-1929'

The Philadelphia Inquirer published my review of The Letters Ernest Hemingway, 1926-1929, today.

Perhaps no 20th-century writer has had a greater influence than Ernest Hemingway. His novels, short stories, and journalism are penetrating and iconic; his personal life, thinly veiled in his fiction, was the stuff of drama and romance.

Hemingway was rich, famous, and beloved by millions of readers worldwide. He had the freedom to live and travel anywhere he wanted, and he hunted and fished around the world. As a writer, he covered wars, crime, sports, and any subject that interested him. Although his life ended in suicide, he otherwise led what was for many the quintessential writer's life.

The Cambridge University edition's third volume of The Letters of Ernest Hemingway covers 1926 to 1929, years of ascent and recognition. By 1926, Hemingway was a rising star on the literary Left Bank in Paris. Editor Sandra Spanier notes that this volume traces his emergence from a group of post-World War I expatriate writers into the American mainstream.

... "Hemingway was no ordinary correspondent, but a gifted writer with exceptional skills of observation and unusual sensitivity to his times," editor Rena Sanderson notes. "One of the distinguishing characteristics of his early fiction is its contemporary quality - its depiction of modern life during the early 20th century. The letters, like his fiction, reflect his sharp eye, and capture an era." 

You can read the rest of the review below or via the below link:

http://mobile.philly.com/beta?wss=/philly/entertainment/literature&id=367762651

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My Philadelphia Inquirer Review Of 'Hangman's Game'

The Philadelphia Inquirer published my review of Bill Syken's Hangman's Game today.

I've read scores of crime novels in which the protagonist is a cop, a crook, or a crime reporter - but a pro football player, let alone a punter? That's the case in Bill Syken's Hangman's Game, set against the backdrop of Philly professional football. Syken, a staff reporter and editor at Sports Illustrated and a Philadelphia resident, knows both football and Philly.

Nick Gallow, the narrator, is an injured college star quarterback who switches to punting to make it to the pros. "I figured it out once," he tells us at the outset. "I calculated the time I spend actually performing the task that gives my job title, and it came out to fifty-one minutes per year. Not even an hour. And that calculation is generous, believe me. That total grows if I include practices, but, still, that leaves me with a lot of anticipation to chew through."

It also leaves Gallow a lot of time to investigate the murder of a fellow football player.

You can read the rest of the review via the below link:

http://mobile.philly.com/beta?wss=/philly/entertainment&id=347316712 

My Philadelphia Inquirer Review Of Nelson DeMille's 'Radiant Angel'

My review of Nelson DeMille's thriller Radiant Angel appears in the Philadelphia Inquirer today.

In Radiant Angel, Nelson DeMille's latest thriller, John Corey targets the resurgent Russians, in a change of pace from the usual Middle Eastern terrorists. Corey, a tough, wisecracking, and irreverent retired NYPD homicide detective turned contract federal agent, has left the New York Anti-Terrorist Task Force for the Diplomatic Surveillance Group. He and his team are assigned to follow a Russian named Vasily Petrov, who is posing as a diplomat. Petrov is a colonel in the SVR, the Foreign Intelligence Service that took over espionage duties from the old KGB.

"Col. Petrov lives in a big high-rise in the upscale Riverside section of the Bronx," narrator Corey tells us. "The building, which we call the 'plex - short for complex - is owned and wholly occupied by the Russians who work at the U.N. and the Russian Consulate, and it is a nest of spies. The 'plex itself, located on a high hill, sprouts more antennas than a garbage can full of cockroaches."

... DeMille, a former U.S. Army officer who saw combat in Vietnam, did extensive research on seaport security for this thriller; a threat to New York Harbor is key to the plot. Radiant Angel is fast-paced and exciting, with amusing commentary and sarcastic asides from Corey. He's a loose cannon. But as DeMille has said in interviews, sometimes, a loose cannon is the only way to win a battle.

You can read the rest of the review below:

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My Philadelphia Inquirer Review Of Richard Price's 'The Whites'

My review of Richard Price's crime novel The Whites appeared in today's Philadelphia Inquirer. 

You can read the review below:

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My Philadelphia Inquirer Review Of 'Gotti's Rules'

My review of George Anastasia's Gotti's Rules appeared in today's Philadelphia Inquirer.

Appearing on ABC some years ago, former Mafia capo Salvatore "Sammy the Bull" Gravano told an interviewer about the time he was eating in a New York restaurant with Gambino crime family boss John Gotti.

A nearby couple was staring and whispering and Gotti grumbled. Gravano asked Gotti if he wanted him to handle it.

"No," Gotti told his underboss sternly. "This is my public."

Gravano said he was taken aback. They were both members of La Cosa Nostra, a secret criminal society. And here was a boss who believed he had a "public." Gravano said Gotti's ego and need for public attention led to his downfall.

In George Anastasia's Gotti's Rules, John Alite, an associate member of the Gotti crime family, outlines other Gotti shortcomings, such as rapacity, disloyalty, hypocrisy, and treachery.

As for Alite, Anastasia introduces him to the reader this way: "John Alite was a murderer, drug dealer and thug." For 25 years, Anastasia writes, Alite brutalized people. He stabbed them, shot them, and beat them with pipes, blackjacks, and baseball bats.

"He's not proud of that, but he doesn't try to hide from it, either," Anastasia writes. "It's who he was. But not who he is." Alite's years with the Gotti family ended when he testified in court against John Gotti's son, "Junior."

You can read the rest of the review below:

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My Philadelphia Inquirer Review Of 'Unbreakable Bonds: The Mighty Moms And Wounded Warriors Of Walter Reed'

The Philadelphia Inquirer published my review of Dava Guerin and Kevin Ferris' Unbreakable Bonds: The Mighty Moms and Wounded Warriors of Walter Reed today.

You can read the review below:

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