Published: April 23, 2012
Wild |
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Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail
By Cheryl Strayed
New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2012
As Reviewed By Ted Odenwald
Cheryl Strayed’s surname is basically a self-imposed label which she took legally when she divorced. “I had diverged, digressed, wandered, and become wild. I didn’t embrace the world as my new name because it defined [...]
Published: April 6, 2012
Robertson Davies: Man of Myth |
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Judith Skelton Grant. Robertson Davies: Man of Myth.
New York: Viking, 1994.
As reviewed by Ted Odenwald
As the hundredth anniversary of his birth approaches, it seems appropriate to revisit the life and accomplishments of Canadian novelist, journalist, educator, dramatist, and performing artist, Robertson Davies. Judith Skelton Grant’s detailed, analytical, and incisive biography pays tribute to her fellow [...]
Published: March 4, 2012
Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman |
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According to narrative historian, Robert Massie, Catherine the Great of Russia was “a majestic figure in the age of monarchy,” unequaled by all enthroned women except Elizabeth I of England. Her achievements rank her alongside the most famous Russian ruler, Peter the Great, as both expanded Russian territories and…
Published: February 23, 2012
A Jane Austen Education |
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William Deresiewicz. A Jane Austen Education: How Six Novels Taught Me about Love, Friendship, and the Things that Really Matter. New York: Penguin Press. 2011.
As reviewed by Ted Odenwald
William Deresiewicz combines literary criticism and memoir, focusing primarily upon how the novels of Jane Austen had awakened him to certain truths about life in general—and had [...]
Published: January 17, 2012
Charles Dickens: A Life |
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Claire Tomalin. Charles Dickens: A Life.
New York: The Penguin Press. 2011.
As Reviewed by Ted Odenwald
Claire Tomalin has written an outstanding biography of Charles Dickens, published for the two hundredth anniversary of the birth of Britain’s greatest 19th-century novelist. Her meticulously researched and documented study explores Dickens’ strengths and weaknesses, presenting opposing sides of controversial issues, [...]
Published: December 27, 2011
The Shakespeare Thefts: In Search of the First Folios |
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Eric Rasmussen. The Shakespeare Thefts: In Search of the First Folios.
New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011.
As reviewed by Ted Odenwald
A character in Edgar Lee Master’s Spoon River Anthology observes that people thought him mad because his life goal was to memorize the entire Encyclopedia Britannica. Shakespearean scholar makes a similar profession of lunacy regarding his decades’-long [...]
Published: December 3, 2011
Roger Ebert. Life Itself: A Memoir |
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Roger Ebert. Life Itself: A Memoir.
New York: Grand Central Publishing, 2011.
As reviewed by Ted Odenwald
Rituals are an important part of Roger Ebert’s life. He revisits people and events that have been formative for him. He revisits places through which his education and career have taken him: his hometown, Urbana, Illinois; the University of Illinois, [...]
Published: November 20, 2011
Nightwoods |
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Charles Frazier. Nightwoods.
New York: Random House, 2011.
As reviewed by Ted Odenwald
Set in rural North Carolina in the early 1960’s, Charles Frazier’s Nightwoods exhibits strengths that readers have come to expect from his two earlier novels, Cold Mountain and Thirteen Moon: characters who are on the fringes of society, intelligent beyond their levels of education; a [...]
Published: October 23, 2011
Our Kind of Traitor |
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John Le Carre. Our Kind of Traitor.
New York: Viking. 2010
As reviewed by Ted Odenwald
Though Our Kind of Traitor may not be totally Orwellian in message and tone, there is enough disenchantment and cynicism permeating this novel to assure us that John Le Carre has not lost his edge. His target is corruption in the [...]
Published: September 30, 2011
Dear Donna, It’s only 45 Hours from Bien Hoa |
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Dear Donna, It’s only 45 Hours from Bien Hoa: Stories from the Vietnam War.
Douglas Neralich.
1st Books Library, 2002.
As reviewed by Ted Odenwald
Douglas “Doc” Neralich has created a succinct, incisive, and moving collage of his experiences as a medic with the 36th Engineer Battalion in Vinh Long, Vietnam. Interweaving short stories, brief anecdotes, and poetry, “Doc” [...]
Published: September 12, 2011
Benjamin Franklin: An American Life |
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Walter Isaacson. Benjamin Franklin: An American Life.
New York: Simon and Schuster Paperbacks, 2003.
As reviewed by Ted Odenwald
To arrive at an accurate picture of Benjamin Franklin, claims biographer Walter Isaacson, “we must rescue [him] from the schoolbook caricature of a genial codger flying kites…and spouting homespun maxims… [and from] critics who would confine him with the [...]
Published: August 28, 2011
FDR’s Funeral Train |
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Robert Klara. FDR’s Funeral Train: A Betrayed Widow,
a Soviet Spy, and a Presidency in the Balance.
New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010.
As reviewed by Ted Odenwald
The death of President Franklin D. Roosevelt on April 12, 1945, shook the nation; the heroic world leader, who had guided his people through the Great Depression and through nearly four years [...]
Published: August 15, 2011
In the Garden of Beasts |
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Erik Larson. In the Garden of Beasts.
New York: Crown Publishing Company, 2011.
As reviewed by Ted Odenwald
FDR’s choice of William E. Dodd as ambassador to Germany in 1933 was odd at best. Dodd simply did not fit the “mold” required for the august position: he was not rich; he had no political leanings; his views of [...]
Published: August 1, 2011
Clarence Darrow: Attorney for the Damned |
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John A. Farrell. Clarence Darrow: Attorney for the Damned.
New York: Doubleday, 2011.
as reviewed by Ted Odenwald
Clarence Darrow is often regarded as a folk hero, as evidenced by two American classics: Irving Stone’s biographical novel, Clarence Darrow for the Defense and Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee’s depiction of the Scopes Monkey Trial in [...]
Published: July 20, 2011
The Final Storm: A Novel of the War in the Pacific |
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Jeff Shaara. The Final Storm: A Novel of the War in the Pacific.
New York: Ballantine Books, 2011.
As reviewed by Ted Odenwald
Okinawa was the last stepping stone for American forces as they anticipated invading Japan and eventually ending World War II. But the stepping stone became a major stumbling block-a series of gruesome, bloody battles [...]
Published: July 6, 2011
Washington: A Life |
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Ron Chernow. Washington: A Life.
New York: Penguin Press, 2010.
As reviewed by Ted Odenwald
The fresco in the eye of the U.S. Capitol rotunda depicts the “apotheosis of Washington,” the ascension into the heavens of the “Father of our country.” For two centuries Americans have idolized, lionized, mythicized, and even deified the Revolutionary War hero [...]
Published: June 18, 2011
Jeff Shaara's Civil War Battlefields |
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Jeff Shaara. Jeff Shaara’s Civil War Battlefields: Discovering America’s
Hallowed Ground. New York: Ballantine Books, 2006.
As reviewed by Ted Odenwald
Jeff Shaara has written two fine Civil War novels, Gods and Generals and The Last Full Measure, which, joined with his father’s Killer Angels, comprise a powerful and moving trilogy analyzing several major battles and [...]
Published: June 9, 2011
The Captain: The Journey of Derek Jeter |
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Ian O’Connor. The Captain: The Journey of Derek Jeter.
New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2011.
as reviewed by Ted Odenwald
Ian O’Connor is well known to Bergen County sports fans as a knowledgeable analyst, a lover of the game of baseball, and a biting critic of capitalistic baseball, the business world that has inspired megalithic stadiums, [...]
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