Some Recent Books Read

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I’ve been zipping through paperbacks like crazy, and here are some recent reads of note.  One very interesting one is Beyond Belief: My Secret Life Inside Scientology and My Harrowing Escape (2013) by Jenna Miscavige Hill.  Jenna is the niece of Scientology’s supreme leader, David Miscavige, and she defected from the cult as a young adult after growing up in it.  She doesn’t show the church in a good light, and her narrative squares well with other reports I’ve read about it.  (I’m a bit of a cult-watching junky, fascinated by quirky aspects of comparative religion, and I’ve been following Scientology’s meltdown for quite a while.) 

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A Handmaid’s Tale (1985) by Margaret Atwood is science fiction portraying a totalitarian theocracy in the USA.  It was a nominee for the Libertarian Futurist Society’s Prometheus Award.  Scary. 

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What It Is Like to Go to War (2011) by Karl Marlantes is an honest look at the human institution of warfare, by someone who has seen the hell of war.  He had written the novel Matterhorn: a novel of the Vietnam War (2011), and after reading both I see that his novel had drawn on many of his personal experiences.  Nasty shit, but his thoughts on war are important. 

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I am reading the textbook, Buddhist Religions:  a historical introduction (2005) by Robinson, Johnson, and Thanissaro, 5^th edition.  I had read the 4^th edition before I left the States, and this is heavily revised.  I am also reading, along with it, its companion volume of readings, The Experience of Buddhism: sources and interpretations (2002) by John S. Strong, 2^nd edition.  Both are part of the excellent series, “The Religious Life in History”.  But I get bogged down in the parts about the later mystical sects of Buddhism and their supernatural beliefs. 

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Charles Stross is one of my favorite science fiction writers.  His Halting State was great, and I just read the sequel, Rule 34.  His Glasshouse (2006) won a Prometheus award from the LFS.  He has an under-stated sense of humor somewhere between P.G. Wodehouse and H.P. Lovecraft.  (Was Lovecraft funny??) 

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Last Hours on Everest (2013) by Graham Hoyland dealt with the famous 1924 disappearance of Mallory and Irvine on Everest’s heights.  A good overview of the whole subject. 

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I just finished Ready Player One (2012) by Ernest Cline.  Also a Prometheus winner.  A great read. 

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-Zenwind.

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