Down and Out in Paradise, The Life of Anthony Bourdain

DOWN AND OUT IN PARADISE, THE LIFE OF ANTHONY BOURDAIN by Charles Leerhsen is well read by Vikas Adam. It’s a harrowing but always interesting backstory to the celebrity chef whose impact on culture was worldwide due to his years on the road in three series, talking food and impressions of those he met. Bourdain was an enigma to many, especially after his suicide, foretold earlier in his life at points when his “dark side” emerged. His best friends were stunned that he would hang himself over a woman who proved impossible to please or control. Leerhsen spent many hours interviewing associates and acquaintances in order to unravel the mystery, and criticizes the CNN film Roadrunner for staying on script and not examining what was his ever ambitious personality—to live fast and die young. A narcissist who hated his own life and could blame his crew and handlers for not getting things just right, Bourdain nonetheless had a sense of obligation and this book explores where his gifts lay and where they didn’t. It attempts to turn the mystique inside out, and achieves this, if not to the extent that Kitchen Confidential created it. Recommended for anyone wanting to understand the dual nature of the human psyche.

When You Have to Go There by Kevin R. Doyle

WHEN YOU HAVE TO GO THERE by Kevin R. Doyle is read by Caryn Hoaglund for Books in Motion. It’s a police procedural following detective Helen Lipscomb, after she’d botched a case and been reassigned from her squad. She then is on the case of a serial killer killing cops, and must negotiate the politics of the office and numerous finger pointing sessions to survive with her career and her life. Doyle is author of THE GROUP series, of which this is book two, the last being AND THE DEVIL WALKS AWAY. Hoagland is a stage actress from Spokane who elicits empathy well with the main character while walking us through the day to day habits and back stabbing that make up modern police detective units, especially for women. Her reading is straight and crisp. At just over nine hours, it’s recommended for listeners who want a realistic background to fill out the headlines which most police books focus on. The characters seem real, and the action never too unbelievable. Following procedure is everything in the police department, as you may suspect. Don’t make waves or go outside your narrow chain of command. Lipscomb takes heat for her actions here, which are dramatic. 

Neither Snow Nor Rain and Shutter

NEITHER SNOW NOR RAIN: A HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES POSTAL SERVICE by Devin Leonard is read by LJ Ganser for Recorded Books. It details the entire history since the time of Franklin until 2016. It has been quite a ride. At one time the USPS was without peer, and indispensable. Letters were without envelopes and sorted without zip codes. Then, with the expansion of the country west, special efforts were required to reach San Francisco and the gold boom via stagecoach and horse. When UPS and Federal Express started cutting into funds, junk mail came into being to save it. But then came email. Who writes personal letters much, anymore? Well, they do on birthdays and holidays, but for years now the postal service has been shuttering offices and moving from hiring to automation and robots. This is in part from violence, also outlined in the book. Such as the shooting in Edmond, Oklahoma, when a man killed 14 and himself. He’d been chosen over 22 other people because he was a vet, even though he was on verge of being fired from a previous postal job. Many fingers were pointed between management and the unions, as other shootings occurred. My own novel Postmarked for Death was influenced by one in Royal Oak, Michigan. It’s a chilling account there, too. What happens next is anyone’s guess. But the shootings appear to have subsided, and moved into the general public. This book is a must hear for anyone with a stamp collection. 

SHUTTER by Ramona Emerson is read by Charley Flyte. It’s an odd novel, well written but more of a literary title than a thriller. It’s about a Navajo photographer named Rita who works for the Albuquerque NM police department. She sees some of the victims, and hopes to take their pictures but can’t. She doesn’t believe in God, but she believes in ghosts. The writing is superb, but can sidestep into personal matters since it’s written in the first person. She was discriminated against as a child, and learned to take photographs as an escape. Each chapter title is another brand of camera. She says at one point that she remembered upsetting her parents by never crying, just laying there staring upward, so they never knew when she was asleep or might be dead. She has an affinity to the dead, and one in particular is with her from beginning to end. Will it all be resolved in a followup novel? We shall see. Or rather hear. Charley Flyte is an excellent narrator, who captures the wordy images with a snap for each shot. 

Cheating Death audiobook

Never thought I’d hear a book about aging that revealed so many things others hadn’t.  Not only do you learn which vitamins and supplements work and which don’t, but the interactions and reasons behind the confusion. Drug and hormone and stem cell research therapies aid the overall understanding needed to negotiate the sea of products and opinions out there, dazzling and blinding at the same time. What do you really need? A cogent, deciplined approach to the subject of aging survival geared to outsmart diabetes, cancer, heart disease, and dementia. Narrated by the always engaging LJ Ganser, CHEATING DEATH by Dr. Rand McClain is a must hear for everyone over fifty looking to beat the odds stacked against us all. Diet, exercise, and prevention, plus modern science testing and monitoring plus treatments add up to little if you don’t comprehend the big picture. Here is that moving picture. Rated GPG, meaning Grand Parents Guidance.  

Cadillac Desert and Superfans

Couple centuries back the call “go west, young man!” propelled settlers and homesteaders into the Louisiana Purchase and beyond into New Mexico, Colorado, Arizona, Nevada, Utah, and California. Our mythic vision of “conquering” the west envisioned cowboys and ranches with cattle and crops abundant. Indians were resettled onto reservations, although many did not go quietly. Fast forward to today, with many millions of people inhabiting oasis cities like Vegas, Phoenix, and Los Angeles, sustained by dams and water projects that feed water out for irrigation, and cause rival special interests to lobby for rights to dwindling supplies. Farmers, ranchers, and the general voting public still yearn to maintain the values represented by “taming” the west, six gun in holster, cattle lasso at the ready.  It is a powerful image, not one easily refuted. What refutes it? Science. The west is drying up, due in part to climate change, growing populations using up underground water that fell as rain centuries earlier (when no one lived there), cattle production, and dams redirecting river water to irrigate fields instead of replenishing underground reserves. Those who think short-term and expect the government to solve the problem are in for a big surprise. According to the author of Cadillac Desert (a classic examination of the history of water in the west) “unless people change, the desert will reclaim the west. The desert cities will see a mass exodus.” This audiobook by Marc Reisner, read by Francis Spieler and Kate Udall, contains an apocalyptic postscript by Lawrie Mott. California wildfires and droughts will increase in time, while flooding and hurricanes will dominate the eastern seaboard. Some of the points made by the book, whose subtitle is “The American West and Its Disappearing Water,” are: 1) Instead of cattle we should raise bison, which require much less water. (Settlers killed bison for sport by the thousands from trains.) 2) Dams on rivers exist in the thousands, but are not sustainable, and kill untold millions of fish like salmon. Some are dangerous, such as several located near earthquake faults in California. A wall of water twenty stories high coming down main street is not something a non-superhero could survive. 3) No single politician has or will ever be able to solve this problem. It is too complex. Just ask Jack Nicholson’s character in the movie Chinatown. (The Owens Valley water wars that inspired the film are but one of the scandals explored in the book.) No one can predict when exactly it will happen, and few are even asking. Short term profits beat long term solutions in American politics, as everyone scrambles for their cut before the bowl goes dust.  

George Orwell once said that, “Sports is war minus the shooting.” Award winning sports journalist George Dohrmann has compiled a select tribute to fandom in SUPERFANS, which utilizes the stories of actual fans whose extreme love of sports animate the text. Part psychology, part revelatory confession, the audiobook is narrated by former sports radio host, actor, and voiceover talent Chris Ciulla (audiobooks to video games such as Fallout 4.) Ciulla is an engaging narrator whose tone fits the material without being melodramatic. After all, some of the “superfans” are melodramatic enough. One Vikings fan posted 1000 times a year on a message board, besides watching games. Shrines to teams are assembled around TV sets. A church pastor admitted to be a “crazy” fan of the Cowboys, while a church podium in one parking lot ushered in new fans devoting their lives forever with the ending shout, “Score!” Another fan threatened the life of an opponent’s family although he was a professional and family man himself. Still, Dohrmann denies sports is religion, despite the Religion of Sport series on Directv. In editing fan stories to let fans do most of the talking, Dohrmann maintains his distance from criticism, instead letting some of the psychologists he interviewed do the job of talking about player concussions, domestic violence, and time lost to superfans whose devotion to teams is due to their identity with the team, and may consume their lives. Will appeal to fans and sports atheists alike.        

Award winning sports journalist George Dohrmann has compiled a select tribute to fandom utilizing the stories of actual fans whose extreme love of sports animate the text. Part psychology, part revelatory confession, the audiobook is narrated by former sports radio host, actor, and voiceover talent Chris Ciulla with an engaging tone befitting the material without being melodramatic. Vikings fans are melodramatic enough: one posted 1000 times a year on a message board, besides watching games. Shrines to teams are assembled around TV sets. A church podium ushers in new fans devoting their lives forever with the ending shout, “Score!” In editing fan stories, Dohrmann lets psychologists he interviewed talk about player concussions, domestic violence, and any negatives. Will appeal to fans and sports atheists alike.