Day 352 – 52 Books in 52 Weeks

Four more books down… going to be close to finishing the fifty-two.

First book: Son of Hamas by Mosab Hassan Yousef. This is true story about Yousef who’s father was one of the seven founding members of Hamas (hence the title). He takes us through his upbringing as a Muslim. His grandfather was an Imam, his father a Sheikh. Yousef takes the reader behind the scenes of Hamas and gives insight into what Muslims are taught to believe and how Hamas operates and how all of his experiences led him to become a Christian.

I’m not going to say too much about this book because I borrowed it and I don’t have it here to reference as I write, and to rely on my memory isn’t a good idea. I do remember coming across some inconsistencies, such as him stating that it was his mother that woke the children for morning prayers, yet later in the book, several times, he mentions that it was his father. It doesn’t really change the story, it’s just one of those little things that stuck out to me.

Anyway, it was interesting to learn about his family, his father’s rather highly placed connections, and the Palestinian and Israeli conflict that still rages today. He also describes some of the means to recruit members into fighting and/or giving their lives for the Hamas’ cause. One example I wrote down in my notes says that in the first two and a half years of the Second Intifada (which began in 2000), Saddam Hussein paid $35 million to the families of Palestinian martyrs. Ten thousand dollars was paid to the family of anyone killed fighting in Israel and $25,000 to the family of every suicide bomber.

It was a revealing book, but a rather dry read.

Next up: Blaze by Richard Bachman, or as most of the universe knows him, Stephen King. This book surprised me. After reading two of his books this year and being left disappointed, I picked this one up because I knew it would be a fast read and I could add it to my list of completed books. It was, however, one of the best books I’ve read by King.

Blaze is a man who, as a child, had an abusive father who threw him down the stairs enough times to nearly kill him. The abuse left him slow but his size kept the bullies away. He falls in with a scam artist who sort of takes him under his wing. George, the scam artist, dies but Blaze is determined to carry out their last job: kidnapping the baby of a wealthy family. No harm is intended, they just want the money, then they’d turn the baby back over to the family.

King tells the story by going back and forth between the present (plotting of the kidnapping) and the past (Blaze’s life with his father, foster parents, orphanage, etc). Blaze is a magnificently drawn character, one of King’s best. His huge, six feet seven. His fist can kill a man but Blaze hates violence. And as King takes you through the story, you can’t help wanting to pull Blaze out of the mess he’s in and take care of him.

This is not a horror story. Granted you have George as sort of a “ghost” throughout the book, there’s none of the typical Stephen King gore or horror you’d expect. It’s a story about a guy who’s been kicked all of his life, who kidnaps a baby and falls in love with the child and the ensuing hunt to find him and the baby. The story is of the caliber that made King the biggest selling author of all time.

Third: Avenger by William Shatner. Yes, Captain Kirk. Yes, this is a Star Trek book. And yes, you could definitely tell it was written by Bill. The story takes place after the movie Star Trek Generations where Kirk dies and Picard buries him. A plague has hit the Federation and, of course, Kirk knows how it started, where it started and is going to find the cure. Kirk has supposedly found his true love, though of course, if there’s a beautiful young woman in the scene, Kirk is Kirk and his “true love” is forgotten.

Anyway…
We have Spock, Picard, Data, Riker and a slew of new characters… and the central figure: Spock’s father, Sarek. It’s a typical Star Trek novel, and entertaining. I like how Sarek was more or less the central figure (even though he’s dead) and how the two series were woven together through the common link with the Sarek story line (Kirk and his team don’t meet up with Picard and his team until late in the book – each has a different storyline). However, after just watching the Blu-Ray release of the Star Trek movies, an interview at the end has Shatner admitting he never saw The Next Generation (TNG)… yet the book is filled with references to TNG, so obviously he had a lot of help coming up with this story.

Fun, but predictable. Not exactly impressive writing.

Finally, Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer. Earlier in the year I had read Krakauer’s account of the tragic Mt. Everest disaster. Loved the book, loved the writing style, saw this in the store last night, picked it up and read it. I remember hearing all of the to-do about Sean Penn’s movie Into the Wild, but didn’t connect the two (since I hadn’t yet read Into Thin Air and thus didn’t know about Krakauer). In any case, I’m now interested in seeing the movie.

But about the book, the cover of the paperback says it all: “In April 1992 a young man from a well-to-do family hitchhiked to Alaska and walked alone into the wilderness north of Mt. McKinley. His name was Christopher Johnson McCandless. He had given $25,000 in savings to charity, abandoned his car and most of his possessions, burned all the cash in his wallet, and invented a new life for himself. Four months later, his decomposed body was found by a moose hunter…”

Krakauer takes the reader through the life of Chris McCandless. He pulls from interviews with the family, friends, those who gave Chris (or Alex as he called himself) rides, and Chris’ own journal. Was Chris on a suicide trip? Was he incompetent or stupid? Was he just a victim of bad luck? What really killed him?

Krakauer, in a very conversational style, leads the reader through the path that McCandless took and tries to get into the mind of the young man who was trying to live out the Tolstoyian life: away from government, away from civilization, close to nature. I don’t recall anything about the story when it broke in 1992, and after reading this book, I can’t believe I didn’t. It is an incredible story. A fresh-out-of-college man decides to up and travel across the country as a vagabond.

Krakauer was particularly interested in the story because his own was very much like Chris’: difficult relationships with their fathers, enjoyed the adventurous life, stubborn and willful, and a bit reckless. But Krakauer made it out of his reckless years alive. McCandless did not.

The book is both a great story of adventure, but also of lessons learned and mysteries to be solved. Very good book, well worth the read.

Son of Hamas: A Gripping Account of Terror, Betrayal, Political Intrigue, and Unthinkable Choices

Blaze: A Novel

Avenger (Star Trek)

Into the Wild