Book Talk

Gloom and Doom

We can handle bad news in lovely weather a little better than in January and lots of books about troubling issues arrived this month. By all means read them, then go outside and enjoy the greening trees!
   
Mark Lynas has written Six Degrees: our Future on a Hotter Planet. Estimates of temperature increase by the end of this century reach to almost six degrees Celsius. This seemingly small increase will change life as we know it.  Coral reefs will die, polar animals go extinct, the American Midwest and the Amazon basin will become arid wastelands. Whole countries will disappear and, if we are lucky, we will be able to relocate to survive. Lynas believes that we have less than a decade to implement necessary changes.

Earth: the Sequel, the Race to Reinvent Energy and Stop Global Warming by Fred Krupp, has a slightly more hopeful tone.  The change to other forms of energy will created new jobs, industries and fortunes.

Warning against the alternative energy hype is Robert Bryce. He warns that the United States will need foreign oil for decades to come. No combination of current technologies can replace oil. Read Gusher of Lies: the Dangerous Delusions of “Energy Independence”.

Nobel prizewinner in economics, Joseph E. Stiglitz, and Linda J Bilmes estimate that the war in Iraq will cost about three trillion ($3,000,000,000) dollars of American wealth. Obviously the pre-war estimate of 50 million dollars was a little low… And besides the cost, there has been a lack of planning in paying for it. Earlier wars were financed by raising taxes. During this war, taxes were cut. The enormous economic and social consequences are explored in The Three Trillion Dollar War: the True Cost of the Iraq Conflict.

Sadly, the cost of war is also measured in human lives, and one that was lost was that of Pat Tillman. A NFL player who gave up a promising career to enlist, Tillman was killed near the Pakistan border. Though first reported to have been ambushed by the enemy, his family later learned that he was killed by friendly fire. Written by his mother, Mary Tillman with Narda Zacchino, Boots on the Ground by Dusk: my Tribute to Pat Tillman, is the story of the family’s search for the truth.

British author Nicholas Guyatt cuts right to the chase in Have a Nice Doomsday: Why Millions of Americans are Looking Forward to the End of the World. Guyatt traveled across the United States visiting mega-churches and desert prophets to find the rationale. He considerately includes a list of “Ten Apocalyptic Books, Movies, and Games you Shouldn’t be Without.”

Even fiction books are predicting the end…According to Mayan legend, if thirteen skulls are not reunited the world will end on December 21, 2012. Stella Cody must unravel the secret notes of the crystal skull’s last Keeper to prevent the prophecy from being fulfilled. Many men have died for this perfect blue sapphire, and there has already been an attempt on Stella’s life. Read The Crystal Skull by Manda Scott.

Twenty years ago Nell Jarreau witnessed a murder and her testimony put a man in prison. New evidence has exonerated the man. In Delusion by Peter Abrahams, Nell re-examines the past, and its path to present danger.

In Santa Fe Dead by Stuart Woods, trial lawyer Ed Eagle has testified against his ex-wife. A very bad move as she is still able to make his life a living hell. His only way out is to figure out what she’s really up to.

In 1955 Phenix City, Alabama was dubbed “The Wickedest City in America”. After crime fighter Albert Patterson is gunned down, a small group of men decide they have had enough. Wicked City by Ace Atkins blends truth and fiction to describe their battles.

Virginia Cooper
Adult Services Librarian