reviews

The Bravery of Choice: Life After the Apocalypse Author: Stephen King Combining horror and philosophy into a haunting literary mélange, The Stand has long been touted as one of King’s most revolutionary and enduring works. Integrating visceral horror with psychological trauma and spanning a wide scope of characters and choices, the 1000 + page work is a true opus, almost an epic, with a distinctive set of parts. First there is death, then recovery, and finally: ultimate choice in which the characters choose to stand for their beliefs. It all begins in the dead of night when a lone man and his [...]

Voodoo, James Bond, and Sharks Author: Ian Fleming In the second James Bond novel our suave anti-hero finds himself enmeshed in a smuggling scam with international ramifications and the tribal hint of voodoo. Sent by M to investigate a criminal overlord in New York by the name of Mr. Big, Bond finds himself following the roots of the problem back to a long lost pirate treasure in the tropically creepy climes of Jamaica. Along the way, he meets a seductive Fortune Teller, Solitaire, tied to the criminal empire who is charmed into helping Bond unweave the complicated history of lies [...]

A Patriot in Moscow? Author:  Ted Rall Patriotism.  Not of the “my country right or wrong” variety, but something based more on a steadfast belief in the founding principles of American democracy.  That’s the emotion that resonates most strongly in Snowden, a brief illustrated account of the life of a young whistleblower in exile by Ted Rall. Famous for single-handedly revealing the full extent of the US government’s ubiquitous domestic surveillance system in 2013, Edward Snowden has been both hailed as a hero and condemned as a criminal.  But whatever you think about his actions, the question that’s most intriguing [...]