author: Murray Leinster
name: Bodhipaksa
average rating: 3.50
book published: 2007
rating: 3
read at: 09/08
date added: 09/02/08
shelves:
review:
This World Is Taboo is classic sci-fi from 1961, although there’s very much a 1950’s feel about the dialog and characterization. The hero, Calhoun, is an itinerant medical worker but with the quick wit and instincts of a Sam Spade. The plot does have some points to make about discrimination, although the sex roles are pure 1950s. Leinster wrote well for a science fiction author of his era, and at times he writes with a good deal of psychological insight. This short novel is worth a read as one of the better sci-fi novels of its time.

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This was only my second Cormac McCarthy novel — I’d read and loved All the Pretty Horses some years ago.

The Road is a splendid example of post-apocalyptic fiction (I almost said science fiction, but to many people that term is offputting) and could be described as "A Boy and His Dog" meets "Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome" meets The Odyssey.

An unnamed man and his son are heading south through a landscape devastated by a nuclear winter, in which nothing lives except for wary survivors, and in which there is nothing to eat but increasingly rare scavenged canned goods — and of course other wary survivors.

Some walk alone, others in small groups. Some have formed cannibalistic groups. All are heading south because there’s no other option.

The writing is terse and tight. The characterization is rich. The descriptive prose is breathtaking. The plot is tense.

It’s a quick read, which is just as well. I started reading The Road in bed, late at night, and couldn’t stop until I was finished, several hours later.

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The following book review was published in Wildmind’s latest newsletter.

8 Minute Meditation: Quiet Your Mind. Change Your Life, by Victor Davich (Perigee Trade, paperback, $12.95).

You can expect from Mr. Davich’s book a witty and engaging guide to some basic meditation techniques drawn from the world of Insight Meditation. The book outlines a systematic eight-week program of meditation, including the practices of simply following each breath, staying in the moment by “noting” thoughts as being about the past or future, paying attention to sounds, and some instructions on cultivating lovingkindness.

The guidance is clear and useful, but brief — probably totaling around a dozen pages out of almost 200. Most of the rest of the book deals with the common questions and misperceptions that teachers encounter — along the lines of meditation being the same as hypnotism, or meditation being a form of escapism — as well as some biographical material and a select list of resources.

Unfortunately you can’t, due to the unrelenting self-help-expert persona that Mr. Davich adopts, expect to be treated as an adult. We’re frequently reminded that the book contains no difficult words or complicated ideas. I don’t, it must be said, have any aversion to ideas that are expressed simply, but if you’re going to write that way just do it, and stop telling me you’re doing it! Keeping up his seventh-grade-level approach, the author even supplies us with a little “Certificate of Completion” that we can fill out ourselves. We’re also reminded that the author got an A in an exam and worked for two — not one, but two! — Fortune 500 companies, although what bearing this is meant to have on his abilities as a meditation instructor is not clear.

While I felt uncomfortable with the self-help presentation, I still thought that the guidance was apt and that the instructions, although simple, were effective. 8 Minute Meditations would certainly be useful for the readership at which it is clearly aimed — those who are seeking inspiration in the “self-help” section of their local bookstore and are completely new to meditation. More experienced meditators may gain some insights that could feed their practice, but I’d recommend that readers who fall into that category seek elsewhere for guidance.

That last post was just because I was subscribing my blog to Technorati and I had to put a link to my profile to prove I owned the blog. But while I was there [Vanity alert!!!] I did a quick search for my name and was pleasantly surprised to see that I’ve been blogged fairly often.

One blogger had apparently retyped my entire book on vegetarianism, had a friend add cartoons, and posted the whole thing online. Can you say “copyright violation” anyone? Anyway, I’m really not too bothered since it’s good to get the message of non-harm out there, and in fact I’m a little disappointed that the e-book no longer seems to be available. I wonder what the cartoons looked like?

“Mindful Eating” is becoming a popular subject these days, what with mindfulness practice diffusing into western culture and with westerners (and especially Americans) becoming increasingly overweight. A new book, “Mindless Eating,” explores the flip-side of mindful eating — why and how we eat without awareness even of how much we’re consuming.

The book hasn’t yet been published, but there was a fascinating article in the New York Times the other day — Seduced by Snacks? No, Not You (the NYT requires free registration) — about the author, Brian Wansink, Ph.D., and his work. Judging by the article the book will be a good read.