A new year...a new decades challenge

Happy new year to my reader(s): Just popping in to make a list for the new decades challenge. Last year, I went from the 1830s and worked my way toward modern times. This year, we begin in the 1990s and work back. Here goes:
1990s - Darwin: the life of a tormented evolutionist
1980s - Galapagos by Kurt Vonnegut or Pleasures of entomology by Howard Evans
1970s - On Human Nature by E. O. Wilson
1960s - Cat's cradle by Vonnegut or Life of Insects by Wigglesworth
1950s - Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury
1940s - The natural history of mosquitoes by Maston Bates
1930s - Biology of the amphibia by Noble
1920s - The biography of spiders by Savory
1910s - The life of the caterpillar by Fabre
1900s - Insect life by Comstock

After looking at the list, I do detect an insectish theme here. We may play with this list over the coming months, but tomorrow I begin to read...and read...and read.

Finishing up the Decades Challenge

Well, I finally made it. I finished the Decades challenge almost a year after it began. And I thoroughly enjoyed it. Read a bunch of stuff I wouldn't have otherwise read. Here's what was read:
1830s - Voyage of the Beagle by Charles Darwin
1840s - Vestiges by Robert Chambers
1850s - The origin of species by Charles Darwin
1860s - Man's place in nature by Thomas Huxley
1870s - Descent of Man by Charles Darwin
1880s - The formation of vegetable mould by Charles Darwin
1890s - The island of Dr. Moreau by H. G. Wells
1900s - The natural history of aquatic insects by H. Miall
1910s - The lost world by A. C. Doyle
1920s - The origin of birds by Heilmann
1930s - Snows of Kilimanjaro by Ernie Hemingway.

I'm definitely going to do this challenge again in 2009, but I won't go so deeply into the past. I really wanted to read the old evolution masterpieces. In the coming year, I may begin in the 1970s, 1980s, or 1990s and work my way back. Thanks for doing this challenge, Michelle, and I can't wait to get back to it in January!

The lost world

I was happy to read The lost world by Arthur Conan Doyle for the Decades challenge (1910s). I haven't read any A.C. Doyle since I read some Sherlock Holmes as a kid. In short, I really loved this book. It was full of interesting characters and adventure. I wish I read it as a kid. I would've loved this book when I was 10.

As a biologist, I do have some issues with the science, but I don't want to be a spoil sport. This is a fast reading, well written (and easy to read for an almost 100 year old book), adventure story. I can't wait until I can read it again. It usually only takes me about 18 months to completely forget a book so I can read it again. Middle age and stupidity do have their up sides.

Hemingway: Stories where nothing happens Part II

In college a friend of mine suggested that I read The Sun also rises. I was amazed at how it was an entire book where absolutely nothing happened. I kept waiting for SOMETHING, but that something just never came.

Well, I gave Ernie another try with pretty much the same results. For Annie's What's in a Name Challenge as well as the Decades Challenge (1930s), I read Snows of Kilimanjaro. It was a series of short stories where basically nothing happens. Nada. After a whole series of such stories, imagine my surprise when I got to the last story where something actually happened. The last story is a humdinger and I recommend it. The rest of the book I would only recommend for people whose lives are way too and they need a book to calm them down. For such people who couldn't take any excitement at all, this is a good read.

My Ph.D. adviser did tell me not to tear down a barn unless I could rebuild it better. I definitely can't write better. His prose is actually very nice, but story-wise I really would have liked some plot. My advice is to skip to the last story, "The short happy life of Francis Macomber.

What's in a Name II

I am delighted to sign up for my daughter's new reading challenge, What's in a Name II. Here are some possibilities:

1. Profession: Darwin: the life of a tormented evolutionist by Desmond and Moore, Time traveler by Novacek

2. Time of Day: The search for Dawn Monkey by Beard, Night Prey by Sanford, Dawn of the Dinosaurs by Prothero.

3. Relative: Beyond Band of Brothers by Winters, Wifey by Judy Blume (no giggles, please, New Guinea tapeworms and Jewish Grandmothers by Desowitz

4. Body Part: Bones of contention by Chambers, Taking wing by Shipman, Fins into limbs by Hall.

5. Building: Welcome to the Monkey House by Vonnegut, The Haunting of Hill House by Jackson

6. Medical Condition: Musicophilia by Sacks, Death Trap by McDonald, Fates worse than death by Vonnegut

Thanks for the Challenge, Annie!

Miocene Apes: Here's what I think

I read The ape in the tree: an intellectual and natural history of Proconsul by Alan Walker and Pat Shipman, the husband and wife team from Penn State, which is my wife's alma mater and where my academic career got off to a very inauspicious beginning in 1984, but it wasn't all a bust because I met my wife who is my favorite person as well as my best friend. But, this isn't the time or the place to walk down memory lane. This was an interesting book. I read this for the What an Animal Challenge. The first part was a travelogue and discussion of the logistics of major paleological expeditions. This part of the book was interesting, but I was really itching to learn more about them miocene apes, which was the subject of the second half of the book. This part was enlightening and somewhat frustrating. I learned a bit about Proconsul and a few other early apes, but I was left really longing for more. I wanted more in depth natural history of all of the miocene apes, but I feel like I didn't get it in this book. I did enjoy the style and writing of the book. It was a nice fast read, but now I've got to dig deeper into the literature to learn more about my early ancestors.

Not Fantasy Island

Once again, my wonderful wife, Debi, recommended a winning book. She knew I would like The Island of Dr. Moreau by H. G. Wells and indeed I did. I read this one for The Decades Challenge (1890s) as well as for R.I.P. Challenge.

A man is lost at sea in a lifeboat and "lucky" for him he is picked up by a ship. He can't help but notice that one of the men on the ship is strange. He has a beastly snout and ears. But, once they arrive at the Island, he soon realizes that there are many beast-men roaming free on the Island. And to compound the tension, there are horrible screams coming from Dr. Moreau's lab at all hours of night and day. Well, it turns out that Moreau has the lab skills necessary to turn animals into men-like creatures. The men-like creatures are not supposed to eat meat, but some of the island's rabbits have been turning up half eaten. The tension builds and before long, the man finds himself alone with the beast-men, who are becoming more beastly by the day. If Something Wicked This Way Comes was creepy, this book was really creepy. But excellent.

As if this story wasn't fascinating enough, the author's writing was absolutely captivating. The writing was amazingly elegant. This book is over 100 years old, and older books can sometimes be a real bummer to read sometimes (e.g., Dickens' Great Expectations...I anxiously await the wrath of the Dickens crowd). Not this book, however. I can't wait to read more Wells, especially War of the Worlds. This was an extremely interesting story that was written in amazingly engaging and elegant prose.

Something wicked

I had a tough time picking books for the RIP Challenge, but my lovely wife, Debi, recommended Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury. I've never read any Bradbury before, so I gave this one a shot. It does have a very catchy title, I thought. And it is a very interesting and creepy book. A carnival rolls into town in the wee hours of the morning and two teenage boys have to check it out. They see some very strange things involving, among other things, the time space continuum and a shrunken salesman, and get the carnies angry. These are carnies you don't want to be angry with you. They engage the boys in a cat and mouse game for a while. Ultimately, the Rooseveltian concept that there is nothing to fear but fear itself wins the day and puts the carnies in their place. Ray Bradbury has a very distinctive style of writing that definitely helps keep up the creepy tone of the book. I'm very glad I read this one, especially at this time of year.

Thoughts on Stalking the Plumed Serpent

This is another one I read for the What an Animal Challenge. I didn't PLAN to read this one for this challenge, but I found out about this book, which is new, and I couldn't resist furthering my snake theme that I have going. This book is a series of "adventures in herpetology" that are mainly about snakes by D. Bruce Means, who is a herpetologist at Florida State. He travels around the world in pursuit of interesting species of snakes. His stated goal in this book is to make more people appreciate snakes and other "creepy crawlies". Like many herpetologists, he things warm and fuzzy mammals get most of the conservation efforts, and, of course, he is correct. I think that he will mostly be preaching to the choir, as this book will probably be read by people like me who already love creepy crawlies, snakes, sharks, worms, bugs, and other things that make many people scream. But if he succeeds and converts a few people, then it will be well worth the effort. I enjoyed this book, which could've used a few more pictures of the creatures he was "hunting". It did have 10 pages or so of pictures, but it is hard to get an idea of the beauty of a rare snake without seeing it. Sometimes a picture is worth 1000 words as they say. One part of this book stood out to me. The author hiked a several hundred mile "trail" that John Muir hiked in the early 1800s. It was now nothing but highways and strip malls and the author was almost run over several times. It does speak volumes about the progress of mankind and how we treat our world. We are paving and building all animals into oblivion. And we are animals, too.

Natural History of Aquatic Insects

I read Natural History of Aquatic Insects by Professor L. C. Miall for the Decades Challenge (1900s) and for the What an Animal Challenge. You know this book is old when the author refers to himself as "Professor". I'll have to do that when I write my first book. This book was written in 1903. It contains the level of nauseating descriptive detail only found in nature books from this era. It goes through various groups of aquatic insects and lists all of the information known about each. Usually one or two well known species are highlighted. But the level of detail is intense and you can and will learn quite a bit about this group of creatures from this book. All told, there really are not many books about the ecology of aquatic bugs. Even though it's 105 years out of date, this is a very educational book. I learned a lot. I did, in fact, forget much of what I learned because I read it months ago and am just now doing the review. But whenever I need to know how a midge larvae breathes or what a whirligig beetle eats, I know which book to use.

The Origin of Birds - A must for vertebrate zoologists

I read the Origin of Birds by Gerhard Heilmann for the decades challenge. This book was published in the US in 1927 and was very much ahead of its time in its content. It is more than anything else a book about the similarities between birds and reptiles and makes one of the stronger arguments I've ever read for common ancestry between these groups. Long before Velociraptor and Deinonychus and other very famous bird-like dinos were found, Heilmann saw the important similarities. He found, as have later researchers, so many similarities between certain reptiles and birds that they MUST be related. My students are to this day absolutely astounded to hear of this, but it was noted as soon as Archaeopteryx was found in the 1860s. This book has a wonderful description of Archaepteryx.
It is an incredibly detailed book. The level of anatomical detail would probably bore most people without a vested interest in vertebrate zoology to tears. But I found it extremely educational. Heilmann, as I stated earlier, was a great arguer. His rebuttal of the hypothesis that birds are related to bird-hipped Ornithischian dinosaurs was scathing.
This is not an easy book to get one's hands on. I managed to buy an old library copy for only $37, but some copies approach $100. Glad I got it and glad I read it.

Stephen Jay Gould's Hen's Teeth and Horse's Toes

I read this as part of the What an Animal Challenge. It is a collection of the great evolutionary biologist Stephen Jay Gould's essays that he used to publish in Natural History magazine. It is an older collection, originally published in 1983, but still very relevant and interesting. There were essays on the history of evolutionary thought and evolutionary politics, such as the Scopes "Monkey" Trial. Several essays were on exceptions to "traditional" thinking on evolution and "Darwinism". Gould is an interesting mix of scientific and professional ego, love of Darwin, and hatred of "dogma" and a need to "think differently", especially about "Darwinism". Some of his thoughts are so bogged down in his own personal issues that he can't see facts right in front of him, while at other times he is incredible free thinking and poking fun at people who are "stuck in the rut" of traditional thinking. I used to think he was a bit more of an egomaniac, but after seeing him on the Simpsons, I saw his lighter and funnier side. But, as a lover of evolution, I must respect him and admire his erudition. Much of the time, we see the world in very similar ways. In this particular collection of his essays, Gould is, I think, at his best. The essays are thoughtful, interesting, educational, and well worth reading even 25 years after the fact. I had some of my students read an essay from a similar book last year, and many of them found Gould to be a bit tough to swallow. He was an academic and an intellectual and was very fond of big words. But he was a fascinating author full of fascinating ideas, and I will not rest until I've read all of his collections of essays. I've read several other of these collections as well as bits and pieces here and there. This collection is the best I've read to date.

Spiders of the World

I read Spiders of the World by the Preston-Mafham brothers for several reasons, not the least of which is that I love spiders. I also read this one for the Nonfiction Five as well as the What an Animal Challenge. This book is part of a series that includes Insects of the World, Rodents of the World, Sharks of the World, etc. It's the first one of the series that I read and I really enjoyed it. It was a very thorough introduction to all aspects of arachnology, including different groups of spiders, anatomy of spiders, and all aspects of the natural history of spiders. The natural history of spiders was my favorite part, especially the low-down on the sex lives of spiders. This was not too technical and not too basic. It was the perfect mix. If you want to learn more about the lives of these creatures that share our homes, yards, and lives, this is an excellent place to start. Not sure if it's still in print or not, but lots of used copies must be floating around. I bought this book over a decade ago. I'm glad I finally got around to reading it. And remember, kids, spiders really are our little friends. It's almost always much more dangerous to be bitten by a human than a spider...and more likely too, especially if you have a toddler in the house.

Mean and Lowly Things by Kate Jackson: My Thoughts

I do love a good story of field biology. When I saw this book, I knew I had to read it, and I read this one for the Nonfiction Five. It is the story of Dr. Kate Jackson, a herpetologist who was looking for a field study in which to "make her name in the field". She decided to go to the Congo to study the snakes and frogs in a relatively unexplored area. She made two expeditions to two different areas and this book is the story behind these trips. She certainly had more than enough misadventure and excitement to fill a book. It wasn't all fun and games. The main challenges did not appear to be venomous snakes, scorpions, bugs, etc., but people. The people she had to work with to get permits and the local people who helped her were very interesting. This was a good adventure story and was definitely a good read if you like such books. The only thing missing from my perspective was information about the biology of the reptiles and amphibian species she was collecting for the Smithsonian. As a biologist who relied on the Smithsonian to no small degree for my Ph.D. work, I understand the need for museum specimens such as those she collected. But I really would've liked to learn more about natural history of the beasts she encountered and collected. But this was a very enjoyable book and it really made me wish I could've been there in the Congo too.

Sign me Up for the RIP Challenge

My girls have gotten me excited about Carl's RIP Challenge. It does seem the season to read something creepy. Here's my list of possibilities:

- The haunting of hill house by Shirley Jackson
- We have always lived in the castle by Shirley Jackson
- Something wicked this way comes by Ray Bradbury
- The halloween tree by Ray Bradbury
- Duma Key by Stephen King
- Cell by Stephen King
- Lisey's Story by Stephen King
- Bag of Bones by Stephen King
- Murder in the Rue Morgue by Edgar Allan Poe

I am going to try to try, as Bart Simpson says, to read 2 of these fine books, or do the Peril the 2nd. Sounds fun.

Blue Blood by Eddie Conlon

This is a big book, 559 pages with SMALL text, which is why I included it for the Chunkster Challenge. I also read it for Annie's What's in a Name Challenge and the Nonfiction 5.

The author is a NYPD officer and we follow him from the Academy through getting his Detective badge. He works in the Bronx mainly in the public housing division. Needless to say, the author has seen some shit over the years. He has seen what people do to each other. Better him than me. Most of the time, he worked in Narcotics...setting up buys, etc. There is some interesting material about what it was like in Manhattan on 9/11.

What really struck me from learning about what it's like being a cop is how hard it is dealing with the beaurocracy...sorry I just can't figure out how to spell that @%^&*( word. Captains, Sargeants, etc. are constantly interfering with their work and preventing them from making arrests and "sting" operations. One day, the author recalled that he woke up and didn't want to go to work...his boss was an ass. When he realized he had a root canal and didn't have to go in, he was thrilled. That was the moment he decided to transfer to a new division. Things did get better.

Our author is no "ordinary" officer, however. Before NYPD, he got a degree in English from Harvard. He does write a good book. If you want to learn about what it's really like to be a big city cop, this is an excellent book. I didn't fall in love with it the way I did David Simon's Homicide, however. But, Officer Conlon did not work with murder most of the time, so he had different material to work with. This is a good read.

Vestiges: One Crazy, but important, book

I read Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation by Robert Chambers for the 1840s installment of the Decades challenge. This is an interesting mixture of wild Victorian aged conjecture about how the natural world works based on the old notions of progress. It was one of Stephen Jay Gould's goals in life to stamp out this kind of idea that the entire history of the world has been leading up to the moment when humans, clearly the pinnacle of evolution, appear. Ya gotta forgive the author for this, as it was the 1840s. It is also necessary to forgive the usual Victorian racism where Caucasians are clearly the most intelligent and advanced of all humanoids. But it appears that all Caucasians who could publish believed that at the time. But, Chambers was ahead of his time. He without a doubt influenced Darwin...a lot I think. Chambers discussed how life clearly went from simple to complex. He discussed the origin of species and how new species come from existing species. He strongly hinted at the tree of life. He recognized how embryology suggests common ancestry. He discusses how existing structures are modified over time. And, most importantly, he breaks the biblical literal interpretation thinking about the natural world.
I think he also influenced the intelligent design folks as well. Chambers clearly believed God was behind it all, but not by micromanaging, but by establishing the laws by which nature will "work". At one point, however, he states: "design presided in the creation of the whole design again implying a designer, another word for a Creator".
I'm glad I read this book. People have discussed in several books I've read the influence this book had on Darwin. Some say a lot. Some say a little. I think it definitely was important. Luckily, Darwin was intelligent and cherry-picked the most accurate observations.

Kurt Vonnegut at his best

For the nonfiction five challenge, I read Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.'s Armageddon in Retrospect. I've never met a Vonnegut book I didn't like. Slaughterhouse-Five is one of the best, if not the best, books ever written. Armageddon in Retrospect is a series of short stories, most fiction, but some nonfiction that included a speech Vonnegut was going to give before his death last year. The thread connecting all of the stories was war. If you know much about Kurt Vonnegut, you know he served in WWII and was a POW in Dresden during the U.S. and British bombing campaign that essentially leveled the city. The war was clearly a defining experience of his life. This was a wonderful book. I cannot recommend it highly enough. 2007 was a tough year. The world lost two great men, my father, and Mr. Vonnegut. I will leave you with one of Vonnegut's humdingers that he put in between chapters of the book:
"Where do I get my ideas from?
You might as well have asked that of Beethoven. He was goofing around in Germany like everybody else, and all of the sudden this stuff came gushing out of him. It was music.
I was goofing around like everybody else in Indiana, and all of a sudden stuff came gushing out. It was disgust with civilization."

I believe it's time to read Cat's Cradle again.

Distracted by Scooby-Doo

This morning I woke up early and planned to get to the grocery store and buy the weekly victuals before the mob arrived. My boys, however, were watching a Scooby-Doo movie, which was titled "Scooby-Doo and the alien invaders", or something like that. I happily sat on the couch much like a bum and watched the movie. It was wonderful. I got the damn groceries in the afternoon.
More deep and exciting nonsense soon.

Not Darwin's best book, but his last book

As part of the decades challenge, I read Charles Darwin's final book, The formation of vegetable mould through the action of worms with observations of their habits. If you are thinking that there is NO WAY a book with a title like that could be disappointing, I'm afraid you are wrong. This book was boring. At times, it was excruciatingly so. Making matters much worse was the fact that the copy of the book I got had none of the figures. There were supposed to be 20 or so photographs of fun stuff like worm castings and excavations of roman ruins that worms had some influence upon, etc., but none were in my copy, which by-the-by was published by indypublishing.com and purchased through amazon.com. If you really want this book, the figures would be essential.
Darwin was ever the scientist. He fed worms in pots different garden veggies to determine their favorites (I won't tell you the results...wouldn't want to ruin your read), and calculated the amount of soil eroded per acre per year by worms by measuring the amount of soil (castings) they bring up to the surface that will be washed away through surface runoff. He had an attention to minute detail to say the least. I remember from my visit to his home that he had large rocks placed in his backyard so he could calculate how fast the action of worms would "sink" the rock. The man did not do half assed science ever. When he tackled a problem like worms, he tackled it full bore. I totally respect that. But it doesn't always make exciting reading and now I'm somewhat scared to tackle his book about the various contrivances of orchids to ensure pollination by insects. But I'll definitely read "On the origin of species" again. That was a great book, as was "The voyage of the beagle". So enjoy your Darwin, but make a wise choice.