JOHN LEWIS: IN SEARCH OF THE BELOVED COMMUNITY by Ray Arsenault

(John Lewis, third from left, walks with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. as they begin the Selma to Montgomery march from Brown’s Chapel Church in Selma on March 21, 1965)

If you ever wanted to know what type of man John Lewis was, all you have to do is ask someone from the other side of the political aisle what their opinion is of him. In this case I would point to someone who disagreed with Lewis about every conceivable issue – former North Carolina Congressman and Trump Chief of Staff Mark Meadows who would respond to questions about the Georgia Congressman and Civil Rights leader – “he was my friend,” and Lewis would reciprocate those feelings. You might ask how two such disparate characters could call themselves friends – all you have to do is read Raymond Arsenault’s new biography, JOHN LEWIS: IN SEARCH OF THE BELOVED COMMUNITY to understand the unshakable integrity and believer in man’s humanity which made up the core of the former activist and progressive legislator.

Lewis believed in forgiveness and compassion as part of achieving what referred to as “the beloved community” where racial hatred would be eradicated, and we would all live in a world of fairness and equality as he was determined to replace the horrors of the past and present with his ideals. Arsenault’s biography cannot be described as a hagiography as he delves into Lewis’ life, decisions and actions carefully offering a great deal of praise, but the author does not shy away from his subject’s mistakes and faulty decisions. At a time when racial “dog whistles” dominate a significant element of the political class it is unsettling to listen to a presidential candidate demean his opponent’s racial heritage linking it to her intelligence and background. This has led to racially motivated violent rhetoric that permeates the news making it a useful exercise exploring the life of a civil rights leader who fought valiantly against these elements in our society.

(Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., stands on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Ala., on Feb. 14, 2015. Rep. Lewis was beaten by police on the bridge on “Bloody Sunday” on March 7, 1965, during an attempted march for voting rights from Selma to Montgomery)

Arsenault’s monograph begins by exploring Lewis’ rural upbringing in Pike County, Alabama. Sharecropping was the main source of income in a white dominated economic system designed to keep tenant farmers under the thumb of their landlords. Any progress his parents might have achieved was never enough to escape poverty. For Lewis, growing up in this racial and economic system formed a social and intellectual laboratory as he hated working in the cotton fields and soon became intoxicated with education where the inequality of white and black opportunities was glaring. The structure of Jim Crow society dominated. Lewis had high hopes with the Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas but the “massive resistance” the southern white supremacists responded with disabused Lewis that the decision would ameliorate the situation blacks found themselves locked into.

The development of Lewis’ approach to achieving change is explored in detail and we learn the impact of Martin Luther King, Jr. on Lewis at an early age. Arsenault spends a great deal of time delving into the King-Lewis relationship from the mid-1950s civil rights struggles through King’s assassination in April 1968. The development of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) which Lewis would come to lead, and King’s Southern Christian Leadership Council (SCLC) is important as it shows the dichotomy that existed in the Civil Rights movement particularly as they split from each other in the early 1960s as Black nationalists like Stokley Carmichael and H. Rap Brown advocated violence against white supremacists took over SNCC.

No matter what aspect of Lewis’ career Arsenault discusses he presents a balanced account offering intimate details whether delving into Lewis remarkable rise within the Civil Rights movements from the late 1950s to 1970; his exceptional organizational skills, the schism that developed and seemed to dominate the movement, his four years on the Atlanta City Council through his congressional career. In recounting Lewis’ decision-making, he relates how each judgement was reached and how it affected his social gospel of the beloved community ideology.

(Martin Luther King, Jr.)

Make no mistake the book is more than an intellectual approach to Lewis’ role in the Civil Rights movement. Arsenault seems to cover all the major aspects of the Civil Rights movement from sit ins, stand ins to boycotts challenging the White supremacist governors, sheriffs and other officials in Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, and Tennessee. Places like Selma, Jackson, Montgomery, Memphis come to dominate the narrative as does the impact of peaceful and violent events on Lewis’ belief system and planning.

For Lewis it was a battle to maintain his belief in nonviolent protest as a tool to uplift his community. At times he would become frustrated after he was physically beaten or arrested, but he would always seem to veer away from anything which would contradict his core ideas, even when close friends and other leaders moved away from a total non-violent approach. He grew angry when the younger generation turned to black power and confrontation, but he always remained loyal to his core principles.

Arsenault’s portrayal does reveal a confrontational and antagonistic strain in Lewis’ personality on rare occasions. One that comes to mind is the nastiness of his Georgia congressional campaign against his friend Julian Bond and fellow activist which cost both men a deep friendship when Lewis was victorious.

(Rosa Parks on a Montgomery bus in 1955)

Perhaps Arsenault’s most interesting chapters include Lewis’ evaluation of the Kennedy brothers who came late to the game of protecting civil rights workers. At the outset, Lewis had great hopes for John F. Kennedy, however he would be disappointed as the politics of Southern Democrats got in the way. With the passage of the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the 1965 Voting Rights Act, which the Supreme Court would undermine in 2013, Lewis felt more optimistic, particularly with the metamorphosis of Robert Kennedy, especially after Dr. King was assassinated. There are chapters dealing with the Freedom Riders, important historical figures like Medgar Evers, Emmett Till, Rosa Parks, James Lawson, Andrew Young, Martin Luther King, Jr., James Farmer, Bayard Rustin, along with the Bull Conners, Sheriff Clark, Governors John Patterson and Lester Maddox among many that lend a sense of what it was like to deal with and live through such a tumultuous period in American history.

In the last third of the book, Arsenault describes the Republican resurgence under Gingrich, Reagan and the Bushes which made it difficult for Lewis to navigate the House of Representatives as any liberal agenda was dead on arrival on the House floor. At times he grew upset for the lack of progress that resulted in few if any legislative victories. He had high hopes for the election of Barack Obama, but it was not to be due to Republican obstructionism and in many cases outright racism. The arrival of Donald Trump took his frustration to new levels as events in Charlottesville, Va, a Muslim ban, hideous commentary concerning immigrants, and the actions of Mitch McConnell in the Senate made the achievement of a “beloved community” impossible. Before his death, Lewis would witness a Republican party taking America backwards trying successfully in many cases to undo fifty years of progress made under Democratic leadership – something against which he had repeatedly warned. What separated Lewis from most of his Congressional colleagues was his historical perspective. He could not accept the racism of the Trump administration which returned him to the dark days of the 1960s culminating in the deaths of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy.

(Robert Kennedy’s speech in Indianapolis, IN following the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr.)

In light of Donald Trump’s racial attacks against Kamala Harris, Lewis’ life story seems apropos in light of where we are as a society and how far, or perhaps not as far we have come after the Civil Rights movement. If there is one area that Arsenault could have explored more was learning about the people who knew Lewis the longest and what these relationships actually meant to him. However, Arsenault’s book is well written, researched based on documents and interviews, and has produced a thoughtful and measured account of Lewis’ life and work which continued even as he contracted pancreatic cancer and worked until ten days before his death in 2020 as he visited Black Lives Matter Plaza in Washington, DC.

(Tear gas fills the air as state troopers, on orders from Gov. George Wallace, break up a march in Selma on March 7, 1965, on what is known as “Bloody Sunday”)

SOUTHERN MAN by Greg Iles

August 7, 2024August 8, 2024szfreiberger Mystery/Thrillers Leave a comment

(1320 John A Quitman Blvd, Natchez, MS 39120, USA)

A 963 page novel that weighs quite a bit is a tall task for any reader. Can it maintain your interest? Is it worth the time and effort involved in digesting it? Apart from the fact that the publisher, William Morrow, Inc. has employed the cheapest paper possible in the production process leading to torn pages and other issues the answer is a resounding yes. The book I am alluding to is Greg Iles’ latest Cage Penn novel, SOUTHERN MAN. The effort continues the story of Mr. Penn that cemented his character portrait in Iles’ NATCHEZ BURNING trilogy and CEMETERY ROAD. Once again set in what Phil Ochs used to sing about in “Here’s to the state of Mississippi” in the 1960s, the cities of Natchez and Bienville emerge as the dominant localities for another Iles’ epic.

Iles’ casts a wide net in his story. We renewed our acquaintance with Penn fifteen years following the conclusion of the previous novel. The author does a marvelous job of bringing the reader up to speed and filling in the gaps of what occurred during the previous decade or two. This allows the book to be read as a standard–alone; but it is more satisfying if you have read the previous stories. We find Penn with a prosthetic leg as his mother is dying of cancer, and his daughter Annie, a civil rights attorney, wounded at a concert that was a demonstration against police violence after a 12 year old black boy is killed by police in Memphis. Further, Penn is obsessed with learning how his father died in the infamous Parchman Prison and how he had hoped to rescue him from the gang violence and corruption that existed all the way to Jackson, the state capital.

The storyline is very timely as issues of third party candidates, dissatisfaction with Donald Trump, racial hatred and violence fostered by white supremacists, and the fears for the loss of democracy are all present. A civil war is a possibility as a “supposed” radical black group refuses to accept the murders, illegal police actions, and the “good old boy network” that seems to still dominate the south decides to fight back. Another storyline centers on a former Army Special Operations Sergeant, Robert E. Lee White who gained notoriety as part of the team that captured and killed Abu Nasir, an al-Qaeda leader in a 2008 raid in Afghanistan. Lee, dubbed the “TikTok candidate” has energized the youth of America and other age groups and hopes to be elected president over the Democratic and Republican candidates.

(Mississippi lynching)

The story pits black vs. white, states rights vs. federal power, and the survival of democracy pitted against a fascist threat. As Iles proceeds his historical knowledge from 1960s rock n’ roll, the civil rights movement, to political crusades is impeccable. Ile’s inventive mind has placed America on the eve of a possible civil war and anarchy and contains many of the elements of our current political and racial state of affairs.

Iles offers an alternative scenario for the 2024 election relying on white anger and white panic. The story begins with a rock concert serving as the basis for a demonstration against police violence. The venue is Missionary Hill and after a noise complaint Tenisaw County Sheriff deputies mishandle the situation resulting in the killing of close to thirty people, women and children among them, all black. Known as the Mission Hill Massacre, Iles set the stage for the violence, paranoia, and political opportunity that follows.

At this point we learn that at age 38 Penn was diagnosed with myeloma, an obscure blood disorder that his mother, Peggy Cage has just passed from which impacts his behavior throughout the novel. Though Penn dominates the novel, other characters play important roles. One of the key actors is Robert E. Lee White, a man who on the surface is a war hero, successful podcast radio host, and an aspiring politician who hopes to use the massacre at Mission Hill as the starting point of his political campaign. Iles carefully teases the reader as to what White’s plans are to enhance his candidacy, however his true colors emerge as the story progresses. High on his list of tactics include assassination, befriending Penn and his daughter Annie. Further, he manipulates Charles Dufort, probably the richest man in Mississippi, Donny Kilmer, an extremely violent redneck, Sheriff Buck Tarleton, militia leader Shotwell Barlow, Martyn Black, a gamer and drone operator who happens to be White’s cousin, and most importantly the racial situation in southwest Mississippi.

White has an important personal problem he must overcome. First, he is gay and his former lover Charlot Dufort, the son of a wealthy father who refuses to help him out of drug and gambling induced debt. Second, Tommy Russo, the leading organized crime figure in Bienville and Natchez is also a loan shark that has Charlot in his crosshairs. Three, Corey Evers, his right hand man and lover who witnesses White’s sexual liaison with Sophie Dufort, the daughter of Charles Dufort. If the public learns of White’s past sexual proclivities his campaign is finished.

(Author, Greg Iles)

A number of characters stand in White’s way apart from Penn. His daughter, Annie Penn, a civil rights lawyer at first trusts White then she witnesses his true colors. Marshall McEwan, the owner and editor of the Natchez Daily newspaper, the Watchmen. Andrew McKinny, a black historian who wants to restore Penn’s home, Pencarrow, as a monument to slavery and how it affected blacks during the 19^th century. Dan Kelly, a former Delta Special Forces operative and close friend of Penn. Kenrick Washington, a black veteran, town guide, and college student who emerges as a hero at Mission Hill.. Nadine Sullivan, bookstore owner, former attorney who might be in a relationship with Penn. All play important roles in the novel.

Iles’ uses White’s strategy as one story line. The second rests upon the violence that has been taking over Bienville since the massacre. Third, the attempts of the Poker Club and white supremacists to take over county government and strip Bienville, run by blacks of their governmental powers. Former southern plantation mansions are being burnt to the ground including Pencarrow, the home Penn purchased for his dying mother. The question is who was responsible. Was it black radicals bent on revenge calling themselves “the Bastard Sons of the Confederacy,” or was it a false flag operation by white supremacists supported by the Sheriff’s office or the members of the Poker Club, made up of the political elite in the area. Third, Iles constructs a mini novel within the larger story. He successfully integrates the background history of southwest Mississippi during the pre-Civil War era. Applying the research conducted by Peggy Cage the last years of her life as she tries to determine the truth of her family’s lineage. She is able to link Barlow’s and Pencarrow with her family through diary entries, interviews and other primary materials which will result in undercutting what Penn and his mother believed their entire lives. Penn always wondered about the 1861 lynchings that killed 50 slaves and tortured many more only a few miles from his childhood home-was he in some way related to the men who committed these murders? Iles creates numerous twists and turns and is able to expertly tie all of these threads together in creating an amazing tale.

Fear and rage dominate the novel similarly to today’s political and racial occurrences. The murder of Mayor “Doc” Berry, seen as Bienville’s reincarnation of Martin Luther King by a redneck sheriff contributes to the emotional undercurrents of rage. The popularity of another hero, Kendrick Washington provides White with a literal target to boost his popularity. The actions of Ray Ransom, a Vietnam veteran who did time as a convict at Parchman but reformed his life by working with disadvantaged children, and friend of Penn are further characters enveloped in the racial storm throughout the novel.

The racial unrest and violence and political machinations that Iles portrays will keep the reader on the edge of their seats as he manipulates your emotions as you react to the story line with nothing getting lost in the shuffle. The book is terrifying because of its plausibility as Iles captures the tinderbox that is America today. It is an expertly crafted political and racial thriller which reverberates with our current world, and you should not let the book’s length deter you – it is quite a ride and worth getting aboard.

(Natchez, MS Plantation)

SKIES OF THUNDER: THE DEADLY WORLD WAR II MISSION OVER THE ROOF OF THE WORLD by Caroline Alexander

July 23, 2024July 23, 2024szfreiberger World War II Leave a comment

(Flying “the Hump” in World War II. The Curtiss C-46 Commando was a mainstay for those operations, conducted over the Himalayan foothills where there was no emergency landing strip.)

The term “Over the Hump” is a concept that seems lost to history. When applied properly it embodies the American effort to supply the Nationalist Chinese weapons and supplies to combat the Japanese army which by 1942 invaded Burma and captured and cut off the only ground route into China. The only way to offset Japanese progress was to supply the Nationalist Chinese by air flying over the Himalayas from India.

In her latest book, Caroline Alexander the bestselling author of THE ENDURANCE: SHACKELTON’S LEGENDARY ATLANTIC EXPEDITION and THE BOUNTY: THE TRUE STORY OF THE MUTINY ON THE BOUNTY among other works has written an exceptionally detailed narrative and analysis of the American effort to thwart the Japanese describing the dangerous flights by inexperienced pilots over the Himalayas, discussing the diplomatic agenda of the United States, England, and China, along with insightful personality studies of men like General “Vinegar” Joe Stilwell, the American officer in charge of aid to China, General Chiang Kai-Shek the leader of Nationalist China, and Claire Lee Chennault, the American officer who commanded the “Flying Tigers.” The book entitled, SKIES OF THUNDER: THE DEADLY WORLD WAR II MISSION OVER THE ROOF OF THE WORLD focuses on the newly created infrastructure for the mission, training of pilots, and the hazardous flights they engaged in. Further, Alexander delves into the allied strategy of the China-Burma Theater (C.B.I.) which was complicated by the conflicting political and military interests of Franklin D. Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, and their unreliable ally, Chiang Kai-Shek.

(Lieutenant General Joseph Stilwell (1883-1946) eating field rations on Christmas morning, 1943)

For Alexander, the C.B.I. was the war’s “most complicated theater” and was driven by competing interests and contradictions that exposed the fault line between the allies. For many, C.B.I. translated to “confusion, beyond imagination.”

Alexander’s riveting new work begins with the allied defeat in Burma in April 1942 sealing off the ground corridor linking India and China. This would an “ariel Burma road” to supply Chiang’s troops and allied forces. According to Alexander’s research some 600 planes and 1700 American airmen would be lost flying over Burmese jungles and mountains.

Although the supply effort was deemed a military operation, its primary goal was political, not military, a result of President Roosevelt’s desire to retain the support and boost the moral of Chiang Kai-Shek and his government and ensure a close relationship between the United States and China as Washington wanted the Nationalists to become a major player in the post-war world. The British as Alexander develops throughout the monograph were not as supportive of FDR’s raison detre and actively worked to undermine the American approach. The tension “between the practical and symbolic purpose of the Hump operation was to persist throughout the war” – a dominant theme of Alexander’s work.

(Stilwell with Chiang Kai-shek and Chiang’s wife, Soong Mei-ling, in 1942)

Early on Alexander introduces her argument that a united front to defeat Japan would be difficult to achieve. First, Chiang hated the Chinese Communist Party because they were the only group he was unable “to buy off, absorb, liquidate, or suppress…” Second, they were the only party that was gaining popular support. Third, Chiang believed the Chinese people were incapable of governing themselves. Lastly, and most importantly the Chinese army’s military strength was not applied against Japan despite American aid and encouragement and was held back due to Chiang’s belief of the coming civil war against the Chinese Communist Party led by Mao Zedong. In all areas, negotiation, his relationship with Stilwell, and his belief in his own destiny Chiang was the major impediment to try and defeat Japan.

Alexander’s book is well sourced and researched. She carefully explains the Japanese seizure of Burma entering Rangoon in March 1942. The chaos that resulted was due to British General Archibald Wavell’s belief that the Japanese would never invade Burma through Rangoon. Alexander carefully recounts the horrors Burmese refugees suffered trying to escape the Japanese invasion through monsoons that fostered torrential rains and muddy roads.

A strength of the author is her focus on the major players in the conflict, exploring the pilot’s experiences, and the results of American efforts. Prominent figures like General “Vinegar Joe” Stillwell are examined carefully. His relationship with Chiang Kai-Shek was terrible which impacted US policy, Stilwell’s relationship with General George C. Marshall, and President Roosevelt are keys to Alexander’s analysis. In the end Stilwell’s off-putting personality, ego, and strong beliefs would lead to his recall from China in 1944 due to Chiang’s request. Marshall’s description of Stilwell as being “his own worst enemy….his pathological tactlessness and rudeness was a major factor in the troubles he had in China.” The role of Claire Lee Chennault is also vital to the story of who would contribute to the conflict and the confusion that vexed the C.B.I. theater. Over the course of the war, Chennault’s own propaganda machine increased his reputation and the air assets he commanded. He would gain great notoriety in the United States, but in the end according to the author his contribution to the success of the Burma theater is debatable. Alexander’s criticism of Roosevelt is warranted as his view of Chiang was unrealistic. His belief in his own powers of persuasion were misguided as was his evaluation and ignorance of the key logistical facts of supplying Chiang’s forces. His approach would be very detrimental to the men who built the facilities and the pilots who carried out the Burma mission. Roosevelt’s belief and promises in the amount of tonnage of supplies that could be delivered were impracticable.

(Claire Lee Chennault)

Other prominent figures that are discussed include Vice Admiral Lord Louis Mountbatten, the British commander in Burma who did not get along with Stilwell and also demanded his replacement. General Henery “Hap” Arnold, the commander of the US Air Force, British General Orde Charles Wingate, 1^st Air Commander Philip Cochran, General William Slim, General Frank Merrill, among others who receive extensive coverage.

To Alexander’s credit her focus is not only on influential figures. Her descriptions of the many pilots and the weather, topography, equipment failures are exceptional. Descriptions of the environmental hazards faced by pilots are fully warranted. Weather was the most onerous aspect of flying over the Himalayas. Monsoons, ice formations, thunderstorms, jungles, mountain peaks, deserts, sandstorms all had to be overcome. Further, training could be spotty. Many pilots lacked the experience needed to confront and overcome all of the obstacles in flying and delivering their cargo. With Chiang threatening to leave the war many pilots were rushed into situations for which they were unprepared. Many of the pilots lacked any combat experience and were psychologically and mentally ill equipped to deal with the dangers they faced. The result was misreading instrument failures, the situation they found themselves confronted with, the performance of their aircraft etc. resulting in bailing out when not necessary, crashing their planes when conditions did not fully explain what had occurred. Alexander’s account puts the reader in the cockpit with pilots as they had to cope with balancing their own survival and completing their missions.

To sum up Alexander does a wonderful job telling the story of the men who risked their lives dealing with brutal terrain and horrific weather conditions to keep China in World War II. While Alexander devotes a great deal of time explaining strategic and political issues, her interest lies primarily on the variations of individual human personalities. The author tells, through clear and engaging narrative, the story of the pilots in the planes to the level of campaign overview, sometimes really from 30,000 feet.

(Aerial reconnaissance photograph of the Sittang Bridge in southern Burma, which was destroyed in the face of the advancing Japanese on 23 February 1942)

Perhaps historian Elizabth D. Samet describes Alexander’s effort the best; “Ultimately, and rightly, the pilots — intrepid as “sailors of old” crossing “unknown oceans” — are the core of the book. Demeaned as “Hump drivers,” ostensible noncombatants at the bottom of the aviation hierarchy, they flew an inadequately charted route over baffling terrain, its surreality intensified by their frequent refusal to wear oxygen masks.

Alexander adroitly explicates technical concepts — flight mechanics, de-icing, night vision — but is at her best rendering pilots’ fear. Besides terrain, its sources included weather, enemy aircraft, insufficient training, night missions and “short rations of fuel” on the return leg. At least a pilot could depend on his plane, the beloved Douglas C-47 Skytrain, until the introduction of unreliable or unsound higher-capacity models turned the machines themselves into another source of terror.

Readers thrilled by sagas of flight will marvel at the logistics required to transport a stunning 650,000 tons of cargo by air, the audacity required to fly the Hump, the search-and-rescue operations necessitated by its hazards and the experimental use of aviation involved in the Allied recapture of Burma in 1944.

A Chindit column crossing a river in Burma, 1943.

(A Chindit unit forging a Burmese River, 1943)

They will also have to reckon with Alexander’s hard-nosed conclusions about the C.B.I. Others who have chronicled its history concentrated on the strategic merits of this deeply imperfect theater or celebrated its pioneering use of air power.

The image that dominates the end of Alexander’s epic is “the aluminum trail” of wreckage — “the hundreds of crashed aircraft that still lie undiscovered in the jungles, valleys and fractured ranges beneath the Hump’s old route.”*

*Elisabeth D. Samet. ”The Scrappy World War II Pilots Who Took Flight for a Perilous Mission.” New York Times, May 14, 2024.

Photo Credit: PhotoQuest / Getty Images (Colorized by Palette.fm)

THE ASCENT by Stefan Hertmans

July 8, 2024July 8, 2024szfreiberger Historical Fiction Leave a comment

12la iglesia de San Nicolás (Sint-Niklaaskerk), el Campanario (Belfort) y en ultimo término la Catedral de San Bavón (Sint-Baafskathedraal) gante belgica church nicholas belfry cathedral ghent belgium

(The city of Ghent, Belgium during WWII)

Internationally acclaimed Dutch author Stefan Hertmans has written two powerful historical novels that have achieved extraordinary recognition. The first, WAR AND TURPENTINE was long listed for the Man Booker International Prize in 2017 and the second, THE CONVERT was a 2020 National Jewish Book Award finalist. His latest effort, THE ASCENT is a captivating story about family and evil that alludes to the problems that face society today.

It is a story that originated with Hertman’s own life experiences. In 1979, the author purchased a town house in the Belgium city of Ghent. It was in poor condition that dated back to the end of World War II. Though a neglected structure, Hertman was enamored with it. The house forms the basis of the novel which fits the mold of a technique known as auto fiction, a combination of autobiography and fiction that describes the author’s quest to learn about Willem Verhulst, a Flemish nationalist who during World War II was a member of the SS and sought to link Flanders and Nazi Germany. Hertmans was unaware of the checkered history of the house when he purchased it and the interaction between the real estate agent and the author lends itself to the condition of the house and why it attracted him. Years later when he sold the house he came across a memoir of the previous owner’s son, Adriaan Verhulst, a renowned professor of history and coincidentally, the author’s former teacher. Hertmans would learn that Adriaan’s father, Willem had served in the SS during World War II and committed unspeakable crimes.

The Year of Silence: Belgium’s darkest moments during WWII

(Pro-Nazi rally with speech by VNV strongman Hendrik Elias (Vlaams Nationaal Verbondat) at Grote Markt, Antwerp, on 26 September 1943)

Hertman would become obsessed with the Verhulst family resulting in an exploratory mission to tell the story of Adriaan’s father, the story of the house in which he lived, and the people who he came in contact with. Hertman’s relies on memoirs, diaries, official documents, and interviews with Willem’s three children to recreate the lives of one family as they navigated the tumultuous events of World war II under the aegis of Nazi collaboration in their midst. The result is an amazing novel that reimagines the life of a family surviving a world war that destroyed a significant part of Europe. It is a testament to the author who successfully blends history and fiction to reach its readers about the past, the role of human nature during conflict, and providing lessons for the future.

Hermans carefully lays out the national and ethnic conflict that existed in Belgium before and during the war. It centers on Flemish nationalists who wanted schools to reflect Dutch culture and those who favored the French. Willem loathes the Belgium state and hitches his wagon to Flemish nationalism. Willem was blind in one eye from childhood, and it greatly affected his socialization process while growing up and provides clues for his later behavior. Willem’s first wife, Lisa, will die of cervical cancer in 1925 in her late twenties. Two years later he will remarry Harmina Margaretha Wijers who had been Lisa’s nurse during her illness when she lived with her pastor who never accepted the “one eyed” Belgium.

Harmina who went by the name Mientje and Willem had a son Adriaan, and two daughters, Aletta, and Suzanne. Mientje was a very pious Protestant and grew suspicious of her husband’s activities and his interest in Nazism. Willem was a womanizer who had a long running affair with a woman nine years his junior named Griert Latomme. For Mientje her children were her life and she overlooked “pappi’s” faults for years. Willem would force the family to move from a comfortable middle class home in Ghent to a house provided by the Nazis in Oudburg after he had ingratiates himself with the SS and often traveled to Germany. Needless to say, Mientje despised the house.

(German soldiers parade past the Royal Palace in Brussels, 1940)

Hertmans does an excellent job describing the German occupation of Belgium and its impact on its citizens. He follows the course of the war carefully and has a firm knowledge of historical events and battles. The author intersperses chapters describing his purchase of the house and his interactions with the children and other decades after the war.

(‘Confidential agent’ Willem Verhulst and his wife Mientje in 1930)

Under the German occupation Willem is made Director of the Ghent Rediffusion Service to be used as a vehicle for Nazi propaganda. From this position Willem rose in the Nazi hierarchy to become a reliable collaborator and achieved SS rank as he cobbled together thorough lists of resistance fighters and anyone who opposed or even spoke words that the Nazis deemed treasonous. Countless people were rounded up, beaten, tortured and many would die in the extermination camps.

The marriage of Willem and Mientje made little sense. He possessed a dual personality; on the one hand he was very sweet toward his wife, but he was a womanizer and a Nazi collaborator. He did his best to keep his wife and family in the dark when it came to his activities. She was very religious and cannot fathom why their lives have taken such a drastic turn. Once he started wearing his SS uniform at home, she forbade the children to enter certain rooms that were used for Nazi visitors and held Nazi memorabilia referring to them as “the death rooms.” The issue of spousal loyalty reverberates throughout the novel. No matter how abusive he acted at times or as she learned of his Nazi activities she always tried to smooth over their relationship and keep him calm, standing by him. However, by July 1944 when Willem contemplates fleeing with the family to Hanover, Germany, she refuses to allow herself and the children to accompany him.

(Stefan Hertmans)

Hertmans does a masterful job weaving the post war history of how collaborators fled Belgium and how they were treated by the Germans and Belgians upon their return. Roughly 15,000 Flemish citizens fled with another 6,000 Walloons joining them. By integrating so much factual information into the novel it reflects the authenticity of the story as the author fictionalized certain aspects of his work.

The book is segmented into two parts. The first half surrounds Willem’s rise in the Nazi hierarchy and the deeds that would result in his arrest and imprisonment. The second half of the book focuses on the post war period as Willem languishes in prison unrepentant, writing untruths and fantasies in his diaries, while outside, Europe lies in ruins. Hermans describes the boarders who Mientje housed and their futures, and what became of Mientje and her children and the final years of their father. David McKay provides a lucid translation from the Dutch which is illustrated with photographs and other information. Hertmans combination of history and fiction is a powerful reminder that the horrors of World War II are inexhaustibly fascinating and how events that seem beyond our control can result in disaster.

WW2 - WWII German luftwaffe soldiers training with a MG 34 machine gun - probably near Ghent, Belgium Stock Photo

(WWII German Luftwaffe soldiers training with a MG 34 machine gun – probably near Ghent, Belgium)

THE YANKEE WAY: THE UNTOLD INSIDE STORY OF THE BRIAN CASHMAN ERA by Andy Martino

June 28, 2024szfreiberger baseball Leave a comment

Over the years there have been many books describing the turbulent years of New Yankee failure in the 1964-1976 and 1982-1995 periods culminating in their resurrection in the mid-90s leading to the dynasty of Jeter, Rivera, Posada, Petite, and Williams who I include as a “core five”, not “four. These books tell a familiar story with vignettes, statistics, and personality studies of the major characters. However, no book has taken the approach offered by baseball reporter and analyst Andy Martino presents in his latest book, THE YANKEE WAY: THE UNTOLD INSIDE STORY OF THE BRIAN CASHMAN ERA. The title of the book is somewhat of a misnomer as it is not a biography of the current Yankee general manager, but a fairly objective deep dive into how baseball transformed itself over the last four decades within the broader tale of the success and failures of one specific franchise. The Yankees went from a team steeped in tradition than any other team, and now they have evolved into a modern approach immersed in data and technology in addition to old-world scouting. Martino’s basic theme is capturing “how a franchise is run on the executive level during a time of dizzying change in the industry.”

NEW YORK, NY - JULY 08: General manager Brian Cashman of the New York Yankees speaks to the media after the game against the Tampa Bay Rays was postponed due to rain on July 8, 2011 at Yankee Stadium in the Bronx borough of New York City. (Photo by Jim McIsaac/Getty Images)

(Brian Cashman, February 2012)

Martino points to a number of myths surrounding the organization that has been in charge of the New York Yankees for decades. Most writers point to CBS’ sale of the team in 1973 to George Steinbrenner as the beginning of the resuscitation of the franchise. Obviously, that is a watershed year for the franchise, but it was CBS under the direction of Mike Burke who laid the foundation for success as Thurman Munson, Ron Guidry, Craig Nettles, and Sparky Lyle among others were all on the roster. Another interesting point of information is the role of Gene Michael as the architect of the 1990s dynasty and mentored Brian Cashman. Everyone seems to credit the Oakland Athletics duo of Sandy Alderson and Billy Beane for implementing “Moneyball” or an analytical approach to player evaluation. Michael was doing the same thing for the Yankees taking on many roles in the organization and received little credit as he was obsessed with on base percentage among many analytical emphasis.

Gene “Stick” Michael plays a prominent role in Martino’s monograph as he is credited with rebuilding the Yankees. First, the former light hitting shortstop had the ability to stand up to Steinbrenner. Second, he was a brilliant talent evaluator whether a player was ascending or declining. Third, Michael brought Bill Livesey aboard the Yankee brain trust. Livesey was the Yankees’ director of player development from 1980 to 1982. He then managed the Oneonta Yankees in 1983–1984. He served as the Yankees’ scouting director from 1991 to 1996, where he was instrumental in assembling the “Core Four” that led New York to multiple World Championships. Livesey developed a Red Auerbach, the Boston Celtics hall of Fame coach approach to player evaluation. Known as the “Livesey profile”, player evaluation was based on the tools that each individual exhibited at his position. This was the “secret sauce” the Yankees relied on from the 1980s considering the skill level and expectation for each position. According to Martino, “The New York Yankees have stuck with the profile system, both in drafting amateurs and identifying Major League free agents and trade targets.” Interestingly, later when Brian Cashman was General Manager he got away from the system in 2020-21 it brought in players like Gleber Torres and Luke Voit, one of which will not be re-signed at the end of the current season and the other is long gone.

(Gene “Stick” Michael)

A fascinating aspect of the book is the context of Yankee history of certain managers. Martino provides intricate details as he describes the managerial approaches since the 1920s. Though a New York Giants manager, John McGraw educated Casey Stengel who managed the Yankees from 1949-1960. Stengel’s favorite player was Billy Martin who he took under his wing as a father figure. Martin’s revolving door managerial career with the Yankees spanned the 1975-1988 period. A disciple of Martin was Buck Showalter who managed the team from 1992-1995 and brought the team to the precipice of a dynasty. This created a managerial chain that represented 130 years of baseball experience and oral tradition. Brian Cashman, who arrived as a college intern in Yankee land in 1986 and remains its General Manager today functions as a human through line across four decades.

Tom Hauck//Getty Images

(A-Rod and Jeter, 2004)

Martino does not neglect aspects of the story that many have told before. The role of George Steinbrenner is recounted in detail especially the Dave Winfield/Howard Spira controversy that led to Steinbrenner’s suspension from baseball in 1990 and during his absence Gene Michael was able to rebuild the Yankees relying on the Livesey profile and create a team that won five world championships. The tense relationship between Alex Rodriguez and Derek Jeter is carefully analyzed integrating psychological principles. A-Rod was an insecure person who had greater talents than Jeter, but Jeter had the championships. A-Rod wanted to be loved, Jeter kept to himself, somewhat standoffish like Joe DiMaggio, and once you crossed him as A-Rod did with his magazine comments you were out of his orbit. The brilliant and at times controversial trades that Michael arranged, for example Roberto Kelley for Paul O’Neill, are all part of the narrative. Jeter’s intransigence about shifting positions, the role of Joe Torre reflects the enormous amount of research and interviewing that the book is based on and Martino’s ability not to pull any punches in describing personal relationships that dominated the period.

(George Steinbrenner)

The first two-thirds of the book focuses on the education of Brian Cashman as a future baseball executive, his personality, and decisions he witnessed. The last third of the book zeroes in on Cashman’s role as General Manager and his successes and failures. It’s clear from his account that Cashman paid attention to those who came before him as General Manager in how he evaluated players not just by numbers but also by intangibles like character, where numerous championship-level players come up short. Cashman’s player acquisitions, which brought confrontation with Steinbrenner and his Tampa “kitchen cabinet” are all present. These decisions tended to be correct, though they’ve entailed battles along the way—for example, the decision not to re-sign Rodriguez, letting Joe Torre leave as manager, and the fight to keep superstar Aaron Judge on the roster, are all recounted in Martino’s memorable sketches.

One thing is clear from Martino’s excellent recounting of Yankee history is that Brian Cashman stands out as a future member of the Hall of Fame. Even Billy Beane, who has been credited with implementing “Moneyball” argues that Cashman has been the best General Manager in baseball history. You might not agree with that evaluation, but all baseball fans should enjoy this insider account, even if you live in Boston!

NEW COLD WARS: CHINA’S RISE, RUSSIA’S INVASION, AND AMERICA’S STRUGGLE TO DEFEND THE WEST by David Sanger

June 16, 2024szfreiberger American Diplomatic History, Chinese History, Cold War, Russian History Leave a comment

Destroyed Russian tanks and military vehicles are seen dumped in Bucha amid Russia's invasion in Ukraine,

(Destroyed Russian tanks at Bucha, Ukraine, May, 2022)

Following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991President George Bush Sr. announced a “new world order” as a focal point of American power. This vision was carried out in America’s moment, the defeat of Saddam Hussein forcing Iraq to withdraw from Kuwait and implementing certain policies to control the Iraqi dictator. For Bush and American policy makers these events symbolized the unipolar power structure in the world that would be dominated by the United States. A major premise fostered by the new unipolar world for American policy makers was that since the Cold War was over Russia would experience greater democracy if it could be drawn into the American orbit. Secondly, China could also be democratized if it could be integrated into the liberal economic realm led by Washington. Both suppositions have turned out to be a fantasy.

Today, the reality is clear – the Russian government has evolved into a revanchist regime led by a man who believes the worst event in Russian history was the collapse of the Soviet Union. Vladimir Putin’s main goal is to restore the glory of the Soviet Union and reassemble its empire. In the case of China under the leadership of Xi Jinping any subservience to the United States and the west would not allow China to achieve its rightful place of economic and political leadership in the world. According to the Chinese government any attempt to block Chinese growth would be a humiliation, not to be tolerated.

Chinese President Xi Jinping, right, and Russian President Vladimir Putin pose for a photo prior to their talks in Beijing, China, Feb. 4, 2022.

(Putin and Xi at the Beijing Olympics, February 2022)

How did the world balance of power evolve from a unipolar world under American leadership in the post 1991 era to a multipolar power structure today where two major powers, Russia and China have begun to cooperate to offset western economic power and political influence? The answer to this question, if in fact there is one forms the basis of New York Times National Security correspondent, David E. Sanger’s latest book, NEW COLD WARS: CHINA’S RISE, RUSSIA’S INVASION, AND AMERICA’S STRUGGLE TO DEFEND THE WEST.

China’s continuing rise to economic and political influence on the world stage has been and will continue to be fueled by nationalism and a sense of past grievance. The same can be said of Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, a decision based on personal ego and exacerbated by Russian nationalism. For Putin, Ukraine is an illegitimate country that has always been part of Russia. Similarly, Xi argues that Taiwan is not a country and has been and will be part of China in the future. These positions by two of the world’s most powerful autocrats creates a dilemma for the United States as to how it should proceed when confronting these new perceived threats.

Putin and Xi had a common interest; “to stand up to the United States, frustrate its ambitions, and speed along what they viewed as its inevitable decline.” After the events of January 6, 2021, the bifurcation of the American political system, the ongoing drama that is Donald Trump, the right wing white supremacist movement in the United States, economic inequality, and immigration issues as the 2024 election approached, all reinforced their view that their rationale was likely to evolve in their favor. The events between the fall of the Berlin Wall and the invasion of Ukraine reflect how western leaders who accepted historian Francis Fukuyama’s analysis of 1989 that we were experiencing the end of history: “that is the end of mankind’s ideological evolution and the universalization of western liberal democracy as the final form of human government” was totally misguided. What Sanger proposes is a dose of reality.

New photos show China’s artificial islands are highly developed military bases

(In this Oct. 25, 2022 aerial photo, buildings and communication structures are seen on the China-built artificial island at Mischief Reef in the Spratly Islands, South China Sea)

Sanger has written a comprehensive and insightful work of contemporary history that everyone in Congress and the national security establishment should read. He writes with a verve that seemingly offsets any subject that might appear somewhat dry. In arguing his premises his facile mind seemingly encompasses all areas related to the “new Cold War” from a discussion of the history of the microchip and semi-conductors as it relates to China’s quest for world power to the historical “Finlandization” of the Russo-Finnish border after World War II and its contribution to Vladimir Putin’s paranoia when it comes to the west. Sanger’s monograph is more than a compilation of autonomous topics concerning the quest on the part of China and Russia to overturn American world dominance. It is a work of synthesis that seems to turn over every rock in his quest to explain the background for his book’s title and where the world balance of power stands today.

Writing at a time that the Russian invasion of Ukraine has entered its third year with Putin and Xi seemingly moving closer together Sanger has done a magnificent job. Sanger’s lengthy career, impeccable knowledge of national security policy and issues, and his access to the major players on the world stage make him the perfect candidate to take on such an important topic. Sanger’s dominant theme is an explanation of how we misjudged what would happen at the end of the Cold War and trying to discern what comes next at a time of maximum peril and increasing threats.

Sanger begins his study by providing intimate details of how and why Putin invaded Ukraine despite American warnings and the tepid European reaction to American intelligence as Russian forces began building up around Ukraine’s borders and what they were about to perpetrate. The European reaction is couched in terms of the American invasion of Iraq and the faulty American intelligence that was disseminated pertaining to Saddam Hussein’s nuclear capabilities in 2003. For Washington policymakers it should have become increasingly clear that steering Putin in an acceptable direction, especially after he made his feelings known at the Munich Security Conference in 2007 was a pipe dream. Events in Georgia, Crimea, eastern Ukraine, the election interference of 2016 should have disabused anyone that Putin would not proceed with his personal agenda, seeing himself as another, “Peter the Great.”

President Biden and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky shake hands.

(President Biden and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky shake hands after signing a security agreement on the sidelines of the G7 in Savelletri, Italy)

In terms of President Xi the post-Clinton presidencies assumed China’s economic interests would overwhelm its other national objectives – territorial ambitions in the South China Sea, use of cyber tools to steal industrial state secrets and western “intellectual property,” and its desire for greater worldwide influence. The United States totally misread this. The west would wake up as China employed repressive technology against Hong Kong, increased its threats against Taiwan, reinforced its claims to vast areas across the South China Sea and built military bases on prefabricated islands, and tried to make as much of the world dependent upon Chinese technology. With Chinese policies at the outset of the Covid 19 outbreak, China’s reputation suffered a severe hit.

The book delves into many issues, but all are in some way related to Russia and China. The messy withdrawal from Afghanistan is recounted in detail and its impact on Russia and China. This was not the Biden administration’s finest hour, but after 20 years of US involvement in Afghanistan, Biden had experienced enough, and he was going to withdraw and ignore any advice to the contrary. Perhaps the best books on the topic are Carter Malkasian’s THE AMERICAN WAR IN AFGHANISTAN: A HISTORY; Craig Whitlock’s THE AFGHANISTAN PAPERS: A SECRET HISTORY OF THE WAR and David Lyon’s THE LONG WAR: THE INSIDE STORY OF AMERICA AND AFGHANISTAN SINCE 9/11. Sanger is correct as he points out that “superpowers have limits. America was relearning the lesson that it had failed to learn so many times before: that invading a nation is easier than building one.”

Another fascinating section deals with how the United States went from the world’s leading producers of microchips and semi-conductors in the 1980s to total dependency on Taiwan. It is clear from his portrayal that the supply line which affected all aspects of the US economy could be crippled by China if Beijing moved on Taiwan. It would not require a full scale invasion, but a quarantine/blockade of the island, or cutting underwater cables that linked Taiwan to the United States to accomplish its goals. The problem dates to US technology companies shifting their manufacturing processes overseas to Asia in the name of profits. The situation was exacerbated and highlighted during supply chain issues due to the outbreak of COVID 19 and the reliance on China for technology components. This would lead to the CHIPS ACT of 2022. Sanger warns the reader that it may appear the United States was moving to catch up pumping billions into the construction of modern technology facilities – but the US acted on a political timetable, the Chinese on a commercial one. The Biden administration has tried to overcome the China policies of a number of previous administrations in areas of national security, but the problem took years to emerge, and it probably will never be totally solved. What is very interesting is there is a surprising continuity between the Trump and Biden administrations when it comes to China. Biden has largely kept in place Trump’s trade war tariffs on Chinese products, increased export restrictions to impede Chinese technological advances, and increased US rhetoric regarding Taiwan.

(Taiwan-based company TSMC is bringing two major developments to north Phoenix, and it means good things for Arizona’s economy)

Sanger recounts all the major aspects of the war in Ukraine from drone warfare, to threats against the Ukrainian nuclear plant at Zaporizhzhia, Putin’s megalomania, Xi’s goal of a unipolar world led by China, the role of technology creating a new kind of warfare, the “nuclear paradox” and the issues surrounding nuclear deterrence, the “Prigozhin coup,” among numerous topics. In all areas under discussion Sanger and his long time researcher Mary K. Brooks has “has crafted a cogent, revealing account of how a generation of American officials have grappled with dangerous developments in the post-Cold War era — the rise of an enduringly authoritarian China, the return of state-on-state conflict in Europe — that have produced a geopolitical mash-up of old and new…NEW COLD WARS vividly captures the view from Washington. But, as Sanger makes clear, with America no longer an unchallenged hegemon, the fate of the U.S.-led order rests more than ever on the ideas, beliefs and emotions of people far outside the Beltway. One finishes this book wishing for equally comprehensive portraits of the view from elsewhere, especially Moscow and Beijing.” *

*Justin Vogt. “Frost Warning.” New York Times, April 13, 2024.

Houses destroyed by Russian shelling are seen in Irpin

(Result of Russian shelling of Irpin, Ukraine, May, 2022)

THINK TWICE by Harlen Coben

June 8, 2024szfreiberger Mystery/Thrillers Leave a comment

(The Dakota, home of Win Lockwood)

It has been eight years since best selling author Harlen Coben released a new Myron Bolitar novel. The series began in 1995 with DEAL BREAKER introducing a wonderful storyline that centered around a former basketball star forced into retirement due to injury who reinvented himself as a sports agent. Over the years Coben has written eleven renditions of his Bolitar series that exhibited his humor, acerbic wit, and well thought out plots that have created millions of readers. To my immense joy and excitement Coben has just released his newest version of the series, THINK TWICE, which possesses all the characteristics that have made his other books in the series such a success.

Coben is a remarkable storyteller who has won numerous awards for his Bolitar series. In his current novel we are introduced to renowned basketball coach Greg Downing who has recently passed away. In fact, Bolitar had given the eulogy at his funeral. To Bolitar’s surprise two federal agents entered his office demanding to know Downing’s whereabouts, claiming he was alive since he was now a suspect in a double murder. Bolitar is stunned but soon realizes that his former adversary and client is alive.

Coben launches his plot by describing how a murder takes place and moves on to introduce a series of interesting characters which are the hallmark of Coben’s novels. First, we revisit cast members of the previous books that dominate his latest. Obviously, Bolitar takes center stage as does his friend and business partner Win Lockwood. Time has changed both men, Bolitar more so than Lockwood. We learn that the former basketball star is now married for the third time and has a biological son who plays a significant role in the storyline. Lockwood on the other hand, has aged but remains a wealthy snob who dominates any room he enters. Esperanza Diaz no longer works for Bolitar and has joined the law firm of Fisher, Friedman, and Diaz. Big Cyndi, Bolitar’s assistant in his sports/law agency, remains “Big Cydni.”

(Harlen Coben, author)

The story begins with a series of contradictions where murders keep occurring and most seem solved by the FBI. However, those involving Downing morph into a plot line that leads to a brilliant serial killer who sets up a number of murderers by creating evidence against them to cover their own tracks. A substantial portion of the novel revolves around how Bolitar, Lockwood, and others prove that Downing who went off the grid three years before for reasons Coben makes clear was not a killer, despite the FBI belief that he was. Of course, the remainder of the story centers on finding the real serial killer.

In doing so Coben’s acerbic wit is paramount. His character’s commentary is sarcastic, funny, are dead on. Remark like; “Insecure enraged men are a growth industry,” Bolitar’s father’s remarks concerning the joys of edibles that have improved his sex life after decades of marriage, and his description of a basketball pickup game is priceless along with new characters he introduces. We meet Joey the Toe, a mobster named Joseph Turant who has been convicted by the Feds for a crime he did not commit. Turant is convicted because the Feds supposedly pressured a gay individual to testify against him. Greg Downing plays one of the lead roles and is married to Bolitar’s ex-wife and raises Bolitar’s biological son named Jeremy who is introduced as a member of the US Army, but as the story evolves that is not his occupation. Emily, Bolitar’s ex. and Downing’s spouse provides insights into her relationships with both her husbands. Grace Konners, Greg Downing’s lover. Ronald Prine, a dirty Philadelphia real estate mogul. PT, a career FBI insider who helped Bolitar and Lockwood in the past, now guides them in their investigation. Terese, a journalist and Bolitar’s latest spouse, and lastly, Sadie Fisher, a dynamic lawyer who represents Downing. Then there are those who are accused of murder and are innocent, and of course the murder victims themselves.

The core of the novel are secrets, lies, and a murderous conspiracy that stretches back into the past. In true Coben fashion the reader has no clue as to who the guilty party is. The twists and turns can sometimes become confusing, but soon divergent scenes begin to make sense as Bolitar and Lockwood get closer and closer to solving the case, but as they do danger lurks in the background.

If you enjoyed Coben’s previous Bolitar yarns this one should measure up and meet your expectations, especially the ending. A great summer read – enjoy.

(The photograph can be dated to about 1910 by the automobiles at the curb, and by the presence of the Langham Apartments at 135 Central Park  West between 73rd and 74th Streets, which was completed in 1906)

THE DEMON OF UNREST: A SAGA OF HUBRIS, HEARTBREAK, AND HEROISM AT THE DAWN OF THE CIVIL WAR by Erik Larsen

June 1, 2024szfreiberger American Civil War Leave a comment

(Fort Sumter)

Today we are experiencing a country that seems to possess at times an inexplicable dichotomy as people on both sides of the political spectrum rage at each other. Many times, their commentary is not supported by facts and the mention of a “cult” fires the imagination of many. This is not the first time in our history that we have suffered from such a political, social, and economic impasse. If one possesses a modicum of historical knowledge you are aware that in 1814 at the Hartford Convention a secessionist movement had tremendous support in New England. If one moves further ahead in American history we learn about a series of compromises, one in 1820, another in 1850 designed to postpone rather than heal the divergence in American society and culture. Those efforts obviously failed as the events of the 1861-1865 period reflect.

A key to the onset of the Civil War that culminated in 1861 were events taking place following the election of Abraham Lincoln on November 6, 1860, that reached a crescendo when on April 11, 1861, southern militia commander P.G.T. Beauregard demanded that Major Robert Anderson, the commander of Fort Sumter surrender his fort, but Andersen refused. In response Beauregard opened fire on Fort Sumter shortly after 4:30 a.m. on April 12, 1861. Interestingly, Beauregard had been a student of Anderson. What followed is known to everyone who has ever taken an American history class. There have been countless books written about this period, the latest being Eril Larson’s THE DEMON OF UNREST: A SAGA OF HUBRIS, HEARTBREAK, AND HEROISM AT THE DAWN OF THE CIVIL WAR, a book that focuses on white elites on both sides of the political equation. In so doing his deeply researched monograph focuses on the tragic errors, miscommunication , enlarged egos, remarkable ambitions, tragedies and betrayals that dominated the chief characters that Larsen presents.

(Major Robert Anderson)

The author is a master storyteller as previous bestsellers – THE SPLENDID AND THE VILE, DEAD WAKE, IN THE GARDEN OF THE BEASTS, THUNDERSTRUCK, THE DEVIL IN THE WHITE CITY, AND ISAAC’S STORMcan attest to. In the past his books have ranged from murder during the Gilded Age, the Galveston hurricane of 1900, crime set in Edwardian London, the voyage of the Lusitania, an American family in Berlin in pre-World War II Germany, the Nazi blitz on London during World War II focusing on the Churchill Family, and now focusing on the events and personalities that led to the American Civil War. As in all of his previous efforts Larsen’s research is impeccable, and his writing maintains the reader’s interest throughout.

Larsen’s main focus is on a few important individuals whose attitudes, wealth, and egos either drove the south toward war, or at the very least secession, and those who tried to no avail to prevent the coming fratricide. Obviously, Abraham Lincoln plays an outsized role. Lincoln was viewed with horror in many parts of the south, especially the home of secession, South Carolina. Most historians, be they Allen C. Guelzo, Michael Burlingame, David Herbert Donald, Doris Kearns Goodwin, and most recently Jon Meachem and Ted Widmer believe that Lincoln’s views pertaining to race, slavery, and the south in general evolved over a period of crises. By 1861 his position was clear – he would not interfere in the south to end slavery, but he would contain it and not allow it to spread outside of the south. Further, he believed in negotiation, not violence to resolve the secession issue, but would not surrender any federal property. Other important northern figures that Larsen explores are William Henry Seward who had a low opinion of Lincoln and believed that he should have been president and that only he had the knowledge and astuteness to end the secession crisis. General Winfield Scott, the Commander of the Army, argued against military action to retain Fort Sumter due to the condition of the northern forces. President James Buchanan who oversaw an administration of incompetence refused to take on the crisis and just let it ride until the next president took office. However, the key player apart from government officials was Major Robert Anderson, the commander of Fort Sumter. Larsen integrates his diaries and other writings into his narrative and provides insights into his loyalties and view of events. For Larsen, Anderson is his most sympathetic character.

(Edmund Ruffin)

Larsen’s most effective theme revolves around southern “chivalry” and certain genteel behavior that was expected among gentlemen. These gentlemen were southern because northerners did not conform to the south’s view of expected behaviors. Chief among these figures was South Carolina Governor Frances W. Pickens; James Hammond, a South Carolina planter whose racial and economic views pertaining to slavery provided the cornerstone of the southern position. His accomplice was Edmund Ruffin, another planter whose greatest fear was the amalgamation of whites and blacks and what he saw as the eventual emancipation of slavery. For him it would mean the destruction of the southern way of life and utter ruin of everything he stood for. There are other important players that include Confederate President Jefferson Davis and General Beauregard that Larsen places under the microscope and concludes that the haughtiness and sense of entitlement by southern planters/politicians make them most responsible for the fiasco that ensued. Larsen describes the palatable arrogance of southern elites after South Carolina succeeded believing they now represented a sovereign nation and should be treated according to their new position with respect and deference.

(James H. Hammond)

Larsen never seems to miss an opportunity to provide details that the reader may never have been aware of. For example, the role of Dorothea Dix whose reputation was elevated by her work with the mentally ill was a firm believer in the ethos put for by Hammond and Ruffin that “negroes are gay, obliging, and anything but miserable.” Her role is enhanced when she reported on a plot to assassinate Lincoln on his way through Baltimore to reach Washington and his inauguration. Larsen delves further into the role of Allan Pinkerton and his undercover spies to protect Lincoln one of which Kate Warne is a major force in Ted Widmer’s recent work, LINCOLN ON THE VERGE: THIRTEEN DAYS TO WASHINGTON. Other important women Larsen incorporates include Mary Chestnut whose diary provides insights into aspects of southern society, beliefs, and politics.

The author’s coverage is extensive, and he focuses on many issues that are components to the larger decision making process. For example, Lincolns relationship with Seward; Lincoln’s communications with his commanders, particularly Anderson and Scott. Further, Larsen discusses attitudes in New York which was seen as an island of pro-confederate sympathy in the north. This was due in large part because New York was home to “bankers, merchants, and shipping companies who maintained close commercial ties with southern planters and routinely issued credit secured by the planters’ holdings of enslaved blacks.” Many New Yorkers argued that the federal government had no authority to block secession. Another fascinating approach that Larsen takes is presenting William Howard Russell, the London Times newspaper correspondent. Russell’s diaries offer careful analysis as he seemed to meet with many prominent figures on both sides and presents a non-American viewpoint.

The key decision that must be made is whether to resupply Fort Sumter after South Carolina demands it be turned over to the state after it seceded. Larsen explains the evolution of Lincoln’s approach which by April 8, 1861,as he decides to provision the fort, but with no weapons and ammunition. The debates, personalities involved take up a quarter of the book and is well thought out and reads like a novel, which is one of Larsen’s strengths.

(Secretary of State William Seward)

According to historian Adam Goodheart; “perhaps no other historian has ever rendered the struggle for Sumter in such authoritative detail as Larson does here. Having picked his way through a vast labyrinth of primary and secondary sources (some of them contradictory), he emerges with a narrative that strides confidently from one chapter to the next. Few historians, too, have done a better job of untangling the web of intrigues and counter-intrigues that helped provoke the eventual attack and surrender — how a few slightly different decisions by leaders on both sides could have led to dramatically different outcomes in the secession crisis, ones that might not have involved a war at all.”*

(Mary Chestnut)

Despite this there are a number of areas that Larsen should address. Why do we need so much personal detail about James Hammond, the flirtations of southern women, especially Mary Chestnut? Where is the face of slavery and blacks in particular? The role of Frederick Douglass and abolitionists in general gets short shrift. However, the strengths of the book greatly outweigh any deficiencies – it is an excellent read and a strong addition to the ever expanding bibliography of the outbreak of the Civil War.

*Adam Goodheart. “Erik Larson vividly captures the struggle for Fort Sumter,” Washington Post, April 26, 2024.

(Fort Sumter)

MY BELOVED MONSTER: MASHA, THE HALF-WILD RESCUE CAT WHO RESCUED ME by Caleb Carr

May 18, 2024szfreiberger Biography 1 Comment

Caleb Carr, with glasses and a white beard, nestles his face on his cat's head.

(Caleb Carr considered his late cat Masha, the subject of his new book, the love of his life.)

Over the years I have enjoyed Caleb Carr’s historical fiction immensely. THE ALIENIST, THE ANGEL OF DARKNESS, and SURRENDER reflect his commitment to his craft integrating an accurate approach to history and exceptional character development. His latest book is a total change from what he has written previously. MY BELOVED MONSTER: MASHA, THE HALF-WILD RESCUE CAT WHO RESCUED ME maintains his superb writing and as far as character development it continues in his latest work, this time with a feline. Being a cat lover myself, having had deep relations with the feline species over the years, including KC who was with me and my family for over nineteen years, and our current duo of Kota and Shelby who we rescued over ten years ago, I greatly enjoyed Carr’s dual biography of Masha and Caleb. I have learned a great deal about Carr’s life and views on society, which makes his historical novels more interesting. But, from a cat person’s viewpoint I learned a great deal about felines through Masha’s life story, both about Masha and my own cats.

Carr’s recounting of his relationship with Masha is presented on a number of levels. First, it provides insights into how humans and felines bonded. I can relate to a great deal of what Carr recounts, but he adds a dimension I have never thought off – how a cat’s neurological, heredity, and species development impacts their choice of whom to bond with and try to manipulate. Second, if you are a cat person you realize early on that they control you, not the other way around. As Carr explains they are able to get you to do what they want easily, but once you gain their trust you can impact their behavior as opposed to controlling it. Third, Carr’s ability to decode much of Masha’s inner world.

In a sense Carr has written a love story that is like no other. He describes how each participant in the relationship projects their needs and how they are met. Carr and Masha had been together for seventeen years and most of the time they were inseparable. Masha is a Siberian Forest cat which presents its own issues that domesticated cats do not present. Carr adopted her after her previous owner locked her in an apartment. When they met, a cat’s intuition was on full display as somehow she knew that Carr was a perfect match, especially when she was taken home to a three story home in rural upstate New York. She would have the best of two worlds; outside where her instincts could be tested; and inside where she could control her environment and also her relationship with Carr.

Masha had to be special as she replaced Suki, Carr’s previous cat who he also had a strong relationship with. According to Carr cats are independent and are never responsive to punishment or negative reinforcement as forms of discipline and training. They do not need us, but rather make use of us. “Their loyalty depended on mutual respect and decent treatment.” Carr carefully relates how his own life, in part, paralleled that of Masha. At a very early age he drifted away from people and forged his closest bonds with cats. As a boy he believed he had been a cat in a previous life and wanted to return to that life. He grew up with an abusive father with two alcoholic parents who were somewhat violent. Carr feared his father would kill him and he evolved into a very angry person. He would turn to cats for compassion. Cats taught him how “to give and receive not simply a talent for survival but compassion, affection, love, and joy.” As the two of them bonded over the years Carr expressed surprise at their shared childhood traumas, shared physical ailments that included arthritis, neuropathy probably caused by the physical violence of their younger years. For Carr illness added a new intensity to his connection with Masha as he wondered if he would outlive his companion. When Carr was ill he returned to Masha who like many cats knew exactly how to care for her friend.

The number of astute observations Carr makes is astounding. Among the many that I can relate to are cats usually bond with just one human, not several, no matter how well socialized they might be – I have witnessed this firsthand as my wife Ronni and I share two cats, Kota and Shelby. Interestingly, Kota gravitates to me and would spend her entire day, sleeping, playing, and just keeping me company. Shelby is attached to Ronni and is content to stay on the right side of our bed where Ronni sleeps, and Kota dominates the left side with me – in fact, we had to buy a king size bed to accommodate all four of us! Many cat owners believe that cats stick around so long as food is available and that cats are aloof, at times, finicky. In fact, what they want is attention, interaction, and play – and if they do not receive it they can become lethargic and obese as food becomes their only option.

As Chris Bohjalian writes in his Washington Post review “what makes the book so moving is that it is not merely the saga of a great cat. Libraries are filled with books like that, some better than others. It’s the 17-year chronicle of Carr and Masha aging together, and the bond they forged in decline. (As Philip Roth observed, “Old age isn’t a battle; old age is a massacre.”) He chronicles their lives, beginning with the moment the animal shelter begs Carr to bring the young lioness home because the creature is so ferocious she unnerves the staff — “You have to take that cat!” one implores.”* Through the struggles that life presents all of us from illness, happiness, and sadness.

Trust is the key in any relationship and cats are no exception, but the trust level between Carr and Masha reaches an incredible level. Whether Carr is discussing his own health history or that of his feline companion their synergy amazes. How they support each other is nothing less than extremely unusual, but if you are a cat owner and have had an injury or an illness you have experienced the sensation of being cared for by your furry friend. I can speak to this from knee to hernia surgeries or my wife’s knee replacements – there is always a cat present to cheer one up, indirectly lessening one’s pain.

For all of Carr’s insights into Masha’s behavior there is one area I would question – her language skills. Carr goes a little overboard when discussing his verbal interactions with Masha, particularly the idea that she is sounding out words. I do believe cats do understand a series of words, but to go as far as a conversation between a human and a feline I have my doubts. In the end Carr has authored a marvelous book delving into his lifelong relationship with cats and focusing on Masha in particular. Carr has written a love story which can only bring a smile and tears to the reader.

*Chris Bohjalian. “Libraries are full of books about great cats. This one is special.” Washington Post , April 13, 2024.

To learn more about Caleb Carr and his latest book check out the following article from the Los Angeles Times:

‘Alienist’ author Caleb Carr — grieving his late cat — reflects on his life amid battle with cancer

Caleb Carr considered his late cat Masha, the subject of his new book, the love of his life.

By Chris Vognar

April 15, 2024 3 AM PT

My Beloved Monster: Masha, the Half-wild Rescue Cat Who Rescued Me

By Caleb Carr
Little, Brown: 352 pages, $32

Caleb Carr visits the grave of his beloved Masha, whom he considers the love of his life, every day. “We have a little chat,” said Carr, best known for his 1994 crime novel “The Alienist,” during a video call from his home in upstate New York. It’s late at night — Carr is a longtime night owl who does most of his work after it gets dark — and the author, who now has a long white beard, is thinking about grief and dying — subjects that linger over his new nonfiction book, “My Beloved Monster,” and loom over what might be the final months of his life.

Masha, the beloved monster, was a Siberian forest cat whom Carr rescued from a shelter and built a life with in his mountainside home in Cherry Plain, N.Y. Animals, particularly cats, had long been a source of companionship and comfort for Carr, an antidote of sorts to a chaotic, abusive childhood in New York’s Lower East Side. As Carr writes in the new book, his father, the Beat poet, journalist and convicted manslaughterer Lucien Carr, had a habit of knocking his son down flights of stairs. “I began to understand that he was trying to kill me,” Carr writes. “And while I didn’t yet know about his past” — Lucien Carr stabbed David Kammerer to death in 1944, later claiming that Kammerer came on to him sexually and offering a “gay panic” defense — “I certainly recognized, from the horrifying and even gleeful expressions that would enter his face when he came after me, that he was capable of killing.”

“I have been living with the idea of death since I was a small kid because my father taught me about it,” he said. But death has become much more than an idea of late. Carr, 68, has cancer, which started in his prostate and has spread throughout his body.

“If I could be around when the book is published, that would be really nice,” he said in late January. “I don’t know what’s going to happen when, but it’s not going to be good. I always knew cancer moved fast, but boy, when it starts to move, it starts to eat you. Madness. Just madness.” “My Beloved Monster” will be released on Tuesday.

It was Masha’s death on April 5, 2022, and Carr’s subsequent despondence, that led him to write “My Beloved Monster,” which reads as a love story, a tribute and a reminder that, in some instances, the uncomplicated love of animals helps humans keep going.

A blond, long-haired beauty with a wild side who had been rescued from a cat hoarder, Masha initially greeted Carr, as he writes, with “one of the most communicative gazes I’d ever seen in a cat, a look facilitated by the structure of her face: the eyes were oriented fully forward, like a big cat’s rather than a domestic’s, and seemed to comprehend everything she was studying — especially me — only too well.” Carr writes about cats with a tender vividness that might make you see your own pets through new eyes.

As a child Carr lived in an environment where people couldn’t be trusted, with wild parties and everyday life descending into violence. He lived in a neighborhood so rife with drugs and prostitution that it provided the shooting location for the climax of Martin Scorsese’s “Taxi Driver.” But he always had animals: dogs, gerbils, fish, rabbits and, most to the young Carr’s liking, cats. The family cats would join him in cowering from the domestic turmoil, and comfort him as he reeled from another beating. They seemed to understand him.

Carr would go on to a career as a military historian, journalist and novelist, reaching a wide audience with “The Alienist” (and its 1997 follow-up, “The Angel of Darkness”). The books put his darkness into words as he told the story of a late 19th century forensic psychiatrist on the trail of a serial killer. But he never really forgot his four-legged friends. When he met Masha, he quickly realized he had found a soulmate.

“Animals fulfill something that was damaged in all of us when we were very young and can’t be fixed by people,” Carr said. “We can go on to have relationships with people, but those wounds need a different kind of treatment than people can provide, and that causes trouble when you have to explain that very carefully to whatever girlfriend or whatever significant other you have. I never lasted as long with a woman as I did with Masha, God knows, and no woman ever did for me what she did, which sounds crazy even to me. But it’s really true.”

Carr was actually contracted to write another “Alienist” book, but the spirit did not move him. He was deep in grief and needed to get it onto the page. He began cranking out the story of his life with Masha and sent a draft to his editor, Bruce Nichols, who was also the publisher of Little, Brown before he stepped down in March. Nichols was on board with Carr’s change in direction from serial killing to cat love.

“It was clearly a passion project for him, not only because of his medical situation but because he spent his whole life with cats and this one was very special to him,” Nichols said. “If you’re a cat lover and owner, or a dog person, I think it will resonate with you. And I don’t think it matters whether you care about historical fiction or military history or any of Caleb’s past experiences. It’s sui generis. It is what it is, and it’s an amazing book.”

Carr certainly hopes to tap into the pet community (and perhaps see if any “Alienist” fans are Catster subscribers). He also hopes to win over skeptics who might doubt whether one can love and grieve a beloved animal with the intensity usually reserved for another human.

“I’m hoping that some people will learn from this, and maybe even catch themselves almost thinking of Masha as a person,” Carr said. “That’s really what we have to do as a society much more: Think of these animals as our equals. That’s what they are.”

(Author, Caleb Carr)

CITY IN RUINS by Don Winslow

May 8, 2024szfreiberger Crime Leave a comment

(The Bellagio Water Fountain Show on the Strip in Las Vegas).

If one likes epic crime novels I imagine that you are a fan of Don Winslow. The author of twenty-five books, seven of which were best sellers, Winslow has established himself as a master storyteller and a person with extensive knowledge of organized crime and drug cartels. His latest, and I am sad to say his last novel is the final piece of his Danny Ryan trilogy entitled, CITY IN RUINS, a continuation of the story that has evolved through previous books; CITY ON FIRE and CITY OF DREAMS.

In an April 1, 2024, interview with Benjamin J. Russell of the New York Times Winslow announced that he was retiring from writing crime fiction novels to devote more of his time to political activism. Winslow who has excoriated Donald Trump in videos and social media posts believes that writing books would not allow him to reach a large enough audience to try and influence the American electorate. However, his loyal readership will certainly miss him.

In the current work of fiction, Winslow states that the Danny Ryan trilogy which he worked on for over thirty years was like a homecoming. Winslow left Rhode Island himself when he was a teenager and provides a searing crime novel, which travels through Providence, Rhode Island, Washington, D.C., Wall Street and Las Vegas. In so doing Winslow details the seamier side of Las Vegas through characters who thought they had put their organized crime experiences in the past.

Danny Ryan seems to have achieved everything that life could offer, a respected businessman and a multi-millionaire. However, his past has produced numerous enemies, a past that included being an Irish mob soldier, and a fugitive from the federal government. Now, he craves normalcy, however his business plans rub Las Vegas power brokers the wrong way, and an FBI agent bent on revenge sees an opportunity to bring him down.

For Ryan, his prime concern is safety, and safety creates the need for power. Ryan has power owning hotels and other business interests. However, a number of threats emerge at the outset of the novel as Congress has created the Gambling Impact Study Commission designed to investigate the impact of gaming on the American people. Ryan’s fear, along with other power brokers, is that the federal government would gain the power to impact the profitability of his holdings, investigate the seamier sign of his wealth, and possibly imprison him. These other power brokers, Vern Winegard and Barry Levine were also a threat to Ryan’s position, wealth, and self-image. Though they met monthly to discuss common issues, Winegard who was about to purchase a prime property on the Strip that Ryan coveted, and Levine who owned three mega hotels across from Ryan’s are major obstacles. In reality, no matter how hard Winslow tries to normalize Ryan as a legitimate businessman, a loving father, and a generous person who treats those around him well, he can’t seem to break away from the fact that Ryan cannot escape his mobster past.

Winslow constructs his plot lines very carefully. First, we have the Ryan-Winegard competition for control of certain properties on the “Strip” which would allow one of them to dominate the hotel-casino business. Second, is the role of organized crime as both Ryan and Winegard have a past that does not want to let them go. Third, centers around Chris Columbo, a mobbed up individual who stole from his bosses, disappears, then reappears ten years later. Fourth, a trial involving Peter Moretti, another mob figure who killed his mother and stepfather. Fifth, the revenge sought by FBI Sub Director for Organized Crime, Regina Moneta who blames Ryan for the murder of her FBI boyfriend a decade ago. Sixth, the ambition of Camilla Cooper, an evangelical Christian who sits on the Nevada Gaming Control Board who sees bringing down Danny Ryan as a step to gaining the governor’s mansion. How Ryan navigates these threats and certain other situations provide the core of the novel.

Winslow is an expert at creating characters and their backgrounds which immediately spark interest in the reader. In addition to those previously mentioned there are other important people. Abe Stern, a 93 year old billionaire who wants no part of Vegas but decides to assist Ryan with his travails. Stern’s son Josh also plays a vital role. Dr. Eden Landau, a psychiatrist that Ryan falls in love with. Madeleine, Ryan’s mother who lived with Marty Ryan Dan’s father, likes to see herself as a wonderful grandmother but is heavily involved with the mob over the decades. Marie Bouchard, the Nevada prosecutor after Peter Moretti and his lawyer Bruce Bascomb. There are a number of organized crime “types,” throughout be it Ryan’s organization or that of Alfred “Allie Boy” Licata, an old mob boss banned from Las Vegas who years before killed Abe Stern’s brothers and his crew.

Winslow describes Las Vegas and the characters he develops accurately in terms of the historical reality of the “Strip.” He writes; “Enough isn’t a concept in Las Vegas, an over-the-top town where too much isn’t enough, success is success, and more is always better.” As one follows the story line each character subscribes to this credo. Ryan tries to stay clean through most of the novel, but his old enemies keep circling. He does what he can to prevent the power struggle he has unleashed from turning violent, but through a series of miscalculations, bullets start flying, endangering not only his gambling empire but his life and the lives of those he loves.

Years ago, when Winslow first read Aeschylus, he recognized that the Greek father of literary tragedies had explored every major theme found in modern crime fiction, from murder, vengeance, and corruption to power, justice and redemption. He became obsessed, he said recently, with the idea of retelling the ancient stories in a modern-crime fiction trilogy. In an ode to Greek tragedy Winslow refers to Virgil’s epic poem, “The Aeneid” throughout the novel and the quotes he uses to divide sections of the novel fit perfectly.

While CITY IN RUINS can be read as a standalone, readers would be best served by reading the trilogy from the outset. With his compelling characters, his vivid prose, and his exploration of universal themes, Winslow has produced a masterpiece of modern crime fiction which will not disappoint returning readers or any new audience.

City of Lights: In dramatic contrast, today's main strip in Las Vegas is vibrantly illuminated by hotels and casinos as far as the eye can see

(Las Vegas Strip today)

Doc's Books

A window into Doc Freiberger's library

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