Memoirs of the Middle East: We Heard the Heavens Then by Aria Minu-Sepehr

In keeping with my recent trend of reading borrowed books I’d previously ignored I took another stab at Aria Minu-Sepehr’s 2012 We Heard the Heavens Then: A Memoir of Iran. I’ve been wanting to read it because I love Iranian memoirs and because its author lives in my former hometown of Portland, Oregon. After slow start I finished it a few days ago. While it won’t go down as one of my favorite Iranian memoirs it’s still a pretty good read.

With his father a respected air force general Minu-Sepehr grew up in a household catered by servants and witnessed an endless parade of lower echelon soldiers ready to serve his father’s every whim. Revered as the general’s son he was treated with a degree of deference usually reserved towards minor royalty. Fortunately, for those around him this privileged status, even combined with his father’s doting on him didn’t turn the young Minu-Sepehr into a spoiled brat.

Ensconced on an air force base hundreds of miles from the capital Tehran and safe within his family’s protective cocoon turmoil, trouble is brewing  fueled by years of governmental misrule, political oppression and religious strife. Once unleashed, these forces would eventually lead to the chaotic overthrow of the Iranian monarchy, and its eventual replacement by a ruthless theocracy. Minu-Sepehr’s account of the Iranian Revolution unfolds gradually, as its seen through the eyes of a child and filtered through the protective lenses of his parents and members of his household. Writing as an adult decades later, his recollection of events resembles a slowly at first, then all at once Hemingwayesque approach told with a nuanced voice that comes with age.

We Heard the Heavens Then reminded me how much I enjoy memoirs by Iranians, as well as other writers from the Middle East. I’m hoping in 2023 I’ll be reading  more of these and when I do, you’ll see them featured on this blog.

The Bright Ages: A New History of Medieval Europe by Matthew Gabriele and David Perry

Last year in one of my Nonfiction November posts I featured a selection of books about the Middle Ages. One of which was Charles Warren Hollister’s Medieval Europe: A Short History. It’s been a favorite of mine for decades thanks to its straightforward approach and readable style. But my most lasting takeaway from this excellent book is the author’s firm denial a European-wide “Dark Ages” ruled the continent for a thousand years. The reality, Warren Hollister argued is a bit more complex. Over that long length of time some parts of Europe advanced economically and intellectually while others might have stagnated or even regressed. In the decade since I read Medieval Europe the more I’ve read about this period of history the more Warren Hollister’s claim rings true. 

Looking for another decent book on the Middle Ages I recently borrowed a Kindle edition of Matthew Gabriele and David Perry’s late 2021 book The Bright Ages: A New History of Medieval Europe. They subscribe to a similar viewpoint. Europe did not spend a thousand years as some benighted peninsula at the extreme end of Eurasia, cut-off economically, culturally and intellectually from the rest of the world. Instead it was a vibrant, dynamic and well-connected continent, enriched mightily by even its most distant neighbors.

Traditionally, many felt the Dark Ages began with the Fall of Rome. As successive waves of barbarian hordes overran the Italian peninsula high culture came to an end. In reality, the Empire’s borders had been growing increasingly porous over the last several hundred years.  Intermarriages involving Roman elites and their foreign counterparts were becoming commonplace. More and more foreign-born soldiers were rising up the ranks of an increasingly polyglot Roman army, with some even becoming generals. And when these invading groups did takeover, they adopted Roman customs and language and quickly converted to Christianity. (Or in the case of the Goths ditched Arianism for the era’s more orthodox Christianity.) Lastly, regardless of who happened to be running the show in Rome the Byzantines still saw themselves as Romans. Carrying on the legacy of Rome they soldiered on until their crushing defeat at the hands of the Turks in the mid 15th century. 

Gabriele and Perry also challenge the notion of Europe’s distinctness vis-à-vis its Islamic neighbors. Both Christianity and Islam, along with Judaism aren’t just monotheistic religions. There are Abrahamic faiths, which comparatively speaking, share more similarities than differences. While Christian armies frequently fought Muslim armies during the Crusades and the Reconquista from time to time they fought as allies, both in the Middle East and Iberia. Intellectually, the writings of Islamic luminaries Ibn Sina (Avicenna) and Ibn Rushd, (Averroes) together with their Jewish counterpart Maimonides profoundly influenced European thought, especially the theology of Thomas Aquinas. 

After the Mongols’ expansive conquests a well-maintained conduit was established across Eurasia, facilitating the transfer of goods and ideas between Europe and the Far East. Chinese silks flowed west, Catholic missionaries traveled east and a guy named Marco Polo captivated Europe with stories of his travels. 

The Bright Ages, much like the above mentioned Medieval Europe is a straightforward, readable and fresh look at Europe’s Dark Ages which in reality, probably wasn’t all that dark. 

Library Loot

Same old story. Out running errands yesterday, popped into the library for just a few moments and walked out more books. Even though I’m already up to my eyeballs with library books I couldn’t resist grabbing another small stack. Three of these are books I borrowed in the past yet never read. Who knows, maybe this time I finally will.

• The Next Great Migration: The Beauty and Terror of Life on the Move by Sonia Shah – Over a decade ago I read and reviewed her 2010 book The Fever: How Malaria Has Ruled Humankind for 500,000 Years. I’m a sucker for a good migration story. 
• 1916: One Hundred Years of Irish Independence: From the Easter Rising to the Present by Tim Pat Coogan – Borrowed this one a few years ago and only read the first few pages. Hoping to read this one for Rose City Reader’s European Reading Challenge. 
• A Mountain of Crumbs by Elena Gorokhova – Another one I borrowed several years ago and ignored. If it all goes well after this one I’ll read Gorokhova’s follow-up Russian Tattoo. 
• The Empire and the Five Kings: America’s Abdication and the Fate of the World by Bernard-Henri Lévy – Just like 1916, I borrowed this back before the pandemic, read a few pages only to return it pretty much unread. A little something for Introverted Reader’s Books in Translation Reading Challenge. 

Library Loot is a weekly event co-hosted Claire from The Captive Reader and Sharlene from Real Life Reading to encourage bloggers to share the books they’ve checked out from the library. If you’d like to participate, just write-up your post, steal the Library Loot icon and link your post using the Mr. Linky on Sharlene’s Blog. 

Library Loot

Same old story. Out running errands yesterday, dropped by the library to return a book. And walked out the door with four more. Even though I’m already up to my eyeballs with library books I couldn’t resist grabbing more reading material. Will I ever learn? No, of course not. 

• The Troubled Heart of Africa: A History of the Congo by Robert B. Edgerton – Been wanting to read up on Africa. Why not start with this 2002 book. 
• Tehran Children: A Holocaust Refugee Odyssey by Mikhal Dekel – Second time I’ve borrowed this book. Maybe this time I’ll finally read it. 
• The World’s Strongest Librarian: A Memoir of Tourette’s, Faith, Strength, and the Power of Family by Josh Hanagarne – I love quirky memoirs by librarians. 
• The Removers by Andrew Meredith – This memoir looks twisted- in a good way! 

Library Loot is a weekly event co-hosted Claire from The Captive Reader and Sharlene from Real Life Reading to encourage bloggers to share the books they’ve checked out from the library. If you’d like to participate, just write-up your post, steal the Library Loot icon and link your post using the Mr. Linky on Claire’s blog.  

Book Beginnings: We Heard the Heavens Then by Aria Minu-Sepehr

Not only does Gilion host the European Reading and TBR 22 in 22 on her Rose City Reader blog but also Book Beginnings on Friday. While I’m no stranger to her European Reading Challenge, finally in 2022 I decided to participate in Book Beginnings on Friday. This week I’m back with another post.

For Book Beginnings on Friday Gilion asks us to simply “share the opening sentence (or so) of the book you are reading this week, or just a book that caught your fancy and you want to highlight.”

MY BOOK BEGINNING

For as long as I could remember, my father had been a general. Growing up in the air force, around armed forces, I had become adept at recognizing ranks. One look at someone’s uniform, at their silver stripes, bronze asters, or gold stars, and I could tell exactly where they stood, who obeyed whom.

Last week I featured Matthew Gabriele and David Perry’s 2021 The Bright Ages: A New History of Medieval Europe. Before that it was Johny Pitts’s 2019 Afropean: Notes from Black Europe.This week it’s Aria Minu-Sepehr’s 2012 We Heard the Heavens Then: A Memoir of Iran.   

Some of you might remember We Heard the Heavens Then is one of the books, along with The Bright Ages I grabbed recently from the public library. Some of you might even remember I borrowed this book once before only to return it unread. This time I’d really like to read it. (If for no other reason the author lives in my former hometown.) Here’s what Amazon has to say about the book.

We Heard the Heavens Then is a deeply moving story told from two vantage points: a boy growing up faster than any child should, observing and recoiling in the moment, and the adult who is dedicated to a measured assessment of the events that shaped him. In this tightly focused memoir, Aria Minu- Sepehr takes us back through his explosive youth, into the heart of the revolution when a boy’s hero, held up as the nation’s pride, became a hunted man.

Nonfiction November Week 4: Worldview Changers

After taking last week off, I’m back with another post for Nonfiction November. This week our host is Rebekah of the blog She Seeks Nonfiction. Even though she’s been blogging since 2016 I discovered her blog only about a year ago. Since then I’ve been a huge fan, in no small part because I see her as a kindred spirit. Rebekah was raised in the “conservative Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod” even though she “never really believed in God”, and I’m an ex-evangelical Christian. If the books featured on Rebekah’s outstanding blog are any indication she’s a progressive individual who strongly embraces science, reason and intellectual honesty. With that in mind she’s the perfect book blogger to host our latest installment of Nonfiction November.

One of the greatest things about reading nonfiction is learning all kinds of things about our world which you never would have known without it. There’s the intriguing, the beautiful, the appalling, and the profound. What nonfiction book (or books) has impacted the way you see the world in a powerful way? Do you think there is one book that everyone needs to read for a better understanding of the world we live in?

When first introduced to this week’s topic I was excited to participate even though wasn’t sure where to begin. I thought about limiting the scope solely to books critical of Christianity, the Bible or religion in general. I also considered discussing just various political books that have impacted me over the years. Or significant history books that did the same. But in the end I decided to throw caution to the wind and feature as many books as possible that significantly shaped my view of the world. They did this by overthrowing my previous beliefs or assumptions, or in some way or another making me look at things with a different perspective. If this project wasn’t ambitious (or foolhardy) enough, I’d also like to approach things somewhat chronologically, starting with books that impacted me as a young man. (But I’ll still mix things up here and there.)

The Early Years

• Democracy for the Few by Michael Parenti – An assigned text for my American Government 201 class in college, Parenti’s Marxist-inspired critical look at America’s political-economic system was an eye-opener to say the least. It would inspire me to read other works he’d written like The Sword and the Dollar: Imperialism Revolution and the Arms Race, Inventing Reality: The Politics of the Mass Media and finally, decades later God and His Demons. Looking for other authors like him, I followed renegade CIA officer Philip Agee’s advice and read Jerry Fresia’s Toward an American Revolution: Exposing the Constitution and Other Illusions.
• There Are No Children Here: The Story of Two Boys Growing Up in The Other America by Alex Kotlowitz – Stumbled across this book at the public library a year or so after college graduation and was blown away by Kotlowitz’s intimate look at life in one of Chicago’s infamous public housing projects. Left wanting to learn more “how the other half lives” I’d go on to read Michael Harrington’s The Other America: Poverty in the United States and Gabriel Thompson’s Working in the Shadows: A Year of Doing Jobs (Most) Americans Won’t Do.
• Open Veins of Latin America: Five Centuries of the Pillage of a Continent by Eduardo Galeano – After seeing this referenced in book after book I bought a used copy at some old bookstore. If you wanna understand Latin America start here.

Christianity and the Bible: A New and Critical Look 

• Rescuing the Bible from Fundamentalism: A Bishop Rethinks the Meaning of Scripture by John Shelby Spong – First book I ever read that tried to interpret the Bible in more modern light.
• What Paul Really Said About Women: The Apostle’s Liberating Views on Equality in Marriage, Leadership, and Love by John Temple Bristow – An attempt to make the writings of Paul (or those impersonating him) less misogynistic while still staying within a Christian context.
• A Short History of Christianity by Martin E. Marty -First book I read that showed me how Christianity evolved as an institution over the last two thousand or so years.
• God: A Biography by Jack Miles – Miles treats God as a literary character tracing his development over the course of the Hebrew Bible.
• The Good Book: Reading the Bible With Mind and Heart by Peter J. Gomes – Another book like Spong’s that tries to proclaim a kindler, gentler Bible.
• The Lost Christianities: The Battles for Scripture and the Faiths We Never Knew by Bart D. Ehrman – Based on Ehrman’s book early Christianity should be thought of competing “Christianities” as opposed to one, monolithic young Church.
• The Gnostic Gospels by Elaine Pagels – A novel look at one of those competing versions of early Christianity and its scriptures.
• The Bible in History: How the Texts Have Shaped the Times by David Kling – A cool look at how the Bible has been interpreted throughout history and how it’s influenced.
• The Harlot by the Side of the Road: Forbidden Tales of the Bible by Jonathan Kirsch – Fun look at those bizarre, frequently bawdy Bible stories you never heard in Sunday school.
• The Bible Unearthed: Archaeology’s New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin of Sacred Texts by Israel Finkelstein and Neil Asher Silberman – There is zero archeological evidence  supporting the Biblical narrative of the Hebrews’ wandering in the desert.
• Unauthorized Version: Truth and Fiction in the Bible by Robin Lane Fox – Trained classicist Lane Fox turns his highly educated critical eye upon the Bible.
• The Rapture Exposed: The Message of Hope in the Book of Revelation by Barbara R. Rossing – Remember all that rapture talk you might have heard in Sunday school? It’s all a recent evangelical construct.

History: A Deeper Understanding 

• The Twentieth Century: A People’s History by Howard Zinn – 20th century American history from the underside.
• East and West by C. Northcote Parkinson – According to Parkinson East and West are like an oscillating piston forever vying for supremacy.
• The Fifties by David Halberstam- Commonly thought of a conservative decade, the truth is rather otherwise.
• Plagues and Peoples by William McNeill – It’s amazing the degree that disease has impacted human history.
• Backgrounds of European Literature by Vincent F. Horton and Rod W. & Hopper – Classical, Hebrew and Gothic influences have all profoundly shaped European thought and expression.
• How the Irish Saved Civilization by Thomas Cahill – Who would have thought the Irish were so influential in preserving Classical knowledge?
• Medieval Europe: A Short History by Charles Warren Hollister – The Middle Ages weren’t uniformly the “Dark Ages.”
• Europe: A History by Norman Davies- Taught me Europe is merely a peninsula of Asia, and the 19th century was the true birth of the Modern Age.
• Savage Continent: Europe in the Aftermath of World War II by Keith Lowe – Think all the killing ended once Germany surrendered? Nope.
• The Vanquished: Why the First World War Failed to End by Robert Gerwarth – Even after the conclusion of World War I the fighting especially in Eastern Europe continued.
• The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America’s Great Migration by Isabel Wilkerson- Blacks leaving the South for the North, Northern Midwest and California in the decades following World War I is a story needing to be told.
• The Silk Roads: A New History of the World by Peter Frankopan – Western Europe’s rise to prominence in the Early Modern age was fueled by trade with Central and East Asia.

Anti-Colonialism: At Home and Abroad 

• The Wretched of the Earth by Frantz Fanon – Why colonialism is so harmful and how to fight it.
• Discourse on Colonialism by Aimé Césaire – Colonialism is bad but you can fight it, and be proud if you don’t happen to be white.
• The Autobiography of Malcolm X by Malcom X and Alex Haley- Inspiring story of an man who went from convicted petty thief and prisoner to world-class civil rights leader. And he read like a scholar while in prison.
• Black against Empire: The History and Politics of the Black Panther Party by Joshua Bloom and Waldo E. Martin, Jr. – Terrific history of one of America’s sadly forgotten political movements.

Developing a Post-Religious Worldview

• How We Believe: Science, Skepticism, and the Search for God by Michael Shermer – The book that made me start questioning things.
• The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason by Sam Harris – Great critique of religion told using direct, accessible language.
• God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything by Christopher Hitchens – Hell of a writer. And persuasive.
• A Manual for Creating Atheists by Peter Boghossian – More of a manual for creating great critical thinkers.
• Godless: How an Evangelical Preacher Became One of America’s Leading Atheists by Dan Barker – What makes an evangelical minister walk away from religion?
• Fleeing Fundamentalism: A Minister’s Wife Examines Faith by Carlene Cross – Cross is a likable, intelligent woman, who for excellent reasons gradually left the faith. A highly underrated memoir.

The Middle East: A Deeper Understanding

• From Beirut to Jerusalem by Thomas L. Friedman- First book I read about the Middle East and it’s still a fave.
• Children of Jihad: A Young American’s Travels Among the Youth of the Middle East by Jared Cohen – Excellent first hand account of Cohen’s person to person contacts across the region.
• The Media Relations Department of Hizbollah Wishes You a Happy Birthday: Unexpected Encounters in the Changing Middle East by Neil MacFarquhar – Another excellent first hand account of an author’s person to person contacts across the Middle East.
• Crossing Mandelbaum Gate: Coming of Age Between Arabs and Israelis, 1956-1978 by Kai Bird – A memoir recalling the the “Golden Years” of the modern Middle East by a person who grew up there.
• We Look Like the Enemy: The Hidden Story of Israel’s Jews from Arab Lands by Rachel Shabi – Outside of Israel, few people are aware of a segment of the country’s Jewish population that hails from the Arab World, sharing many of that region’s cultural characteristics.
• Black Wave: Saudi Arabia, Iran, and the Forty-Year Rivalry That Unraveled Culture, Religion, and Collective Memory in the Middle East by Kim Ghattas – One of the best books on the Middle East published this decade.
• The Shia Revival: How Conflicts within Islam Will Shape the Future by Vali Nasr – Prescient and powerful.
• The Ayatollah Begs to Differ: The Paradox of Modern Iran by Hooman Majd – Required reading if you wanna understand Iran.
• Dreams and Shadows: The Future of the Middle East by Robin Wright – Wright is an expert on the Middle East and it shows.

East vs West and Nations Rich and Poor: Competing Explanations 

• Carnage and Culture: Landmark Battles in the Rise to Western Power by Victor Davis Hanson – Militarily speaking, the West has prevailed over the rest of the world thanks to a collection of shared concepts such as dissent, inventiveness, adaptation and citizenship. Too bad this author is now a big Trump supporter.
• Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies by Jared Diamond – Europe conquered the world not because Europeans are smarter. Favorable geography helped played a major role.
• Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity, and Poverty by Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson – Unlike the above mentioned Guns, Germs, and Steel, authors Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson believe human institutions help determine whether a nation becomes rich or poor.
• Why the West is Best: A Muslim Apostate’s Defense of Liberal Democracy by Ibn Warraq – According to Warraq, Western values we take for granted like pluralism, individualism, freedom of thought and secularism are keys to our success and should be passionately defended.

Corruptions of Power

• Dark Money: The Hidden History of the Billionaires Behind the Rise of the Radical Right by Jane Mayer – Essential reading if you wanna understand the American political landscape.
• Corruptible: Who Gets Power and How It Changes Us by Brian Klaas – All of us at least once in our lives has encountered someone who abused his or her authority. Does power ultimately corrupt? The answer is nuanced to say the least.

Animals: Smarter Than You Think

• Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are? by Frans de Waal – If there was ever a book that changed my worldview it’s this one. Frequently the cognition gap between human and beast is a lot narrower than you’d think.

That’s all for now. Enjoy Nonfiction November!

Nonfiction November Week 2: Book Pairings

Last week Katie from the blog Doing Dewey kicked off Nonfiction November. This week Rennie at What’s Nonfiction has agreed to host. She invites participants to share their favorite book pairings, and takes a pretty inclusive approach. It could be a pairing of nonfiction books with fiction, podcasts, documentaries, movies or even additional works of nonfiction.

In past years I’ve been straight-forward, just pairing up nonfiction books with works of fiction. However, last year I did something new and featured Michael David Lukas’s 2018 novel The Last Watchman of Old Cairo, pairing it with a half-dozen books about the ancient Cairo Geniza and Egypt’s Jewish community. This year I thought I’d return to my old ways. I’ll be looking back at what I read in 2022, both nonfiction and fiction and select 15 books. For every work of nonfiction I’ll suggest a piece of fiction and visa versa.

• The Wrong End of the Telescope by Rabih Alameddine
• I Was Told to Come Alone: My Journey Behind the Lines of Jihad by Souad Mekhennet

• A Dream Called Home by Reyna Grande
• The Book of Unknown Americans by Cristina Henríquez

• The Pursuit of Italy: A History of a Land, its Regions and their Peoples by David Gilmour
• Not All Bastards Are from Vienna by Andrea Molesini

• God and the Fascists: The Vatican Alliance with Mussolini, Franco, Hitler, and Pavelic by Karlheinz Deschner
• Warburg in Rome by James Carroll

• King Leopold’s Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror, and Heroism in Colonial Africa by Adam Hochschild
• The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver

• Spain in Our Hearts: Americans in the Spanish Civil War, 1936–1939 by Adam Hochschild
• For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway

• I Must Betray You by Ruta Sepetys
• The Hole in the Flag: A Romanian Exile’s Story of Return and Revolution by Andrei Codrescu

• Free: A Child and a Country at the End of History by Lea Ypi
• The Fall of Stone City by Ismail Kadare

• The Attack by Yasmina Khadra
• Literature and War: Conversations with Israeli and Palestinian Writers by Runo Isakson

• Not Our Kind by Kitty Zeldis
• “The Rest of Us”: The Rise of America’s Eastern European Jews by Stephen Birmingham

• The Confusion of Languages by Siobhan Fallon
• Black Flags: The Rise of ISIS by Joby Warrick

• A Hero of France by Alan Furst
• Death in the City of Light: The Serial Killer of Nazi-Occupied Paris by David King

• Here in Berlin by Cristina García
• Stasiland: Stories from Behind the Berlin Wall by Anna Funder

• A Terrible County by Keith Gessen
• The Future Is History: How Totalitarianism Reclaimed Russia by Masha Gessen

• Ukraine Diaries: Dispatches From Kiev by Andrey Kurkov
• Death and the Penguin by Andrey Kurkov

Considering my reading tastes it’s no surprise I’ve included lots of history and international politics kind of stuff. For the first time doing these pairings I’ve featured books by two siblings (Masha and Keith Gessen), a pair of books by the same author (Andrey Kurkov) and two works of nonfiction by the same author (Adam Hochschild). In other firsts, close to half were translated into English from another language, with three quarters of these books written by either immigrants, expats, refugees or children of immigrants. I hope you enjoyed my post and I look forward to reading all the others from Nonfiction November.

Immigrant Stories: The Wrong End of the Telescope by Rabih Alameddine

Rabih Alameddine’s 2021 novel The Wrong End of the Telescope caught my eye back in June when I spotted a copy at the public library as part of its Pride Month display. Sucked in by its cool cover art, upon closer inspection I noticed it’s set on the Greek island of Lesbos. Even though I was all set to read James Angelos’s The Full Catastrophe: Travels Among the New Greek Ruins to satisfy the Greece requirement for Rose City Reader’s European Reading Challenge I instead opted to give Alameddine’s novel a chance. After bringing it home I thought the author’s name looked familiar so I did some checking. Lo and behold he also wrote the short autobiographical piece “How to Bartend”, which was my favorite essay from The Best American Essays 2020. Eager to read more from Alameddine I dived into The Wrong End of the Telescope and was not disappointed.

Born and raised in Lebanon, Dr. Mina Simpson lived for decades in America. Aware Mina is a trained medial professional fluent in Arabic she’s recruited by her friend to help provide humanitarian assistance to Middle Eastern refugees who’ve sought sanctuary on the Greek island of Lesbos. Fleeing the horrors of war and Islamic terror countless multitudes now find themselves interned in the island’s infamous Moria refugee camp, now subject to disease and neglect. Among the dislocated is Sumaiya, a Syrian mother in the throes of late-stage liver cancer. Asked by Sumaiya to keep her illness a secret Mina complies, and with her limited resources does all she can to make the stricken woman’s last days as pleasant as possible.

Spliced into this large-scale tragedy is Mina’s own life story, told through a series of flashbacks. Married to the same women for over 30 years, nevertheless she’s been ostracized by her family for decades thanks to their refusal to accept her sexuality. Only her brother fully embraces who she is and respects the painful transition she’s made along the way. Ironically, she’s assisted in her humanitarian efforts by a member of the Red Crescent, who happens to be a gay Palestinian with a working knowledge of Farsi he learned from his bisexual Israeli lover over the course of their adulterous affair. (A presumed Mossad agent specializing in Iranian operations.)

The Wrong End of the Telescope puts a human face on suffering, both on a grand and individual scale. At the same time it artfully contrasts the journeys we’re forced to undertake, be they across land and sea or from one manifestation of ourselves to another. Please consider this novel highly recommended.

Book Beginnings: True Believer by Kati Marton

Not only does Gilion host the European Reading and TBR 22 in 22 on her Rose City Reader blog but also Book Beginnings on Friday. While I’m no stranger to her European Reading Challenge, only recently I decided to participate in Book Beginnings on Friday. This week I’m back with another post.

For Book Beginnings on Friday Gilion asks us to simply “share the opening sentence (or so) of the book you are reading this week, or just a book that caught your fancy and you want to highlight.”

MY BOOK BEGINNING

How does an idealist turn into a willing participant in murder? How does such a person-who is neither poor, nor socially deprived-learn to crush those he loves for the sake of a cause, a promise, and an illusion?

Last week I featured the 2021 novel The Wrong End of the Telescope by Lebanese-American writer Rabih Alameddine. The week before it was the 2012 Kindle release of Lawrence Durrell’s 1960 travel memoir Bitter Lemons of Cyprus: Life on a Mediterranean Island. This week it’s the 2016 biography True Believer: Stalin’s Last American Spy by Hungarian-American writer Kati Marton.

I’ve been wanting to read True Believer for the last five or six years. However, I had no idea until held a copy in my hands the author, Kati Marton also wrote The Great Escape: Nine Jews Who Fled Hitler and Changed the World. I thoroughly enjoyed her 2006 book and had I known she was the author of True Believer I would have read it a long time ago. After starting the book just this morning it’s shaping up to be a winner.

Instead of me blathering on, here’s what novel’s page on Amazon has to say:

This astonishing real-life spy thriller, filled with danger, misplaced loyalties, betrayal, treachery, and pure evil, with a plot twist worthy of John le Carré, is relevant today as a tale of fanaticism and the lengths it takes us to.

True Believer reveals the life of Noel Field, an American who betrayed his country and crushed his family. Field, once a well-meaning and privileged American, spied for Stalin during the 1930s and ’40s. Then, a pawn in Stalin’s sinister master strategy, Field was kidnapped and tortured by the KGB and forced to testify against his own Communist comrades.

Sunday Salon

For over a month I’ve been taking part in The Sunday Salon hosted by Deb Nance at Readerbuzz. So far it’s been a huge success and I’m striving to make it a regular feature. So here’s another post. 

Last week I started and finished the 2021 novel The Wrong End of the Telescope by Lebanese-American writer Rabih Alameddine. Currently I’m still reading Lawrence Durrell’s Bitter Lemons of Cyprus: Life on a Mediterranean Island and Dzevad Karahasan’s Sarajevo, Exodus of a City. Like I mentioned last week all three of these books are for Rose City Reader’s European Reading Challenge. 

Articles. With my nose buried in several books last week I managed to read just two articles. This week I’ll try harder and hopefully read more. 

• CNN -“You have a doppelganger and probably share DNA with them, new study suggests” by Jen Christensen
• New York Magazine – “My Week With America’s Smartest* People” by Eve Peyser 

Listening. Like I’ve said before, with so many things going on in the world there’s no shortage of material for my favorite podcasts. 

• Fresh Air – “How The Ultrawealthy Avoid Taxes“,  “The Growing Conflict Between China & The U.S.”  and “Former GOP Operative On Enabling Trump’s Rise” 
• Friendly Atheist – “A Texas-sized Loophole in a Christian Law” 
• Vox: Today Explained – “RIP OAN” 
• The Bulwark- “Tim Miller: Wait, Are You Getting Squishy?“
• Vox Conversations – “Steve Bannon is still at war”  
• Deep State Radio – “The Destructionists: a conversation with Dana Milbank” and “Slava Ukraini!: Special Ukrainian Independence Day Edition of DSR”  
• The Economist: Checks and Balance-“Extreme goes mainstream” and “Trump Towers“
• The Daily – “Who Killed Daria Dugina?” and  “The Effort to Punish Women for Having Abortions” 
• Talking Feds – “Fentanyl: The Nation’s Hidden Killer” 
• The New Yorker: Politics and More – “What’s Driving Black Candidates to the Republican Party?” 
• Post Reports – “What really happened as the U.S. left Afghanistan“, How a car bomb in Moscow became a flash point in Ukraine” and “How favoritism trumped science in Iran’s covid response” 
• The Ezra Klein Show– “Why the Evangelical Movement Is in ‘Disarray’ After Dobbs” 
• The Mindshift Podcast – “Recovering a Sense of Agency: Lifting the Veil of Mormon Mind Control (with Luna Corbden)” 
• The Thinking Atheist – “We Dissent: Four Secular Women on the Front Lines”  
• The World Next Week – “Macron’s Algeria Trip, Drought in China, Anniversary of Afghanistan Withdrawal, and More” and “TWNW Special: What to Read and Listen to This Summer”  

Watching. Right now I’m watching just one TV show and it’s Mr. Robot. Like I’ve said before it just gets crazier and crazier thanks to insane plot twists, great writing and superb acting. It’s been one hell of a wild ride. Unfortunately for me, I have only two episodes left to watch. 

Everything else. Friday, instead of indulging in my weekly ritual of fine wine and conversation at my favorite local winery I drove up to Portland. After a quick trip to Powell’s Books I proceeded to my friends’ place for an evening of beers, fun and frivolity. Our wonderful hosts fired up the grill and put on the soccer game. After watching the home team come from behind to beat our hated rivals the Seattle Sounders a few of us stayed up past our bedtimes conversing on the porch. Saturday on my way home I hit a massive church yard sale and walked away with small stack of books, almost all of which were free. Among the treasures are Pulitzer-Prize winners American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer by Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin and Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides.