Book Review: The Buzz on Professional Wrestling by Scott Keith

The Buzz on Professional Wrestling by Scott Keith
My rating: 1 of 5 stars

Coming in at roughly 217 pages in an oversized format, The Buzz on Professional Wrestling was published just weeks before the 90s Wrestling Boom ended and began a slow declined thanks to the WWE monopoly. After spending a little time on “wrestling 101” and a “history of wrestling” (up to 1984), author Scott Keith then dedicated the rest of the book to look at pro wrestling from 1984—and the start of the WWF Golden Age—to sometime in 2000, covering both WWF (now WWE) and WCW through biographical sketches of Hulk Hogan, Randy Savage, Ric Flair, Sting, Steve Austin, Goldberg, and many others. The first time I read this book all the way back in 2001, I thought this book was pretty good, however after 20+ years during which I learned a lot more from other sources I can say this book is awful. There are a lot of issues from poor editing and basically lying about things people supposedly did, namely Hulk Hogan—who has done a lot of shady stuff in the business and in real life not covered in this book—who it turns out did not do everything Keith accused him of. Basically, this book was a cash grab in The Buzz on series to get in on the wrestling boom but given how bad it was written I’m happy that it was published just before the wrestling business cooled off and no one was interested anymore.

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Book Review: Mr. Stone and the Knights Companion by V.S. Naipaul

Mr. Stone and the Knights Companion by V.S. Naipaul
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

A life-long bachelor a few years from retirement and without achievement in his career drastically changes everything in a few sudden bursts of inspiration. Mr. Stone and the Knights Companion is a novella by V.S. Naipaul detailing the how an average man achieved the one great achievement in his life.

The titular character is a middle management lifer in the late 1950s/early 1960s London with retirement slowly getting closer when he suddenly falls for a twice widowed woman and during a holiday finds inspiration to create a program for retirees for his company. Naipaul creates a mediocre man living an eccentrically self-regulated life that suddenly changes everything up not once but twice and sees how things turn out. The pacing is pretty good and the second characters alright, but Naipaul excelled in portraying his main character’s arc which was both triumphant—albeit all too brief—and sad all too predictable when you look at the whole novella.

Mr. Stone and the Knights Companion is only 126 pages long, but V.S Naipual shows the humdrum of a middling man whose one burst of inspiration is just a blip in his life.

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Book Review: The Time of Contempt by Andrzej Sapkowski

The Time of Contempt by Andrzej Sapkowski
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The fallout from the first Nilfgaardian war is affecting politics and future war plans only for a certain white-haired individual to interfere. The Time of Contempt is the second Witcher novel by Andrzej Sapkowski sees Geralt, Yennifer, and Ciri come together at a conclave of magicians only for things to go to hell.

Throughout the book there is a sense that things are happening but the characters and thus the readers only see what’s happening to them until everything hits the fan. Sapkowski builds the events up slowly as the main characters come together on the Isle of Thanedd for a conclave of mages when two coups, one supported by the Nilfgaardians and the other by the Northern Kings who are planning covert action about the Nilfgaardians as well. The entire book feels more coherent than Sapkowski’s previous outing as the main narrative took over 60% of the book while aftermath took up the rest especially as Ciri makes an important decision near the end of the novel. Though there is a quick succession of point-of-view narratives across the continent, they are framed in a conversation between Dandelion and Geralt providing a better flow than the previous book. Thanks to a series by the YouTube channel Wizards and Warriors, I have a rough idea of the political and physical landscape of the continent which helped to understand where things were because there is no map which is the only thing that takes away from Sapkowski’s world building. Overall, this is a better book than the previous novel and makes me look forward to the rest of the series.

The Time of Contempt is an improvement on the opening novel but with the same great action and character development thus making me interested in where Andrzej Sapkowski takes things.

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Book Review: Tribal Bigfoot by David Paulides

Tribal Bigfoot by David Paulides
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Following up his initial investigation into Bigfoot incidents and witnesses, a former police investigator expanded his search area in northern California as well as expanding out to Minnesota and Oklahoma. Tribal Bigfoot is David Paulides follow up to his first book, The Hoopa Project, in which he gathers more evidence and proposes a new theory about bigfoot today.

Expanding his research area to the northern California countries surrounding the Hoopa Valley, Paulides methodically examined the terrain and wildlife before looking for witness testimony for the viability of bigfoot in the area. Like his previous book Paulides spends most of his time going over the witness testimony—which are back up by affidavits—followed by his personal observations of the area where the incident(s) took place in each interview. Once again Paulides hired law enforcement forensic artist Harvey Pratt to draw sketches from the memories of witnesses he interviewed, and it is the result of these sketches and local Native American knowledge that Paulides made his big conclusion at the end of the book. Paulides believes that bigfoot isn’t an ape as some researchers believe but a homininan that can reproduce with humans which seems to be showing with the amount of a more human-looking bigfoot seen by witnesses than the ape-looking bigfoot of the Patterson-Gimlin footage. Like his previous book Paulides’ is a little dry in his style though his writing did improve as did his referencing between witness accounts.

Tribal Bigfoot continues David Paulides’ research into bigfoot in northern California as well as glance at Minnesota and Oklahoma. The book not only contains Paulides well done research, but also a theory that bigfoots and humans can produce offspring.

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Book Review: Childhood's End by Arthur C. Clarke

Childhood's End by Arthur C. Clarke
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

The two most powerful nations on Earth are reaching for the stars when suddenly the stars reach down, and everyone waits. Childhood’s End by Arthur C. Clarke is one of the most important novels of “the golden age of science fiction” with its surprising twist and interesting ending.

Given the time the book was published and how Clarke projected the “future” timeframe that the story took place, it didn’t hurt the overall story. The benevolent alien contact trope, but with a unique hidden agenda twist was good as well. The surprise twist of the appearance of the aliens was cool, though the later explanation at the end about how their appearance was ingrained in human consciousness was disappointing though it went with the ending of the book. Clarke’s point-of-view characters were a bit flat just there to move the narrative along, which overall was fine. Yet it was Clarke’s prologue for the 1990 edition—which I read—unfortunately undermined the story even before I had begun that I wish that Clark had decided to make it an epilogue. Overall, I thought this novel was okay, I wasn’t dissuaded from reading other of Clarke’s works.

Childhood’s End is one of science fiction’s most important works from its golden age and put Arthur C. Clarke on the literary map.

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Book Review: Blood of Elves by Andrzej Sapkowski

Blood of Elves by Andrzej Sapkowski
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

The child is hunted because of her lineage and the power in her blood, yet she is under the protection of a man mutated to protect people from monster beasts. Blood of Elves by Andrzej Sapkowski is the first novel of The Witcher series as the titular character Geralt of Rivia looks after Ciri, the child of destiny and heir of Cintra.

Set in the aftermath of a war of conquest a few years before, the story sees Geralt and Ciri—a politically neutral witcher and the fugitive princess of conquered Cintra—navigate the new political order was one looks to find those looking for his ward and eliminate them while learns not only to fight but her magical potential. The novel feels like a string of Sapkowski’s short stories that at first seemed to be linked towards a narrative climax, but suddenly in the middle of the book things just get fractured into different storylines and timeframes with no narrative cohesion nor a satisfying stopping point in the arcs begun in the book. Overall Sapkowski’s action scenes and world building are very good, but the biggest fault is the randomization of narratives that are just introduced haphazardly chronologically in the flow of the book.

Blood of Elves is an okay start of The Witcher series by Andrzej Sapkowski as it has good action scenes and background worldbuilding, but its overall structure especially in the second half of the book muddies things.

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