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The Holy Bible: English Standard Version. In progress [16]
Death's End, by Cixin Liu. In progress [15]
The Crash Detectives: Investigating the World's Most Mysterious Air Disasters, by Christine Negroni. Negroni offers a credible theory about the disappearance of Malaysia Air 370 by folding in the fascinating and sobering details of at least a dozen other air disasters and near disasters that have occurred since the dawn of the age of flight. [14]
Deep Time, by David Darling. [13]
Siddhartha, by Hermann Hesse. [12]
Ancient Ruins and Rock Art of the Southwest, by David Grant Noble. Those who know me understand that sussing out what humankind was up to in the pre-historic period is my thing. David Noble's book came highly recommended by another amateur enthusiast who works a V-Bar-V petroglyph heritage site. It does not disappoint, offering succinct directions, useful descriptions, and thoughtful analysis of "ruins and rock art" found in my neighborhood. [11]
Black Elk Speaks: Being the Life Story of a Holy Man of the Oglala Sioux, by John G. Neihardt. "Black Elk Speaks" tells the story of an Oglala holy man and his Lakota people who lived through the worst of the American Indian Wars, from the Fetterman Fight to the Little Big Horn to the Wounded Knee Massacre. This book has long been on my "To Read" list (and my bookshelf), but when Joseph Campbell spoke highly of it in "The Inner Reaches of Outer Space" I bumped it to the top of my list. As I enter the autumn of my life I have been encountering books I should have read in my youth. This is one of those. [10]
Sinagua Sunwatchers, Kenneth J. Zoll. Of the thousand some petroglyphs discerned on the rock panels at V Bar V Heritage Site located along Beaver Creek in the Verde Valley, many correlate to midday shadows cast by two rock gnomens during the equinoxes and solstices and at other calendrical events throughout the year. "Sinagua Sunwatchers", by Kenneth J. Zoll, lays out the details patiently in methodical detail. [7]
The Little Book of Atheist Spirituality, by Andre Comte-Sponville. My, what a fine "little book" this one is! Comte-Sponville reminds us that the search for meaning has long been - and will forever continues to be - conducted by the non-believer and the non-religious as well as the theist. He reminds the theist that atheism need not equal nihilism while reminding the atheist that non-belief need not entail fatalism. I plan to make gifts of this rich little volume to my favorite evangelical, my favorite Marxist, and many of the others I also love in between. I'll be reading "The Little Book of Atheist Spirituality" again. [6]
The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, by Omar Khayyam. As with many volumes I finally have made time to read I wish that I'd read this many years ago. It stands as a worthy companion to the works of Rumi, Ecclesiastes, and the Tao Te Ching. [5]
Flintknapping: Making & Understanding Stone Tools, by John C. Whitaker. A rich resource for those who want to make stone tools or just understand their place in pre-history. [4]
An Atheist and a Christian Walk into a Bar: Talking about God, the Universe, and Everything, by Randal Rauser and Justin Schieber. [3] A worthy effort by two evenly matched opponents, yet more enjoyable than most such exchanges in that authors Rauser and Schieber obviously respect each other. Not sure they got to choose their title. Schieber was called upon to defend the implications of a materialism I'm not sure he holds, while Rauser defended a God of the Philosophers (bare theism) rather than the trinitarian~monotheism of biblical Christianity. I'd buy a sequel, but next time I'd hold out for paper rather than use the Kindle app on my smartphone again.
Mr. Gatling's Terrible Marvel: The Gun That Changed Everything and the Misunderstood Genius Who Invented It, by Julia Keller. [1] A social history about the man and his times, the application of patent law, the rise of industrialization, the internecine machinations of weapons procurement by the American military establishment, and the role of military technology applied to the acquisition and defense of empire. Regrettably, this book contains very details about the innovative gun itself, its evolutions, or its re-adoption in modernized form in the Jet Age. Not what I expected.
Let's read 48 books in 52 weeks...
