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Very detailed, might bore some people

Revisado: 10-17-21

Good listen overall,feel like I learned a good deal. The book does go on for a bit though so if you lack the patience of a dedicated history student then this book probably won't appeal to you.

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esto le resultó útil a 2 personas

Bad pacing, feels incoherent at times

Revisado: 10-02-21

This one was a pretty big disappointment to me. There were plenty of positive reviews as I'm sure you've seen but for me personally something just felt off. The author packs in a ton of scenes that just feel so PAINFULLY unnecessary and what's even worse is the fact that he jumps from one scene to another without giving any notice whatsoever. I think that a good writer changes scenes or perspectives in a way that lets the reader know what they're doing. There should be some sort of hint or subtle indication that says "okay, now we're going over here" but in this book it takes a paragraph or two after the fact before you realize that we're now hearing a completely different characters perspective.

I think this story might have been good if it had been executed more skillfully but in truth that's not all that was wrong with it. As some others have pointed out the characters themselves are rather bland and uninteresting. Straub makes strained attempts to imbue them with deeper personality but I think he only really succeeded in doing this with a couple of them. Most of them are so plain that their personalities could be summed up with one or two words. It also doesn't help that despite having all these characters he never seems to do anything significant with them. There are no truly memorable quotes or actions that I can attribute to them.

I finished this book because A.) I don't like to leave any book that I payed for unfinished and B.) I wanted to see where it was all headed. this is one of those stories that tries to lead you on by hinting at more interesting or exciting events to come. It whispers "just wait and see, there's a lot more coming if you just wait" but sadly it never really delivers. The story trudges on at a steady 3 miles per hour for the first 3 and a half quarters and then suddenly picks up in the last couple hours or so. Just as it's finally starting to get interesting It's basically over and you're left thinking "what the hell was that?".

If the author hadn't wasted so much time meandering about in a vain attempt to give his characters some trace of life then I think the story itself would have only taken 4 or 5 hours at most. It felt like someone took an idea for a short story and tried to drag it out into a full size story. There were some creepy elements in there I suppose but the suspense and mystery all seems to fizzle out into nothing when we finally learn what's been going on. Now I'm used to reading Stephen King so I don't think my standards for actual scariness are all that high. A lot of his books aren't actually all that scary but his writing is so good that it makes you want to keep going anyway. This story on the other hand was not only boring but badly written as well.

One last thing I want to say is that I wish people would stop giving either 5/5 or 1/5 reviews exclusively. It seems like 90% of reviews are either "5/5/5, it was perfect, best book ever authored by human hands" or "1/1/1, terrible awful bad and terrible, it was the worst book ever, nothing good about it at all". This black and white style of reviewing is just plain worthless if you think about it. It would be better not to write a review at all if you're not able to see why we have a nuanced 1-5 star system instead of a binary thumbs up/down one. A five star book should be a true masterpiece and to give it 5 in EVERY category is like saying that it was completely flawless. That shows a lack of critical thinking if you ask me. The same could be said for giving a 1 in every category, if the book was that bad then why were you even able to finish it? People really just need to stop being so dramatic and extreme about everything.

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Very, Very basic and a bit rambling at times.

Revisado: 09-22-21

If I were a complete beginner in the general study of religions then I think I might have found this collection to be more useful. Despite that assessment I would also have to say that there are better introductory books for total beginners (like "the world's religions" by Huston Smith) and by offering this one we might be taking a bigger risk of boring the listener to the point where they're no longer interested. If this had been my introduction to the subject then I probably would have walked away from it thinking that maybe I'm not that interested in this study after all. The fundamental problem with this collection of lectures is how they play it safe too often and focus too much on the three Abrahamic religions due to the instructors personal experience centering around them. While listening to this group of lectures you will told about about how many religions (but not all) have prophets and holy figures from the distant past who are still venerated by their followers today, You will be told how many religions have important texts that serve as their sort of literary foundation. You will be told how many religions have places and things which are considered sacred and are viewed with great respect. If you already knew all of these things then maybe you can understand how I felt while listening to the lectures. There were so many times where I thought "okay, that's borderline common knowledge but what else can you say about this group? What deeper insights or observations can you offer? And then after having these thoughts I would wait for a reply only for the professor to launch into a completely different area without ever providing that deeper "makes you think" sort of information that I was hoping for. Maybe I just chose the wrong work to listen to and I set myself up with these false expectations because I didn't read into the description enough. It's possible I'll admit, but I can't shake the feeling that this is just not nearly as interesting as the subject of comparative religion is capable of being. Now I don't fully blame the professor because I know that in this modern climate it is dangerous to express any sort of original thoughts when it comes to religion. A professor has to think of how their students might react and perhaps the fear of accidentally offending one of them is the reason why this whole series of lectures seem to 'play it safe' so consistently, When writing an actual book the author has more freedom I think and for that reason I can forgive the professor. He does seem to have a genuine interest in the subject and I understand that after giving the same lectures time and time again it's hard to instill your voice with that sort of vibrant enthusiasm that an author might employ in their writing. He probably didn't choose the cover description which drew me to this collection either so once again I just want to make clear that I do not blame the author of these lectures for everything.

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Couldn't stand the narrator, weak narrative

Revisado: 09-19-21

I was recommended this book by a friend and I had high hopes for it but found it disappointing. It seems to me like the passionate writing of a young man, naive and full of strong words but lacking that nuanced understanding and wisdom that usually comes later in life. The author is very clearly using the main protagonist to voice his own personal views and the story itself is just a vehicle for him to do this more conveniently. It's not terribly well written and the most impressive part of the whole thing is the horrific idea that serves as the books core concept: the complete destruction of the protagonist that leaves him still alive but unable to do almost anything. This is a pretty original and powerful idea from a horror standpoint but the rest of the book was not all that great.

During an early passage the author has his character launch into a lengthy tirade against war, violence and the war machine as a whole. For this portion (which by my guess was at least 15 or 20 minutes long) the author seemingly forgot to include the usual bits like "he said" or "he thought to himself" which normally are there to remind the reader that we are hearing the thoughts/words of the character and not those of the author himself. I believe this mistake revealed the fact that the character was no longer speaking at this point but in fact it was the author who needed to get this rant off his chest and he was using the character as a mouthpiece for his own griping. I don't think he did this deliberately but rather it seems to have been an unconscious mistake. Nevertheless it showed me that the author had written this book with the intention of making a very specific point.

The point being that war is always bad, evil and horrible and that nothing is better than life itself. Extremely naive, like I said, but that's the kind of absolutist reasoning a passionate young person is willing to get behind. The author writes about war as if it's something you can just decline to participate in at any time. He writes about it like it's some optional group activity at a kids summer camp to which you can simply say "no thanks, I'd rather just stay in the cabin and draw pictures with my crayons".

It doesn't surprise me that an American would have this view of war as it is something that has almost always been very distant and separate from our day to day lives. We are indeed the people who (most of the time) can say "no thanks" and just got back to living in peace. For the rest of the world it is rarely so simple however. For most other nations war is a thing that will come right into your home town, into the place where you live and work, and it will tear your peaceful little life to shreds whether you want to fight in it or not. Most people end up fighting and facing the horror of war because they have to, not because they want to.

Trumbos criticism of war is weak precisely because it is so heavily rooted in these naive notions about war that many Americans are possessed by. I do sort of understand his feelings however. Even if I disagree with his reasoning and method I believe that what he was trying to get at is the real truth. Trumbo is an idealist, that much is certain. When idealists get something wrong it's usually because they got carried away by their emotions and their deep desire to root out all unpleasantness and suffering from the world. If we as a species could put an end to war by simply laying down our arms and refusing to fight then we would have seen the end of war long ago.

Unfortunately it will probably never be that easy. You can refuse to fight but the person who's trying to kill you and your people won't feel the same way. He'll probably just kill you and then move on to do the same to everyone you care about, stepping over your corpse like a stray piece of garbage. War exists because there are people who insist upon it, people who cannot and will not be reasoned with by other means. While it may be true that our government has lied and manipulated us to fight many unnecessary wars in recent memory that is not always the reason why wars occur.

In conclusion I think we should be suspicious of the reasons why our government tries to send us off to war and we should always question and scrutinize those justifications as much as possible. At the same time we must also realize that sooner or later we will have to defend ourselves from legitimate threats if we want to go on living as peacefully as we have been. Trumbo is attacking a specific kind of conflict here, the manufactured kind that governments come up with in bad faith rather than due to any real necessity. His message only falls flat because it is too broad in its scope, too ambitious and hopeful to ever become reality. His love of peace and desire for cooperation amongst all people is admirable but sadly he overestimates the number who share his feelings.

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Very intriguing, solid read.

Revisado: 09-14-21

Out of the King books I've read thus far (maybe 4 or 5 so not too many) I think this may be my favorite. I actually found myself wanting to see even more of the overlook and its spirits by the time I was close to the books end.

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Informative and well written but be warned...

Revisado: 09-13-21

I was initially put off by the slow reading pace which the narrator uses but once I got used to it I didn't really mind. If you're the sort who gets impatient when someone is speaking slowly then I would recommend sampling before you buy. The author has many opinions and makes no attempt to disguise them so if you think you might be bothered by that then I would also advise you to be wary. I was able to accept those two aspects of the book and move past them but not everyone may find it so easy to do so. I do believe that it was worth the effort because I learned a lot from the book in spite of these minor distractions. The actual content is pretty informative and there is plenty of wisdom and insight to be found in it.

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esto le resultó útil a 3 personas

felt like being read a Wikipedia entry

Revisado: 08-26-21

narration was a bit dry for my taste and the writing was too for that matter. it's a nice little collection of stories but somehow they managed to make this subject less interesting to me.

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