Mini Reviews | Hodge Podge

I feel a potential reviewing slump coming on so obviously the only way to stop it is to write lots of reviews about completely unrelated books. Here's hoping it works!

Rating ⭐⭐⭐⭐

I really enjoyed this book - but I am such a sucker for books about cities, city biographies so to speak. I love learning about how massive cities we now take for granted started out sometimes at tiny villages with futures no could have predicted.

The author does a fantastic job pulling together many threads - history, anthropology, archaeology, and our own modern observations. She is an archaeologists, so that level of expertise is welcome as she not only discusses the rise and fall of some major urban centers, but the process of discovering them.

We visit several fantastic locations around the world - Tenochtitlan, Pompeii, Tell Brak, and the like. In these city remains, and others as well, the author explains how over many thousands of years the city as we know it today emerged. As we journey through the ancient world, even through some of the author's own digs in India, we see that the world as we know it today has more in common with these cities of the past than we think. She makes a lot of comparisons between cities now vs then, and delves into the idea of cities impact the people who live there. I found this part particularly interesting; our environment impacts us as much as we impact it.

I also found her take on the future of cities to be of interest. The likelihood of all major cities simply collapsing over time is not necessarily a given. It's true that many cities in the ancient world came to an end at some point and were abandoned, otherwise archeological digs at these locations would not happen. However, for cities to simply end is not all that common. The citizens move elsewhere, taking the influence of their former cities with them when they move on to other cities, and the cycle continues.

Recommended.

Rating ⭐⭐⭐⭐

I have a fairly good working knowledge of the Kennedys as a whole, but the bulk of my deeper knowledge revolves around Jack, Jackie, and JFK, Jr. I know some about Bobby, but only as he functioned in relation to JFK in the White House years, and then later in regards to his assassination. I was sixteen when JFK Jr. died and was absolutely gutted. Even at that age I remembering wondering how much more one family could take, and that Caroline was now all alone.

Side note: If you are one of those crazies who thinks JFK Jr. secretly survived the plane crash that killed his wife and sister-in-law, and that he would ever in a million years support the former guy and run as his VP, you can kindly fuck all the way off into the sun. A) That would never happen, given the fact that he was a Democrat who many thought could win the party nomination and presidency someday and B) Shame on your for piling more hurt onto Caroline every time you spout this nonsense.

When I came across this book I was delighted, as I am trying to learn more about all of the Kennedys. I am not sure why, and there are many detractors who deride the obsession our nation has with the family, but so many of us still can not look away. Even as the generation after Caroline and JFK Jr. have not managed to capture our attention the way their predecessors did, there are still many who read books such as this, about the eight children of Joe and Rose.

Kathleen, called Kick by her family, was Joe's favorite child and Jack's favorite sister. It is easy to see why. She was adventurous, charming, clever, hilarious. She made her debut into London society in 1938 when Joe was appointed the US Ambassador. London fell in love with Kick as well, as did a specific young man named Billy - William Cavendish, heir to the Dukedom of Devonshire and Chatsworth. They married despite protests of her family over the religious divide, and Joe Jr was the only Kennedy to attend the civil ceremony. Unfortunately a long life together was not in the cards, as Cavendish was killed in action while fighting in Belgium just a few months later. Kick would not live much longer than her husband, dying in a plan crash four years later, at age 28.

Kick was in many ways ahead of her time. She did what she wanted, when she wanted, and saw whomever she wanted - despite threats from her family that she would be cut-off on various occasions. Kick lived her life to the fullest, never minding a bit of scandal that came along with whatever she was up to.

Kick would become the second Kennedy child to die, but certainly not the last. Joe Jr was killed four years earlier in the war, around a month before Cavendish. Her beloved and favorite brother Jack would become the third in 1963, and from out of these family tragedies the so-called Kennedy Curse would emerge.

The author makes good use of sources, relying both on family stories and words by Kick's own in hand in the form of letters she wrote.

I would recommend this one to those with an interest in the Kennedy family dynamics and these 'forgotten' children who have been eclipsed by Jack, Bobby, and Ted.

NetGalley ARC | The Real Valkyrie: The Hidden History of Viking Warrior Women

I received a free digital ARC from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Rating ⭐⭐⭐⭐

It will surprise no one that everything we think we know about Vikings women dates back to those darn Victorians and their ability to completely Victorian-ize everything.

The island of Birka, not far from Stockholm, is home to a once-busy Viking village, meant to control trade routes around northern Scandinavia. It also happens to be home to hundreds of Viking graves. One grave in particular is of most interest to the author, that of a Viking warrior that was first excavated in 1878. Given the items recovered from the grave and the high-status burial provided, for over one hundred years it has been assumed (by dudes who could not conceive of any other option) that the Birka Warrior was male.

Not so, says the 2017 DNA test.

And from there the author is off and running on a fantastical journey across Europe, imagining what life must have been like for this warrior who lived over hundreds of years ago.

The author does a fantastic job using archaeology, history, and the Norse legends and sagas to bring to light a much more accurate picture of how Vikings women lived, fought, and died. In imagining what life might have been like for this warrior, to whom she gives the name Hervor, the author is able to shed more light on the women of the age who were far more independent than the Victorians would have you believe.

Using the many varieties of sources previously mentioned, the author constructs an example of what life might have been like for young Hervor. Each chapter begins with a segment of Hervor's "story" - a story which sees her cross paths with other formidable women of the age, from Queen Gunnhild to Queen Olga of Kyiv.

While the author has fictionalized what life might have been like for this Birka warrior, each chapter delves deeply into various aspects of life for the real Viking women who lived so long ago. There is extensive research here and the author clearly knows her stuff. The author's knowledge of the sagas and old Norse stories is a wonderful addition to the historical record.

Mini Reviews | Ancient Egypt

 

I love Ancient Egypt so much. I want to visit and see all there is to see of that world. It also infuriates me that so much has been lost to history - and continues to be lost as smuggled pieces magically make their way to private collections. Egypt has been robbed of so much and deserves to get their history back.

 Rating ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Absolutely LOVED this one and could not put it down. Easily one of my top-five favorite books on Ancient Egypt. It's the perfect combination of academic and accessible for those who are not as fond of non-fiction as I am.

When one thinks of Ancient Egypt, most likely the first thing that pops into your head has something to do with tombs, mummies, the pyramids, etc. After all, these items make up much of the visible remains of this mighty culture - and mummies + funerary items travel well, all over the world on display.

In this text Dr. Naunton's primary focus is on what we HAVEN'T found yet - such as the tombs of some of the most famous rulers to ever live; think Cleopatra, Alexander, Nefertiti, and Imhotep (I know, I know, he was never Pharaoh, but he's still a big deal). Just think about that line-up for a second and what it would be like if even ONE were to come to light. People would go batshit crazy over it, and rightly so. I would be one of those people.

Yet he also looks at those at the reigns of some more obscure rulers as well, thus giving a well-rounded picture of the whole of Egypt's ancient world and not just those that blockbuster movies are made about. I found these lesser-known rulers' reigns to be just as fascinating as those mentioned above.

Here the author takes deep look into the lives of these rulers and what they accomplished in their time on the throne. Based on incredibly detailed scholarship, he also discusses what their tombs likely contained, how they were buried, and why their tombs have remained undiscovered for centuries. even better, he lays out how they might yet be found.

I appreciated the variety of images that accompanied the text, both color and black and white. The maps came in handy as well - as did the list of kings he included. I think we can all agree that scholarship on this massive period of time is far from complete, but this list with dates is the most up-to-date we have at the moment. And honestly that's what continues to draw people to Ancient Egypt - there's still so much more to discover.

This a must for anyone who happily "suffers" from Egyptomania. Absolutely brilliant. You will not be disappointed.

Rating ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Another great read from Brian M. Fagan, one of the leading experts on this most ancient world. We meet a wide variety of people from many different periods, many who had one thing in common: they were super fucking greedy.

This mainly applies to the tomb robbers who beat modern archaeologists to these finds by thousands of years, to those who paid well for pieces to be spirited out of the country and into private collections. And even today, with so many artifacts on display around the world, sitting in museums far from their place of origin. These artifacts MUST be returned to Egypt, though I highly doubt it will ever happen unfortunately.

Fagan also introduces us to fledgling archaeologists, some who did their best to protect and preserve their finds and others who all but ripped stones, pillars, obelisks, etc. from their resting places.

The author tells the story in chronological order and it's not terribly hard to see why so many artifacts were lost - France and England both somehow thought that they had the rights to another country's history, and could tell that history better than Egypt. It's such a gross perspective. There were of course archaeologists who were in it for the history and not the money, but money ruled over everything else, and still does today. It certainly did not help that there were those within local government positions in Egypt who gladly took the money and handed over the history. Basically, the whole system sucked.

The first volume of this book was published in 1974, but I read the revised edition that came out in 2004. There was much to update and Fagan writes just as passionately about the newer discoveries as he did the earlier ones. He also does not shy away from critiquing the tourist industry and explains what should be obvious - tourism might be crucial to the economy, but it is destroying the very things tourists come to see and if not better protected, they will not survive. Stricter guidelines have been put in place over the years, and hopefully they are enough.

Fagan does a marvelous job bringing to life many of those who sought Egypt's ancient artifacts. yet he does an even better job with those who sought to preserve the history and keep it where it belongs. Incredible attention to detail and brilliantly written.

Highly recommended.