Tag Archives: history

Book Review: On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century by Timothy Snyder

Posted on May 4, 2017 by Tietsu

*Insert Overly-Emphatic Political Treatise Here* See what I mean? No? That’s fine. I’m not here to change your mind. Hell, I’m barely here at all. Life has me scared and I’ve pretty much taken to books, booze, and checking and … Continue reading →

Posted in Book Review, Nonfiction | Tagged Authoritarianism, communism, Conservative, Donald Trump, Fascism, history, Liberal, On Tyranny, Philosophy, politics, The President, Timothy Snyder, Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century | Leave a comment

Book Review: The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11 by Lawrence Wright

Posted on April 25, 2017 by Tietsu

In an interview, Wright mentioned that he was using three tome-filled bookcases in order to do research on the book that would eventually become The Looming Tower. Now, I’ve never written a non-fiction book, hell, by any reasonable standard I … Continue reading →

Posted in Book Review, Nonfiction | Tagged 9/11, Afghanistan, Al-Qaeda, american history, Extremism, history, Islam, Lawrence Wright, politics, religion, terrorism, The Looming Tower, war | Leave a comment

Book Review: The Radium Girls: The Dark Story of America’s Shining Women by Kate Moore

Posted on April 11, 2017 by Tietsu

When a loved one dies there is always some(or one) among the grief stricken who are left with the task of writing an obituary. There are people at the paper, at the memorials, who can help, but the burden still … Continue reading →

Posted in Book Review, Nonfiction | Tagged american history, Biography, corporate greed, death, history, Kate Moore, patriachy, radiation poisoning, Radioactivity, Radium, The Radium Girls, There was a time when we put radium in literally everything, women's rights | Leave a comment

Book Review: The Ten-Cent Plague: The Great Comic-Book Scare and How it Changed America by David Hajdu

Posted on March 23, 2017 by Tietsu

Comics used to be big business. You might say to yourself ‘Hey, wait a minute, random internet person! Comics are big business now!” It is here that I shake my head slowly and tell you that what you are speaking … Continue reading →

Posted in Book Review, Nonfiction | Tagged art, Censorship, Comic books, Comic Code Authority, communism, David Hajdu, history, politics, publishing, The Red Scare, The Ten-Cent Plague | Leave a comment

Book Review: @War: The Rise of the Military-Internet Complex by Shane Harris

Posted on February 16, 2017 by Tietsu

@War suffers not only in its kitschy title, but in its wee-haw, all hail the Military Industrial/Internet Complex viewpoint. I read this book as tentative research for a project and early on it became clear that my only option to survive … Continue reading →

Posted in Book Review, Nonfiction | Tagged cyber warfare, cyberspace, history, Military, Military Industrial Complex, Military Internet Complex, NSA, politics, science, Shane Harris, war, warfare | Leave a comment

Book Review: The President’s Club by Nancy Gibbs and Michael Duffy

Posted on February 7, 2017 by Tietsu

It’s impossible to review The President’s Club without look towards the last few weeks. In the same way that one can no more look at the first century of the Roman Empire without looking at Nero and Caligula. And … Continue reading →

Posted in Book Review, Nonfiction | Tagged american history, Biography, democrat, Harry Truman, Herbert Hoover, history, Lyndon Johnson, Michael Duffy, Nancy Gibbs, politics, republican, Richard Nixon, The President's Club | Leave a comment

Pieces from the Novel #2: A Hole in Creation

Posted on January 25, 2017 by Tietsu

I face the edge looking out, hues of purple and blue gliding across the earth below. I feel them moving. Tribes, towns, and cities of phosphorescent billions crisscrossing like apathetic phantoms. Continue reading →

Posted in Creative Fiction | Tagged A novel someday, ash, damnation, demon, dream, Dreams Away, excerpt, falling, fire, ghost, history, humanity, nightmare, phantom | Leave a comment

Book Review: Farewell: The Greatest Spy Story of the Twentieth Century by Sergei Kostin

Posted on December 27, 2016 by Tietsu

The book didn’t start off promising. It started in fact with a foreword written by Richard V. Allen. This name meant nothing to me, but when I approach books outside of my usual stalking grounds this tends to be the … Continue reading →

Posted in Book Review, Review | Tagged Biography, Espionage, Farewell: The Greatest Spy Story of the Twentieth Century, François Mitterrand, history, KGB, Ronald Reagan, Russia, Russian, Sergei Kostin, Spy, The Cold War, Vladimir Vetrov | Leave a comment

Book Review: Debt: The First 5000 Years by David Graeber

Posted on December 1, 2016 by Tietsu

Reviewing this is hard for a couple of reasons. First of all, for me, it is out of my wheelhouse. Both anthropologically and economically. That first thing being said, that is why I read. So I can at least glimpse … Continue reading →

Posted in Book Review, Nonfiction | Tagged anarchy, business, David Graeber, debt, Debt: The First 1000 Years, economics, economy, finance, Graeber, history, money, politics | Leave a comment

Book Review: Notes From a Dead House by Fyodor Dostoevsky

Posted on November 29, 2016 by Tietsu

There seems to be a sort academic predisposition of hatred towards Pavear and Volokhonsky. It’s a strange thing, one I neither understand nor want to. People seem utterly baffled by a literal translation that forces one to endure turns of … Continue reading →

Posted in Book Review, Nonfiction, Review | Tagged academia, classics, dostoevsky, fyodor dostoevsky, history, intellectual awakening, pavear, prison, russian literature, Siberia, translation, volokhonsky | Leave a comment