Dunkirk – The Cost of War.

Credit: Set Photo, Christopher Nolan Movie, Dunkirk

The first and most obvious cost of war is the violent loss of lives and of its aftereffects upon survivors in the form of PTSD.  The other cost, ironically, is to be unprepared for war.

 

Sounds somewhat oxymoronic, does it not? But paying for the cost of preparedness may be the precondition to avoiding or minimizing the former: This concept was demonstrated during the long years of the Cold War between America and Russia.

Dunkirk:  At the onset of World War Two, the stranding of over 300,000 British and French troops who were driven to the edge of the sea on the beaches of Dunkirk, France, by German forces, abundantly underscores the fallacy of appeasement, a disastrous policy adopted by British Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain.

FALL from GRACE

Dust cover from the hardback book.

Fall from Grace, written by master storyteller Richard North Patterson, a former trial lawyer turned author, is an excellent choice for summer reading.

The plot is set on Martha’s Vineyard, as are those of the other books in this trilogy, Loss of Innocence, and Eden in Winter. Not coincidentally, the Vineyard is also Patterson’s summer home.

As the denouement of this tale progresses, it tears at the heart and soul of the Blaine family, where intrigue, mystery, and complex relationships rule its days.

Benjamin Blaine, alpha personality, principal protagonist, and renowned author drives himself to success and fame, yet becomes dysfunctional within his own family.

Duty and Honor

From the Paperback Version

Jack Ryan Jr appears once again in this novel that partially owes its success to the fame of Tom Clancy, but which was penned by Grant Blackwood following Clancy’s death in 2013.

It was The Hunt for Red October that propelled Clancy to the best-seller lists, especially after Ronald Reagan’s endorsement of that book as being “my kind of yarn.”

In this more current tale, Jack Ryan Jr, son of President Ryan, finds himself being tracked for assassination.  He doesn’t know who is attempting to find and eliminate him; nor does he know why.

And he doesn’t want his famous dad’s help.

Somewhere Safe . . .

. . . With Somebody Good is the title of Jan Karon’s book, one her latest in the life of small-town Mitford.  Karon is a prolific and easy to read author. 

Nonetheless, her series of tales about the mythical town of Mitford has grown into at least nine books, all of which are better read in sequence.

I discovered this when I purchased Somewhere Safe with Somebody Good at a Barnes & Noble book store in Washington, D.C. during one of my visits there.

It’s much more enjoyable to have read Karon’s books about life in Mitford in the order in which they were written.

The plot lines in Somewhere Safe . . .  resolve around the servant leadership of an Episcopal parish priest, Tim Cavanagh and his wife Cynthia, both of whom become the center of life in their little corner of the world. 

 

Father Tim evokes a time when residing in  and participating with the activities and rituals of a Christian parish was at the core of life for many people. 

The Upcoming Insipid New Jersey Primaries?

Jack Ciattarelli at an April, 2013 Town Hall Meeting

According to an article in Sunday’s The New York Times, the interest being demonstrated by Garden State voters to the gubernatorial primary elections which will be held on June 6, are of little interest.

That’s too bad, but not unanticipated given that rarely do primaries garner much attention.

Moreover, the Times story used up most of its ink naming and discussing the Democrat candidates, giving negligible attention to the other side of the aisle.

The only reference to the GOP was that of Democrat front runner Phil Murphy’s criticism of “the transportation plans of Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno, one of two main candidates running in the Republican primary,” according to Nick Corasaniti, writer of the Times report.