Charles Ashbacher Reviews

  Review of Moonchasers and Other Stories , by Ed Gorman, ISBN 0312860102 Five out of five stars Very tight and entertaining short stories   In this collection, Ed Gorman demonstrates his versatility in writing about the faults and foibles of human beings. The title story is about how two boys sneak around and explore an abandoned building. While moving around, they encounter a wounded bank robber who still has the money. Desperate for provisions and medical supplies, the robber gives the boys money to buy supplies. There is a police officer that has some real personal issues, so there is a complex interaction between all the players.   Gorman creates a complex story where the line between the good and bad guys is blurred. The resolution of the issue of police malfeasance is one that was very unexpected. Boys will be boys, sometimes they are full of mischief and other times they stand their ground to try to make the wrongs as right as possible.   Other st...

  Review of Wild On the Bases , by Wilfred McCormick Three out of five stars A story that has not aged well   Baseball coach Rocky McCune has taken his Koulean team to the annual Kaibob tournament. It is being played on a Native American Reservation, although only one of the four teams consists of Native Americans. They have traveled some distance to take part in the tournament and their expenses have been paid by the tournament organizing committee. A fundamental component of the tournament is a dancing performance by the locals.   The Kouleans are by far the better team and the tournament not only draws people in the area, but others plan their vacations so that they can be there when the games are played. There is a great deal of action off the diamond, Rocky and his players commit several major verbal blunders in their conversations about the Native Americans. These blunders take place on and off the diamond. Some of the people rooting for the other three te...

  Review of Where Nobody Knows Your Name: Life in the Minor Leagues of Baseball , by John Feinstein ISBN 9780307949585 Five out of five stars Deep insight into the minor leagues   All sports nonfiction books provide insight into the machinations of the action to some degree. However, few provide the depth of revelations like this book. The main characters are a group of baseball players, managers, coaches and one umpire that have spent an extended about of time in the minor leagues. Many of the players have spent at least some time in the majors, some little more than a cup of coffee, but others had significant success, yet for whatever reason, ended up back in the minors and still retain the dream of going back.   For me, there were two major revelations in this book. The first was about the umpires, who also start at the very bottom and slowly work their way up the levels until some of them get the call to be full-time in the majors. The most recent contracts ...

  Review of Sky: A True Story of Courage During World War II , by Hanneke Ippisch, ISBN 0816745242 Five out of five stars Another story of great bravery during WWII   Hanneke Ippisch was fifteen years old when the Germans invaded Holland in 1940. Up to that time her childhood was a normal one, her father was a pastor, so his family was known throughout the region. At first, the German occupation was fairly mild, and the war damage was localized, so little changed. However, as the war continued the Germans began their process of removing what they considered undesirables and confiscating materials they needed for their war effort. This included conscripting men to work in jobs supporting the Wehrmacht.   As the German grip on Holland tightened, Ippisch began working for the Dutch underground in opposing the Germans.   Her actions put her at great risk, for the Germans reacted very harshly to any action they deemed as anti-German. For some time, she was able ...

  Review of On Dangerous Ground: Stories of Western Noir , edited by Ed Gorman, Dave Zeltserman and Martin H. Greenberg, ISBN 9781587671920 Five out of five stars Wide variety of stories in the western genre   There are 21 stories in this collection and while all are based on the western genre, there is a wide variety. There is often the requisite gunplay, but in most cases the characters are fairly well developed, so the shoot-em-up action is not necessarily the primary plot event. The emphasis is on the people living their lives in a place where the social conditions are still wild and untamed. My favorite in the collection is “The Old Ways,” by Ed Gorman. The plot is based on the clash of cultures between whites and Native Americans, told from the perspective of a Native American that works as a floater in a casino run by Madame Dupree. His job was to circulate among the card games using house money and use his holdout cards to win. A large percentage of his winni...

  Review of Island of Hope: The Story of Ellis Island and the Journey to America , by Martin W. Sandler ISBN 0439530822 Five out of five stars So many stories based on one place   An amazing 12 million immigrants were processed on Ellis Island between 1892 and 1954, and they were from a wide variety of cultures. Up until 1924, the source countries were widely varied, but new laws that took effect in 1924 set quotas from certain areas and countries. This book is a brief explanation of the process and brief mention of their stories and what their lives were like once they were accepted and left Ellis Island.   The best aspect of the book is the inclusion of photos of some of the people that have arrived for processing. There is the Greek man in full military uniform that looks like a dress, there is a picture of two Russian Cossacks trying to look fierce and a Norwegian woman wearing clothes that look Scandinavian. One of the most interesting aspects is how the im...

  Review of Shaihu Umar: A Novel About Slavery in Africa , by Alhaji Sir Abubakar Tafawa Barewa, ISBN 9781558760066 Five out of five stars Another look at the history of slavery   This is an excellent book that covers an aspect of the history of slavery that is very rarely covered. The fact that slavery has until very recently been a fundamental component of human economic life is often lost. The context of this novel is the slave trade in the northern section of Africa around and in the region of the Sahara Desert. With an emphasis on Nigeria.   Issues of how African chieftains regularly raided the areas of other tribes in order to capture people to be sold into the slave trade and how many of those slaves were sold and held locally are covered. It has generally been lost in the modern conversation about slavery that the people that European ships picked up on the African coast for slave cargo were sold to them by Africans.   The timeframe is the late ni...

  Review of Beasts of the Blood-stained Jackboot: Illustrated WW2 Pulp Fiction For Men , ISBN 9781840686715 Five out of five stars Pulp fiction as a propaganda tool   When Germany started World War II in Europe, the actions of the German forces occupying other countries were known to be harsh to the point of brutal. This behavior gave fiction writers great latitude in creating stories about the Germans. In the area of the pulps, the usual fare of scantily clad women was incorporated into the stories of German behavior. The results were a propaganda tool that was also titillating.   These stories have a general theme of women being abused by monsters in human form and all have phrases equivalent to, “She was now reduced to shivering in fear in her lace bra and panties.” Like good pulp stories, the monsters lose out in the end, although not before they generate a great deal of suffering.   This book is an interesting look back at how the men’s pulp fiction ...

  Review of The Long March: The Choctaw’s Gift to Irish Famine Relief , by Marie-Louise Fitzpatrick ISBN 9781582460659 Five out of five stars True story of the poor giving what they can   This book is based on a true story, where the Choctaw people, shortly after surviving the Trail of Tears, did what they could to help others. They are now living in what was then known as Indian Territory and is now the state of Oklahoma. In 1847, they hear of the famine taking place in Ireland, where thousands of people are starving due to the potato blight.   With almost nothing of their own, the Choctaw people manage to gather together $170 that they send to the Irish. The story is told from the perspective of the Choctaw people. While the amount was small compared to the extent of the crisis, the key consequence is what it meant to the Choctaw. It was a way for them to regain a great deal of their pride that was lost when they were forcibly uprooted from their homes and wal...

  Review of Guild , by Edward Gorman ISBN 0871315211 Five out of five stars There is a resolution, but it is not a happy one   Leo Guild is an ex-lawman that is now a bounty hunter. He is in the process of bringing Maloney into a town called Danton and he is hot, dusty, tired and ready to rest after he makes his delivery. When they arrive, Maloney asks if he can have one last beer and Guild, thirsty himself, buys a bucket and they share it before Maloney is taken to jail.   The town has been run by Mason Cord, but his son Frank has generally run his businesses into bankruptcy. Frank has a wife and children, but he is really married to gambling and other vices. Therefore, there is a desperation in Frank as he tries to cover himself any way he can. Unwilling to pay any debt that he can avoid, there is a confrontation with a stage magician and gambler named Earle and Earle ends up dead by unknown hands.   What makes this story go is the many supporting chara...

 Review of Major League, DVD version Five out of five stars Greatest fictional sports scene  This is clearly one of the best sports movies ever made. There is a big game at the end, yet one of the most unusual celebration actions by the winners. The scene where the Charlie Sheen character comes out of the bullpen to the song “Wild Thing” is arguably the best sports scene ever filmed.   The premise is that a woman has taken over ownership of the Cleveland Indians major league team and her goal is to run it into the ground so that she can move the team to another city. Surprisingly, this premise is more reasonable than it should be. While the owners deny it, there is strong evidence that some owners of major sports teams have done just that.   She puts together a collection of misfits and questionable talent and refuses to spend more than the bare minimum in maintaining the team. Yet, to the surprise of almost everyone, the members of the team gel and challen...

  Review of Dark Trail , by Ed Gorman, ISBN 0871316358 Five out of five stars Unusual twist on the classic gunfight   Leo Guild unexpectedly encounters his former wife Sarah, she left him to run off with a gunfighter named Frank Evans. Sarah tells Leo that Frank has now taken up with a young woman named Beth, and her former boyfriend is a younger gunfighter named Ben Rittenauer. As a consequence, Rittenauer has vowed to kill Evans.   Strong feelings are still present between Guild and Sarah, yet she remains devoted to Evans, even though she does not hesitate to use Guild. The people in town treat the two gunfighters as rock stars and it seems inevitable that they will face off in a duel. That becomes certain when a local cattle baron wants to create a spectacle right out of ancient Rome, a gladiatorial contest between the two gunfighters with $10,000 in cash to the one who survives. Despite Guild’s attempt to prevent the contest, both men agree, and the word is ...

  Review of Branded , by Ed Gorman, ISBN 0425196488 Five out of five stars Murder mystery wrapped in a western context   Andy Malloy is an adult male that lives with his father Tom and stepmother Eileen. They are a very mismatched couple in a terrible marriage. Tom is a drunk and Eileen is a woman that welcomes amorous adventures with many men. They fight all the time, and their marital difficulties are no secret to the townspeople.   When Andy comes home and finds Eileen dead from a gunshot wound his first thought is that Tom killed her. Not thinking clearly, he buries Eileen in a shed and waits for his father to come home. His plans are compounded by a snoopy woman that had been on her way to visit Eileen. The town Sheriff Burkett is a man lacking in scruples, although he has reduced crime in the town. He is not above beating up a suspect and there have been rumors that he has moved many times, leaving behind a set of unsolved murders.   There are many ...

  Review of The Case of the Horrified Heirs , by Erle Stanley Gardner Four out of five stars Convoluted tale with many valid suspects   The story opens with a wealthy woman named Lauretta Trent becoming sick with gastric distress once again. Fortunately, she recovers, but her doctor tells her that this is her third major issue in the last eight months and her heart is being put under great strain. Seemingly unrelated to this, legal secretary Virginia Baxter is arrested in an airport for attempting to smuggle narcotics. The arresting officer is acting on a tip, with Virginia’s cooperation in allowing her bags to be searched, the arrest is easy. Puzzled at the turn of events, she calls the office of Perry Mason, and he rushes to her aid. It is clear to Mason right away that the arrest was one where Virginia was set up. After some rather easy legal maneuvering and establishment of factual chain of custody of the bag containing the narcotics, Mason manages to get the cha...

  Review of One Frenchman, Four Revolutions: General Ferrand and the Peoples of the Caribbean, by Fernando Pico, ISBN 9781558765610 Four out of five stars The war between European powers in America   Marie-Louis Ferrand was a French military man with a long and varied career. He served as a privateer on the side of the colonies in the American Revolution, managed to serve as an officer in the French army before, during and after the French revolution and volunteered to go to what is now Haiti, then called  Saint Domingue, when Napoleon decided that he wanted to reconquer that nation. In 1793 the native Haitians revolted and became the first nation to officially abolish slavery. The significance of this event cannot be overstated and of course it had lengthy consequences.   After Haiti was declared an independent country, Britain saw an opportunity and attempted to replace the French. In the years before 1793, Haiti was the economically most productive colo...

  Review of Into the Forest , DVD version Four out of five stars Different approach to the apocalypse   The setting of this movie is the tropical rainforest of the northwestern United States and southwest Canada. A family consisting of a father (Robert) and his two young adult daughters (Nell and Eva) live in a very isolated house in the forest and the father is extremely talented in living in the forest. He cuts a plentiful supply of firewood, is very good in maintaining things and they have a small flock of chickens.   Suddenly, there is an unexpected, massive and total loss of electrical power. While Robert had solar panels installed, the inverter has not arrived, so they are useless in terms of power generation for the house. They travel to town and discover how widespread the outage is, it appears to be national in scope and while they have battery powered radios, there is no official government information that explains the problem. The viewer never learns...

  Review of Secrets of Successful Women Inventors: How They Swim With the “Sharks” and Hundreds of Other Ways to Commercialize Your Own Inventions , by Edith G. Tolchin, ISBN 9780757005244 Five out of five stars Secrets, not really, just good advice   As someone that has read thousands of books and reviewed hundreds of them, my experience is that the word “secrets” in the title is not descriptive of the contents of the book. It always seems to be a word used to draw buyers and readers to the book. That is also the case here.   However, that does not mean that the book is not worth the investment of purchase and reading. The U. S. Patent office was created in Article I of the U. S. Constitution, so the basic principles of intellectual property were established when the nation was founded. The first patent law was established in Venice in 1474, so the basic principle of the rights to intellectual property were born in the Renaissance. While technology has undergon...

  Review of Perry Mason: The Case of the Perjured Parrot , by Erle Stanley Gardner Four out of five stars A bit of a break from the Mason formula   The Perry Mason stories penned by Erle Stanley Gardner follow a basic formula with many of the same auxiliary characters to add the proper ambience. In this case, there is a bit of a modification of this formula. Seargent Holcomb is in his usual anti-Mason state of mind, despite the many cases behind them where Mason led the process of finding the real killer(s), Holcomb still makes it clear that he can’t stand Mason and will do all he can to pin him down in something he can be arrested for.   However, in this story, there is the county Sheriff Barnes, a man that is smart enough to recognize Mason’s skills at deriving the truth in a sea of confusion has proven useful. Therefore, when wealthy Fremont Sabin is killed in a remote cabin and Mason appears at the murder scene, Barnes is willing to let Mason be part of the ...