In the Garden of Iden by Kage Baker

Keeping up with my sci-fi reading trend. Baker has a series of books about "The Company." The setup of the story is promising. In the future immortality is invented and time travel is invented to test it out. The owners of the technology (the Company) make some people from olden times immortal and use them to amass wealth and save extinct species, working within the various times as operatives.

Promising. The story is told by a recruit from the time of the Spanish Inquisition, a young girl who is made immortal and trained as a botanist to save several medically-valuable species. A "Spanish" team of operatives goes to rural England in about 1554, just before England is reconnected to Roman Catholicism. The estate where they stay is divided as far as religion, with factions in each camp. It's an interesting setup, as the "Spanish" as suspected to be agents of the Inquisition (though they are irreligious altogether, but pretend to Catholicism in order to fit expectations.)

I was unhappy with what becomes a main thrust of the story--the young woman becomes entangled with a Protestant "true believer" who had previously been a libertine. He essentially becomes one again, however, taking the girl as his sexual partner for the duration, all the while endeavoring to "save her soul" by urging her to convert to the true religion. The inconsistency between belief and behavior is obvious, but never even commented upon by the girl, oddly, or the others who seem to be aware of it. It all leads to tears, of course, when the Roman Catholic church is reestablished and Protestants are now under the thumb of the throne.

Baker was recommended by the Plano Library based on other books I enjoyed, mainly because of Connie Willis and her books on time travel. I enjoy Willis's a lot more than I enjoyed this first book of Baker's series. I may try another of Baker's to see how the series continues as far as narration and content.

The Inimitable Jeeves by P.G. Wodehouse (Audio)

Another audio book! The same reader as did Carry On, Jeeves did this one. Another PGW book that I've read several times, so I knew what was coming each moment. But it was fun to hear someone else read it to me.

The book includes stories about unmarried Bingo Little and also his eventual marriage to Rosie M. Banks. To please Bingo's uncle, Bertie has posed as Rosie M. Banks ("his pen name") and is found out eventually when the real Rosie shows up, married to Bingo.

It also includes "The Great Sermon Handicap" and "The Purity of the Turf," two stories with the blighter Steggles who nobbles the favorites to ruin the book in local bets on sermon length and the children's races in the village fair.

I listened to this on the way to Chattanooga on 3/21/13.

Roger Williams and the Creation of the American Soul by John M. Barry (Audio)

Barry's work on Roger Williams spans 150 year's time and two continents. He covers a thorough history of the schisms and changes of religious affiliation in England in the period from 1500-1680ish and the journey of Puritans as outsiders, insiders, and leaders. This book was a great supplement to the Teaching Company class I listened to recently on the history of Christianity in the Reformation era. It expands to cover the beginnings of a church/state separation. Edward Coke, about whom I recalled learning nothing in the past, was an attorney and statesman who was in and out of favor, and who brought Williams into his practice as a lad and whose thought influenced Williams greatly.

Though a long listen, it was engaging throughout, and detailed enough to provide insight beyond just the historical facts.

Williams was an original thinker who stood for his convictions and fled England when his nonconformance threatened his life. Initially accepted warmly in America, he eventually alienated the authorities in Massachusetts and Connecticut and was banished. He fled in a deep snow, and sought refuge with various Indian groups, whose languages and leaders he had taken the time to get to know. He believed that the State should have no role in religion and that all religions should be accepted equally. This was tested severely when the Quakers and Ranters came to Rhode Island, but it remained a refuge for those who had been rejected by other colonies.

I got this from the library and finished it as I was driving to Chattanooga to visit my daughters, on 3/21/13.

The Advantage: Why Organizational Health Trumps Everything Else in Business

Business books are usually pretty uninteresting to me, because most I have read (parts of...) are poorly written and have few new insights. The Advantage is a notable exception that I was eager to read. The premise, supported by statistics, is that (as the subtitle notes), companies with healthy organizational behavior are more profitable and successful. Having worked in a few less-than-healthy organizational environments and with non-business groups with similar problems, I can attest that much less gets done by everyone when the leadership is fragmented and has disparate visions for the company (or no vision at all.)

Lencioni combines and condenses insight he put into five separate books, making this a quick overview of his concepts and learning. His practical suggestions were a highlight--asking new teams as they come together to spend time coalescing as a team and getting to know one another--seems obvious but it's not. One question he suggests teams start with as they get to know each other (beyond the obvious name and role) is to tell one thing that was a particular challenge to them when they were growing up. He gives a few examples of organizational understanding breakthroughs when the simple exercise was used. 

I finished this on about 3/12/13. I bought and read it as a learning exercise for our church Session planning, so I will add it to my business book library. 

Carry On Jeeves by P.G Wodehouse (Audio)

P.G.Wodehouse is always a pleasure. I've probably read this short story collection at least 10 times, ans I picked the audiobook version up at the library to listen to during NPR pledge drive week. It only took a few days of commuting to get through this short book, and it was the first actual audiobook I have actually listened to. (Usually it is "college" classes on CD that I check out.) 

It was fun to have this read to me. It took some getting used to to as the reader played Jeeves as a considerably older Jeeves than I have always envisioned. But, it makes sense that he would be older given his wisdom and knowledge, so I got used to it and got to hear some of my favorite Bertie and Jeeves stories during otherwise wasted commute time. Win win!

The History of Christianity in the Reformation Era by Brad Gregory

Not actually a book but this is a good place to keep track of it.

This is a class from the Teaching Company, with the usual 1/2-hour lectures on CD. It covered the origins of the Reformation up through the Restoration in England. The professor took a geographic approach along with tracing the major movements (Anabaptism, Protestantism and Roman Catholicism.) He took the approach of trying to portray the nuances of the various movements vs. a black-and-white set of motivations for change (or lack thereof.) One interesting thing was the changes the Catholic church made in response to the complaints of corruption and lack of personally vital spiritual life. The response was to create an educational and catechetical approach to training the laity in the beliefs of the church.

I learned a lot about the Anabaptists and the distinctions from Protestants. Gregory also did a nice job accurately portraying the Calvinist movements and Lutheranism.

Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom by Cory Doctorow

A quick read, sci-fi with a lot of great ideas that drive the content and action.

In the not-too-distant future, immortality has been attained by serial use of clones to replace worn out or even tiresome bodies, with your "content" downloaded to the new body. If you're murdered, a clone is grown and "you" are restored from backup. Further, the economic society is now reputation-based, with credits ("Whuffie") accumulating based on good and cooperative behavior in the Bitchun Society, and antisocial behavior costing the user Whuffie, which can be seen by anyone looking at you as a readout if they look above your head, thanks to the electronic brain interface built into the clones. It could make a ponderous and pompous sort of intellectual sci-fi book, but instead Doctorow weaves an engaging first person narrative, with the protagonist a 100 year old man who has "recycled" only four times, the latest taking place at the start of the book when he is murdered.

The protagonist has taken up residence at Disney World and helps maintain Liberty Square and the Haunted Mansion. A rival group takes over the Hall of Presidents and threatens to take the Haunted Mansion as well. Underhanded deeds make it hard to maintain reputational currency, but sometimes they must be done.

Doctorow does a nice job of exploring options available in such a society. You can choose your age look: a 50-year-old can be "19 apparent" and a younger doctor could appear to be a wizened septuagenarian. You could "deadhead" by making a backup and killing yourself with a "wakeup call" set for years, decades, or centuries in the future. What are the implications for your family for this kind of decision? What does it say about whether you care for them or find them interesting to be around? You can do something evil and then kill yourself and restore from a backup and not even remember it. You can forget to backup and have an "old version" of yourself as the only restore option, one that perhaps does not know your current love--or that she has dumped you.

The story alone is a really imaginative one, and the "science" is explained only as narrative, revealing itself as it needs to.

I finished this on 3/4/13. I got it from the library. I've read good things about Doctorow before, and when Seth Godin mentioned him in his blog recently, I added this book to my library queue.