Month: November 2013

Paddle Your Own Canoe by Nick Offerman

Posted November 7, 2013 by Michael @ Knowledge Lost in Humour, Non-Fiction / 3 Comments

Title: Paddle Your Own Canoe (Goodreads)
Author: Nick Offerman
Narrator: Nick Offerman
Published: Penguin, 2013
Pages: 320
Genres: Humour, Non-Fiction
My Copy: Audiobook

Buy: Amazon, Book Depository, Kindle (or visit your local Indie bookstore)

Nick Offerman is best known for playing Ron Swanson on Parks and Recreation. This is his first memoir where he muses about life, manliness, wood work and how to best grill meat. Find out about Offerman’s childhood in small town Minooka, Illinois, his love of the theatre, his love of wood work, his wife Megan Mullally and the deadpan comedic style that made him a star.

If you are a Parks and Recreation fan, and in particular a Ron Swanson fan, then this is the book for you. Just to be clear my favourite character is April. Most of Ron Swanson’s quirks and history are taken right out of Nick Offerman’s life so it is almost like learning about the history of the Pawnee Parks Department director.

I got the audiobook of this and I highly recommend you do the same as Offerman narrates this himself. So it feels like Ron Swanson is narrating the book and then you get that Swansonesque chuckle when he tells a joke or a funny story. Listening to Ron Swanson was the best part of the book and I was actually interested in Offerman’s life.

Paddle Your Own Canoe goes further than just talking about Offerman’s life; he also talks about his personal philosophies and what he considers to be the real makings of a man. There is a lot of talk about equality, treating everyone equal, no matter religion, sexuality and so on. It was really interesting to listen to him talk about respect and not being an asshole. I was really impressed with his views on life. not all of them, but he seemed like a really down to earth and stable guy.

When he talks about Megan Mullally is one of my favourite parts. The love he has for his wife and the respect he shows her is beautiful. He talks about their courtship and their marriage and it is all so wonderful I don’t think I could bare it if they ever separated. He is a little sleazy and even tells the reader to Google Megan Mullally’s breasts, but over all you can see how much he adores her.

I didn’t think I would enjoy reading a memoir of an actor, especially a comedian but I thought this was wonderful. I wonder if reading a memoir of a really amazing actor would be as good. This is light hearted, fascinating and surprising. I never thought Nick Offerman would have such a love for the theatre but now I want to see his deadpan style on the stage. Fans of the show or Offerman will love this; I’m not sure about everyone else.

Solo by William Boyd

Posted November 6, 2013 by Michael @ Knowledge Lost in Thriller / 2 Comments

Title: Solo (Goodreads)
Author: William Boyd
Series: James Bond
Published: Jonathan Cape, 2013
Pages: 322
Genres: Thriller
My Copy: Paperback

Buy: Amazon, Book Depository, Kindle (or visit your local Indie bookstore)

The year is 1969 and special agent James Bond has just celebrated his forty-fifth birthday when he is directed by M to undertake an unusual assignment. The western African nation of Zanzarim is in the middle of a civil war and his mission is to eliminate the rebel threat. When Bond gets to West Africa he soon finds out this isn’t as straightforward as it appeared. Soon he finds himself going solo to seek revenge.

I love the James Bond movies but haven’t had much experience with the 007 books; I have only read Carte Blanche and Casino Royale. So if I’m comparing this book to those two, then Solo is amazing. But if I compare it to everything I know about Bond then there is something missing. William Boyd has modelled his Bond after You Only Live Twice so I can’t help but picture Sean Connery.

Solo’s 007 seems to be a heavy smoker but his drinking and womanising is lacking. I know that might seem weird but Bond and misogyny go hand in hand. It is like having a Bond without any wacky gadgets…oh wait, that is a bit of problem here too. One of the things that got me out Boyd’s Bond was that whenever he beds a woman he is making love to her. This just bothered me, I can’t imagine Bond being in love with all those women so the term ‘making love’ doesn’t seem right, also couldn’t we mix it up a little and use a few different teams; ‘slept with’, ‘took to bed’ and so on?

Apart from my issues with this novel, Boyd has a decent knowledge of James Bond and it was nice to see references in the book to a younger 007. For example when he tried to get a Walther PPK in a gun store, they didn’t have any so he went with a Beretta and made references to this being his weapon of choice when he was younger. Little things like that really pulled the book together.

Aside from his knowledge on Bond, William Boyd also has a decent knowledge of that classic spy thriller formula. Nothing too complicated but the light reading of a Bond or Thriller novel. Blending the nuances of the Bond and spy thriller genre, Boyd really seemed to make this his own. While die-hard fans may be annoyed and some people will be bothered with the changes, this was a lot of fun to read.

Top Ten Tuesday: Top Ten Sequels I Can’t Wait To Get My Hands On

Posted November 5, 2013 by Michael @ Knowledge Lost in Top Ten Tuesday / 16 Comments

It’s Tuesday again which means time for another round of Top Ten Tuesday; I like joining in of this meme because I have a set topic to work with. Top Ten Tuesday is a book blogger meme that is hosted by The Broke and the Bookish and this week the theme is: Top Ten Sequels I Can’t Wait To Get My Hands On. Rather than going for sequels, I ‘m going to look at the books I’m looking forward to in any series.

By Blood We Live by Glen Duncan (The Last Werewolf trilogy)
Untitled book 4 by Carlos Ruiz Zafón (The Cemetery of Forgotten Book series)
The City of Mirrors by Justin Cronin (The Passage series)
The Severed Streets by Paul Cornell (The London Falling series)
Hollow City by Ransom Riggs (Miss Peregrine series)
Sleeping Late on Judgement Day by Tad Williams (The Bobby Dollar series)

Since I’ve round out of books to mention, here are some books I’m really looking forward to reading that are part of a series and already released;

Maddaddam by Margaret Atwood (Maddaddam trilogy)
Moon Over Soho by Ben Aaronovitch (Peter Grant series)
Death Claims by Joseph Hansen (Dave Brandstetter series)
Countdown City by Ben H. Winters (The Last Policeman series)

The Third Person Effect

Posted November 4, 2013 by Michael @ Knowledge Lost in Psychology / 0 Comments

My wife and I were raised in in religious homes, she was raised Catholic and I come from a Pentecostal background. This often leads to some interesting debating on theology. While we are both accepting of each other’s theological views, both seem to think we are right. In psychology this is known as the Third Person Effect.

The hypothesis predicts that individuals overestimate the information they receive while generalise others. There is a misconception that the information an individual has is based on experience or fact and anyone that may disagree are falling for lies or propaganda from sources you may not know or trust. While in truth, most thinks that anyone who believes differently to themselves are gullible. That means most people believe they are far less susceptible to persuasion that they really are. We are smart, intelligent and thus not susceptible to these persuasions (more on the Dunning-Kruger Effect in the future).

We are affected by persuasion from the media, family, teachers, mentors and religious leaders. Yet we never want to believe that we are being persuaded, we don’t want to think that others influence our opinions. When we see something that may not align with our person ideals we can be defensive or automatically disregard the message as a lie or a persuasion for the weaker minded.

You’ve heard it all before; “I can see right through those lies” “People are such sheep or so stupid” and my favourite, the theosophy I want to live by; “I prefer to lead, not follow”. A lot of people think this, and with mass media and even con artists out there, so many of us must be delusional. We might even go to the extreme as to think we need to help them, stop them from falling into the trap. This could lead to censorship, banning or maybe something worse. The ‘them’ we often try to save could be anyone, children or gay and lesbians and so on.

From one extreme of a harmless debate on theology to censorship or brainwashing; these may not be connected but the whole idea of the Third Person Effect and persuasion is an interesting one. We want to think we are independent thinkers and see ourselves as having an open mind. When we disagree with someone do we automatically think they are wrong? We may not want to try and help this weak-minded people that are ignorant of ‘our’ truth but we might shake our head or feel sorry for them.

Points to think and comment on

We tend to think we are not like the people that we work with or went to school with or even live in the same location as us. We are unique but everyone else is thinking the same thing.
Mass media often use research and marketing to try and cut through the Third Person Effect.
How can we truly be open minded and independent thinkers?

Barracuda by Christos Tsiolkas

Posted November 3, 2013 by Michael @ Knowledge Lost in Literary Fiction / 10 Comments

Title: Barracuda (Goodreads)
Author: Christos Tsiolkas
Published: Allen & Unwin, 2013
Pages: 528
Genres: Literary Fiction
My Copy: ARC from Publisher

Buy: Book Depository (or visit your local Indie bookstore)

Danny Kelly’s dream is to win Olympic gold, and he even transferred to a prestigious private school to help realise this goal. But at this school he was an outsider and was shunned by the rich boys that attend. His coach believes in him, but the rest of the swim team doesn’t and this could start affecting his confidence. Danny’s win at all costs ferocity drives him and his psychotic approach earns him respect as well as the nickname Barracuda.

Christos Tsiolkas is best known for his highly controversial, but brilliant novel The Slap. Going into this book I worried that this wasn’t going to live up to my expectations of the author but I was surprised. My prediction for a clichéd ‘overcome all odds to achieve greatness’ type novel may be right but it is also very wrong. That is the basic plot but I forgot to take into account of Tsiolkas’s ability to incredibly layer stories.

Barracuda started off tame, full of angst but tame compared to The Slap but soon I was in unfamiliar territory. Unflinching, controversial and not afraid to tread into the dark side; the kind of book that is uncomfortable to read but enjoyable to finish. The thing I love about Christos Tsiolkas, apart from the dark and brutal approach, is the profound and thought provoking story telling. He is the master of his craft.

This novel like The Slap is a great look at modern Australian life, but this one isn’t looking at parenting but instead the teenage years. Barracuda’s main focus is not about winning or chasing your dreams but for me it is all about alienation. When I was a teenager I was uprooted from all my friends in Sydney and moved to a small country town in north Queensland, where I had no friends and this novel made me relive that feeling of alienation (which I’ve never forgiven my parents for).

Tsiolkas doesn’t stop there, he likes to add layers upon layers and you spend a lot of time after reading this book just thinking about it. This for me is a sign of a great novel and I love how he dealt with alienation so effectively and then managed to look at struggles with sexual identity as well. I feel like Christos Tsiolkas is not afraid to put more and more problems for one character to deal with and it feels so real, the angst of an Australian teenager growing up in the 90’s was done to perfection.

I will admit while I loved this book, it was uncomfortable and sometimes poking at old wounds but the novel was almost a masterpiece. I did feel like it was a little long and dragged on a little at times but overall I was very pleased. Christos Tsiolkas is fast becoming my favourite Australian author and I really want to read some of his other books; maybe not The Jesus Man but Loaded sounds really good.