Category: Books I’ve Reviewed

The Campaigns for Vicksburg, 1862-63: Leadership Lessons by Kevin Dougherty

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Five stars plus! I loved reading this amazing book by Kevin Dougherty. “The Campaigns for Vicksburg, 1862-63: Leadership Lessons” is too good of a book to be relegated as just another history of Vicksburg. Bookstores should not limit the book to assignment in the military history section. It deserves a prominent place in the business section with the books on leadership and management as well as the military history section. As I read the book I was reminded of a book I read in the early 1990s, “Leadership Secrets of Attila the Hun”. The book is that good!

Kevin Dougherty does a great job of providing leadership lessons from the key military and political leaders of the time.  He helps us understand Vicksburg. He does this by sharing the challenges, characteristics, and styles associated with leadership during the Civil War. He follows with an overview of the entire Vicksburg Campaign.

Next, he provides thirty case studies or leadership vignettes. He starts with General Winfield Scott’s Anaconda Plan. He carries us systematically through the campaign. We meet and learn about the key leaders and engagements. Each of the thirty vignettes begins with the short summary. It follows with a succinct history of the event (e.g. Chickasaw Bayou: William Sherman and Knowing When to Quit). Sharing the resulting leadership lessons learned from the event follow. The chapters (vignettes) conclude with a sidebar of “Takeaways” which provide a succinct summary of the lessons learned.

As you are enjoying reading the book, you learn valuable lessons on the difference between management and leadership. You gain an understanding of servant leadership. You see the value of clear communication from leaders to their subordinates. You comprehend the worth of personal presence of the leader in an organization.

The author ends the book with conclusions about leadership during the Vicksburg campaign. The areas covered are strategy, confidence, unity of effort, frame of reference, situational awareness, risk taking, problem solving, personal bravery, and technical skill. The inclusion of the Vicksburg Campaign Order of Battle as an appendix is appreciated and helps with the understanding of the size of the leadership task faced by General U.S. Grant.

“The Campaigns for Vicksburg, 1862-63: Leadership Lessons” is a valuable addition to the study of leadership and Vicksburg.  It would be an excellent study for business leaders as well as the professional officer and soldier. I recommend its addition to the personal library of all students of military science. My hope is it would be included in the reading lists of the officer basic or advanced courses. As in “Leadership Secrets of Attila the Hun”, the lessons presented in “The Campaigns for Vicksburg, 1862-63: Leadership Lessons” are timeless.

Well done, Lt. Col. Kevin Dougherty, Ph.D. , US Army (retired) Adjunct Professor, Tactical Officer at The Citadel. I enjoyed your book. Well done, indeed!

The Martian Chronicles: Chapter Nineteen

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Usher II (April 2005/2036) first published as Carnival of Madness in Thrilling Wonder Stories, April 1950. “Usher II” tells of Bradbury’s and other writers’ fear of censorship.

A literary expert named William Stendahl retreats to Mars and builds his image of the perfect haunted mansion, complete with mechanical creatures, creepy soundtracks and the application of many tons of poison to kill every living thing in the surrounding area. He is assisted by Pikes, a film aficionado and former actor whose collection was confiscated and destroyed by the government and was subsequently banned from performing. When the Moral Climate Monitors come to visit, Stendahl and Pikes arrange to kill each of them in a manner reminiscent of a different horror masterpiece, culminating in the murder of Inspector Garrett in a sequence reminiscent of Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Cask of Amontillado”. When Stendahl’s persecutors are dead, the house sinks into the lake as in Poe’s short story, “The Fall of the House of Usher”.

Bradbury hints at past events on Earth, set in 1975 – 30 years prior to the events in “Usher II.” A government-sponsored ‘Great Burning’ of books is described, followed by the emergence of an underground society of citizens possessing small hoardings of books, the ownership of which had been declared illegal. Those found to possess books had them seized and burned by fire crews. Mars apparently emerged as a refuge from the fascist censorship laws of Earth, until the arrival of a government organization referred to only as “Moral Climates” and their enforcement divisions, the “Dismantlers” and “Burning Crew”. Bradbury would reuse the concept of massive government censorship (to the point of abolishing all literature) in his book Fahrenheit 451.

In 2010 Los Angeles artist Allois, in collaboration with Bradbury, released an illustrated copy of Usher and Usher 2 double feature.

The Martian Chronicles – Chapter Eighteen

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The Naming of Names (2004-05/2035-36) first appeared in The Martian Chronicles. Not to be confused with the short story “The Naming of Names”, first published in Thrilling Wonder Stories, August 1949, later published as “Dark They Were, and Golden-eyed”.

This story is about later waves of immigrants to Mars, and how the geography of Mars is now largely named after the people from the first four expeditions (e.g., Spender Hill, Driscoll Forest) than after physical descriptions of the terrain

The Martian Chronicles – Chapter Seventeen

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the-martian-chroniclesWay in the Middle of the Air (June 2003/2034) It first appeared in Other Worlds, July 1950.

In an unnamed Southern town, a group of white men learn that all African-Americans are planning to emigrate to Mars. Samuel Teece is an obviously racist white man who loudly decries their departure as he watches a great mass of humanity passing his shop porch. He tries to stop several black men from leaving. One man is harassed because of an old, unneeded debt — other black passers-by give money to relieve the debt. Teece then tries to keep a younger black man (named “Silly”) from leaving, claiming that his work contract (signed with an “X” on a contract, as it is implied that Silly could not read or write) forbids his departure from Teece’s business. After an argument and a threat to lock him in a shed, some of Teece’s white companions stand up to Teece and force him to let Silly leave with his family.

As he drives off, Silly yells to Teece, “what will you do nights now, Mr. Teece?” Teece realizes that Silly is referring to his nocturnal visits to black homes, destroying houses, and lynching black men. Enraged at Silly’s comment, Teece and his father set off to get him. After giving chase in a car, the road becomes impassable, blocked by the discarded belongings of all the departing African-Americans. Teece and his father walk back to the shop, after which the rockets for Mars lift off. Teece, saying that he will be “damned” if he looks at the rockets, sits back in the quiet afternoon, and wonders what he really “will do nights.”

This episode is a poignant depiction of racial prejudice in America. However, it was eliminated from the 2006 William Morrow/Harper Collins, and the 2001 DoubleDay Science Fiction reprinting of The Martian Chronicles.

The Martian Chronicles – Chapter Sixteen

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The Wilderness (May 2003/2034) It first appeared in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, November 1952.

Two women, Janice Smith and Leonora Holmes, prepare to leave on a rocket to Mars, to find husbands or lovers waiting for them there. Janice muses on the terrors of space, drinks in last memories of the Earth she will soon be leaving, and compares her situation to that of the pioneer women of the 19th century American frontier.

This story only appears in the 1974 ion of The Martian Chronicles by The Heritage Press, the 1979 Bantam Books illustrated trade ion, and the 1997 ion of The Martian Chronicles. In its original form, the story was dated 2003, and this date is consistent with the other stories. As it seems in the 1997 ion, the date (together with all the other dates) has been shifted ahead 31 years, to May 2034.

Inferno: The Epic Life and Death Struggle of the USS Franklin in World War II by Joseph A. Springer

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Joseph A. Springer sets the standard for how oral histories should be written with “Inferno: The Epic Life and Death Struggle of the USS Franklin in World War II”. You feel as if you are on-board as the story of “Big Ben”, the USS Franklin, in World War II unfolds. It is necessary read for anyone who claims to be a World War II history buff.

The book divides into two parts. The ship’s change of commanders is the dividing point – Captain Shoemaker’s command and Captain Gehres’ command. It is a well-structured book. It starts with the specs and construction of “Big Ben”. It takes us through the training of the crew and shakedown voyages. We travel through the Panama Canal to San Diego and on to Pearl Harbor laying all the appropriate groundwork along the way.

The author rapidly moves us into naval carrier operations. You are there in the South Pacific for many of the famous battles. You experience Iwo Jima, Peleliu, Luzon, Manila, Leyte, and Honshu.

Mr. Springer takes great care in organizing and selecting interviews. You are in the aircraft cockpits experiencing the words and emotions of the men who lived through the survived the events. The stories are breath taking eyewitness accounts and survival stories. He manages to get you inside the heads of the pilots and ship’s crew. You feel the fear and experience the heroism.

The USS Franklin’s size and importance led to one of the Navy’s first encounters with Japan’s Kamikaze attack planes. The suicide pilots delivered terrible damage to “Big Ben” in October 1944 off the Philippines. The damage forced Big Ben back to Bremerton, WA for repairs and a change of command.

In March 1945, “Big Ben” experienced the devastating bomb attack off Honshu, Japan. That attack defined her crews’ extraordinary valor. Somehow, they saved the ship. “Big Ben” traveled back to New York. She was rebuilt, but would never be the same.

Mr. Springer makes good arguments to restore the entire crew of the USS Franklin’s honor. You learn how the spiteful and hateful actions of her second captain attempted to segregate the crew into two groups. Group one was the sailors and airmen that remained on board during the entire ordeal. Group two was the person who did not stay onboard for the entire ordeal. Unfortunately, Captain Gehres made no differentiation for those who may have been blown overboard by exploding ordnance, forced off due to flames and heat, removed to a rescue vessel as a result of injury or simply because they were ordered to abandon ship. Joseph A. Springer wins the argument that All Hands of the USS Franklin were the real heroes of this gut-wrenching ordeal and fight for survival. This includes those on the rescue vessels.

The book gets my highest rating. It has excellent photographs, maps, illustrations. The reference material at the end of the book will make ever the most critical historian smile. Buy the book. “Inferno: The Epic Life and Death Struggle of the USS Franklin in WWII” is an excellent book.

One Great Way to Promote Your Book: A Blog Tour

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Once upon a time

Once upon a time in a century long past when an author wrote a book his or her publisher might send the writer on a book tour.  The author would visit media outlets in various cities promoting their book and conduct book signings.

Oh, this still sometimes happens if the author is enough of a celebrity to merit so large a capital investment on the part of the publisher.  Other authors with outgoing personalities traveled the country promoting their work, sometimes at their own expense.  While this method worked, it was difficult for new authors.   Newspapers, magazines, radio and television stations were not anxious to use their copy space or airtime on an unknown writer.

As the age of the Internet developed, many new authors would promote their book through on-line forums, message boards, groups and chat rooms.  These formats encouraged potential reader and book buyers to consider the book.  Many times the author marketed their book through these sites by simply making a short sales pitch as they signed their name to their comments.  While this method is useful and generated grassroots support for a book it was extremely time-consuming and could be disheartening for author and publish because it requires a large amount of work for minimal return.

Today’s realities

Today with the economic recession and minimal dollars available for publishers or even self-published work and for those with family situations which include children or the need to keep their day job other options for promoting their work need to be considered.  A new opportunity emerged with the dedicated book or author website and blogs.

The most exciting of these new opportunities is the blog.  The name blog comes from the word weblog.  This is an online journal.  The purpose of a blog is three-fold.  It educates and entertains the public while allowing the readers the opportunity to provide immediate feedback.  Today professionals also run blogs seeking a targeted audience.  The professional’s goals include building standing and name recognition while making money.  Blogs have the added benefit of being inexpensive, easy to set up and support, and simple to find through search engines like Google, Bing, or Yahoo!

An author promotes their book to get people talking about their book and its message, to make some money, and to sell enough copies of the book for the publisher to keep it in print. A blog tour can be used as a great way to promote your book.

What is a blog tour?

While you ultimately want to increase your book sales, the purpose of a blog tour is to generate interest about your book. A blog tour allows cross-promotion of your book with the blogger’s site. It’s a great way for them to get free content for their blog while promoting your book.  It allows the author the opportunity to target the correct audience.

How do you set one up?

You begin by contacting suitable blogs.  You ask if they would be interested in being part of the tour. If so, a book can be sent to them to give away in a lottery type drawing, and review.  They can invite you to write a guest post or even interview you.   A schedule is created and the book is featured from two times a week to every day of the month. Determine your target blogs.  Make up a list of potential blogs. This will take a little research.  You can search for book blogs with emphasis given to those that focus on the genre you write. I write for three blogs that include regular book reviews.  They are Kepler’s Military History Book Reviews,  Writing After Fifty, and Kepler’s Book Reviews.  I have contact information on my blogs for requesting book reviews.   Almost all blogs have a listed a way for contacting the blog.  My blogs are shared as examples.

Next you approach the bloggers via email.  If they have interest preparations are made for a date and an agreement of exactly will be done.  Books need to be sent to them well in advance.  Your publisher may take care of this.  Almost all authors or publisher I deal with do this.

I urge reviews.  When I review a book I always include reviewing it on my site, on Amazon.com, bn.com, Twitter, goodreads.com as well as all my personal sites like Multiply and Facebook.    On my personal site I always include a link where the reader has the opportunity to buy the book.  I like to include the publisher website when possible where the publisher can make largest profit on the sale.

Interviews require less writing than guest posts.  The author and blogger can agree on a set number of questions.  When I ask an author for an interview I send them no more than ten questions.  I draw the questions from the book and the author’s life and interests as I know the author.

Put it on the calendar

Schedule your book blog tour calendar.  You not only promote it on your site, but promote it on the sites of the participating bloggers.  Almost all blogs have calendars of upcoming events.  Make sure you book blog is included on their calendar. Bloggers work hard for free.  They promote what interests them.  They are a key element of the new media.

Don’t stop with one book blog tour.  After your first blog tour is completed make sure you host a second one a few weeks to a few months later with a new group of blogs.  The second time around you can try something different.  Instead of doing a second interview maybe you would want to share excerpts from reviews of your book, maybe post 2 to 3 question interviews conducted by you of the persons who a few of the persons who positively reviewed your book. It could be a fun way to get the reader to see how other readers enjoyed and benefited from  your efforts.  Your personal creativity can come up with other ideas.

Have fun!

Once upon a time in a century long past when an author wrote a book his or her publisher might send the writer on a book tour.  The past is behind us.  Welcome to the future called today. I think Book Blog Tours can be a fun to promote your work.  In the twenty-first century you as the author are going to have to take a more active role in marketing your book.  Why not try a Book Blog Tour? It allows you to talk about yourself, your book and who knows you just might meet some interesting bloggers, develop an audience and following, and sell a few books along the way. That will make you and your publisher happy.

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One Great Way to Promote Your Book: A Blog Tour by by Jimmie A. Kepler is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

“Sacrifice On the Steppe: The Italian Alpine Corps in the Stalingrad Campaign, 1942-1943″ by Hope Hamilton

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As a lifelong history buff, military history enthusiast, former US Army officer and holder of a BA degree in history, I find myself pleasantly surprised from time to  time when I encounter a book that fills a void in my historical education. “Sacrifice On The Steppe: The Italian Alpine Corps in the Stalingrad Campaign, 1942-1943″ written by Hope Hamilton and published by Casemate is one such book. The idea for the book originated when the author listened to her uncles’ reflections of his participation in World War II.

When Hitler had Germany invade Russia in June 1941, Prime Minister of Italy Mussolini declared war on Russia. He quickly sent a hastily organized Italian Expeditionary force of 62,000 men to join the Russian campaign even though Adolf Hitler discouraged such a move. Italy was unprepared militarily. Mussolini’s motivation was to join Hitler in receiving the spoils following an imagined rapid Nazi victory against Russia.”

Hope Hamilton’s book draws on personal interviews, exhaustive research and the written accounts of Italians who participated in and survived Mussolini’s tragic decision of Italian involvement. Mussolini compounded his mistake by sending even more troops the following year. The author does a good job of showing the human side of the Italian involvement on the Russian front. This is not a scholarly work on the tactics and logistics of the Italian involvement. Rather, it is the story of the people who made the terrible trek from Italy to Russia to support their German ally. The German’s had little trust of and kept the Italians minimally informed and I believe misused the Alpine troops by not maximizing the troops mountain fighting ability by their placement along the Don River.

The author does a great job of telling the soldier’s story. Her writing style focuses on the individual accounts of the soldiers. She discusses how the Alpine Corps was caught up in the German campaign capture Stalingrad in the autumn of 1942. She takes us through the Soviet offensive that followed in late November. We experience the collapse of the entire Axis front and the Alpine Corps’ withdrawal to the Don. I could have used a more background about the Stalingrad Campaign. The book does not take a strategic view of the campaign. Little attention is given to the big picture. The story is told from the Italian point of view instead of looking at it from the Axis point of view.

The book includes good notes, is well indexed, and has a great bibliography. I enjoyed the book. If you are looking for an after action report of the Italian participation or a critical analysis of the campaign this is not the book for you. If you’re looking for a good overview and an understanding of what the Italian soldiers experienced then you’ll enjoy the book. I give it four stars. It is a must addition to any military historian’s library. It is a good first volume to fill a long void of an English language account of the Italian involvement on the eastern front.

March 4, 2014

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Today in Texas History:

It is Tuesday March 4, 2014. It is the 63rd day of 2014. There are 302 days left in the year. Down in southeast Texas in Hardin County along the Pine Bayou is the Batson-Old oilfield. On March 4, 1904, it reached its greatest everyday production with a yield of more than 150,000 barrels of crude. Batson, along with the Spindletop, Sour Lake, and Humble fields assisted in establishing the Texas oil industry. Source: http://digital.houstonlibrary.org/cdm/ref/collection/wpa/id/630 and http://www.tshaonline.org/day-by-day/30545

A Quick Freeze with Thunder Sleet and Freezing Rain:

North Texas and Denton County where I live were brought to a near stop by an unusual March weather event that combined ice/freezing rain and thunder sleet. After a warm Saturday where temperatures topped at a near record of 84 degrees, a cold front dropped temperatures to freezing by Sunday morning. The mercury continued falling all day. By Monday morning, we were nearly 70 degrees colder than Saturday afternoon. Even though the weather service predicted the drop in decrease, the change caught many off guard. Fortunately, this is north Texas. The temperatures will warm to the mid 40s on Tuesday and back into the 70s by Friday.

Matthew McConaughey
Matthew McConaughey

Texas Boy Wins Best Actor:

Matthew David McConaughey, born in Uvalde, Texas, won the Academy Award for Best Actor for portraying a cowboy diagnosed with AIDS in the biographical film Dallas Buyers Club.    

Book Review – Writing in Obedience: A Primer for Christian Writers

Texas authors Terry Burns (Amarillo, Texas) and Linda W. Yezak (Nacogdoches, Texas) wrote the book I just finished reading, “Writing in Obedience: A Primer for Christian Writers”. It is an excellent work, packed with information I wish I had available before I started my writing career over thirty years ago. Divided into three parts the book begins with a section aimed at Christians writing fiction. It is valuable for the Christian who writes fiction, as well as the Christian fiction writer. They do a good explaining receiving a call from God to write Christian fiction versus being a Christian, who writes fiction. They help us look how much Christian content is right, and Terry makes an excellent point of how to present the content.

Part two contains how-to advice for the beginning Christian writer. The chapter on finding help is an example of the sound advice given.

Part three is a much-needed examination of how to be published with option available in 2014. Terry Burns gives some of the best advice in the book. He says yes, if we write it we should submit it.

Using the techniques where first one and then the other tells their story or take on a subject works. I appreciated how they labelled who was telling writing. I strongly recommend the book for the new or established Christian author.

Picture credit: Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Matthew_McConaughey_-_Goldene_Kamera_2014_-_Berlin.jpg. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license. Matthew McConaughey at the awards of the Goldene Kamera 2014 in Berlin. Date 1 February 2014, 20:20:06. Source Own work of Author Avda.

March 2, 2014

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Writing in Obedience
Writing in Obedience

Today in History: 

It is Sunday March 2, 2014. It is the 61st day of 2014. There are 304 days left in the year. On this date in 1939, Roman Catholic Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli was elected pope on his 63rd birthday. He took the name Pius XII. He served until his death in 1958.

Crazy North Texas Weather:

Yesterday the high temperature here in north Texas was a near record 84 degrees. As I type at 3 PM Dallas, Texas time the temperature is a cold 25 degrees. We have thunder sleet and freezing rain. We are expecting a low temperature tonight of 10 to 12 degrees with wind chills below zero. That is a far cry from the over night low of 60 just two night ago. Why mention the weather? This is a good example of the weather in north Texas.

Sunday at Church:

My tradition on Sunday is to attend Sunday church and Bible fellowship class. Today we had a surprise. Our pastor, Dr. Jack Graham, shared the resignation of Todd Bell, the churches long-time worship pastor. Todd had been with the church over twenty years.

Leaving church an ice covered windshield that required scraping greeted us. The bitter north winds made the ice removal a major chore. I felt like I was freezing to death.

The Tech Guy:

While I am typing this, I am listening to Leo Laporte, the Tech Guy. You can see and hear Leo at http://twit.tv/show. I have been listening to him on Twit since 2005 and on the Screen Savers on the old Tech TV since the late 1990s.

Book Review – Writing in Obedience: A Primer for Christian Writers

I finished reading the book “Writing in Obedience: A Primer for Christian Writers” by Terry burns and Linda W. Yezak.

Terry Burns and Linda W. Yezak’s book “Writing in Obedience: A Primer for Christian Writers” is an excellent work, packed with information I wish I had available before I started my writing career over thirty years ago. Divided into three parts the book begins with a section aimed at Christians writing fiction. It is valuable for the Christian who writes fiction, as well as the Christian fiction writer. They do a good explaining receiving a call from God to write Christian fiction versus being a Christian, who writes fiction. They help us look how much Christian content is right, and Terry makes an excellent point of how to present the content.

Part two contains how-to advice for the beginning Christian writer. The chapter on finding help is an example of the sound advice given.

Part three is a much-needed examination of how to be published with option available in 2014. Terry Burns gives some of the best advice in the book. In this section, he says yes, if we write it we should submit it.

Using the techniques where first one and then the other tells their story or take on a subject works. I appreciated how they labelled who was telling writing. I strongly recommend the book for the new or established Christian author.