Charles Ashbacher Reviews, 5530 Kacena Avenue, Marion, IA (2026)

11/24/2025

Review of

67 Seconds, by James Robinson and Steve Yowell

Five out of five stars

To me, a great ambiguous ending

The setting is in a world of the future where the geopolitical structure has shifted. Prussia has once again risen to be a powerful force in Eastern Europe and Asia and it is expanding eastward into Afghanistan. A Prussian Empire with an Emperor now extends from the French border across Asia to China. At the start of the timeline the armed forces of Prussia have carried the war into the heart of Afghanistan and a team of a female reporter and male photographer are in the heart of the action.
The male photographer (Brian Fellowes) was sick of covering war and was about to retire from journalism when he encounters reporter Emily Bougue. He falls immediately and totally in love and the two of them travel the globe covering the shifting alliances as war moves from place to place around the world.
Intertwined with this story there is the singular plot of Emily spotting a known war criminal teaching in an elementary school. The female teacher is informed that she has been recognized so she takes her class hostage and loads them onto a dirigible airship. Emily manages to get aboard the airship, offload the children and partially disable the engines. The count of 67 seconds is a timeline of Brian’s efforts to run across roofs in an attempt to grab one of the tether ropes of the airship before they are out of reach. As the count continues he slips, falls and fails in his attempts to grab the rope. The story ends when he makes one last and desperate effort to grab the rope.
The authors do an excellent job moving back and forth between the two separate but connected plots. There is no definitive ending, a story device that many enjoy and some detest, so the opinion of many will be based on that one characteristic. I personally enjoy ambiguous endings, so that was not an issue with me. The artwork captures the cold professionalism of Emily as well as the unstated devotion of Brian. It is a great short story of love, adventure, devotion and danger.

11/23/2025

Review of

The Lady or the Tiger, by Frank Stockton ISBN 9781540351227

Five out of five stars

Arguably the best short story ever written

I clearly remember reading the title story of this collection in my eighth-grade language arts class. A few of the girls hated it because they didn’t know the ending and were not shy about expressing their opinions. Explanations as to that being the point of the story did not change their opinions at all. Finally, with a gleam in her eye, the teacher announced that we would read “The Discourager of Hesitancy: A Continuation of ‘The Lady of the Tiger’.” The class, as we all wanted to know what had happened, eagerly received that announcement. There was great disappointment in all of us when we realized that there was to be no resolution and the situation was made worse by the second unresolved ending.
To make things a little better, the teacher then had each of us write our own ending to both stories. To date, this remains the most interesting writing assignment I have ever received, the level of interest and energy in the class for this assignment was the highest I have ever seen.
Stockton was a masterful storyteller, he takes what would otherwise be slightly absurd circumstances and turns them into stories that grab and hold your attention. The only downside, and it is a slight one, is that you need to know a little about the social mores of the time the stories were written. Stockton wrote them right before the start of the twentieth century, so his descriptions of the interactions between single men and single women are proper for the time but seem strange to the modern reader.
The stories in this collection are:

*) The Lady of the Tiger?
*) The Griffin and the Minor Canon
*) Love Before Breakfast
*) “His Wife’s Deceased Sister”
*) Our Story
*) Mr. Tolman
*) Our Archery Club
*) The Discourager of Hesitancy

each and every one of them is a gem.

11/23/2025

Review of
The Red Scarf, by Richard Mason ISBN 0874838509
Five out of five stars
Deeply moving story involving segregation
It is an extremely rare occasion when the printed word can generate moisture in my eyes. However, I grew misty at the description of two boys spending their money for eyeglasses that are a Christmas present for their “Uncle” Hugh. A little historical context is needed to appreciate the significance. The setting is southern Arkansas in the early 1940’s, the two boys (Richard and John Clayton) are white and their “Uncle” Hugh is an elderly black man. When Richard finds a dead mink on the side of the road he is relatively wealthy and can buy Christmas presents for his entire family as well as a beautiful scarf for Rosalie, the girl he wants to woo. However, when he is shopping, he remembers how badly Hugh needs reading glasses so that he can continue to read his bible and this leads him to give up the presents and buy the glasses for Hugh.
There is a great deal of love between the boys and Hugh, he tells them wild stories that keep them spellbound. Hugh lives alone in what amounts to a shack some distance from the small town and is a railroad pensioner. The boys look after him, getting his groceries twice a week and the other members of the community understand and appreciate what they do, sometimes seeing that Hugh gets a little extra.
There is not the slightest hint of racial prejudice in the story, although “colored”, the polite term of the time is regularly used. When the boys tell the optometrist that they are buying the glasses for an elderly colored man that is a friend of theirs, he reduces the price for them. Furthermore, they are also able to buy a Christmas goose for Hugh when the seller reduces the price. In the end, Richard’s good deeds are rewarded and he even gets a kiss from Rosalie.
Some of the other very memorial characters are Bubba, a cook at the local diner, Peg, a one-legged saloonkeeper and Wing, a one-armed police officer with a wicked swing with a blackjack. Richard and John Clayton have a wonderful childhood full of (mis)adventures as they are constantly scheming to make money. There is a sad ending with a plot device that one would not expect from a story positioned in the segregated south of the 1940’s.

11/06/2025

Review of
Endless War, by Ralph Peters, ISBN 9780811705509
Five out of five stars
Cynical, realistic treatise on wars
When I was working as a software developer and we were having meetings there were times when very imaginative statements were made regarding the features to be added and the time it would take to implement them. I would often raise questions as to whether the plan was realistic and my concerns would sometimes be received by the comment, “Charlie, you are so cynical.” My response was often, “I prefer the term ‘experienced’.”
In this series of essays, Peters expresses opinions that are both cynical and experienced. He uses the events of history to convincingly argue that war and conflict is a fundamental component of the human condition. He takes a hard view concerning religious strife arguing that religious conflict is based on emotion, so it foolish to think that such conflicts can be reasoned to conclusion.
Using history all the way back to the ancient Greeks, Peters points out that where conflict is possible, it will generally happen. Wars end when both sides are exhausted or when one side overwhelms the other. Peters cites many examples of what the main thesis of the book is: when you go to war, do so with maximum force with a clear objective. Killing as many of your adversaries as quickly as possible is the way to minimize casualties over the long term.
Peters is contemptuous of most of what is now the national security apparatus in the United States. From the halls of academia to the halls of a Congress that are largely purchased to the military officers that toe the line to the defense contractors that make massive amounts of money producing military equipment. He sees most of it as counter-productive in the goals of U. S. national security.
This book is one of the most interesting that I have read. The points are strong and backed up by history. Peters spares no one in his criticisms of how America had been fighting wars over the last ten years. I was particularly impressed with his statements about Afghanistan and the absurd notion that it will ever be a cohesive nation or even if it will ever come close to being a country that has risen out of a feudal state. Those of us that know the history of that region and the cynical actions of the Pakistani security forces knew very early that the United States would someday be leaving in a hurry and with the conservative forces back in power. Peters in essence predicted the result of the U. S. presence in Afghanistan.

10/07/2025

Review of
Threshold of Empire and The Battle for Manila 1898-1899, by James H. Nelson, ISBN 1884570712
Five out of five
Account of a much understudied event
There have been many significant and trajectory changing events in the history of the United States and they are generally covered in the K-12 history curriculum. One event that is generally not given the historical attention that it is due is the war between the United States and Spain in 1898 to 1899.
It was a very short and hugely successful war in the sense that the Spanish forces were quickly and totally defeated. The American victory over the Spanish fleet in Manila Bay was arguably one of the most one-sided naval victory in the history of naval warfare. The Spanish had 9 vessels sunk with only one American ship damaged. There were nine American wounded compared to 77 Spanish dead and 271 wounded. Spanish power in Asia was destroyed forever.
However, the key outcome of the war was the fact that America became a colonial and global power. The Spanish islands in the Caribbean were taken over, which was a logical, nearshoring extension of American power. However, the acquisition of the Philippines, thousands of miles from the American west coast and a gateway to Asia, was something unexpected. Before the war, very few Americans could have located the Philippines on a globe. Once the decision was made to make the Philippines an American possession, the United States became a major player in Asian affairs. It can be argued that it was the initial event spawning the rivalry between the United States and Japan.
This dramatic change and the fact that American military forces had to defeat an indigenous guerrilla force fighting for independence is something that is not given the examination that it should. American forces engaged in some very ruthless actions in subduing their opponents.
This book is a significant addition to the history of a watershed event in American history. It is an accurate rendition of the unusual events that led to a Spanish defeat and the rise of a new colonial power that expanded its territory thousands of miles beyond its previous borders.

10/06/2025

Review of
The Legend of Pancho Barnes and the Happy Bottom Riding Club, Nick Spark Productions DVD
Five out of five stars
Great story of what should be an aviation star
For most people, their knowledge of female aviation pioneers begins and ends with Amelia Earhart. While Earhart accomplished many things, including having an expert public relations group, she was not the best female pilot of her time. There were other women that were better pilots, and even more daring. One of those women went by the name of Pancho Barnes.
Born Florence Leontine Lowe and into wealth, her adult life began rather traditionally when she married a minister and established a traditional home. However, after a sojourn in Mexico where she passed as a man and became involved with leftist revolutionaries, she adopted the name “Pancho.” It was a fitting choice, for she was quite revolutionary in her breaking of sexist norms.
Pancho was such an intuitive pilot that she soloed after only six hours of instruction. She was so talented that she became a movie stunt pilot, flying with and among the most daring flyers. The work was dangerous and one of the major contributions she made was the formation of the Associated Motion Picture Pilots union that standardized pay scales and working conditions.
Pancho broke Amelia Earhart’s speed record and after going broke at the onset of the Depression, she bought land adjacent to Muroc Field, where new planes were being tested. She created the Happy Bottom Riding Club, a dude ranch that catered to the pilots that were flying the planes. Three of the pilots that knew her well were Buzz Aldrin, Chuck Yeager and Jimmy Doolittle. Clips of comments from Aldrin and Yeager appear on this video.
Her dynamic and revolutionary personality are captured in this video, as well as the conflicts she had with a specific Air Force commander. Her ranch house burned down under mysterious circumstances, and she had to face down trumped up charges that her ranch was a site of organized debauchery.
Spoken of with reverence by some of the best pilots the United States has ever produced, the sheer dynamism of Pancho Barnes is captured in this video. While this is a documentary, it will be clear to all who view it that her life should be the subject of a feature film. She was a legend in her time and should be a legend for all time in the aviation industry.

09/13/2025

Review of
The Eerie Silence: Renewing Our Search for Alien Intelligence, by Paul Davies, ISBN 9780547133249
Five out of five stars
Plausible answers to the basic questions regarding life outside Earth
Decades ago, I graduated with majors in biology, chemistry and mathematics. Since that time, I have read and understood many books and articles about life and intelligence outside Earth. It is a rare occasion when I encounter anything that presents a previously unencountered perspective on alien life.
Davies opens with the rather unintuitive thread that the search for alien life should begin on Earth. He is correct in stating that most microscopic species have not been identified and catalogued, so there is a significant possibility that species could be discovered whose metabolic pathways place them outside what is considered the standard zoological tree of Earth based organisms. For example, carbohydrates and proteins with a structure different from the fundamental handedness of terrestrial organisms.
This is an approach that has real possibilities and that can be done without leaving Earth and is something that I have not seen so logically put forward before. A concerted effort to identify and categorize microorganisms found throughout the Earth will have strong scientific and commercial value, even if no unusual results are discovered.
Another thread that Davies covers in detail is the reality that carbon-based intelligence may only be a transient phenomenon. There are strong reasons to believe that humans will soon create machines with high intelligence and the ability to expand and reproduce, quickly rendering humans obsolete and uncompetitive. A plausible case can be made for the premise that such machines are the logical end result of natural selection. With the ability to intellectually grow and adapt, have nearly unlimited memory, and the ability to grow replacement parts for every component, such machines could be considered the pinnacle of the evolutionary tree. Furthermore, such societies may exist throughout the galaxy.
I enjoyed this book immensely. Without having to postulate any technology such as warp speed or matter transporters, Davies develops arguments regarding why societies with large sizes could be created and continue to expand. If these machines could function for tens of thousands of years, then sub-light speeds become less of an obstacle in the management of a civilization. While it is clear that not all of what Davies postulates is true, it is a good bet that some of it either exists or will someday.

09/09/2025

Review of
The Infinite Book: A Short Guide to the Boundless, Timeless and Endless, by John D. Barrow, ISBN 1400032245
Five out of five stars
Infinity for the masses
The concept of infinity is both simple and extremely difficult to comprehend. That is because there are in fact so many ways the fundamental concept can be applied. The idea that there is no largest natural number is easy to understand. Nearly everyone can comprehend that one can continue to add one to positive integers with no possible ending. If it is explained the proper way, then it is also easy to comprehend that one can take the average of two numbers and get a third between them. By repeating the process, the concept of an infinite number of decimal numbers can also be understood.
The concepts of being able to match up the positive integers and the positive whole numbers so that there are an “equal” number of elements in both sets, where one is inside the other is where some people start to get lost. The continuation to transfinite numbers with hierarchies of infinity is a difficult, but not impossible concept to grasp.
The place where the concept of infinity really becomes difficult, even for mathematicians and people who study the universe is when the question arises whether the universe is finite or infinite in both breadth and in time. There is now little doubt that the universe as we know it began with what is called the Big Bang. In other words, elapsed time can definitively be traced back to a point where the universe popped into existence and has expanded at a great rate since then. No known laws can take us back before the Big Bang and we do not yet have enough information to determine what the ultimate fate of the universe will be.
Barrow covers these topics in ways that are as understandable as possible for people that have not engaged in deep study of the concepts. The book is both a fun as well as informative read. All readers will come away with more knowledge about the many types of mathematical infinity as well as the current understanding of the properties of the universe and the various options for how it will evolve.

08/07/2025

Review of
Praying For Gil Hodges: A Memoir of the 1955 World Series and One Family’s Love of the Brooklyn Dodgers, by Thomas Oliphant, ISBN 0312317611
Five out of five stars
Baseball and so much more
This book contains many different threads; all tied together by a love of the Brooklyn Dodgers and the void that remained when they moved to California. It is largely an autobiography of Oliphant in his early years growing up in a small apartment, attending school, engaged in youth and school activities and being devoted to the Brooklyn Dodgers. His father was stationed in the South Pacific in World War II and operated on land. Like so many that slogged through the humid jungle, he came down with serious cases of tropical diseases.
Increasingly finding it difficult to carry out his work as a freelance writer, his father reached the point where he could no longer earn a living. This put a severe strain on the family finances, yet as Oliphant emphatically states, he never felt deprived.
Intertwined with the story of his life is the history of the Brooklyn Dodgers, with a focus on their ability to win pennants and lose in the World Series to the New York Yankees. Often in incredible ways. No history of the Dodgers would be complete without some detailed coverage of Branch Rickey and his move to sign Jackie Robinson and integrate baseball.
No sports book is complete without some form of “big game at the end,” and that happens here as well. That event is the 1955 World Series, when the Dodgers were finally able to defeat the Yankees, touching off celebrations throughout Brooklyn. Oliphant does a superb job in intertwining his life, the characteristics of the Brooklyn populace and explaining the background of the Dodger team in the first half of the decade of the fifties. He covers the reasons for the departure of the Dodgers, pointing out that attendance at Ebbets Field had declined and it was a dilapidated structure by the time the Dodgers left. Oliphant even does a bit to come to the defense of Walter O’Malley.
Although this is largely an autobiography of Oliphant, a non-athlete, it is also a first rate sports book. The writing is superb and some significant name-dropping is done. For example, Oliphant describes his interactions with Arthur MacArthur, son of General Douglas MacArthur. He also gives his impressions of the General’s personality. This is one of the best non-fiction sports books of all time.

07/21/2025

Review of
Moscow 1941: A City and Its People at War, by Rodric Braithwaite, ISBN 1400044308
Five out of five stars
When the war on the Eastern front was decided
Although there were many large and obvious signs that Germany was about to attack the Soviet Union in the summer of 1941, the Soviet leadership (Stalin) chose to ignore them. Trains bearing Soviet grain and other raw materials were on their way to Germany while the German armored units and aircraft were decimating Soviet Red Army formations. So rapid was the advance of the German forces, millions of Red Army soldiers were surrounded and captured.
There was a great deal of debate among the German leadership as to what should be the primary goal of conquest in 1941. There were those that considered the capital city of Moscow to be the primary goal while others were in favor of maintaining the broad front.
This book is about the near conquest of Moscow by the German forces. While other areas of the front are mentioned, the focus is on the city and how the people and the leadership responded to the crisis. What is made very clear is one of the most important historical facts. Had the Germans made a concentrated drive on Moscow, they could have taken it. Even though their forces were split, small units came within visual range of the city.
It is fascinating to be taken within the Soviet government at a time of true existential crisis, when all of the mistakes made by Joseph Stalin were exposed. One of the most interesting historical tidbits is that when the officials went to wake Stalin after it was clear that the Germans were attacking, he thought that he was going to be arrested.
While it is unlikely that the capture of Moscow by the Germans would have led to their victory against the Soviet Union, it is clear that without the capture of Moscow, the Germans could not win. Although it is possible there could have been a negotiated settlement like the treaty of Brest-Litovsk. The Soviet Union simply had too many resources available, most specifically (wo)manpower and the willingness to throw it at the Germans. The Soviet Red Army was the only military in the Second World War where significant numbers of women served in combat roles.
This book is an important description of the most critical time during the Second World War. Had the Soviet Union not survived the onslaught of 1941, it is difficult to imagine how the Allies could have successfully invaded Europe in 1944. It is impossible to understand how the Allies won the Second World War without knowing how the Soviet Union survived the German onslaught of 1941. This book explains how it survived.

07/08/2025

Review of
Aftermath: Following the Bloodshed of America’s Wars in the Muslim World, by Bir Rosen, ISBN 9781568584010
Five out of five stars
Depressing, yet illuminating story of the misguided wars
In the aftermath of the United States engaging in acts of war against the Iranian nation, reading this book is extremely important. Those of us that follow these things remember how the administration of George W. Bush justified their invasion of Iraq on massive falsehoods regarding terrorism, supposed weapons of mass destruction and the vague concept of bringing freedom and democracy to the Arab nations.
Rosen does a superb job in explaining how the invasion of Iraq simply split open all of the underlying hostilities between the Sunni and Shiite populations of Iraq as well as the aspirations of the Kurds for their own nation. Rosen begins with a historical recapitulation of the religious differences between the Sunni and Shiite branches of Islam. The mechanisms whereby the British Empire carved Iraq out of the remains of the Ottoman Empire are also explained along with how this created ethnic conflicts that the British used to maintain their control of Iraq.
Rosen clearly has a very deep understanding of the ethnic undercurrents of Iraq and how they led to the extremely brutal civil conflict that the American forces and their allies tried to tamp down. This book is a demonstration of how ignorant of the American body politic is of the internal structure of other nations.
The war in Afghanistan is also covered, but not to the amount of ink expended on Iraq. Clearly, Rosen is also very knowledgeable about this country as well. Once again there is a demonstration of how ignorant the American body politic is about Afghanistan. The rather ignominious departure of the American military was predictable, given how the Afghans were able to deal with their British and Soviet invaders.
It is not possible for me to understate the significance of this book as the United States continues to engage in acts of war against the Muslim world. None of the recent US military interventions in Muslim countries have had an outcome anywhere near what the stated intentions were.

06/29/2025

Review of
The Heathens, by Ace Atkins, ISBN 9780593328408
Five out of five stars
Atkins outside the Parker box
My familiarity with the writings of Ace Atkins has previously been restricted to his stories that are a continuation of the characters created by Robert B. Parker. I have been impressed by his work in this area Atkins does a good job expressing the personalities in ways very similar to Parker.
In this book Atkins weaves a story packed with supporting characters that are ruthless, single-minded, a whole lot of quirky, afraid of facing the world, rebellious, intelligent, single-minded and determined to discover the truth.
The main characters, if there really is such a thing, are teenage delinquent TJ Byrd and Tibbehah County Sheriff Quin Colson. When TJ’s mother is murdered and her dismembered body is found in a nearby shed, such is the nature of TJ’s wildness that she is the prime suspect in the minds of nearly everyone. Knowing this, TJ teams up with her boyfriend, best female friend and with her nine-year-old brother, they hit the road with U. S. Marshall Lillie Virgil in pursuit. They travel across several states.
The boyfriend is an expert at hotwiring cars, and they find some assistance with one of his relatives. While this is in many ways a road story, there are many flashbacks to the characters at their point of origin, for that is where the original crime will be resolved. The characters there are generally criminals from the brutal murderers to the almost hapless con artist.
There are unusual twists and turns as TJ and her group travel. They encounter some very bad actors along the way yet manage to find enough resources to continue until there is the inevitable climactic events where TJ and her band end up as well as the resolution at their point of origin.
Even though the story follows several threads, they are well interconnected, so there is no sense of any of the characters and their exploits being unnecessary. The story is set in the modern world, TJ and her band are savvy social media users. This aspect is also very well done.
I found the story to be an intense page-turner. You root for TJ and her group to survive as well as focus on the actions of Sheriff Colson as he follows several threads that converge on an explanation of what really happened with TJ and her mother. This is clearly in the pure Atkins voice as he demonstrates his ability to create and exploit characters outside the Parker universe.

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