Book Review: Old Age is a Terminal Illness

Author: Alma H. Bond
Publisher: Universal Publishers
ISBN: 1-58112-904-1

When five of her friends died within the space of a few years, Dr. Alma Bond, acutely aware of her own advancing years, grew depressed. Dr. Bond finally decided to deal with her problem by keeping a dream journal. Believing that her dreams held clues to the issues underlying her depression, she perceived the journal as a means for analyzing, understanding and, ultimately, controlling her psychic, emotional and spiritual pain. The journal eventually evolved into a forum in which Dr. Bond would record, in addition to dreams, ideas gleaned from her readings and her developing philosophy of the relationship between life and death.

Having been a professional analyst for several decades, it is not surprising that Dr. Bond draws heavily on Freud’s writings as fuel for her thought processes. Her journal is rich with references to the works of Freud, as well as to the writings of a range of psychologists, philosophers, poets and other students of the human condition.

In addition to drawing on her dreams and a range of literature, Dr. Bond draws on a lifetime of memories of life and love to clarify her thoughts and emotions about death. She describes her brother’s tragic death at the age of eighteen, her husband’s death in middle age and, of course, the lives and deaths of those friends whose losses had plunged her into depression.

A year after she began her journal, Dr. Bond brought the project to a close. In addition to aging yet another year, Dr. Bond had come to satisfactory terms with her fear of death. Did she conquer it completely? No, of course not. After all, she knows it is inevitable – someday. In the meantime, she is far too busy enjoying life to pay undue attention to death.

The book’s title is indicative of the humor that suffuses Dr. Bond’s book. Many books about death are either excessively clinical or disgustingly morbid. This book is neither. Ultimately, Old Age is a Terminal Illness is a celebration of life. Dr. Bond enumerates and celebrates a lifetime of fulfilling, loving relationships throughout her book. Every time she comes to peaceful terms with another loss, she resolutely affirms her joy in living and her desire to continue enjoying life as long as possible.

Dr. Bond’s writing is honest and gracious, and her book is enriching and easily digested. While this book will not appeal to all readers, there are several sorts of people who would benefit from reading it. First, readers suffering the agonies of losing a love one will find Dr. Bond’s book comforting. Second, clergymen and other professionals who offer grief counseling will find Dr. Bond’s book informative. Finally, readers pondering the meanings of life and death will find Dr. Bond’s book insightful. For readers such as these, Old Age is a Terminal Illness is a timely and indispensable book.

Quickie Comment: The History of the World's Most Famous Board Game

If you grew up, or have lived, in North America, chances are you've played Monopoly. You probably know that the original version is based on Atlantic City, New Jersey. On my first trip to that city at age 11, I earnestly searched for all of the Monopoly streets. If you travel at all, you've seen other versions too: the New York City or Chicago versions, the University of Iowa or Virginia Tech versions, the US National Parks version, and so on and so forth. I grew up playing the American Atlantic City version, with the little metal playing pieces: a dog, a steamboat, a car. . . . When I visited Canada on vacation, I was surprised to learn that there is a Canadian Atlantic City version with completely different playing pieces, including a little wooden milk bottle.

If you go to the Monopoly home page, sponsored by Hasbro (the game's manufacturers), you will read that the game was invented in the 1930s. If you read Philip E. Orbanes book, Monopoly: The World's Most Famous Game - And How It Got That Way, you'll learn that an earlier "folk" version of the game, called The Landlord's Game, had been circulating for about three decades before Hasbro introduced its mass-market version. It seems that Monopoly's history is not as straight-forward as Hasbro would like consumers to believe. Given the game's premise, this is, to say the least, an amusing irony.

If you want to learn more about Orbane's book, you can read David Parlett's fine review of it here. Don't be surprised if, upon reading his review, you're inspired to head over to your nearest bookseller so that you may read more about the world's most famous game. After you've done that, you'll undoubtedly amaze family and friends, the next time you play Monopoly, with your insightful knowledge of the game's provenance. In my case, that may alleviate my pain when I suffer yet another bankruptcy at Park Place.

Book Review: It Might Have Been What He Said

Author: Eden Collinsworth
Publisher: Arcade Publishing
ISBN: 1-55970-812-3

Isabel tried to kill her husband, but she can’t remember why. With the help of her psychiatrist, Isabel slowly restores her memory of the events surrounding the attempted murder. They begin by examining Isabel’s childhood.

Isabel was born into a wealthy, dysfunctional family. Her father was emotionally distant. He refused to give his adult children any financial assistance for fear of instilling laziness. Her mother was mentally disturbed. She tried to kill herself and spent much of her life in an asylum. Her brother was socially dull. He depended on his younger sister to guide him through the maze of family interactions. It seems that Isabel, with her photographic memory, intellectual aptitude, interpersonal insight, acerbic wit and cool demeanor, is the only normal person in the lot.

Ambitious and conscientious, Isabel swiftly rises to the top of her profession as a publisher. She meets her opposite in James, a talented, debonair, indolent writer whose primary interest in life is being (carefully distinguished from getting, which requires effort) rich. Opposites attract and Isabel marries James. Their marriage starts happily enough, but cracks gradually appear beneath the veneer of their relationship. James is the source of all the cracks: he spends irresponsibly, works intermittently and drinks excessively. In contrast, Isabel’s determined efforts to hold together her marriage and family are almost saintly.

Isabel and James have an unusual son. Burgo is intellectually gifted, socially astute and the devoted son for which all mothers wish. An elementary school child who should still believe in Santa Claus (but does not), Burgo tells his mother, “you are fact, Papi [Daddy] is fiction” (p. 182). Despite his youth, Burgo realizes that his mother is the family bedrock, his father the quagmire. Surprisingly, this circumstance does not alarm him. Surely he is the most placid child ever to grace the face of the earth. After Isabel’s botched murder and her marriage’s dissolution, the story ends with James ensnared in a trap of his own making while Isabel and Burgo dash into a promising future.

The greatest weakness of this story is its characters. Burgo does not resemble any child in the known universe. Instead, he resembles Wesley Crusher, the nauseating boy wonder from Star Trek. James is so unremittingly boorish it’s impossible to conceive what, aside from his good looks, attracts Isabel to him. And Isabel’s solitary flaw seems to be her bad temper, which is displayed only once throughout the entire book. None of the characters have any depth or complexity; they are all neatly categorized as either heroes or villains.

The second weakness of this story is the anti-climactic nature of its climax. Building gradually to its apex, the actual culminating event is comically clumsy. Moreover, the event’s aftermath is hardly credible. James conspires with Isabel to pretend it never happened and they resume their ordinary lives. When the marriage eventually dissolves, it is James the would-be murder victim, rather than Isabel the failed murderess, who is to blame. This is not surprising. After all, the characters in this book either wear white hats or black ones. Gray hats don’t exist in their world.

It Might Have Been What He Said is Collinsworth’s first novel. She writes concisely and the story moves at a fairly good pace. Moreover, her initial premise forms an intriguing skeleton upon which to build a captivating story. Unfortunately, neither the characters nor the plot provide the flesh and bones required to make this book a full-blooded body. Overall, this is a decent, but not great, first novel. If Collinsworth learns from the experience gained with this book, she may prove to be a writer worth watching in the future.

Quickie Comment: Flower Confidential

I haven't yet read Flower Confidential, by Amy Stewart, but I'm intrigued by Adrian Higgins' review. The review was published in the Washington Post this past Sunday, February 11. You can read it here.

According to Higgins, Stewart's book provides the inside scoop on the floral industry. Chances are, the roses you gave your wife, or received from your husband, this week were grown in South America, dipped in God knows what chemicals to more or less preserve them, shipped to Miami, then shipped to your local florist.

WOW! I actually thought perhaps my store-bought flowers were grown in a local greenhouse. Not likely. There's something disappointing about the fact that economic globalism isn't limited to sneakers and stereos. It even affects the floral centerpiece on my dining room table. Something to think about.

D'Souza & the West, Darwin & Wallace, Stalin & Science

There are so many interesting books in the world that I can't begin to read all of the ones on my constantly growing "books-to-read" list. Perhaps readers will be interested in some of these:

Dinesh D'Souza has created quite a stir with his contention that decadent Western societies are largly responsible for the terrorism that is aimed against them. A review of his latest book - The Enemy at Home - and a link to reader comments can be found here. Another review, with a link to comments, is available here. Yet another one here. A final one here.

Charles Darwin was not the only person to posit natural selection as a mechanism of evolution. One of Darwin's contemporaries, Alfred Russel Wallace, developed the same basic idea. When Darwin finally published his theory, part of his motivation was to get it out before Wallace did. Volumes have been written about Darwin, but not much attention has been paid to Wallace. As one reviewer points out here, that situation is changing. This reviewer cites several biographies of Wallace that have been published since 2000.

Finally, a new book - Stalin and the Soviet Science Wars discusses Stalin's attempts to force science to conform to his brand of Marxism. The review is available here.

If anyone has read any of these books, please drop a comment and share your thoughts.