Bantam Books – …on the B.L.

Thank You For My Service by Mat Best

September 6, 2019September 6, 2019 RaeAnna

Worth A Read Yes: Entertaining and Honest
Length 240
Quick Review Mat Best was a Ranger before contracting and becoming known for his youTube channel, tshirt/whiskey/coffee companies, oh, and he made a movie. He’s entertaining as hell in his book Thank You For My Service.

Best is a badass, but I belong to a Marine family. | Thank You For My Service

As military adjacent, I’m interested in military nonfiction and memoirs, but as a critic I’m always wary because I’ve read some racist bulshit masquerading as war memoirs. Mat Best does a better-than-most job at balancing the realities of war with humanity in Thank You For My Service.

Best was a Ranger in the 75th Ranger Regiment for five active military deployments before working and deploying multiple times as a private contractor. While working as a contractor, he created a youTube channel capitalizing on his creative side to document his time, opinions, and experiences as a member of the military. The channel lead to a partnership, which created a tshirt company, whiskey company, production company, a movie, and a coffee company. He’s kind of a jack of all trades, it seems.

The military is a completely different way of life. It’s hard to understand if you’re not in it. Even as a milso, it’s not my way of life, but I am more familiar with it than others. If you’re not into a morbid sense of humor, don’t read Thank You For My Service because that’s a huge part of the narrative and the military. Jokes and rude humor are essential. To be honest, the book would be super weird if he didn’t include dark jokes. Best redacts certain words, even whole sections of text, to maintain anonymity and secrecy. This underpins the fact he had a dangerous job, and even though he’s cracking jokes, people’s lives are at risk every moment of every day.

I decided to pose with Thank You For My Service by Mat Best at the Aviation Memorial on MCAS New River in Jacksonville, North Carolina.

War is war. People killing people. War memoirs tend to dehumanize the enemy in a plethora of ways. It’s part of the job, and it would be hard not to when you see your friends and colleagues dying. Best doesn’t sugar coat the feelings he had in theater, but he also makes sure the reader knows on the other side of his gun are people. The fact he didn’t use racial slurs impressed me. He does er on the side of “kill the enemy,” but that was literally his job.

Best is confident, funny, and smart. He writes about his experiences leading up to enlisting, deployments, Ranger school, loss, getting out, private security, joining and being a private contractor, and figuring out his life. He doesn’t shy away from discussing what he went through getting out of the military. Being in his early twenties but feeling disconnected from his peers. So many military guys feel this way when they get out after their first enlistment.

He and I, I am sure, have a lot of differing opinions, but he’s also a person I would have a ton of fun grabbing coffee with or joking over a bonfire. Throughout Thank You For My Service he emphasizes the sense of community he had in the military. It’s true, whether you’re in or military adjacent, when you meet someone who is military, you have something to talk about or bond over.

Memorable Quotes|
“Thinking you’re going to die and wanting to die are totally different things. I didn’t have a death wish. It’s just that, in my experience, the more you deploy and face the dark realities that exist in life, the more comfortable you become with the idea of death.”
“…being immersed in Ranger culture for four straight years had affected how I saw the world and, more to the point, how the world saw me.”

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Title: Thank You For My Service
Author: Mat Best
With: Ross Patterson and Nils Parker
Publisher: Bantam Books
Copyright: 2019
ISBN: 9781524796495

Books, Fiction

Fire and Blood by George R.R. Martin

May 18, 2019May 17, 2019 RaeAnna

Read Yes
Length 706
Quick Review The Targaryens came to Westeros. Aegon I united the seven kingdoms and began a three hundred year dynasty leading to the events being played out in the beloved show Game of Thrones.

Lounging in a burgundy ballgown at Glassell in Houston and Fire & Blood by George R.R. Martin.

Fire & Blood by George R.R. Martin | Burgundy Mermaid Gown

I love the HBO show Game of Thrones based off George R.R. Martin’s series A Song of Ice and Fire. I’m sad to see it go tomorrow night. I’ve been holding off reading the books until the show is over. I didn’t hesitate to read this prequel, though.

I started watching Game of Thrones the show in its second season. I don’t read fantasy because I don’t like it. The exception being Harry Potter, everyone should read that; it’s culturally important. Game of Thrones is one of those series that has gripped the world. It’s incredibly well done, but I haven’t read the books. I finished George RR Martin’s first prequel (there will be two) Fire & Blood, and it was not what I thought it would be.

I don’t know what I expected out of this book, but this wasn’t it. I liked it, but it was boring. Like really boring. I love history books, I think they’re far more interesting than novels to be honest. I’m the kind of person that enjoys reading textbooks. Fire & Blood read like an incredibly dry history book. In all honesty, it kind of is.

Fire & Blood is the first of a two part prequel documenting the 300 year reign of House Targaryen over Westeros until their demise leading to the storyline played out for the world to watch on HBO. The Targaryens came to Westeros after the Doom of Valeria and resided on Dragonstone for awhile. Then, Aegon I decided to hop on his dragon and conquer/unite the seven kingdoms of Westeros WITH his sisters Visenya and Rhaenys, which Arya points out to Tywin Lannister in season 2 episode 7. FYI, Aegon’s sisters are his wives. This is totally normal and fine for the Targaryens, which could be more pointed out in the show. The book follows the ruling Targaryens in Westeros for a good 150 odd years. Including the Dance of Dragons.

Fire & Blood by George R.R. Martin calls for dressing up in a ball gown. Obviously. I’m fancy.

After reading the prequel, things happening in the show made a LOT more sense. Names and stories from history made in passing during the show come to life within the 700 pages of Fire & Blood. The dialogue is a little rudimentary and clunky at times: “But not so high as to keep out dragons. Dragons fly.” Not so riveting. There is a lot in this book. Dorne is probably my favorite. Yay strong warrior women and female leaders.

Martin has an incredible mind. History is made up of people who actually lived, breathed, and did stuff. Creating that kind of intricacy in an imaginary world really deserves a great deal of applause. The book might be a bit dry, but the amount of information he comes up with and gives background to is truly remarkable. I love history, so it’s fun to find the historical parallels. Martin also has a great deal of respect for women. The female characters are incredibly powerful and probably more dimensenial than the male characters. That said, Martin doesn’t shy away from the difficulties facing women historically and documents the expectations, violence, cruelty, and blatant overlooking of their existence within the pages. The illustrations throughout Fire & Blood are quite beautiful. What is interesting is the fact the men age, but the women stay young and beautiful when illustrated. (Unless they are old and mean to begin with. Old being a relative term.)

It took me awhile to read the book because a) it is a big book b) it reads fairly dryly. Over all, I really enjoyed Fire & Blood as a whole. The story and Martin’s imagination are quite fantastical. I would suggest it, but it can get a bit dry at times. I love being able to watch the show and understand the history and the references much better than I did before.

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Memorable Quotes
“The game of thrones takes many a queer turn…”
“And in songs, as ever, love conquers all. The truth, we submit, is a deal less simple.”
“Save my wife, you should have said, but what are wives to men like you.”
“…no plan made by man has ever withstood the whims of the gods above.”

Title: Fire & Blood
Author: George R.R. Martin
Publisher: Bantam Books (Penguin Random House)
Copyright: 2018
ISBN: 9781524796280

I really had fun dressing up for this shoot in a ball gown. | Fire & Blood by George R.R. Martin | Shoes |

Books, NonFiction

Brief Answers to the Big Questions by Stephen Hawking

November 29, 2018 RaeAnna

Read Yes
Length 256
Quick Review Stephen Hawking isn’t an anti-social genius. He’s brilliant, no doubt. He’s also witty, sarcastic, charming, and completely relatable in his book Brief Answers for the Big Questions, published posthumously.

*Brief Answers to the Big Questions* is probably one of my favorite books of the year | Watch | Jeans | Socks | Boots | Sweater

I had a wonderful time reading Brief Answers for the Big Questions by Stephen Hawking. This is the first book I’ve read by Hawking. I read it on airplanes on Thanksgiving day, so the only break I took was walking between terminals. It’s a book that pulls you in and keeps you even if science isn’t your thing.

I was under the illusions Stephen Hawking was a one of those scientific geniuses who I’d be unable to have a conversation with because he’s that much smarter than me. Except that’s exactly what feels so wonderful about Brief Answers for the Big Questions the intimacy of it. It’s a conversation between Hawking and the reader. He doesn’t shove science and math down your throat; instead he is warm, funny, charming, and absolutely relatable.

His sense of humor is evident from the very beginning. The forward is by Eddie Redmayne, who played Hawking in the movie The Theory of Everything. Hawking is funny, blunt, and very self-deprecating “Eddie Redmayne plays a particularly handsome version of me…” It makes him even more admirable in his humility. The word “surprised” was used far too often when Hawking discusses his successes. Even though he was brilliant and earned everything he had, he seems completely shocked looking back at the things he accomplished.

There are very few things non-sciency people will need to look up because Hawking does not drown the reader in things they probably are unfamiliar with or equations. He wants Brief Answers to the Big Questions to be accessible to all. He talks about theories and equations with a sense of humor because he’s talking to people not scientists. M-theory – I did look that up- and Einstein and quantum mechanics and The Big Crunch “In Britain, people don’t seem too worried about a possible end twenty billion years in the future. You can do quite a lot of eating, drinking and being merry before that.” are all there but understandable. It’s not just science, though. He constantly references everything from history, science, philosophy, literature, and pop culture ie: Jurassic Park, Star Trek, etc.

I truly giggled to myself often while reading *Brief Answers to the Big Questions.*

Has funny little Q&A’s throughout the chapters. They usually sum up in a sentence or two his personal feelings about the overarching question being asked in the chapter. My favorite being the Q&A on page 141 when he mentions throwing a party in 2009 for legitimate time travelers. It culminated in him sitting alone in the college hall because he sent out invitations after the party was over to ensure there would be no phonies

I learned that Non-Euclidean geometry exists. Had I known this before, I could have been a total smart ass in formal geometry in high school. I found out triangles do not have to add up to 180° in flat three-dimensional space, but space would be curved and therefore non-euclidean. New information!

I highly enjoyed the small little jabs he made throughout including, “If there are beings alive on Alpha Centauri today, they remain blissfully ignorant of the rise of Donald Trump.” I don’t have to wonder too hard how he felt about the election.

Brief Answers to the Big Questions is highly entertaining. Hawking answers the questions, but really he’s just posing more. He is FULL of huge ideas. It’s absolutely amazing all the things he accomplished in spite of the obstacles he overcame. One of my favorite quotes is in the last pages of the book, “Opening up the thrill and wonder of scientific discovery, creating innovative and accessible ways to reach out to the widest young audiences possible, greatly increases the chances of finding and inspiring the new Einstein. Wherever she might be.” I love his inclusivity and call to action while simultaneously empowering the young women and men of today.The last two paragraphs are inspiring and a call to action and empowering.

Lucy Hawking, his daughter, summed up the sentiment of who he seemed to be through his own words in her own afterword, “He was a surprisingly modest man who, while adoring the limelight, seemed baffled by his own fame.” Reading Brief Answers to the Big Questions was an absolute pleasure. Professor Hawking will be greatly missed for generations to come.

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Memorable Quotes
“Although, if there were such a God, I would like to ask however did he think of anything as complicated as M-theory in eleven dimensions.”
“We don’t expect the universe to end in a brick wall, although there’s no logical reason why it couldn’t.”
“This is a pity because, if they had, I would have got a Nobel Prize.”
“The producers of Star Trek even persuaded me to take part, not that it was difficult.”
Particle Accelerators: “They would have to be larger than the solar system and they are not likely to be approved in the present financial climate.”

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Title: Brief Answers to the Big Questions
Author: Stephen Hawking
Publisher: Bantam Books
Copyright: 2018
ISBN: 9781984819192