If one spends very much time doing anything connected to Russia, the topic of spies will undoubtedly come up. As one who was born before the Cold War had ended and as one who served a church mission in Russia, Russian spies are something I’ve often heard about. On my mission, I served in the mission office for a while. Missionaries who were serving in the city of Kaliningrad (I, sadly, have never been able to visit that intriguing place) once sent the office a copy of an editorial cartoon published in a local newspaper that depicted missionaries for our church asking local Russians about missiles. Thanks to the Cold War, all Americans knew there was a vast intelligence complex in Russia, bent on suppressing dissent in Russia and recruiting spies abroad. It seems that the American news has often dealt with the topic, too, thanks to traitors like Robert Hannsen and Edward Snowden or people that catch the media’s attention like Anna Chapman. There have been a few Russians willing to help the West, though, even if we seem to not hear as much about them.
Next Stop Execution by Oleg Gordievsky is the account of one of those Russians. The book is an autobiography or memoir, and takes the reader through Gordievsky’s life from his early childhood to his post-defection life in England. He seemed to have a fairly normal childhood, although his father was somewhat enigmatic since his father worked for Stalin’s intelligence organ, the NKVD. Gordievsky did well in school and happily joined up when the intelligence services came calling. He enjoyed being pushed by his training and quickly assimilated to the system, including bureaucratic idiosyncrasies. He had a talent for languages, and ended up being posted abroad, where he enjoyed life and started to get a taste for Western democracy. Gordievsky chronicles his home life, including an unsatisfying first marriage and then a second marriage. He explains how he had suspicions about inefficiencies in the Soviet system and outright lies about Communist doctrine early in his training since he had access to Western publications. Those doubts didn’t lead to much until he saw the Berlin Wall go up and Czechoslovakia invaded. After that, he decided to take action and responded positively to overtures from the British and Danish intelligence services. Eventually, he would go on to spy for quite a while for the UK, before being outed. He says he figured out on his own that something was about to go down since he was unexpectedly called back to Moscow from London, where he had been posted. Gordievsky made the decision to get out of Russia then and there. He left his wife and kids, surviving extended family, and homeland with the help of the UK via a harrowing ride to Finland. That story includes all the stuff of movies, including being smuggled across borders in the trunk of a car. Gordievsky’s life in the UK, he says, has been interesting, presenting information to many Western governments, but not without some sadness since his longtime separation from his second wife resulted in them splitting up.
The book was interesting and a good read. I enjoyed reading about his childhood and schooling and probably could’ve handled more information about everyday life in the post-WWII Soviet Union. Having lived in Russia as a missionary and having experienced everyday Russia, information expanding my views on that is always nice to have. I enjoyed reading about some of his disdain for the processes his agencies made their employees go through. As an American, I often participate in the time-honored tradition of complaining about bureaucracy, and it was good to see that Russians do the same. The middle part of the book, about his work and home life, was maybe a little less interesting, and I thought a little on the egotistical side. His philosophical evolution was interesting to read about, especially from the standpoint of current international relations. He was intrigued by the West because of democracy and economic opportunity. It is worth asking is we are doing all we can today to preserve those two ideals. The final section of Gordievsky’s book, about being hunted by his own employer and his escape to freedom, was riveting, although, as mentioned above, a bit sad because of the need to leave his family behind. That, too, though, is a lesson, not unique to this book, about the value of liberty and the need to sacrifice in order to have liberty.
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Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl by Harriet Jacobs, whose pen name was Linda Brent (available 
Clinton Cash: The Untold Story of How and Why Foreign Governments and Businesses Helped Make Bill and Hillary Rich by Peter Schweizer (ISBN: 978-0-06-265943-9) talks more about Bill and Hillary Clinton after the Clinton presidency than during it, but the story told would not have been possible if it weren’t for Bill Clinton having held America’s highest office first. After leaving office after eight years, the Clintons decided to stay intimately involved in politics. Hillary was elected to the Senate, ran for president, and was secretary of state under Obama. In the book, Schweizer chronicles how the Clintons leveraged their proximity to power to rake in piles and piles of money. The author points out that there is nothing technically wrong about that fact. What was so suspicious was the timing, amount, and source of much of that money. The book carefully points out the machinations that often took place under the radar. When certain shady businessmen wanted to get involved in the Kazakh mining business, big donations were made to the Clintons’ foundation, Bill made a high-profile visit to Kazakhstan, said some stuff that, in some ways, legitimized Kazakhstan’s dictator, and suddenly those same businessmen had a deal. When Russia wanted in on buying American uranium and Hillary sat on a Senate committee that was involved in the approval of that plan, those involved in the deal were donating to the Clintons. Similar actions took place when India wanted to get nuclear technology. The Clintons had shadowy dealings in South America and in Africa. When the Clintons were in a position to possibly affect the outcome of a decision, they and their friends seemed to benefit and America seemed to lose. Schweizer ends his book with an appeal to those who have the legal authority to investigate these suspicious dealings.
In Europe’s Shadow: Two Cold Wars and a Thirty-year Journey through Romania and Beyond by Robert D. Kaplan (ISBN: 978-0-8129-8662-4) is a wide-ranging survey of Romanian history, focusing on the post-World War I XX century and the first decade or so of the XXI century. Kaplan has 
Outrage, Inc.: How the Liberal Mob Ruined Science, Journalism, and Hollywood by Derek Hunter (ISBN: 978-0-06-283552-9) talks about that very ice age and how it never came, but the same alarmism that drove the talk about it has not abated at all. In fact, according to Hunter, the hype about the ice age’s replacement cause, climate change, is exponentially greater and has been combined with overwrought hype about dozens of other issues. The thesis of Hunter’s work is that that hype is lacking a foundation in reality, but has overtaken all of pop culture, a lot of the news media, and a lot of the scientific world. He talks a lot about the Leftist bias in all of those areas that the Right so often complains about. In each section, he provides concrete examples and then some analysis to drive home the points being made. He digs into some things that many readers probably would not even consider on their own, such as the budgets (and sources of those same budgets) for various movies. He found that while the movie studios and producers make their mainstream fare, they also unabashedly spend millions on agenda-driven movies that usually don’t do well at the box office. An agenda-driven press, though, happily covers those films in great detail. Hunter discusses the origins of some of pop culture’s environmentalist stars like Bill Nye and Neil deGrasse Tyson and why they are really only qualified to speak about certain issues, but seem to be asked for what are portrayed as authoritative statements on a variety of things. Hunter notes that if people can be incited to anger, they do what all people do when angry: make less-effective decisions, including asking for government policy that limits liberty and voting in politicians that want to expand government control.
Church of Cowards: A Wake-up Call to Complacent Christians by Matt Walsh (ISBN: 978-1-62157-920-5) is a book about that very call to action. In the book, Walsh discusses some of what he perceives to be problems in America and then talks about how they are largely, if not completely, overcome by Christians getting up and putting their religious beliefs into action. While he is Catholic (not discussed in the book, but a known fact), the book is not directed at any specific denomination; the things he says are meant to be applicable by all believers. He notes that polls generally find America to be about 70% Christian, but that America does not function like a country that is 70% Christian. The opening chapter presents a fictionalized situation where barbarians come to America to slaughter Christians, something like ancient Rome, but can’t find anyone that will stand up for what the barbarians believe to be Christianity. The people they find are wishy-washy and non-committal about anything other than their openness and tolerance. The rest of the book that looks deeper into those watered-down values and how far they are from what Walsh believes is taught in the Bible. Modern man’s disdain for organized religion, the commitment many show to entertainment instead of God, and a brand of religion that doesn’t require any sacrifice from its adherents are a few of the topics that draw Walsh’s ire in a, typical for his Internet-based daily show, scathing take-down of modern American Christianity. The book asks those who call themselves Christian to start taking their religion more seriously, which, for most, will mean making effort to change and become more active.
It seems there are 
Kommando: German Special Forces of World War Two by James Lucas (ISBN: 0-304-35127-X) is a book that takes a look at special forces from the other side. Lucas is clearly pro-Ally and writes from a perspective driven purely by scholarly interest. The writing is dispassionate and appropriately covers the material. He discusses German special forces in the army, navy, and air force during World War II. He notes that German efforts in this area, just like happens to be the case for many other countries, historical and modern, were hampered by bureaucratic infighting, although this is probably a good thing in the case of World War II. The book catalogues various battles and operations that German special forces were involved in, some successful, such as the taking of a large fortress, the Belgian Fort Eben-Emael, and others resulting in large losses for the Germans, such as an attempt at capturing Yugoslav Partisan leader Josip Tito. There were also descriptions of guerilla action and more political things, such as an operation in Poland, where the intent of the operation was to make it look like the Poles were revolting, harming Germans, and giving Germany a reason to attack. There were descriptions of the German Navy trying to conduct special operations in specially designed boats and submarines, most of which were abject failures. The air force didn’t fare much better, although the author places much of the blame for this on German military leadership, including Hitler, who expected too much and did not use the special forces in appropriate situations. Finally, the book examines non-military forces, which were special only in the sense that they weren’t regular soldiers. In general, using civilians was even more havoc-filled than the failed operations that involved professional soldiers.
Savage Continent: Europe in the Aftermath of World War II by Keith Lowe (ISBN: 978-1-250-03356-7) takes a very raw look at the immediate post-World War II period in European history. The author catalogues the side of post-war Europe that is not usually highlighted in articles and books: genocide, ethnic cleansing, corruption, and violence. The wartime years are famous for those, but they continued, usually on a smaller scale and in a more isolated fashion, for years after the Allies defeated the Axis powers. Lowe examines the post-war conditions and how they created the ideal setting for further violence. While the Allied armies tried to gain control and figure out just what they had on their hands, displaced persons and refugees wandered Europe. There were plenty of instances of vigilante justice and people looking for revenge against the Germans or other people that had truly or only purportedly wronged others. In Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, and a few other places, the German concentration camps were still being used, either has temporary housing or by the Soviets or others for their original purposes, just against a new type of inmate. Ukrainian and Poles fought. Greece went into a civil war. Jews continued to find no quarter. The Allies and international organizations worked hard to remedy the harsh conditions, but given the level of destruction the war had wrought, it was often slow going. Finally, the emerging struggle of the Cold War meant that some of these problems were not given the focus that some would have liked them to have been under.
Dave Barry’s Money Secrets: Like: Why Is There a Giant Eyeball on the Dollar? (ISBN: 1-4000-4758-7) is a parody of financial advice books or self-help books and contains a lot of Barry’s goofball humor as well as the kinds of juxtapositions of what people are always saying and what actually happens in real life that have kept comedians in business since the dawn of time. He talks about the need for money, the lack of money, the history of money, investment opportunities, financial gurus, famous rich people (the bit on Donald Trump was surprisingly germane), tipping, and the stock market, among other things. None of it is sound financial advice, but it the vast majority of it hits home, like all good humor, because there’s some truth to it.
Master and Commander by Patrick O’Brian (ISBN: 0-393-30705-0) is the first in what turned out to be a twenty-book series. The novel starts off with the main protagonist, Jack Aubrey, being promoted and taking the helm of his own ship. He finds a guy named Stephen Maturin to be the ship’s surgeon, and off the two main characters in the series go, sailing for the Royal Navy. Their first duty is convoy escort, but having successfully completed that, they are given permission to cruise, looking for prizes (enemy ships, as the setting for the books is the Napoleonic Wars). Aubrey leads his crew to a few successes, some minor, some much more significant. Throughout, life aboard a ship and life in port are presented in life-like detail, right down to the ropes and pulleys aboard the ship. While Aubrey and Maturin headline the action, the story includes the other officers and men aboard, giving a complete picture. The story is loosely based on some actual events in the Royal Navy’s history. When the crew is in port, one is also introduced into Captain Harte, Aubrey’s superior, and Harte’s wife, with whom Aubrey is having an affair. That comes back to bite Aubrey toward the end of the novel, when he is prevented from getting any of his prize money, which is Harte’s way of getting back at him.
In Flashpoints: The Emerging Crisis in Europe by George Friedman (ISBN: 978-0-307-95113-7), the author examines the history of Europe between the great wars and then wants to know if Europe will continue in its post-World War II ways or return to its long history of war. He argues that Europe’s history of conflict has not come to an end. The war in Bosnia & Herzegovina after Yugoslavia disintegrated and Russia’s invasions of Georgia and Ukraine are given as the most prominent examples of how Europe has not been very peaceful since the fall of the Soviet Union, and that’s relatively recent. He discusses many of the problems Europe is facing, such as immigration from predominantly Muslim societies, the UK’s distance from the EU (the book was written before Brexit was finalized), friction between northern Europe and southeastern Europe, and economic concerns throughout the European Union. Friedman bases a lot of his analysis on what he calls 
12 Strong: The Declassified True Story of the Horse Soldiers by Doug Stanton (ISBN: 978-1-5011-7995-2) tells the story of the earliest American soldiers to go into Afghanistan after the attacks that rocked America. The book starts with the airplanes flying into the World Trade Center and the reactions of the Army Special Forces soldiers who would eventually be the first to respond. The reader learns quite a bit about the lives of the twelve guys to go into Afghanistan. There were a variety of backgrounds, but all were committed to serving their country and making sure the terrorists didn’t strike again. The book tells of their preparations, some of which were rather unorthodox, including buying things from local stores or ordering supplies from catalogs. Actually getting into Afghanistan was a complicated matter, even with bases nearby in Uzbekistan. The helicopter rides from Uzbekistan to Afghanistan were harrowing experiences with pilots flying blind in unfamiliar territory with unfamiliar weather patterns. They eventually made it, though, and then the soldiers got to doing what they were trained to do. It wasn’t just fighting, though, as they were also trained to adapt to local conditions and get in the heads of the people they would be fighting with and against. They had to make allies out of temperamental Afghan warlords. The book portrays this as happening fairly easily and quickly, which may have been the case, but the men expressed a lot of trepidation about how their interactions with the Afghan leaders would go and were grateful for the American firepower that backed up what they were claiming they’d be able to help with. The initial American soldiers were careful to remain in their advisory roles and let the Afghans run the war. This also built respect and trust, and was a key to both building alliances and successful military action. The special forces soldiers were convinced that their work in Afghanistan was so successful because it was really the Afghans’ fight against the Taliban — America was just helping. One subplot, if it can be called that, in the book is the story of John Walker Lindh, the American who joined the Taliban. He was a prisoner that some of the soldiers in the book came in contact with. The book closes with happy reunions for the soldiers after completing their tour of duty, but then some must turn around and go to Iraq. They answered the call of duty, but most did not see the war in Iraq in the same light as that in Afghanistan, and it ended in the loss of life for some of them. They didn’t see the same system in Iraq, where the Americans were simply advisors and the suppliers of firepower, and that bode badly, according to them.
Saints: The Standard of Truth (ISBN: 978-1-62972-492-8) is the first volume of a multi-volume history published by the Church itself. It basically covers the time period that corresponds to Joseph Smith’s life. It presents information about the Smith family, Joseph’s early years, his growing interest in religion as a teenager, the First Vision, the long path to Joseph acquiring the golden plates, the translation and publication of the Book of Mormon, and the founding of the Church. As the story goes along, the cast of characters grows rapidly to include the others who played key roles in the restoration of God’s Church on the earth, such as Joseph’s wife, Emma, Martin Harris, Oliver Cowdery, the Whitmer family, and others. Once the Church is founded, the book traces the history of the Church, focusing a little bit less on Joseph Smith, although never really getting away from him since he was so incredibly central to the story. One reads about the Church’s westward progression through Kirtland, Ohio, onto Missouri, and then to Nauvoo. Along the way, stories famous to anyone who has been in the Church long, such as two sisters rescuing the pages of what would become the Doctrine and Covenants or the early Saints praying for the ice on the river to break so their boat could get through, are presented. There were also a few lesser-known stories. The book ends with Brigham Young being called as the second president of the Church and his vision of moving the members of the Church even farther West in a quest for safety and freedom.
The Guns of August by Barbara W. Tuchman (ISBN: 978-0-345-47609-8), since it is about the first thirty days of the war, doesn’t do much more than mention reconnaissance planes a couple times when it comes to the airplanes of World War I, but the book does provide a very detailed review of those critical early battles in 1914. The stage is set with an extensive review of both French and German military doctrine leading up to the war, as well as the military and political personalities involved. After the French and German positions were well established, the reader learned about the English and the Belgians. Then, things got moving, and the Germans invaded Belgium. It didn’t go quite as they planned, though, with a lot more Belgian defensive efforts than they planned on and an English response that somehow seemed to not be completely accounted for in German war planning. The Germans still advanced quickly, taking advantage of their superior numbers and superior firepower. Once they were well into French territory, the French finally gathered themselves and were able to stop the German advance only miles from Paris. The French effort was eventually aided by the British, who were shown to, overall, be slow and indecisive during this opening stage of the war, and by the Russians, who opened an eastern front that the Germans were forced to respond to even though it ultimately proved to be less of a concern than initially thought. Throughout the first thirty days of the war, all parties involved suffered from indecisiveness, incomplete information, and decisions based more on what people had planned on than on what was actually happening. These mistakes were a large reason the war took the turn that it did, leading to four years of trench warfare that left Europe broken.
An American Life: The Autobiography by Ronald Reagan (ISBN: 0-671-69198-8) chronicles Reagan’s life from the time he was born to the end of his presidency. He spends significant time on his childhood, teenage years, and college years. These formative years provided a strong foundation that would serve as a basis for Reagan’s later success in life and in politics. He was open about the shortcomings that both he and his family members had (such as his alcoholic father). He chronicled his entry into the media business, first as a sportscaster and later as an actor, where he had some considerable success. The major portion of the book, though, is dedicated to Reagan’s political pursuits. He spends a little bit of time discussing his stint as governor of California. He talks about political friends and foes, the problems that faced the state, and what he was able to do about them, claiming victory in some instances and admitting defeat in others. Easily half of the book is dedicated to Regan’s time as president of the United States. The budget, the Cold War, and foreign policy are the major themes. In the discussion about budget, there is a major sub-current: liberal bias in the media and the inability of the Democratcs to compromise. Reagan clearly found the Cold War and his role in it to be extremely important because the book talked about that a lot and included more journal entries quoted on that topic than any other. He also quoted lengthy passages from correspondence between himself and Soviet leaders. Here, it seemed, details mattered. Iran-Contra was dealt with extensively. Reagan wanted the U.S. to play a major role in foreign policy in Europe and South America, but strove for balance that encouraged the countries in those regions to solve their own problems, much like his economic policy at home tried to encourage the American people to do their part to pull themselves out of their economic hardships.
A Higher Call: An Incredible True Story of Combat and Chivalry in the War-torn Skies of World War II (ISBN: 978-0-425-25286-4) by Adam Makos and Larry Alexander is a unique story that tells the story of one of America’s greatest generation as well as a German fighter pilot who was doing his patriotic duty in fighting to defend his family and his country who came together for a few minutes over wartime Germany for an experience like no other. The book chronicles the life of Franz Stigler, the German ace pilot. He had other plans for life, but became one of Germany’s top pilots once war forced itself into his life. In the 480 combat missions he flew, he faced just about everything imaginable, including the loss of his closest kin. It also tells about American Charlie Brown, although I thought maybe not in quite the same detail. Brown did not have the long, distinguished combat career that Stigler did. He got off to a bit of a rough start, though, and his plane and crew were badly shot up in their first bombing raid over Germany. A couple of them lost their lives, and it seemed to the men in the plane that they should not have been able to fly back to their base in England. Brown more than once credited the fact that the plane stayed up to the hand of God, and I do not doubt him. As the American bomber flew away from its target, Stigler approached in his fighter. He could’ve easily been the straw to break the camel’s back, but he was himself amazed at how the plane stayed up in its battered state, flew in for a closer look, and felt a professional respect for his aeronautical compatriot behind the controls of the American plane. His long combat career and worthy mentors had taught Franz that his job was about protecting his homeland and the everyday people of his homeland (Franz, like many of the aviators, was ideologically against the Nazis), not needlessly killing, even when he had the enemy in his crosshairs. Instead of shooting the plane down for yet another kill, Stigler escorted the bomber past the German anti-aircraft defenses. This act was unprecedented and unrepeated. The book finishes with a description of Brown’s desire to find the German pilot who had been so kind to him and their subsequent opportunity to meet up and bring some understanding to people who had been on opposite sides of such an awful conflict.
I Am Malala by Malala Yousafzai (ISBN: 978-0-297-87092-0) is the story of the schoolgirl from the time she was a little girl to the beginning of her recovery in England. The book starts with her young childhood and takes the reader through day she was shot in great detail. Interwoven into her discussion of cricket with friends, friendly competition among classmates, and trips to ancestral villages to visit extended family are brief lessons on Pakistani history and geography, which adequately set the stage for Malala’s life and what would become important to her as she got older. Far away from the bigger cities where more liberal attitudes existed, life in the villages of Swat went on much like it had for centuries, following traditional Islamic custom. Malala’s father was a trend-setter in many ways and surrounded himself with others who wanted to see progress in the field of education. He believed everyone should have an education. He also didn’t have a lot of use for many of the traditions that prevented women from freely moving about, going to school, or otherwise expressing themselves. His oldest daughter followed in his footsteps and was nationally prominent by the time she was of junior high age, having won a few national awards, having met with various Pakistani dignitaries on the way. She enjoyed school, enjoyed learning, and wished everyone had the same opportunity. She saw how the lack of such opportunities negatively affected others in her community, including her own mother, who was illiterate. She and two others were shot by Taliban gunmen in 2012, and because she needed long-term intensive care and was under continued threat, she and her family were evacuated to the UK, where they have lived ever since.