The Mountain of Silence A Search for Orthodox Spirituality

by Kyriacos C. Markides
In his book “The Mountain of Silence,” University of Maine sociology professor Kyriacos Markides brings to the contemporary reader a living picture of the spiritual traditions of the Orthodox Church. Part travelogue, part history lesson and spiritual treatise, Markides describes his visits to Mount Athos, a one-thousand-year-old community of monasteries in northern Greece, and to his native Cyprus, a country largely occupied by Turkey since 1974.
The book offers an account of his journeys and encounters with Father Maximos, an Athonite monk later sent to Cyprus to build churches and monasteries. Markides writes about his personal conversations with Maximos.

While contemporary readers may understand Christianity as falling into just Protestant and Roman Catholic camps, the Orthodox churches of the East can offer them a different perspective into the mystical and spiritual approaches toward a oneness with God, and the path toward wisdom and holiness.

Raised Orthodox, Markides becomes an agnostic during his college years. His later encounter with the spiritual traditions of the East, and the monks in their ascetical struggles to defeat their own egotism, guides him to reconsider many of life’s questions in the context of a living faith in God.

He subscribes to the approach of the late Harvard sociologist Pitirim Sorokin and transpersonal thinkers like Ken Wilber that we can know reality in three ways: through the “eye of the senses” (empirical science), through the “eye of reason” (philosophy, logic, mathematics), and through the “eye of contemplation” (systematic and disciplined spiritual practice to open up the intuitive and spiritual faculties of the self). These are three different and unique orders of reality with their own legitimate and distinct domains, laws and characteristics than cannot be reduced into one another. An “integralist” approach to Truth presupposes honoring and cultivating all three “eyes” on an equal basis.

Mount Athos has, in its quiet way, preserved the “eye of contemplation” while it was being displaced everywhere else in Western civilization. He suggests that it could today inject Christianity in the West with a new vitality.

-Reviewed by Philip Anast

John Adams

By David McCullough

Although Adams was one of the country’s pivotal founding fathers, his accomplishments are often overshadowed by George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and even Alexander Hamilton. McCullough provides a sympathetic and very engaging look at this crusty New Englander who played a central role in drafting the Declaration of Independence and negotiating with the Dutch and French governments during the Revolutionary War. The biography of America’s second president is loaded with funny anecdotes, including the time Adams and Benjamin Franklin were forced to share a bed at a crowded New Jersey inn. According to McCullough, the two rotund patriots argued for hours about whether the bedroom window should be opened or closed. Franklin eventually won the debate and the window stayed open because Adams fell asleep out of boredom. That scene deserves to be in a movie some day!

-Reviewed by Mike Nikolich

Term Limits
Vince Flynn
This book is a political thriller in the tradition of Tom Clancy and Robert Ludlum. Written pre-911, looks at what happens when a group of Navy SEALs get fed up with corruption in Washington and “professional politicians” who overstay their welcome in the interest of power, and what happens when that corruption extends all the way to the President’s cabinet. A series of high-profile, essentially corrupt politicians are being systematically assassinated by an unknown group. This group seems to be able to penetrate any security to get to who they want, then escape without leaving a trace. A freshman congressman, Michael O’Rourke, has a suspicion of who’s behind it but since he essentially agrees with the intent he decides to keep his mouth shut. When O’Rourke’s mentor, Senator Erik Olsen, winds up dead from a copycat killing, he gets involved. The plot features shadowy figures, corrupt government officials, clean government officials trying to do good, and all the usual elements of a political thriller. It’s fast-paced and an easy read, and while not up to Clancy at his best still an enjoyable story.
- Reviewed by Ken Krause

Bag of Bones
By Stephen King
Read enough of King’s work and his formula jumps right off the page. I have read most of his books and enjoy his style and wicked mix of humor, tragedy and gore. So, I don’t really mind the stock elements. But this fusion of ghost story and romance surprised me. Yes. There are horrific villains – both human and supernatural. And the guts fly in a few places. Still, King manages to comment on racism, writer’s block and mid-life crisis, all while expressing his faith in the indestructible bonds of marriage. In my opinion, this ranks among his best work, along with Hearts in Atlantis, Misery and Delores Claiborne.
- Reviewed by Bob Dirkes

Border Radio:  Quacks, Yodelers, Pitchmen, Psychics and Other Amazing Broadcasters of the American Airwaves
by Gene Fowler and Bill Crawford
Back in the 1930's you could hear almost anything on the radio - cures for cancer, fortune-telling and even a goat-gland operation that promised to revitalize a diminished sex drive.  Gee, this doesn't sound all that different from the hundreds of spam emails that flood my inbox each week!  Border Radio provides vignettes about dozens of the early radio pioneers, including Texas Govenor W. Lee "Pappy" O'Daniel, whose character showed up in the movie, "O Brother, Where Art Thou?", and quacks John R. Brinkley and Norman Baker, who schlepped the goat gland operation and cancer cures respectively, and even legendary DJ Wolfman Jack.  If you're a fan of radio, you will love this book.
- Reviewed by Mike Nikolich

The Greatest Generation
by Tom Brokaw
No generation in recent memory has done more to shape our world than the generation that grew up during the Depression and came of age during World War II. This book tells the stories of a representative group of individuals to paint the picture of their lives during and since the war. It covers people who went on to live ordinary lives as well as the famous and powerful. It talks about the extraordinary valor of some. It covers those who contributed here at home. And it even covers the prejudices and shames of the time, including stories about Japanese-American soldiers who fought for the Allies in Italy while their families were placed in detainment camps as security risks because of their heritage. If you like recent American history, this book is a must read.
- Reviewed by Ken Krause