[Johann Heinrich August] Heros von Borcke. Memoirs of the Confederate War for Independence. 2 vol., Blackwood, 1866; Google Books, 2006.

I came across the name of Heros von Borcke, as he was known in America, in Gettysburg, the novel I recently reviewed. It turned out he wrote a memoir which is a very useful primary source for the story of the cavalry of the Army of Northern Virginia during the American Civil War. He was a Prussian officer who immigrated to North America to join the war in 1862. Unlike the English memoirist Fremantle, he was not a mere observer. He joined the Confederate Army to fight in J.E.B. Stuart’s cavalry and became his adjutant.

Perhaps the most striking thing about Memoirs of the Confederate War for Independence compared to most accounts of the Civil War is that the cavalry was busy almost every day during “the time when kings go out to battle” (II Samuel 11:1), i.e., when it was not winter weather. Most histories as well as fictional accounts like those of Shaara, Reasoner, or Bacon, focus on the main battles fought by infantry and artillery. Meanwhile, the cavalry is tracking the enemy, trying to disrupt movements, or scouting. In each of those cases, they frequently have clashes or skirmishes. As a result, there is lots of action in this memoir.

There are four Confederate military leaders Borcke especially admires: Longstreet, Jackson, Lee, and Stuart. He noted that Lee called Longstreet his “war-horse.”

Longstreet’s soldiers were perfectly devoted to him, and I have frequently heard friendly contentions between officers and men of his corps, and those of Stonewall Jackson’s, as to which of the two was the most meritorious and valuable officer. (1.32-33)

He credits Jackson, as do many historians, for his effective use of artillery. More than nearly anyone at the time, Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson understood the strategy of modern artillery. Like so many other weapon systems, artillery had undergone some great technological changes since the Napoleonic wars half a century before, the last time there was a major war in the West. After the Battle of Malvern Hill, the last of the Seven Days Battles in July 1862, Von Borcke would write:

The effect was more disastrous than had been before produced by artillery. In this battle our losses were very heavy, and I may say that the victory was ours only from the ignorance of our position on the part of the enemy, who retreated exactly when he had gained the most important success. (1.71)

Indeed, most histories call the campaign a Union victory; however, McClellan withdrew his forces, so the South considered it a victory as well. Von Borcke notes the reason why. We know also from history that McClellan consistently overestimated the Confederate strength and acted very cautiously. It seems that Jackson and the Confederates would learn more from this experience, whether it was a victory or not.

As is well known, Von Borcke tells us that Jackson was badly injured at Chancellorsville by friendly fire and died of pneumonia, probably exacerbated by the injury and subsequent amputation of an arm. However, he adds an interesting detail. Jackson also observed some idiosyncratic beliefs about health and hygiene. He often rode with one hand raised because he said it helped his circulation (though some said he was praying). He also had a habit of sucking lemons. In addition, Von Borcke tells us that Jackson believed that resting and sleeping under wet blankets would help him recover. However, Jackson’s doctor admitted that such a chill added to the pneumonia and “aggravated its severity” so that it “became fatal” (2.259n).

While Von Borcke does offer a few criticisms of Lee in certain situations, overall he gives Lee much credit for understanding strategies and using his forces effectively. Even when he had to withdraw, as after Antietam, he gives Lee credit for making the right move. Von Borcke took the position, as some even do today, that in spite of what Northern newspapers reported, that Antietam was a rebel victory.

He especially praised Lee for understanding and taking the good ground before fighting. He believed that made all the difference, especially at the First Battle of Bull Run. Ironically, when Lee did not take the high position at Gettysburg, it resulted in probably his most ignominious defeat. Von Borcke would not himself be present at Gettysburg. He was badly wounded at Middleburg two weeks before, and many thought he would not survive. Though he would attempt to rejoin the army in 1864, Middleburg did put an end to his active participation in fighting in the war.

We read also about Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, and Brandy Station. Brandy Station is still “the greatest cavalry battle every fought on the American continent” (2.279).

He notes that nearly all the residents of Virginia supported the rebel cause. He appreciated the support the people there gave the army. Many times he tells of being hosted for meals and even parties by locals. If Von Borcke is to be believed, we understand that all the young women of Virginia were attractive without exception, and nearly all its citizens were hospitable.

One incident makes it clear that Von Borcke did not understand the effect slavery had on its victims. As an officer, he was given a slave as a kind of orderly. At one point, the major gave his slave permission to do some personal errands, and thw slave never returned. Von Borcke claims it reflected his slave’s “treachery and ingratitude,” never considering what it would be like to live under the constraints of chattel slavery for life.

He does have a certain self-deprecating humor. Through much of his experience, he was trying to learn the English language. At one point he was trying express his complimentary view of Jackson’s military intelligence. He meant to say that Jackson’s observations warmed his heart, but said “It gave me heartburn to hear Jackson talk” (2.37). Naturally, this received a lot of laughs from his listeners, but he seems to have taken it in good humor.

Some of his other observations make the reader chuckle. He describes “egg-nogg” as a popular holiday drink.

It is very agreeable to the taste, and has the dangerous property of concealing its strength under the guise of an innocent softness of savor, thus exerting its intoxicating influence on the inexperienced before the least suspicion is aroused. (2.159n)

He notes, as many observers have, that the Confederate soldiers were not especially well equipped. Many had no shoes, and their clothing was often not much more than rags. Von Borcke observed that even his own uniform had “large holes for ventilation” and his “riding-boots were soleless” (2.67). Food was often a problem. On a number of occasions the cavalry would be the corps that provided sustenance when they would capture a lightly protected Union supply train. This reader lost track of the number of horses the narrator went through in his two years on the march. Once he had to resort to riding a mule.

Von Borcke also commends Lee for the way he fought at Fredericksburg, another example of Lee understanding the better ground for battle. When some criticized Lee for not following up after the victory there, Von Borcke defends him by saying that the Union could easily recruit more “Germans and Irishmen” to replace 20,000 or 30,000 casualties. In contrast, “how valuable each individual life in that army [Lee’s army] must have been considered,” so Lee took more care (2.132).

Von Borcke does admit that Stuart took more risks than he would have, but commends his bravery and intelligence, especially at Brandy Station. Indeed, he frequently uses the words gallant and heroic to describe many of the Confederate soldiers. On a few occasions he even uses the terms to describe Union fighters, though he is skeptical that any of the top Union generals were really doing a good job. Of course, he never personally encountered Meade or Grant, though he recognizes how someone could effectively defeat the Army of Northern Virginia. He in fact is describing what Grant actually would do.

Although he saw little action himself after his incapacitating injury, he would continue as best he could serve as an aide to Stuart. He records Stuart’s last words as he was with him after he received his mortal wound at Yellow Tavern. He did not remain in North America until the bitter end.

Anyone who reads this will understand that virtually anyone writing about the Civil War including those mentioned at the beginning would use this as a valuable first-person primary source for the fighting in Virginia.

Of the four generals whom Von Borcke observed the most, three have traditionally been held in high esteem as leaders by anyone studying military history. That is not the case with Longstreet. While Von Borcke may have respected him more than any of the other three, that esteem did not carry over. I suspect that is because of the so-called Lost Cause, which became a standard interpretation of the Civil War for a century or more—think Gone with the Wind or even Forrest Gump.

Of course, Stuart and Jackson died in the war, so no one knows how they would have responded to the ultimate surrender of the South. Longstreet simply acknowledged that the South had tried and lost and accepted the outcome. He would actually serve President Grant as an ambassador. He also staunchly supported the rights of free blacks. To the Lost Cause types that meant going over to the “enemy.” I am reminded of what Tony Horwitz wrote in Confederates in the Attic about the Sons of the Confederacy:

I began to hear echoes of defeated peoples I’d encountered overseas: Kurds, Armenians, Palestinians, Catholics in Northern Ireland. Like them, Southerners had kept fighting the war by other means. (Horwitz 38)

Perhaps it was even from Von Borcke’s influence that books like The Killer Angels and Gods and Generals began to put Longstreet in a more favorable light.¹ At any rate, Memoirs of the Confederate War for Independence still is a significant primary source.

Note
¹ To show how things have changed, in 1994 The Longstreet Society was formed in Georgia to study and recognize the General. That would not have happened a hundred years ago.

Thomas Fretwell. Why Israel? Ezra Foundation, 2021.
———. Why the Jewish People? Ezra Foundation, 2021.

These two short companion books deal with some thorny questions of Bible interpretation and history.

Why Israel? is subtitled Understanding God’s Plan for Israel and the Nations. Basically, the author says that God is not done with the Jewish people in history and the existence of the modern state of Israel demonstrates this. The book is five chapters, each chapter based on a verse or part of a verse from Romans 11:25-29.

These verses summarize the apostolic view of the Jewish nation after their rejection of Jesus, though written before the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple in A.D. 70. Romans 11:25 warns his Gentile readers in Rome not to misunderstand God’s purposes. That is the theme of the books’ first chapter.

The second chapter reminds us that God’s purpose will be fulfilled through the Jews, that their rejection of Jesus is only temporary “until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in” (also Romans 11:25).

The third chapter reminds us that in the next two verses of Romans we are told that God will rescue Zion. He has a plan that Israel will experience a national regeneration. As with the other chapters, Fretwell uses many Bible prophecies to support these statements in Romans. We note, for example, that most of Zechariah 12, 13, and 14 prophesy such a regeneration.

Chapter four says that “unbelieving Israel is still beloved for the sake of the fathers” (68). There are few places in the Old Testament where the Lord specifically said that He has helped Israel or Judah, not because of their own righteousness but because He remembers his promise to Abraham and other ancient patriarchs. Four is the shortest chapter with the fewest quotations from the Bible, but this reviewer was reminded of Ezekiel 36:22-24, among other Scriptures:

Therefore say to the house of Israel, Thus says the Lord God: It is not for your sake, O house of Israel, that I am about to act, but for the sake of my holy name, which you have profaned among the nations to which you came. And I will vindicate the holiness of my great name, which has been profaned among the nations, and which you have profaned among them. And the nations will know that I am the Lord, declares the Lord God, when through you I vindicate my holiness before their eyes. I will take you from the nations and gather you from all the countries and bring you into your own land.

Referring to Romans 11:11, Fretwell says the purpose of letting the Gentiles know about the God of the Bible and His Messiah is to “provoke the Jews to jealousy.” No, Gentiles are not Jews, but many have learned about the God of the Jews and worship Him, though perhaps in a different manner.

Finally, the last chapter notes that “the promises of God are irrevocable” as Romans 11:29 says. Therefore, when God said as He did in Ezekiel 36 as quoted above as well as many other places, that God will have the Jews, who were scattered all over the world, return to their Judean homeland, He meant it. He did not change His mind.

This then leads into the theme of the second book in the series, Why the Jewish People? The subtitle reads Understanding Replacement Theology and Antisemitism. Technically, the subtitle should specify Western Antisemitism since there is nothing about Islam or the Far East or Africa. Still, it makes a case that so-called Replacement Theology or Supersessionism has its roots in Antisemitism.

Replacement Theology promotes the idea that since the Apostolic Age God is finished with the Jewish people in terms of prophetic significance or promises. Any such promises made to the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob now apply to Christians or the church and no longer apply to the Jews. In other words, the church has replaced Israel in God’s economy or the church has superseded the Jews in God’s plan for the ages.

While the book does deal with the idea that the Jewish people are still part of God’s plan, it attempts to show that, at least among Christians, Replacement Theology has its roots in Antisemitism. It notes that the big break between Christians and Jews took place in A.D. 135 during the Bar Kochba revolt against Rome. Jewish leaders were saying that Bar Kochba was the Messiah. Christians, many of whom were Jewish, denied this since they already had a Messiah. Along with their warning about Jesus’ prophecies concerning Jerusalem that were fulfilled in A.D. 70 with the fall of Jerusalem to the Romans, their denial of Bar Kochba made the Jews consider Christians traitors and not true believers.

By the year 300 or so, a number of Christian writers and preachers were denouncing Jewish teachings and characterizing Jews in very strong language. I had noted elsewhere that by the fourth century the church was celebrating Easter according to the Roman solar calendar rather than the Jewish lunar calendar. Even today that is why some years Easter corresponds to Passover but in other years they vary. That is simple and logical understanding. Why not use the calendar that most of the world is using? In America we celebrate George Washington’s birthday on February 22, although he was born on February 11, 1731, because in those days England and its colonies were still using the Julian Calendar. But that becomes February 22, 1732, in the Gregorian Calendar we use today.¹

However, Why the Jewish People? also quotes church leaders from the time period to show that it was more than just a choice of calendars. There were some claiming that they could never imitate the Jews for a variety of reasons, most of them derogatory. So most of the book goes through Western history quoting Luther and Calvin among others to show their anti-Jewish bias. It includes well poisoning, blood libel, and other slanders.

It does note that beginning in the 1600s some Christian leaders started to change. Cromwell, for example, welcomed Jews to England as Washington did to America. Jonathan Edwards and other theologians began to speak of the necessity of Jews returning to the Holy Land and re-establishing their own nation-state. By then, though, the enlightenment picked up where the church left off. Darwinism, for example. spoke of favored and inferior races. The Jews in such an arrangement were always among the inferiors.

I do have one minor quibble. The author claims Augustine was Antisemitic. Perhaps he was, but the quotations from Augustine that the author uses simply remind us that the Jewish Diaspora was a result of their falling away from God as prophesied in many places in the Old Testament, e.g. Deuteronomy 28:64. Indeed, that passage from Ezekiel quoted earlier warns of a time when the Jews will be spread over the whole world among the Gentiles and outside their own country. Regardless of how we interpret Augustine, Fretwell does make a case that Antisemitism has had a shameful history among many Christians.

The question then becomes this: While Replacement Theology may be rooted somewhat in Antisemitism, there are verses in the Bible which suggest it may be true. What about Supersessionists who are not Antisemitic? The last chapter deals with some of the verses that may be talking about it and tries to show that such verses are taken out of context or mean something else.

I personally only know a few Supersessionists, and some of them are motivated by concern for Palestinians. However, the one section of the New Testament that I have seen used to support it is Acts 28:23-29 where Paul quotes from Isaiah 6:9-10. That is not included in this book. I would have been interested in how they handle that one. Perhaps they would simply go back to Romans 11:25-29 which Paul also wrote and forms the basis of Why Israel?

One of the most moving examples of someone who did not believe in Replacement Theology was Hudson Taylor, the famous missionary to China. Every year he gave some of the money his ministry received to a mission agency that specialized in witnessing to the Jews. With this donation, he would include the note “To the Jew first” (see Romans 1:16). That ministry would turn around and send a donation to Taylor’s work with the note “and also to the Gentile” (Why Israel? 73).

Perhaps we should all meditate more on Galatians 3:28-29:

There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to promise.

God did create nations, but there is only one race (Acts 17:26). And God’s ultimate plan is described in Revelation 7:9-10:

After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!”

Amen.

Note
¹ For more on this see https://englishplus.com/grammar/00000141.htm.

Ellery Queen. The Scarlet Letters. Little Brown, 1953.

I happened to come across The Scarlet Letters in the local library and thought it looked interesting. Ellery Queen was the pen name of two cousins who were prolific mystery writers. For many years they also edited the Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, which my father subscribed to back in the 1950s or 1960s. As a kid, I recall reading an “Ellery Queen, Jr.,” mystery from the Scholastic Book Club. This was, then, an impulse in nostalgia to see whether Ellery Queen still made the grade.

It does. The Scarlet Letters is a clever mystery, very much in the vein of Agatha Christie. When Billy Wilder was directing Witness for the Prosecution, he did not pass out the last ten pages of the script to the cast until right before it was shot because there was such a surprise ending. If I were directing a film of the The Scarlet Letters, I would do the same thing. There is wild and clever ending. Nevertheless, an alert reader might have picked up a few clues along the way.

Ellery Queen is the main character in this novel, as well as the author. While the story is told in the third person, it is told from his point of view. He is a mystery writer and editor—we are told more than once that he has been working on an issue of the Ellery Queen magazine. He is single and lives with his widower father who is an inspector for the New York City Police. He also does occasional private detective work with his father as a helpful ally.

Queen’s secretary is Nikki Porter, an attractive redhead. Queen and Porter appear sweet on each other, but in this story they are both too caught up in the mystery to act on any personal matters. Nikki’s good friend Martha Lawrence has become increasingly afraid of her husband, Dirk. They have been married five years, and the honeymoon has worn off. Dirk has even gotten violent and says he suspects her of being unfaithful. Martha goes to Nikki for help, knowing her connection with Ellery Queen.

Martha has inherited a sizeable sum of money and has been using some of her inheritance to produce and direct plays. The first one only lasted a week, but she is trying again. This means that she is working much of the day with others, especially the playwright, and then with the actors and stage manager. Dirk works at home as a writer, so her absences seem to fuel his jealousy. He will call the various people and places she says she is visiting to check up on her. The novel soon establishes that Mr. Lawrence is what today we would call a control freak.

For Martha’s safety and perhaps to see if there is any truth to Dirk’s suspicions, Nikki moves in with the Lawrences to keep an eye on things and report back to Ellery. (They have a spare bedroom in their New York apartment.) Soon she discovers what become known as the scarlet letters. She finds a brief note, fallen out of a much larger envelope, that said “Thursday, 4 P.M., A.” The note is typed in red ink. Typewriters often used ribbon that was half black and half red. The typist could toggle between the two colors.

After much more sleuthing and some tailing of Martha, Nikki and Ellery figure out that “A” is not a person, but a place. Then they find a guidebook to the city in Martha’s apartment that has different locations circled in red ink. They realize that a different letter stands for each place in the book, and they make an alphabetical list. It appears that these short notes that come in the mail each simply have a day, a time, and the next letter in the alphabet. So A turns out to be the A—— Hotel, B the Bowery Follies, C the Chinese Rathskeller, and so on all the way through Xochitl (a Mexican restaurant), Yankee Stadium, and the Bronx Zoo.

Ellery trails Martha or waits for her at the different places and observes that she is meeting up with Van Harrison, a former matinee idol, now in his fifties but still retaining some good looks and charm. It does appear that the classic scarlet letter is involved, that she is meeting this actor for an extramarital affair.

D is a popular night club. Ellery gets a table there and sees Harrison enter. Martha never shows up, but at one point a well-known gossip columnist comes to Harrison’s table and talks to him. The conversation gets heated, and the two men step outside to start a fight. Ellery tries to break it up and all three get beaten somewhat. Ellery manages to leave the scene before the police show up, but his father recognizes him from a photo on the front page of the newspaper the next day showing Harrison and two other men going at it in an alley next to the club. Ellery is otherwise unidentified; his father seems to be the only one who recognizes him.

Before Ellery has a chance to talk to him, the gossip columnist leaves town for over a month. If I go much further, I am giving up too much of the tale. Needless to say, the gossip columnist has some helpful information about Van Harrison. However, Ellery spends quite a bit of time putting pressure on Harrison and some others connected with him with no luck to either stop things or expose the truth. Naturally, Nikki and Ellery fear that if Dirk discovers the affair he may get really violent…

Nikki has known Martha for some time and cannot believe she would be unfaithful. She was already in her thirties when she married, and Dirk was her one and only. Still, the evidence clearly tells us that there is something going on between Martha and the once-handsome actor.

The various events and various rendezvous are coming to an inevitable head. There is not just the scarlet letter associated with adultery, the letters circled in red in the guide book, and the red ink used in the typed notes. There is blood.

A few years ago I directed Witness for the Prosecution at my school. The ending was such a surprise that an audience member told me that she felt like she had to take notes to keep all the drama straight. Readers may feel that way after reading The Scarlet Letters, but they will have fun. Ellery Queen, the detective, was one bright guy. Ellery Queen, the writers, were two bright guys.

Jens Andersen. The Lego Story. Translated by Caroline Waight, Mariner, 2022.

My prayer to the Lord for LEGO is that he will help us run a business that is honest in every way, in our life and dealings, so that our lives are lived in his honor and with his blessing. (62)

—Ole Kirk Christiansen, 1942

The Lego Story tells the history of the well-known toy company, its origins and its growth. It is a fascinating story covering three generations of a family-run business into the fourth generation.

Ole Kirk Christiansen (1891-1958) was the founder of the toy company. He began in rural Denmark on the Jutland Peninsula as a carpenter. In the 1930s, he found that the wooden toys he made were in demand. He was careful to make high quality wooden toys, and his only real competitor in Northern Europe was the Swedish Brio, which still makes wooden toys today. It was then that he coined the name Lego (often written in all capital letters) from the Danish leg godt, or “play well.”

The business managed to survive the German occupation—in one exciting tale of what was probably the closest call they had to being taken over by the Germans, the principal involved pretended not to understand the German language and eventually the officer gave up and never returned. By German standards Lego was still small potatoes.

After the war, Christiansen saw that plastics were being used more and more for toys, and he began experimenting with plastic molds. By 1949, Lego was making some plastic toys along with its nearly 300 different wooden toys.

The bricks that changed the world of toys did not emerge overnight, nor were they an immediate sensation. Christiansen saw some similar hollow blocks with short columns for connecting them and copied them. They had been patented in England, but he could sell them in Denmark and, later, Germany. In 1950 Lego made cubical hollow blocks that attached. The brick shape came out a few years later. Kids could build things better than with plain wooden blocks, but they still did not stay attached to each other well.

A couple of significant events happened in the 1950s. Lego would make an arrangement with a British company to sell the bricks in the United Kingdom. They were then able to take care of the patent issue to everyone’s satisfaction. But the big breakthrough was in 1958 when Lego, after much experimentation, figured that by putting hollow columns inside the bricks, the bricks would interlock and stay attached much better.

In 1959 they made their first foray into North America by entering a marketing agreement with Samsonite. Samsonite makes, and still makes, very rugged plastic-based luggage. Both sides thought it would be a match since both were concerned about the quality of their plastic products. However, the toy market is very different from suitcases and briefcases, so the toy was largely still unknown in North America when the agreement ended in 1969.

As is true with all toys in the toy market, there were ups and downs from year to year, but we gradually see how Lego took advantage of new developments and different licensing agreements. In the early 1970s, Legos finally became well known in the United States and Canada when the company made a licensing agreement with McDonalds to include a small Lego kit in its children’s Happy Meals.

In the 1990s, when the Star Wars films were re-shown in theaters, Lego came out with various Star Wars kits. Later, they would do the same with Harry Potter. By 2000 they realized that many adults still built things with Legos, so they began more marketing aimed at them such as the series of famous buildings made with smaller bricks.

Probably the single biggest change or improvement since 1958 came out in 1978 and caught on in the 1980s: the Lego figures. Some strategic people hired by Lego promoted the idea of role playing and making little plastic people to populate the various buildings and vehicles children made with Legos. the figures also began to attract more girls to play with the Legos, which up till then was largely seen as a toy for boys.

The Lego Story is largely told from the perspective of the three generations of family members who ran the company: Ole, his son Godtfred Kirk Christiansen (1924-2015), and Godtfred’s son Kjeld Kirk Kristiansen (b. 1947). Other family members were involved. Even fathers and sons had different visions for the company. Ole, for example, was more interested in quality and manufacturing, often spending more than others might have. Godtfred was a businessman, but one who never forgot how to play. The front of the book has a helpful family tree that the reader may have to consult once in a while to keep the names straight. Kjeld, by the way, spelled the family name more in line with current Danish orthography. No one in the family had a problem with the way he spelled it.

There were a number of flops or products that were not worth retaining along with related products like Duplo blocks that took off well. Kjeld stepped down from his position in 2004 and the first non-family member ran the company though Kjeld would remain on the Lego board until 2016. The company is still privately owned.

The author was able to interview many people including family members, workers, retired workers, and townspeople of Billund, Denmark, which still is its headquarters. The book is full of quotations from Kjeld. It gives an intimate view of the family dynamic over the years as well as many experiments: some like the Lego people were successful beyond imagination, and others did not succeed like the deal with Samsonite. But that is life and corporate life.

As suggested by the quotation which introduces this review, Ole and his wife were devout Christians, impacted by the widespread revival that took place in many lands shortly after the turn of the twentieth century. Until the 1960s, workers could attend an optional prayer meeting before work each day. While neither Godtfred nor Kjeld were as openly expressive about it, they both acknowledged that a faith in the God of the Bible was important to them, to the company, and, perhaps as we have seen, to the joy and peace of many children around the world as they played and continue to play with Legos.

James Reasoner. Gettysburg. Cumberland House, 2001.

Well, the last book I reviewed turned out to be fifth in a series. Gettysburg turns out to be sixth in a series of ten novels, each named for a battle of the American Civil War. I was interested to see how this book deals with the battle I am probably most familiar with. I have visited Gettysburg and toured the battlefield—I have done that at a number of historic sites connected with both the Civil War and the American Revolution. But also my great-grandfather was a fourteen-year-old apprentice working in Gettysburg in 1863. He did not get there till after the battle, but heard Lincoln give his Gettysburg Address in November.

Reasoner’s Gettysburg is told from a Southern point of view. He follows the vagaries of five brothers from Culpeper in Northern Virginia. Four are in the Confederate Army and together cover a lot of what the CSA soldiers would experience. One is in Vicksburg. He is just mentioned in passing here; clearly, he will probably be the main character in Reasoner’s Vicksburg, number five in this series.

Titus Brannon is currently a prisoner in Camp Douglas in Illinois. Camp Douglas was the most notorious Union POW prison, sometimes called the Andersonville of the North. Yes, here the Union does not come across too well. As in the writings of Mary Chesnut or Henry Timrod, the Yankees typify pharisaical self-righteousness—at least most of them do. What complicates things is that everyone back in Virginia thinks Titus is dead. There was no Red Cross or Geneva Convention overseeing POWs back then and sending notes home. Some Quakers attempt to do their part with some success.

One of Titus’s fellow prisoners is his brother-in-law, Nathan. Nathan joined the Union Army but was imprisoned from a mistaken identity. He has come to loathe the North, too, because of his treatment at Camp Douglas, though he still believes slavery is wrong.

The main focus is on the two brothers in Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia: Mac, a cavalryman under Jeb Stuart and Fitzhugh Lee, and Will, an infantryman. Because they are in very different units and usually miles from each other, they only run into each other from time to time. However, their peregrinations with the army keep the reader abreast of the travels of Lee from Virginia to Pennsylvania and the various skirmishes they have before the big one in Gettysburg.

Will is a Captain. He enlisted back when the war began but has been promoted. From his perspective we get a sense of what a typical Confederate infantryman would have experienced. As a junior officer, though, he is privy to some strategy sessions and orders, so we also get a sense of what A.P. Hill, Ewell, and others were thinking during the month leading up to the battle.

Macbeth “Mac” Brannon’s perspective gives us the closest sense of the Confederate command. He is an aide to General Fitzhugh Lee, who is just under Stuart in the cavalry’s chain of command and nephew of Robert E. (“Uncle Bob” to Fitzhugh). Mac has one of the best horses in the country, so he not only fights vigorously, but he also is often called upon to deliver messages to and from the command. Through his persona we get a good sense of what Lee and Stuart are thinking. Indeed, Stuart and both Lees are significant characters in the story.

One cannot help but compare this to probably the most famous novel about Gettysburg, The Killer Angels, upon which the film Gettysburg is based. That novel tells the story from both sides, focusing primarily on Lee and Longstreet for the South and Hancock and Chamberlain for the North. While there are also fictional characters who are important in the story, the personal narratives are mostly about the historical figures, unlike this Gettysburg which focuses on the Brannon family.

Besides the Southern sympathies expressed by the Brannons and other characters, Gettysburg has much more about the events leading up to the Gettysburg battle. We read about Brandy Station and Winchester, and a number of the skirmishes both the Stonewall Brigade and Stuart’s Cavalry get into. Since the series is more of an attempt to cover the whole war, we get an overview of what the armies in Virginia, Maryland, and Pennsylvania are doing between Chancellorsville and Gettysburg. Only chapters 21 through 23 out of 24 chapters in all are about the actual Battle of Gettysburg itself.

While The Killer Angels focuses on Little Round Top and Pickett’s Charge, Gettysburg deals more with Culp’s Hill—which changed hands and had its own share of brutal fighting—and the cavalry skirmishes of Stuart around Harrisburg and Hanover.

There is one curious parallel. The Killer Angels tells us a bit about a foreign military officer who is observing the Southern army, namely Arthur Fremantle, an attaché apparently assigned to help England determine whether or not to recognize or support the Confederacy. While Fremantle is mentioned on one page, Reasoner’s Gettysburg introduces us to another foreign military officer who also wrote about his experiences in the war, Johann Heros von Borcke (Reasoner spells it Borke). Borcke was a Colonel in the Prussian army and had immigrated to North America specifically to join the Confederate Army. I guess we will have to find a copy of his memoir and see what he has to say.

One slight literary allusion runs through the novel. All the Brannon siblings’ names are inspired by Shakespeare. Titus is Titus Andronicus, Macbeth is obvious, Will is William Shakespeare Brannon, Cory in Vicksburg is Coriolanus, and Nathan’s wife and the Brannons’ sister is Cordelia. There is also the youngest brother Henry, who is still at home keeping the family farm with his widowed mother. There are any number of Henrys, but we assume Henry V was his namesake.

There could be complications back home, too. Since everyone in Culpeper thinks Titus is dead, Henry and Titus’s wife are developing an interest in one another. Guess I will have to read the next novel to find out what happens: Kind of like reading Richard II through Richard III with the six Henry plays in between to learn English history during their civil war in the fifteenth century.

This book is slightly reminiscent of the nonfiction Witness to Gettysburg because it details a number of battles leading up to the big one in Pennsylvania. Unlike Witness to Gettysburg, this novel has no maps, a real liability for readers.

Mark Greaney. Back Blast. Berkley, 2016.

We have reviewed a few books by Mark Greaney, but they have all been posthumous or coauthored “Tom Clancy” works. Here was something that Greaney did that had no connection to Jack Ryan, Jr., or the Clancy mythos.

Back Blast actually will remind readers of the Jack Ryan, Jr., stories, especially ones about the Campus. Like some of those books, there is just about nonstop action involving secret agents operating on the limits of legality. In this case, there is not a clandestine organization like the Campus, but simply a CIA apparatchik who has created his own bureaucratic kingdom and can do pretty much whatever he wants and get away with it. It is a reminder how much evil government workers can do when they no longer see themselves as serving the people.

Dennis “Denny” Carmichael leads a division of clandestine services within the Central Intelligence Agency. He has it in for Courtland “Court” Gentry, one of the best covert operatives in the CIA until Carmichael gave the order to terminate him. For five years, Gentry has been on the lam in foreign countries, escaping from CIA assassins and others. The problem is that he has no idea why the Agency suddenly turned on him. It becomes clear to him that Carmichael is behind it, but he cannot imagine why.

It turns out that this is the fifth of at least seven novels about Gentry, who becomes known as the Gray Man. This is the first in the series that I have read, and there is nothing lost by reading this book out of order. The narrative provides enough background so that the reader is up to speed pretty quickly.

Speaking of speed, Back Blast is a true page turner. Gentry decides it is time to return to the United States to see if he can straighten things out with the CIA—provided, of course, that no one tries to kill him first. People are trying to do that even before he lands in North America.

Gentry is clever, skilled with weapons, and physically fit. He makes for a kind of ideal character in an entertaining story. Of course, things get complicated right away. Gentry arrives in Washington, D.C., more or less under the radar, and tries to stay that way. However, he is not terribly successful at that.

Some muggers try to rob him one night. Big mistake. He injures one of them, and gets the other to tell him who the drug dealer behind their action is. Gentry sees an opportunity not just to get even and maybe help law enforcement a bit, but perhaps to get a hold of some ready cash since pushers usually have a lot of Benjamins on hand. He does accomplish his goal at the house of the drug dealer, but the FBI and CIA both see this as evidence of Gentry’s work. Macheath’s back in town, so to speak.

Carmichael has one of Gentry’s former associates, Zack Hightower, assassinate the CEO of a security firm often used by the CIA, and the Agency blames it on Gentry. Gentry also happens to be in a convenience store late one night when three thieves try to rob it. He successfully thwarts the robbery, but again his skills and methods make it clear that the robbers had encountered a trained counterterrorist.

It gets more complicated. It becomes clear that Carmichael has some secrets he does not want exposed and is willing to kill to keep them secret. He comes to depend on an associate from Saudi Arabian intelligence who has diplomatic immunity to do some of his wet work. He even has men disguised as D.C. Metro Police to hide the fact they are hit men.

A young reporter from the Washington Post assigned to the D.C. crime beat becomes suspicious that the official story he is getting from the police and FBI is at the very least not the whole story. He is able to enlist the help of one of the most experienced reporters whose specialty is the intelligence bureaucracy. They begin to discover things that may eventually answer some of Gentry’s questions.

There are few narrow escapes. The body count gets higher. While most of it is blamed on Gentry, the only ones he seems to have actually terminated or injured were armed criminals like the drug dealer and the convenience store holdup men.

Greany is very good at showing us how Gentry attends to detail. He manages security cameras well—hiding his face from them and even setting up a meeting during the time of day that the sun’s glare obscures a camera’s image. He is very stealthy, but also does some extreme things to heighten his stealth by creating distractions. He is a very entertaining character.

There is also a classical element here. Carmichael’s near obsession with Gentry, who appears innocent of any wrongdoing, reminded this reader of Javert’s obsession with Jean Valjean in Les Miserables or Lt. Gerard trying to catch Dr. Kimble in The Fugitive. (I believe the film based on the TV show Gerard is a U.S. Marshal, but the idea is the same.) Like Richard Kimble, Gentry tries to stay ahead of various plots to capture or kill him while at the same time trying to find evidence that will exonerate him.

To tell much more would get into spoiler territory, but Back Blast is a blast to read. For anyone who enjoys the derring-do and action of the Jack Ryan, Jr., stories or the books about Jason Bourne, this will be a lot of fun and hard to put down.

Dee Henderson. Undetected. Bethany House, 2014.

Undetected is really two stories. First, and foremost to this reader, there is the story about submarines and research on underwater navigation. Second, there is a stock romance.

Let us take care of the romance first. I tell my male students when we read Jane Eyre that that book contains the seeds of the plots of most romance novels written today. So in Undetected, Gina Gray is being courted by two sailors, St. John Rivers and Edward Rochester; oh, sorry, I mean Daniel Field and Mark Bishop.

Gina, though, is no Jane Eyre. She is reluctant to speak her mind and afraid of being hurt. She is also a genius. I recall once hearing an interview with a successful movie actress who married an actor considerably older. She said simply that the guys her age had neither the money nor the experience she had as a matinee idol. She could relate much better to the older and more experienced actor. The narrator hints that is the kind of man Gina needs.

Gina graduated from high school at fourteen, got her first Ph.D. at twenty-one and developed a sophisticated sonar system for submarine navigation and safety. The cross-sonar system—something like it actually exists—is more accurate because it uses sonar from at least two points to triangulate. She was curious about it because her older brother, Jeff, is a submariner, and she thought that it might help make his job safer.

Gina is now 28 or 29, and brother Jeff is the Commanding Officer of a fast attack submarine. Commander Mark Bishop is the Commanding Officer of a ballistic missile submarine. Jeff tries to fix Gina up first with Bishop, who is about twelve years older than Gina and a widower. He demurs, so Jeff has her meet one of the younger men on his crew, Daniel Field. The one perhaps factual flaw in this story is that Daniel is described as a sonarman but also as a Naval Academy graduate. Sonarman is an enlisted rate. An academy graduate might be a sonar specialist, but he would have an officer rank.

Much of the story, then, tells of Gina working out her relationships. Since the cover has the picture of a higher ranking naval officer—he has the gold braid or “scrambled eggs” on the visor of his cap—we can guess which guy she will end up with.

The cool part, though, is the imagined (or maybe classified) technology. Hunt for Red October appealed to its “technodude” readers partly because the submarine Red October had a unique tractor-type propulsion system. Theoretically, it might have been quieter than propellers. I am not sure anything like it was ever tried, but it was an interesting idea. So is the cross-sonar, and so is Gina’s latest experiment.

What if it were possible to “ping” a vessel without being detected? This idea sounds like it might work. Simply passively record and ambient sound (waves, ice, underwater rock slides, a whale) and use that sound to ping, that is, to bounce a sound wave off a vessel. It would likely be dismissed as part of the natural surroundings by any vessel that happened to hear it.

So Cdr. Bishop and Mr. Field become involved in some of those experiments, which seem to work very well. Once the Secretary of the Navy understands what has been accomplished, Gina gets a permanent personal security detail. Can’t have other countries find out about this very interesting stuff. The detail does put some limits on her personal life.

Gina also contributes to a team that is using satellites to come up with a more accurate map of the sea floors of all the oceans.

There is one chapter that is worth reading even if the reader were to pass over the rest of the story. Chapter seven is a conversation between Gina and Bishop which at its core is about the concept of a just war. Gina got interested in underwater acoustics because her big brother was a submariner. But what if her research just made it easier to kill people? That begins to bother her. The discussion really boils down to the whole question of good and evil.

“People can misuse what God created. But that has everything to do with man’s free will and tendency to evil, not science. What God created is good. So do what you were created to do. Break new scientific ground. Help us understand the dynamics of what God created.

“You can’t protect the world from itself, Gina. You can only give good men the tools necessary to do their jobs…” (148, cf. Genesis 1:31)

At any rate, Gina has decided that she has done enough marine acoustics work and wants to get into something else. She has standing job offers from NASA and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. She thinks that getting into astronomy or astrophysics would be a change of pace—except that she makes a connection between a solar flare she has recorded data on and how that information can be used to passively detect submarines. Henderson makes the science sound reasonable, just as Clancy did with Red October.

While I did have a question about the sonarman, otherwise, Henderson described life aboard a nuclear submarine and on a sub base pretty accurately. As someone who lived on a sub base for two years and worked with submariners and sub hunters, I can vouch for that.

Besides the intriguing technology, excitement comes for Commander Bishop’s crew as somebody in the Eastern Pacific apparently shoots a torpedo at Jeff Gray’s boat at the same time North Korea launches a missile and China is threatening to take over some uninhabited islands claimed by Japan. China also alleges that someone may have deliberately sunk one of its submarines. Suddenly, on orders from the President, Bishop’s boat prepares to fire some intercontinental ballistic missiles as soon as Washington gives them the word.

It reminds us that in the real world, many submariners have witnessed geopolitical events that the rest of the world has no knowledge of.

In all fairness to the romance aspect, all the main characters—Gina, Daniel, Mark, and Jeff—act like mature adults who really have the interests of others foremost. There are also some kittens and a puppy to add some cuteness. But the submarine story is the selling point to this veteran.

Robert L. Dilenschneider. The Ultimate Guide to Power and Influence. Matt Holt, 2023.

The Ultimate Guide to Power and Influence provides a handbook for people in a position of leadership or influence. It is direct, clear, and based on the author’s own experience as a consultant for large corporations and his wide reading and research.

The author’s basic thesis is simple:

The goal is to give you ideas and to help you think about how to make your life better. Why? Because if your life is better, then everyone you come into contact with will be better. And that is an achievement. (21)

Beginning with the Socratic idea that the unexamined life is not worth living, the reader is encouraged, even exhorted, to examine his or her own life. And the overarching theme is that if you make the lives of those around you better, you have succeeded. Dilenschneider does quote a number of philosophers, but also he quotes many successful people in business and even a few from politics.

A recurring theme is integrity. A good leader must lead with integrity. People must trust the leader. There are practical chapters on networking, helping others, communicating, using social media, reacting to crises. All these things can contribute to one’s ability to lead. It is not so much cleverness as honesty and character.

One repeated idea is that good leaders listen. He gives numbers of examples of successful corporate leaders who in different ways received input from the people working for them. In some cases it was a matter of going through an entire plant and talking with all the workers. In other cases, it might be having meetings with no specific agenda, just to hear how things were going and if anyone had any good ideas.

Dilenschneider repeatedly tells us the importance of communicating by telling stories. And that is what much of the book is—stories about people in leadership positions. In some cases, it is how they got there; in some cases, how they stayed there; and in some, how they lost their positions. There is chapter on learning from mistakes. After all, anyone who takes a chance to lead something is bound to make some mistakes.

Two stories he tells illustrate a difference. Back in the early 1980s there were about half a dozen incidents of people receiving poisoned Tylenol. The capsules were apparently all poisoned while on store shelves, but Johnson & Johnson initiated a huge recall and handed out many refunds—and started using tamper-proof packaging. While sales fell at first, the quick response and willingness to take responsibility for something they did not initiate brought good will, and the sales revived quickly.

More recently, about ten years ago, news reports surfaced that Volkswagen was fudging some of its emissions measurements. At first they denied it, and then began making weak excuses. Many people at the car company ended up losing their jobs, though a final explanation continued to be vague. Sales declined and have never really recovered.

Both instances involve power, leadership, and issues of integrity. Perhaps some of the actions were perceptions not based on all the facts, but the handling of the two crises produced what many would say were predictable results in either case.

There are many stories and examples like these that make The Ultimate Guide to Power and Influence memorable and worth reading.

OK. So how does it compare to the granddaddy of such books: Dale Carnegie’s How to Win Friends and Influence People? I would not be surprised to hear that Mr. Dilenschneider took a Dale Carnegie course at one time.

When I was quite young, my father took a Dale Carnegie course. Being a preschooler and living in Pittsburgh, I think I got Dale and Andrew a little confused, but my father at the time was in both sales and politics. I know the classes helped him get elected and give effective speeches. I also recall much later when my father retired. At that point he was an officer of a well known insurance company. At his retirement party, his boss said that my father was always a man of integrity. That not only made me proud as his son, but also reminds us that, as Thoreau said, “truth alone wears well.”

Both books spend a lot of time about how we relate to others. Leaders need people. Good leaders do not exploit people. The commanding officer of the Coast Guard group I worked for had the rank of commander. He had worked his way up from the enlisted ranks to that position. He knew his stuff. But he said that he could not have become a commander if he did not have good people working for him.

Dilenschneider says something similar. If you want to be the best leader, bring out the best in those around you. This book shows you how in a surprisingly easy to digest form. And, of course, it includes things like emailing and social media and other things that did not exist when Mr. Carnegie was flourishing. If Dilenschneider were not so busy consulting and writing, perhaps he could start his own course.

Stephen W. Hiemstra. Image and Illumination. T2Pneuma, 2023.

Image and Illumination is a profound book. I was recently given this book to read and am already starting to reread it. I am a wide reader and used to work in a Christian bookstore, but I have never come across a book quite like this.

The book basically and simply discusses what it means to be created in the image of God. He tells us:

Probably the most inconvenient verse in the Bible is this: “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female he created them.” (Genesis 1:27) (91)

The “inconvenience” of this verse is that we are meant to be “joined with our spouses to accomplish God’s mission.” God Himself is triune, Father, Son, and Spirit. His nature is that like a loving family. So the family is God’s main instrument on earth for carrying on His mission and fulfilling His covenants.

So Dr. Hiemstra very slowly and deliberately takes us through the significance of what it means to bear the image of God. Obviously, since the Fall, that image has been marred, but as C. S. Lewis reminds us, every human being is an eternal being. That means both a blessing and a responsibility.

A recurring theme is what Hiemstra calls the Deuteronomic Cycle. We are reminded that whenever man tries to create an accomplishment outside of God, it eventually will wane. Our world is presently faced with many utopian schemes. They are bound to fail if they do not acknowledge what God says about the nature of mankind.

Moses anticipated the course of human development in Deuteronomy 30:1-3. You (plural) will sin; be enslaved; and cry out to the Lord. God will send you a deliverer and restore your fortunes…This pattern, called the Deuteronomic Cycle, outlines biblical history and with it the rise and fall of nations. (105, emphasis in original)

So Illumination, the second part of the book’s title, begins with the discussion of light. The first thing God created when He was creating the universe was light.

What is God’s first act of creation after creating the heavens and the earth? The Bible reads: “And God said, Let there be light, and there was light.” (Gen. 1:3) Then, God declares the light to be good. Goodness and light are equated as God begins by creating a moral universe. (111)

So there is “a moral mandate even before human beings are created.” Interestingly, the book notes that after God created humans, God said things were not merely good but “very good” (Genesis 1:31).

Now, since the Fall, God’s main mission, if you will, is one of restoration.

Faith matters; right now it matters a lot because God in his mercy delivers on a familiar promise: “A thousand may fall at your side, ten thousand at your right hand, but it will not come near you.” (Ps. 91:7) At this point in time, lost opportunities are a pattern. Life expectancy in the United States is falling due to preventable causes—suicide, drug overdoes, and refusing to be vaccinated. Fertility rates and living standards are also falling, all indicators of a society under stress and underperforming. (133)

So the book is a study of what it means to be a human being, created as a moral being in the image of God. What can we learn from history? What can we learn from God’s Word? How do we see ourselves? Part of understanding the meaning of life is understanding who we are.

Image and Illumination is formatted almost like a devotional book. The chapters are fairly short, usually under ten pages. At the end there is a prayer to pray or at least to meditate upon. Then there are a few, usually four, questions to consider.

It is clear Hiemstra wants us to think. That is why I am rereading this book.

There is so much. Yes, there is the Deuteronomic Cycle, but there is also the image of God. That means relationships. So, yes, while some of the book is about how we relate to God and how God relates to us, much is about how we relate to other people, beginning with the family.

Being created with our spouse in the image of a Triune God, who is in relationship even within himself, suggests that our own identity is revealed in relationship. (170)

The ideal relationship would be that of a husband and wife. But he does not slight those who are single, even using the example of Catholic priests and nuns. They, he notes, are ideally bringing a heavenly lifestyle to earth since in heaven people will not be married to each other (see Matthew 22:30) but are part of the Bride of Christ (see, for example, Revelation 19:7-8).

God continues to test us to see ourselves the way He sees us. Hiemstra uses the example of Moses quite a bit, perhaps because more is written in the Bible about him than any other person apart from Jesus. Moses committed murder because he wanted to free his people. That clearly was not God’s way, so Moses spent forty years in exile. Finally, after being a shepherd on the edge of the desert in Midian, God called him.

God first created in Moses a desire to free his people from bondage and then God called Moses to honor that desire. While the burning bush served as a Rorschach test, it did not project Moses’ attributes on God. Rather, God used the burning bush to teach Moses about himself, laying bare Moses’ own desires. (184)

Now the people of God under Moses had much to learn. “The forty year curse incident (Num. 14:34) demonstrated the power of fear to hold back those unwilling to trust in God’s promises” (201).

Yes, one may argue that in the New Covenant under Christ, we live by grace. But it was God’s grace that delivered the Israelites from Egypt.

Christians live under grace, but those resisting God remain subject exclusively to law. Even for Christians, the temptations of secular society are real, ever present, and hard to resist. But we have the image of Christ given in scripture to guide us during trials and tribulations when we have no alternative but to rely on God. (205)

There is so much more. One simple example is the author’s take on the Parable of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15:11-32).

In the parable, the younger son thinks only of himself asking for his inheritance and leaving home for a faraway country where he squanders it. What is unique about this story is that suffering that the young man goes through draws attention to his sin and allows him to see the error of his ways. He grows up and learns to love his father. Unlike Moses’ Deuteronomic Cycle, the cycle of sin is broken and his life transformed. (258)

The book points out that the father did not try to dissuade the son. The son had to learn on his own. Indeed, “The difference between the two brothers arose because the younger son proved teachable and his older sibling proved unwilling to learn” (1994).

Hiemstra is writing from much study and experience. He freely uses the Bible. He also refers to many Christian authors including Aquinas, Augustine, Calvin, Luther, as well as a number of contemporary authors. He served as a counselor or chaplain for hospitals and street ministries, so he got to see people in all kinds of situations, many down-and-outers. He sees the need for transformation, not only for the drug addicts and street people, but for the many of us who tend to look down on them, like the older brother in the Prodigal Parable.

At the same time, he is direct and clear. What God calls sin is sin. Part of the transformation is turning away from sin, even sin that may be acclaimed by some as liberating. He takes the casting out of demons seriously, not mere “first-century psychology.” It gets back to the question of light and darkness.

He also deals with the question of establishing righteousness “to be proved righteous and blameless under the law.”

You hear a variation on this pharisaic argument today when people reject the applicability of original sin and argue that people are basically good. The implication is that we have no reason to ask for forgiveness and, by inference, we have no need for Jesus to have died for our sins. (326)

Much then involves the idea of restoration. Yes, the Prodigal Son was restored to his father. How then do we restore the image of God in our lives?

Restoring the image in which God created us requires that the original sin that tarnished the divine image in us must be accounted for and overcome. The cycle of sin and death must be overcome because human progress is fleeting. It is not enough to condemn the sin or to console the brokenhearted because our hearts need to be transformed. Divine intervention is required because we cannot do it on our own. This is why Christ needed to pay the penalty for sin on the cross and we need the intervention of the Holy Spirit in our daily lives. (351)

I could go on quoting the book to demonstrate how realistic and honest and clear it is. Read it for yourselves. You will be glad you did—or perhaps you will be offended. Either way, it will be worth it.

N.B.: Citations are Kindle locations, not page numbers.

M. C. Beaton and R. W. Green. Death of a Traitor. Read by Graeme Malcolm, Hachette Audio, 2023. A Hamish Macbeth Mystery.

We have enjoyed and reviewed several Hamish Macbeth mysteries. This one, Death of a Traitor, we listened to on CD. The reader’s smooth accent and varied voices helped make the tale come alive. It has many of the elements that have made these mysteries popular: Hamish’s fluster over women, suspicious outsiders, hostile insiders, Hamish’s pets, and some exciting action.

The mystery this time is quite complicated. Kate Hibbert, the outsider, has lived in Lochdubh, Macbeth’s remote Scottish village, for about a year. She does occasional housekeeping and odd jobs for people, but for reasons that become clear only during the investigation of her murder, she has rubbed a number of people the wrong way. At one point even MI5 comes into play.

She disappears with her suitcase. Her only relative, a cousin from down south, files a missing person report after a few days. The cousin, one of several attractive females in this story, is concerned because Kate is a silent partner in her up and coming fashion business. Kate has promised to invest half a million pounds. Where does a transient who does mostly odd jobs get that kind of money?

After missing for three weeks, Kate’s body washes ashore on a small island in the loch. The locals associate the island with a medieval tale (which begins the story) about a woman who commits suicide after being accused of witchcraft. A couple of researchers examining the flora of the island discover the body. While Kate was last seen wearing the coat on the body, her face and limbs are disfigured beyond recognition—a combination of three weeks in the water with various crabs and fish and of the apparent tortures she endured before being killed. It requires dental records to insure the identity.

Some of the regulars in the Hamish stories help to complicate things. Inspector Blair, as usual, is trying to make Hamish look bad and take credit for himself. Hamish’s friend, Inspector Anderson, was taken off the case because he drove a car while drunk and is laid up in the hospital recovering from broken bones and other injuries. As a result, Chief Inspector Daviot, who holds an ambivalent opinion of Hamish, supervises things more closely than usual.

Without giving away too much of the story, Hamish learns that nearly everyone Kate worked for or knew her had a reason to dislike her. The title suggests a general reason, that she betrayed people’s trust. Let us just say it is much more than mere gossip. Many people had a reason to see her gone. There is a kind of refrain in the story: I am glad she’s dead, but I did not do it. Curiously, one document found near her body contains the encrypted names of Daviot, Anderson, and Blair. What exactly is going on?

Hamish himself has some trust issues. He is assigned a new constable for this case by Blair. So, he wonders, can he trust this young recruit or is he spying for Blair? Jimmy Anderson swears by him, tells Macbeth that the young man is his godson, that his father was a distinguished police officer, and that he can be trusted. The new constable adds some humorous relief as he gets distracted and perhaps smitten by several of the women they encounter on the case including Kate’s fashionable cousin and Hamish’s former fiancée Priscilla.

Priscilla’s father, a minor nobleman, never forgave Hamish for being engaged to his daughter. He saw Hamish as beneath their status, and now his daughter is acting friendly towards another policeman. Let us just say that he keeps a very close watch on the two of them to a humorous effect.

Green’s preface to the first Hamish Macbeth mystery that he completed after the death of Mrs. Beaton, the author, made it sound like that Death of a Green-Eyed Monster was going to wrap up the series and that Mr. Green merely fleshed out what Beaton had already started. The ending of that book seemed to tie up a lot of loose ends. Clearly, there was at least one more book. And the preface to this one makes no suggestion that we have heard the last of Sergeant Macbeth.