Need For reads

--> Nonfiction Diverse fauna down under WALKER’S MAMMALS OF THE WORLD: Monotremes, Marsupials, Afrotherians, Xenarthrans, and Sundatherians By Ronald M. Nowak 757 pp. Johns Hopkins University Press Reviewed by David E. Hoekenga, M. D. Walker’s First Edition of Mammals of the World has been a treasured possession of mine since it was published in 1964. Two volumes with black and white illustrations in a black slipcase followed me as a zoology student and then later in medical school as an amateur naturalist. With over five thousand mammals alive in the world today, keeping track of them on seven continents is no easy task. I hoped to be able to compare the new volume at 750-plus pages to the first volume of my old Walker’s , but the new volume works differently. It is based on the oldest evolutionary clades or groupings, starting with the echidnas and platypuses – egg-layers all. Then come Tasmanian devils and bandicoots. None of these creatures are terribly familiar, but the ne...

--> Nonfiction What we humans do to ourselves UNBOUND: How Eight Technologies Made Us Human, Transformed Society, and Brought the World to the Brink By Richard Currier 376 pp. Arcade Publishing   Reviewed by David E. Hoekenga, M.D. While used occasionally before the last two hundred years, the term technology has been widely applied to human effort since then. In Currier’s book it is used to describe events that in some cases occurred millions of years ago and to eight different eras of human development critical to human progress. In his first section the author describes the primate baseline and how unique monogamy is in humans occurring in only three percent of mammals. He finds that monogamy while not perfect promotes “social stability.” Then drawing on very early man out of Africa such as “Lucy,” Currier describes how standing fully upright, forging fire-hardening sticks, and especially a bigger brain benefitted the early hominids in their ascent . Making clever use o...

Nonfiction Challenges for Mother Earth UNBOUND: How Eight Technologies Made Us Human, Transformed Society, and Brought the World to the Brink By Richard Currier 376 pp. Arcade Publishing   Reviewed by David E. Hoekenga, M.D. While used occasionally before the last two hundred years the term technology has been widely applied to human effort since then. Currier uses it to describe events that in feels were critical to human progress. The author describes the primate baseline and how unusual monogamy is, occurring in only three percent of mammals, including humans. He writes that monogamy, while not perfect, promotes “social stability.” Drawing on very early man out of Africa such as “Lucy,” Currier describes how standing fully upright, forging fire hardening sticks, and especially a bigger brain benefitted the early hominids in their ascent . In the cleverly titled chapter “Hats, Huts, Togas and Tents,” s humans protect themselves and move into more hostile environments around the ...

--> Fiction Mutilation, migration, spycraft Amie Cut For Life By Lucinda E. Clark 312 pp. Umhlanga Press Reviewed by: David E. Hoekenga, M. D. Whenever I talk about going back to Africa with excitement in my voice, I invariably run into well-meaning people who claim they can experience it just as well watching a show or two on TV. Well, they can’t. I’ve never been able to convey the amazing smells of the continent that are like no other. If olfactory memories are more persistent than any other, then Amie Fish traveling under the name Felicity Mansell as a British spy tries hard. After, unwisely, spending time with her parents in Jo’berg even though her elaborate cover is that she was killed previously in an explosion in Zimbabwe. Her elaborate fake funeral is a waste because her mother is a blabbermouth. Then she wanders around Botswana and Zimbabwe where an attractive white woman sticks out like a sore thumb. Clark captures the flavor of African towns beautifully. Atari was ju...