Conspiracy Theories and Other Dangerous ideas

Conspiracy Theories and other Dangerous Ideas by Cass R. Sunstein, 267 pages

I picked this book up when browsing the recently arrived new books in Social Science. While the title makes it seem that it is about the different theories and other legends or myths, it is actually about how they start and why they last. The book is broken down into chapters, with each chapter being a “dangerous idea”. I put that in quotes as it would be more accurate to say dangerous political ideas. Some of the “dangerous ideas” are things like health care reform and minimalism. I can’t say I consider those to be dangerous to think about. Dangerous in a political sense yes, but not for the average person.

Overall I should have stopped reading after the first long chapter on conspiracy theories. The rest of the ideas, while discussed don’t go into the same detail nor do they fully explain either the issue or the suggested possible answer.  

The Spy Who Loved Me

The Spy Who Loved Me by Ian Fleming, 221 pages

I did not care much for this novel. It is written in the first person and through the eyes of a Canadian woman named Vivienne Michel or Viv. The first third of the novels tells of her growing up and forays into adulthood. From her first parties to her first crush and first heartbreak it tells it all in explicit detail. The story seems to hop from one love affair to another with not much of her life in between. Finally it finds her working at a small motel in the Adirondack Mountains.

In the second third she is being harassed and abused by some street toughs named Sluggsy and Horror. They claim to be sent by her boss but they mean her no good. Finally in the third part we get to see Bond show up and do what he does best. Despite the slow start the book manages to end with explosions and gun battles that really should be in every Bond novel.  The book ends with a moral that we are supposed to take away but it seems halfhearted at best.

Hopefully the next Fleming novel will return to the old style and give us the thrilling story that Bond is supposed to be.

Our Guys

Our Guys: The Glen Ridge Rape and the Secret Life of the Perfect Suburbs, Bernard Lefkowitz
516 pages


        This is a book that you would have to get from the stacks, and its just as well.  While I do enjoy reading True Crime, sometimes it is more disturbing than I would like.  What was most upsetting was that something like this even happened in the first place, let alone reading an account of the whole egregious event. I was outraged every time I picked up the book and read more.  This book is fairly old, and he crime happened five or six years before the book came out.  It was also a grueling read because it was simply way too long, and Lefkowitz rehashes a lot of points along the way.
         The main thing that kept me hanging on through this was the examination of the affluent suburb where the accused were born and raised, and of the attitudes of the people who lived there at the time. No one wanted to believe this could happen, but it was a place not unlike any other in the country.  The perpetrators of this crime were young men who were outwardly successful in sports, and in school, yet rarely had to suffer any real consequences for their actions.  Glad to be done with this one.