Books I Read June 30th

For the first time in what seems like years, I met my weekly book quota. Not last week—last week I was lazy. This week. Anyway.

Dreamsnake by Vonda N. McIntyre – A healer searches for love, a new snake in a ruined future earth. One of those books in which the post-apocalypse looks like a kind of idealized vision of 60s counterculture (see also: Dhalgren, Engine Summer). I wanted it to be weirder.

Beyond the Door of No Return by David Diope – A pre-revolutionary French academicist reflects o n a youthful sojourn in Senegal, the ills of slavery.

The Possessed by Witold Gombrowicz – A Polish pastich (?) of the Gothic novel. Beware the minor works of great writers.

The Army of Flanders and the Spanish Road, 1567-1659: The Logistics of Spanish Victory and Defeat in the Low Countries' Wars by Geoffrey Parker – Heralded as marking the birth of new military history, Parker's study reviews the history of the 80 Year War entirely in economic/material terms, eschewing tactics and personalities almost entirely. I have a weird thing about the Wars of Religion, but even if you didn't I think there's something fascinating about reading something which forces one to consider the infinite complexities of human existence, that behind the siege of Breda or the Battle of Rocroi were hundreds of sutlers waiting to turn carrion scavenge into specie.