Elizabeth C. Robinson's Blog: Honest Reviews, page 2

Epigenetics (2012) and Game Theory (2008)

So the full titles of the books are: Epigenetics: How the Environment Shapes Our Genes by a professor named Richard Francis and Rock, Paper, Scissors: Game Theory in Everyday Life by Len Fisher.
Epigenetics: How Environment Shapes Our Genes

Rock, Paper, Scissors : Game Theory in Everyday Life
These are both non-fiction books, so I won't exactly be focusing as much on plot and romance as much as organization and clarity.

A quick note on the subjects of these books:
-Epigenetics is, as the title claims, the study of how our genes interact with the environment around us. This new subfield of Genetics has been developing ever since we realized that our genetics expression can change without mutations. In my own words, an individual (such as you) can evolve based on the environment that you're put in. Not just on a psychological level, but your environment actually changes your genetics. My personal favorite experiment, not mentioned in the book, is on the inheritance of fear. Yes, if not all of the epigenetic markers are removed before fertilization, fear can be inherited. The book focuses more on epigenetic's "intended" natural function: gene regulation (ex. turning on certain hormones when you're exposed to long periods of stress, etc.). The mouse fear study I'm referring to can be found here
-Game Theory, a bit older than epigenetics but not too old, is the study of decision-making and forming strategies in everyday situations. For instance, the game of rock, paper, scissors; splitting up a birthday cake; or when playing chicken with your neighbor.

Of course, for more info on either of these topics, you can read the books.

Rock, Paper, Scissors
This book was very opinionated. There's nothing wrong with that intention; the author's whole stated purpose for studying game theory was to find ways to apply game theory to real-world social problems. So of course those would be mentioned in the book. But personally, I didn't agree with what little was said of those recommended strategies. Fisher briefly explains a skeleton of a plan for real-world applications, but what little there is either comes across as impractical or is inadequately explained. Otherwise, the book is well-organized, entertaining, and informative. Fisher does a great job of explaining the "seven deadly situations" and examples of their occurrences in every day life.

The awful thing, though, is that often the examples don't seem to line up with the described theories. It's perfectly understandable to compare the Cold War to a game of Chicken, or disappearing spoons in a workplace as the Tragedy of the Commons. But there are several other examples that become somewhat confusing as to their relation to the assigned Situation.

Non-fiction books are designed to either inform or persuade, and the author does not fully accomplish either of these. The persuasion is cut off by only giving vague ideas of real-life social cooperation solutions; it comes across as food for thought, just prompting the reader to think about the topic and its possibilities. But then the other option, informing, occasionally fails with the chosen examples. Yet I will say that these instances were rare, so it's fair to classify the book as a mostly successful informer.

The organization was a bit confusing before the author explicitly stated its organization a ways in. Maybe I just didn't read quickly enough.

Overall, I do recommend it as an informer. Game Theory, mostly as far as social decisions are concerned, is something that I know intuitively on a basic level. Many people probably do. But even so I still recommend the book for its mathematical/scientific perspective of looking at things.

Another reason I would recommend it: it somehow makes math sound fun!

Epigenetics
Now, at first I was angry with this book. I've been a huge fan of Epigenetics for a while, and I was really hoping for some juicy details on things like inheriting fear or changing eye-color. It did touch on the subject of epigenetic differences in identical twins, and it did touch on inherited stress/famine responses, but mostly the book talked about gene regulation and effects on early childhood. But once I accepted that this was vital information, I got more invested in the book.

And THEN I got to the chapters about color blindness and Mules/hinnes. WOW that stuff is fascinating! And, of course, the book does a wonderful job of explaining things. Some things seemed oversimplified to me (but that might be because I'm planning on majoring in biology), but oversimplified is better than under-simplified when it comes to non-fiction.

You want to know whether or not I recommend this book?

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Read it.

It's not nearly as witty or anecdotal as the Game Theory book, but the subject is so exciting! And I never once got angry at the book for a lack of explanation.

This review wasn't as organized as most of my reviews were, but that's probably because the books were non-fiction (I didn't group these together because they're similar, but because I was too lazy/busy to write the Epigenetics review before I'd already finished the Game Theory book). The review would be too long if I summarized and commented on every chapter, but with no plot there's not much else to comment on.

But I feel somewhat frustrated. These are both very interesting and important topics. While I wouldn't be offended if none of my followers read the fiction books I review, I would feel honestly offended if any of you, reading this, didn't try to look deeper into these topics.

On that note, I do have a question for you. If someone acts negatively towards you (bullying, shaming, insulting, ignoring, acting out, being passive aggressive, etc.), do you think it would change them more to punish them (not reward them) for behaving badly, or do you think they would change more if you redeemed them? Does it vary by situation? Would you be able to tell which method you should use?

Any questions, comments, or concerns are highly appreciated!

Gregor the Overlander Series by Suzanne Collins (2003)

Gregor the Overlander

Yes, it IS the same Suzanne Collins from the Hunger Games.
And yes, this is a kids' series. Published by Scholastic.

And there's nothing wrong with that. Yes, the entire time I was assessing how these kids' books had some pretty heavy themes and bunches of gore, and trying to relate that to the Hunger Games. I think I paid more attention to these books as YA/teen books then I did as a kids' series, and that's entirely my fault. It turns out that plenty of my friends read these books once upon a time, but I hadn't even noticed their existence until I saw someone with a copy of Curse of the Warmbloods.

Anyways, you're here to read a review! So I'll stop rambling about background info.

What I did not like about the books:
Until about halfway through the series, I was under the impression that this series had been a flop, and so Suzanne Collins drastically changed her style and genre to make the Hunger Games. But then I finally noticed all the lines about "New York Times Bestseller!" at the beginning of each book...But apart from having read the Hunger Games first, there were other reasons that I thought this series hadn't been a success. I thought of it as a Percy Jackson rip-off whenever it tried to be funny or ridiculous (for instance, whenever Boots needed a diaper change or Gregor's life was saved by a soda can). But there was less of that as the series went on.

I absolutely did not like the writing style (and no, I don't like the style in the Hunger Games, either). I felt constantly deprived of details, most of the Underland teens had the exact same personalities, and the peace vs. war theme seemed thrown in at the last moment and then hammered in mercilessly. Now, the war vs. peace theme got better as the series progressed. The rest was just as bad throughout. I'm willing to dismiss the lack of rich writing because the series is for a much younger audience. But that would contradict the ending of the series, when Gregor is left at a crossroads with no clear answers. All he's learned is to be disillusioned and to love thy neighbor. Sure, kids can't slog through words with five syllables, but they should already know not to kill people. By not having Gregor have any CLEAR and DEFINED hope at the end of the series, no one learns anything; either kids are too young to appreciate that there sometimes isn't a clear answer, or they're too young to think of a viable solution to the war vs. peace theme. Kids CAN be exposed to more adult, complex themes, but they still have to be walked through it. The book as it's left is simultaneously not thought provoking at all and too thought-provoking without providing answers, depending on how you view it. The message essentially is: the world sucks because of war, and we can only kind of hope that someday it won't be like that. That theme is not new. It might be new for kids to not have the moral spoon-fed to them at the end, but that doesn't necessarily mean that they'll stick with the question after the book is over, let alone find a meaningful answer to this problem. Even at that age, kids have already been overloaded with "war is bad" messages to the point where it doesn't mean anything; you can only make it mean something if you TURN IT INTO SOMETHING, which Collins does not.

On several smaller notes, I have other problems with the series. First of all: the romance. I know I hate saying this in my reviews, but THE ROMANCE IS BORING, CLICHE, AND PREDICTABLE. It just is. Gregor's chemistry for Luxa was added in during the third or fourth book, and it began with "a feeling he couldn't identify". Instantly, I know that there is no question about it; from that moment, I know there's a romance (after all, she's the only girl he hangs out with). But, of course, they can't be together because of their own social positions, yet still end up together in the do-or-die of a war. There's nothing new there. The romance isn't slowly evolved from any dynamic they've had since the beginning, or from some kindness that one hadn't seen in the other initially. Nope. It just kind of happens. You know, put two kids in a room together and they'll probably just pair up. To be fair, the romance DOES add to Gregor's personal development, which is more than I can say for most books/movies/shows/etc. The romance itself isn't that great, but Gregor's reaction to it is. The only problem is that Gregor was already developing because of his love for his family, not just for this Underlander girl. A bromance would have had the same effect.

Second of all: this book makes me feel old. Why? Well, my parents always gawked at my childhood books, with their 12 year-olds fighting demons, falling in love, and dying. It just wasn't realistic to them. Well, guess what I was thinking about 11-year-old Gregor? Yep. He's 11 or 12 the entire time, but here he is falling in love and training as a rager. The whole time. Harry Potter and Percy Jackson had the decency to let the character grow up. Here, the events take place over the course of a year! And the fact that I'm skeptical of that makes me feel incredibly old.

What I did like about the books.
Ripred. Every page that this rat occupies is my new favorite in the book. Normally I would say he's too overpowered, but Collins does a great job of fitting in a believable explanation. Heck, he even has a meaningful backstory, and one that doesn't affect him in a predictable way. He's great for comedy that doesn't rely on diapers, and he serves as the best role-model Gregor could possibly have.

Actual deaths. Just like the Hunger Games, there's quite a bit of gore. And realistic gore at that! I don't think this is really that bad for kids, especially since this is a book and not a movie, and there's an extreme lack of detail. In fact, at that age I would have learned a lot about wounds and battle techniques from this book.

The story does grow on you. One of the issues of having nondescript writing is that the characters don't really appeal to the audience much because they're not described much; you don't see their thoughts. It's just a mess. BUT by the fifth book, the characters have successfully become meaningful to me (well, not all. I still can't tell the difference between Howard and Mareth). I can't really explain this very well. I did feel like other parts of the story could have been better developed, but obviously the parts that Collins decided to focus on got through; by the fifth book I was honestly invested in the fate's of the worlds involved. I CARED. I almost wanted to scream when the book ended like that. Come to think of it, that's how many of my friends reacted to the ending of the Hunger Games, Mockingjay. They were outraged by all the deaths because they cared about the characters, especially Prim. I didn't, so I didn't mind. But here, I want to scream about the end because this book was SO close to teaching me something I could taste it!

The world. Now, it's been a while since a book like this has made me want to fantasize, but Collins managed it here. And, for me, that's a very important aspect. If you don't feel compelled to write fanfiction, then it's not worth your time. The feeling wasn't very intense with these books, most likely because not much of it was new to me, and there were very few happy moments. It was a darker series, and Gregor rarely enjoyed himself beneath New York City until the fourth book. But we still don't see much of it; we just hear about it. Yes, Regalia's got some cool pluming and bats, but that's about it. But if I had been younger and not used to the idea of riding bats or naturally running water, I would've eaten this stuff up. And I DID eat up that whole echolocation thing.

Overall?
I would recommend it. I think even teens my age would have something to gain from it, if you have the time. But if you are a super active reader and you're beyond middle-school or even elementary-school, I would avoid the books. I only decided to read them:

a) I saw the title Curse of the Warmbloods (**SPOILER** The curse is a plague that only affects mammals. That's all you need to know. The lizard on the cover is nothing special. Nothing to see here)
and b) The books mysteriously appeared on my Kindle.

So overall, if you don't agree with what I have to say and read a bunch, then I highly recommend it. But if you don't read much, it's not really worth your time. Go read something closer to your age group. Like, for instance, the Hunger Games.

What did you think of the new review format? Too wordy? Not enough sections? Just right?
Any of you guys read the Overlander series? What do you remember most about it?
Any questions, comments, or concerns are highly appreciated. Silence gains you nothing. Feel free to comment below, friends, newcomers, and strangers alike.

I Am Malala by Malala Yousafzai with Christina Lamb (2013)

I Am Malala: The Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban

For those of you who don't know, the "with Christina Lamb" means that Christina Lamb is Malala's ghost-writer.

I know it's difficult to have a review for a nonfiction book. But I'll do it, anyways.

Since I know that the majority of you probably clicked on this to gain a moderate knowledge of Malala herself, I'll briefly educate you here so that you can get on with your non-book-review-reading lives:
Malala Yousafzai is a Pakistani girl, currently about 17 or 18 years old, who grew up in a valley called Swat. After a tragic earthquake, the Taliban (a terror group that the US sponsored years ago to combat the Soviet Union when it invaded neighboring Afganistan) came to the valley to help with repairs. People welcomed them with open arms, and soon the Taliban were spewing out all kinds of propaganda. They are fundamentalist Muslims who cracked down on women's freedom, secularism, and what they saw as Western ways in the valley of Swat. Malala's father and his friend openly spoke out against the Taliban because they were trying to stop all Western-style education, such as chemistry or English, while he was a school owner and teacher. When the Taliban outlawed girls' education, Malala's father encouraged her to continue attending school. Soon some reporters asked the girls of her school to write anonymous journals about their illicit schooling, an offer that only Malala took. However, war broke out between the Taliban and the Pakistani army, and Malala's family was evacuated. When they returned, they were told the Taliban had been entirely removed from the valley. Since conditions were still bad and the valley was in an economic slump, Malala and her father now actively spoke out against the Taliban, who were still active in other regions. Malala was targeted by the Taliban for "spreading secularism" and shot coming home from school one day, along with two other girls. She was rushed off to Pakistan's finest hospital and briefly stabilized, but when her conditions worsened she had to be airlifted to the UK for better treatment. Her family has lived there ever since out of fear of extremists, but they long to one day return to Swat.

Now onto the review.

The odd thing about all biographies and most non-fiction books (that aren't textbooks) that I've read is that they seem unorganized. Granted, this is because these books are never organized in chronological order, nor are they organized according to different aspect of the story. This being said, the first few chapters of I Am Malala skip around between all of Pakistan's history, the valley's culture, Malala's family history, and Malala's early childhood. I found this confusing, especially when trying to keep all the outlandish Pakistani names straight. However, I Am Malala executes this better than most biographies I've read for a couple of reasons. First of all, this haphazard writing only lasts for the first part of the book. Second of all, the book does a good job of reviewing what it's already told us. If it mentioned Prime Minister Bhutto in a paragraph in chapter 2, it reminds you of who she is and why she's important the next time that she's mentioned. While Pakistan's history seemed muddled in the beginning, it kept my mind on track later with phrases like "since it was the Americans who empowered the Taliban in the first place", or "as the first Prime Minister after the 1947 partition". So while this lack of structure irked me in the beginning, I understand why it's necessary to not coral all these elements into separate chapters, and the book does a good job of it.
Again on the topic or organization, I hate it when books stuff all of their pictures onto a few pages right in the middle of the book, back to back. If someone is mentioned in Chapter 3, I don't really care about seeing his picture by the time I get to chapter 8. And in this book, there were pictures halfway through the book of events that hadn't yet been mentioned in print. Sigh. Spoilers.

The first few chapters describe the culture of Swat, the valley in which Malala was born and where she lived until recent years. I LOVE how the culture is described. This is one of the book's greatest strengths: it's clarity in all kinds of different aspects. It knows just how to describe culture in a folkloric way and then switch to personal narrative and then switch to an easily-understood history lesson all on the same page. So in addition to being informative, the book was MASTERFUL in its descriptions of Pashtun culture (Malala's family is part of the Pashto clan, an ethnic group that is spread across Afghanistan and Pakistan). I love their two-line poems, their legends, their important figures, their customs. I love it all. And I honestly wasn't expecting to learn about it in this book.

How about the peoples' stories? The book describes the life stories of several people, not just Malala. In fact, Malala's story isn't really described; it's shown throughout the book and not just told in one paragraph. A lot of the people in this book are really inspirational. I know I can't really praise the author on conceiving them, since this all really happened, but this is probably my favorite part about the book. Just knowing how these people went from poor to rich, rich to poor, cowardly to brave, living on a literal garbage heap to attending boarding school, turning from a religious extremist to a secular women's rights advocate (spoiler: Malala's father was once a religious extremist, but that was before terror bombings). Their changes in circumstance are really interesting.

I always thought it was incredible that a girl my age could be so brave. But in fact, Malala knew lots of girls who would have done the same as her, but whose parents wouldn't approve of it. And Malala's family was certain that it wasn't her that was in danger; they thought, if anything, her father would be targeted. But he was already speaking out. And Malala was originally anonymous! I'm not saying she's not brave. Not at all. But the book does a good job of reminding me that hard times bring out the brave side of people. It's her father's story of having a stutter and overcoming it that reminds me that some of the best orators were once shy with stage fright. It's Malala's story about stealing jewelry that reminds me that people make mistakes, but they can overcome them. Malala wasn't just born fighting for women's rights; Swat culture is a lot more lenient towards women than the Taliban were (and I mean A LOT). It was her father that always told her she had the right to an education. It was her father that treated her as an equal to her brothers from the minute she was born. The situations these people went through are incredible! And every word of it is true and believable.

After the point in time when the earthquake hit Swat, the book becomes more focused. It tends to dwell less on backstory or exposition and more on what's chronologically happening in the family's life. The events happen in order and follow a common theme (politics and family life, not culture or history), so it becomes a lot easier to follow.

There's not much else to say about the book. I love how honest Malala is, admitting mistakes and in some cases admitting behavior that not everyone would find that charming (for instance, occasionally teasing her brother in a book that millions of people are going to read). I suppose there's only one thing I want to say:

PAKISTAN HAD A FEMALE PRIME MINISTER BEFORE THE U.S. DID?!?!?
Pakistan? Pakistan!
Sometimes there are incongruities in life.
Or, sometimes, we let our prejudices get the better of us. I formally apologize to Pakistan for being so shocked at your progressive attitudes.

I ABSOLUTELY recommend reading this book. I'm adding it to my list of favorite books of all time. This book made me cry, one of two books to ever do that. I didn't cry during the 8th Harry Potter movie, so the idea that a book (which doesn't have sad music or gore in it) can make me cry is pretty darn impressive. Don't get the wrong idea; the book isn't sad. But it has powerful emotional moments. I never once disagreed with the tone that Malala took towards the events being described. Every moment of it was understandable, and you can really feel what's going on. That's more important than most would realize at first glance. I often have trouble comprehending that books like this actually happened. Here, I have no trouble whatsoever.

Also, donate to the Malala Fund. You can enter any amount you want. And trust me, a little bit of money can go a long way in these situations.

Anyone have an inspirational personal story to share? Interesting family history? Two line poems? Any questions, comments, or concerns are welcome and appreciated.

I am definitely using two-line poems in my books now. Much easier and more powerful than trying to write a sonnet.

The Color of Magic by Terry Pratchett (1983)

The Color of Magic
This is one of those books that's world famous, on all the best-seller lists, a must-read for all scifi/fantasy fans, yet somehow I don't like it.

For the uninitiated, Discworld is a scifi-fantasy series based in Discworld, a world that is flat like a disc and riding on the back of a turtle through space. The book has the fantasy elements of medieval England with dragons and wizards, but occasionally throws in some science-sounding words. The book is a parody of fantasy novels, known for its outrageous scientific interpretations of Discworld.

Now I almost feel guilty for writing this review because Mr. Pratchett died recently. So I feel it necessary to mention now that I don't think the book is bad, by any means. I think it's just not my style. In fact, I'm still not entirely sure what it is about the comedy itself that I didn't find appealing. I thought of several theories:

1-Perhaps the comedy is so famous that it has already been copied by countless people and so to me seems unoriginal
2-It's the comedy of a different time, specifically of the 80's and not the 21st century. I ran into this problem with Huckleberry Finn.
3-It's British.
4-It was incredibly funny for the time because not many books were meant to be funny. But now with books filled with comedy such as the Percy Jackson series, it seems relatively tame by comparison.

No matter what the reason, I didn't especially enjoy the comedy. It got a few laughs here and there, but overall that wasn't enough to carry the entire book.

So what would be enough to carry the whole book? Like I said, I overall would not read the book again. It did several elements well enough. No element in it is bad or annoying. But while some of it is moderately enjoyable, I didn't find much to be great.

Let's start with the characters. The book didn't focus very much on developing characters, but that's just a matter of style. The only character I thought was especially good was Death himself, which is why I'm giving Discoworld another chance by skipping ahead to "Mort", a story about someone being apprenticed to Death.
In this book Death. Is. Funny. Every scene that has him in it has something funny about it, whether it's Death complaining about how Rincewind "doesn't keep his appointments" or the cartoonish way that people realize they're going to die. He also gets some good lines, like taking away "1/9 of a cat's life".
I also enjoyed Twoflower from time to time. In the beginning, it was great to see a naive tourist visiting medieval England. But by the end of the novel he'd learned nothing and was getting a bit annoying.
The one well-described, original character was Hrun the Barbarian and his talking sword. They were the only characters that ever surprised me. However, they were in about 1/4 of the book, so it's not as if they could carry much of the story.

Now let's look at the writing. The writing style is 3rd person omniscient and is overall pretty casual. One thing you'll have to get used to is the constant changing of scene. The book is almost written like a TV episode, where you're constantly shifting from one situation to another. Each scene only lasts about a page. It doesn't have many complicated words and is easy to read. Pratchett even has a few really interesting lines, like how he describes a massive fire in the town of Ahnk-Morpork as "a mere comma in its long history, not the end". The writing itself has no problem. In fact, the occasional lovely insight (like the comma metaphor) adds onto his clarity. It's rare that you don't understand what he's saying, and honestly I think the sentences I didn't understand were the result of my lack of understanding for adult British phrases from the 80's, and not the sentences themselves. He sometimes uses clever, funny euphemisms which are always understandable. He doesn't describe many scenes in detail, but few people do. In fact, the writing is probably the funniest part of The Color of Magic; the situations aren't humorous, but the way he phrases peoples' thoughts and feelings is hilarious.

And now the plot. There was only one scene in the book where I was invested in the plot at all, and I've actually forgotten what scene that was (which is not a good thing). The plot honestly seems like a half-hearted way to get in a few cheap jokes and show everyone a little bit of Discworld. This is where things get confusing and annoying. He constantly skips around to irrelevant scenes that aren't funny or necessary. The villains aren't defeated in any clever way. In fact, half the time they're defeated just due to a plot device that was added in at the last moment (to be fair, the idea of Discworld is that nothing makes sense and so these plot devices are excusable. But that doesn't make them any more enjoyable.). There's one scene where the two main character apparently switch dimensions and get sucked into our world in an airplane. If the scene had been funny, I might have enjoyed it. Since the scenes don't last very long, I was only confused for about a page. But the scene had absolutely nothing to do with the plot or characters or even Discworld, considering they were on Earth at that point.

So let's finish on a positive note: the ideas. This is what makes me tempted to hear about the rest of Discworld (though I don't look forward to reading it). A lot of good books are unique ideas, but Pratchett's are all over the place. The world on a turtle and earth is flat thing isn't anything new, but I did like the way that he described this nonsensical world in scientific terms. I liked the gods playing a dice match with the characters' lives and how the camera actually had a tiny painting demon in it. I liked all those things. I wasn't particularly inspired by any, but the book was so full of them that I want to hear more. There were plenty of original ideas that I'm surprised haven't been used anywhere else in cultural references since then.

Overall, I think the reason I don't like this book is the lack of comedy. The experience is like watching a cartoon; there's not a lot of beautiful writing/animation, the characters don't get much focus, and the plot doesn't entirely make sense. If the book was funny, then I would have seen it as a cartoon and therefore loved it. But since that element was missing, I really didn't see much value in the other elements of the story.

As I said before, I'm giving Discworld a second chance. Who knows? Maybe I'll suddenly understand the humor. Maybe Pratchett will also have moved onto developing characters and plot by that time ("Mort" is not the second book in the series).

So have any of you read Discworld? What did you think of it? If you read it recently and remember it, what do you disagree/agree with me on? I'd love to respond to any questions, comments, or concerns, whether or not they're related to the book review.

Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe (1958)

Things Fall Apart
A short novel but definitely worth the read! The writing itself is short and simple but is chock full of folklore and metaphors. There isn't a single word I don't know, but I still enjoy the outlandish phrases that Achebe uses. The plot, or rather plots, is/are engaging. There is never a point where one of the stories feels drawn out. In the beginning, most of the stories revolve around anecdotes showing the tribal way of life; later, it shows how the tribes become slowly changed, and has stories that are relevant to the overall plot. You can't really tell from the blurb, but the basic idea, the reason that the title is "Things Fall Apart", is the end of the traditional tribal ways.

The characters themselves aren't fleshed out in a way that we would think of from modern books, where they speak in unique ways and have their own hopes and dreams and character quirks. But a few of the characters, like Enzima, are still interesting just because of the situations that they're put in, if not necessarily because of their personalities. Even before the tribal ways are upset by missionaries, the perils of everyday life and chance events still put some of them in jeopardy.

It's the kind of book that you would read if you ever enjoyed reading about myths (from any culture) or "primitive" societies. I especially liked how the missionaries' relationships to the tribes changed over time. It really showed how Christian influence began and slowly took over in a way that few history textbooks can show you. It gives specific events of when the two groups come into conflict and describes how the church slowly gained power over the natives. I've personally never read anything like it. It really shows you how the natives viewed their own gods and medicinal practices and how they viewed the missionaries' ways when they did finally arrive.

Another thing that was interesting, though not huge, was how the arrogant characters didn't upset me. Normally when a character is sexist or racist or just full of himself, I start to hate him. But in Things Fall Apart, there really aren't any good guys or bad guys; everyone is just a product of their station in life.

It's not one of my favorite books of all time, but it's certainly up there on the "flawless" list. I highly recommend it to those who like folktales, history, and/or philosophy.