Book 2: A Canticle for Leibowitz

A Canticle for Leibowitz is a 1959 post-apocolyptic science fiction novel by Walter Miller.

This book is three short stories. The first, Fiat Homo, is set in the mid-26th century, 600 years after a nuclear holocaust nearly destroys mankind.  Science and technology were blamed for the war, and the society called itself "Simpletons" and persecuted anyone who deigned to learn or invent. Leibowitz, an engineer from the time before "the Flame Deluge", survived the blast along with his science and engineering texts and notes. He converted to catholicism and founded an order of monks to preserve these historical documents, called "the Memoribilia," of the 20th century humans. Fiat Homo tells the tale of the canonization of Leibowitz and gives a picture of a church that preserves civilization and the relics and history of mankind.

Fiat Lux, the second story, set 600 years after the first, tells of the beginning of secularization, the development of science, both by the church and by the secular cognoscenti, and the beginnings of the rift between the two. By the end, the church begins to grow weary of the technology and worries about the future.

Fiat Voluntas Tua, the third story, set 600 years after the second, tells a tale of a civilization that has developed spaceships, colonies on other planets, and has redeveloped nuclear weaponry. Society is engaged in a massive cold war, coming to the brink. As might be expected, the book culminates with mankind nearly wiping itself out again with a nuclear war. Panicked, the church sends a small colony to a neighboring planet, taking with it the sacred Memoribilia, to be preserved for future humans, presumably starting the cycle over again.

This book is often predictable, giving lessons of the cyclic (and destructive) nature of humanity, of the benefits and dangers of technology, and of the usefulness and obstructiveness of the church (these things, too, seem to be cyclic). The book is full of symbolism and serious themes -- there is a heated debate at the end of the story about euthanizing people with critical levels of radiation exposure, and here we see again the church trying to save humans (humanity) from themselves (itself), very literally -- but also has several humorous moments; for example, in Fiat Homo, when one of the monks is on a desert sojourn, he finds a fallout shelter, but he believes that a fallout is a desert monster and destroyer of humans.

I'm sure many research papers have been written on this book, and it's critically acclaimed. I had a hard time getting through Fiat Lux, but I'll chalk that up to being excessively tired throughout. I really enjoyed this book and highly recommend it.

By the way, if you decide to read this book and don't speak Latin, be warned: there are several Latin phrases and passages throughout. You can read the book while skipping them (I did), but Wikipedia has a page which probably would prove helpful. I wish I had found this before reading the book.

Book 1: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly

Ever wonder what the best night to order fish at a restaurant is? Or where the chefs at your favorite restaurant dine? Or whether the kitchen in your favorite Chinese restaurant is as clean as you'd like to it be? Anthony Bourdain, formerly the executive chef at Brasserie Les Halles in NYC and currently host of the Travel Channel's No Reservations, writes an autobiography/expose of the restaurant industry with Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly. In addition to tales of how he got his start -- from dropping out of Vassar to dishwashing in Provincetown to attending CIA and eventually cooking and/or cheffing at several major NYC restaurants -- Bourdain gives us an inside look at the dirty little secrets of the restaurant industry. We see who's sleeping with whom (hint: everyone, with everyone), why you shouldn't order fish on a Monday (it was delivered Thursday), and a quick way to gauge the cleanliness of a kitchen (see if the restroom is clean; it's WAY easier to keep clean than a kitchen).

Bourdain doesn't seem to pull any punches or sugar-coat anything along the way; he has a very what-you-see-is-what-you-get writing style, and the book reads as though he's sitting across from you, telling his tales over a cold one, or several.  He drops some helpful hints for the would-be chefs also: why you shouldn't quit your day job and go to culinary school, how to make your own dishes look as beautiful as some of the food you see in high-end restaurants (hint: small metal rings), and what tools are essential for your home kitchen (it's fewer than you might think). 

If you have strong objections to tales of sex in the storage closet or gratuitous heroin/cocaine use and the selling of your LPs on the streets of NYC to fund your next score, or if you don't want to hear that the bread on your table might have been on another table previously, this might not be the book for you. But I chuckled lots throughout, and I truly enjoyed this peek -- through Bourdain's eyes -- into the crazy world of the restaurant workers.