Jonathan H. Ward

The New Libertarianism: Anarcho-Capitalism by J. Michael Oliver My rating: 4 of 5 stars [Disclaimer: I am a friend of Mr. Oliver and his family. I am not normally predisposed to reading books on economics, politics, or objectivism—indeed, I have never read any of Ayn Rand's books, and I did not know what objectivism was until I read this book. I do not self-identify as a Libertarian. I read the book because I wanted to understand more about the underpinnings of Mr. Oliver's economic and political views than we have been able to discuss in our conversations during social gatherings. All this is to say that I do not feel as qualified to judge the merits or shortfalls of Mr. Oliver's arguments as would someone who is more knowledgeable in these subjects.] Oliver's book is divided into three broad sections, covering Objectivism, the State, and Capitalism/ Voluntarism. I'll start my discussion with the second section, which launches into the evils inflicted on mankind...

Voyage by Stephen Baxter My rating: 5 of 5 stars In contrast to my experience with Homer Hickam's "Back to the Moon," I quite enjoyed Stephen Baxter's "Voyage." As the subtitle mentions, this is a compelling alternate history of what might have been had a few key events gone differently. To sum up the main divergences in history without spoiling anything, John F. Kennedy survives the assassination attempt but is rendered an invalid, who publicly twists Richard Nixon's arm during the televised Apollo 11 moonwalk to redirect space exploration toward a manned landing on Mars. All moon landings after Apollo 14 (with the Apollo 15 crew and a rover!) are cancelled; the Saturn hardware repurposed to supporting a Mars initiative; and NASA never builds the Space Shuttle or the Viking Mars landers. We have then a plausible scenario for how NASA could have afforded a push toward a manned Mars landing in the mid-1980s without a massive funding increase. Baxter gets all the details...

Back to the Moon by Homer Hickam My rating: 2 of 5 stars I'm not much of a fiction reader, and this book unfortunately reinforced my tastes rather than making me eager to read more fiction. I have to imagine that Mr. Hickam, as a former NASA engineer, had his tongue very firmly planted in his cheek as he wrote the book. It's so full of incredulous events and technical impossibilities that if you were not aware of Mr. Hickam's background, you'd think it was written by someone who knew nothing about how spacecraft actually work and just set out to pen a thriller set aboard the space shuttle. I'll give him the benefit of the doubt and assume that he was doing this entirely for fun. Think Roger Moore in "Moonraker" in terms of level of accuracy. I felt guilty reading it, but I also had a hard time putting it down because I couldn't resist seeing what wildly improbable event was...