What I Read -- The Nordic Theory of Everything

The most recent installment of my 2026 Reading Challenge was The Nordic Theory of Everything: In Search of a Better Life, by Anu Partanen.  

It was not exactly the book that I expected. Beginning with chapter 1, "The Nordic Theory of Love," it is more a book about government and social policy - especially policies designed to fund and subsidize individuals at various stages of life - than it is a book about individual psychology, which is what I expected. Specifically on the subject of families and children, the author argues that, since Nordic countries provide more robust support for parental leave, child care, and return-to-work policies for parents, parents - even single ones - are much more likely to be productive, working members of society.

In general, the concept is that if you have happy, healthy, well-supported, self-sufficient (albeit with government assistance) individuals, they will be able to form relationships on equal footing, with neither person in a position of subservience to the other. The knowledge that the other doesn't necessarily need them, but rather is choosing them, encourages spouses to behave better with each other.  As a consequence, the relationships they have will be stronger and better grounded.  

There is some sense to that, but I'm not sure I followed it all the way to the conclusion.

I listened to the audiobook version of this book.  It's read by Abby Craden, and the accents are horrendous.  It was pretty unenjoyable to listen to. 

What I Read -- The Gales of November

My latest "available now" audiobook selection was The Gales of November: The Untold Story of the Edmund Fitzgerald. It is, as it sounds, an investigation into the causes of the wreck of the famous ship on Lake Superior on November 10, 1975.

As with much of the start of the Challenger, my previous read, the early part of the book is dedicated to the personal stories of the people involved: the executives at the shipping companies, Master Captain Ernest McSorley, the 28 other men aboard the ship (and one who had a narrow miss), and their families.  As with Challenger, it probably could have used a bit of editing but I though it was better done in this book because the call-backs to this information were better tied in at the end. 

Also loaded up - which I loved - was a history of the shipping industry on the Great Lakes, including shipped materials (in the case of the Edmund Fitzgerald, it was taconite iron ore), ship construction, weather, and winds.

Much in the nature of The Perfect Storm (the story of the wreck of a fishing boat off the coast of Nova Scotia) and so many similar stories, it was a series of small decisions - probably none of which alone would have individually caused a catastrophe - that added up in ways that were impossible to predict, leading to tragic results. 

I wonder how much any of us would know about the wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald if not for the famous song written by Canadian singer-songwriter Gordon Lightfoot?  (Fun fact about the song: the released version was the first take.  Not the first take in the recording studio, but the first time the band had ever heard the full song all the way through, let alone joined in to play!) 

Lots of ships have gone down in the Great Lakes, many of whose names are nearly forgotten and whose stories are long-since lost, but we all remember the Edmund Fitzgerald.  A substantial portion near the end of the book and the epilogue are dedicated to the story of Lightfoot's song's writing and release, and the the ongoing annual reunions held by the family members and descendants of the men who died when she went down.  The story is kept alive by the younger generations; one of the granddaughters has a tattoo on her forearm of the last words ever dispatched over the ship's radio: "We are holding our own."

What I'm Reading Now -- Shark Heart

K's latest choice for our postal book club read is Shark Heart, by Emily Habeck.  

What I know so far is that Wren and Lewis are one year into their marriage when Lewis is diagnosed with a rare disorder which causes him to, gradually, turn into a great white shark. 

How do they cope with that?  The next 330 pages will reveal all! 

What I Read -- Challenger (and a bit about the Francis Scott Key Bridge)

When K and I were in the DC area recently, we popped into Wonderland Books in Bethesda on a rainy morning.  K, who is a teacher and so perhaps was not surprisingly plagued by the story of the Challenger explosion, which took the life of Christa McAuliffe, the first and only participant in the Teacher in Space Project, pointed out the book Challenger to me.

Not long after that, it came up as one of the available audio books in my library app, so I grabbed it and gave it a listen. 

The beginning of the book is a little slow.  We spend a lot of time meeting various administrators who were involved with the program at NASA, employees of the subcontractors, the astronauts, and their families.  Much of that comes back later, but it could have used a bit more editing. 

The rubber really meets the road in about the last quarter of the book.  The disaster has occurred, the investigation is underway.  And man, are the results of it horrifying.  I'll avoid providing too much detail, but the combination of learning about what the astronauts likely went through and learning that the cause of the disaster was known and ignored is simply appalling.

It's also a good reminder that the small things can sometimes have a huge impact.  Remember a couple years back when that cargo ship crashed into the Francis Scott Key bridge in Baltimore?  Well, the NTSB has now issued the findings from their investigation.  The long and short of what they determined is that the ship lost power because a wire came loose in one of the many circuit breaker boxes.  The break in that circuit caused the system to believe that the engine cooling water level was low.  With that particular engine, the low cooling water warning causes the engine to shut down, which is why the ship lost propulsion and steering, and why it subsequently crashed into the bridge.  But what is the reason that the wire came loose?  Because the label that was affixed to it at the breaker box was affixed in the wrong place along the wire, which meant that it didn't quite seat properly, which allowed it to shake loose with all the engine vibration.  There is a great video animation of what went wrong here. 

Wild, right?  

Six people died, the ship and its cargo were damaged or lost, economic losses due to limited access to the Port of Baltimore for the 11 weeks following the crash are estimated at $1.2 billion, and bridge replacement costs are estimated to be $5 billion.  All because one label was glued to one wire in the wrong place. 

What I'm Reading Now -- A Guide to the Good Life

After some semi-existential frustrations in the last couple of years (mostly career-related), I've begun reading a bit about Stoic philosophy.  My current investigation is via A Guide to the Good Life: The Ancient Art of Stoic Joy, by William B. Irvine.

I actually started out looking for a different book on Stoicism, but this one was available at my library, so I decided to grab it instead.  I'm about 40 pages in as I write this, and so far I like the concept: an investigation of Stoic principles together with their practical application to everyday life.

As I get a little farther along, I'll see if that concept holds up.  

What I'm Reading Now -- We Do the Damndest Things

As is tradition, I picked a book to read when we headed out west last month.  We were going to be in and out of Jackson, so I selected We Do the Damndest Things, by Gaspari "Gap" Pucci.  

Mr. Pucci, of Italian heritage (as you might have guessed), left behind his family in Pennsylvania to relocate to Wyoming after discovering the great wide open via Army postings during the Cold War. He fell in love with the area, and with his wife, Peggy, and they made their lives on a small ranch outside of Jackson.

The book is a miscellaneous collection of his memories and stories.  We're back from Jackson now and I haven't finished it yet, but I hope to keep plugging away at it in between my other reads. 

What I'm Reading Now -- Paris in the Present Tense

I picked up Paris in the Present Tense in the audio book section of the library one day while I was browsing.  There are a lot of Mark Helprin fans in my family, and I've read a couple of his tomes and short stories myself.  He has a really nice way of capturing the feeling of a place, even though most of what I've read of his is much more about people than places.

I don't know anything about what the story is in this one, but I bet I'm going to get a great sense of Paris! 

Some Things We've Done - 2025 Edition

Our around-town activities in 2025 were substantially curtailed by the fact that we were only "around town" for 7 months of 2025!  In early August, we headed off for our sailing semi-circumnavigation, the planning for which began several months earlier and took up loads of our time.  We did still manage a few things, but far less than usual.

2025

SLSO - the 2024-2025 season wrapped up in the spring, and had featured Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 and Violin Concerto in D Major, Prokofiev's Suite No. 2 from Romeo and Juliet, Mahler's Symphony No. 1, and Mozart's Requiem Mass in D Minor. 

Chicago - S and I took a quick weekend trip up to Chicago to do our Safety at Sea course at the Jackson Park Yacht Club.  I really like Chicago.  I frequently forget that, but every time I go - for any reason - I am reminded what a fun city it is.

OTSL - the 2025 season's shows were Die Fledermaus, This House, A Midsummer Night's Dream, and Don Pasquale.  Because of the timing of the shows (K and E visited on different weekends), we were able to have a meal inspired by each show!  Some of the deliciousness included: 

Die Fledermaus: kasespaetzle, goulash, and sachertorte, with weisbier to drink 
This House: chicken and waffles, pizza, and New York cheesecake, with Manhattans to drink
A Midsummer Night's Dream: a charcuterie board and pastitsio, with wine to drink
Don Pasquale: Margherita pizza, cacio e pepe, and tiramisu, with Roman punch to drink

A year on, the show that is sticking with me is This House.  If you get a chance to see it, I would recommend jumping at it.  

Montana - our Christmas in July trip was to a ranch in Montana.  Though they nominally had other available activities, horseback riding was their big thing - but they were great at it!  The horses were well trained and clearly well looked after.  This ranch stuck to more of a schedule than some of the others that we had been to, but it was a family-run place with a relatively small staff, so that made some sense.  

K, J, S, and me had our usual pre-holiday holiday, which took us up to Calgary to see the Calgary Stampede!  It was an eating, drinking, rodeo adventure if ever there was one!

Sailing - in early August, we left St. Louis to start our sailing trip.  There's a whole separate blog about that, and all the crazy stuff we saw and did.  

And that brings us to the end of 2025. 

What I Read -- In The Woods

I got on a kick of mysteries several years ago now - which has waxed and waned over time - but Tana French's In The Woods has always been on the list.  I finally got to it as an audio book, now that I'm back to having a regular commute.  It really does make the drive so much more enjoyable! 

I wasn't actually super taken in by the mystery of this one, but I very much enjoyed the main character, Adam Ryan.  He's a detective on the Dublin murder squad, and gets tasked with investigating the murder of a pre-teen girl in the same woods where two of his friends disappeared when they were twelve.  The two incidents are, not surprisingly, tied together.  Investigating the murder dredges up all sorts of things that Ryan would have otherwise left buried forever.

The story was good enough, but it was really Ryan himself who engaged me.  I'm not even quite sure why.  He was reasonably believable - a bit of a worn-out policeman who has a good partner but drinks too much - but not astonishingly so. I just liked the character.  Which may actually mean that I liked the audio book narrator.  Something to interrogate if I listen to more of the series.... 

Cutting For Stone -- Take 2

I can see why Cutting For Stone was so wildly popular upon its release.  What's not to like?  It's easy to read (or in my case, listen to), it educates on medicine while simultaneously entertaining with language, there's a mystery, there's a frustrated love interest, and on top of it all, it's just a good yarn.

I wondered, after I finished this, if Abraham Verghese had written anything since then.  I've gotten out of the professional book business, so I don't see the new releases the way I used to.  Then, just a couple of weeks after I finished this, I stopped in at The Book House and happened to turn around only to find The Covenant of Water looking right at me!  I haven't bought it yet, but it's now on my list.

But, as far as Cutting for Stone goes, it's the story of twin brothers abandoned as infants by their father, who fled when their mother died in childbirth.  They were raised in a rural hospital in Ethiopia by some of the other medical staff their, and made a good life for themselves through their teenage years. Things go sideways between the brothers for reasons I will not spoil, and, though they part ways, it is not the end.  As time passes and they each continue making their way in the world, the secrets of their past, and the secrets of their parents, come to light.