Mark Fackler

Great potential, but story was distracted

Revisado: 02-10-24

I really enjoyed the this story and the author"s narrative about the disaster. Where she lost me is that like many writers these days, they seem to insert gratuitous political narrative and climate change preaching to the point of being distracting. When discussing regulatory factors that may have allowed the shipping companies to cut corners and avoid responsibility, she name-drops only Republican politicians when obviously these factors are not exclusive only to Republicans. Finally at the end of the book in the epilogue, she goes into a preachy narrative about how climate change was the cause of the disaster and shaming "climate deniers" after spending the previous chapters attributing the fault to horrible decisions by the Captain, neglect of the parent shipping company and the flaws of the weather tracking model being used by the Captain that day. She lost me on her soapbox after having me pulled in with her account of the disaster.

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Devolves into political advocacy

Revisado: 04-29-23

What started as a very interesting historical analysis of the impact of pathogens on global development devolved into a social justice sermon. The author seemed to focus on American slavery over the far more extensive colonial slavery of the Caribbean and South America. I enjoyed many of his points, but felt there was an effort to push the author"s progressive ideology.

The final chapters of the book is where I think Kennedy fails. His seeming desire to place China on a pedestal as the model of dealing with disease and responding to the COVID pandemic appears myopic in its acceptance of official Chinese death numbers as fact. He uses the figure of 15K dead to chastise the US and the UK in their approach with the caveat that it may have resulted in oppressive social ramifications. The 15K death figure and the zero death pushed by the Chinese is impossible and propaganda. To use that false figure to call for more oppressive governmental control of health policy shows the author"s political bias.

I don"t mean to bash the book as I think it had many good points, but the author"s political bias made it one that keeps me from highly recommending it others. I would recommend The Mosquito: A Human History of Our Deadliest Predator by Timothy C. Winegard if you want a more historical looks at the impact of pathogens spread by mosquitos.

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Much more about animals than gladiators

Revisado: 01-29-23

Informative and detailed, but not what I expected. I think the title is deceptive and that there was not a tremendous amount of discussion about gladiators, rather there was far more discussion of animal events, their procurement, and why they were more prevalent. The gladiators were basically a side note and I suspect the title was used to spur more interest.

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Disappointing ending and political pandering

Revisado: 12-16-22

I thought the approach and style of the book was quite novel, but the after a large build up, the ending seemed rushed. I couldn"t help to get the feel that the writer was trying to work in some anti-Trump and Patriot-type extremists to try and pander to Hollywood in the hope of getting the book optioned into a movie. It didn"t really serve any substance to the plot and just felt like it was inserted gratuitously. Not a bad read, but could have been better. The narration was excellent.

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Worth the listen for Perspective.

Revisado: 08-08-22

I was hoping to obtain a little more insight into the thoughts of Chinese in Wuhan when it came to the source of the virus. Fang Fang did a good job of that from the perspective of an academic elite that seemed to have a friend in every area of society. Since she was a successful writer, that should be expected. She seemed like a very caring and compassionate person, while maintaining a spunky independence. That said, she certainly took on personal risk calling local bureaucrats, but seemed to have little criticism for the national government. It was interesting to note the dichotomy of her criticism of local leaders, but the trust she had in the national government. Not sure if that was due to her cultural upbringing or her fear of speaking out against the national leadership and party.

What I do find particularly interesting is that in the 14 hrs of text, she never once mentions the Wuhan Institute of Virology. Since she was former academic, and by her own admission, came from a family of scientific academics, I find it very interesting that she discussed the Wuhan University and other academic circles in Wuhan, but never the Virology Institute and the research they were conducting there. She had to have known it was there in the city given her background and she never uttered the name once in all of her diary entries. This makes me even more convinced that it is the likely source of the initial outbreak. It is the 800lb gorilla standing in the room that she never mentioned when discussing the seafood market and the unknown source. Very interesting..... Definitely worth a listen fthough for the cultural insight and Ms Fang seems like wonderful person.

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Good story, but no Biden

Revisado: 10-03-21

I enjoyed the story. However, it is obvious that Chris Wallace did not want to burn any bridges with the incoming president and barely even mentioned his involvement or opposition to the raid. From that aspect you have to question what else was left out.

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Incredibly informative but a bit unbalanced

Revisado: 07-15-21

A must-read and definitely an eye-opener. However, almost no discussion of Democrats and their involvement and conflicts with China.

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A Bit Light on Content

Revisado: 05-06-21

Mr, Gladwell is his engaging self in the military snapshot of bomber strategy and its philosophical considerations. Obviously the format with audio clips is very different than other audio books and comes off as a podcast. At the end of the day, it seemed not much more than that if you are looking for something more robust and researched. Delivers the concepts he wanted to note to his audience, but not much more. Worth a listen and certainly a great little insight into the back and forth between precision and city bombing strategies, but I found myself looking for more meat on the literary bones.

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