Call of the wild.

I have decided to read call of the wild and maybe white fang if I have the time because they are both readily available (sitting on my desk) and I feel like reading a winterish book. Since it is -18 out right now, then I will read the fountainhead by Ayn Rand once my friend finishes reading it I will borrow it.

So I am still reading world war z and it is getting exciting. The stories as I have already said are alot more than testosterone soaked (as much as a book can be) adventures they realistically show how the world might react to a zombie Apocalypse. I just read about a big battle that the military chose for the press to see and give the American public some hope. This story was told by a veteran who attested to the mass stupidity about the battle, it was meant to be a easy staged battle with a couple infected showcasing the newest technology unfortunately the newest technology is useless against a zombie horde. The landwarrior fighting system is useless and bulky against a mind less swarm (the landwarrior fighting system is a real system developed by the military that links all soldiers to a network through a heads up display). In this battle the military had not prepared enough supplies to actually fight off the horde and all the fancy technology was useless because it couldn't consistently destroy the head (which is how you kill a zombie of course). Also they had prepared like they were fighting people with guns not an undead swarm by placing sandbags and other useless bits of cover instead of garrisoning atop rooftops where the zombies couldn't get them. The battle goes terribly and at the end the veteran is saved by some 'super' weapon that anihinalated the zombie horde. It is not explained YET what that weapon exactley does (something about heat and pressure).

Already ready for a new book

So I actually really like World War Z almost to a point I am ashamed of but I also want to read a more academic intellectual and challenging work. I am considering reading The Fountainhead or Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. I really want to read Atlas Shrugged because it is her magnum opus but it is also very long and if it isn't amazing I will most likely lose interest. I am just getting sick of reading books with no overarching idea or point to them, the last book I read that had a point was actually The Power of One which I have read before and I lost interest to a more exciting book about half way through. I also might read Call of the WIld or White Fang since I am a big fan of both books and Jack London as a author.
So in World War Z the infection actually began and I found the first story to begin the war was very cool and a little funny. The person telling the story sounded way too much like Sarah Palin for it to be a coincidence. She is the mayor of a new development that was made to be resistant against future zombie attacks. So she talks about her family and sounds like a typical house wife describing her 'perfect' suburban family. Then she goes on to describe how they prepared for the infection. She describes how they really didn't think that anything would happen but their kids were worried. Then there was an attack and they had bought a gun for protection but couldn't get to it before her husband had been bitten and was being infected. Her and her kids escaped and survived the apocalypse and then went back to living a 'perfect' suburban life.

World War Z (post 2)

As I read farther into this book I appreciate how much time the author spent coming up with the ideas for the book. In the most recent passage I've read the narrator or the "author" is interviewing a fear monger who created a rabies vaccination that they 'thought' would work. Obviously it didn't because the infection wasn't rabies and this person being interviewed is doing everything he can to deny blame. He blames the person for coining the term African Rabies when the first outbreaks happened. Also he said that he never believed that the infection would spread to America, and that he was no worse than the people making money off of the avian flu because none of their magic cures would have worked, but the disease died before it could do any harm. I think that this is a very interesting subject and unexpected since most books written about a zombie apocalypse or a similar subject are just gory poorly written and uninspired books. Instead of the typical story of finding a zombie in your closet or being attacked by hoards of zombies and having a gory exciting climax that ends with one of the characters inevitably being turned into a zombie and just being a cliche fest. This book is actually well thought out and addresses how things such as the economy would react to this apocalypse. What I think is strange is that this book references the current economic crisis before anybody knew we were going to have one. I think that this is because the author was just vague enough about the state of the world at the time of the infection that the reader can fill in the blanks. Examples of this are the conflict and mutual distrust between Israel and Palestine that will not go away any time soon.

World War Z

Over break I received the book World War Z as a gift. I had heard amazing things about the book from critics as well as some of my friends but I was still skeptical of the book despite it being a critically acclaimed best seller. I was worried that it would be a very bad book because of it's subject matter. The book is about a theoretical zombie apocalypse. It is written after the hypothetical zombie war, and humanity barely survived. The book is a collection of interviews and stories from people who witnessed the zombie war. The book goes in chronological order from the beginning to the end of the zombie war. I've read the beginning and it portrayed a very realistic near future world view. America and China were at each other's throats, at the same time the first outbreaks begun in China and the Chinese government was trying to cover up the initial outbreaks. Later on as the outbreaks became more prominent and larger the Chinese government went public and told the world that they had an epidemic of "super rabies" but the entire world believed that it was just propaganda. Another story that I found interesting dealt with Palestine and Israel. Told by a 17 year old who "though he had all he answers". The interview reveals that Israel was having a "voluntary quarantine" and that anybody from Palestine was allowed to go to Israel and live in safe camps. The boy believed that it was all a lie and the Israelis were going to kill or imprison them, so he attempted to join a organization of suicide bombers against Israel before his father forced him to go to the voluntary quarantine. When they reached the border they found a large electric fence as far as the eye could see and one entrance guarded by a group of dogs and soldiers. The soldiers quickly admitted the boy and his family and they walked in between a pack of dogs. They saw some injured people walk through the group of dogs but the dogs snarled at them, and the people were forced into a black van. The boy found it strange that some injured people walked through the pack of dogs and the dogs remained docile but when others went though they snarled and the people were forced into the vans. Later on the boy realizes that the dogs could tell if someone had been infected and hadn't been "turned" yet. Overall I find World War Z to be a surprisingly good book.

The Power of One

Peekay the main character of The Power of One has gotton of the train and he moves in with his grandfather and his mother who is no longer having her mental breakdown/being in an internment camp (it isn't entirely clear if she was both in an internment camp and having a mental breakdown or some variation of that.) He meets new characters in the town such as Doc a german piano teacher who is also a biologist, and he pursues his new dream of becoming the welterweight champion of South Africa but he is taught boxing by a guard at the local prison and he is by far the smallest kid there. He constantly quotes Hoppie saying "first with the head then with the heart" which I believe is a concept I haven't explained. Overall the quote means that you must come up with a plan in your head then go through with that plan with you heart. I haven't gotton to any major conflicts yet but he is taking piano lessons from Doc who is a German man and the nation of South Africa is officially at war with Germany at the time so I predict that his nationality will create problems for him and Peekay later on in the novel.

Big Hettie

Big Hettie is a very perplexing character in The Power of One. First of she is a morbidly obese drunk Irish woman, she carries around a big bag of food and obviously suffers from a crippling eating disorder. She was married to a flyweight boxer who was the only flyweight in South Africa at the time so he was always forced to fight larger men who knock him out every match. Unfortunately he suffered a hemorrhage during one of his fights and died. She grieves for his loss and seems to carry on her life with him through the boxer Hoppie who I referenced in my last post. Also the character Big Hettie seems a little unbalanced she is both a tragic character because of her husbands death, her eating disorder, and her death. But she is also a funny idea she is just so tragic but everything she does is instantly a joke like when she gets drunk in the compartment with the main character and when he awakes he thinks that he is dead because of the stench. She is also very random in a way because she doesn't seem like a very important character who delivers only one lasting line and idea that Hoppie could easily have delivered. She seems like one of the random people you meet and they are just so odd that they must be mentioned or maybe the author has some connection to a person of this type and decided to put their story in the novel (since the book is semi-autobiographical). The important phrase she says is "courage is what make you life your head up, pride is what makes you do it." Eventually her morbid obesity catches up with her when she dies while stuck in between two bunks on a train and is rendered immovable.

Research Paper

Should the United States invade Sudan to stop the Genocide in Darfur?

Straus, Scott. "Darfur and the Genocide Debate." SIRS. Feb. 2005. 7 Dec. 2008 .

Scott Straus writes about the debate over if the conflict in Darfur is even a Genocide he tells of the cause of the conflict between the Arab people in Darfur and the Black Africans who also occupy the region. The Sudanese government armed the Arab nomadic groups who began raiding cities and killing many blacks. The Arabs were armed to stop the black rebels and these groups of armed Arabs became known as the janjaweed which can be translated to "evil men on horseback". Much of this conflicts fault rests in the extreme draught in the country. Strangely enough much of the attention paid to the conflicts in Darfur are over the debate on whether or not it should be called a genocide or not, not how to stop this "genocide".


Farley, Maggy, and Edmund Sanders. "Push For Sudan Warrant Gets A Mixed Response." SIRS. 15 July 2008. 7 Dec. 2008 .

Farley and Sanders discuss the condemnation of the Sudanese president as a criminal. They discuss the ramifications of this act they say that if he is declared a criminal there will be more effort from many nations to stop his genocide but it could also strengthen the resolve of his followers. Also if the president is declared a criminal that would close off any possibilities to negotiate with him, the Sudanese people will also see him as a vulnerable figure if he is officially declared a criminal by more powerful foreign leaders. It is not clear if declaring the Sudanese president a criminal will benefit the efforts to stop the genocide and bring peace or if it will hinder them.


Hunter-Gault, Charlayne. "A crisis up close: the sole reporter on a historic trip to Darfur with world peacekeepers, Africa Bureau Chief Charlayne Hunter-Gault updates us on the worsening conflict.(africa dispatch)." Essence 38.11 (March 2008): 156(4). Student Resource Center - Gold. Gale. Edina Public Schools. 8 Dec. 2008

Hunter writes that the USA has provided sanctions against many companies that the but the Darfurian people are afraid that if there is foreign intervention in their conflict they will only suffer more. She says an African proverb that states "When elephants fight, it is the grass that suffers. Innocent Darfuri men, women and children continue to be trampled." This shows that the Sudanese people are worried that UN or US intervention will cause the janjaweed to become more violent and that the US will make the same mistakes they did in Iraq and the people of Darfur will suffer.


Berger, Rose Marie. "A responsibility to protect: is military intervention the only way?(DARFUR)." Sojourners Magazine 35.11 (Dec 2006): 8(2). Expanded Academic ASAP. Gale. Edina Public Schools. 8 Dec. 2008
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Berger writes that a humanitarian war in Darfur could result in the the killings of more civilians. She cites the massive casualties of civilians in the Iraq war which also has it's roots in a humanitarian cause against a malevolant dictator who was also believed to have WMDs. She says that humanitarian wars rarely yeild humanitarian results. Berger claims that financially attacking some Sudanese officials will hinder their genocide. Also controling the media to point a spotlight onto the problems in Darfur could help provent the killings.