WWW. WEDNESDAY asks three questions to prompt you to speak bookishly. To participate, and to see how other book lovers responded, click here.
PS I no longer participate in WWW.WEDNESDAY via that link because her blog won't accept Blogger comments. I mention this only to save you the frustration I experienced trying to link up.
1. What are you currently reading? A Murder in Hollywood: The Untold Story of Tinseltown's Most Shocking Crime by Casey Sherman. A glamorous actress – a household name – is involved with the murder of a mobster. In her bedroom. By her teenage daughter. It's impossible to overestimate what a big news story this was in 1958.
The Lana Turner scandal gets an in depth treatment here. Casey Sherman works hard to put the sordid incident in context. He not only tells us Lana's story, but also that of Mickey Cohen, the mob kingpin who employed the thug on the bedroom rug. So far, the writing is really clunky, though.
PS Lana Turner starred in the movie version of Peyton Place, the book Cher is reading in the tub.
2. What did you recently finish reading? PT-109: An American Epic of War, Survival and the Destiny of John F. Kennedy by William Doyle. A Japanese destroyer collided with a PT boat in August 1943. The US Navy made no attempt at rescue, assuming that all 13 men aboard were lost. The US Navy was wrong, and in 18 years, one of those 13 would be the Commander in Chief. On the face of it, that's a great wartime saga. The reality doesn't disappoint.
Doyle takes us through Kennedy's naval career and then into politics. But he always frames JFK's life through a PT-109 lens, and it's effective. The context taught me a lot about post war Japan-US relations, and how meaningful it was to the Japanese that the President was in cordial contact with the commander of the Amagiri, the man who nearly missed killing him during wartime.*
I admit I am not that interested in battles on air, sea or land, so the passages about what went on aboard PT-109 that fateful night didn't really mean that much to me. What about the radio? What about the radar? Don't care. What I did find gripping – and, frankly, left me in awe – was Kennedy's 8-day battle to keep his men alive and get them to safety after they washed up on a small island. No fresh water. No food. Since many of the men had removed their pants and lost their shoes as they swam miles from their wreckage to shore, the sharp coral and hot sand were perilous. Two of the men sustained bad burns, so infection was another enemy. Oh yeah, and there was the tropical bugs and unrelenting sun. Morale could have sunk like their ship. After all, it didn't take the men long to realize the Navy was not looking for them. I might have given up. OK, I'm sure I would have given up. But JFK would not let them give up.
I don't have to tell you that Kennedy survived the ordeal and became a decorated war hero. What I didn't know before this book was that in November, Kennedy took command of a second PT boat, and then rescued more than 30 marines whose ship had been damaged and was sinking.
August to November: That's a shit-ton of heroism in barely 90 days.
I know our current President would be dismissive. To paraphrase what he said on camera about John McCain, Donald Trumps likes sailors whose ships aren't destroyed. I disagree.
*A Japanese sailor who had been aboard the Amagiri that night made a comment that stayed with me: "He avoided death in war but was murdered in a parade." That's as profound a reflection on the vagaries of life as I've ever heard.
3. What will you read next? I don't know.
