Igor Tikhonov Tikhonov itibaren Kozów, Pologne
I'm reading this slowly as it is very sad. What has surprised me the most is the reaction of the world to the Amish forgiveness. It's a normal Christian response (one would think) yet most people seem stunned by it. Some are even skeptical to the point of thinking that the Amish are doing this only for the media. Yet the Amish shun the media. I find myself wishing I had the type of community life that the Amish do.
** spoiler alert ** The first half of this book is the reason people who say you can get just as much out if the series by using some of the reading order guides as you can by reading in published order. This book is often placed as a stand alone novel or as part of the Ankh Morpork series. Which I believe is a huge mistake. The wizards feature heavily in this book which features the first appearances of Ridcully and Ponder Stibbons, The Librarian is a particularly important player. This is Gaspode's first appearance as well as the book where Detritus & Ruby meet so it links to the Guards series. You also get a lot of insight into CMOT Dibbler as a person & I feel that if you read out of order his appearances in the other books won't mean as much to you. If you read in published order you will see that around this point the world starts to take shape into something familiar. That said the second half of this one isn't very good in my opinion I find the movie references a bit forced and I don't really care about the two main characters. Unlike pyramids it doesn't bother me that we never find out what happened to them.
Chris Hedges was a war correspondent in some of the ugliest wars of the twentieth century, and this book is the product of his observations and research. He is fascinated by what makes us people who go to war, who do this awful thing, and who keep doing it. I read this years ago, but I think I may re-read it soon, because I recall his insight being absolutely fascinating.