Reviews and Comments

Allow me to introduce the genre of "Ambien lit." For as long as I can remember, I've been an avid reader. I've also been a chronic insomniac. Years ago, a doctor prescribed me Ambien and I took one before picking up my bedtime read. The following night I started reading and realized I couldn't remember a goddamn word I read the night before. So if you're taking a sleep aid, want something to read, and retaining any of it is not a concern, have I got the book for you. This memoir is not exactly uninteresting. In fact, Margaret Williamson had entree into a world not many foreigners had access to and some of the photos are simply incredible. On the other hand, this is exactly what you would expect from the wife of a colonizing political appointee that can only see her side as the good guys. That the book ends with a list of artifacts that now reside in the Cambridge museum brings this memoir to the perfectly tone-deaf conclusion. An adequate choice if you care to read but don't care about retaining any of it. Sweet dreams.

Nice strong start here that (perhaps unintendedly) confronts the most basic critique of phenomenology: How do we establish an objective science based on subjective experience? The entire 1st chapter is a beautiful example of inquiry into present-time awareness. A self-dialectic if you will. How does one separate the tools and techniques of examination from consciousness itself? By not setting up that opposition in the first place. As an author, Tim Parks has the luxury of weaving his life into his subject matter which offers the reader an example of how poetic and creative the inquiry into direct experience can be. What don't I like about this? Well, this guy probably reminds me too much of myself. Other than that, Parks seems wedded to the "spread mind theory" although I suspect he's not yet fully convinced, i.e., he hasn't integrated this abstract framework into his working experience. No need to have a horse in this race; the journey is the destination.