Welcome to Edition 2 of Beach Bum Reading.
Finding Florida: The True History of the Sunshine State by T.D. Allman
This book first pulled me in because it looked like a nice, fat book (500 pages) of FL history. There is a lot of interesting information in the book for sure, but the author’s negativity is unrelenting and the book started to get very tiresome because it became clear that, for whatever reason, Allman hates Florida for reasons unknown. Everybody is racist. Everybody is bad. Florida sucks. The other issue I had with the book is that, in a book that claims to be a history that sets the record straight, there was a surprising lack of cited sources so I ended up doing a lot of fact checking myself and found many inaccuracies in the book (turns out I’m not the only one–The Tampa Bay Times compiled a short list). I also found that in situations where historical facts could not be 100% certain, but that there are 2 or 3 likely scenarios of what the likely truth is, Allman 100% of the time went with the most negative, villainous version available, presented it as fact, and did not let the reader know there are alternative theories to an event that are just as likely to be true. On page 394, I was also surprised to learn that sending a man to the moon failed “to fulfill any scientific purpose.” Goodness. This book could have been good. Despite it’s negativity I still got a lot out of the book.
Sick Puppy and Skink: No Surrender by Carl Hiaasen
Two hilarious Skink novels in the genre of Florida Weird. Sick Puppy deals with an eco-terrorist terrorizing a litterbug that just doesn’t get that he should change his litterbug ways. Skink makes a late appearance. No Surrender is a young adult novel featuring Skink, which was a good read and was presumably designed to introduce young readers to the Skink character and novels. I’ve always been aware of Skink, but haven’t read any of the books until now and I intend to polish all of them off. I’ve finished 2 out of 7 now.
Everglades: River of Grass by Marjory Stoneman Douglas
This is one of the Florida classics. I thought it was going to be a very environmentally focused book that contained long prose about the beauty of palmettos in the breeze, and there certainly is some of that. But I was pleasantly surprised to find that this is very much a good history of South Florida too–of its explorers, people, places and development. I learned you can’t have South Florida without the Everglades and that it is vital that Floridians continue to conserve and preserve the Everglades.
Son of Real Florida: Stories From My Life by Jeff Klinkenberg
Klinkenberg, long time FL newsman that has written many interesting articles about Old Florida, released this book which is a collection of some of his best Florida stories. This is part autobiography, part Florida culture and part Florida history. I really enjoyed the chapters on the Highwaymen and on Professor Gannon. Years ago I also read Klinkenberg’s Pilgrim in the Land of Alligators, which was good too.
The Iliad by Homer
I finally got around to reading The Iliad in my quest to read all the books that I want to read “someday.” This is the goriest book I have ever read. There are detailed passages about spears crashing through teeth and tongues being severed. I didn’t know what to expect. I remember studying the Iliad story in high school, I saw the movie Troy, and knew the basic plot. I was surprised to find that the famous Trojan Horse did not make an appearance and was surprised to find that Achilles was not invincible even though I’ve heard that about a hundred times prior to reading the book because there are indeed passages of him getting hurt other than on the so-called Achilles heel. Like the Bible, this should be required reading because so much of our current world comes from this book. This is one of those books that will help you gain some of that elusive virtue of wisdom.
Well, what a great, productive FL exploring month it has been! On top of all this reading, I also got one last trip to Adventure Island this summer and got to check one more state park off my list — Warner-Boyce Salt Springs State Park. Which was amazing, but the bugs were bad. I’m planning on going back during the winter to paddle one of their kayak trails.
To close Beach Bum Reading – Edition 2 I’d like to remind you that I wrote the definitive guide to Busch Gardens, available on Amazon, a guide that will teach you to navigate the park like a regular, and even if you are a regular, there are number of hidden nuggets in there that you probably didn’t know about the park. I’ve also written two children’s books available on Amazon as well — The Big Scary Bear and Starlet The Manatee. Check ’em out!
