The Last Outlaws - Thom Hatch

For all that I do love (some) Westerns, I haven't read much about them. The reality is often not so gripping and neatly resolved as the fiction. But my dad included The Last Outlaws: The Lives and Legends of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid in the last batch of books, so it seemed like a good place to start, especially since I don't know a lot about either of them (that's a Western I've never gotten around to seeing).

So I didn't know that both of them were strongly opposed to shooting anyone, or to robbing average folk. Well, robbing them in terms of rifling through their pockets. If they had money in a bank or on a train, they were out of luck. I didn't realize the two of them had been operating independently for years before they teamed up, and that it was largely Sundance joining Butch's preexisting group. Frankly, Sundance wasn't terribly successful as a bandit operating on his own. He doesn't seem to have possessed the patience and foresight Cassidy did.  I didn't know that both men would leave banditry behind for periods of time, working at mines or ranches, usually with horses or mules. Sometimes they left because they got the itch to go, and sometimes they had to leave because the law came sniffing around.

Not that the law necessarily had much success catching them. Butch was the more gregarious of the two, well-liked most everywhere he went, but both of them had a knack for making friends anywhere they stayed for long. Probably because they were generous with time and money to their neighbors, and had generally courteous manners. Sundance was more likely to get heavily drunk, but neither was the type to get soused and start trouble, which is the sort of thing people come to appreciate. Which is how you get outlaws with plenty of people willing to shelter them, guide them, even speak to the governor about amnesty for past crimes on their behalf. Think of The Fugitive, and how none of Kimble's friends were interested in help the marshals.

One frustrating aspect is the gaps in the story. Records from the 19th century aren't as extensive as I might like, so there are significant stretches where Hatch has to guess at what they were up to, whether or not they could have been involved with a particular heist. Etta Place (Sundance's longtime lady love) is the source of a lot of that, since there's no record of who she was before joining the group, and there's no concrete evidence of what happened to her. She simply drops out of the story after a theft she may have taken part in Villa Mercedes (it's interesting that on the maps included at the beginning, that theft is listed as "alleged", rather than the Rio Gallegos bank robbery, which Hatch argues in the book has less evidence for being Butch and Sundance). I understand Hatch's need to try and fill in the blanks, but the suppositions do run a bit long. There's a stage at which all the guessing becomes pointless. There are also segments of the book where he begins describing other relevant people and their backstories, and it feels too much like a list. Hatch tries for natural transitions, using one person's history to lead to the next, but it doesn't always hold, and as thin as some of the details are, it might have been better to skip a few to maintain narrative momentum.

I wasn't terribly interested in the last two chapters, which deal with the possibility Butch and Sundance lived longer than is suspected, and with their longevity in the public mind. I know both of those go to the "legends" aspect touted in the title, but it's not something I'm concerned with, as I barely knew the "lives" part prior to this. The Last Outlaws is a good starting point if you're as familiar with Butch and Sundance, their lives, and their cohorts, as I was. It should be easy to follow and not a difficult read, and you can peruse the bibliography to see if there are other sources to track down for a more scholarly approach.

What I Bought 5/27/2013 - Part 8

I feel like I should say something about Man of Steel, but I haven't seen it, and I'm not planning to. Dangers of the Internet. I'm not a big fan of Superman to start with, and very little of what I've seen and read about it makes me think I'd much enjoy it. I'd like them to downplay Jor-El more. He got Clark off Krypton and that's great, his jobs over. None of this "Holographic Space Dad hands out edicts" crap, Clark is Superman (as opposed to just another super-powered being) because of how the Kents raised him, full stop.

Katana #3 & 4, by Ann Nocenti (writer), Cliff Richards (penciler #3), Alex Sanchez (penciler #4), Rebecca Buchman, Juan Castro, Le Beau Underwood, Phyllis Novin (inkers, #3), Art Thibert (inker #4), Pete Pantazis (colorist, #3 & 4), Matt Yackey, Gary Major (colorists, #4), Taylor Esposito (letterer, #3 & 4) - Because nothing says a consistent vision for a title like two pencilers, 5 inkers, and 3 colorists in the span of two issues! Cripes. There have got to be more artists who can stick to a monthly schedule and produce quality work out there somewhere. But why would they want to work in comics?

Katana gets wind of some big deal involving the Dagger Clan down at the boat graveyard. Which just so happens to be where Killer Croc had a taxi drop him off earlier that day. Yeah, it's a trap, and Tatsu suspects as much, but she lets her confidence and obsession get the best of her. Which is how she ends up in a fight with Croc, and he ends up breaking her sword, releasing all the souls within, including the Creeper, and her husband. The spirits scatter. Croc follows the dragon he was after, the Creeper dashes off to find a body to ride, a young girl of the Dagger Clan visits Shun, the girl with the tattoos, and removes her foot. She couldn't have simply taken a picture? And Maseo wonders what the hell is up with his wife, that she sleeps with her sword.

That particular conversation seems to break Katana for a bit. She sleeps a lot, brushes off Junko's advice to find someone to reforge her sword, quits her job as a waitress. I'm not sure if it's the thought that anyone she's killed is condemned to a Purgatory within the sword, or if it's what Maseo said about her. Either way, the Creeper showed up for a rematch, which may have lit the spark in her again. Frankly, if he's so worried about being trapped once she reforges the sword, just point out it would draw Maseo back in as well. I have to think that would stop her in her tracks.

That fight at the end of issue 4 ended abruptly. The Creeper lunged at her, she sidestepped, he went over the roof, she remarked it's not going to be easy killing her. But there's no sign of him. Is he unconscious, landing safely and getting ready to strike back? Did he just leave because he lost the element of surprise? There's a sound effect as he goes off the roof, "KRAK" which makes no sense at all. It doesn't look like Tatsu hit him, he didn't hit her or anything else, it doesn't represent thunder, I don't know what it's about.

This is one of my issues with Sanchez. For a book that is presumably going to feature a lot of martial arts style fighting, he's not real good at fight scenes. The posing looks awkward, and it's not always evident how a character got from one position to another. I'm not sure about how things are emphasized, either. Most of page 6 is devoted to the Creeper releasing sickles and chains from his cloak, but I feel like the beginning of Tatsu's conversation with Maseo probably should have gotten more attention. But it's wedged in at the bottom fifth of the page.

I preferred Richards' artwork on issue 3, at least the first three quarters of it. Whoever took over inking on the last 5 pages used too heavy of a line. It weighed things down, and  cost the art some of it's fluid nature. A lot of the sense of movement was lost, and the faces didn't look as strong, either. Prior to that, though, it was looking pretty good. The exchange between Junko and Tatsu, I like how even when she's standing on the roof above him, seemingly in the position of authority, the focus is on him and his relaxed smile. She stole his jug of wine, but he still has her hat, and she hasn't really gotten anything from him. The fight with the Daggers a few pages later has a nice shot where she swings low, cutting people at the shins, and the next panel is angled so it follows along the underside of the swing. The fighters changing up in response to what just happened.

I'm surprised Junko is pushing Tatsu to go to Japan. She just got here, we've just started to get to know this supporting cast, and she might leave? But it could be she's not going to do it. She'll keep trucking on with her other weapons, and the foreseeable future will be her trying to track down these other spirits and decide whether to try and imprison them again. Or she could help them settle their business and move on. We'll see.

Burn Notice 5.10 - Army of One

Plot: Picking up where the last episode left of, Mike and Sam rush to the warehouse Lucien told them about. They make it past the first round of alarms, but sadly not the second, and the killer escapes after torching most of his stuff. At least we get to see his face. And at least Mike got a partially burned up computer. But with Pearce insisting Michael give her his files, he needs to get something off the computer fast. Sam knows a guy, but they aren't buddies. Tasing was involved, and with Fiona along, tasing is involved again. Also ankle bracelets, because Dixon's under house arrest.

As for Michael, he and Madeline have been roped into helping Jesse with a security gig. Michael is supposed to be a tech guy helping Holcomb perform some corporate espionage on a billionaire. Turns out his idea of espionage involves taking hostages and demanding bank codes at gunpoint. Michael needs their eyes off him so he can dismantle their group, and to that end, concocts a maintenance guy named James Marsden. Who just so happens to be an ex-Army Ranger. Fiona must have convinced Mike to watch Under Siege recently. With a lot of help from Maddy (and a little help from Jesse), Mike pulls it off, and gets his files to Pearce by her deadline. And as a bonus for that, he learns she has a name to place with the face we saw, Tavian Korzha.

The Players: Lucien (The Lead to Max' Killer), Tavian Korzha (The Man Who Killed Max and Framed Michael), Dixon (Sam's "Friend"), Holcomb (Project Manager)

Quote of the Episode: Maddy - 'Michael, what are you doing?' Mike - 'Putting blood on my shirt.' Maddy - 'That can't be sanitary.' Mike - 'I need to look like I'm fatally wounded. I'd prefer not to use a bullet.'

Does Fiona blow anything up? No.

Sam Axe Drink Count: 0 (11 overall).

Sam Getting Hit Count: 0 (7 overall).

Michael's Fake Laugh Count: 0 (5 overall).

Other: Michael had an alias this week, Matt Graham! Not the most creative name ever, but what the hell.

That grenade seemed over-powered. I mean, that was a big explosion at the end. It would certainly keep Holcomb's promise to kill all the hostages if they caused trouble, but again, do grenades pack that much punch?

I liked how the security guard backs Michael up on his plan to get people out through the fence. He needed a vote of confidence from someone in the group. Too bad the guy lost his nerve part way. Actually, all the people doubting Michael and shouting seemed pretty realistic. He might have gotten more obedience if he'd gone the "bad guy" route and barked orders while waving a gun. Once the hostages thought they had some wiggle room, they started getting mouthy.

It didn't make a lot of sense to me that "Matt's" reason why he would kill all the hostages was that he wasn't going back to prison.  If you killed nearly two dozen people, I'm pretty sure you'd get the death penalty, and you think Holcomb would realize that. But maybe he didn't care. He felt the walls closing in, so screw it, let this guy stain his hands. Worst comes to worst, Holcomb can say he didn't kill anybody at the trial, pin it on "Matt".

Jesse doesn't ever do subtle with his performances. He's always over the top, always yelling or acting the fool. That's not a complaint, I love it. His 'Better yet, call the President of the United States,' line was just ridiculous, but by that point, the guy in the tower was probably ready to do anything to make Jesse go away. It does scare me to think it might be that easy to divert a plane. Wear a nice suit, flash some official looking identification, yell a lot, and voila!

I'm curious how Sam will fix the problem he and Fiona created for Dixon. Somehow I don't see Sam admitting to abduction, and I'm not sure what his other options are. Dixon was under house arrest, Dixon left the house, he's in trouble. Eh, maybe Sam can put on a nice suit and yell a lot about national security. That'll probably work.

Monty And Rommel: Parallel Lives - Peter Caddick-Adams

Peter Caddick-Adams wanted to compare and contrast two important World War 2 field marshals, and that's how you get Monty and Rommel. He starts from their earliest days, and the final two chapters deal with each man's legacy after the war. Somewhat different circumstances, since Montomgery was still alive and serving as a NATO commander, and writing books about the war, while Rommel was, obviously, dead. Which meant his legacy had to be determined by others, and in some ways, I think he fared better. Possibly because he wasn't around to annoy people with his abrasive attitude.

That's something that shines through in the book, the similarities between the two. Born within four years of each other almost to the day, neither to an aristocratic family (Rommel's father was teacher, Monty's a pastor/bishop), no strong military tradition in the family. Both served in World War 1, and both became known later for a style of command that emphasized contact with the rank and file. In Monty's case, this was in direct response to what he perceived as a distance between the higher ups and the people actually doing the fighting and dying. It may have been similar in Rommel's case - he certainly recognized that his presence could boost morale - but I think he liked to be on the front lines, taking an active hand. The brief time during WWI he spent in a staff office was a horrible time for him. Which is a pity, because there were probably some valuable lessons he could have learned*. Rommel strikes me as someone not comfortable delegating, he always wanted to be there, making certain things were done properly. Which is not really practical when you reach the higher levels of command he did later on.

Another thing the two had in common was their prickly nature with superiors and equals. Both of them tended to piss off their bosses, as well as anyone they were supposed to be coordinating with. They both tended to think they knew what was best, and they both tended to hog the credit (and shift the blame) after. About the only person in High Command Rommel had in his corner was Hitler (since Rommel didn't care much for the Nazi Party in general), which meant he was up the creek once der Fuehrer decided Erwin was in on the assassination plot**. Monty irritated Eisenhower (and Omar Bradley, Churchill, and a host of British Army and RAF officers), but none of them were likely to shoot him, and Ike was willing to calm down once Montgomery uttered appropriately groveling apologies.

Caddick-Adams lays things out quite thoroughly, and isn't afraid to digress into biographies or anecdotes about other people as they enter the story. At times, this can feel like meandering, or padding for areas where the subjects are not dominant, but it serves as a useful reminder that war isn't a one-man band. However skilled these two were, they both needed help to succeed. They needed superiors to recognize their skills and give them the chance to succeed (and also the protection to fail). They needed soldiers willing to listen and learn (both of them, but Monty, especially, were big on training for quick response), and cooperation from other branches of the service (Rommel certainly could have vouched for how much the RAF helped in the desert, even if Montgomery wouldn't).

It's interesting how accurate the title "Parallel Lives" is. They were never on the front lines in the same fight in WWI, especially with Rommel spending time on the Eastern Front and Italy. Rommel suffered some health issues around the time Montgomery was starting out in the desert, and left that theater entirely later on. Then he missed D-Day because he was home for his wife's birthday. Then within a month and a half, he got strafed by an Allied airplane, which took him off the lines for awhile, then there was the Hitler assassination attempt fallout. For the most part, the two went on about their business, only briefly intersecting

* There was a quote in Neptune's Inferno, to the effect: 'Amateurs talk tactics, professionals talk logistics.' I think Monty, maybe owing to his greater experience in handling such things, was much more aware of logistics than Rommel. Rommel seemed to regard supply lines as something for him to complain that others weren't maintaining sufficiently.

** Caddick-Adams does discuss all that, and notes that Rommel destroyed a lot of his personal papers from the Normandy campaign, so it's difficult to tell how much he might have known. I believe his impression is Rommel was aware there were people unhappy with Hitler, and ready to remove, even kill, him, but that Rommel was not on board. Which doesn't mean other people didn't think he was, or didn't think they could convince him to be a figurehead after.

What I Bought 5/27/2013 - Part 7

This opening bit is usually about me, but to heck with that. I know how I'm doing. How are you doing?

Rocketeer: Hollywood Horror #3 & 4, by Roger Langridge (writer), J Bone (artist), Jordie Bellaire (colorist), Tom B. Long (letterer) - Simonson gave Betty a lot more clothes there on the cover than she gets inside. It's a good cover. I like how the fingers of Rune's shadow start to resemble the brick squares in places.

Cliff lost the rocket, which is gonna make it tough to help Betty, who's not being quite careful enough snooping around Rune. The Charles' clue her in that Rune used to a hypnotist, and that the professor is a mechanical engineering genius gone missing. Which doesn't do Betty much good once she's in Rune's clutches. Cliff, meanwhile, is trying to use a rocket pack Peevy built to save the day, with mixed results. At least he got his wallet back, from Groucho Marx no less.

For a moment, that seems to have exhausted Cliff's run of good luck, because he fails utterly at a stealthy approach. Fortunately, Doc Savage's goons bring back the real rocket, allowing Cliff to use Peevy's a battering ram or blunt instrument, duties for which it is much better suited. Betty is rescued, at least partially by Cliff's moving speech about how much she means to him. Hey, it grossed out Rune and distracted him so the Professor could shoot him. Cliff comes to an arrangement with Savage about the rocket, and he and Betty enjoy a good five seconds of peace and harmony. After which they resume arguing about the things they usually do.

J Bone's pretty outstanding at drawing things. The look on Cliff's face when Rune meets his end, with the lines under the eyes, and the dismayed look. I thought Cliff might throw up in the next panel. Also, when Savage is making his proposal, you can just see the outline of Cliff's foot and fingers under the tarp in the background. Jordie Bellaire adds something to it all. Sho'Zzoth is given this incredibly dark black and green combo, giving an eerie, ominous presence compared to everything around it. Plus, there's a nice gag where all the happy couples are hugging and showing affection, so Bellaire goes with a pink background. But when Nick tries the same with Nora, she blows him off, and the background is plain white. Don't feel bad Nick, the gin still loves ya.

Langridge writes a lot of funny stuff into this. I laughed hardest at Rune's goons when the one said, 'What the hell?! Let's just shoot him!' 'You had a gun? Why didn't you say?' J Bone adds to it by having the other goon look as though he's about to smack the first fellow. I can't decide if I like the use of Groucho and the Charles' To be fair, I didn't know it was supposed to be Groucho until we were told, though I had been curious how this narrator knew all this stuff. Nick and Nora felt too ancillary to the story, given Langridge went to the trouble of using them. I guess the idea is that because this is a Rocketeer comic, we follow the regular cast, but while we do, Nick and Nora are out doing their own investigating and their story just happens to dovetail with Betty or Cliff every so often. On the whole, I still preferred Cargo of Doom, though I prefer how Langridge writes Cliff and Betty's relationship to how Waid handled it (still don't like how Betty got painted as the bad guy in that one).

What I Bought 5/27/2013 - Part 6

We've reached that time of year where the temperature is reluctant to fall below 70 even at night. I don't much like working during this time of year. The gnats, however, love that I work during this time of year.

Hawkeye #9 & 10, by Matt Fraction (writer), David Aja (artist, #9), Francesco Francavilla (artist, #10), Matt Hollingsworth (colorist, #9), Chris Eliopoulos & Clayton Cowles (letterers, Cowles for #10 only) - So, Kate's shirt. Is that an ego thing, since she is Hawkeye, or an expression of affection for Barton? Or that she loves being a Hawkeye, that the very concept of it stirs deep feelings in her?

There's a lot of hopping around, temporally, in these issues. We start back at Cherry dropping in on Clint at the Mansion, so that did happen, though it still doesn't explain why everyone has playing cards on their foreheads. From there, we see how each of the other ladies in Clint's life handle this. Natasha, Bobbi, and Jessica, went to Kate, to try and find Clint. Because none of them know where he lives. Kate does tell, but at least tries to call Clint and warn him. But by the time she arrives (and pummels some bros), Jessica's there. That leads to an ugly and awkward conversation, though Clint is lucky Jess only slapped him. She does have spider-strength, after all. Jessica also advises Kate to get far away from Clint, and Clint basically tells her the same, so Kate heads to a party.

Meanwhile, Natasha is tracking down Cherry (I keep wanting to call her Ginger), but she doesn't completely lay out what Clint's up against, only drops vague hints he's pissed some people off. And Bobbi drops by to check on Clint, beats up those same two bros (I'd pity them if they weren't morons), and gets Clint to sign their divorce papers. Clint is too battered and exhausted to care much, but gets some decent advice from Grills that night. I don't think it'll make much difference (Clint burnt that particular bridge, but good), but what the hell. Then Grills gets shot.

Booooo.

Issue 10 is Kate at the party, meeting some cool older guy and trying to impress him with talk about New York City. Kazi, as he says he's known, isn't terribly impressed with it, but does seem impressed with her. Throughout their night, we see Kazi's life up to that point, which is terrible. War-torn, lost everything he cares about, killing for money with the same greasepaint design on his face as he was wearing when his brother(?) was killed by a bomb or artillery shell. Frankly, if Hawkeye were going to be menaced by a tragic opera type figure, I'd rather have seen the Commedia Dell'Morte from that Power Man and Iron Fist mini-series Fred van Lente wrote, but I doubt the Russians would have turned to them. Kazi leaves the party, reaches Clint's place, watches Clint snap at Kate, watches Kate give it right back with both barrels, then he shoots Grills. Again. For the first time. Whatever.

Boooooooo.

Killing Grills aside, how were they? I preferred issue 9, with all the ladies running about, taking care of business. Natasha is confident Clint is fine, so she investigates Cherry. Jessica is (understandably) hurt, so she heads straight for him. It leaves me curious what Bobbi was up to after leaving Kate's? There wasn't a long gap between Jessica arriving and Bobbi (Clint says he'd been asleep 45 minutes, so figure an hour), but I do wonder. Did she need that time to go get the paperwork, or did she recognize Jessica needed to see him first, and decided to wait? As for issue 10, eh, half of it is people exchanging small talk at a party. And as someone who could cheerfully go the rest of his life never hearing how special New York is, I didn't really appreciate Kate's spiel about how special New York is (the fact cities tend to be full of people makes me regard cities as necessary evils, at best).

Offhand, does anyone know if that was a specific play Kasi and Janek were performing in the flashback? Or was it just two kids making something up to entertain people? I'd suspect the latter, but the way Janek kept changing how he said "I love you" each time struck me as deliberate.

Enough about writing, let's talk art. I mean, this is David Aja and Francesco Francavilla here. I prefer how Francavilla draws Kazi with the greasepaint. Maybe that's Francavilla's coloring style. He uses all these strong, solid colors, a lot of orange when Kazi's in costume, so to speak, but also strong blacks, and it makes the white really leap out. It grabs the eye, forces you to regard the expressionless face. He also uses it well as a pivot, or way to move the eye around. The page where Kazi is in the middle, and all around are the people who are being shot, stationed within panels of fractured glass. He's the centerpiece, they're simply props in his personal hell. On the last page, it's Kazi's face that guides the eye directly to the smoking gun.

There's also page 10, right after "Kazi shoots everyone on a crowded street", with he and Kate are chatting. It's a 12-panel grid, starts us at a distance, watching them both, but quickly moves in so only one character can appear in panel at a time. And it keeps moving closer. On the second line, we can still see most of Kate or Kazi's face, but by the end of line 3, it's strictly their mouths in view. Kate's given a, magenta/very light purple hue, whereas Kazi's mostly blue, some yellow backlighting. It's interesting because the way the perspective is moving closer suggests they're getting closer, but their colors remain largely distinct. Even when his hands touch hers in the 11th panel (is it the 11th hour, last chance to make a move?), it's strictly blues, none of her purple/lavender. Then the perspective jumps away again for the last panel, only now they're backlit, so they're mostly shadows. I don't know what all that means, but it's cool.

I also like that the panels for their time together are these very orderly, neat ones, thin line marking the boundary, almost perfectly white gutters between them. While Kazi's flashbacks have these rougher boundaries, thick black lines, a sometimes dingy gray for the gutters. Different worlds. I'm also curious why, on page 13, when kazi kills a man for the Russians, Francavilla drew the panel of the blood splatter first, then the panel of the gun going off. The "BANG BANG" effect overlaps both, though mostly the first. and in fact obscures a lot of the first panel. Maybe because the victim is incidental, another prop in Kazi's world.

Hmm, that was a lot about Francavilla, but probably not nearly enough. Don't want Aja to feel left out - we all know my reviews are what he lives for, right? - so let's take a minute to appreciate the "PFT PFT" panel on the last page. Yes, it's Grills getting shot, and that sucks, but it's a striking image, the gun outlines in the first PFT, Grills in the second. Hollingsworth going with red for the effects helps too, since so much of the page besides that is either grey (bricks, the skies), or the brown of Grills' coat. Aw Grills, why'd you have to go and grill while listening to Clint's woes?

Neptune's Inferno - James D. Hornfischer

Neptune's Inferno is all about the U.S. Navy's work at Guadalcanal, and that's almost all it's about. The Marines on the island get mentioned occasionally (mostly as spectators to naval battles, or in regards to their frustration with the lack of support they were getting from the Navy), and the airplanes get a little more mention (since they could get directly involved in battles at sea). But this is largely the Navy's show, because Hornfischer focuses on the ship-to-ship battles that took place at night, when planes were not terribly useful.

Hornfischer provides some interesting quotes and observations, from Halsey's idea on how carrier power is a square (2 carriers are 4 times as powerful as 1), to how Admiral Yamamoto hated the idea of captain dying with their ships (since it wasted good officers). The most interesting might have been how all three branches were reliant on each other. You need the Marines to occupy the island, and to protect the airfield. You need the planes to protect themselves, the Marines' base, and the ships from enemy planes. You need the ships to keep the other two resupplied, and to keep the Imperial Navy from bombarding the planes into nothingness at night. The problem is that it takes some time before the Navy starts holding up its end of the bargain.

One thing that comes through clearly in Hornfischer's retelling is how quickly things go awry in a battle, especially at night, with the limited communication equipment of the time. It just about every sustained battle between the two navies, one U.S. ship will get confused and fire on another. The South Dakota suffered a complete electrical failure from the concussion of its own guns. Ships lose track of one another, are too afraid of breaking radio silence to confirm their locations (or report sightings of the enemy), or ignore the technological advantages they have. 'Cause the thing is, the Japanese Navy didn't have radar. They had to rely on seeing their enemy. At night, you would think that would give the navy with radar - and the guns to fire from the limits of its range - the advantage. The U.S. commanders consistently squander this advantage, because most of them are crusty old guys who don't trust this consarn, newfangled radar*. Which is how there end constantly being battles where both groups are within sight of each other, negating the radar advantage, and letting the Japanese utilize their considerable torpedo advantage to great effect. (U.S. torpedoes were a joke, which might be the answer to Hornfischer's question of why the U.S. didn't bring their submarines into the fight as the Japanese did.)

The writing is overdone at times, though that's hardly unusual when it comes to books about World War 2. There's a lot of talk of grand, heroic gestures, and also some chillingly sad moments (usually involving men who had to abandon ship). Hornfischer is surprisingly non-judgmental about some of the more brutal acts committed by servicemen. Machine gunning downed Japanese airmen as they float in the ocean, for example. He doesn't excuse it, doesn't condone, barely comments on it other than to mention it happened and move on. Maybe it's better he didn't get pious on us, and allowed the reader to sort their own feelings. Maybe he felt he couldn't let it pass, but didn't want it to foul up his narrative, so he moved past it as quickly as possible.

On the whole, it's engaging, as I found myself at times shouting at the officers in the book, calling them idiots for not opening fire, and the fact he has sometimes incomplete and contradictory reports can make his descriptions of the battle seem as chaotic as I imagine the thing was.

"Captains were fortunate to find help for their troubles. They were given command of a multitude and saddled with fault for their failings. The bargain they made for their privileged place was the right to be last off the ship if worst came to pass. Burdens grew heavier the higher one ascended in rank. Captains concerned themselves with ships and crews, commodores with squadrons, task force commanders with objectives, and theater commanders with campaigns. The burdens of sailors weighed mostly on the muscles. The weight of leadership was subtler and heavier. It could test the conscience."

* To be fair, Hornfischer points out that in one battle, Dan Callaghan may have chosen to ignore the radar reports because he felt the best chance his cruisers and destroyers had against the battleship Hiei was to get really close, where even its armor couldn't stop their guns. For myself, I'd prefer to keep my much smaller, much less heavily-armored ships out of sight of the battleship that's reliant on visual targeting, but that's me. Maybe that's too cautious. It's unlikely, following that strategy, that they'd have managed to damage the Hiei, but the U.S. might also have taken a lot fewer casualties.