Advance Library Book Club reviews "End of War"

Sandy Long carries a load of Christmas books for book club members to choose from for the December read. The club meets on the third Monday of the month at 4 p.m., so that members who are still teaching school can still attend.

Throughout history, world leaders have sought an "end to war"-- from Woodrow Wilson, who dubbed World War I, a "War to end War"-- to John F. Kennedy, who said that war might be 'indefinitely postponed by the eventual discovery of a weapon so horrible that it will truthfully mean the abolishment of all the nations employing it." Kennedy hoped that science would be the "means of bringing it (war) to an end."

Both great leaders were wrong. The Greek historian Plato had it right, when he said, "Only the dead have seen the end of war."

David L. Robbins uses Plato's quotation as the title for his novel about the race for Berlin in World War II.

Robbins' characters are both real and fictional, as he writes this epic tale of war.

The real players in the game of power are Franklin Roosevelt, who dies before the end of the war, an aging Winston Churchill, who tries to use diplomacy to keep Russian forces from taking Berlin first, and Josef Stalin, the brutal and paranoid dictator of the young Soviet Union.

Other less powerful characters include Gen. Dwight D, Eisenhower, supreme commander in Europe, and the other Allied military leaders and advisors.

The fictional characters, which Robbins has added to the novel to show the pawns in this massive game of chess, are Charley Bandy, an American photographer for Life Magazine, Ilya Shokhin and Misha Bakov, two Russian soldiers, and Lottie, a German girl living with her mother in Berlin.

Through the eyes of these minor characters, the reader gains a vivid view of just how horrible war really is.

Seven members of the library club met at 4 p.m., Monday, Nov. 16, 2013 to discuss this selection for November. All agreed that the novel was a challenging, but worthwhile, choice.

"We try to read a challenging book like this one--or like 'The Jungle'--one month, and then, we'll read a more cheery one the next month," explains retired reading teacher Cynthia French. "For December, we're all going to read a Christmas book of our choice, so we'll each read something different. We'll do this again for January, as we've decided to each read a Zane Grey book. We were discussing it one day, and several of us said we had never read one of his books. One month, not long ago, we each read a different book by a local author."

"End of War" was recommended to the group by Sandy Long, who is the library's book purchaser.

The book club meets on the third Monday of the month at 4 p.m. During the winter months, the club usually meets at the library on C Highway beside the old gym.

The next meeting will be at Port Cape on Dec. 16.

The library is open 20 hours a week: Mon/Weds--Noon to 4 p.m. Tues/Thurs--3 p.m. to 7 p.m. Sat.--11 a.m. to 3 p.m.

The phone number is 573-722-5533.

"Snacks and Stories with Santa" will be on Saturday, Dec. 14 at 10 a.m.