(We just listened to Dune last year through an audio book. Agree with the review, I always loved Dune since I was young...read the entire series a few times.)

Now listening to Captains and The Kings, which is so meaningful and an historic novel. Prophetic for these times... She wrote it in the 70's and it covers just about everything.

Review by Charles Kovaks, who does a much better summary than i could write myself...

Taylor Caldwell started writing in the late 1930's and in a few years became a best selling author much disliked and ignored by the US Establishment of the time which was already quite liberal regardless of party label. This was due to her abiding espousal of traditional American and Christian ideals and values which are very evident in her books. Captains and the Kings (CAK) was written much later (1972) in her career, almst 40 years after the start of the New Deal and during the domestic turmoil of the Vietnam War.

CAK is a very long book, but thanks to the author's literary skill, it is never boring and even the long descriptions serve to increase the suspense of what is to come. The descriptive paragraphs and pages can be skipped, but to do so is to miss some good English prose. The plot is a saga of a dreadfully poor Irish immigrant becoming a very wealthy man; a familiar story. What makes CAK different is that the book is permeated with Caldwell's political and social views - most of them similar to Ayn Rand's but softened by the author's Christian morality. Even so, her abiding contempt for politicians and for moochers and looters is clear enough, and in view of we have seen since 1972, some of this book may appear prophetic.

Unfortunately, CAK also revolves around the doings of an international conspiracy which the author claims has been running the world for at least 200 years. This conspiracy is not of the anti-Semitic canard variety; indeed Jews are rarely mentioned in this book and then sympathetically, and its leaders here are mainly Protestant Americans, some named. It is a tribute to the author's ability that the book remains a page turner in spite of its improbable premise.

****(((( Bonnie, laughing!LOL LOL LOL, by me..."improbable premise" indeed! And PS... a 5 star review is not too generous)))****

Perhaps five stars is too generous a rating, but this is a powerful book and should be widely read in view of how our world developed since 1972.

: (Thanks, D. :)

: Reader D. writes/sends us: =====

: Here's a fascinating analysis of the book, and a link to the
: pdf you can download for free (or read in the 'preview' if
: you aren't able to download it): Link
: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R0krUthYxF4

: Link https://www.pdfdrive.com/dune-e168521809.html

: Some books I enjoyed as a teenager seem to have much deeper
: meaning now that I have lived for several more decades (and
: through this very weird time in history).

: It's all about consciousness and what it means to be human.

: *************************************************************