22 — Wednesday, January 25, 1989 - North Shore News

Book gives insight into Nile geography

PUBLISHERS’ PROMOTIONAL representatives are a
decidedly perverse lot. Indeed, behind those smiling faces
lurk some pretty mangled psyches, judging by the timing of
Journey Up The Nile’s release.

What kind of heartless monster
sends out review copies of a
crammed with beautiful color
photographs of multi-hued deserts,
Juxuriant tropical foliage and crisp,
blue skies in the middle of the
West Coast’s monsoon season?

Journey Up The Nile (Rain-
coast/Thomasson-Grant; 164 pp.;
$49.95 in hardcover), dubious in-
tentions aside, is a fascinating
journey of geography, cultures and
time as author/photographer
Robert Caputo takes readers on a
4,000-mile trek from the Nile’s
Mediterranean mouth to the lush
highlands of east-central Africa.

The peoples, flora, fauna and
architecture enroute are stunning-
ly presented in this coffee table
format book thanks to Caputo’s
photographic skills. Renowned for
his images which have appeared
in such notable magazines as Geo,
Time, Life and Natural History,
Caputo has lon; been one of Na-
tional Geographic's top
photographers in Africa. He has a
fine eye for the documentary, the
delicate and the incongruous in
his approach to his art as fourney
Up The Nile amply demonstrates.

Another coffee table book out
this week is an excellent example
of good intentions gone awry; A
Fow! Alphabet was a disappoin-
ting effort from Chronicle Books’
Alan James Robinson.

The concept was interesting
enough: produce a book il-
lustrated with bird images, one for
each fetter of the alpha The
idea's simplicity was quite elegant
but failed miserably in the execu-

tion.

Its chief shortcoming is in the
one area that should have been
this book’s strongest feature: these
have to be some of the ugliest fow!
illustrations to appear in print in
quite some time and succeed ad-
mirably in destroying any appeal A
Fowl Alphabet (53 pp.; $24.50)
might have had. One cannot help
but wonder if the illustrator even

likes birds, for that matter. Expect
this title to be heavily discounted
in the very, very near future in

MIKE
STEELE

book reviewer

better bookstores everywhere.
Another flawed creation is
Herman Friedhoff’s Requiem For
The Resistance (Penguin/
Bloomsbury Books; 281 pp.).
According to the subtitle, this
book purports to tell the story of
the civilian struggle against
Naziism in Holiand and Germany
during the Second World War.
Well, much of it centres on the
activities of the author, a deco-

rated hero of the Dutch resistance,
and precious little is said about the
intriguing roles of German civilians
defying Hitler and his cronies.

While some of the material is
highly interesting, in large part its
failings are those of the writer,
whose style injects an air of super-
ficiality to the recounted events.
Strangely enough, Friedhoff seems
to excel at describing the rather
erotic pursuits of himself and his
co-resistance members while fail-
ing to adequately impress the
reader with the life-and-death
realities of the war and the risks
taken by civilians.

In its favor, it should be said that
Requiem For The Resistance does
a remarkable job of explaining
Duich morality and philosophy
that made widespread resistance
to the Nazis inevitable but
Friedhoff’s Requiem For The
Resistance is at best incomplete
and unsatisfying while its hefty
$39.95 price-tag cannot be
justified by any stretch of the

PRAY, NORTE SHORE
Eighteen Pastors, Priests and Ministers of North
Vancouver, along with a nuniber of prayer

rou s. chatten e all Christians to come
O pray for an awakening of the p
pie to Sod and the reality of His Grace. ois
event will taka place on Sa urea Evening, Jar-
ry 28 at 7 p.m. at St. Andrews and St.
; Stephens Presbyterian Church, 2641 Chester-
. Tnrose Ministers Involved:
Bob Allison, St. Andrews John Hardy, Hillside Baptist
& St. Stephens Ed Hird, St. Simon's Anglican
Presbyterian Jim Lucas, Canyon Heights
Randy Bers, Pentecostal
Delbrook Baptist David Martin,
Virginia Briant, North Shore Community
St. Richard's Anglican Owen Scott,
Dan Cochrane, Lynn Vailey Full Gospel
sutherland Bible Chapel Gordon Stewart, Capliano
Randy Galloway, Christian Community
South Lonsdale Baptist Arnie Toews,
Eugene Harder, North Shore Alliance
New Hope Community Bev Ward, First Baptist

A number of laymen from these and other
churches also join with on Tuesdays.

imagination, inflated or otherwise.

Science fiction fans have a treat
in store for themselves though in
Joan C. Vinge’s Catspaw, a
futuristic story of a young
telepath’s life on the fringes of
society.

Written by the Hugo Award-
winning author of Psion, World’s
End and The Snow Queen,
Catspaw is not only an inventive
and well-told piece of sci-fi but
one which draws some disturbing
contemporary parallels with the
rea! and present world.

The main character is Cat, a
teenaged, telepathic halfbreed
employed for his talents by an
amoral corporate combine yet

despised by most denizens of his
galaxy as an alien. In his role as
the ultimate ‘bugging’ device. Cat
is plunged into a world of business
greed, prejudice and assassination
as he tries desperately not only to
thwart the machinations of rival
corporate interests but aiso to
achieve some sense of belonging
and self-worth.

Catspaw (Random House/
Warner Books; 392 pp.; $24.95 in
hardcover) is an enjoyable story
and one with a few novel twists,
including the protagonist's tele-
pathic interaction with the sentient
and near-sentient electronic
‘brains’ of massive, intergalactic
computer systems.

Now Open in
Capilano Mali

With any meal

Luncheon or Dinner

of *4” or over
formeriy The Sirlotner

RAMCOFF CONCERTS
PRESENTS THE

VANCOUVER
STRING
QUARTET with
Gene Ramsbottom
and Melinda Coffey —

Sat, February 4, 1989
at 7:00 pm.

Tickets $10.00 Adults,
$8.00 Seniors/Students
available at recCentre
Lonsdale, 23rd & Lonsdale
in North Vancouver ,
by phone 987-PLAY or
VTC 280-4444

WE ARE KEOPENING
JAN. 28TH

2300 Lonsdale Avenue
North Van. 984-4484

Please make your reservations early
to see what we have done during
our holidays
And try some new dinner items

The Bridge House Restaurant
3650 Capilano Road, North Vancouver

(opposite the world-famous Capiiano Suspension Bridge)

987-3388