Review: The Iron Cage by Amos Keppler

   I received an Advance Reader Copy of Amos Keppler’s novel The Iron Cage. It made me so happy. I’ve been waiting for this story for ages.

  This is the final book in The Janus Clan, a series of thirteen novels, that has been published the last fifteen years, but started, the way I’ve heard it, in the author’s childhood. I’ve read all the previous twelve, and it’s such a pleasure to see it all coming to its conclusion.

  Mike is setting his final plan in motion. The events starting twenty years earlier in the brothers’ childhood are reaching their end. Mike and Ted Warren are brothers. They have always been rivals, to the point of exchanging blows. Violence ensued every time they encountered each other on their journey across the planet.

  The Janus Clan is an extended group of misfits that have existed for centuries. The Warrens have always been a part of that. They can compare in some ways to the gypsies, traveling endlessly from place to place, never finding peace anywhere. They are a part of a struggle with roots far back in human history. And now, the end game, the final days, begins.

  It’s so exciting to watch it unfold. The streets of Miami, the settlement of pre-revolutionary Pittsburgh and not the least modern Las Vegas come alive in my mind as I read.

  June and Liz are sisters, like Ted and Mike are brothers. They have been apart for more than ten years, and have grown further apart in that time. The end begins in Miami and grows from there, to the literally explosive climax in Downtown Las Vegas.

  The interactions between Liz and June, and June and Gail gave me the chills. When you read those passages, you get a sense of true evil, pretty much the kind we see unfolding in Palestine these days.

  Mike and June, two not very likable characters, are described in excellent ways. So are their opposite numbers Liz and Ted. You may believe you know what’s going on six chapters into the book, but you would be wrong.

  Everything, or almost everything, will be explained in those final pages. This is one conclusion propelling the story of The Janus Clan onward to the final story arc.

  Be aware that this is only the final book being published, not the true final books in the series. The events described in ShadowWalk and Phoenix Green Earth are both taking place after the ending of this book. I heard the author say in an interview that he is publishing the books in the order they were written, not necessarily in sequence, and that’s how I’ve read them, and it has worked well for me. I and the rest that have read all the books know how it will all turn out, and believe me, it’s grand.

Misogyny and racism - Richard Dawkins and the «new atheism»

  There is little doubt about it: one arm or rather a branch of atheism exemplified by Richard Dawkins is clearly steeped in racism and misogyny and clearly a tool for Western imperialism. Those swearing to that faction are used by the Christians and western governments in order to demonize Islam. There is a lot of talk about child Marriage in Muslim countries, but none about the numerous in the US, more than 200000 in the last fifteen years, or the fact that it is legal in forty-one states.

  When I tell people that, many of them have no idea what I’m talking about. They are totally uninformed, ignorant of the current world and how it works.

  They hide behind «Islam is not a race» in order to justify their racism, try out any attempt at justification, like racists always do.

  It’s also a matter of selection and proportions. Islam horrors are totally overrepresented in the media. Where are the mass rapes of Catholic choir boys and the child victims in numerous Christian groups? Where is the ongoing horror of «the American Taliban», the vastly powerful and destructive Christian right?

  I wouldn’t claim to practice the best kind of atheism, but mine is better by far than this… travesty of it.

  It’s a matter of context.

  I see little or no attacks on Christianity in your timeline, Richard, no mention of the Catholic mass rape of children, for instance. I see no mention of the ongoing Israeli massacres and abuse of children, done with active support of western countries, the United States in particular and the drone killings by the US army. No mention of the countless children living in poverty forced into prostitution in the west. The ongoing Christian crusade by US/NATO military forces and Christian missionaries.

  It’s a matter of context. You can’t, for instance ignore that children marriage/brides and abuse are common in United States and several western countries, including in the Catholic Church and in the upper classes in the UK. By singling out Islam, you show yourself to be horribly and dangerously biased, nothing but one more despicable racist, xenophobe.