#1: Apparently Apple thought it should be censoring what you can read on your iPod/iPhone by rejecting applications that might, possibly, let you read something they find objectionable. The latest instance concerned a book reader application called Eucalyptus, but it’s been going on for a while. After they started getting some bad PR over this, they finally went ahead and approved the application.

#2: Somebody rewrote the Bible to include zombies. I’ve included it because a) it amuses me for some unspecified reason and b) it amazes me that someone would take the time to do this. Click at your own risk.

#3: Publishing continues to not “get” the Internet (okay, admitedly that in and of itself is not news, however new examples surface every day). Editors at Avon Books gave an interview over at All About Romance. The bit that has online reviewers scratching their heads is the bit about Avon’s view on online review sites not being worthwhile unless they can “make” a book.

Once again publishing looks at the Internet as simply the offline world put online, which it is not. If they’re waiting for a single review site to have the clout of Publisher’s Weekly or The New York Times then they are missing what working with online reviewers is all about: buzz, word-of-mouth, trust, etc. The other things they said didn’t particularly impress me much.

#4: And then there is Seth Harwood who gets how to use the Internet to get attention for his books (also a publishing contract from Random House!). I found it interesting that having his work in front of an audience, even for free, has pushed him to produce more.

#5: An interesting take on how the added value in ebooks may actually be the readers who read the book before you. It’s slightly more complex than that, but an interesting take on the value added by reader discussions and annotations in ebook editions.

#6: A big fat *yawn* from me that Scribd.com now allows anyone to sell documents (including ebooks) on their site. They let authors set the price and set download/DRM options. Scribd gets 20%. There’s a lot of hype about this. Sounds good, so why the yawn? The store is US-only. Not an American citizen living in the US? No book selling for you. So much for the “global” Internet.

On Christmas Eve in Santa Fe, an undercover agent defies his controllers by interfering with a Russian mafia kidnapping of a newborn child. Wounded and on the run with a child that has the power to change global events, Paul Kagan needs a safe haven. He finds that haven at the home of a battered wife and disillusioned son. Now they are all defending their haven against enemies determined to get in.

I’ve read almost all of David Morrell‘s books and there are some that I absolutely love and there are others that are okay but not on my reread list. The Spy Who Came For Christmas falls into the latter category. There are two stories being told in The Spy Who Came for Christmas. One is the story of the undercover agent Paul Kagan. The other story is Kagan’s retelling of the nativity story as a tale of espionage. I’ll deal with each one in turn.

The story of Paul Kagan and the baby suffers from a pacing problem. The story takes place mostly with the characters under siege in the Santa Fe house. In fact, the characters remain under siege for 187 out of 233 pages before the bad guys storm the house. That is a particularly long period for the characters to be confined to a couple of rooms. There are flashbacks to liven things up and add background information, but I still found myself losing interest in the characters and situation. As for the kidnapped baby, a strong case is never made for why this is child is so important to the Russian mafia (or the rest of the world for that matter). There are hints that this child is supposed to mirror the birth of Jesus but as a reader I need something more concrete than that to buy into the story.

I don’t have much to say about the retelling of the nativity story. I get the nagging feeling that in order to get the full effect that Morrell intends a knowledge of Christianity is necessary as well as assumed. That’s a departure for Morrell who has had religious themes in his books before, but has never depended so much on the reader’s knowledge to impart the story.

Although David Morrell is one of my favourite authors, I’m not a fan of this particular book. If you’re new to Morrell, I recommend The Brotherhood of the Rose or Creepers instead. You can find David Morrell’s books at amazon.com, amazon.ca, and amazon.co.uk as well as other online and bricks and mortar booksellers.

Descartes’ Bones: A Skeletal History of the Conflict Between Faith and Reason by Russell Shorto is an examination of how we got to where we are today by looking at the travels of the bones from Renee Descartes. To refresh the memory of anyone who needs it, Renee Descartes is the philosopher who said “I think, therefore I am,” and used that as his starting point for figuring out the world instead of what he was told by authority figures (at the time, these were primarily the church and royalty).

The publisher calls it “a grand and strange history of the 350-year-long debate between religion and science.”

I quite enjoyed Descartes’ Bones. Shorto did a good job of keeping to the history and not making value judgments on the beliefs that are part of this history. This is not a philosophy book, but a history book. The word skeletal in the subtitle is not only a description of the physical bones, but of the depth of history presented. While some see that as a weakness, I think this book fills a need. Many people need a brief introduction to the history of faith versus science and would be turned off by a deep examination of the philosophical conflicts. Using Descartes’ bones as the scaffolding for this introduction is a way to make the history accessible and interesting to readers who otherwise would never touch a book on the topic.

If you’re already aware of Descartes’ influence on modern thought, then this book is likely not for you unless you are interested in how his bones were used as relics throughout the centuries. If you don’t know what Descartes’ philosophies have to do with the conflict between faith and science, then Descartes’ Bones is a brief, readable introduction.

Many people are familiar with Scott Adams’ Dilbert cartoon. God’s Debris is not a Dilbert book. In his introduction, Adams says: “The target audience for God’s Debris is people who enjoy having their brains spun around inside their skulls.” He admits that not everyone may be comfortable with that. For those that do enjoy the spinning sensation, this thought experiment explores the nature of the universe, reality, and God.

The story is set in the present. The main character is a bored courier who delivers a package to a wizened old man—or maybe the package delivers him. The courier and the old man proceed to have a philosophical conversation. Adams has written the story so that the old man’s answers to questions are based on the premise that “the simplest explanation is usually right.” This leads the character to make pronouncements that sound right, but are often flawed (as common sense often is when it comes to complex phenomena). The reader’s task is to figure out what is wrong with the old man’s simple premises as the conversation constructs a view of God and the universe that may be surprising to some or a repackaging of philosophical beliefs from different traditions depending on your background.

What I like about this book is the discussion it generates between people who have read it. The nature of God is a very heavy subject, but this book is not a difficult read, and it approaches the topic differently than many people are used to. Its greatest value is that it generates discussion. Whether you love it or hate it, you’ll have something to say about it.

God’s Debris can be downloaded from Andrews McMeel Publishing.

If you want something a bit different check out these three posts by Lynn Viehl at Paperback Writer. The links are to limited-time HarperCollins book downloads (with a bunch of restrictions and hoops because this publisher STILL doesn’t understand the freebie concept). Also a link to Lynn’s 2006 free ebook challenge, and an erotica short with no restrictions (look through the top 10 list in the third post to find it).

Check back next Monday for another free book download tip.