BOOK REVIEW

At Ease is, perhaps, the most unconventional book ever to pop up in my column.

Like previous books, it features dozens of half naked, and plenty of fully nude men in erotic situations.

However, At Ease is entirely reality based. Composed of Navy photos taken during World War II. Most of these pictures have never seen the light of day, having been buried in the deepest vaults of the National Archives in Washington, D.C..

Except for one, the absolute best photograph and the most well-known picture in the black and white volume (on page 17), which has been available from the U.S. government printing office as a poster for decades.

It depicts a completely naked blondish Navy airman manning an anti-aircraft gun in the turret of his plane. He had been skinny dipping when the alert came that enemy aircraft was incoming. He didn’t have time to get dressed, instead he raced butt ass naked to his weapon to defend America.
Still glistening with reflective droplets of moisture from his interrupted dip.

Of course the Navy, like the other military services, was completely segregated at the time. This shameful practice is clearly evident in At Ease.
Blacks and whites never cohabitated, nor even showered together.
So we have separate scenes of the races bathing, playing cards, carrying munitions, exercising, catching some rays, sleeping and eating.

My favorite picture of our African-American sailors is on page 127. Eleven choice men taking an open-air shower at a supply depot in Guam, the white suds all over their hard, firm bodies in sharp contrast to their dark skin.

There’s a delectable photo of a Caucasian sailor (page 135) sudsing himself up on the deck of his ship in the Philippines before diving overboard to rinse off the soap. He’s got a good tan line, and the magnificent setting, next to his weapons station, an anti-aircraft battery, is incredibly stimulating.

Infinitely more seductive than the tame cover photo. I would have put this picture on the cover, and printed up millions of posters!

The underlying thread that binds these photos together is the spontaneity of the pictures, the lack of pretense. All of them were taken of men living their everyday lives. The title is a succinct one, at ease as opposed to the formality and rigidity of their on duty lives.

Only two pictures appear to be posed, featuring a pair of very muscular young sailors without their shirts on (pages 74 & 75), seemingly standing at attention, draped with heavy artillery shells, Pancho Villa-style. The kind of propaganda coup Benito Mussolini would have wet his fascist pants over. But on closer inspection the picture is not what it seems, the iconic duo are not in

Some ritualistic pose, but are instead waiting to load their brass shells onto an approaching fighter plane.

Our view of a tattooed sailor in the shower on page 128 is partially obstructed by another sailor loading an old-fashioned, round washing machine. But that only ads to our excitement and arousal, and to our yearning to see what we are missing. It, in effect, makes us into collective peeping toms.

There’s only one variation on the photographic theme. Two full-page
contemporary ads, one for Coca Cola from a 1945 issue of National
Geographic, and the runaway winner of my heart, a full-page ad for Cannon Towels from 1943 in Life Magazine that drips with male eroticism!

It’s a whimsical painting of maybe a dozen soldiers bathing in a tropical South Pacific lagoon, lounging on the trunk of a fallen palm tree, and drying off with, of course, fluffy Cannon cotton bath towels, above the caption “Army Day, crocodiles keep out!”

At Ease: Navy Men of World War II, by Evan Bachner.
http://www.abramsbooks.com/
You may contact the author by email: ErnieAlderete@charter.net

Book Reviews
By Alberto Orozco

Sólo lo Mejor/Only the Best
100 Grandes Refranes y Frases Célebres
Warner Books – Bilingual edition
Autor: Adrienne Avila y Leslie Pockell

Una celebración de la herencia hispana con refranes y fraces célebres. Miguel de Cervantes, Jorge Luis Borges, Octavio paz, Santa Teresa de Avila, Pablo Picasso, son algunos de los “colaboradores” que con su sabiduría sobre la vida harán que te sientas motivado a ver la vida con mayor optimismo. ¿Sabes quién dijo que cada niño es un artista, el problema está en cómo mantenernos como artistas mientras crecemos?

¿Qué han hecho con mi país, Tío?
Ediciones B
Autor: Michael Moore

Tras el clamoroso éxito internacional de su última obra, Estúpidos hombres blancos, y de Bowling for Columbine, el documental más visto en la historia del cine, Michael Moore vuelve a la carga y sin pelos en la lengua con una sarcástica y despiadada cruzada con una clara misión: acabar de una vez por todas con el mandato de George w. Bush, el hombre que se coló en la Casa Blanca gracias a los compinches de su papá. Moore no deja títere con cabeza e invita al lector a ponerse manos a la obra para tratar de salvar al mundo de uno de los hombres más poderosos y nocivos del planeta.

El puente hacia el infinito
Editorial: Millenium
Autor: Richard Bach

Con Juan Salvador Gaviota, Richard Bach nos hizo volar por lugares de encanto y aventura, para guiarnos hacia una luminosa libertad. En El puente hacia el infinito Bach narra su propio camino hacia el amor, hacia su alma gemela. Un camino cuyos obstáculos y desvíos iniciales lo hacen abandonar la búsqueda y construirse murallas de protección, que se convertirán en su cárcel… hasta que conoce a la única mujer que puede liberarlo.

Cerrando ciclos vitales
Editorial Pax México
Autor: Cristina Stecca de Alvizúa

¿Cómo vivir de manera diferente? Podemos establecer una nueva relación con nuestra experiencia pasada y recuperar lo valioso, lo que nos ha permitido crecer y madurar. En este valioso libro, Cristina Stecca, con una sabiduría lúcida y sencilla, nos ofrece recursos para ver y afrontar nuestra vida de una manera distinta, para aceptarnos y querernos, y utilizar las inmensas herramientas que poseemos en el repertorio de nuestra historia.

Cómo utilizar lo que tienes para conseguir lo que quieres
Amat Editorial
Autor: Marilyn Tam

En su larga carrera, Marilyn ha ocupado puestos ejecutivos en compañías de renombre internacioal, como Aveda, Reebok y Nike. Este sorprendente libro describe los secretos del éxito de Marilyn tanto en los negocios como en su vida privada y los pone en tus manos. La filosofía de la vida que tiene Marilyn, así como sus secretos para extraer de ella las lecciones más dulces y más amargas, siempre le ha servido para avanzar. Con esta obra quiere compartir su sabiduría contigo.

The 200 Best Illustrators worldwide
Lüerzer’s Archive

The 200 Best Illustrators worldwide features visual stimuli from leading illustrators whose work has won the Society of Illustrators’ Annual Gold & Silver awards, among other honors worldwide. This top shelf book is a compilation of the remarkable work of such leading illustrators from across the globe as Anita Kunz/Canada, Fumihiko Gotou/Japan, and Brad Holland/USA.

The Complete Gay Divorce
Newman Communications, Inc.
Author: Brette McWhorter Sember

Although gay wedding books seem to be on every bookshelf these days, this is the first title to explain the process of ending a gay relationship. Just like straight couples, gay couples do break up! And because most gay couples have no formalized union at all, The Complete Gay Divorce explains your rights when you end a non-legalized relationship, and how to apply them.

Olivier
Henry Holt and Company
Author: Terry Coleman

Olivier played nearly every role in existence. And yet Olivier remained as mysterious in life as he was on stage, skilled at shifting his identity and obscuring who he truly was. Now, based on exclusive and unrestricted access to Olivier’s estate, and authorized by Olivier’s family, award-winning journalist Terry Coleman reveals the man behind the legend with Olivier, a mesmerizing new biography complete with photographs from both his personal and professional lives.

A People’s History of the Mexican Revolution
The New Press
Author: Adolfo Gilly

By the end of the revolution, Zapata was assassinated, Villa was defeated, and a bourgeois government was in power, but the rebellion was not without its victories. Gilly’s seminal work serves as an essential reminder that the Mexican Revolution provided the starting point for the socialist uprisings of the twentieth century, with reverberations still felt through social justice movements in Latin America and the rest of the world.