Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, February 6, 1994 TAG: 9402060177
SECTION: HORIZON PAGE: C-4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Say "U-Haul" and most of us think of moving ourselves, starting over in a\ new place, good friends helping us load on a sunny summer day who are then\ thanked with beer and pizza. Most of don't think of greed, murder and nepotism\ run wild. Unfortunately, that is what U-Haul has been about.
When L.S. Shoen founded U-Haul in 1945 with a single, hand built trailer, he\ meant to start a dynasty that would be synonymous with moving. A barber by\ training, he was a college graduate with a taste for the good life. After being\ expelled from medical school, he turned his interests and intelligence to\ business. He worked long days building and servicing trailers and attended law\ school at night. His aim was to build a business that would secure his children\ from the poverty of migrant labor he had experienced as a child. And so\ he made the classic mistakes which have haunted the rich since King Lear: he\ spoiled his children outrageously, put them on U-Haul's board of directors, got\ them out of every legal scrape they ever got into, took their side against loyal employees, and watched his whole world come crashing down when his children voted him out of the company. He hit bottom when the wife of his eldest son, the one son who had stayed loyal throughout, was murdered in her home. Her killers have never been found.
"Birthright" is a clever, well written book about what happens when good\ intentions and good families go bad. An enjoyable read for "true crime" fans\ and would-be entrepreneurs.
- KENNETH LOCKE
Cigarettes Are Sublime.
By Richard Klein. Duke University Press. (price not listed).
This is the sort of book that academic types write to amuse their\ colleagues. Professor Klein in his fight to give up the nasty habit of\ cigarette smoking decided to analyze why something so bad for you seems to\ good. So, as you might expect a professor of French to do, he turned to French\ literature to find the deeper existential meanings of smoking. The movie\ "Casablanca" comes in for a chapter of analysis as well, and "The Cardinal of\ the Kremlin" and "Platoon" rate a brief mention. But most of this is stuff\ that only other professors of French will read and understand.
- SIDNEY BARRITT
Snake Eater. A Bardy Coyne Mystery. By William C. Tapply. Otto Penzler Books. $20. First, the disclaimer. After reviewing almost 1,200 books, it looks like one of them would have been among William G. Tapply's eleven other Brady Coyne novels. Not so. Second point: I may be lucky. "Snake Eater" is about a wilderness-loving former Green Beret (who ate snakes), grew marijuana, ostensibly for his Agent Orange poisoning, and got busted. Enter Brady Coyne, lawyer errant, who finds the case mysteriously dropped. Then his client gives him a book he has written and asks him to find a publisher. Then the client is murdered (and so is his agent) and the book disappears. Coyne didn't read the book, of course, neither did he think to ask for a copy, nor, come to think of it, does he think to do much of anything else. To have done so would have solved the mystery. "Snake Eater" moves rapidly, considering it doesn't have anywhere to go, except in circles. The story's got more holes in it than a Cape Cod fishnet, so that by the time we come to an end, the whole thing has gotten away and only the cliches are left. _ROBERT HILLDRUP The Grand Tour. By Ron Miller and William K. Hartmann. Workman. $25.95 (cloth) $14.95 (paper). In Victorian times, taking "The Grand Tour" meant traveling to the cultural centers of Europe. Today, in "The Grand Tour," the authors have compiled a stunning exploration of the universe using full color photographs, paintings, and line drawings. A revision of a book first published in 1982, "The Grand Tour" takes the reader on a trip around the universe starting from the largest planet (Jupiter) to the smallest asteroid (1991 BA). The revisions added 24 new photographs and 52 new or updated paintings compiled from the latest data received from space probes Magellan, Voyager, and Giotto. Knowing I will never be in space, vicariously voyaging through books is the best I can do. This book is as pleasant a guide as I have seen.
\ - LARRY SHIELD\ \ Kenneth Locke is a Radford pastor.\ Sidney Barritt is a Roanoke physician.\ Robert Hilldrup is a Richmond writer and former newspaperman.\ Larry Shield trains dogs and horses in Franklin County.
by CNB