Catherine Raynes: The Breath of the Gods and The Detective

The Breath of the Gods by Simon Winchester  

What is going on with our atmosphere? The headlines are filled with news of devastating hurricanes, murderous tornadoes, and cataclysmic fires. Gale force advisories are issued on a regular basis by weather services around the world. 

Atmospheric scientists are warning that winds – the force at the centre of all these dangerous natural events – are expected to steadily increase in the years ahead, strengthening in power, speed, and frequency. While this prediction worried the insurance industry, governmental leaders, scientists, and conscientious citizens, one particular segment of society received it with unbridled enthusiasm. To the energy industry, rising wind strength and speeds as an unalloyed boon for humankind – a vital source of clean and ‘safe’ power. 

Between these two poles – wind as a malevolent force, and wind as saviour of our planet – lies a world of fascination, history, literature, science, poetry, and engineering which Simon Winchester explores with the curiosity and Vigor that are the hallmarks of his bestselling works. In The Breath of the Gods, he explains how wind plays a part in our everyday lives, from airplane or car travel to the ‘natural disasters’ that are becoming more frequent and regular. 

The Breath of the Gods is an urgently-needed portrait across time of that unseen force – unseen but not unfelt – that respects no national borders and no vessel or structure in its path. Wind, the movement of the air, is seen by so many as a heavenly creation and generally a thing of essential goodness. But when it flexes its invisible muscles, all should take care and be very afraid. 

  

The Detective by Matthew Riley  

For 150 years, women have been going missing. 

And all of the investigators who went in search of them - from 1877 to the present day - have disappeared, too. 

Now Sam Speedman, a most unique private detective, is on the case. 

Brilliant, direct and disarming, Sam is ... different. He's not your average private detective. But then again, this isn't your average case. 

For not even he will be prepared for what he will find. 

 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:07):
You're listening to the Saturday Morning with Jack Teams podcast
from News Talks.

Speaker 2 (00:11):
That'd be okay When I say this, it's going to
sound boring, right. It is the story of Wind, the
story of the remarkable role that wind plays in our life.
If I give you the title of the book, it
sounds a bit more dramatic, The Breath of God's by
Simon Winchester. But Catherine Rains, our book reviewer, has read
it and reckons it is pretty damn interesting. Good morning, Catherine.

Speaker 3 (00:36):
I do. You're quite right, And yes, but it wasn't
a topic that I thought that I would pick up
a book and read about. But I very much enjoy
Simon Winchester's writing and that was why I picked it up.
And in this he explains how wind plays a part
in our everyday lives, from airplane and car travel to
natural disasters that seem to be becoming more frequent and regular.

(00:57):
And you know, he sort of says Wind as this
force of course, and it doesn't respect any national borders
or any vessel or structure in its path and winches
to read and the story takes you on this journey
around the world, and he stops in places and he
talks about, you know, wind driven tumuil weed, and how
maately clever ancient mariners were, and the technology behind wind

(01:21):
turbines and the firestorms that are generated, and then what
happened during the Allied bombings of places like Tokyo and Dresden.
And he also considers when he stops along the way,
how different things might have been had wind blown different directions. So,
for example, during the Chernobyl disaster, it was a prevailing
southeasterly wind and its effects were immediately detectable in Scandinavia,

(01:43):
But if it was during the spring and the westerlies
were there it would have spread over Soviet territory instead,
and potentially might have been concealed from the world. And
when Chester starts in the beginning is kind of defining
wind in its consequences. And he also talks about this
really interesting event during the nineteen seventies through to the
twenty tenish time, about the global stilling to rest. Jill

(02:06):
Stilling and meteorologists and others could not work out why
the average speeds of the winds planet's dropped more than
two percent during these decades, and he offers a really
reasoned and compelling way of why they occurred and the
causes and the connections to climate change. And you know
what sounds like, as we talked about in the beginning,
a really strange subject to write a book on. It's

(02:27):
really fascinating. And he mixes in these personal stories and
interesting people and places, and he writes in such an
engaging style. I can guarantee you will be hooked and
you will find yourself reading this book because he just
he tells it in such an interesting way.

Speaker 2 (02:41):
It does. You've sold me. You've sold me, and I'm glad.
I'm glad that you have because I'm sure there'll be
some people who say, oh wow, really a story about wind,
But no, it does sound amazing. Okay. So that's The
Breath of God by Simon Winchester. Next up The Detective
by Matthew Riley.

Speaker 3 (02:56):
So for something completely different. This is a contemporary crime
novel and it's set in the deep South of the US.
And you meet this This guy is not your sort
of typical hero. Is a guy called Sam Speedman, and
he's a private detective. But he was also autistic. But
he uses those unique attributes to his complete advantage. His
obsessive behaviors, the deep concentration, the problem solving, and the

(03:20):
immense patience he has to crack cases. And when we
meet Sam, he's he's focused on one of these old
unsolved cases. And it comes to like in this quite
gruesome manner, and for one hundred and fifty years, women
have been disappearing, and all of the investigators who when
in search of them from eighteen seventy seven to now
have also disappeared. And Sam just starts to uncover one

(03:41):
dark it's secret after another, and each kind of more
harrowing than the last. And you find yourself in the
plains of Texas and in the middle of Louisiana and
in Florida and back again, and you're these unspeakable crimes
and some of the worst people imaginable, and it gets
deep into that those worst bits of southern politics. And
Sam's character is really unconventional, as I said, and it

(04:03):
just in it, but it's told in his perspective, which
helps you understand of his character and the perception of
what he's thinking, because he's directly speaking to you. And
then add in that airiness of the swamp country and
the world of the rich and famous and there's this
conspiracy involving politicians and judges and police and the megal
wealthy at the center of the book, and it seems
really outlandish when you're kind of first reading it. You know,

(04:26):
recent events kind of give things a little bit more credibility,
and he pulls in references to actual events and real
press conferences. So every now and again you find yourself thinking, oh, yeah, okay,
but it's a really page turning read, and the social
commentary about the US is really really interesting from Matthew
Riley's perspective.

Speaker 2 (04:44):
Yeah, nice, okay, great. So that is The Detective by
Matthew Riley. The Breath of Gods by Simon Winchester is
Catherine's first book. All of the details for both of
those will be on the news Talks he'db website.

Speaker 1 (04:56):
For more from Saturday Morning with Jack Tame. Listen live
to news Talks that'd be from nine am Saturday, or
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