“The Abortionist” a review

I figured the least I could do for my friend Michael would be to buy and read his book, “The Abortionist.”

It was well worth it.

The story is about Elliot Stearns, a former policeman who took up writing after a bullet left him paralyzed from the waist down. As a free lance writer and crime columnist Elliot writes on his blog From Where I Sit and for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Michael explains all this on his blog.

In the book, a psychopath is killing women using techniques an abortion provider would use. Elliot along with his friends on the police force are attempting to find the very clever killer.

Things are complicated by the fact that Elliot has again come in contact with his ex-fiance, Caroline. Things come to a head when their relationship brings danger to Caroline.

I liked the book. It was a mystery, albeit with few possible suspects. The story moved along and there were enough surprises to keep you guessing.

Knowing I am a Christian, Michael asked me if the fact that the killer seemed to have religious reasons for doing his killing bothered me. It does, but that was mitigated by several things. One, so many killers in books, movies and TV are portrayed as “religious nuts” that one becomes used to the whole thing. Two, sadly, we hear too often on the news that someone very much like “The Abortionist” has done some gruesome killing using religion as justification. Three, Michael dealt very well with the subject in the Epilogue by saying that the guy wanted to kill and wrapped in religiosity to justify his evil, much like suicide bombers wrapping themselves in a few words from the Koran and missing the message of the rest of the book.

For my like-minded readers (evangelical Christians), the murders were recounted with perhaps too much gruesome detail. There are a couple of sex scenes and one or two of the victims were described as being unclothed. There is swearing throughout the book.

Technically, a couple of minor spelling and grammatical lapses were noticed.

None of these, however, took away from the story line and the underlying debate about abortion. Caughill has done a good job of being fair to both sides of the abortion debate and looking at the human drama underneath. This he has wrapped up in a gripping story that is worth the read.

Don’t get bogged down in trying to analyze the beliefs of the various characters. Enjoy the story. The Abortionist is worth your time.

Waukesha Carnival 02/08/2009

Welcome to this week’s edition. It’s gettin’ late and I have to work tomorrow, so let’s get to it.

First sad news, Darryl Enriquez at Waukesha FYI tells us about the Waukesha Freeman layoffs. One of those laid off was photographer and Waukesha blogger Byron Houlgrave, who shared the last picture he clicked for the Freeman.

Continuing in Waukesha city, Jeff reviews the fish fry at Michael’s Italian America Restaurant at Five Points Blog.

James Wigderson went to the Waukesha Common Council meeting and shares his thoughts with us at Wigderson Library & Pub.

Spiralling out a little, Linda Richter at Inside New Berlin finds the security cameras in schools unsettling and it’s not just the price tag.

At peterepublic, Pete Fanning drops by to remind us he’s still alive, just very, very very busy.

Kyle Prast at Practically Speaking reminds us that US Rep. Sensenbrenner and state Rep. Leah Vukmir will have several town halls. One is past, two are upcoming.

In posts about state news, Wisconsin Sen. Mary Lazich (chief aide Kevin Fischer?) points out at Conservatively Speaking that the Wisconsin Covenant program could be costly.

In a couple of miscellaneous posts, Curt Otto gives us the question to last week’s answer, or something like that. Any way it’s all over at Maple & Main.

Meanwhile, over at the Spring City Chronicle, Michael Phelps gets the Bonehead of the Week award. Pretty much a unanimous vote, I would say.

Then in posts on national issues, MommaBlogger takes time out to rant over that Florida case of the botched abortion at Homemakers Guide to the Galaxy.

Dan Deibert shows us how fast government can move when they want to, with pictures at The D Spot.

Alex has some thoughts about Republican votes and raises at A Little off Main.

At The Other Side of  My Mouth, Tim Rock has some thoughts on the Republican vote on the stimulus package.

Silent e tells us why Democrats are unpatriotic at silent e speaks.

Cindy Kilkenny has a two-parter over at Fairly Conservative on building our own stimulus package.

Dad29 points out that the American people seem to be understanding the ramifications of the stimulus package.

Whew, that’s it for another long one. As usual, if you have one you liked add the link in the comments below or e-mail me at thoughtfulconservative [at] yahoo [dot] com. Same for posts you’d like to nominate for next week’s carnival. It doesn’t have to be one of your own. Links to our archives and future editions can be found here.

Waukesha Carnival – No football Sunday edition

OK, this is late. Google Reader decided to quit working last night. But this is edition 50, IIRC. But let’s not rest on our laurels.

Beginning with posts on national topics. silent e has a question at silent e speaks now that administrations have changed. I can answer it. No. We’ve got at least one more year.

Dad29 opines that Obama calling out Rush Limbaugh a rookie mistake. He’s right. He only increased Rush’s audience. James Rowen has the tack Obama should take.

At Wigderson Library & Pub, James Wigderson has some points to make about living and blogging in the Obama era. That’s what I’ll try to follow. Will I criticize? Yes. But I’ll try not to nit pick. I hope my readers will never find Obama Derangement Syndrome here.

MommaBlogger at Homemaker’s Guide to the Galaxy has some info on CPSIA. I hear libraries will feel the effects also.

Dan Diebert shares at The D Spot a picture that belies the enviro-consciousness of the president’s followers.

Kyle Prast links to a thought-provoking pro-life ad at Practically Speaking.

A little bit closer to home Concernedcitizen lets us know he’s still at Skeptics Anonymous. The usual suspects are at fault for his lack of posting. It happens.

Huckleberry Dumbell crowns his Bonehead of the Day, the Oconomowoc Common Council. You can read why at The Spring City Chronicle.

Dave posts about a lunch at Sprizzo’s at Five Points Blog.

Alexander at A Little off Main has a name for Republicans who are fine with the stimulus increase government spending and want their share–RINO.

Linda Richter at Inside New Berlin notes the return of Jefferson Davis and Ted Wysocki.

The Asian Badger gives some perspective on Flight 1549 and links to FL390 where the Airbus 320 pilot who blogs there gives even more perspective.

Finally, a couple of miscellaneous posts. First, Byron Houlgrave has a nice sports shot.

At Fairly Conservative, Cindy Kilkenny links to a couple of piece’s that would be worth a read by all of us. Unfortunately, the title played havoc with my internet filter as did the title of one of the articles.

And Scott Feldstein brings us home with some nice thoughts on reading to kids.

That’s it for this edition. If you have posts from last week you think should be here, note the link in the comments. Also if you see something for next week’s carnival, place a link in the comments here.

Waukesha Carnival

Welcome to this week’s edition, the thirty-eighth dating back to September 16 of last year. This is where I share the links of noteworthy posts of the preceding week. Feel free to share other posts in the comments.

Let’s see what we have locally.

OK, this has nothing to do with the free mug I got at Drinking Right, but those of you who have met or read JJ Gravelle at The Daily Scoff, just knew that he would deal with the New Berlin-Pewaukee urination bruhaha in a tasteful and sensitive way.

Continuing in the sports vein, Dan at Skeptics Anonymous thinks last season was a pretty good one for the Brewers.

Scott Berg at his blog 359 Degrees talks about the Brookfield city Finance Committee meeting.

Josh at Blog Waukesha wonders Is there competition to Kramer? as he blogs on the race for the 97th district of the Wisconsin Assembly.

If you don’t go to Spring City Chronicle for Huckleberry Dumbell’s daily news summaries or his Sunday Scans, you should at least go for his ghost blogging and poetry which he combines here. And it’s annotated!

James Wigderson blogs at Wigderson Library & Pub about his weekly column in the Waukesha Freeman (always worth the 50 cents) where he blogs about free speech.

silent E speaks about a great piece by Michelle Malkin he read concerning Joe the plumber.

Cindy Kilkenny at Fairly Conservative fact checks the factcheckers in her post Why you should never trust CNN.

Alex at Hobo Springs is relieved McCain is finally saying he’s not George Bush.

And Kyle Prast maintains at Practically Speaking that the presidential election is not over yet.

MommaBlogger shares a recipe for Apple Grilled Cheese at Homemaker’s Guide to the Galaxy.

State Sen. Mary Lazich (aide Kevin Fischer?) compares abortion to light bulbs in this post, Pro-choice, but not about light bulbs at Conservatively Speaking.

Similarly, at Common Sense Waukesha, Dean Culver posts his thoughts on Liberal Hypocrites.

Finally, to post only on gloom is just not right. Dad29 cures that with some bank humor.

That concludes this week’s edition. You can always submit your favorite post of the week using this submission form. Or you can e-mail it directly to me at thoughtfulconsevative [at] yahoo [dot] com. Or put it in the comments of this post.

Past and future editions can be found on our here for your perusal.

PC run amok (some more)

Post conception fertility control? Follow the links here.

This week’s Waukesha Carnival

Welcome to this week’s edition of a Waukesha carnival.

We start off with David B. Bohl who presents High Maintenance Friends and How to Deal With Them at his blog Slow Down Fast Today!

Turning to local news, Fox Head gives us his take on the Milwaukee Police Department report on voter fraud.

Jeff at Five Points is largely in favor of the proposed Harley event in downtown, but has some concerns. He has some related thoughts on parking and shopping.

Curt Otto gives us some informatin about downtown in Tales from the West Side.

James Wigderson follows up on The Great Lakes Water Debate with this post.

Spring City Chronicle, known for his dispatches from the local dailies, also posts poems regularly. I thought this one on the Red Cross Nurses was excellent.

Continuing the trend of non-political posts, soniabologna, a new poster at Eat Wisconsin, shares the greatest kitchen tool we’re not using. I don’t use one because I haven’t seen one big enough for my use.

Cindy Kilkeeny posts her pictures from Morocco.

MommaBlogger at Homemaker’s Guide to the Galaxy proclaims the birth of Zachary William.

Where did Lisa go? She answers her own question at the link.

Back to politics, Troy Fullerton wonders what happened to free market Republicans, specifically in48 relationship to wine distribution.

Dad29 gives some insight into the Progressive Movement in Wisconsin.

Kyle Prast informs us that Dr. Alveda King, the daughter of Dr. Martin Luther King, is coming to visit the area. She will be the keynote speaker for the Pregnancy Help Center fund raising Gala this Thursday at Brookfield Suites.

That concludes this edition. If you have some post to submit to the next edition use this convenient carnival submission form. Past posts and future hosts can be found on the blog carnival index page. Or, you can e-mail them directly to me at thoughtfulconservative [at] yahoo [dot] com.