Why Is Axe Murder Funny? Why Is It Captivating?

Reviewing Rachel McCarthy James’s ‘Whack Job’ and Andrew Klavan’s ‘The Kingdom of Cain’

Tools have a bias toward some uses more than others. It’s an argument I make about books in The Idea Machine, following the observation of media theorist Douglas Rushkoff. “People like to think of technologies . . . as neutral,” he said, “and that only their use or content determines their effect. Guns don’t kill people, after all; people kill people. B…