A Tale for Winter Should Be Warmer

Winter's Tale

by Mark Helprin

Read on December 25, 2015.

I think this book will end up taking the prize for Most Disappointing Read of 2015. Possibly split with Neal Stephenson's The Diamond Age. Close call.

My expectations for Winter's Tale were high, and it delivered in several ways. Colors are a theme of the book, and that jives nicely with Helprin's writing style. The man can describe the hell out of a landscape, a weather system, a painting. He gets even better when describing fantastical things, like the tremendous animals that live, unmoving, while constantly moving across the space of the entire universe. It sounds hokey when I write it, but not when he does. The existence of the Lake of the Coheeries and its inhabitants and their relationship with New York City are fascinating.

But for the disappointment - that came from the book's underpinnings. The value system or morality that runs through the text is vastly different from my own personal one. For example, a character at one point essentially tells another that it's a privilege for the poor to be ground up and spit out by the workings of the universe, because it's a wonderful honor to be so close to the machinery.  Like, ewwww.  Many times, it's implied that all injustices, instances of terrible bad luck, and criminal acts are all OK, because, well, they just are. Somehow cosmically, the balance sheet will zero itself out one day and people will be rewarded with a glimpse of a perfectly just world. And, that's it. Just a glimpse, indicated by a flooding gold light. So, yeah. Some foggy, vague idea of a fleeting moment of justice somehow makes everything else that came before better. (SPOILER ALERT: Plus, I think Abby returning to life invalidates the whole damned thing. Was her death part of the balance, or was it not?  Make up your mind about this stuff.)

Kindness is not valued in this book. Love only makes an appearance, as far as I can tell, twice, maybe thrice. It's frustrating, because, to my mind, without those two things, what on earth is there? Justice is a good answer, but it cannot stand alone.

Or in other words, I don't think I'll ever completely trust someone in a position of comfort and security telling me, "It's not so bad that some people get horrible lots in life. It's all part of a cosmic plan, just trust me on this." And yes, that has the implications you are probably thinking that it has.

Final Call:

The pure descriptive power rates the stars but can't hide a lack of heart. 

If you like this, try:

I don't even know.

I'm Not Alone!

Leave Me Alone, I'm Reading

by Maureen Corrigan

Read on December 17, 2015.

I picked this up for a friend, and decided to read it before I passed it on. I'm really glad I did. The book is in three parts, and the last one spoke to me less than the first two, but overall this is still a very strong book. Corrigan talks a lot about female characters in literature. I was particularly fascinated by the observation that, traditionally, most male protagonists have adventures. They do something tangible, tackle an injustice, take out the bad guy. Women in literature, on the other hand, tend to hold fast through some insufferable situation, using their inner strength to survive until circumstances change around them. I loved how she framed this as the female adventure story. 

Probably the best thing I took away from this book was Corrigan's discussion about how reading many mainstream books with male protagonists as a young Catholic girl affected her throughout her life. I can relate very much to those effects, as someone who was raised in a family where women are definitely passive and often submissive, all the while also identifying with book characters who took charge and got things done. You can end up with a desire to do things, but an utter lack of confidence when it comes to doing them. In this respect, the book was almost like a free trip to a therapist.

Final Call: 

If you like reading about reading, this is a stand-up entry into the books about books category!

If you like this, try:

Book Lust, by Nancy Pearl

When It All Goes Down, What Do We Keep?

The Girl with All the Gifts

by M.R. Carey

Read on November 14, 2015. 

I can't remember, now, how I found out about this book. This, unfortunately, is a review that I did not write at the time of reading, being the procrastinator that I am.  It's actually four months later, which is bad, but does give me the opportunity to look back and see what has stayed with me over time and through the reading of, hmmm, let's see, twenty-two books since this one.

Surprisingly, the answer is, quite a lot. Melanie as a character is fantastic. Her teacher and the security man and the other traveling companions all still hold a place in my head, despite their names escaping me.

At first, I thought the story was going to take a very different arc. Then, as Melanie and her companions' journey began to take up larger and larger parts of the book, I realized the resolution could not be what I was expecting. There simply wasn't time. The actual resolution is fairly unique, to my knowledge. I would love to read a sequel, although I do not think there are plans for any. I want to see Melanie make her plan a reality. (Note from 2018 - not only is there a movie, there's a stand alone book set in the same universe. Still no actual sequel, though.)

I give this book, overall, pretty high grades for execution. The premise hangs together. People do things based on realistic motivations. The 'science' behind the epidemic and Melanie's existence is not stretched too far. It's about as believable as The Passage, which is pretty good company to be in. And like a lot of other good apocalyptic books, it takes a hard look at humanity and what's worth saving. 

Final Call: 

Mushrooms for the win!

If you like this, try:

Other zombie books are sure to please, so maybe try World War Z by Max Brooks? Both are spins on the traditional zombie tale but I think this one, despite staying at a smaller scale, is more innovative. 

Following Up a Great One

Anil's Ghost

by Michael Ondaatje

Read on November 10, 2015. 

Two things brought this book to my attention. First that it's by the author of The English Patent, a book I adore. Second, it's set in Sri Lanka, a literary location I don't think I've visited. The plot, set around the investigation of war crimes by the government against civilians, seemed promising. 

And, the thing is, it is a good book. Anil has depths, her relationship with Sarath has delicious tension, and Sarath himself is complex. The setting is strong; it's an atmospheric book.

All that being said, it did not impact me in the same way that The English Patient did. Part of that may be that there is no great destructive romantic love driving the plot, part may be that there are just very few books that can rise to the same caliber. Even from the same author.

Final Call: 

If you like this, try:

Ondaatje's other books would be a good place to start, because he's a Sri Lankan native. I'm also planning on reading Wave by Sonali Deraniyagala, which documents her grief after a tsunami affects her family holiday in Sri Lanka. 

Battle of the Apocalypses

Station Eleven

by Emily St. John Mandel

Originally read on October 27, 2015

I'm reading some apocalyptic stuff because its coming up on Halloween and I like to tuck in a creepy, eerie book to mark it.  This year, it's two.  Both deal with apocalypses, and in an interesting turn, Station Eleven briefly alludes to The Passage.  (Even more strangely, the allusion made me realize something about The Passage that I hadn't quite put together before!)

So let's do a direct comparison, because those can be fun:

How We All Die:

TP - Military attempt to build super soldier with immortality virus goes horribly awry.  Vampires.

SE - Superflu epidemic.

Extent of Destruction:

TP - Most of North America is a vampire playground.

SE - 99.9% of humanity dies, worldwide.

Religious Overtones:

TP - Allusions and parallels galore.  Fate/Destiny/God is At Work Here.

SE - Characters deal with what happens through their various religious beliefs, and one character's beliefs are very important, but not a central theme

Is it a Page Turner?

TP - YES.

SE - Occasionally.

Action Scenes:

TP - No problem. Here, have even more action!

SE - Eh.  Most are awkward.

What's the Biggest Problem?

TP - Too many people doing things because of some mysterious feeling or drive.

SE - A religious zealot villain with very little complexity.  

Is it a Good Book?

TP - Hell Yes.

SE - Yes.

What's the Best Part?

TP - The easy, natural power of the storytelling.

SE - The way that the book weaves complications from the time before the flu to consequences after the flu, when you might assume a pandemic would obliterate the past completely.

Final call:

The emphasis on art in several forms is refreshing.  I also get the impression that I would enjoy hanging out with the author.

If you like this try:

Sorry, fresh out of ideas!

Did I Ever Tell You?

Everything I Never Told You 

(Originally read on October 9, 2015)

Here's the obligatory quick read that I usually need after tackling a big brick of a book.  This is a family drama, looking at how different family members react to each other's expectations, before and after a traumatic, life-changing event.  If books were paintings, this would be a watercolor of a rainy day, all gray and pastels.  Muted and sad, but making a pretty picture nonetheless.  

The ending was beautiful, as it was written, with one problem.  SPOILERS FOLLOW: Marilyn feels like she pressured Lydia into taking her own life.  We, the readers, find out that this is not so.  But, after I finished, I realized that Marilyn is never given this knowledge.  No one except the readers and Lydia actually know what happened.  I would think that being convinced you contributed to your daughter's suicide, as a not-psychopathic mother, would destroy a woman, not set her up for a reunion with her somewhat estranged husband.  

The only other complaint is how narrowly most of the characters are defined.  It's almost like the author came up with five descriptors or drivers for each character, and almost everything they do and say reinforces those themes.  I guess what I am saying is that the bones, or architecture, of the story are too close to the surface and it shows in places.

It's still a very nice read.  It was cathartic, in an odd way.

Final Call: 

This is completely worth the time it takes to read it.

If you like this, try:

Never Let Me Go, by Kazuo Ishiguro, because I think it's the only other book I've described as a watercolor painting.

Illywhacker

This is a Booker Prize finalist from the 1980s, and I am left to wonder if maybe it doesn't age very well.  I think it's supposed to be a grand statement about the spirit and character of Australia, with comedy and tragedy and everything in between and everything a little fantastical, too.  

The general theme, i.e., lies and their value and what they say about the people who tell them and listen to them, is very intriguing.  Unfortunately, a lot of the book doesn't really address it.  You read on and on about improbable people doing improbable things in improbable ways, and then before you know it everyone's living in cages in a pet store.  No, really.  Maybe every 20 pages or so, you get a quick little flash of really insightful or beautiful text that you can't tie to the rest of it.  The balance is off, for me.  Or maybe it's just that I am not familiar enough with Australia to get all of the in jokes.

This is the only Peter Carey book I have read to date, but I get the impression that several of his other titles might have been a better place to start.  I also cannot tell you how much I dislike the cover.

Final call:

This book actually might be right up a lot of people's alleys, especially if those alleys are very literary and enjoy world fiction particularly, so don't write it off on my account.     

The Diamond Age

I .... just don't know about this one.  The premise sounds beyond promising:  a young girl (ok, street urchin) in the future gets her hands on a smartbook programmed to essentially raise said child to be subversive, and before you know it, the entire world's in trouble.  

But the execution is a bit off.  Instead of getting tighter, the story spins off into weird subplots.  Poor Hackworth, always hapless, and disappearing from his family for ten years.  Sort of.  Miranda's in the story, then she's out of it sort of, then she's suddenly the key to it all.  And here's a sentence I never thought I'd have reason to type: the sexually transmitted data plot line was a huge turn off in a book about raising young girls.  It just didn't fit the mood or style and reaaalllllly slowed down the story. 

Sometimes books go astray by going for a big picture at the end, and giving no closure for the characters we've loved the entire book.  The Diamond Age is the exact opposite.  Just a few pages from the end of this looooooonng saga, we're still hearing incredibly specific details about how characters are fighting in the street.  Then, the book ends.  It's so bogged down in the minutia that I have no idea how the large scale competition between the Feed and the Seed is actually going to shake down.  Worse, I have no idea whether Hackworth is helping the Seed or not, or whether it's even a good thing.  

Gah!

Final call:

I can't give a book with this much humor and imagination less than four stars, but it probably deserves three. 

The Years of Rice and Salt

Somehow, I read a synopsis of this book somewhere, and bought it, and read the back of it, and still managed to not realize what the book was about!

I thought it looked at how life in Africa might have proceeded if European colonization had not occurred.  And yes, that is a part of it, albeit a very small part.  I missed the whole let's rewrite global history as if the Plague breakouts in the 1300s had killed almost everyone Western Europe, instead of only one third of them.  And I definitely had no idea about the strong Buddhist bent to the plot.  Not that any of that is a bad thing, but I rarely go into a book so off course as to what I was about to read!  

This one lies pretty solidly in that grand science fiction tradition of using alternate worlds and/or histories to question how society operates.  The author is compared to James Michener, too, since both have written epic fictionalized histories that follow generations (not quite generations in this case, but the effect is similar). I realized that it's been quite a while since I've read something in either of those veins.

So, this one was hot and cold for me.  There were parts that were frankly just beautiful, but more and bigger parts were a slog.  I had 15 pages left last night to finish this entire 700+ page book and couldn't do it.  That, like, never happens.  Some of the issue comes from the difficulties of covering so much time relatively quickly - the pace gets very uneven.  Some of it comes from the extended discussions, which were really mini-lectures, on the fabric of religion and civilization, although actually many times those were interesting to me.  

There are 10 books, I most liked Awake to Emptiness and The Widow Kang.  For a long time I thought the book's title had no specific meaning, but Widow Kang has a wonderful explanation.  The discussion of reincarnation in the last few pages of the book is both amazing and wickedly clever.     

Maybe most troubling is that I'm not sure what the big picture is.  The book seems to make judgments about particular religions/civilizations, but some of them don't seem correct, even within the context of the book.  But I think I would need more time than I'm willing to commit to untangle everything. 

Final call:

I wouldn't say that this book has broad appeal, but it's also pretty approachable.  If you feel like walking on the philosophical wild side, give it a go.

The Tiger's Wife

The big "thing" with this book, if you read know anything about it at all, is that it's a blend of the realistic and the mythic.  A major theme is how people turn real events into stories to comfort themselves or help them make sense of their lives.  But exactly how this works with the events and stories presented in the book, I'm not always sure.  The diggers in the vineyard, those were obvious.  And the way the deathless man's role seemed to mirror what a doctor's role is, knowing who will live and who will die.  The tiger seemed like a symbol for outside influences pulling on a very insular village, dangerous and to be distrusted.  I could make those connections.  But the tiger's wife herself, and Luka, and the apothecary, and their back stories, those remain opaque to me. 

How almost any of this relates to Natalia and her grandfather, I don't know.  Aside from it all supposing to be very Balkan.  Despite Natalia saying that the key to understanding her grandfather lies between the stories of the tiger's wife and the deathless man, I struggled to pull together any grand connections between the stories and his life.

Then there's war.  The entire book is painted on a backdrop involving various and numerous wars.  Sometimes you get lost and can't remember which war caused what to happen.  The author plays it as another facet of the Balkan cultural attitude, which may not be fair, I think.  Certainly it's what led me to see the tiger and his wife as the "outside" and the "different" sparking conflict.  

I do get the impression the author was trying to use animals to make us see plainly what humans hide, particularly the costs of stress from war.

I thought I would like this book more than I did.  Which is not to say I didn't like it; I predicted that this would be an easy five stars for me, and it's a solid four instead.  I'm not sure I completely got what the author was throwing out there, but I was able to interpret (i.e. make stuff up!) enough on my own to feel satisfied.  

Final call:

I say read it, and don't stress out about trying to figure everything out on the first go.  This is an impressionist painting done in words - individual parts may make no sense, but the overall effect is clear enough.

In the Woods (Not Literally, This Time)

Here's another book I picked up recently and decided to wedge in to this year's reading list (like many things in my life, chalk it up to a Chambersburg thrift store).  Part of the attraction was that it's set in Dublin and its suburbs.  And the other attraction is that every once in a while I just have a hankering for a good detective novel.  Plus, this one's set up is pretty engaging, when you read the back cover.

What I wasn't expecting was the quality of the writing.  Tana French is good!   And funny!  She's got a sly way with it.  She has great adjectives.  She describes someone's voice as "Daffy Duck with a Donegal accent," for pete's sake.  French is good at character development, too, because at the heart of this mystery, she's really exploring the personalities of and relationship between the two lead detectives.

There are two mysteries in this book:  one based in Detective Ryan's past, and the one he's investigating in the present.  We do get an answer - terrifying and unsatisfactory as it may be - to the present-day mystery.  The past mystery, though, that one's handled in a more artful and subjective manner, and we come, along with Detective Ryan, to accept that we'll never know what happened.  Considering I was afraid the book would go all Shutter Island on me, that's a relief, actually.

The whole shebang, in all its aspects, is just handled very well.

Final call:

Aaaaaaaand now I have more books to read, because I found out that this is the first book in the Dublin Murder Squad series.  A wonderful problem to have!

The Anubis Gates

I do know how this book made it on to my list   I saw an article about the origins of steampunk and it included this title, saying that it's also one of the best science-fiction books around.  Then I found it at a library book sale.  Done, and done!  Since I feel like I have a lot of random thoughts about it, let's just do a bulleted list:

• The Anubis Gates reminded me of a book from earlier this year, Drood.  That book also has Egyptian cults and lots of subterranean London action, so maybe it's not so surprising.  Both books were also on the Dickensian side of things, although at least in The Anubis Gates, Dickens himself is not a character!
• This is one of the just plain cleverest books I've gotten my hands on.  The plot zips in and around and over itself perfectly.  There are layers and layers behind what's happening and why.
• The mystery of William Ashbless is a hoot.  You figure it out pretty quickly, but then find out that you really didn't know everything after all.
• The ending is just fantastic.  One of the more perfect ones I've come across lately.
• The part that happens in actual Egypt sticks out like a sore thumb from the rest of the book but it's one of the best parts.  So is the trip back to the 1600s.
• When the book tips over into the horror side of things, it gets really horrific.  The idea of a body-switching werewolf is especially terrifying, not to mention an evil clown on stilts.
• Who knew Samuel Taylor Coleridge had it in him!
• This is one of the earliest examples of steampunk, and it's really interesting to compare it to the genre now.  For instance, aside from magic/sorcery/time travel, there really isn't much in the way of alternative history, or steam-driven technologies that didn't exist at the time.  No dirigibles, no protagonists running around with aviator goggles.  No people with mechanical eyes or other body parts.  But the atmosphere is there, for sure.  The high action, the humor, the tongue-in-cheek feel to the plots you sometimes get.  It also reminds me very much of the Parasol Protectorate books, minus the technological fancies.
• It's really wordy!  I found a long paragraph that was actually one sentence!

Final call:

I'd give this book the time of day, any day.  And I don't think you have to be a sci-fi or fantasy nut to enjoy it. 

Life After Life (after life after life)

I have a lot of stories that begin with, "I stopped in at the library ..." and this is one of them.  I usually go in to check their book sale room.  This time I saw A God in Ruins on the new fiction shelf.  Just out in May of 2015, and I could walk out with it, no waiting, no cost, three weeks, all mine.  So, of course, I did.  The only issue?  You have to, or should, read Life After Life first, because A God in Ruins is a companion piece and I was afraid it wouldn't make sense to read them in the wrong order, or to read one without the other.

It's no spoiler to say that this book has a unique structure.  Ursula Todd lives her life over and over again, with circumstances changing slightly or greatly from time to time.  It takes her quite a few tries to live past childhood.  That she makes a probably successful attempt on Hitler's life is revealed on the second page.  The rest of the book is, more or less, explaining how and why she got to that point.

The mechanism behind the repeat lives is never explained, it doesn't need to be.  There are some marvelously dark humorous vignettes, particularly centered around the Spanish Influenza epidemic.  Ursula's growing awareness of her looping lives is a neat aspect of the plot.  The actual "larger picture" is not defined - I have my theory of what happens and why, but I suspect that it doesn't match up with others' ideas or even the author's, necessarily.  But more on that with the next book!    

I have Life After Life as an ebook.  I recommend tackling this with a paper copy.  I would love to have been able to flip back and forth through the sections easily.  Each begins with a date and sometimes it's easy to forget when and where you are.

The few glaring loose ends turn out to be mostly addressed in A God in Ruins.

Final call:


I'm actually really tempted to bump this up to five stars.  But I'm withholding that final star, well, because, you'll see.

Two Booker Prize Winners: Hotel du Lac and The Bone People

I'm so far behind in reviewing books that you're getting a two-fer.  These books both won the Booker Prize, and they both left me a little cold.  So why not pair them here.

First up, Hotel du Lac by Anita Brookner.  This was a very late addition to my 2015 Challenge List, one I never told you about.

This is a slim little volume, certainly eligible for my "Perfect Little Books" shelf.  But I don't think it's going to get there, not quite.  This is a Booker Prize winner, so my opinion of it takes me a little by surprise, although from what I read, many thought it was not the strongest book in the year it won.

Don't get me wrong, I more or less enjoyed reading it.  But I do feel a failure to connect with much of the book's intellectual heft.  I think, maybe even hope, that it's because I've grown up in a different era from Edith, the main character.

This book is very much about the feminine world, i.e., the world as inhabited by females.  I don't think you can accuse Anita Brookner of feminism, though.  She spends a lot of time looking at women with personality problems who happily or unhappily fill the roles society has provided for them.  Except, maybe Edith, who by the end of the book, has bucked society's expectations of her not once, but twice.  (Although I don't know that returning to England to continue in her mistress role is really that avant garde.  Women have been mistresses for millenia.  You could argue it's a traditional role.)

Edith spends an increasing amount of time in the book conversing with Mr. Neville.  It's a good chunk of these talks, and Edith's observations on other characters, that sometimes remain opaque for me.  Edith's saying words, and Neville responds with more words, and I understand them all individually, but taken together I'm not always sure what they are getting at.  This is just intermittent, though.

Final call:


Really, this is a three and a half.  The writing is artful, but didn't really speak to me.  I wouldn't put it high on your list.

And now, for The Bone People by Keri Hulme.

This is a really cool book in a lot of ways, with so much potential. Sure the narrator is an author stand-in, and she has all these super-duper-but-unrealistic-to-find-in-one-person talents. But I really like the concept of the three main characters all needing something from each other to heal, and seeing how Kerewin builds bridges despite being hurt and volatile herself. I like the weird artsy stuff that blends its way into the narrative. I like the strange little inventions that Kerewin and Simon create. There's a lot of humor in the book, although a lot of it's grim or sarcastic.

I do not appreciate at all how the abuse was handled. I read the book as each of the three - Kerewin, Joe, and Simon - having to face crisis and come through transformation in order to heal emotionally. But Simon really got the short end of that stick. Kerewin, and Joe especially, take their failings out on Simon. Then they both go through their own near-death experiences and are "saved" by some mystical processes that aren't really clear. They come out the other side, somehow, wiser and more in tune with their Maori heritage. (Joe's story requires some extremely wild leaps of imagination, too.) So these two are supposed to be redeemed, I guess, by all this.

Now take Simon. He's 6-7 years old, he's a mental mess for good reason, and he's often drunk or drugged out of his mind in the story. Joe abuses him. At first you think it's "just" a whack here and there. Later, you realize it's serious and frequent beatings. Then, Joe very nearly kills him and does cause permanent damage to Simon's hearing and facial structure. Jeeeeesus. I don't think there's a character under any sun in any universe that can come back from that, for me. Certainly not by flinging himself off of a cliff, experiencing some strange interactions with an old guy, and then inheriting the old guy's secret Maori god-thing while being miraculously healed himself.

Of course, at the end, Simon still loves Joe, and Kerewin, who is indirectly responsible for the final savage beating. Warped love is all Simon knows and he isn't the best judge of what's good or right in the world.  What 6 year old is??? I think that's what angers me - that Simon bears it all in this story. No mystical healing potions for him, he's left with his horrible scars and lost hearing and a devoted love for those who did the damage. While the very culpable adults are absolutely healthy and just feel guilty every once in a while when they notice Simon's face. The author doesn't seem to see him as a real boy at the end, just this construct to help Joe and Kerewin finally get in touch with each other and their inner Maori. Which I guess is fine, but don't think the average reader will appreciate it, given the sensitivity of the topic.

Final call:


Another Booker Prize winner that comes close, but just sorta misses the boat at the end.

Orange is the New Black

A nonfiction book!  What a change of pace!  For those who have seen the television series about life in a women’s prison, this is the book its loosely based on.  To sum it up very quickly:  well-to-do white girl goes to federal prison on an old drug charge, makes friends, and influences people.

There are some eye-opening pieces of information here.  That the federal system can move so slowly, to the point that people who have reformed themselves are doing time for charges in their relative youths.  Piper Kerman, the author, waited for six years to find out the disposition for her case!  The crimes she committed were ten years old when she entered prison.  It all seems a bit ridiculous.

For the actual time in prison – there were a lot of astute observations, and they were blended in to the general story well enough.  Nothing came across as preachy or as having an agenda, except for Kerman’s opinion on the US’s war on drugs, which I think is one gaining more and more traction of late.

As an piece of writing – I wasn’t terribly impressed.  Pretty average stuff, really.  It was a bit hard to follow a timeline.  Something would sound endless, and then you’d realize it was a day or two. People were introduced in a way that made you think you should know who they were, when it was really the first time they’d been talked about.  Little trip-ups like that.

I will admit, one aspect of the book rubbed me the wrong way.  I’m sure Kerman was only trying to demonstrate how her perspective cannot be said to be an average one.  That she had more resources than most people, both in dealing with the legal aspects of her case and in making prison life more bearable.  But she comes across as weirdly boastful many times:  I had so many visitors.  My family still loved me despite everything.  I had hundreds of books mailed to me.  These hard-boiled women procured numerous difficult-to-find things for me because I was so awesome.  My friend created an executive job in his business so I could work post-release.  It got a little old after a while, although I am sure it was not done with deliberate intent.  It also read to me as Kerman knowing she was privileged, but still possibly not aware of just how privileged.

Final call:


I actually brush up to similar issues (what is the purpose of prison, do nonviolent people really belong there, how much rehabilitation should occur, how can people reintegrate in society) in my day job, and while Kerman’s story is interesting, the questions it raises are really pretty basic now.  I’m happy to say that, looking back over the 10 years since the book was published, there has been plenty of public policy debate about these questions.  Unfortunately, it seems to be because we can’t afford to put more people in prison, not because people see a better way to deal with crime and punishment.

Euphoria

This book is not a part of my pre-arranged reading list this year.  But when I stumbled across a fictionalized take on Margaret Mead’s life, with a cover like that?  I was a goner.  Take a minute and look at that cover again.  I was over a third of the way through the book when I realized the cover has a photographic credit.  That’s a picture, not a painting, folks.  A rainbow gum tree’s bark, which plays a small part in the book.  Thank goodness that’s not something she made up (see below).

It's appropriate that it shows up in the middle of my posts on Ireland, because I read this during the trip (somewhat unusual for me, also see below).

For the text itself – I love this book but I’m still not sure why.  No one should ever say what I just did, that this is a fictionalized take on Margaret Mead.  It’s an author who thought, oh, three anthropologists in New Guinea, what a wonderful start.  Let’s change their names slightly but make everything else up!  I think my love comes from King just doing such a good job of making everything else up.  There is a real emotional richness to the story.  And King winds it all up much more neatly, if also far more dramatically, than the threads appear to have been tied in real life.

There are some slip ups, particularly in research.  I read a review complaining that the book mentions the howling of monkeys, when monkeys are not found in New Guinea.  And I found another one – describing thousands of white osprey lifting off of a lake.  Birders know that white ospreys are not a thing and that your standard osprey wouldn’t be caught dead acting like that, much less with thousands of its peers.  They’re essentially hawks, for crying out loud.

But in the end it just seems like more of King’s imagination at work.  She needed thousands of white osprey for a particular moment in the story, and they didn’t exist, so she made them up.  That’s impressive in an odd way, and it IS a beautiful moment in the book.  I can forgive that.

Final call:


I always take books on vacation, but I rarely find the time to read them.  That I started and finished this during a fantastic visit to Ireland should tell you how strongly it was pulling on me.  I should give it a five based on pure entertainment value, but I know this book is like ice cream.  Tasty but not  a lot of nutritional value :)

The Sound of Waves

Here’s the book that made me create a new shelf on my Goodreads profile.  What shelf is that, you ask?  It’s one called “Perfect Little Books.”  It has a few other slim volumes for company – The Optimist’s Daughter by Eudora Welty, The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaimain, and A Virtuous Woman by Kaye Gibbons.  I drew an arbitrary line at 200 pages – if you’re perfect and you’re under that, you’re in!

For a short book, The Sound of Waves by Yukio Mishima is full of atmosphere.  The ocean, the sea, the waves are always in the background and often at the forefront.  This is a timeless story – I was well into it before a few mentions of movies or wartime activities made me realize this is indeed set in the 1950s.  It seems much earlier, and I think intentionally reads as myth or fable.  A simple story of teenage love with plenty of beautiful observations couched in wonderful prose.  A story where those who do the honorable thing are rewarded. 

In the end, the effect is almost hypnotic.  All that being said, I found the story of the author’s life to be more interesting than this particular book. Mishima committed ritual suicide while in his 40s, after he completed a set of four books he considered to be his masterpiece.

As a total tangent - I would love to know more about the cover art, because, yes, that's a fish with some jewels wrapped around it!

Final call:

   

Really four and a half.  Highly recommended for a time when you need a peaceful read.  Take some time to read about the life of the author, too.

Trouble with Troubles

This is the second of two books with Irish connections that I wanted to read prior to our vacation there later this year.  Now that I have read both, I'm thinking there are probably better ones I could have picked, lol.  Neither particularly make you want to go to Ireland, that's for sure.  I have to say, the edition I have has a goofy cover.  I don't know why but it just hits the wrong note with me.

I guess then maybe its not too surprising that the rest of the book went on to be slightly off key, too.  The first issue was just that it took me a long time to figure out the tone of the book.  It's pure farce, but its slower and more detailed than most.  The setting and the people are all symbols, and don't really act as you would expect.  The second issue is the dark humor.  Now, I love dark humor, but hoo boy, this was DARK.  Imagine Three Men in a Boat with guerrilla warfare, abundant animal cruelty, and near-rapes.  I have to wonder what cats ever did to Farrell.  I'm sure they were symbols for something, too.

But on the whole, this was a timely read.  This book follows a group of Anglo-Irish living in a crumbling hotel in Ireland during the years (1919-1921) that Irish Nationalists were clashing with the ruling British in extremely violent ways that eventually led to Irish independence.  The violence is mostly a backdrop, which becomes illuminated by the attitudes and actions of those in the hotel, those of the British "status quo."

This is perfectly illustrated when the hotel's owner grouses about his exceedingly poor tenants stealing from his field crops.  The protagonist of the book, the Major, then points out that you can't expect people to willingly starve themselves to death to appease the owner's sensibilities.  Of course this falls on deaf ears.

All in all, a lot of the attitudes and actions remind me of current recent events in the U.S., although of course the political context is different.  But a privileged and powerful group not understanding why a disenfranchised and impoverished group might resort to violence, that sounds awfully familiar.

Final call:

Troubles is clever and insightful but still didn't win my heart over.  I certainly wouldn't tell anyone to not read it, though!

The Gathering

There are two books by Irish authors on my Challenge list this year that I wanted to read before we actually travel to Ireland:  Troubles by J.G. Farrell and The Gathering by Anne Enright.

The Gathering fills me with ambivalence.  Part of the issue is that I don't have much common ground with the characters naturally.  A Protestant American only child is very far from the sufferings felt by a child from a very large Irish Catholic family.  But having an unfamiliar point of view isn't that uncommon, who wants to read only books about situations they know about?  Something else is wrong, too.  

I think it's mostly that Veronica Hegarty, the narrator, does a pretty poor job of explaining things.  She keeps everyone, even us, at a distance.  After a short while, you realize she's miserable and has a hard time distinguishing memory from imagination.  She also has a very unsettling way of referring to her body and everyone's genitalia in the most awkward and uncomfortable ways possible.  The reasons for this emerge, but like most books with unlikable first person narrators, it makes for something of a grueling read.

Another thing I have noticed is that if the back cover of a book makes reference to a mysterious family secret with long-term repercussions - nine times out of ten it's going to be sexual abuse of a child or teen.  Spoiler alert:  The Gathering is one of the majority.  That may actually be why Behind the Scenes at the Museum was so refreshing - now there's a family that was very thoroughly messed up but next to none of it had to do with sexual abuse.

Not saying by any means that it's not a topic worth writing about.  But it's almost cliche, the way it comes out in The Gathering.  

All that being said, Enright is a fine writer.  She has a great style.  Sharp little sentences that can nick you like a knife.  The best part is that the end does seem to point to optimism in the face of all of Veronica's problems.

Final call:

Skip this if you don't like reading stories narrated in the first person by characters who have a lot of issues, to put it mildly.  Veronica's a tough pill to swallow.

A Strange Pairing

I recently read two books that are similar on one level but very different on others.  Both of them are on my 2015 Challenge list, but it was more or less chance that I read them back to back.

Jhumpa Lahiri's Interpreter of Maladies is a short story collection.  I understand that the first story and the title story tend to be thought of as the best, but I have to say that I enjoyed the second story very much.  A tale of American children of Indian descent out trick-or-treating, while a visiting Bangladeshi scholar doesn't know if his family is dead or alive because of ongoing political turmoil surrounding the partition of Pakistan and Bangladesh.  That some children are imagining bogeymen and collecting candy, at the same time and on the same earth as children who may be victims of a civil war.  Those images had staying power for me.    

Final call:

Lahiri has a straightforward style, and her stories appear much simpler than they are.  I think most people would enjoy this book, be one of them.

____________________________

The second book I read is A History of the World in 10 1/2 Chapters by Julian Barnes.  I have read Barnes before, two books actually, but wow.  This one takes the cake.  If I had a graphic for six stars, I would give it that.  

A History of the World is a novel, but you could argue that it's also a collection of short stories.  Ten stories and a personal essay that counts as the half.  At least one of the stories and the essay verges on nonfiction, and the story has a brilliant piece of art criticism.

So, it has a quirky structure and quirky topics for some of the chapters, there are extreme feats of imagination, and plenty of humor, too.  But this is a philosophical novel, at its base.  It seems to read as a deconstruction of religion, but turns into something very different, I think.  His message seems to be that people should seek objective truth, even if it doesn't exist, and be judged by the love they show their fellow humans.  And, that neither history, art, religion, or myth can supply objective truth.  I can't really argue that and have rarely seen it illuminated so creatively.  

I love this book the same way I love Cloud Atlas.  For tackling the big questions, although Barnes does it a lot more directly, even lapsing into his own voice (maybe).  The chapters at first don't seem at all connected, but eventually subtle connections, direct connections, and thematic similarities emerge.  By the end, I realized that the stories are having a philosophical argument among themselves, or at least, demonstrating the principles in the half chapter.

I saw this book compared to Joyce, Calvino, and Mitchell, but you really just have to read it to see what I am talking about.  I also remember thinking this book makes a nice, optimistic pairing to Coetzee's Elizabeth Costello, which seemed to say that Western Civilization was bankrupt and heading for moral crisis.

Final call:

I cannot recommend this book highly enough, but I also don't think the average person would like it.  I'm pretty sure this shouldn't be your first foray into books with disjointed narratives written by author/philosophers.  Maybe start with David Mitchell and Ghostwritten or Cloud Atlas for a taste of where this kind of book can take you.