Author: gr4c5

I write. I read. I cook. I run. That's me, in a nutshell.

Dogs of Riga

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Mankell, Henning. The Dogs of Riga. Read by Dick Hill. Blackstone Audio, 2006.

Reason read: Sweden is beautiful this time of year.

Kurt Wallander is back! I first met the detective in a much later book (book 7). He still drinks too much, still has trouble with relationships and still loves coffee and the opera. This time Kurt is pulled into a Latvian murder mystery. At first, the mystery is centered on two well dressed individuals found dead in a life raft. After it was determined the crime originated out of his jurisdiction Wallander assumes he is off the hook. That is, until the Riga inspector assigned to the case is also found murdered. Complicating matters is the fact Latvia is fresh from breaking ties with Russia. Suspicion runs high and corruption is rampant in Riga. Add a love interest and you get the perfect thriller.

Book trivia: It was such a bummer to learn that this is part of a series and I have started to read them out of order. This is book #2. I already read #7. I said that already.

Author fact: It was such a bummer to learn that Mankell died last year.

Audio fact: read by Dick Hill.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “The Baltic States” (p 34).

August Ahead

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My obsession with moving rocks has come to an end now that the big boys are playing in the backyard. This hopefully means I’ll scale back to just two fanatical activities: running and reading. Or reading and running. I wonder who will win out? I am in the last month of training before the half marathon, but here are the books planned for August:

  • Anarchy and Old Dogs by Colin Cotterill – to continue the series started in May in honor of Laos Rocket Day. I have been able to read other books in the series in one to two days.
  • Dogs of Riga by Henning Mankell – in honor of July being one of the best times to visit Sweden (listening as an audio book).
  • Lost City of Z: a tale of deadly obsession in the Amazon by David Grann in honor of August being the driest month in the Amazon.
  • The High and the Mighty by Ernest Gann in honor of August being Aviation month.
  • If Beale Street Could Talk by James Baldwin in honor of Baldwin’s birth month (print & AB).
  • Children in the Woods by Frederick Busch in honor of Busch’s birth month (short stories).
  • Flora’s Suitcase by Dalia Rabinovich in honor of Columbia’s independence.

PS – on the eve of posting this I ran 7.93 miles. Why the .93? My calf/Achilles started to give me grief so I had to stop. Now I wonder if the running has a chance to catch the books?

Just July

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July was a nutty month. Lots of music: Phish three times, Warren Haynes at Tanglewood, Dead and Company twice, and Coldplay. (August is only Pearl Jam and Mieka Pauley.) We made it up to Monhegan for a week and down to CT twice. And! And. And, I moved a lot of rocks (don’t ask). For the books it was:

  • Milk in my Coffee by Eric Jerome Dickey
  • Disco for the Departed by Colin Cotterill
  • Cranford by Elizabeth Gaskell (AB)
  • The Last Battle by Ryan Cornelius
  • Sign of the Four by Arthur Conan Doyle
  • The Glass Palace by Amitav Ghosh
  • 8:55 to Baghdad by Andrew Eames

I think, once I got used to Dickey’s style, I grew to like Milk but my favorite by far was The Glass Palace by Amitav Ghosh. Is it a movie? Because if it isn’t, it should be. I said that in the review as well.

Full disclosure: I had Lost Upland on my list as well. I simply ran out of time and couldn’t get to it. I’m okay with seven books for the month.

8:55 to Baghdad

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Eames, Andrew. The 8:55 to Baghdad: from London to Iraq on the Trail of Agatha Christie. New York: the Overlook Press, 2005.

Reason read: in honor of the first electric train (July, 1835).

In 2002 Eames embarked on a (mostly) train journey from London, England to Iraq to follow in the footsteps of mystery author Agatha Christie. It is a beyond brilliant idea for Eames is able to weave together a travelogue of his own experiences, historical snapshots of the regions he traverses and an abbreviated biography of one of the world’s best known crime writers of the century. Eames’s journey takes him through Belgium, France, Switzerland, Slovenia, Croatia, Bulgaria, Turkey and Syria; ending in Damascus on the eve of the Gulf War.

Quote I really liked, “Personally, I feel that travel writers have too much of a responsibility towards the unfamiliar to waste their time endorsing that is already very well-trodden” (p 51). Amen to that.
Another quote, “There is no room on the land for anything as frivolous as parkland in this city while there are still drill bits to be rented out and hub caps to be sold, so if you want a quiet moment to puck your nose, read the paper or hold hands with your loved one then a ferry is the place to do it” (p 196). Okay then.
Last one, “And besides, what sort of chat-up lines do you use on a nation with whom you are about to go to war?” (p 290).

Author fact: According to the dust jacket, Eames is an authority on the Nile. Cool.

Book trivia: I wasn’t expecting photographs but there is a nice sprinkling of Eames’s travels as well as a few of his subject, Agatha Christie.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter of course called “Making Tracks By Train” (p 139).

Glass Palace

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Ghosh, Amitav. The Glass Palace. New York: Random House, 2001.

Reason read: Ghosh was born in July.

There is much love for Ghosh’s The Glass Palace. This was the right balance of historical fiction, love story, and political commentary within a sweeping saga. Dolly is a woman who has been in the service of the Queen for as long as she can remember. Rajkumar is an orphan boy taken in by a teak logger and taught the trade. Glass Palace follows them through childhood, their storybook romance, growing families and the inevitable, old age. Intertwined are the stories of their children, their children’s children, war, economics, society, politics, fashion, feminism, and life. The way it was written the story could have been without end.

Quote to quote, “This is how power is eclipsed” (p 36). Don’t hate me but I thought of a John Mayer line, “Power is made by power being taken.” Same thing.

Book trivia: This should have been a movie. It has all the right components: war, beautiful women, explosions, death, romance, cars…Speaking of the cars, Ghosh was especially detailed with the automobiles.

Author fact: Ghosh also wrote Sea of Poppies which is on my Challenge list.

BookLust Twist: Two twists – from Book Lust in the chapter called “Historical Fiction From Around the World” (p 47) and again in Book Lust To Go in the chapter simply called “Burmese Days” (p 47).

Last Battle

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Ryan, Cornelius. The Last Battle. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1966.

Reason read: to finished the series started in honor of D-Day. To be fair, this wasn’t part of a “series” but it made sense to read next since historically, the last battle came after the events in A Bridge Too Far.

I’ve said this before, but one of the best things about reading a Cornelius Ryan book is that it is never ever boring. His books read like a movie (as been said before by many reviewers), complete with characters you root for and villains you love to hate. The very first people you meet in The Last Battle are Richard Poganowska, a 39 year old milk man and Carl Johann Wiberg, “a man more German than Germany” who happens to be an Allied spy. Ryan introduces you to the lesser known elements of war – passionate people who try to save entire orchestras and animals from a war demolished zoo. As an aside, it was heartbreaking to meet Schwartz and his beloved Abu Markub. I’m glad Ryan circled back to their story at the end.
And speaking of the end, this truly is a depiction of the last battles fought in World War II. Ryan circles all the players, leaving no one out: the defenders, the attackers and of course, the civilians. The race to conquer Berlin and the subsequent divvying up of Germany was fascinating.

As an aside, someone went through The Last Battle and sadly, marked it up with a RED pen. How annoying.

Quote that stopped me, “How do you tell sixty nuns and lay sisters that they are in danger of being raped?” (p 26). That was the reality of German Berliners if the Russians took over their city.

Book trivia: The Last Battle is chock full of interesting photographs, including one of the author with one of his subjects.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter (for obvious reasons) called “World War II Nonfiction” (p 254).

Cranford

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Gaskell, Elizabeth. Cranford. Read by Davina Porter. Prince Frederick, MD: Recorded Books, 2008.

Reason read: Cranford takes place in a fictional town in England. In July England celebrates a day called Swan Upping. Swan Upping is the practice of catching mute swans and marking them. As I understand the tradition, any unmarked muted swan belongs to the Monarchy.

This is a weird little book. Picture a society made up mostly of women. In the fictional town of Cranford women run the show. If a new couple arrives in Cranford to settle down sooner or later the man of the house vanishes. This society simply doesn’t need a man…until Captain Brown and his two daughters arrive on the scene. There is no central plot as this was originally published as a satirical serial. However, the entire story is told first person through the eyes of a visitor and most of the story centers on one particular character, Miss Matty (Matilda).

Quotes that caught me, “Things that many would despise, and actions which it seemed scarcely worthwhile to perform, were all attended to in Cranford” (p 32),

Author fact: Mrs. Gasket publish the first biography of Charlotte Bronte.

Book trivia: Cranford was first published as a serial in 1851 and was edited by Charles Dickens.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “The Maine Chance” (p 135), although Cranford doesn’t take place in Maine. Has nothing to do with Maine in any way, as a matter of fact. Pearl was just making a comparison, as usual.

Disco for the Departed

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Cotterill, Colin. Disco for the Departed New York: Soho Press, 2006.

Reason read: to continue the series started in honor of Rocket Day (May).

Dr. Siri is back! We are in the People’s Democratic Republic of Laos and the year is 1977. In this third installment of our reluctant yet humorous coroner we learn more about his life as a shaman, hosting the spirit of Hmong Yeh Ming and how, despite being 73 years of age, Siri grows younger everyday. This time Dr. Siri is called to a small mountain town to solve the mystery of a Cuban buried alive in concrete. While there he is inhabited by a spirit who loves to dance and keeps taking Siri to a disco (hence the title). Nurse Dtui accompanies Siri into the mountains and has her own little romance. We also learn more about Siri’s assistant, Geung Watajak. Interestingly enough, Disco backs up and explains Geung’s arrival into Dr. Siri’s life as morgue assistant which was a nice surprise. I appreciate the building of supporting characters.

Quotes I’d like to quote, “She became renown for wild solo rantings and spontaneous acts of flashing” (p 13), “Socialism was having a negative effect on the weather” (p 79) and one more, “Siri sat alone in the guesthouse restaurant and stared into a mug of coffee so thick you could lose an anchor in it” (p 150).

Book trivia: Like the other Cotterill books before it, Disco for the Departed was a quick read. I read it in one day.

BookLust Twist: obviously from Book Lust to Go in the chapter simply called “Laos” (p 128).

Milk in My Coffee

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Dickey, Eric Jerome. Milk in My Coffee. New York: New American Library, 1998.

Reason read: Cow Appreciation Day is tomorrow – 7/14/16. I kid you not.

The premise is Jordan and Kimberly are supposed to each take turns telling their side of their seemingly doomed romance. While I tagged this “chick lit” it isn’t. Not really. It’s the story of two people trying to overcome the color of their skin and their deep rooted opinions. I appreciated Jordan’s ingrained racism that spoke to a long standing tradition of passing prejudice through history. He continually referred to the South unapologetically, as if that’s just the way it will always be, like it or not. His perceptions of Kimberley as a white woman are generations old. There was more drama in this story expected but that didn’t take away from the story.

Milk in My Coffee is broken into four parts. The first eleven chapters are from Jordan Green’s point of view. Every chapter is titled “Jordan Greene” before it switches to Kimberley Chambers (for one chapter). Wouldn’t it have been simpler (and I would have preferred this) to have one giant section of Jordan Greene narrative?
This isn’t a huge deal, but Milk in My Coffee contains references that date the plot. I didn’t know Erica Kane or Nurse Rachid so I didn’t get the jokes referencing them. Luckily, I know Barney, Vanna White, and Eartha Kitt so they were not a great mystery.

Everyone knows I am nit picky when it comes to dialogue. I want the characters to talk to one another as if they really know each other and are authentic with one another. It bothers me when conversations don’t make sense. To be honest, that only happened once in Milk. Jordan asked what Kimberly was doing for the holidays. She explains about how holidays and her birthday bring her down. They then go off on a mini tangent about birthdays. After that, without missing a beat Jordan asks again about the holidays as if he never asked and she answers in a completely different way.

Dickey is full of cheesy analogies:

  • “More purple than Barney”
  • “More tracks than a Hot Wheels set”
  • “Like microwave popcorn”

Quote I liked (yes, there was only one), “I didn’t know her well enough to earn any heartbreak, but I felt it anyway” (p 14).

Author fact: Dickey’s bio reads like Superman: engineer, stand up comic, able to develop software, best selling author…

Book trivia: Milk in My Coffee is a best seller. Did I mention that?

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “African American: He Say” (p 12).

Black Faces, White Faces

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Gardam, Jane. Black Faces, White Faces. New York: Abacus, 1975.

Reason read: Gardam’s birth month is July.

Black Faces, White Faces loosely links together ten short stories, all taking place in Jamaica; all involving vacationing Brits completely out of their comfort zones. What is special about Black Faces is that Gardam interlocks details as well as characters. For example, a character in one story leaves behind a toy. Another character from another story finds it.
“Babe Jude” – encountering crude vacationers & a language barrier.
“Missus Moon” – foreigners witnessing a funeral.
“Best Day of My Easter Holidays” – a boy’s essay about meeting crazy man Jolly Jackson.
“The Pool Boy” – Lady Fletcher doesn’t want to be so prim and proper.
“The Weeping Child” – Mrs. Ingram tells the story of the ghost of someone who is still alive.
The House Above Newcastle” -Newlyweds Boofey and Pussy are unrecognizable to each other on their honeymoon.
“Saul Alone” – a sad story about a stroke victim observing the people around him.
“The First Declension” – a wife suspects her husband of having an affair while he visits Jamaica.
“Something To tell the Girls” – two teachers on holiday in the mountains of Jamaica.
“Monique” – a woman mourning the loss of her lover.

Quotes I liked: from “Babe Jude” – “He foresaw an agitated lunch and felt depressed” (p 6), from “Best Day of My Easter Holidays” – “We seemed somehow after a very long time to get back to the same place, I don’t know how” (p 19), and from “The Weeping Child” – “Imagination was her rarest occupation” (p 34).

Author fact: Gardam is a Fellow of the Royal British Society of Literature and an Officer of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire.

Book trivia: Black Faces was a little harder to get from a library. I requested my copy from the Boston Public Library.

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “Jane Gardam: Too Good To Miss” (p 96).

Where the Road Ends

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Hicks, Meghan M. and Bryon Powell. Where the Road Ends: a Guide to Trail Running. Champaign, IL: Human Kinetics, 2016.

Reason read: for the Early Review program for LibraryThing. Perfect, isn’t it?

The first time I laid eyes on the cover of Where the Road Ends I instantly thought “cheesy” and when I glanced through the pages I was reminded a little of a middle/grade school textbook, all glossy and full of pictures. But, that is where the fluff ends. As far as content goes, Where the Road Ends is chock full of great information. Most of it might be second nature to the more experience ultra runner but for beginners this book is a perfect must-have. The layout of information chapter by chapter is intuitive, starting with just learning and ending with full-out racing. In between is a plethora of everything you need to know: how trail running differs from the road, how to navigate the terrain, what equipment to use, how to stay fueled and hydrated (especially on the long desert runs), and so on and so on. Don’t judge a book by it’s cover (or lack thereof). This is a well organized informative book.

July on Deck

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July. Summertime. Lots of music (starting with you guessed it, Phish). Lots of running (hopefully all outdoors). Lots of travel, lots of play. Plenty of reading:

  • Milk in My Coffee by Eric Jerome Dickey (in honor of National Cow Appreciation Day on the 14th. I kid you not.)
  • Disco for the Departed by Colin Cotterill (#3 – to continue the series started in May in honor of Rocket Day)
  • The Last Battle by Cornelius Ryan (#3 – to continue the series started in June for D-Day)
  • Cranford (AB) by Elizabeth Gaskell (in honor of Swan Upping. If you don’t know about this day, check it out. It’s fascinating. Or you can wait for my review when I’ll explain the practice.)
  • Black Faces, White Faces by Jane Gardam (in honor of Gardam’s birth month)

As an aside, I have read the last two Cotterills in a day each, so I know I need to add at least one or two more books to the list. I’m off to the great unknown for vacation so when I get back I’ll probably have to revisit this list.

Also, I should note that I won another Early Review book from LibraryThing, but since its not here yet I won’t promise to read it. 😉

 

By July

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June was an interesting month. Ran 43.5 miles. But, for the reading it was full of short stories and quick reads. Finished:

  • The Millstone by Margaret Drabble
  • Thirty-Three Teeth by Colin Cotterill
  • Love Medicine by Louise Erdrich
  • Yocandra in the Paradise of Nada by Zoe Valdes
  • A Bridge Too Far by Cornelius Ryan (AB)
  • A Death in the Family by James Agee
  • Edge of Time by Loula Grace Erdman – probably my favorite

Short stories:

  • “A perfect Day for a Bananafish” by JD Salinger
  • “For Esme – with Love and Squalor” by JD Salinger
  • “The Orphan” by Nell Freudenberger
  • “Outside the Eastern Gates” by Nell Freudenberger
  • “Four Calling Brids, Three French Hens” by Lorrie Moore
  • “People Like That Are the Only People Here” by Lorrie Moore
  • “Mr Squishy” by David Foster Wallace
  • “The Suffering Channel” by David Foster Wallace
  • “Blight” by David Bezmozgis
  • “Hot Ice” by David Bezmozgis

For fun I read two books related to running:

  • Anatomy, Stretching and Training for Marathoners by Dr. Philip Striano
  • Rocket Fuel by Matthew Kadrey, MD

And for the Early Review program with LibraryThing, another book about running:

  • Off the Beaten Trail by Meghan Hicks and Bryon Powell

A Bridge Too Far

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Ryan, Cornelius. <em>A Bridge Too Far</em>. New York: Popular Library, 1974.

Reason read: D-Day. Need I say more?

Like The Longest Day before it, A Bridge Too Far reads like a novel at times. It isn’t a dry regurgitation of names, dates, places and statistics. Like The Longest Day the reader gets to know key players in a personal, almost intimate manner. They become more than names of historical significance. The violent battles become real with the ugly sights and sounds of war. This is largely in part due to Ryan’s first hand interviews with witnesses: the veterans and townspeople alike; anyone right in the thick of the action. What sets Ryan’s books apart is that he was given exclusive access to documents that others had only heard about. The confirms and clarifies the history books.
A Bridge Too Far details the failed Market-Garden Operation. Their mission was to seize five major bridges in Belgium, France and Germany. Market was the “from air” attack and Garden was the ground portion of the offensive. After many weather related delays the operation lasted from September 17th to the 24th, 1944. This imaginative battle plan was supposed to be the Allied answer to end the war. Only it didn’t turn out that way.
As an aside, it’s easy to see how Ryan’s books all transitioned easily to the big screen.

Author fact: Ryan became a U.S. citizen when he was 31 years old.

Book trivia: the dedication says it all, “For them all.”

As an aside, while I was working on this blog it dawned on me (after three or four edits) that I had titled it “A Bridget Too Far.”

BookLust Twist: from <em>Book Lust</em> in the obvious chapter “World War II: Nonfiction” (p 254).

PS ~ I don’t think it would be a spoiler to say that I couldn’t bear the end. If you know your history, you know how it goes.

Edge of Time

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Erdman, Loula Grace. The Edge of Time. New York: Dodd, Mead & Company, 1950.

Reason read: Erdman’s birth month is in June.

When Bethany Fulton married Wade Cameron she had no idea what she was getting herself into. As a child she had loved Wade from afar for as long as she could remember. Coming of age, she continued to love him despite the fact he preferred her pretty cousin, Rosemary. After Rosemary rejects Wade for a wealthier suitor Wade takes Bethany instead; takes her to be his wife and to accompany him to the wild unknowns of Texas. Bethany’s first hurdle is understanding where she is going for she can’t picture a house without running water or real glass windows; she can’t picture a landscape without trees. Bethany’s second and bigger hurdle is internal – getting over the fact she is Wade’s second choice for marriage. The memory of Rosemary hangs over everything, especially in the beginning when Wade had no way of telling his far-off Texan neighbors he had married a different girl. More than that the land teaches Bethany to lose her naive ways.

Edge of Time is the kind of simple story. The title comes from Wade’s realization they arrived too late in Texas to be ranchers and too early to be farmers. They arrived “on the edge of time” (p 232).

Lines I liked, “Loneliness bit into people here” (p 81), and “A blob of inconsequential nothingness on the great face of nothingness itself” (p 254).

Book trivia: Erdman dedicated Edge of Time to the homesteader. She felt that plenty had been written about ranchers and nesters, but homesteaders were an unknown.

Author fact: Erdman died in the 70s. I think it’s great that her books still live on.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called (of course) “Texas: Lone Star State of Mind” (p 233).