Category: BookLust II

House on the Strand

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du Maurier, Daphne. The House on the Strand. New York: Doubleday Company, 1969.

I chose this book for October because somewhere out there someone deemed October National Starman month…whatever that means. When I think of Starmen, I think of David Bowie and Starman and Moonage Daydream. Don’t ask me why. I just do. That leads me to think of Natalie singing his version of  “keep your mouth shut, you’re squawking like a pink monkey bird” and that’s when things get really weird. And weird to me is, and will always be, October. Halloween and all that.

Dick Young and his old college chum (and biophysicist), Magnus Lane, are working on a potion that can send a person back in time. Their potion is in the planning stages and when we first meet Dick he has just tried to time-travel for the first time. His trip is successful and he finds himself in the 14th century. The travel itself is more a mental trip than a physical one. While Dick’s physical body stays in the 20th century it’s his mind that is actively in the 14th century. This explains why Dick can walk as if he is a ghost, undetected, through the past. Unhappy with his 20th century life, married to a woman with two boys from a previous relationship, Dick finds himself traveling back to the 14th century more frequently and  recklessly. It becomes an addiction to stay “connected” to the people of the time, particularly an attractive woman named Isolda. The story ends in tragedy, as it only could. Because it hasn’t been researched properly, the drug gets the best of Dick and Magnus in the startling conclusion of House on the Strand.

Oddly rational question: “The point is this: Does the drug reverse some chemical change in the memory systems of the brain, throwing it back to a particular thermodynamic situation which existed in the past, so that the sensations elsewhere in the brain are repeated?” (p 14). Hmmm…
My favorite line: “I realised at that moment, more strongly than hitherto, how fantastic, even macabre, was my presence amongst them, unseen, unborn, a freak in time, witness to events that had happened centuries past, unremembered, unrecorded; and I wondered how it was that standing here on the steps, watching yet invisible, I could so feel myself involved, troubled, by these loves and deaths” (p 68).

BookLust Twist: From More Book Lust in the chapter called, “Time Travel” (p 221).

Off Balance

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Gordon, Suzanne. Off Balance: the Real World of Ballet. New York: Pantheon Books, 1983.

Yet another book I wasn’t supposed to read this month. I have no idea how it got on the list because it’s designated for October – National Art Month. Woops. Luckily, this was easy to read and I got through it very quickly. It didn’t take away from the books I was supposed to read.

I had only read one book about ballet and all about how difficult it is to be a dancer before reading Off Balance. Off Balance: the Real World of Ballet  was pretty much the same theme. I found the entire book to be well written but extremely depressing. Having no experience with the world of ballet (“real” or otherwise) I had to take Gordon’s word for it. According to everything I have read dancers are unhealthy, prone to injury, anorexia, and mental issues; they are socially stunted and obsessed with pleasing their teachers. Dancers don’t have formal educations, family lives, or productive interests outside of dance. The family of a dancer makes sacrifices above and beyond normal expectations. Dancers earn woefully little and they don’t get vacation pay. Workloads are exhausting yet they can get fired at a moments notice. The entire book is like this. Open any page and you will find something negative about the world of ballet. It got to be so depressing and negative that I couldn’t wait to finish the last page. I started to believe that any self-respecting person should not want to be involved in the world of ballet and if he or she did it was sheer stupidity that drove ambition. After all, as Gordon herself writes, dancers don’t think for themselves – they receive constant direction from their teachers.

BookLust Twist: From More Book Lust in the chapter called, “Dewey Deconstructed: 700s” (p 74).

Those Tremendous Mountains

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Hawke, David Freeman. Those Tremendous Mountains: the Story of the Lewis and Clark Expedition. New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 1980.

Confession time: I thought I would be bored to hell and back by this book. History was never my strong point, even if I was supposed to relate to it. Ancestry or not, I couldn’t relate to anything historical. Those Tremendous Mountains was a different story. I was really amazed by how much I enjoyed it. To say that I loved every page wouldn’t be far off the mark. Hawke blends the diaries, notes and sketches of Captains Meriweather Lewis and William Clark with his own narrative to create a lively and creative account of the famous duo’s expedition. It is not a dry retelling of the trials and tribulations of traversing  daunting mountain ranges. It is a portrait of desire, courage, friendship and loyalty. Thanks to a very specific and detailed charge by Thomas Jefferson to count every tree, flower, river, animal, and weather condition along the journey and both Lewis and Clark’s insatiable desire and curiosity to discover the world around them they documented thousands of species never seen before, making their expedition that much more famous than those gone who had before them. Their curiosity for every new plant and animal they encountered gave them a wealth of information to send back to the President. Hawke also carefully portrays Lewis and Clark as humanitarians with a keen sense of diplomacy when dealing with the Native American tribes they encountered. Knowing they would need help crossing the Rockies Lewis and Clark made sure to have plenty of gifts for the natives. Bartering for the things they needed came easier with a show a respect rather than force. 

Probably my favorite parts in the book were the displays of friendship between Lewis and Clark. While President Jefferson continuously called it Lewis’ expedition, Lewis insisted Clark was his equal and it was their expedition. Even after Jefferson downgraded Clark’s rank from captain to second lieutenant Lewis the men on the expedition “never learned of his true rank and always called him Captain” (p 51). Probably my favorite lines comes at the end: “By then the trust  between them was complete and remained so to the end” (p 248). 

BookLust Twist: From More Book Lust n the chapter called ” Lewis and Clark: Adventurers Extraordinaire” (p 136).

Turbulent Souls

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Dubner, Stephen J. Turbulent Souls: a Catholic Son’s Return to His Jewish Family. New York: William Morrow & Co., 1998.

In the beginning, Turbulent Souls started out slow for me. I’m not exactly sure why. I think, true to form, the background of any story is the least exciting. It’s the opening act, the warming up so to speak. This setting of the stage is vital to the story, though. Dubner needed to explain his Jewish parents conversion to Catholicism in order for the rest of his story to make sense.

Stephen Dubner was born into a large, upstate New York, Catholic family. Only, Stephen never really felt at home with his parents’ view on religion. Something just didn’t seem comfortable to him. As a young man in his 20’s he meets a Jewish actress who guides him to discover his family’s orginal faith. The more he learns of Jewish customs the easier it is for him to shed everything he memorized about Catholic customs. The more he practices Jewish customs the more it feels like a rediscovery, a return to a religion he left behind before birth. As a journalist Dubner begins to see his family has a story, an amazing one. He cannot ignore the fact that both his parents converted right around the time Jews were being murdered by the Nazis. He discovers Ethel Rosenberg was his mother’s first cousin. As he uncovers the secrets of his family he finds himself.

There were many, many great lines in this book. Here are a couple describing Dubner’s religious childhood: “The aberrant memory is of my father loading us all into the pink-and-gray Rambler for Sunday Mass…my father slamming his pinkie in the back door and yelling, “Shit!” I knew the word; I just didn’t know that my father did” (p 108). “The fires of Hell kept me from letting Dale Schaeffer cheat off my math test even though he offered me first a dollar and then a skull-bashing” (p 114).
Here’s one from Dubner’s college years that I particularly liked (reminded me of my house): “…but even the three of us were no match for the memories of the house. They overpowered us, sent us to bed early, made our supper conversation timid” (p 151).
And one from adulthood: “When I was an alter boy I would get nervous being alone with Father DiPace. He represented God; I represented human shortcoming” (p 201). There are many more fantastic lines, but I’ll stop there.

BookLust Twist: From More Book Lust in the chapter called, “Me, Me, Me: Autobiographies and Memoirs” (p 162).

Professor and the Madman

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Winchester, Simon. The Professor and the Madman: a Tale of Murder, Insanity, and the Making of the Oxford English Dictionary. New York: Harper Perennial,1999.

I was supposed to read this last August and I ended up reading something completely different by accident. The titles were nothing alike but I kept getting them confused. Go figure.

Is this a movie? If it isn’t, it should be. They say that truth is stranger than fiction and I agree. Dr. W.C. Minor was a brilliant American doctor who was found legally insane after committing murder. During his confinement in a mental institute in London, Minor embarked on a quest to help Professor James Murray compile submissions for the Oxford English Dictionary. His astounding contribution led Professor Murray to seek out Dr. Minor, learn of his confinement in an asylum for the criminally insane, and despite all that, become the closest of friends.

The story itself appears benign. Dr. Minor’s mental illness consists mostly of hallucinations and the paranoia that certain people were “messing with him.” As a result nothing could prepare me for the moment when Dr. Minor decided on December 3rd, 1902 to cut off his own penis (a procedure called autopeotomy). “In his delusional world he felt he had no alternative but to remove it. He was a doctor, of course, and so knew roughly what he was doing” (p 193). What the ??? It’s this tongue-in-cheek writing that makes The Professor and the Madman so much fun to read.

BookLust Twist: In both Book Lust and More Book Lust. In Book Lust in the chapter called, “Words to the Wise” (p 249), and in More Book Lust in the chapter called, “Dewey Deconstructed: 400s” (p 68).

Scarlet Letter

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Hawthorne, Nathaniel. The Scarlet Letter. New York: Literary Classics, 1987.

I had to write a book report on this in high school (who didn’t?) then I had to write a critical analysis complete with symbolic meaning and themes in college. I don’t remember what grade I got on the high school paper. Not to brag, but I’m sure it was an A because high school lit classes were easy. In college my paper received a B+/A- because a) I didn’t quote the professor teaching the class (he was an authority on The Scarlet Letter apparently), and b) I didn’t delve deeper in the sexual side of Hester. 19 year old me wanted to concentrate on sin and the effects of that sin on everyone. To me, that’s exactly what The Scarlet Letter is all about.

The Scarlet Letter opens with Hester Prynne being led to the stocks. She is the sinner and as a result is being publicly ridiculed. Her crime is having an adulterous affair that resulted in the birth of a baby girl. She not only won’t disclose the father of her child, but she won’t repent for her affair. She is condemned to wear the letter ‘A’ as a punishment, as a constant reminder to the community that she is an adulteress. While there is residual shame, Roger Chillingworth does not want the public to know Hester is his wife. There is honor in Hester’s scandal – because she refuses to give up the name of her lover. Dignity prevails and she outwardly bears the burden of shame alone. Her lover also shoulders the guilt of sin in his own way as he plays an important part of the community.

BookLust Twist: From More Book Lust in two different chapters. First, “Literary Lives: The Americans” (p 144). Second, “Wayward Wives” (p 231).

August ’09 Is…

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August is a long awaited trip homehome. August is the trials and tribulations of hiring. August is a little Avett Brothers, drums and Sean for music. August is getting back to cooking. August is so many different things, including a goal of 84 miles. Don’t ask. Here’s what August is for books:

  • The Professor and the Madman by Simon Winchester (the easiest way to celebrate National Language Month.)
  • The Moviegoer by Walker Percy (Marking the anniversary of hurricane Katrina later this month – The Moviegoer takes place in New Orleans.)
  • Mutual Friend by Frederick Busch (Celebrating Busch’s birth month.)
  • Turbulent Souls by Stephen J. Dubner (Blame it on someone else month. I think I’ll have to wait for the review to explain this one.)
  • These Tremendous Mountains by David Freeman Hawke (Celebrating the expedition of Lewis and Clark)
  • Wind, Sand & Stars by Antoine Du Saint (August is National Aviation Month)

And for LibraryThing it is: Sandman Slim by Richard Kadrey and I really, really should reread the one Early Review book I didn’t get around to reviewing, Honeymoon in Tehran by Azadeh Moaveni.

For fun it’s a bunch of running band vegetable books. Go figure.

July ’09 Was…

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July ’09 was yesterday, but it was also a really fun month (despite the pool letting go). First there was meeting a friend for dinner and asking her to come work for me! Then there was Rebecca Correia’s Iron Horse show. Of course I rallied the troups (all 12 of us!) and we had a great time. I really need to blog about the three-way Kisa had with the girls and who can forget the Wicked Wally?
How could I forget Boston? The trip into the city was amazing because the company couldn’t have been more perfect. They caught the mandarin fish! I have a few pictures from the day of my way, but I’m dying to see theirs!
July was also the return to running. I am proud to say I logged 35.21 miles in July.

  • The Skull Mantra by Eliott Pattison ~ this one stayed with me for awhile. I think it should be a movie.
  • The Stillmeadow Raod by Gladys Taber ~ cute.
  • Close Range: Wyoming Stories by Annie Proulx ~ ugly.
  • The Enemy by Lee Child ~ fascinating. Can’t wait to read the others!
  • Morningside Heights by cheryl Mendelson ~ middle class society in Manhattan.
  • The Light That Failed by Rudyard Kipling ~ a little tough to get into at first.
  • The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne ~ back to a classic!

For the fun of it:

  • Up the Down Staircase by Bel Kaufman

I was supposed to read a couple of Early Review books but only one arrived in July. I will have to review it in August (I’m reading it now).

Morningside Heights

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Mendelson, Cheryl. Morningside Heights. New York: Random House, 2003.

I need to start off by saying wordy books are hard for me to get into right away. It takes me somewhat longer to “feel” the story, if that makes any sense. Mendelson has a doctorate in philosophy and she has practiced law in New York City. Teacher, philosopher, lawyer, and now writer. Morningside Heights is her first novel. Maybe it’s the combination of all these professions that creates the need for lots and lots of words to set the scene, any scene. True, there is more than enough social commentary to analyze, but, there is also more than enough description as well.

Here’s one of my favorite quotes: “The oligarchs wanted to keep all the bourgeois pleasures for themselves, along with the money, while proletarianizing everyone else, squeezing people with overwork and low pay, corrupting the liberal political forms so that they only answered to cash” (p 120).

Morningside Heightsis the first of a trilogy of novels about an area of New York City called Morningside Heights. Like Astoria is a part of Queens, Morningside Heights is a neighborhood in Manhattan. For as long as anyone can remember it has been a quiet, affordable community but lately, as older residents pass away, their apartments are being sold to upscale “suits” creating an economy the lifelong tenants ca no longer afford. The story centers around Anne and Charles Braithwaite and their circle of family and friends. As the neighborhood changes so does the social structure that the Braithwaites have come to rely on. Everything they hold sacred – their culture – is compromised until finally they are forced to consider a new life…in the suburbs.

BookLust Twist: From Book Lust in the chapter called “New York, New York” (p 170). Also, from More Book Lust in the chapters, “Barsetshire and Beyond” (p 16) and “Maiden Voyages” (p 159). I disagree with this last inclusion. Maiden voyage implies first book, fiction or nonfiction. Morningside Heights is actually Mendelson’s second book. First fiction, yes. But, not first book.

Enemy

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Child, Lee. The Enemy.New York: Delacourte Press, 2004.

If given the entire afternoon and evening I could have finished this book in one sitting. I loved it. It had just the right balance of good guy with a bad attitude; just the right amount of law and order verses crime and chaos. I can see why Pearl was mesmerized by the writing of Lee Child because I was, too.

The Enemy opens with a heart attack. A two-star general is found dead of an apparent heart attack. Within hours his wife is murdered. Within days two special forces soldiers are murdered, one at a time. At the center of each death is Jack Reacher, a complicated military cop. Ordinarily considered one of the best, suddenly Reacher is starting to look more like a suspect instead. Normally a loner, Reacher finds himself working with a young, female partner trying to clear his name. It is obvious he is being set up and Reacher will stop at nothing to get to the truth including going AWOL and much worse. The Enemy is peppered with military jargon and violence but not overwhelmingly so. Reacher has a likable character. He is human enough to do the wrong thing from time to time. How he gets out of the trickier situations really makes the story. I was fascinated from start to finish.

One thing I was really drawn to was the fact there were four murders (teeny spoiler there) and all four murders *seemed* to be staged. The general wearing the condom, Carbone’s over-the-top sex crime, Brubaker’s drug dealing…and…now, I really would be spoiling it if I said anything about the fourth murder!

Best lines, “They don’t like you, they don’t bring you coffee. They knife you in the back instead” (p 4). I saw this as premonition of sorts.
“My brother was a man horrified by anything less than the best” (p 75).

BookLust Twist: From More Book Lust in the chapter called, ” Lee Child: Too Good To Miss” (p 41). Nancy Pearl says it was Lee’s book, Persuader that sold her on reading everything else he wrote. She suggested starting with The Enemy since it’s the first Reacher book of the series. I agree.

Stillmeadow Road

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Taber, Gladys. The Stillmeadow Road. New York: Harper & Row, 1984.

This was first published in 1962 and reissued in 1984. I like books that make a comeback. It is 1960’s quaint. Whimsical, even. Taber has a way of writing that is light and airy. There is no other way to describe it. Well, maybe it just seemed that way since I read it along side Annie Proulx’s harsh Close Range: Wyoming Stories. Whereas Proulx is arid and brutal and ugly, Taber is lush and sweet and pretty. Like, for example, I found it interesting that Taber glossed over everything involving her good, good friend Jill. They lived at Stillmeadow together. They did everything together. Yet, when Jill dies there is only a paragraph or two dedicated to the tragedy. It almost seemed as if Taber was skirting around her friend’s illness and death as a way to avoid talking about what Jill really meant to her.
Stillmeadow Road is a time capsule memoir about a homestead in Connecticut that Taber purchases with her friend, Jill. It’s all about country living, each chapter separated by the seasons. Month by month Taber lovingly describes life in a farmhouse by the weather, what’s happening in nature, how humans react to it all. Her observations focus on the trees, flowers, animals, and condition of the house throughout the changing seasons. Why do squirrels stay active throughout the winter? Why does it rain during dog shows? Why are storm doors so ugly? At the same time Taber injects social commentary about raising children, dealing with death, being neighborly, sorting out religious beliefs, remembering childhood…the story jumps between country-life observation and spiritual introspection.

A couple of favorite parts: “I do not know whether this happens to everyone, but I always have channeled great shocks into as many smaller ones as I can think of” (p 167), and “I have discovered if you take two steps forward and slip back one, you are sill a step ahead, which is a cliche but a true one” (p 169).

BookLust Twist: From More Book Lust in the chapter called “Cozies” (p 57).

Skull Mantra

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Pattison, Eliot. The Skull Mantra. New York: St. Martin’s Minotaur, 1999.

This is the first piece of fiction I have read that has covered Tibetan culture in such great detail.

Shan Tao Yun is a former veteran police inspector – the perfect person to solve a murder. The clothing of the decapitated victim suggests he was either American or Chinese, and wealthy either way. With a delegation of American tourists arriving for a visit, the district commander is anxious to find the killer as soon as possible. Shan Tao Yun is enlisted except, there is one problem – Shan is currently serving time in a Tibetan prison for offending the Party in Beijing. He has been sentenced to the same hard labor as the Tibetan priests he reveres. Shan is given an ultimatum: find the killer or the priests get brutally punished. In the course of the investigation clues lead Shan to an illegal monastery, a mystical world of demons and spells, political upheaval, and historical tragedies bestowed upon the Tibetan people at the hands of China’s government.

This book definitely opened my eyes to the Tibetan culture. I am a big fan of Tibetan music and have seen several documentaries about the Chinese invasion, but Skull Mantra not only illustrated the struggles of the Tibetan people, but their mysteries as well. My favorite scenes involved Dr. Sung, the medical examiner. Pattison created a sarcastic, funny woman who wasn’t afraid to speak her mind. Here’s a tiny example: “A soiled cardboard box was on an examining table, resting on top of a covered body. He [Shan] turned away as Dr. Sung removed the contents of the box and leaned over the body. “Amazing. It [the head] fits.” She made a gesture to Shan. “Perhaps you would like to try? I know. We’ll cut off the limbs and play mix and match.”” (p 126).

BookLust Twist: From More Book Lust in the chapter called, “Crime is a Globetrotter: Tibet” (p 60).

Adventures of Tom Sawyer

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Twain, Mark. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. New York: Oxford University Press, 1996.

A classic is a classic is a classic. No doubt about it. My copy of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer was a facsimile of the first American edition so it includes the original illustrations, typeset, etc. This made reading really fun because the illustrations really add to the story. Truth be known, I had forgotten a great deal of the plot. While I remembered Tom was a troublemaker, I couldn’t remember details of his escapades. I’m glad I reread this.

Tom Sawyer is a typical Southern boy looking for adventure. I don’t think there are many young boys that would skin a cat or fake his own death so that he might attend the funeral, but the mischief of such a boy has always been there…and will always be there, too! Tom lives with his auntie and while he is well loved he is always looking for ways to run away. His sidekick, Huck Finn is eager to join him in adventures “down river.” Both are “smarties” as my grandfather would say. Showing off for their peers, and besting the adults -there is never a dull moment in Tom Sawyer’s world.

Two favorite lines: “The strangling hero sprung up with a relieving snort” (p 40), and “Huckleberry was cordially hated…” (p 63).

BookLust Twist: From Book Lust in the chapter called, “Literary Lives: The Americans” (p 145).

July ’09 is….

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I am feeling better about July. Much better. It’s like the sun has come out (literally and metaphorically). I think I am finding my way out of the darkness. July is social. Dinner with good friends. July is a Rebecca show at the Iron Horse with a whole host of people. July is more attention paid to Hilltop. Reconnecting with Germany. Maybe Norway and Lebanon. Wouldn’t that be cool?
For books, here is the endeavor:

  • Skull Mantra by Eliott Pattison ~ in honor of the best time (supposedly) to visit Tibet (in my dreams)
  • Stillmeadow Road by Gladys Taber ~ okay, this is a stretch: Nancy Pearl calls this book a “cozy.” I translated that to mean “happy” and July is National Ice Cream Month. Ice cream makes me happy and happy is cozy…told you it was a stretch!
  • Close Range by Annie Proulx~ on honor of Wyoming becoming a state in July
  • The Light That Failed by Lee Child~ here’s another stretch: Lee Child lives in New York. July is the month NY became a state. If anyone knows what month Lee Child was born in please let me know!
  • Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne ~ to celebrate Hawthorne’s birth month
  • Morningside Heights by Cherilyn Mendelson ~ in honor of New York becoming a state.

If there is time I would like to add The Light That Failed by Rudyard Kipling or The Making of the Atom Bomb by Richard Rhodes. Also, I’m supposed to have an Early Review book from LibraryThing – something about getting along with you mother-in-law (or something like that), but I haven’t seen it. Janice Schofield Eaton’s Beyond Road’s End: Living Free in Alaska was a bonus book.

This Boy’s Life

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Wolff, Tobias. This Boy’s Life. New York: Perennial Library, 1989.

This Boy’s Life was spellbinding. Tobias Wolff’s personal memoir is not tremendous. It may even sound familiar to anyone who came from a broken home, had trouble with a step-parent, or had a mischievous streak growing up (who hasn’t?). What makes This Boy’s Life such a page turner is the honesty that radiates from every page, every sentence. It is not an overwhelming tragic tale, but it is painful and very real. Wolff does not paint a picture of hero, nor victim. It’s just an account of a troubled childhood. The writing is so clear, so unmuddied, that we can easily see bits of our own childhoods reflected in every chapter.

Probably one of my favorite parts was when Tobias (going by the name ‘Jack’ at this point) talks about altering his less than stellar grades in school. Report cards were written in pencil and ‘Jack’s’ admission of guilt is simply, “I owned some pencils myself” (p 184). It’s sly and smile evoking.

BookLust Twist: From More Book Lust in the chapter called, “All in the Family: Writer Dynasties” (p 5).