Category: NonFiction

January Was…

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January started off and ended with a head cold (damn you, kisa), a really nice dinner party, a re-commitment to the houses HOUSE (glutton for punishment that I am), a re-commitment to charities with a big one – training for a 20 mile walk for Project Bread, a huge re-commitment to friendships and huge changes at the library. For books it was:

  • Death Comes to the Archbishop by Willa Cather in honor of New Mexico becoming a state in January.
  • Red Death by Walter Mosely in honor of Walter’s birthday being in January
  • Biggest Elvis by P.F. Kluge in honor of both Elvis and P.F. celebrating their birthdays in January.
  • Devices and Desires by P.D. James ~ in honor of mystery month.
  • The Eleven Million Mile High Dancer by Carol Hill
  • Edith Wharton: a Biography by R.W.B. Lewis ~ in honor of Edith’s birthday on January 24th.
  • The Guns of August by Barbara Tuchman ~ in honor of Barbara’s birthday.

For fun:

  • The Letters by Luanne Rice and Joseph Monninger ~ a story that partially takes place on Monhegan. How could I resist? This is the blog that was plagarized by some dumb-azz.
  • 30 pages of Nutritional Wisdom ~ a Christmas gift from my sister.

So I didn’t get a LibraryThing Early Review book in January. That’s not a big deal. I have certainly gotten my fair share over the course of the program so I’m not complaining. I do have to admit, I feel a little guilty. For the first time ever, I am really late publishing the review for the last ER book. Maybe that had something to do with it…who knows?

ps~ I did get one for February, or so I am told! 🙂

Edith Wharton: a Biography

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Lewis, R.W.B. Edith Wharton: a Biography. New York: Harper & Row, 1975.

I had always know Edith Wharton was gifted even as a child. I think I was 16 the first time someone told me she was of my age when she first published. What they failed to tell me was that her literary voice fell silent for over a decade after that. I thought she had published all along and as a result I have always been impressed by her lifelong success.

Beginning with Wharton’s genealogical background and ending with her funeral R.W.B. Lewis’s  Edith Wharton: a Biography is at once both extensive and entertaining. Wharton begins her life as Edith “Pussy” Jones, the daughter of a socially well-to-do family. Her life is surrounded by all the things the culture of 1870s cherished – multiple family estates, social gatherings with citizens of good standing and trips abroad to places like Italy and France. With access to letters, diaries and manuscripts Lewis is able to give animated details to Wharton’s upbringing and subsequent literary career. It is no wonder he won a Pulitzer for his work. It also is easy to see how Wharton was drawn to a writing career when you consider the wealth of influences in that era: Henry James, Theodore Roosevelt, William Vaughn Moody, Charles Dickens, Gustave Flaubert, and George Eliot to name a few. What is amazing is her inability to stay the course of confidence. The slightest criticism could send her career out of commission for months at a time.

On a personal note – because Edith’s marriage failed and she never had kids there was on and off speculation about her sexuality. Rumors ranged from lesbian to frigid and everything in between. Edith did her best to remain privately passionate despite the talk, but I think, in the end, there was some overwhelming desire to prove something to her critics. At least, that is the explanation I am taking away with me when it comes to the incestuous, slightly pornographic appendix C.

Favorite Edith Wharton realization: During World War I, otherwise known as The Great War, Edith started up charities to help displaced refugees and war victims. Some if her tireless crusades were taken up by the Red Cross when they became too much for her.

Favorite passages: “She had learned from Bernhard Berenson…to take a professional librarian’s attitude towards her own private library, and the disposition of books..” (p 4).
“…but at this stage it was almost as important for her that the young Bar Harborites excelled at the art of flirtation” (p 39).

BookLust Twist: From More Book Lust in the chapter, “Literary Lives: The Americans” (p 144).

Choice Cuts

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Kurlansky, Mark. Choice Cuts: a Savory Selection of Food Writing from Around the World and Throughout History. New York: Ballantine, 2002.

I like nothing better than a good cookbook. A close second to a good cookbook is reading books written by cooks. Mark Kurlansky does one better and combined the best of food writing from soup to nuts; covering techniques, ingredients and even ethnic origins of food. Then, there’s the introduction. How can you compete when the introduction is titled, “Better than Sex” (p 1)? I mean, come on! Out of the thirty chapters  five six really grabbed my attention. More than the introduction, you ask? Mais oui! How could I not be seduced with chapter titles such as these: “Rants” (p 115), Poultry, Fowl, and Other Ill-Fated Birds (p 210), “Loving Fat” (p 303), “The Dark Side of Chocolate” (p 330), “A Good Drink” (p 361) and, “Bugs” (p 380). See, aren’t you the least bit curious about that last one?

Everything about this book is based on one simple subject – food. Kurlansky takes that subject and explores everything having to do with it. From growing, hunting, buying, and preparing to smelling, eating, and savoring it. The art of cooking, the downfall of rotting, from killing to cultivating. From Cato to Chekhov, Kurlansky finds quotes, essays and passages from a multitude of well known individuals, some with lives centered around food like M.F.K. Fisher and Elizabeth David and some not like Virginia Woolf, Ernest Hemingway and E.M Forster. Whether focused on an ingredient like garlic or chocolate, or a technique like faking venison or baking bread, or a location like favorite restaurants or markets, Kurlansky covers it all. It’s historical and cutting edge. Technical and funny. Poetry and dissertation. Well worth the read.

Favorite passages: “A blonde seems humbly to beseech your heart while a brunette tends to ravish it” (p 39), “So don’t worry about me down here eating nothing and [makeing] an ass of myself. I have had strange eating habits since I was a boy (Ernest Hemingway)” (p 61) and, “cook-books have always intrigued and seduced me (Alice B. Toklas)” (p 182).

BookLust Twist: From Book Lust in the chapter, “Mark Kurlansky: Too Good To Miss” (p 146).

A side note: Before I knew what Choice Cuts was really about I assumed it had something to do with meat. After all, Kurlansky has written about solitary food items such as cod and salt, too. So, thinking this was a book about edible meats nothing disturbed me more than seeing an illustration for what I thought was a squirrel. I was close – it was a dormouse.

January is…

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January is..a little sass
January is..a little sass

What is it about a new year that inspires so much ambition? Where does that fresh start attitude really come from? January is so many things to so many different people. For me it is simply all about the books:

  • Death Comes to An Archbishop by Willa Cather in honor of New Mexico becoming a state in January
  • Biggest Elvis by P.F. Kluge in honor of the King’s birthday and P.F. Kluge having a January birthday as well.
  • Book of Puka-puka by Robert Dean Frisbie in honor of National Geographic month
  • Devices and Desires by P.D. James in honor of January being mystery month
  • Red Death by Walter Mosely in honor of Walter’s birthday being in January
  • Guns of August by Barbara Tuchman in honor of Barbara’s birthday being in January

I haven’t decided on any “if there is time” books because I don’t think I’ll get through what I have chosen (Guns of August is over 500 pages long). Also, I don’t know if I was chosen for a LibraryThing Early Review book for January. I guess we’ll find out by the time I write “January Was…”

For Christmas I received only one book, Nourishing Wisdom by Marc David. A gift from my sister, I plan to read it over the next two to three months. It’s not all that long (185 pages) but I want to take my time with it.

For other resolutions it is running just a little more, maybe drinking coffee a little less. It’s eating a little more healthy, maybe seducing the vending machine a little less. It is writing there more often, maybe blogging here a little less. It is giving up crutches and leaning more on the ones who matter most. Like I said, it is so many different things. I want to thank Sarah and Gnash for their inspiration. Both have amazing ambitions and they have no idea how much I will be cheering them on throughout 2009.

December Was…

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img_0030December started off being my fresh start. New houses, new atttitude. It would have been a return to charity walks (or runs?) had a little thing called house hunting not gotten in the way! December ended up being a really, really difficult month. Lost another house, craziness at work, mental health taking a trip south, a passing of a friend and coworker… Here are the books I read escaped with. It may seem like a lot but, keep in mind, I cheated. I was able to read the first two in November.

  • The Quiet American by Graham Green ~ I read this in three days time…in November. Was really that good!
  • A Dangerous Friend by Ward Just ~ Another book I read in just a few days time, again…in November.
  • Anatomy of a Murder by Robert Traver ~ probably one of the best court-room dramas I have ever read.
  • I’m a Stranger Here Myself: Notes on Returning to America After Twenty Years Away by Bill Bryson ~ funny, but repetitive!
  • A Family Affair by Rex Stout ~ very strange yet entertaining.
  • Lincoln’s Dreams by Connie Willis ~again, strange but entertaining!
  • Shoeless Joe by W.P. Kinsella ~ okay. I’ll admit it. This one made me cry.
  • ‘Sippi by John Oliver Killens ~ powerful – really, really powerful. That’s all I can really say.
  • Snobs by Julian Fellowes ~ silly story about what happens with you combine boredom with good old fashioned English snobbery.
  • Choice Cuts by Mark Kurlansky ~ really interesting, but a bit dry at times (no pun intended).

For LibraryThing it was the fascinating Honeymoon in Tehran by Azadeh Moaveni (really, really good).

Confession: I started Le Mort d’Arthur and couldn’t deal with neither volume one or two. Just not in the mood for the King, no matter how authoritative the version.

So. 11 books. Two being in the month of November and nine as the cure for what ailed me.

Edited to add: someone asked me to post “the count” at the end of each “— Was” blog. What a great idea. I will be starting that next month – something new to start 2009 with. Thanks, A!

I’m a Stranger Here Myself

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BrysonBryson, Bill. I’m a Stranger Here Myself: Notes on Returning to America After Twenty Years Away. New York: Broadway Books, 1999.

I was skeptical of this book. The premise is Bryson has been away from American soil for twenty years (living in England) and the book is supposedly his running commentary on how different everything has become. Right off the bat I wanted to ask, “What? They didn’t have ATM machines or public pay phones in England? Not even by the time Mr. Bryson left?” I have to admit, it never crossed my mind that England could be twenty years behind the U.S. in such things as technology and invention.
In actuality, Bryson’s book was, in a word, delightful. I thoroughly enjoyed his opening essay about the differences between English and American postal services. However, for the most part the comparisons ended there. It was more about how nonsensical America could be with it’s rules and regulations. It reminded me of Robert Fulghum with his humorous observations.

Favorite funnies:
“Going to a restaurant is generally a discouraging experience for me because I always manage somehow to antagonize the waitress” (p 13).
“It is all immensely complicated, but essentially it means that practically every team in baseball except the Chicago Cubs gets a chance to go to the World Series” (p 25).
“He converses as if he has heard that someday he will be billed  for it” (p 93). Sounds like my father!

BookLust Twist: From More Book Lustin the chapter, “Bill Bryson: Too Good to Miss” (p 36).

December is…

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img_00281December is one of the longest months in my opinion. But, it is also one of the most festive, thanks in part to the 25th & 31st. December is also the return of the Hot Chocolate Run, the return of the awesomely awesome Rebecca Correia (to the Iron Horse) and for reading books it is:

  • Anatomy of Murder  by Robert Traver in honor of John Jay becoming the first Chief Justice in this month (I’ll explain at review time).
  • Quiet American by Graham Greene in honor of Ward Just’s birthday (I’ll explain that in a second).
  • Dangerous Friend by Ward Just in honor of Ward Just’s birthday. I had always been told to read Quiet American with Dangerous Friend so that’s what I’m doing.
  • Family Affair  by Rex Stout in honor of his birthday.

And if there is time…

  • I’m a Stranger Here Myself  by Bill Bryson in honor of his birthday.

So, I’m celebrating author birthdays more than real life birthdays. What’s up with that? Not really sure I know myself….

November Was…

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Death of Spuke
November was an amazing election, the slow death of Spuke, an incredible Thanksgiving meal, a few birthdays missed, more houses than I care to admit to seeing, more paperwork than I care to admit to reading, and last but not least, a little bit of music (Sean!). We didn’t get the house and I had to take a few days to get over that…even though I wasn’t 100% in love with the house. How weird is that? Ah well.

For books read, here’s the list:

  • Behind the Scenes at the Museum by Kate Atkinson ~ I went back and forth about this book…almost as much as the plot did.
  • The Darling by Russell Banks ~ Loved, loved, loved this book – full of suspense and great characters.
  • As I Live & Breathe: notes of a patient-doctor by Jamie Weisman ~ read this in one day!
  • Passionate Nomad: The Life of Freya Stark by Jane Fletcher Geniesse ~ such an amazing biography!
  • A Continent for the Taking: the Tragedy and Hope of Africa by Howard French ~ Very similar to The Darling. Same time period, same “characters” and events.
  • Best Essays of the Century edited by Joyce Carol Oates ~ while I only read a sampling of essays they were all good.
  • The Bronte Myth by Lucasta Miller ~dry and long.

For the Early Review Program (yay!):

  • Beyond Belief: Finding the Strength to Come Back by Josh Hamilton ~ really fast but amazingly good read.

For fun:

  • Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson ~ a great story from my childhood about friendship. This was on my challenge list. I just decided to read it out of order one day.

Nine books…sort of. I’ll have a confession for next month 😉

Beyond Belief

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Hamilton, Josh. Beyond Belief: Finding the Strength to Come Back. New York: Faith Words, 2008.

Do not expect Beyond Belief  to be eloquent or a great literary masterpiece. It is what it is – a straightforward, simple, eyt heartfelt account of one athlete’s fall from grace and subsequent redemption through religion. Drafted right out of high school and given a salary of 3.96 million, one can hardly anticipate fancy prose from Josh Hamilton. Instead, what lies in the 257 pages (with help from ESPN senior writer Tim Keown) is a humble account of his life as an athlete, drug addict, and finally, a man of faith.

Here are the lines I hope they keep, “in the vicious cycle of drug use, crack is the endgame. It eats you up from the inside out” (p 149), and “I understand that, and I expect that. My past invites that” (p225).

Bronte Myth

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Bronte mythMiller, Lucasta. The Bronte Myth. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2004.

In honor of British Literature month I added The Bronte Myth to November’s reading list. From the very beginning I was intrigued about this book; Much like how the Bronte sisters themselves invited an aura of intrigue from the moment they emerged on the literary scene. When they first began writing they, like any other authors out there, wanted desperately to be taken seriously. In an era where women couldn’t so much as travel alone the three sisters took on androgynous pseudonyms to in an attempt to hide their gender. Only these pseudonyms attracted too much attention once the sisters started to publish. The more they tried to hide their identities the more reviewers, critics, and the general public started to speculate on who they really were, not as authors, but as members of their society. Following the speculation came accusations and wild rumors -created to fill in the gaps of each sister’s true personality. Lucasta Miller attempts to unravel the mystery and kill the myths that surrounds the Bronte women. While Miller does an extremely thorough job I found the reading to be both dense and dry as a result.

Passage that made me think: “…Gaskell’s belief that though Currer Bell might be morbid, Miss Bronte was the soul of feminine delicacy” (p 59).

BookLust Twist: From More Book Lust in the chapter, “Literary Lives: the Brits” (p 146).

ps~ sorry about the huge-ness of the pic. It’s just such a beautiful cover that I couldn’t bear to shrink it!

Best American Essays

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Oates, Joyce Carol, ed. The Best American Essays of the Century. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2000.

As bloggers we cannot help but be reminded that November is National Novel Writing Month. It’s as if there a reminding hope that writing these one-three paragraph diatribes could somehow be transformed into something as concrete, or as interesting, as a full blown novel. I squirm with discomfort every time someone says I should write a book. While my stories are interesting…to a point, I don’t see a need to make them more than what they are: tiny bubbles of thought designed to pop (and ultimately, hopefully) go away when released.

Anyway. This isn’t about me and my nonability to write. This is about the complilation of essays from those who can.
Best American Essays of the Century wraps up the creme de la creme of essay writing from 1901 – 1997. Beginning with Mark Twain (“Corn-pone Opinions”) and ending with Saul Bellow (“Graven Images.”) As part of the Book Lust Challenge I read the following essays:

  • “Stickeen” by John Muir ~ “…for many of Nature’s finest lessons are to be found in her storms” (p 32).
  • “Corn-pone Opinions” by Mark Twain ~ “We are creatures of outside influence; as a rule we do not think, we only imitate” (p 1).
  • “A Law of Acceleration” by Henry Adams
  • “The Devil Baby at Hull-House” by Jane Adams
  • “The Crack-up” by F. Scott Fitzgerald ~ Life was something you dominated if you were any good” (p 139).
  • “The Ethics of Living Jim Crow: an Autobiographical Sketch” by Richard Wright
  • “Sex Ex Machina” by James Thurber ~ “Every person carries in his consciousness the old scar, or the fresh wound of some harrowing misadventure with a contraption of some sort” (p 157).
  • “Letters from a Birmingham Jail” by Martin Luther King, Jr.
  • “The Brown Wasps” by Loren Eisley
  • “A drugstore in Winter” by Cynthia Ozick

BookLust Twist: From Book Lust in the chapter called, “Essaying Essays” (p 80).

Passionate Nomad

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img_4236Geniesse, Jane Fletcher. Passionate Nomad: The Life of Freya Stark. New York: Modern Library, 2001.

This has been hanging around the house for over a year now. I had no idea it was even on “the list” until now. Someone gave me a copy with the recommendation, “read it. It’s good. You’ll like it.” Okay. So, in honor of National Travel Month I put Freya on the list (as soon as I found out it was even on the list).

Freya Stark was an amazing woman. Not because she explored uncharted territories. Not because she dared to go where even the bravest of men hadn’t. Not because she had no regard for her own well being. Not even because she was an expert Arabist. She was an amazing woman because she dared, period. We hear about the glass ceiling and what women even today are tolerating. Freya faced all that and more.
Geniesse weaves a convincing autobiography of Freya Stark using letters to and from Freya, journals, interviews, but mostly from Freya’s own library of books written about her experiences. Freya was a prolific writer and so Geniesse had plenty of material to draw from. The final product is a fascinating account of one woman’s rise to recognition through exploration and encourage, especially during one of the most volatile times of our history – World War II.

A few favorite passages:
“One suspects that all her life Freya carried some degree of rage…” (p 23).
“A telegram from Freya requesting that a tin bath be shipped into the interior of Yemen was not unusual” (p 156). You go girl!
“Wherever she went to find solitude on this great, empty earth, from nowhere emerged some form of life, human or otherwise, to share the loneliness” (p 217).
“in the middle of the night she was awakened by the tinkling of a music box being played close to her ear” (p 250).

BookLust Twist: From Book Lust in the chapter, “Lady Travelers” (p 143). I am excited to think I will be reading some of Freya’s own works (eventually), – from this same chapter. Maybe next year.

Continent for the Taking

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img_4235French, Howard W. A Continent for the Taking: The Tragedy and Hope of Africa. New York: Alfred A Knopf, 2004.

Howard French’s portrayal of Africa is both professional and passionate. He is scholarly and sentimental. There is a deep knowledge about, and an undeniable kinship with, this continent yet French is able to objectively portray it all. He takes the reader through the events of horrific genocide as well as the equally deadly outbreaks of AIDS and Ebola diseases. French skillfully demonstrates how political infrastructures prove to be volatile and fragile yet Africa’s deep seeded cultural roots remain unfailing.

For me, this was a hard read. I simply couldn’t wrap my brain around the threat of senseless violence everyone, regardless of race, age, caste, or sex, had to endure. When these attacks rained down no one was safe. Survival depended on the ability to outwit, outrun, outhide the attacker.

Passages that struck:
“For Mariam, Africa would forever be home, the place where she returned to recharge” (p 5). Despite its unflinching violence, political unrest, and never-ending poverty there is an allure.
“The advantage of a good travel companion goes beyond plain company; his real value is in the kind of moral encouragement he provides…” (p 83).

BookLust Twist: From More Book Lust in the chapter called, “Africa: A Reader’s Itinerary” (p 4).

As I Live & Breathe

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img_4234Weisman, Jamie. As I Live and Breathe, notes of a patient-doctor. New York: North Point Press, 2002.

In honor of National Health Month I decided to read As I Live and Breathe. I always find memoirs interesting when the author is more than your average individual. Who doesn’t? Dr. Weisman also has a talent for words which makes her unique story all that more compelling.

Dr. Jamie Weisman is a unique woman. While living within the confines of her illness she chose to do something about it, she joined the medical profession. As she says in her memoir, “”Now that I’ve finished medical school, I know what all those names mean, what diseases they describe, but you cannot know what they are as an illness until you see them in a patient” (p 15). Not only is her condition (congenital autoimmune deficiency disorder) rare and confusing, but her duality of patient and doctor gives her an interesting perspective- from bedside manner of doctor to bedridden patient. Because she is able to really know what the patient is experiencing she can deliver the empathy necessary for individuals really suffering.
My only real disappointment was the organization of the chapters. Dr. Weisman jumps around, remembering patients and her own childhood at random. I would have prefered a more chronological accounting. The last two chapters of the book, “begotten” and “begetting” are warmer and more personal and as a result seem a departure from the more clinical previous chapters.

Favorite blurbs:
“Our diseases overwhelm us at the strangest times” (p 16).
“I knew no happy lawyers” (p 31).

BookLust Twist: From both Book Lust and More Book Lust. In Book Lust in the chapter called, “Physicians Writing More Than Prescriptions” (p 185), and in More Book Lust in the chapter called, “Other People’s Shoes (p 181).

September Was…

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September started with a heat wave and the ache of leaving home. School is back in session and I feel like I am trying to rein in wild horses. Here’s what I managed to read in this crazy, crazy month.

  • World’s Fair by E.L. Doctorow ~ yeah, yeah. Not on the original September list. So sue me.
  • The Code Book: The Science of Secrecy from Ancient Egypt to Quantum Cryptography by Simon Singh ~ really wild book. I discovered tow movies I want to see thanks to this book.
  • A Good Enough Parent by Bruno Bettelheim ~ indepth psychobabble (good for all those parents who realllly want to analyze their kids).
  • Far Side of Paradise: a Biography of F. Scott Fitzgerald by Arthur Mizner ~ fascinating and funny.
  • The Diaries of Jane Somers by Doris Lessing ~ this one tricked me because when I first picked it up I thought it was going to be biographical nonfiction!
  • The Nowhere City by Alison Lurie ~ this should be a movie!
  • Pictures from an Institution by Randall Jarrell ~ technically I didn’t finish this one in time so it will be on the list again!

For LibraryThing’s Early Review program:

  • Emily Post by Laura Claridge ~ I have to admit, I wasn’t into this as much as I thought I would be.
  • Any Given Doomsday by Lori Handeland ~ I’m still struggling with the review for this one!
  • The Dangerous Joy of Dr. Sex and Other True Stories by Pagan Kennedy ~ Having forgot my last September challenge book, I tore through this one. My original plan was to save it for October but I couldn’t…it was that good.

For the hell of it:

  •  What I Talk About When I Talk About Running: a memoir by Haruki Murakami ~ totally off my Challenge radar, but I had to read it. It came highly, highly recommended so I jumped off the Challenge train and read about running. Totally worth it.
  • Under the Neon ~ a crazy book about the homeless who live in the storm drains underneath Vegas.
  • The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch ~ another book that came highly recommended. Sad, though!

Other than the books, it was a month for seeing good, good friends. Two friends from Colorado (haven’t seen them in four years!), a Rebecca Correia show (and 4.8 mi run with her!), the Big E with Jypsie and traffic, a good long conversation with one of my oldest and bestest friends in the whole wide world, and, and, and, a visit from my elusive, always on the go, friend SPB. I even got to have dinner with him! How lucky am I?
**personal note: thanks to everyone who helped me through this month. I’m out of the woods.