Tag: 2014

“Romance”

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Turner, W.J. “Romance.” Modern British Poetry. ed. Louis Untermeyer. New York: Harcourt, Brace & Co., 1920. pp 305. Print.

The first thing you need to understand about “Romance” is that the three interesting names in the poem, Chimborozo, Cotopaxi, and Popocatapetl, are all names of volcanoes south of the United States. Chimborazo and Cotopaxi are in the Andes of Ecuador and Popocatapetl is in Mexico, not far from Mexico City. Once you realize what Turner is talking about, the word romance takes on a completely different meaning. This is not about a relationship between a couple; this a boy, escaping the drudgery of school by fantasizing about the volcanoes of a far off land (Turner was from Australia).

Reason read: April is National Poetry month.

Author fact: I am only reading two poems this month and it turns out Turner and Sassoon were friends. Very cool.

Poem trivia: I found a YouTube video of the poem. I have to admit it’s disturbing to watch and hearing Turner’s own voice is downright haunting.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Travelers’ Tale in Verse” (p 237).

“Aftermath”

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Sassoon, Sigfried. “Aftermath.” Modern British “Poetry. Ed. Louis Untermeyer. New York: Harcourt, Brace & Co., 1920. pp 220. Print.

This is a heartbreaking poem and the message is super clear. This is a plaintive cry to Sassoon’s fellow veterans, Do not get caught up in the glories of war! Do not let anyone tell you war is an excusable act just because time has softened your memory. I think there is a country song out there with the same message, but I think it was directed towards people not forgetting about September 11, 2001. The message is the same: don’t become complacent and forgiving when you have suffered so much. Sassoon clearly did.

Author fact: There are only two poems I am reading this month. Turner and Sassoon were friends.

Poem trivia: PBS has a great site dedicated to the Great War. Supposedly, you can listen to an audio recording of “Aftermath” but I couldn’t get it to play (which is why I didn’t include the link here). Google it for yourself if you are curious.

BookLust Twist: More Book Lust in the chapter called “Living Through War” (p 237).

Graduates in Wonderland

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Pan, Jessica and Rachel Kapelke-Dale. Graduates in Wonderland: the International Misadventures of Two (Almost) Adults. New York: Gotham Books, 2014.

Reason read: Chosen as an Early Review Book for LibraryThing.

Jessica and Rachel are two graduates of Brown, out on their own, learning to become “adults.” Jessica has moved to China to study Mandarin and get back to her roots. Rachel starts out in New York City’s art scene but then decides to move to Paris, France. Their story is told through a series of no-holds-barred emails back and forth over the course of three years. They discuss everything from career paths and education to fashion and faux pas but most of all they talk about men, relationships and sex.

My only “complaint” is it was difficult to read Graduates for extended periods of time. Their writing styles are similar enough that their voices started to blend and I would lose track of who was where. It got to a point when I completely ran out of steam and put the book down for three weeks.

Book trivia: It would have been cool to have pictures of the different places the girls have been, especially Jessica’s time in China.

Day the Falls Stood Still

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Buchanan, Cathy Marie. The Day the Falls Stood Still. Read by Karen White. Ontario: Tantor, 2009

Bess Heath is a seventeen year old junior at her private boarding school when her father is laid off from the Niagara Electric Company. After returning home for the summer she realizes nothing remains the same. Now that her father is unemployed, her mother must take on seamstress work to make ends meet and Bess and her sister, Isabel learn to chip in. Bess becomes an accomplished seamstress and slowly builds up her own list of customers. Once Bess meets Tom Cole her life takes another drastic turn. The rest of the story is a love story on multiple levels that spans Bess’s formative years. She falls in love, learns about death and the value of family. She also discovers what it means to be torn between two loyalties. Tom, because of his relationship with nature, is in direct conflict with the Niagara Hydra-electric. Bess has a long standing history with the power company and has a love-hate relationship with the whirlpool at the base of the falls. Both have a deep personal history with the temperamental river. Together, theirs is a story of triumph over tragedy.

Even though this was an audio book I could barely “put it down.” I loved Buchanan’s writing style. You can’t help but fall in love with Bess.

Reason read: March 29, 1848: it was cold enough to make Niagara Falls freeze, hence the day the falls stood still.

Author fact: Buchanan has her own website here.

Book trivia: The Day the Falls Stood Still is Cathy Marie Buchanan’s first novel.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called simply “Niagara Falls” (p 156). Can’t get any easier than that.

Flower and the Nettle

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Lindbergh, Anne Morrow. The Flower and the Nettle: Diaries and Letters 1936 – 1939. Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1976.

The Flower and the Nettle is Anne’s return to the living. It covers 1936 to 1939. After the death of her first born son she and Charles take their second son, Jon, to England for an “indefinite” stay. They are literally driven out of their own country by the media’s insatiable need to photograph and question the family. First, it was Charles Lindbergh’s fame, then it was the kidnapping and murder of their first child. It is at a rambling rented cottage in England called Long Barn that Anne and Charles can finally relax and be themselves again. Jon is allowed to play freely on the lawn without massive hyper-vigilant supervision. Anne is able to concentrate on her writing. It is here that humor returns to her diaries and letters. She says things like, “It is so delicious” (p 30), and “living passionately in the present” (p 31). Later, after her third son Land is born, Anne and her family move to Illiec off the coast of France. This is the “flower” part of her life. The “nettle” is the approach of World War II and the ensnaring politics. Following Charles to Russia for business Anne vocalizes her discontent with the country. She uses words like dirty, hideous, mediocrity, drab, shoddy, third-rate and glum to describe such things as the poor middle class. She is quick to comment negatively on their fashions and complexions. This took me by surprise. What I needed to keep in mind is the intense scrutiny Anne and her family felt. The longer they stay away from America, the more “pro-Nazi” they are “villainized” as being.

One drawback of skipping a book in a series is the potential to not understand references made to that book in the next one. Because I didn’t read Locked Doors I didn’t grasp Lindbergh’s reference to a previous trip to Russia in 1933.

Favorite lines, “One gets so cramped in ordinary living” (p 76). A good excuse to get out there and do something extraordinary!

As an aside, looking at pictures of Long Barn I can’t help but think what a wonderful place! Don’t tell my husband, but it looks like my dream home! It would have been nice if Lindbergh had included maps of not only her travel destinations, but of the places she and her family lived in Europe.

Reason read: to continue the series started in January, in honor of Journal Month.

Book trivia: Maybe because The Flower and the Nettle is a longer book, there are more photographs. For the first time, Anne includes detailed pictures of the interiors of their residence. Long Barn looks like a place where I would like to live!

Author fact: At this point in Lindbergh’s life she considers herself a serious writer despite already publishing earlier.

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “Journals and Letters: We Are All Voyeurs at Heart” (p 131).

Illumination Night

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Hoffman, Alice. Illumination Night. New York: Berkley Books, 1987.

“Simon can hear the sound of pine cones hitting the ground, or bones breaking” (p 4). You know you are in for a wild ride when you read that early-in-the-book sentence because, at that moment you haven’t learned that Simon, at age four, has just heard the result of woman trying to fly. There are so many things you don’t know…yet. I should also add that Illumination Night is a really fast read. I read the first 80 pages before coming up for air. My entire lunch break flew by without my eyes lifting from the page once. Alice Hoffman is one of those authors that can suck you into a story within the first few sentences. Once you are hooked you can’t escape the story or the characters. This is a story of relationships. A grandmother, trying to understand her 16 year old granddaughter. They live next door to a married couple trying to live with their insecurities and unmet desires. All of the characters become entangled with one another when the teenager sets her sights on seducing the husband. And then, this part sounds like the punchline to a joke, a giant walks into the picture…Seriously, this is a simply beautiful story about relationships, the ones with healing and faith in them.

Reason read: Hoffman’s birthday is in March. I tried to read this two years ago. Actually, to be more precise I tried to listen to it on cd two years ago. Every disc was so scratched; damaged beyond repair that it was impossible for me to continue. I sent the whole thing back to the owning library and took it off my list for what was supposed to be one year. One thing led to another and I’m only now getting back to it…in print.

Author fact: Alice Hoffman is one of my favorite authors.

Book trivia: Alice Hoffman signed this copy of Illumination Night. Very cool.

BookLust Twist: from all three Lust Books! In Book Lust in the chapter called simply “A…My Name is Alice” (p1); in More Book Lust in the chapter called “Marriage Blues” (p 162); in Book Lust to Go in the chapter simply called “Martha’s Vineyard” (p 142).

Georges’ Wife

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Jolly, Elizabeth. The Vera Wright Trilogy: the Georges’ Wife. New York: Persea Books, 2010.

This is the last book in the Vera Wright trilogy. Vera has had a second daughter, Rachel, and this time the father is Mr. George, a professor. Once again, Vera has to keep the identity of the baby’s father a secret because their relationship is clandestine. Although, it is not with a married man this time. Vera has gotten herself romantically entangled with someone she is keeping house for. His spinster sister would not approve of their relationship (although there are times when Vera is convinced the sister already knows). As with the other Vera Wright books, Miss Wright is lonely and alone. Sad line: “To be his and not just on the edge of him and not just now and then” (p 418) suggests that she would like to have an open and honest relationship with Rachel’s father. She goes on to say, “I am accustomed to the idea of being alone, but her words cause an extra emptiness, that of being removed from belonging to a family” (p 426). How sad is that? As with the other Wright books in the series, The Georges’ Wife jumps around. In one chapter Vera’s children are small enough to show off to Miss Georges’s guests and the next they have grown up to both become surgeons. Spoiler alert: all Vera’ life she has been an outsider and incredibly lonely. Even at the very end of the trilogy she has not found true companionship. Mr. George, suffering from Alzheimer’s, doesn’t recognize the word ‘couple’ to describe his relationship with Vera.

Reason read: This is the last book in the Vera Wright Trilogy that I started in honor of Jolley.

Author fact: Jolley died in 2007. The Vera Wright Trilogy is considered autobiographical in nature.

Book trivia: Georges’ Wife is the last book of the Vera Wright trilogy. I said that already. The other piece of trivia is that The Georges’ Wife was only published in Australia. I was able to find it in a three-in-one volume.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Australia, Land of Oz: fiction” (p 30). Again, the only reason for Jolley to be included in this chapter is her notoriety as an author after moving to Australia. There is nothing about Australia in the first two books of the trilogy. At the very end of Thew Georges’ Wife Vera and Mr. George move to Australia.

Life in the Air Ocean

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Foley, Sylvia. Life in the Air Ocean. New York: Alfred A Knopf, 1999.

Life in the Air Ocean is made up of nine short stories that are all interconnected.

  • “Cave Fish” introduces Daniel to the reader. Husband to Iris, he is a veteran and has a baby daughter. “Her eyes slipped back and forth like a cave fish” (p 10). I have no idea what that means.
  • “Boy Wonder” takes us back to when Daniel was an abused boy.
  • “Life in the Air Ocean” is from Iris’s point of view. “Iris knew she was dawdling on the side of madness” (p 33).
  • “Elemenopy” is Ruth’s story and alludes to a sinister secret.
  • “Off Grenada” introduces us to three year old Monica as the new addition to the Mowry family. Older sister, Ruth, is now seven years old. “Stilts of electricity were walking over the water” (p 74).
  • “Cloudland” is ominous. Allusions of sexual abuse and alcoholism are repeated.
  • “State of the Union” addresses Iris’s alcoholism and growing paranoia that her husband is cheating on her. At this point, her children have grown (Monica, the youngest, is in college) and she barely has contact with them.
  • “History of Sex” is told from Ruth’s point of view in first person and is probably the most disturbing of the stories.
  • “Dogfight” is told from the youngest daughter, Monica’s point of view.

All along bits and pieces of the story are drawn out. Ruth is a baby without a name of gender for the first two stories. It’s like a peep show where only tantalizing tidbits are introduced. As the curtain goes down on one story, you hope it opens to reveal more in the next. This was a difficult series of stories to read. Depressing doesn’t even begin to describe it. I feel like I read this and winced all the way through it.

Reason read: March is National Family Month and Pearl lumped this book in the chapter “Families in Trouble” (see Twist).

Author fact: While poking around the internet I found an epub book called Cave Fish: Stories by Sylvia Foley. It’s a free download. Hmmmm…

Book trivia:

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Families in Trouble” (p 83). I wasn’t looking forward to reading this because Pearl called Life in the Air Ocean “…one of the most depressing books” she has ever read (p 83). Oh joy.

Running for Mortals

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Bingham, John and Jenny Hadfield. Running for Mortals: a Commonsense Plan for Changing Your Life Through Running. New York: MJF Books, 2007.

If I could, I would read everything John Bingham has ever written on the subject of running. He is, without a doubt, my kind of runner. He writes with authority and humor, something that’s hard to do in this puffed up, I-Run-12-Marathons-A-Year world. He comes across as knowing his stuff but, but. But! decidedly humble about it all the while. We can connect and commiserate with his experiences. It is important to note that both John and Jenny assure the reader runner that it doesn’t matter how tall you are, how thin you are, or your previous experiences with exercise. Anyone can do it. That bears repeating: Anyone. Can Do. It. I am proof of that. To be called a runner, there is no membership. No secret password or secret handshake to get in. If you run then you are a runner. Plain and Simple. John and Jenny just help you become a better version of the runner you already are.

Reason read: the St. Patrick’s Day road race is looming and while I “trained” last year for it, I wanted to do more this year.

Author fact: John Bingham is lovingly referred to as “the penguin” because of his shape and the way he runs. He has embraced this nickname and makes the best of it.

Book trivia: there are no pictures of either John or Jenny in Running for Mortals (that I know of), but there are pictures of exercises (probably more important to the serious-minded reader).

Cabin Fever

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Jolley, Elizabeth. Cabin Fever. New York: Harper Perennial, 1990.

We don’t really move forward chronologically in this “sequel” to My Father’s Moon. When we last left Vera, she was a single mother dealing with her own overbearing mother. The story bounced between Vera’s present and her past. Cabin Fever is more of the same, only with more detail about the time period. In this installment Vera is in New York for a conference but for almost all of the plot we are in the past, when Vera is a new mother trying to make ends meet. She is still as sad and lonely as she ever was. It is at this point that we learn Vera’s mother made Vera change her baby’s name from Beatrice to Helena. We also learn more about the affair between Vera and Dr. Metcalf, a doctor she worked with at the hospital. Vera bounces from one live-in nanny/housekeeper situation to another until she lands at the Georges residence (enter sequel number three). Brother and sister live together and already have a live-in, Nora. Vera finds a way to stay in the house by filling another need of the household. I’ll leave that bit unspoken. You just have to read it to find out…

Quotes that moved me, “Playful spinsters and exuberant lesbians give birth and special seminars are held to discuss the phenomenon of these people wanting to keep their babies” (p 6), “In my secret game of comparisons Bulge us far worse than I am in every respect, her hair, her stockings, her spectacles, and her shape” (p 12),

Confessional: because I didn’t really like Vera in My Father’s Moon I wasn’t looking forward to her story in Cabin Fever. By the end of Cabin Fever I didn’t learn to like her any better. There is a scene towards the end (p 164) when Vera’s daughter is crying. Vera doesn’t go to comfort her. All she can do is watch her four-year-old from across the room. It’s really sad.

Reason read: Cabin Fever continues the series I started earlier in February to honor of Jolley’s passing.

Author fact: According the the back flap of Cabin Fever Jolley conducted writing workshops in prisons. I find that so fascinating.

Book trivia: Cabin Fever is the second book in the Vera Wright Trilogy.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Australia, the Land of Oz: fiction” (p 30). As with My Father’s Moon, Cabin Fever has nothing to do with Australia. Jolley started writing after she moved there. So, I guess it’s like the Olympics. You can represent a country even though you weren’t born there. You just have to have some connection to it.

Careless Love

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Guralnick, Peter. Careless Love: the Unmaking of Elvis Presley. New York: Back Bay Books, 1999.

If in Last Train to Memphis Elvis Aron Presley was a shy, quiet kid with diamond-in-the-rough talent, for all appearances he is now a cocky, self-assured music and movie star in Careless Love. All of the makings of a good rock and roll star are there: sex, drugs and money. At this stage of the game Elvis is dating more women than he can keep track of, taking upppers and diet pills to keep up with the party-til-3am lifestyle, and spending boatloads of money all the while. By the time he is in his early 30s he has bought his entourage push carts, motorcycles and horses. “In all he managed to pay out well over $1000,000 in approximately two weeks, an orgy of spending that seemed to momentarily pacify Elvis…” (p 252). His sincerity gets lost in the mayhem and only resurfaces when he remembers his deceased mother. His mother brings out the best in him. Without her, his struggle to know himself is heartbreaking. Yet, what he really does knows is how to work the public, especially the ladies. Guralnick doesn’t shy from this fact. He is unflinching in his quest for the truth of the legacy. He captures Presley’s demise as the epic tragedy that it was.

Quote that shocked me, “Elvis had told her before they were married that he had never been able to make love to any woman he knew to have had a child…” (p 291).

Reason read: January was Elvis Presley’s birth month. Careless Love is the second volume of Last Train to Memphis.

Author fact: Guralnick has his own website here.

Book trivia: Careless Love was a New York Times Best Seller.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called, “Elvis On My Mind” (p 78). Simple enough.

Alexander Hamilton

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Chernow, Ron. Alexander Hamilton. Read by Grover Gardiner. New York: Penguin Audio, 2004.

Ron Chernow is the master architect when building biographies. His reconstruction of Alexander Hamilton’s life is as detailed as it is complete. Chernow had plenty to work with as Hamilton’s early years were as rich with intrigue as his later political years. But, Chernow doesn’t stop there. Besides given a thorough snapshot of the political and historical times, he dips into the biographies of the influential people around Hamilton as well: John Adams, George Clinton, Elizabeth Schuyler, Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, and of course, Aaron Burr, to name a few. As an aside, I was surprised to learn that Hamilton enjoyed settling disputes with duels. He was quick to suggest them, enough so that his encounter with Burr was not the first, but definitely his last.

Reason read: Typically, we celebrate Presidents’ Day in February and even though Hamilton was not a president (his candidacy was denied), he was a founding father and an instrumental adviser to George Washington.

Author fact: Chernow also wrote Titan and The House of Morgan bot of which are on my list.

Book trivia: Alexander Hamilton is dedicated to, “Valerie, best of wives and best of women.” So sweet.

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “Founding Fathers” (p 92).

Men of Men

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Smith, Wilbur. Men of Men. New York: Doubleday & co., 1983.

Because Men of Men picks up where Flight of the Falcon left off we rejoin Zouga Ballantyne. Now he is ten years older and married to a society girl named Aletta. Despite many miscarriages she has given him two boys, Ralph and Jordan. Somehow Zouga has convinced his family to join him in Africa where he is still searching for riches, only this time instead of elephants and gold it is diamonds. His eldest son, Ralph, is exposed to gambling, violence and prostitution at sixteen, literally coming of age in the bush. It’s Ralph we continue to follow for the most of Men of Men although most characters from Flight return. Robyn, Mungo, Clinton and Charoot, to name a few. In reality, it is everyone’s greed we bear witness to. As with all of Smith’s other books, Men of Men is rich with African history and adventure as well as strong characters, only there are more of them to play with.

Typical quotes, “It was a beautiful stabbing, a glory which men would sing about” (p 291),

Reason read: Men of Men continues the series started with Flight of the Falcon in December. Read in honor of Rhodesia’s Shangani Day.

Author fact: Wilbur Smith’s middle name is Addison. What a cool name!

Book trivia: Wilbur uses the same picture for his photo on the dust jacket. Except this photo has been darkened a little so there is a strange shadow across half his face.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Zipping Through Zimbabwe/Roaming Rhodesia” (p 268).

Ocean of Words

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Jin, Ha. Ocean of Words. New York: Vintage International, 1996.

Ocean of Words is made up of twelve short stories, all centered around Chinese soldiers on the brink of war with Russia in the early 1970s. In every story there is a Chinese soldier wrestling with suspicion, loyalty, individualism and power. They all wave weaknesses or flaws that render them human above all else. Each character possesses a depth of personality that leaves the reader thinking about him long after the story has ended.  I particularly liked the title story in which the “ocean of words” is a dictionary indexed in Chinese, Latin and English.

In order, the short stories are:

  • “A Report”
  • “Too Late”
  • “Uncle Piao’s Birthday Dinners”
  • “Love in the Air”
  • “Dragon Head”
  • A Contract”
  • “Miss Jee”
  • “A Lecture”
  • “The Russian Prisoner”
  • The Fellow Townsmen”
  • “My Best Soldier”
  • “Ocean of Words”

My favorite quotes, “Once you’re conquered by foreigners, you’ve lost everything” (p 27), “History is a mess of chances and accidents” (p 77), and “Mind modeling is more important” (p 174).

My favorite stories: “A Contract” and “Ocean of Words.”

Reason read: Celebrating Ha Jin’s birth month.

Author fact: Ocean of Words is Ha Jin’s first fiction.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called, “China:the Middle Kingdom” (p 61).

Locked Rooms and Open Doors

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Lindbergh, Anne Morrow. Locked Rooms and Open Doors: Diaries and Letters 1933 – 1935.New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1974.

Reason read: While I didn’t read this word for word, I wanted to peruse it to “keep up” with Anne. This should have been the next book in the series, after Hour of Gold, Hour of Lead, but for some reason Pearl doesn’t list it. At this point in Lindbergh’s life (1933-1935) she and her husband Charles are recovering from the kidnapping and murder of their first born son, Charles, Jr. They have a second son, Jon, who is now a toddler. Their big expedition is by seaplane crossing the Atlantic and exploring such places as Greenland and Africa. They are gone for nearly six months, but when they return they are faced with more tragedy. Sister Elizabeth passes away from pneumonia complicated by a heart condition and the kidnapping trial forces the Lindberghs to relive every moment of the tragedy of losing their son. It is at the end of Locked Rooms and Open Doors that Charles and Anne, in an effort to escape the public eye, leave the United States for England, a move that will prove controversial and have grave consequences.

Book trivia: Locked Rooms and Open Doors is the third book in Anne Morrow Lindbergh’s series of diaries and letters.

Author fact: At this point in Anne’s life she has become navigator, copilot, photographer, and log keeper for her husband. Her confidence and courage allows her to describe these expeditions with more color and detail.

BookLust Twist: none. This one was left out for some reason.