Tag: Fiction

Scar Tissue

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Ignatieff, Michael. Scar Tissue. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1994.

From the very first page of Scar Tissue you are sucked in. The opening paragraphs are tragic and utterly real. You can easily put yourself in the story.
I am a big fan of clever one-liners and Scar Tissue is full of them, like “we are programmed to betray” (p 4). Truth be known I would have said “We are programmed to deceive” paying homage to one of my favorite songs of my youth, “Hotel California” by the Eagles. But, Ignatieff is right, betrayal is more in keeping with human nature than deception.

I grieved throughout this entire book. Told from the perspective of a middle aged married man with a family of his own, it is story of watching parents grow old and relationships change. The aging process is especially cruel when it is accelerated by Alzheimer’s disease. The mother the narrator loves dies in the mind right before his very eyes and he is powerless to stop it.  It is difficult to read about the mother’s slow decent into another reality; a reality where childhood happened only yesterday but the spouse she wakes up next to is a complete stranger. The struggle to understand takes its toll on everyone around the narrator. He becomes fixated on “being there” for his mother, especially after the sudden death of his father. His marriage and teaching position suffer until  there is barely anything left.
Probably the most poignant scene in the whole book is the narrator’s visit to an ALS patient and the distinctions made between dying with a sound mind as with the ALS patient and his mother, dying with a damaged mind but a healthy body.

I love it when books I am reading simultaneously overlap. Scar Tissue mentions Italian artist Andrea Mantegna whose biography is in Lives of the Painters, Sculptors, and Architects (Vol 2) by Giorgio Vasari.

Reason read: November is national Alzheimers awareness month.

Author fact: Google Ignatieff’s name and you will see he is all over the internet, but not for his writing. He has had a pretty substantial political career as well.

Book trivia: Scar Tissue was short-listed for the Booker Prize.

BookLust Twist: From Book Lust in the chapter called “Mothers and Sons” (p 161).

Breakfast With Scot

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Downing, Michael. Breakfast With Scot. Washington, D.C.: Counterpoint, 1999.

Less than 200 pages long this was a quick, in-one-sitting read. At first blush I would call this story “quirky” for the simple fact that all of the characters have their issues. What makes this fun to read is how they deal with those issues as well as each other. This is a story about relationships and relating to people around you. The point of view is told from Italian art magazine editor, Ed. Ed and his chiropractor partner, Sam, have become guardians to eleven year old Scot. Scot doesn’t fit in for a multitude of reasons. For one, Ed and Sam have never wanted children. For another, Scot is the child of Sam’s brother’s girlfriend, only the brother is not the biological father. Topping it all of is Scot’s unique personality; his affinity for hand soaps and charm bracelets. While Ed and Sam are homosexuals they are not sure how to deal with Scot on any of these levels. As the reader you want them to not only work it out but work it out as a happy ending.

Poignant line: “But Scot’s the kind of kid other kids push down and kick simply because of the way he puts his hand on his hip” (p 50). This line sums up the entire book.

Reason read: November is national adoption month and while Ed and Sam don’t “adopt” Scot, per se, they are legal guardians.

Author fact: Michael Downing is a local boy, growing up to the west of me and working to the east.

Book trivia: Breakfast with Scot was made into a movie in 2007.

BookLust Twist: From More Book Lust in the chapter called “Adapting to Adoption” (p 1).

Good Thief’s Guide to Paris

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Ewan, Chris. The Good Thief’s Guide to Paris. New york: St. Martin’s Minotaur, 2008.

Right off the bat The Good Thief’s Guide to Paris opens with a head-scratcher. Writer and petty thief Charles Howard is teaching someone how to break into an apartment in Paris, France. After a successful book reading and too many glasses of red wine Howard has offered a fan a one on one tutorial in how to pull off the standard B&E. If you have read The Good Thief’s Guide to Amsterdam you would think Howard is too smart to pull off anything that dumb. But he does and of course this B&E leads to more trouble, including a dead woman in his apartment.
In addition to being involved in the typical bungled burglar caper Howard’s relationship with unmet editor, Victoria, gets more complicated. She wants to see him face to face. This poses a myriad of problems for Howard, the least of all being he has lied about his looks.
the biggest improvement over the Amsterdam book is that Ewan sums up the mystery in a more realistic, less movie caper-ish way in Paris.
Pet peeve: The Good Thief’s Guide to Paris was published in 2008 and yet Charlie Howard is still slinking around using payphones and phone books. Even I had a cellphone before 2008.

Lines that made me laugh: “I felt my eyebrows switch places. I fumbled for an answer” (p 250). I just love the image of Howard’s eyebrows dancing around.

Reason read: A continuation of the Good Thief series I started last month. Only I didn’t need to. Good Thief…Paris stands on its own with barely a mention of Good Thief…Amsterdam. However, if you want to keep the advancement of the relationship with Victoria, Howard’s editor, in chronological order it is best to read Amsterdam first.

Author fact: Chris Ewan is a lawyer and while this puts him in the category of John Grisham, I enjoy Ewan more.

Book trivia: This is the second Good Thief book. Next is The Good Thief’s Guide to Las Vegas.

BookLust Twist: From Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Las Vegas” (p 130). As with The Good Thief’s Guide to Amsterdam, The Good Thief’s Guide to Paris was mentioned as an “oh, by the way…Chris Ewan has also written these “Good Thief Guides” in addition to the one set in Vegas.” Obviously, Paris has nothing to do with Vegas.

November ’12 is…

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November is Thanksgiving. My mom’s birthday. A wedding somewhere out there. The days are getting shorter and the nights are getting colder. Soon it will be time to crank up the woodstove. November is also a football game (Go Pats!) and maybe some music. It promises to be a good month for books, too. I have a couple of really short ones to buzz through:

  • Lives of the Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, Vol 2. by Giorgio Vasari ~ continuing the series started in October in honor of art month. As with Vol.1 I won’t read any bio that has a mistake in it.

    • I’m excited about this volume because Da Vinci is in it.

  • The Good Thief’s Guide to Paris by Chris Ewan ~ a continuation of the series started in October to honor the Amsterdam marathon. This should be a really quick read.
  • Camus: a Romance by Elizabeth Hawes ~ in honor of Albert Camus’s birth month
  • Edward Lear in Albania: journals of a landscape painter by Edward Lear ~ in honor of November being a good time to visit Albania.

    • I guess so.

  • Before the Knife: Memories of an African Childhood by Carolyn Slaughter ~in honor of November being a good time to take a safari in Africa. Truth be told, this won’t inspire me to travel anywhere near the dark continent.

    • I can tell already.

For audio – I’m plan to listen to Martin Gilbert’s biography of Winston Churchill, Winston Churchill, a Life and Dorothy Sayer’s The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club.

For the Early Review program on LibraryThing I will finish Clay by Melissa Harrison. I have to admit I’m not wild about the story. I love the way Harrison describes the landscape around her but not a fan of her character development.

What else about November? Can I say I will be thrilled, thrilled to not have to listen to Scott Brown and Elizabeth Warren bash each other over the head anymore? As a woman I have never felt more “targeted” than in this particular election. That would go for Obama and Romney as well. Grrrr.

October ’12 was…

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October 2012 was started out to sea. We landed on Monhegan sandwiched between the bustling start of Trap Day and the slowing end of tourist season. As a nod to the death of summer we readied our psyches to the coming winter. The island had shed its summer greens and stood cloaked in red rust brown and burnt yellow hues. Hiking the trails was at once magical and sobering. It was easy to curl up with a good book every night and read for at least two hours straight (something I never get to do at home unless it’s an off day). And speaking of the books, here they are:

  • Persian Boy by Mary Renault ~ a continuation of the series about Alexander the Great. I started this in September to keep the story going.
  • Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley ~ in honor of Halloween (duh). Probably one of my favorite books of the month. I read this in three days.
  • The Outermost House: a year of life on the great beach of Cape Cod by Henry Beston ~ in honor of October being Animal Month. The best book for me to read on an island; finished it in three days.
  • Lives of the Painters, Vol. 1 by Giorgio Vasari ~ in honor of October being Art Appreciation month. This was just ridiculous to read. There were a lot of errors according to the translator. I ended up skipping every biography that had a contradiction or error in it.As a result, finished it in two weeks.
  • Hackers edited by Jack Dann ~ in honor of October being Computer Awareness month. This was cool to read. I read three stories a night and finished it in four days.
  • The Dialect of Sex: the Case For Feminist Revolution by Shulamith Firestone ~ in honor of breast cancer awareness month and strong women everywhere. I didn’t completely finish this, but I got the gist of it.
  • The Good Thief’s Guide to Amsterdam by Chris Ewan ~ in honor of the Amsterdam marathon taking place in October. I read this in four and a half days. Easy and very entertaining!
  • The Clerkenwell Tales by Peter Ackroyd ~in honor of Ackroyd’s birth month. This was short, a little over 200 pages, but I took my time reading it – almost three weeks!

The audio book I chose for October was The Man From Beijing by Henning Mankell. This took forever to listen to! I felt like I was constantly plugged into the story. I listened to it on the drive home from Maine, to and from work everyday. even while I was working out, while I cooking. It was a great story, worth every hour between the earphones. Can’t wait to read other Mankell stories!

For LibraryThing’s Early Review program I read Thomas Jefferson’s Creme Brulee: How a Founding Father and His Slave Introduced French Cuisine to America by Thomas J. Craughwell. While I thought I would enjoy this book (TJ is one of my favorite past presidents and I’m wild about food) it fell a little flat for me. I stopped reading on page 200. I also started reading Clay by Melissa Harrison. It was refreshing to get a first-time fiction from LibraryThing!

One thing that I failed to mention about October (and this is related to the books) is that I am back to requesting books from other libraries! Yay yay yay! This was halted in June of 2011 because we were switching ILSs and at the time I figured it would be a good opportunity to read what was on my own shelf and in my own library. Now, nearly 17 months later I am back to having hundreds of libraries to order from. Thank gawd!

We ended October with a freak storm people were calling Frankenstorm in honor of being so close to Halloween. Although we prepared like hell we saw little damage, thankfully. My thoughts and prayers go out to those in New Jersey and New York. It’s sad to see my old haunts get battered around so…

Anniversary of Crazy

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November marks the seventh anniversary of the crazy idea I would read everything indexed in Book Lust by Nancy Pearl. Subsequently that idea mushroomed into reading everything indexed in More Book Lust and most recently, Book Lust To Go as well. Let’s do a little math, shall we? In six years I have read 583 books. That is approximately 97 books a year. If I continue at that rate I will finish the Lust Challenge when I am 93 years old, give or take a year or two…..

I had this conversation with someone a few days ago and without warning the thought that I might not finish this challenge depressed me. Not because of my own mortality but because of all the interesting books I will miss. I had a horrible thought – what if I spent a considerable time slogging through something I found only mildly interesting while I missed out on something completely riveting? What a not nice thought. I shared this ugly-ugly and my companion stridently changed the subject. What if you were to consider November a “new” year and you list out the books you are planning to read? This, of course, would not include LibraryThing and the Early Review program. It would not include the “strays” (as I’ve taken to calling them). Those are the books picked up for no other reason than a good suggestion or an intriguing cover. Accountability. I like it. It gives me structure. So, without further ado, here is the conservative list for Year Seven 11/2012 – 11/2013 in alphabetical order, of course:

  1. Abide By Me by Elizabeth Strout
  2. Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
  3. Among the Missing by Dan Chaon
  4. Apollo: the epic journey to the moon by David West Reynolds
  5. Arctic Grail by Pierre Berton (I started this last year)
  6. Ariel by Sylvia Plath
  7. At Home in the Heart of Appalachia by John O’Brien
  8. Beautiful Swimmers by William Warner
  9. Before the Knife by Carolyn Slaughter
  10. Beneath the Lion’s Gaze by Maaza Mengist
  11. Beyond the Bogota by Gary Leech
  12. Brass Go-Between by Oliver Bleeck
  13. Breakfast with Scot by Michael Drowning
  14. Burma Chronicles by Guy Delise
  15. Burning the Days by James Salter
  16. Camus, a Romance by Elizabeth Hawes
  17. Cardboard Crown by Martin Boyd
  18. Cat Who Ate Danish Modern by Lillian Jackson Braun
  19. Child that Books Built by Francis Spufford
  20. Churchill, a life by Martin Gilbert
  21. Conspiracy and Other Stories by Jaan Kross
  22. Deafening by Frances Itani
  23. Death in Verona by Roy Harley Lewis
  24. Diamond Classics by Mike Shannon
  25. Dining with Al-Qaeda by Hugh Pope
  26. Diving Bell and the Butterfly by Jean-Dominique Bauby
  27. Domestic Manners of the Americans by Fanny Trollope
  28. Edward Lear in Albania by Edward Lear
  29. Fanny by Edmund White
  30. Final Solution by Michael Chabon
  31. Fixer by Joe Sacco
  32. Footnotes in Gaza by Joe Sacco
  33. Full Cupboard of Life by Alexander McCall Smith
  34. Gabriel Garcia Marquez by Gerald Martin
  35. Gentlemen Prefer Blondes by Anita Loos
  36. Girl in Landscape by Jonathan Lethem
  37. Going Wild by Robert Winkler
  38. Golden Spruce by John Vaillant
  39. Good Thief’s Guide to Paris by Chris Ewan
  40. Good Thief’s Guide to Vegas by Chris Ewan
  41. Good-bye Chunk Rice by Craig Thompson
  42. Grand Ambition by Lisa Michaels
  43. Guardians by Geoffrey Kabaservice
  44. Hole in the Earth by Robert Bausch
  45. House of Morgan by Ron Chernow
  46. House on the Lagoon by Rosario Ferre
  47. Joy of Cooking by Irma Rombauer
  48. Kalahari Typing School for Men by Alexander McCall Smith
  49. Light Infantry Ball by Hamilton Basso
  50. Lives of the Painters (vol 2, 3 & 4) by Giorgio Vasari
  51. Mortality for Beautiful Girls by Alexander McCall Smith
  52. No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency by Alexander McCall Smith
  53. Nobody Knows My Name by James Baldwin
  54. Ocean of Words by Ha Jin
  55. Old Friends by Tracy Kidder
  56. Panther Soup by John Grimlette
  57. Points Unknown edited by David Roberts
  58. Rabbit Hill by Robert Lawson
  59. Return of the Dancing Master by Henning Mankell
  60. Rosalind Franklin by Brenda Maddox
  61. Rose Cafe by John Hanson Mitchell
  62. Scar Tissue by Michael Ignatieff
  63. Scramble for Africa by Thomas Pakenham
  64. Southpaw by Mark Harris
  65. Tattered Cloak by Nina Berberova
  66. Tea Time for the Traditionally Built by Alexander McCall Smith
  67. Tears of the Giraffe by Alexander McCall Smith
  68. Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini
  69. Time, Love, Memory by Jonathan Weiner
  70. Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club by Dorothy Sayers
  71. Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackery
  72. Viceroy of Ouidah by Bruce Chatwin
  73. What you Owe Me by Bebe Moore Campbell
  74. Widow for One Year by John Irving
  75. Wolves of Willoughby Chase by Joan Aiken
  76. Working Poor by David Shipler

I’ll update this list May 1st, at the halfway mark. I haven’t spelled out which books I will listen to on CD. This also doesn’t reflect when I’ll read them either. All I know is that I will continue to read whenever and wherever I can. Standing in line at the grocery store, trapped in the backseat of a moving vehicle, before bed, in the bath, while my kisa watches hours of football, with a glass of wine, during storms, by candlelight and sunlight, on vacation, while I’m sick, or waiting for the pasta water to boil. I will skip the books that bore me to tears. I will start books early and finish them late. This is my new year’s resolution.

Clay

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Harrison, Melissa. Clay.New York: Bloomsbury, 2013.

Clay is centered around the lives of four different people only the story starts out like a lukewarm party with lots of dull people. The characters were listless and unmemorable. I felt like a party goer who was more interested in the decor of the party than the people attending it.By page 100 I still hadn’t connected with anyone nor could I tell anyone what it was really about. At the center of the story is TC, a nine-turning-ten year old lonely boy. On the surface he is looking for a companion, someone to share his “me against the world” attitude. Deep down he is searching for his father, always fantasizing about ways to get him to come home after divorcing his mom. Other characters include Jamal, TC’s mother’s boyfriend; Jozef, the Polish immigrant working two jobs; Denny, Jozef’s boss at the furniture shop and Musa, Jozef’s boss at the takeaway; Sophia, the elderly widow across the park; her daughter Linda; granddaughter Daisy, son Michael, and son-in-law Steven. All these characters circle around each other without real rhyme or reason other than proximity. For example, TC and Jozef forge a misfit friendship and Daisy and grandmother Sophie write misunderstood letters to one another.
The best part of Harrison’s writing is her descriptive passages about nature. She captures birds, trees, flowers beautifully. Wildlife comes alive and breathes life into the rest of the story. Because the plot lacked a hook I found I could put Clay down for days at a time and not miss the people I had met. I wasn’t breathlessly interested in seeing what happened next. My curiosity was mild, bordering on disinterested.

Reason read: This was received and reviewed as part of LibraryThing’s Early Review program.

Author Fact: Clay is Melissa Harrison’s first novel.

Book Trivia: Clay will be published in 2013.

Clerkenwell Tales

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Ackroyd, Peter. The Clerkenwell Tales. New York: Nan A. Talese, 2004.

The very first thing you notice when you pick up Clerkenwell Tales is that the table of contents look a lot like the table of contents from Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales. This was definitely intentional. In fact, all of the characters are the same as Chaucer’s only fleshed out a little differently than Chaucer. We start off with a deranged nun full of prophesy and a group of presumed heretics called the Lollards. The Lollards are a secret society of men who seek to overthrow the church, dethrone the king, wreak havoc across London. As a result, chaos will ensue for sure!

Reason Read: October is Peter Ackroyd’s birth month.

Author Fact: Ackroyd’s fascination with Chaucer is ongoing. He recently published a retelling of The Canterbury Tales.

Book Trivia: There is great joy in describing medieval filth in Clerkenwell Tales. Sentences like, “…who was removing a piece of excrement from under his fingernail…” (p 64) is common.
As an aside, there is a book store named Clerkenwell Tales in London, England.

BookLust Twist: From More Book Lust in the chapter called “Digging Up the Past Through Fiction” (p 79).

Man From Beijing

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Mankell, Henning. The Man From Beijing. Read by Rosalyn Landor. New York: Random House Audio, 2010.

The opening scene to The Man From Beijing (aside from the judicial oath) is stunning. Mankell describes in haunting detail the travels of a lone wolf as it hungrily searches for prey. I won’t spoil it by saying anything more. Suffice it to say this scene sets the tome for an ominous story. After visiting a wolf and wilderness center in Colorado my mind’s eye can see this solitary wolf (and it’s ever present hunger) with detailed clarity which makes Mankell’s opening scene even more chilling.

Henning Mankell is a master at writing mysteries. The Man From Beijing is no exception. The story starts with nineteen people, concentrated in one tiny Swedish village, brutally murdered. Most of the victims are elderly and the level of violence inflicted on them is unprecedented. Even their pets have been viciously attacked and killed. As the details of the massacre unfold the plot becomes multi-generational, spanning 150 years; and international, taking place in China, Zimbabwe, the United States and, of course, Sweden.

Reason read: I needed a “wild card” story for the fun of it. I chose The Man From Beijing because it isn’t attached to any other story (Mankell writes mostly series).

Author Fact: Mankell was the first winner of the Ripper Award.

Book Trivia: The Man From Beijing is an international best seller. According to IMDB it was made into a television movie in 2010.

BookLust Twist: From Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Swede(n), Isn’t It?” (p 223).

Good Thief’s Guide to Amsterdam

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Ewan, Chris. The Good Thief’s Guide to Amsterdam. New York: St. Martin’s Minotaur, 2007.

Charles Howard is a suspense writer visiting Amsterdam for inspiration to the ending of his latest crime-thief thriller. He shouldn’t ever get writers’ block because he happens to be one of the very thieves he writes about in his “fiction.” As a petty thief he steals things just because he can. In addition, the thefts stave off boredom and supplement his writing career. One of his sidekicks is his literary agent, Victoria, who he has never met. He tells he everything about his thieving escapades. This time word has gotten around – he’s a good a thief as they come – and he is approached by an American willing to pay him to steal the matching plaster monkey figurines to his “See No Evil.” The figures are cheap and the job seems to simple. Howard rightly thinks there has to be a catch and of course, there is. After successfully stealing “Hear No Evil” and “Speak No Evil” all hell breaks loose when the American is murdered and his death is pinned on Howard.

Chris Ewan’s writing is fun and furious. It’s easy to read 100 pages in a single lunch break without looking up once. His Charles Howard character is entertaining with just the right amount of cheeky sarcasm contrasted with humble likeability. Like other reviewers I enjoyed his sly and flirty relationship with his literary editor. Of course the ending is wrapped in a “Who Dunnit” ending with a neat little bow, but because Ewan kept many details out this play by play was almost necessary to make the ending complete.

Good line: “It was enough, to begin with, to be somewhere I wasn’t meant to be, without anyone knowing about it” (p 79).

Reason Read: in honor of the Amsterdam marathon which takes place in October.

Author Fact: Chris Ewan has his own Bond-like website. It’s entertaining, just like his books.

Book Trivia: The Good Thief’s Guide to Amsterdam is the first in a series of “Good Thief” books by Ewan.

BookLust Twist: From Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Las Vegas” (p 130). This was another one of those “mentioned by default” books Pearl decided to include. This particular “Good Thief’s Guide” has nothing to do with Vegas but because Ewan wrote another one that does take place in Vegas Amsterdam gets a mention as well.

Hackers

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Hackers. Dann, Jack and Gardner Dozois, eds. New York: Ace Books, 1996.

Hackers is an eclectic mix of short stories about a techno-subculture called hackers. Most of the stories are written by well known and respected science fiction writers.  Each story is prefaced with a short bio about the author and many of them are authors already on my Lust list. The list of stories is as follows:

  • “Burning Chrome” by William Gibson
  • “Spirit of the Night” by Tom Maddox
  • “Blood Sisters” by Greg Egan (probably my favorite since I would have done the same thing had it been my sister.)
  • “Rock On” by Pat Cadigan (I didn’t get this one at all.)
  • “The Pardoner’s Tale” by Robert Silverberg ~ I liked this one a lot
  • “Living Will” by Alexander Jablokov
  • “Dogfight” by Michael Swanwick and William Gibson
  • “Our Neural Chernobyl” by Bruce Sterling
  • “(Learning About) Sex Machine” by Candas Jane Dorsey
  • “Conversations With Michael” by Daniel Marcus
  • “Gene Wars” by Paul J McAuley
  • “Spew” by Neal Stephenson
  • “Tangents” by Greg Bear (weird!)

Favorite line: From “Living Will” by Alexander Jablokov, “Gerald set his drink down carefully and put his arm around his friend’s shoulders, something he rarely did. And they sat there in the silent study, two old friends stuck at the wrong end of time” (p 111). This story in particular was very human and very sad.

Reason read: October is Computer month. I have to admit it took me some time to get used to words like cybernetic, fiberoptic and simstim.

Best lines, “That was the summer that I finally managed to hack into a Pentagon computer – just an office supplies purchasing system, but Paula was suitably impressed (and neither of us had ever guessed that paperclips were so expensive)” (p 50).

Author Fact: Since there are a bunch of authors I settled on writing about my favorite

Book Trivia: Even though this was compiled in the mid-90s, most of the stories are highly readable even today. the only element of the anthology that was dated was each introduction that introduced the author as “new” to the scene of science fiction writing.

BookLust Twist: From Book Lust in the chapter called “Cyberspace.Com” (p 69).

Frankenstein

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Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft. Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus. New York: Barnes and Noble Classics, 2003.

I am glad I had a chance to reread Frankenstein. Such a great book! Victor Frankenstein is a student impatient with a classical education. He becomes fascinated with unorthodox science and the engineering of life from human corpses. Left alone with his “research” Frankenstein creates a man more powerful in strength and size than average, and because his methods are crude, so ugly it is deemed a “monster,” a “daemon” a “fiend.” Upon creation Frankenstein immediately regrets his man-made monster and is relieved when it runs away.
Frankenstein is a cautionary lesson in the dangers of messing with science. It is also a commentary on assumptions and misunderstandings. When Frankenstein’s monster starts killing Victor’s loved ones Frankenstein misunderstands the message and makes assumptions about the violence. From the first tragedy it is unknown if it was an accident or not. It is a tragedy that doesn’t end well for anyone. The story of Frankenstein and his monster is told encapsulated in another story that brings us full circle. You cannot help but feel sorry for the monster. He is abhorred and misunderstood from the very beginning. His struggle to belong becomes a diabolical quest when Frankenstein tries and then refuses to create a companion for him.

Favorite lines, “To examine the causes of life, we must first have recourse to death” (p 46), and “But I, the true murderer, felt the never-dying worm alive in my bosom, which allowed of no hope or consolation” (p 78). Okay, and one more: “During my first experiment, a kind of enthusiastic frenzy had blinded me to the horror of employment; my mind was intently fixed on the consummation of my labour, and my eyes were shut tight to the horror of my proceedings. But now I went to it in cold blood, and my heart often sickened at the work of my hands” (p 146).

Author fact: What an interesting concept – Mary Shelley, married to Percy Bysshe Shelley, writes Frankenstein in response to a challenge, “we will each write a ghost story…” (p 7); a competition of sorts among friends. Mary’s story wins. Ironically enough, it is her first story, written as an 18 year old who claims the story came to her in a dream. Another interesting twist is the preface to the Barnes and Noble copy is written by her husband but in Mary’s voice.

Book trivia: Over time Victor Frankenstein’s monster has become known as Frankenstein. Thanks to movies we all know the green man with screws in his temples and crude stitches running down his neck.

Reason read: Halloween is in October. Need I say more?

BookLust Twist: From Book Lust and More Book Lust. From Book Lust in the chapter called “Mechanical Men, Robots, Automatons, and Deep Blue” (p 150). From More Book Lust in the chapters “Horror for Sissies” (p 119) and “Literary Lives: the Brits” (p 147).

Persian Boy

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Renault, Mary. The Persian Boy. New York: Pantheon Books, 1972.

Mary Renault continues the story of Alexander the Great (the first book was Fire From Heaven) in The Persian Boy. When we catch up with Alexander it has been six years. He is now 26 years old. His prowess as a conqueror cannot be questioned, as it was covered in Fire From Heaven, so Renault chooses to explore Alexander’s sensual side as he forges a relationship with slave-boy Bagoas. As a eunuch Bagoas is used to being a plaything for royalty. His beauty is beyond compare and when Alexander is presented with Bagoas as a peace offering he cannot refuse. Despite once serving Alexander’s Persian enemy Bagoas decides to be loyal to Alexander and make Alexander love him. What follows is the classic struggle of Persian versus Macedonian cultures as Bagoas assumes the narrative.

Interesting quotes, “There are eunuchs who become women, and those who do not; we are something by ourselves and must make of it what we can” (p 40).

Reason read: to continue the story of Alexander the Great that was started in September.

Author fact: Mary Renault had a lifelong partner named Julie Mullard (more info here).

Book trivia: Renault strays from third person narrative and tells Alexander’s story through the first person narrative of Bagoas, his companion and lover.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “The Classical World” (p 59).

Oct ’12 is…

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October. What I can I say about October besides it is a yin yang of good and bad. Three different friends celebrate their anniversaries in this month so it is a month of love for some. My cousin passed away October 10th last year. A new dark cloud anniversary for some. Kisa and a friend and I head to Monhegan for a week. It will be good to be homehome. In fact I’ll need to post this early in order for it not to be almost two weeks late. What else is October? Halloween. Pumpkins. A return to cozy knee high leggings. Kisa and I are already talking about buying and burning wood. The stove didn’t see much action last year. Here are the books:

  • Hackers edited by Jack Dann ~ in honor of October being computers month. Disclaimer ~ I had to place an interlibrary loan on this one so I’m not sure I’ll actually read it in time.
  • Persian Boy by Mary Renault ~ a continuation of the Alexander the Great series. Note: I am not reading the third and final book of the trilogy.
  • Last of the Mohicans by James Fenimore Cooper ~ a continuation of the Leatherstocking series. Nope. I’m just saying I’ll read it when I know I won’t. If the preceding book was “attempted” the following book won’t even get a chance. New rule.
  • The Outermost House: A year of life on the great beach of Cape Cod by Henry Beston ~ in honor of October being animal month
  • Dialect of Sex by Shulamith Firestone ~ in honor of National Breast Cancer Awareness month and strong women (I started this last year and didn’t finish it in time).
  • Lives of the Painters, Sculptors, and Architects by Giorgio Vasari ~ in honor of October being art appreciation month.
  • And for audio: The Man From Beijing by Swedish author Henning Mankell ~ as a wild card book.

For the Early Review program on LibraryThing I am reading Thomas Jefferson’s Creme Brulee by Thomas Craughwell. I’m pretty excited about this one. Historical cooking with a Founding Father. You can’t go wrong!

Sept ’12 Was…

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The first four days of September were a Rocky Mountain high followed by the harsh reality of back to school. I felt like a kid. What else? My kisa decided he wants to run a 5k for a charity event so September was our first month of training (the event is on October 14th). We caught the music bug, seeing Phish a few times and Sean Rowe once, which rocked, by the way. It’s fall so the nights are getting cooler. We closed the pool and took out the air conditioner; put a heavier blanket on the bed and put away the swimsuits. I had an eye toward azzkicking boots and comfy sweaters and celebrating eight years of marriage.

Here are the books:

  • Ariel by Andre Maurois ~ in honor of National Book Month. This was an easy book to read in four days.
  • Eleanor Roosevelt Vol. One by Blanche W. Cook ~ in honor of Roosevelt’s birth month. I fully admit I started this in August.
  • American Ground: the Unbuilding of the World Trade Center by William Langewiesche ~ in honor and memory of September 11, 2001. This was an audio book I inexplicably listened to on an airplane.
  • Enchantress From the Stars by Sylvia Louise Engdahl ~ in honor of a hero. I read this in one weekend.
  • Tear Down the Mountain by Roger Alan Skipper ~ in honor of an Appalachian Fiddle Fest held in September. I read this in Colorado over a three day period.
  • The Joke by Milan Kundera ~ in honor of September being the best time to visit Czechoslovakia. Okay.
  • Fire From Heaven by Mary Renault ~ in honor of back to school month. This took me a little while to read but I enjoyed it.
  • To Kill a Mockingbird by Nelle Harper Lee ~ in honor of September being Southern Month. Who has read this book and been able to hold back the tears?

There was only one book I fully admitted defeat on and that was The Deerslayer by James Fenimore Cooper. Just couldn’t do it. By default I am skipping Last of the Mohicans as well. Sad, sad, sad.

For the Early Review Program of LibraryThing I read All Gone: A Memoir of My Mother’s Dementia. With Refreshments. Another LibraryThing book came in at the end of the month but I’ll save that one for October.

For the fun of it I read To Heaven and Back by Mary C. Neal, MD ~ in honor of my aunt who lost her son.