Tag: january

Tell My Horse

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Hurston, Zora Neale. Tell My Horse. Turtle Island, 1938.

Reason read: Hurston was born on January 7th. Read in her honor. I also needed a book written before 1940 for the Portland Public Library Reading Challenge for 2024. Tell My Horse was first published in 1938.

I was first attracted to Hurston as a person when I learned that she was a visionary anthropologist. She dressed flashy and was considered outlandish and flamboyant. Quite the opposite of her writing which is considered serious, scholarly, didactic, and intellectual. I expected Tell My Horse to be a combination of the two and I was not disappointed. Hurston claims to have seen a real zombie, Felicia Felix-Mentor, and even photographed her! Sadly, she does not share them within the pages of Tell My Horse.
There is a sly humor hidden in Huston’s prose which is not easy to do when describing Haiti’s violent history. I particularly enjoyed the section on voodoo. Voodoo is a belief, almost like a religion or an ancient form of mysticism. Hurston is patient with her readers while she explains the culture, delving into the powers of a Mambo, a loa or houngan. Do not mess with Ogoun Feraille, god of war. Make sure to honor other gods like Damballa and Guede as well.
Tell My Horse is riddled with superstitions like do not sharpen hunting blades on the day of the hunt or your dogs will be killed. Soups have to be male (cock soup instead of chicken soup). There is a stone that urinates. A goat can be a consort. The story of Celestina and her goat, Simalo, was bizarre. Rumor had it Celestina and Simalo were married. In order to marry a wealthy man, Celestina needed a “divorce” from the goat. Her father ended up murdering the goat and giving it a Christian burial with flowers, closed casket, and smoking censora as the goat was Celestina’s father’s best friend.
In truth, I wished Tell My Horse came with a soundtrack. I would have enjoyed listening to the songs of invocation. There is a whole section at the end of Tell My Horse of songs of worship to voodoo gods.

Lines I liked, “By that time the place was on fire with life” (p 25), “At any rate, the palace food proved too rich for him, for less than a year after he had taken office he died of a digestive disturbance that his enemies called poison” (p 133),

As an aside, I will never look at the hand shake where thumbs are encircled the same way again. Such handshakes are seen as sexual!
I also want to know if it is still true that you should never pay a Haitian in advance because he (or she) will just steal off with your money without delivering the good or service.
And dare I say that President Stenio Vinient sounded like another delusional man who was once in office? I think I just did.

Author fact: the exact year of Hurston’s birth is a mystery. She lost her mother at the age of nine and left home when she was only fourteen. Like me. She also loved to read. One other “fact” – Hurston reminds me of Queen Latifa in some photographs. I think it’s the smile.

Book trivia: Tell My Horse is a phrase (parlay cheval ou) spoken by those “possessed” by guedes (spirits). As an aside, what is the deal with the cover of Tell My Horse? the man in the cover looks either dead or deep in a trance.

Playlist: “Donkey Want Water”, “Sally Brown”, “Lead kindly Light”, “Good Night”, Ludoric Lamotte, and “Erzulie, Nin Nin Oh!”.

Nancy said: Pearl said that Tell My Horse is a good book to read if you would like a little background history on voodoo.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust to Go in the chapter called “Cavorting Through the Caribbean: Haiti” (p 55).

A Full Net

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Daignault, Susan. A Full Net: Fishing Stories from Maine and Beyond. Islandport Press, 2023

Reason read: as a member of the Early Review program for LibraryThing, I occasionally review cool books.

Disclaimer: I have to say this upfront for the sake of being completely honest. I am not a fishing person. The last time I “fished” for anything, it was off the side of a 7′ skiff with my dad. We were dropping lines (complete with lead sinkers) for mackerel that were running in the harbor of Monhegan. I do not remember eating anything we caught, but I do remember winding up the line and the excitement I felt bringing up those beautiful speckled silver and blue fish. [As an aside, the general store used to smoke mackerel in a converted old fridge. They were delicious.]
Having admitted that I am not an avid fishing fan, it makes sense that I could not fully relate to Daignault’s acute passion/obsession for reeling in the biggest big one or the agony of the one(s) that got away. With the latter, I can only equate it to the pain of a DNF in the world of running road races. [There is nothing more embarrassing for a serious runner than a “did not finish” result attached to your bib number. But again, I digress.]
More importantly, because I am not passionate about fish when Daignault went deep into the fishing terminology I felt like she was speaking a foreign language. Luckily, she translates often.
Aside from fishing, as a person, I found Daignault to be an inspiration. She enthusiastically forged her way through what was considered a man’s world with fishing and her chosen career in the Coast Guard. She was the first woman assigned to the 180-foot buoy tender named Firebush in Kodiak, Alaska. Two years at sea in Alaska is no small feat!
Confessional: Beyond the fishing terminology I found A Full Net hard to read at times only because the stories are all over the place and have a chaotic timeline. One minute she is describing something from her childhood and then the story will jump to the 2020s. There is a bit of repetition I needed to battle as well (How many times could she say her family summered on Cape Cod where she had sand in her toes and salt in her hair?). It was if the chapters were written as stand-alone essays.
One last comment. The subtitle of A Full Net is Fishing Stories from Maine and Beyond. Because Daignault is so secretive about her favorite fishing spots, particularly in Maine, she could have titled her book Fishing Stories from the Southern Side of Pluto. I felt she mentioned other locals such as Costa Rica, Louisiana, Florida, the British Virgin Islands, Alaska, and Cape Cod just as often as Maine.

Book trivia: there is an abundance of photographs which add to the charm of Daignault’s story.

Krik? Krak!

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Danticat, Edwidge. Krik? Krak! SoHo, 1995.

Reason read: Danticat was born in January. Celebrating her birth month with Krik? Krak! I also needed a book for the Portland Public Library Reading Challenge of 2024 with a book about loss. This definitely fit the bill.

Right away, you know you are in the presence of a great writer when you read the very first short story of Krik? Krak! In “Children of the Sea” two teenagers who are in love keep journals when they are separated by dictatorship. Danticat keeps the two first person narratives clear by using capitalization and punctuation for one voice but not the other. The educated boy, a member of the Youth Federation, has escaped Haiti on a boat bound for Miami, Florida, while his young love (who does not use capitalization of punctuation) is left behind to endure military abuses. This was probably one of my favorites. Each subsequent story builds upon the next with the tiniest of threads. A minute detail will tie one story back to another.
“Nineteen Thirty-Seven” is a painful story about a woman visiting her mother in prison. Her mother is accused of flying. The government believes she is a witch, capable of rising like a bird on fire.
“A Wall of Fire Rising” tells the short but devastating story of a family barely making ends meet.
“Night Women” demonstrates the lengths a woman will go in order to provide for her child.
“Between the Pool and the Gardenias” is another heartbreaking story about loss.
“The Missing Peace” illuminates innocence abandoned.
“Seeing Things Simply” shares the story of an artist looking for beauty while ugliness crowds all around her.
“New York Day Women” demonstrates just how much a mother’s love can suffocate a daughter.
“Caroline’s Wedding” weaves a tale of expectation in age old customs.
“Women Like Us” is a message to daughters.
“In the Old Days” is an additional story for the twentieth anniversary edition of Krik? Krak! It tells the story of a woman asked to visit her dying father, a man she has never met.

The short stories of Krik? Krak!:

  • Children of the Sea
  • Nineteen Thirty-Seven
  • A Wall of Fire Rising
  • Night Women
  • Between the Pool and the Gardenias
  • The Missing Peace
  • Seeing Things Simply
  • New York Day Women
  • Caroline’s Wedding
  • Epilogue: Women Like Us
  • New to the 20th Anniversary Edition: In the Old Days

Quotes to quote, “At times I feel like I can just reach out and pull a star down from the sky as though it is a breadfruit or a calabash or something that could be of us to us on this journey” (“Children of the Sea” p 8), “I want him to forget that we live in a place where nothing lasts” (“Night Women” p 73), “They kept their arms close to their bodies, like angels hiding their wings” (“Nineteen Thirty-Seven” p 137).

Author fact: I am reading five books by Edwidge Danticat. Brother, I’m Dying in the last one.

Book trivia: reviewers call Krik? Krak! virtually flawless, passionate, lyrical, devastating, moving and luminous. I couldn’t agree more.

Nancy said: Pearl did not say anything specific about Krik? Krak!

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “The Contradictory Caribbean: Paradise and Pain” (p 55)

Maine Bucket List

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Gonzalez, Shirley. Maine Bucket List Adventure Guide: Explore 100 Offbeat Destinations You Must Visit! Canyon Press, 2022.

Reason read: I have the Maine bug. What can I say?

If you want a compilation of a bunch of random places to visit in Maine and you like your information willy nilly, Maine Bucket List is the guide for you. It comes with some caveats, though. Comprised of 125-ish places in Maine, Bucket List is sorted into “regions” and includes GPS coordinates for Google maps for each spot. Speaking of maps, though, there is not a one included. Not even one of the entire state of Maine. To make matters worse, I strongly disagree with the so-called regions. I found the organization of regions to be strange because if you don’t know the state of Maine, you have no idea why Gonzalez starts in Lewiston. Actually, I know Maine and have no idea why she chose to start with that town. To explain further – Lewiston, Augusta, and Bangor are the first three locations mentioned, but not one of them is in the same county (Androscoggin, Kennebec, and Penobscot respectively). They are all approximately an hour from each other. Gonzalez goes back to a Lewiston locale 75 pages later. Here are more head scratchers: Peaks Island (near Portland) is the page before Lubec, which is some 4-5 hours away. Then Lubec is followed by Gorham (again, 4-5 hours away). Baxter State Park is not in the table of contents under B for Baxter, nor is it under M for Millinocket (where the park is located). You can find Baxter State Park Park under B for Bangor…which is ninety miles away. As an aside, Millinocket has a pretty cool half marathon every December to help support the town.
But, enough of the “region” complaints. I think I made my point. My next gripe is the inclusion of just Will Kefauver’s studio gallery. Why not include any of the other hundreds of fantastic galleries? Why nothing about the Wyeth family or the gallery of Paul Niemiec? I hoped to see the Rockland Breakwater walk mentioned. It wasn’t. I was disappointed that while Gonzalez included the Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens she didn’t mention their fantastic Gardens Aglow event that happens every Christmas. It is an outrageously beautiful display with thousands and thousands of Christmas lights. Every color of the rainbow lights up a winter wonderland. Walking through the park after dark with a cup of hot chocolate is an event not to be missed and so much more exciting than a bunch of trolls.
The guide isn’t all bad, though. Maine Bucket List introduced me to facts about my home state that I was not aware: there is an official memorial to the Underground Railroad, Robert E. Peary graduated from Bowdoin and you can tour his house, and Swans Island has a music festival. I made special mention of the Devil’s Footprint. I will have to check that out the next time I am home.

You know I can’t get away from being critical about information regarding Monhegan Island. I would disagree with the best times to visit the island. Gonzalez says between April and October. I would change that to June to September. Most of the “day tripping” boats don’t start running until Memorial Day weekend. Hotels do not open until the last week of May so if you arrive before the daily boats I hope you know someone to bunk with! Most accommodations are closed by the first or second week of October.                                                

Book trivia: editors of Maine Bucket List had a hard time spelling Mount Desert. It was either Mountt or Deseret. Other missed mistakes include the hours for a monastery: “daily mass at 7:30 a.m. on weekends and 8:00 a.m. on the weekends.” I think the first weekend mention should be weekDAYS. As they say in Maine, hard telling, not knowing. I suppose I could look it up…

Setlist: “State of Maine”

Roma

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Croce, Julia Della. Roma: Authentic Recipes from In and Around the Eternal City. Chronicle Books, 2004.

Reason read: Having just come back from Rome, a coworker gave this to me as a gift.

There is more to Roma than delicious recipes and luxurious photographs. Inside the pages of this cookbook you will find the history of some of Rome’s most traditional ingredients like polenta, olives, and artichokes. You will read about what Caesar liked to serve his guests (moray eels) and learn that Anzio was the birth place of Caligula and Nero. Croce also includes a section on where to eat and sleep in and around the ancient city. Because she includes addresses, phone numbers, and days of operations, it is strongly advised to doublecheck this information as Roma was published nearly twenty years ago. Some places may have not survived Rome’s devastating battle with Covid in 2020. There is a section of mail order resources, complete with address, phone number, fax, website and a brief description. Again, I would check for accuracy.
One of my favorite sections of Roma is the information on festivals. The ancient city celebrates everything from polenta, artichokes, flower artwork, fish, pork, lentils, bread salad, olive oil, and of course, grapes.
Croce ends Roma with information about cooking schools, wine courses and Italy tours, starting with her own Italian cooking school, La Vera Cucina and ending with “To Italy with Julia”, a culinary and cultural tour of Italy.
As an aside, I liked the phrase “an aggressive use of pepper” but it had me wondering exactly how much constituted “aggressive” in Croce’s eyes.

Book trivia: The gorgeous photographs within Roma were shot by Paolo Destefanis.

Author fact: I only have this one cookbook by Julia Croce. Probably because I am not a huge fan of Italian cuisine. I am a huge fan of Chronicle Books, though. I have several cookbooks from them.

As an aside, while I was in Rome for ten days I had the privilege of staying with a Roman family in the Laurentino district. On New Year’s Eve, my host cooked an elaborate ten course meal that included pasta, fish, salad, and bread. The last dish (served at 1:30am) was a lentil-sausage stew. The sausage rounds symbolized coins of wealth in the coming year. It was really delicious.

A House in Corfu

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Tennant, Emma. A House in Corfu: a Family’s Sojourn in Greece. Henry Holt and Company, 2002.

Reason read: in January 1981 Greece joined the European community.

So you want a house on the Greek island of Corfu? It is going to take a lot of work…as Emma Tennant’s parents soon found out. In A House in Corfu it is the 1960s and Emma’s parents have been entranced by a spot at the mouth of a mythological bay. Supposedly, this is the spot where Odysseus came ashore; where Nausicaa took him in. The Tennants decide to build a house they name Rovina. Emma Tennant’s romantic descriptions make Rovina sound like a fairytale when it was all said and done, but first there was the initial build where troubles naturally abounded. Water was difficult to find. (The search went on for seven weeks while the family relied on rainwater.) Supplies needed to come by boat from a tiny harbor and hauled up the countryside. Then there were the island politics to navigate. The locals used the land as shortcuts to fishing spots. Then there was the one time Tennant couldn’t return to London. Because of a military coup led by Colonel Papadopoulos the planes refused to fly.
Tennant pays tribute to other Corfu writers like Homer, Durrell, and Edward Lear.
While I enjoyed Tennant’s romantic descriptions, her parenthetic comments and run-on sentences were tiring.

As an aside, I love learning new things. I did not realize Greeks have siestas. dhen pirazei means never mind.

As another aside, I am fascinated by the Judas trees Tennant described. I was able to see one that was one hundred years old while I was in Rome. Unfortunately, it was not in bloom.

Lines I loved, “Greece has entered our blood by now, and we can no longer remember the cool summers back home or the precautions taken when embarking on a picnic or a day by the sea: waterproofs, cardigans, rug that may never be unrolled due to sudden, half-expected rain” (p 148) and “The sea is a great cleanser, of body and soul: to feel at first that you are entering the heart of a sapphire or an aquamarine, then to sink deeper into the water that has cold springs as refreshing as a subaqueous shower, is to know that you will come out transformed, like a creature in Ovid’s Metamorphoses, and begin the day again as if you had gone nowhere at all” (p 185).

Author fact: I found it interesting that Tennant does not mention a husband, only a son and friends that travel to Greece with her.

Book trivia: There are no photographs of Rovina in A House in Corfu.

Setlist: Melina Mercouri’s “Never On a Sunday”, the Beatles, Bob Dylan, Mick Jagger, and the Rolling Stones’ “I Can’t Get no Satisfaction”.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the simple chapter called “Corfu” (p 70).

Within a Budding Grove

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Proust, Marcel. Remembrance of Things Past: Within a Budding Grove. Translated by C.K. Scott Moncrieff. Chatto & Windus, 1966.

Reason read: to continue the series.

If you remember from Proust’s first volume of Remembrance of Things Past our narrator was looking back on his childhood. Now he is thinking back to when he was a young adult; the coming of age stage of life. This time he has a sweetheart named Gilberte, the daughter of M. Swann, and he still has a singular attachment to his mother. Many of the same characters that were in the first installment are back in volume two, only now they are more refined due to their changing circumstances. Family relations change. Gilberte starts to drift away. The chase of Gilberte seemed endless. Twenty pages later and our narrator is still stalking her; looking for excuses to connect with her. The turning point was when he decides to play hard to get himself. The head game of renouncing Gilberte and then realizing this could backfire and he could lose her forever had a very modern feel to it.
Most of the drama takes place in the seaside town of Balbec or Normandy, France. There are times when Within a Budding Grove drags. Entire pages are dedicated to the description of ladies gowns. Society’s dedication to cordial formalities and the quest for the value of Beauty were tiresome. Questioning the possibilities of happiness or suffering seems an age-old topic. Only when the narrator was looking for intellectual distraction in a dinner conversation did I find the situation funny. To see what others had done with the carnation wrapped in silver paper was relatable.

Quotes I liked, “My father had always meant me to become a diplomat, and I could not endure the thought of that…” (p 13) and “There is perhaps nothing that gives us so strong an impression of the reality of the external world as the difference in the positions, relative to ourself, of even a quite unimportant person before we have not met him and after” (p 341).

Author fact: Marcel Proust’s books coined the phrase “romans-fleuves” as a way to describe them.

Book trivia: Within a Budding Grove is also called In the Shadow of Young Girls in Flower.

Nancy said: Pearl does not say anything specific about Budding Grove.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called Romans-Fleuves (p 208).

Dinner with Persephone

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Storace, Patricia. Dinner with Persephone. Pantheon Books, 1996.

Reason read: January 6th is the Fest of Theofania celebrating the baptism of Christ and a celebration of a return to light.

I have always wanted to visit Greece. The landscapes, the weather, the food. Sigh. All of it has me spellbound. But. But! But, the more I read of Storace’s Dinner with Persephone, I am not sure about the culture. I definitely do not agree with some of the attitudes towards women and marriage. Women are inferior to men. Sexual condescension is a thing. The accepted violence of smacking a wife or daughter around and how it is glamorized in television and movies is concerning. There is an ambivalence towards arson, too which I found odd.
Beyond the confusing side of Greek culture, I enjoyed learning about the icons of the region: a blue eye talisman hanging from an old woman’s neck, the juicy red jewels of pomegranates, the fable of Dionysus and the plant. To be sure, there is a lot of religious talk in Dinner with Persephone. The people Storace talk with mention the Virgin Mary as if she is a next-door neighbor they bumped into while going for coffee. Children bring up events dating back to the Ottoman Empire as if it were yesterday. It is only a perception but it seems religion is worked into nearly every conversation.
There is a subtle, almost secretive sultriness to Storace’s writing. I can’t put my finger on why I think that. The language is tedious at times, but more often sensuous.

P.S. I have not given up on the food of Greece. There is this one dish I am dying to try: zucchini blossoms filled with feta cheese, egg, and fresh mint. Yum.

Quotes I liked, “As I travel here, I am losing the illusion that I know where I am” (p 156),

Author fact: Storace has published a book of poetry and has received an American Academy of Arts and Letters award for her work.

Book trivia: This would have been a fantastic book to include photographs. Sorry to say that there are none.

Playlist: “Kyrie Eleison”, “Battle Hymn of the Republic”, “Let’s Take a Walk on the Moon”, “Denial”, Mozart, Bach, Hayden, Beethoven, Chopin, Mendelssohn’s “Wedding Recessional”, Elton John, “This Land is Your Land”, “The Dream After the Dance”, “Roll Out the Barrel”, “Greece Will Never Die”, Katie Grey, Patsy Cline, and “Carmen Sylvia Waltz”.

Nancy said: Pearl called Dinner with Persephone an excellent choice.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Just So Much Greek To Me” (p 120).

Flying Carpet

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Halliburton, Richard. The Flying Carpet. City Garden Publishing Company, Inc., 1932.

Reason read: Richard Halliburton celebrated a birthday in January. Read in his honor.

Richard Halliburton was a self-described vagabond of the clouds. In Flying Carpet he brings Moye Stephens Jr. along as pilot/captain and mechanic. Their journey takes them through the far reaches of North Africa and East Asia. They followed Alexander the Great’s path into Egypt, over Alexandria and through Babylon. They stop for a month or two in ever location and submerge themselves in the culture. Like on the island of Borneo, trying to impress the tribal chief with a plane ride. My favorite section was when they visited the Taj Mahal, calling it “the one perfect thing on earth.”
A tough portion of Halliburton’s memoir is his treatment of “Negros” and the buying of young slaves. He explained it away by saying his grandfathers were slave owners in Tennessee. He bought two ten year old children to wash dishes and fight the overpopulation of bats in Timbuctoo.
Halliburton seemed like a fun guy to hang out with. He brought a portable record player and liked to dance. He was bold enough to compete for the love of a woman with whom he could not communicate. He opted to live as a prisoner in Teheran “just to see” what it was like.
As an aside, Flying Carpet was the name of the plane Richard Halliburton flew.
As an another aside, I wonder what Halliburton would think of the traffic jams of Mount Everest today. In Halliburton’s time it was forbidden (“irresistible, unattained, and inviolate”). In 1920 Nepal and Tibet had staunchly refused foreigners. Only the Dalai Lama was able to allow English climbers to enter from the Tibetan side. That might have been the beginning of commercial tourism. Halliburton and Stephens were finally allowed to gain access to the airspace around Everest (at 18,000 feet) only because they impressed the Mararajah of Nepal.

Quotes to quote, “To my great annoyance and disappointment, he did not drown” (p 114), “Because it is monstrous, merciless, demanding the utmost of one’s energy and effort” (in answer to why climb Mount Everest), and “A head is a head, and its sex is of no consequence when it has been dried and smoked, and hangs from a ceiling at home” (p 327).

Author fact: I am reading five of Halliburton’s books. I cannot wait to learn more about this fascinating adventurer!

Book trivia: The Flying Carpet includes a few photographs of Stephens and Halliburton’s journey. While there are very many, they are cool.

Playlist: “Happy Days were Here Again”, Ravel’s “Bolero”, “St. Louis Blues,” Schubert’s Serenade “Song of India”, Hymn to the Sun – Coq d’Or, “Barnacle Bill the Sailor”, “Falling in Love Again”, “St. Louis Blues”, and “What Good Am I Without You?”

Nancy said: Pearl called Halliburton’s style of writing “you-are-there” prose. I agree completely.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Where in the World Do These Books Belong?” (p 260).

Digging Up Mother

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Stanhope, Doug. Digging Up Mother: a Love Story. Da Capo Press, 2016.

Reason read: Do you ever feel like your life is too uptight or that you don’t laugh enough at stupid stuff? I was definitely feeling too severe and too closed minded. So when a friend practically threw Digging Up Mother on my desk, I thought to myself “Self! What the hell? Read the damn book.” Definitely not on the Lust Challenge List. Definitely not. This is my 2023 proverbial show-the-panties, thumb-the-nose, and stick-out-the-tongue moment. Deal with it.

How do you navigate the unchartered waters of assisted suicide when it is your own mother who wants to die? Stanhope compares this “adventure” of killing his mother to planning a wedding: at least you know where to start. First, take mother to your house. Second, find a boatload of alcohol…
But Digging Up Mother isn’t all about Dear Mommy Dearest. Think of it as a fast-paced memoir of how Stanhope got his start in life. But. But! But, also think of it as a love story. His mother was his biggest fan, and for many years, his best friend. She supported him through every moment of his life, whether he wanted that support or not. I think I can safely call Digging Up Mother crude and caring and, dare I say? beautiful.
P.S. I hope Bingo is well.

A line I liked, “Everything horrible in life was money in the bank on stage” (p 151). Here’s one more, “Anyone who says that suicide is never the answer hasn’t heard all of the questions” (p 179).

Author fact: Stanhope is from Worcester, MA. Right down the road from me.

Book trivia: Johnny Depp wrote the foreword. Yes, that Johnny Depp. Are you surprised?

Setlist: The Chamber Brothers’ “Time Has Come Today”, Cheap Trick, “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star”, Tom Jones’s “Delilah”, Pink Floyd’s “Mother”, “In the Flesh”, and “Nobody Home”, Suspicious Minds”, Cop Killer by Ice T., P. Diddy, Limp Bizkit, Yakety Sax”, and “You’re Too Good To Be True”. True story. When I was in grade school a friend of mine and I choreographed a dance routine to that last song. I still remember some of the moves.

Fearless Jones

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Mosely, Walter. Fearless Jones. Little, Brown and Company, 2001.

Reason read: Walter Mosely was born in the month of January. Read in his honor.

Paris Minton ingeniously builds his used bookstore from discards and sales from local libraries. For a Negro to own his business in 1950s Watts, California, Minton knows he is an anomaly. What he also is, is unlucky. Soon after a beautiful woman in distress hides in his bookstore he is badly beaten and his store, burned to the ground. Who was the impossibly beautiful woman? Who would want to burn down his store and do that has anything to do with the men who beat him? There is only one thing to do, bail his good friend Fearless Jones out of prison and enlist him to solve the mystery. As Minton tells the story he builds the character of Fearless Jones through their friendship, setting up the character development in future stories.
When you read Walter Mosely expect crackling humor, fast paced action, racial truths, and lots of quick-jab violence.
As an aside, one of the things I like about Walter Mosely’s writing is that his characters use the bathroom. Not many authors include the details of common bodily functions.

Lines I liked, “Being challenged by the law was a rite of passenger for any Negro who wanted to better himself or his situation” (p 4), “The best cop I ever saw was the cop who wasn’t there” (p 87), and “These were men who had lived with Satan before coming to God, and they were still willing to venture over to the wrong side of holiness if the situation demanded it” (p 227).

Author fact: I have twelve Mosely books on my Challenge list, including two nonfiction contributions.

Book trivia: Fearless Jones is the first book in the Fearless Jones series.

Setlist: Louis Armstrong, Billie Holliday, and Pat Boone.

Nancy said: Pearl included Fearless Jones as part of the Fearless Jones series. She didn’t say anything beyond that about the book.

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “Walter Mosely: Too Good To Miss” (p 168).

Conversations Across America

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Loya, Kari. Conversations Across America: a Father and Son, Alzheimer’s, and 300 Conversations Along the TransAmerican Bike Trail that Capture the Soul of America. XK Productions, 2022.

Reason read: as a member of the Early Review Program for LibraryThing, I occasionally review books. This was a December pick that I am just getting around to reading now.

Father and son embark on a 73 day, 4,200 mile adventure from Virginia to Oregon,
My favorite part in the entire book was when Kari’s life rolled by as if it were a memory from a movie.
From the moment I opened Conversations on my laptop I regretted not having the coffee table version Kari mentioned. Some of the landscape photography is absolutely gorgeous. However, here is what you need to know two-thirds of the book are photographs of ordinary people with their accompanying “stories.” Some of the stories are interesting or even heartfelt, but a great deal of them are exclamations about Merv’s age or the number of miles they are trying to bike. Wow is a common refrain.
My only detractor? The sheer volume of stories or conversations overshadowed the beauty of the father/son narrative. I tracked how many pages were dedicated to Loya’s personal journey compared to the pages of “conversations” and the ratio was 1:3. Additionally, the same “conversation” is in the narrative so I felt like I was reading the passages twice.
My favorite section of the book was the end where Loya included a partial list of the gear they carried, their itinerary of the different stages, and the half-time report about dogs and meals.

As an aside, were there really 2,000 filing cabinets? The bit about the trampoline was funny. I also felt Loya was a little judgmental about AT hikers. That’s acceptable if he has hiked the Appalachian Trail in its entity himself and can make a comparison based on his experiences.

Author fact: Kari was trying to sell his home in New Jersey while trying to bike across America with his father.

Book trivia: there is a ton of beautiful photography in Conversations.

Playlist: “New York” by Frank Sinatra, Chariots of Fire, Beach Boys, Def Leppard, Bela Fleck, Tony Trischka, Quincy Jones, Blood, Sweat and Tears, Vivaldi, Antonio Carlos Jobim, Jack Johnson (Hawaiian music).

Chair Yoga

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Chapshaw. Chair Yoga: Gently Build Strength, Flexibility, Energy, and Mental Fitness in Just Two Weeks to Improve Your Quality of Life and Grow Old Gracefully. Chapshaw Publications, 2022.

Reason read: as a member of LibraryThing I am a member of the Early Review Program and I occasionally review books (mostly nonfiction). This is one such book.

Before I started reading Chair Yoga my mind was not really open to all of the different possibilities a chair could bring. I could only think of seating poses like neck rolls, ear to shoulder moves, and spinal twists. Starting with examples of elders who have used chairs in their yoga practice helped set the tone of the rest of the book. Further validation came in the form of illustrating more complicated poses like warriors one and two. Advice concerning different areas of ailment like osteoporosis. sciatica, and hypertension took Chair Yoga from a basic starter yoga book to a more solid reference.
Offhand comments: Can I just say this book had me at David Bowie? To open Chair Yoga with a quote from this musical legend was brilliant.
Maybe I am too biased on the subject of yoga, but I am not sure how anyone can think of yoga at any age as “too woo-woo”…whatever that means.
I am enamored with the idea of eight limbs of yoga. I think of an octopus every time.
It is a shame to say you don’t have to read chapter one and you need only to skim chapter two. Are you saying the words therein are pointless and not worth the reader’s time? Like any good syllabus, Chair Yoga maps out learning objectives for each chapter. There is even homework for assessment. While Chapter nine offers the two week plan read everything leading up to it. It is worth your while.

Book trivia: Illustrations to go with the text are helpful.

Vinland the Good

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Shute, Nevil. Vinland the Good. William Morrow & Co, Inc. 1946.

Reason read: Shute’s birth and death month is January. Read in his honor and memory. I also needed a book for the Portland Reading Challenge. The category is a book that is under 150 pages long. Vinland the Good is 126 pages.

This is the historical fiction story of Leif Ericsson and his quest to discover new lands. Cleverly hidden in a history lesson at a boy’s boarding school, teacher Callender describes Leif’s life’s adventures. Callender is back after six years to teach U.S. History and finds a clever way to keep the students engaged despite the headmaster’s disapproval. [Spoiler: there is a section of the story where Leif warns Thorgunna to keep her ladies away from Leif’s men. It is hinted that Leif worries the men could rape the fair maidens. Thorgunna replies that Leif gives sound advice because her ladies have been without variety…]
Vinland the Good comes to us in the form of a treatment for a script as if Shute planned it as a movie or theater production. Stage directions and props describe each scene before narratives begin. Themes in Vinland the Good include forgiveness (when King Olaf lifts Leif’s stigma of being the son of an outlaw and teaches Leif the art of shipbuilding) and the spread of Christianity. You could also call Vinland the Good a tragic love story as Leif and Thorgunna’s relationship blossoms into love and loyalty.

Best quote, “LEIF (Heavily) Thorgunna, as one goes through life one has to make the best decisions that one can, and work on them” (p 70). Amen to that.

As an aside, I love any book that uses the word ‘gloaming’ in some manner.

Author fact: I have read five of the twenty four Nevil Shute books on my list. He has written a bunch more.

Book trivia: Even though a map is included on the free and pastedown endpapers, there are no other illustrations. Bummer.

Nancy said: Pearl didn’t say anything specific about Vinland the Good.

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

Confessional: this doesn’t happen to me often. I am proud of the fact that my Book Lust Challenge is very organized. I would like to think I have every book cataloged; so it came as a shock to learn Vinland the Good was NOT cataloged in LibraryThing. It was in all of my spreadsheets (TwistList, MBL list, ToGo list, and Schedule list), but somehow I missed the most important place of all, LibraryThing.

Rum Diary

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Thompson, Hunter S. The Rum Diary. Simon & Schuster, 1999.

Reason read: to celebrate Eugenio Maria de Hostos, philosopher who campaigned for education for women. His life is celebrated on the second Monday in January in Puerto Rico. Additionally, for the 2023 Portland Public Library Reading Challenge, I needed a book with a person on the cover.

Paul Kemp, fresh in from New York, begins writing for the Daily News in San Juan. Throughout the entire Rum Diary he comes off as a bumbling and stumbling alcoholic cad who never really writes very much. He spends a great deal of time eating hamburgers at Al’s, chasing women, playing on the beach, getting into various troubles, and of course, drinking gallons of rum. Paul works off a tangle of conflicting emotions through an alcoholic haze. Rum on the island act as a currency.
Thompson’s portrait of Paul Kemp seems three quarters finished. Underneath the swagger and swaying, there lies a decent soul, but you never really understand Paul.
As as aside, I have never been to San Juan so I don’t know why this is a thing, but there seems to be a peculiar animosity towards stray dogs on the island.

Confessional: Reading Doug Stanhope’s Digging Up Mother at the same time as Hunter S. Thompson’s Rum Diary was like a lesson in debauchery. Even though Stanhope’s memories were thirty years later than Thompson’s, the attitudes were much the same. Here’s another trivial similarity – Johnny Depp starred in Thompson’s movie. He also wrote the foreword for Digging Up Mother.

Best lines, “Arriving half-drunk in a foreign place is hard on the nerves” (p 12).

Author fact: Thompson is better known for his novel Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.

Book trivia: Rum Diary was made into a movie starring Johnny Depp.

Playlist: Braham’s Lullaby and “Maybellene”.

Nancy said: Rum Diary is an “exuberant” picture of the drinking life in Puerto Rico. She’s not wrong.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Cavorting Through the Caribbean (Puerto Rico)” (p 57).