Tag: january

Hyperion

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Simmons, Dan. Hyperion. New York: Bantam Books, 1989.

Reason read: January is National Science Fiction Month.

A group of seven individuals are recruited to embark on a pilgrimage. Each of the seven, a priest, poet, soldier, captain, detective, consul and scholar have a story to tell. All stories relate back to their interactions, direct and indirect, with a creature called the Shrike on the planet of Hyperion. Simmons does an okay job at making each storyteller’s voice unique but I feel that was the weakest element to Hyperion. In an attempt to make each voice different some characters are exaggerated and come across as dramatic caricatures while others blend ho hum into the woodwork.
The plot itself is convincing. Each pilgrim has something to accomplish on this journey to Hyperion and this first book is the foundation for subsequent sequels. The hook is, if you want to know more, you need to keep reading.
As an aside, even sci-fi stories have to have some element of familiarity and/or reality so that it’s relate-able to readers. Simmons includes warring New Order Shi-ites and Suni shopkeepers along with some Hegemony infidels.

No quotes. But, I can say this. The story of Rachel is the most intriguing, ansd she never says a word in the present day story.

Author fact: I have six Dan Simmons books on my list. Five are in the Hyperion series.

Book trivia: Hyperion is the first book in a series.

Nancy said: not much, just the basic plot.

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “Space Operas” (p 211).

Italy and the Grand Tour

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Black, Jeremy. Italy and the Grand Tour. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003.

Reason read: I think a very common New Year’s resolution for some is to travel. Read in honor of traveling to Italy.

Italy and the Grand Tour provides the reader with a historical perspective on what it meant to visit Italy throughout the eighteenth century, all the while offering little tidbits of interesting facts (Thomas Cook had a travel company and the word bearleader meant guide, for example). Black is determined to analyze the fine line between cosmopolitanism and xenophobia which he insists is cultural but also difficult to determine based on first hand travel journals and letters. He showcases his points with a considerable myriad of quotations and glorious artwork.

Divided into logical sections covering the regions of Italy, accommodations, food, transport, cost, activities, society, religion, art, politics, Italy and the Grand Tour culminates in the chapter on the impact of Italy. Throughout it all, I found it interesting that some things never change in the world of worldly travel. For example, Black pointed out actual itineraries often differed from what had been planned due to spending too long in one area and not leaving enough time for another. Or getting tired of one place and leaving it sooner than planned. Not to mention weather delays and being waylaid by new friends. As if those things would not happen nowadays!
But, the best part of Italy and the Grand Tour was reading the journals and letters of the travelers. They could be Italy’s harshest critics with one word reviews like uninteresting, unsatisfactory, unimpressed, mean, miserable, disappointed, dirty, dismal, disagreeable, beastly, and filthy. I imagined the hell they would raise with those words on modern day social media.

Quote of a quote I liked, “I still persist in thinking Italy a country worth seeing but by no leans worth living in” (p 53). As said by Frederick, 2nd Viscount Bolingbroke.
Another quote, this time direct from author: “Venice was not the sole cockpit of sexual adventure” (p 122).

Author fact: Black has written many other books but they none are on my Challenge list.

Book trivia: the title comes from the term “grand tour” commonly associated with aristocratic British travelers; those who have the money, means and time to go gallivanting through the countryside.

Nancy said: Italy and the Grand Tour is a “nice historical perspective” (p 46).

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “Ciao, Italia” (p 46).

Dirty Work

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Weston, Gabriel. Dirty Work: a Novel. New York: Little, Brown and Company, 2014.

Reason read: I was supposed to review this in July 2014 for the Early Review Program of LibraryThing. I never received a copy so I decided to borrow it from a local library and review it all the same.

Disclaimer: Dirty Work was first published in August 2014 so this is not exactly an “early” review.

When we first meet Nancy Mullion, she is in the middle of a botched abortion. Her patient is bleeding out and she can’t stop it. Subsequently, a four month medical tribunal ensues; an inquisition where Nancy’s actions are scrutinized to determine if she is competent to continue practicing medicine. Throughout her trial, Nancy flashes back to her childhood and the traumas she suffered as a young girl in England. The writing is fuzzy in the flashbacks. Weston purposefully keeps the abuse vague. Here’s what we know about the first incident; we know Mullion was a very small child; too small to sit properly on a bar stool or hold a rubber ball in her tiny grasp. Weston emphasizes this point further to say Mullion’s hand is so small it cannot encircle the bartender’s penis. What the what?!? All in all, I thought Dirty Work was very disjointed in plot and character development. Weston is vague beyond being clever but one thing is clear – abortion is a stronger character than Doctor Nancy Mullion.

People are calling Dirty Work “original” and “courageous”. Original? No. Courageous? Maybe, because it discusses abortions in such detail and is practically a political commentary on the subject.

Captain of the Sleepers

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Montero, Mayra. Captain of the Sleepers. Translated by Edith Grossman. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2002.

Reason read: Hostos Day in Puerto Rico is on January 11th.

This is a very quick read. Once you get into it you won’t be able to put it down, and luckily because of its length you won’t have to. This is the story of Andreas Yasin who has carried a grudge against family friend J.T. Bunker for his entire adult life. Believing Bunker betrayed his family by having an affair with his mother when he was a small boy, Andreas seeks revenge against the now 83 year old man dying of cancer. But what is reality and what is just a childish memory? Set in the time of the Puerto Rican Independence movement politics permeate Andreas’s world.

Best line, “There is nothing more predictable for a mother than her own child” (p 127).

I know I’ve said this before but I am always amazed when my hometown of Monhegan is mentioned somewhere. I knew something was up when Montero gave one of her characters the home town of Port Clyde, Maine.

Author fact: Mayra Montero wrote one of my earliest Early Review books for LibraryThing, Dancing to ‘Almendra’ back in 2007.

Author trivia: I’m guessing Montero likes cats. The photograph of her on the dust jacket of Captain has a picture of her with a beautiful cat on her lap, only she looks like she is trying to strangle it!

Book trivia: I read this in one insomnia fueled night. It’s only 180 pages long.

Nancy said: Nancy has more to say about the translator than the book.

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

Disaster Falls

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Gerson, Stephane. Disaster Falls: a Family Story. New York: Crown, 2017.

Reason read: a selection for the Early Review Program of LibraryThing.

Grief is hard to explain to another individual. As a listener, unless you have experienced the kind of trauma that changes your whole life it is hard to wrap your brain around it. How does one comprehend an emotion like grief? You may recognize pieces of trauma like how small recognitions in a foreign town you swear you have never visited before give you a sense of deja vu.
Gerson’s story might be redundant in its telling, but that is a part of the grieving process; to tell the story as many times as possible to anyone who will listen. You go over details, searching for truths; for explanations and when you have exhausted your examination you do it again and again, hoping for a different outcome. It’s a never ending cycle of trying to find the Why in tragedy. Especially when the real tragedy of the situation is they (the Gerson family) had real misgivings about the falls before even running the rapids. They had doubt and doubt is the great provoker of the “what if?” game.

I connected with Gerson on one small detail: how chronology becomes “before the accident/after the accident”. For me, everything relating to time became either “before dad died” or “after dad died”. If someone gave me a date I would quickly calculate which side of death my father was on. I say this as a matter of fact, but it is a product of my grief.

Confessional: my aunt lost her son five years ago. In the days, weeks, months and even several years following his death I seriously wondered if she would die of a broken heart and my family would be burying her as well. Her grief was profound and in some ways, complete. It took over her entire existence. I can only imagine Gerson suffered the same hollowing out as my aunt. As my grandmother once said after losing my father, “no parent is supposed to bury a child.”

As an aside: people have been reviewing Disaster Falls since late September so I feel a I am a little late to the party. Not as late as the people who will win an advanced copy in the next month or so, but late just the same.

Author fact: Gerson lost his father in the exact opposite manner of losing his son. Whereas as his son was taken suddenly, Gerson’s father planned his death to the minute.

Book trivia: no photos

A.D.

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Neufeld, Josh. A.D.: New Orleans After the Deluge. New York: Pantheon Books, 2010.

Reason read: Mardi Gras is held in New Orleans every February. Rather than read this in August (typical because of the date of Hurricane Katrina) I decided to twist it up a little. Just as Pearl did (see BookLust Twist at the end of this review).

Right from the very beginning you know you are in for something deeply moving and very special when reading the graphic novel A.D. (although technically it is not a novel. Novel implies fiction, right?). Neufeld starts the reader off looking at Earth from outer space. As we look down on North America we almost get a sense of the calm before the storm. On the next page the graphic orientates us to the tragedy to come as we get a bird’s eye view of the city of New Orleans. We are coming in closer. We see the city as one entity and the storm as another, as if they are two strangers being introduced at a party. As the days go by we follow the lives of seven New Orleans residents. This becomes a biography of each individual.
To me, what is incredibly sad is the emphasis on their naivete, their attitude of “this is no big deal” all because hurricanes in their corner of the world come and go. They have lived through them before. They are experts in the realm of weather. That may be true, but no one expected the levies to go…

Yes. You can read this in one day as posting this on the first implies. My recommendation? Read it several times. Read and share it. There is a message hidden in the comic.

My favorite StopYouInYourTracks quote: “At least then we wouldn’t have had to walk on top of the things I cared about the most” (Leo, on page 171).

As an aside: Neufeld wasn’t the only artist to be shocked by Hurricane Katrina. Many talented individuals expressed their grief through art. But, listen to Natalie Merchant. She wrote a song called “Go Down Moses” (on her self titled album) that addresses not only the city of New Orleans after the hurricane, but the Danziger Bridge tragedy as well. Danziger is what she was referring to when she says, “let your people cross over.” Sad.

Author fact: the author of A.D. is JOSH Neufeld. Josh, not Joshua as Nancy Pearl refers to him. He is Josh in twelve different places in the book: on the front cover, on the title page, four times on the copyright page, in the afterward, on the “about the author” page, on the back flap and three in separate instances on the back cover. Not once does the name “Joshua” appear anywhere. Call me crazy, but I think he wants to be called Josh. For more information on Josh and this project, check out this link.

Book trivia: this was a New York Times best seller. Of course it was.

BookLust Twist: in Book Lust To Go but not for the reasons you would think. You’re thinking this would be in the chapter “New Orleans” but it’s not. It’s in “Comics with a Sense of Place” (p 68).

Liar

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Roberge, Rob. Liar.New York: Crown Publishers, 2016.

Publishing Date: February 2016

Reason read: Early Review book for LibraryThing.

When I first received Liar I did what I always do when receiving an Early Review: I checked the pub date to see how long I had to finish reading it in order to write an “early” review. I was dismayed to see I had approximately three weeks. Three weeks may not seem like a short amount of time, but it is when you are already involved in four other 300+ page books. I shouldn’t have worried. Not with Liar.

This is a quick, quick read. Be prepared. The timeline jumps around a lot. But maybe that’s the point. You can’t keep the chronology straight so it’s harder to keep Roberge’s story straight. Hence, the title of the book. It’s supposed to be a memoir. Is he lying or not? Reading Liar reminded me of those picture viewers: you slide in the disc, look through the viewer to see a particular scene. Advancing the disc allows you to see another scene. When trying to describe this toy (and book) to a friend he said, “oh. You mean like a peep show?” Yeah. Like a peep show. Roberge shows you just hints of a mentally ill/bipolar/suicidal, crazy drug addled, violent/kinky sex fueled life and then quickly closes the curtain. When the curtain reopens it’s a completely different view; a little more is revealed…or not. It could be about the Titanic sinking or some other misconstrued moment in history. You never know what you are going to get. I am resisting the urge to make a timeline and “map” all of Roberge’s life events just to see how his life has played out thus far.

Confessional: there were times when I got “tired” reading this book. My attitude wavered between fascination and boredom. How many times could one read about Roberge waking unremembering in a sticky puddle of his own puke? How many “I Have No Idea What I Did Last Night” scenarios could be described in one book? There was a definite repetition of shock value to Liar and yet, yet I found myself asking what next? I needed to know how did he get through the latest debacle in his life?

 

Do Your Om Thing

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Pacheco, Rebecca. Do Your Om Thing: Bending Yoga Tradition to Fit Your Modern Life. New York: Harper Wave, 2015.

Reason read: I first discovered Pacheco when my beloved gave me a Runners World yoga video and voila! I had found a yoga instructor I liked almost as much as my dear Roo.

Pacheco is feisty and funny, as well as knowledgeable in her practice. I was curious to see if she could write as well. And indeed, she can. For just a small taste of what you are in for when you read Do Your Om…, this is from the introduction: “This book (or, its author) understand that you will occasionally get stressed out, overscheduled, come down with the flu, or possibly dumped on your ass by someone you love with ever piece of your heart chakra” (p x). See what I mean? Feisty and a sense of humor. What follows is how to bring a sense of yogi practice to your life, in your own way. For example, everyone has heard of chakras, but Pacheco takes care to really explain them and their significance. What she doesn’t do is tell you what to do with that knowledge.

Author fact: Pacheco is the face of the Runner’s World Yoga for Runners DVD. Her teaching style is great!

Book trivia: This is not a yoga instruction book! You will not find photographs outlining a flow sequence of poses.

Checkmate

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Dunnett, Dorothy. Checkmate. New York: Vintage Books, 1975.

Reason read: I started the Lymond Chronicles in August to celebrate Dorothy Dunnett’s birth month.

If you have been keeping track, by the end of The Ringed Castle Francis Crawford of Lymond had returned to Scotland from Russia and it had been revealed he might have killed his own son. Also at the end of Ringed Castle Lymond was trying to return to Russia while still married to Philippa, but by the end of Ringed Castle it was obvious (at least to me) the relationship between them was changing. There were even hints of romance blossoming for Philippa. Maybe that was a spoiler alert for Checkmate?
Anyway, when we begin Checkmate the year is 1557. Francis Crawford of Lymond is back in France, now as the M. comte de Sevigny, leading an army against England. Despite his best efforts to divorce Philippa, their marriage continues to used as political leverage and controls his inability to return to Russia. He is ordered to fight for the French for one year before his marriage can be annulled. Imagine if we lived in that kind of society today! Philippa’s feelings for her husband continue to evolve slowly as she is still insistent on learning the truth of his parentage and lineage. It’s this dark secret that introduces the character of astrologer (“yon pisse-pot prophet”) Nostradamus to the plot. Note: Each chapter starts with a prophesy of Nostradamus in old French. It isn’t necessary to have them translated to enjoy the story. Because this is the last book in the series, Dunnett tries to put a bow on the conclusion to Checkmate. I don’t think it is giving too much away to say that one can leave the Lymond series feeling good about Francis’s future.

One detail that carried through the Lymond series was the issue of Francis’s come and go headaches and resulting blindness. I never could wrap my brain around the real cause of these debilitating migraines, especially when his mother says he doesn’t “need” them anymore.

Quotes I liked, “But the days are evil: iniquity aboundeth, and charity waxeth cold” (p 146), “The session ended when Mr. Pigault, full of his own beer, slid comfortably under the table” (p 153), and “Realization drew from him the power of movement” (p 158).

Author fact: Dunnett is also the author of the House of Niccolo series, also on my Challenge list; probably to be started a year from this August.

Book trivia: This is the sixth and final book in the Lymond Chronicles. I have to admit, I will miss Francis!

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter “Digging Up the Past Through History” (p 80).

Do One Thing Different

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O’Hanlon, Bill. Do One Thing Different. New York: William Morrow and Company, 1999.

Confessional: I didn’t read this book word for word, cover to cover. To say that I browsed is inaccurate. To say that I skimmed might be closer to the truth.

I like the idea of doing one thing differently. Pick a habit, any habit and you can change it according to Dr. Bill. In the very first chapter his advice is simple: identify a pattern you would like to change. It doesn’t matter how small or insignificant the offending routine. Once you have identified the pattern, scrutinize it. Analyze it within an inch of its life. Be observant and get to know every detail of what you do and just how you do it. Then, change one thing. Just one little thing. It could be how you put on your socks or how you hold a toothbrush, if that is part of the offending pattern. Just change one thing related to the pattern and you will have broken the cycle. Seems simple enough, right? Or how about this approach? Connect something negative to the offending action. Say you want to stop picking your nose (note: NOT an actual example of O’Hanlon’s). Okay, so back to the nose picking. For every time you pick you nose you must an equally abhorred task, like cleaning the hair out of the shower trap. If you hate dredging up slimy, stringy, soap-scummed hair THAT much, you will stop picking your nose. O’Hanlon’s techniques and examples of these techniques actually working are far more interesting than my description. You just have to read the book.

Up, Into the Singing Mountain

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Llewellyn, Richard. Up, into the Singing Mountain. New York: Doubleday & Company, 1960.

Reason read: to continue the series incorrectly started in December (in honor of December being the best time to visit Patagonia).

Up, into the Singing Mountain takes up where How Green Was My Valley left off. Huw Morgan leaves his tiny village in Wales for a Welsh community in the Patagonian region of Argentina. Singing starts with the same imagery as Valley in that Huw is bundling a little blue cloth. I’m not sure why that sticks out in my mind, but it does. Part of the reason why Huw leaves his community in the valley is his inappropriate love for his brother’s widow. As a child living in her house (to keep her company), no one thought of any impropriety. However, as Huw grows older and his feelings for Bron become more apparent, it was now time to leave.
Huw finds work as a cabinetmaker and builds a reputation on his artistry and skill. Unfortunately, the rumor mill also finds Huw in his new Patagonian community. This time he is tied unfavorably to a widow he has rented a room from, all the  while being in love with a girl several towns over. His inability to defend himself only creates more problems and new tensions. But that is nothing compared to the threats to the community at large posed by a weakened dam and torrential rains. Add rebellious Indios and you have an adventure.

Like the last book I am finding tons and tons to quote: “Strange that a word or a look at the proper moment will change the whole cage we live in, and the places of all those perched” (p 11-12), “It takes a long, long time to lose the poison of towns” (p 20), and “To have a breath of air from the mouths of much” (p 24). I’ll stop there.

As an aside, one of my favorite teas is yerba mate. It was cool to learn where it comes from.

Author fact: after reading the Wiki page on Richard Llewellyn I was shocked to learn some of the things he claimed all his life weren’t exactly true (like where he was born).

Book trivia: not a spoiler alert, but there are some pretty violent scenes in Up, Into the Mountain. I was actually quite shocked by the violence of Lal’s father.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called simply, “Patagonia” (p 174).

Do One Green Thing

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Pennybacker, Mindy. Do One Green Thing: Saving the Earth Through Simple, Everyday Choices. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2010.

Reason read: curiosity.

I first became interested in the “Do One Thing” philosophy when I bought my sister a Do One Thing That Scares You book for Christmas. Okay. Confessional: I just sent the book to her yesterday and it’s not really a gift; it’s a tough love, shake-out-your life kind of poke.

Do One Green Thing is one of those books you don’t read from cover to cover and return to the library…even though that’s exactly what I did. It is meant to be referred to time and time again. It’s meant to be written in, dog-earred and memorized. Because I borrowed a library book I took notes on what “one” green thing I plan to do.

Do One Green Thing is smart. It centers of four areas of your personal life and how you can do that one green thing in regards to them:

  1. What you eat and drink
  2. Where you live
  3. How you take care of yourself
  4. How you get around (transportation)

From there the chapters are broken down into specific sections:

  1. The one green thing you can do and your options
  2. Questions one might have about the green thing
  3. The science behind why the green thing is a good thing

As you might expect, giving up drinking bottled water is the very first green thing mentioned. In giving up bottled water you have a choice, drinking tap water or filtering your own. But, isn’t bottled water safer than tap or even filtered water? There’s that question I mentioned, by the way.  Followed by the science of why giving up bottled water is a good thing. In my own life, I reuse a travel mug for coffee and I have a stainless steel water bottle. One green thing, check!

In addition to the specific sections there are other tidbits like url addresses for more information and fun illustrations. Pennybacker also includes some of her favorite “green” things like water-saving shower supplies and facial moisturizers.

Do One Nice Thing

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Tenzer, Debbie. Do One Nice Thing: Little Things You Can Do to Make the World a Lot Nicer. New York: Crown Publishers, 2009.

Because this was written in 2009 I was skeptical about how many “nice” things I could still do. I was worried many of Tenzer’s suggestions were tied to events long past (like Hurricane Katrina) or websites now defunct. Despite my misgivings, I browsed Do One Nice Thing for easily accomplished and simple suggestions. Here’s what I jotted down after a five minute browse: Hershey kisses, Eden Elementary Family Resource Center, FreeCycle, parking meters and KidFlicks. Here’s what I found out: a Google search for the Eden Elementary Family Resource Center takes me to the Inez Elementary School page. On that page there is a “Family Resource”tab linking to a page created in 2011 and not updated with any information since. No clear way to offer help or to do “one nice thing.” Both FreeCycle and KidFlicks seem to be alive and well. But, my favorites are randomly giving out Hershey’s kisses (ask my staff, I already do) and putting another quarter in someone’s about to expire parking meter. That last one is getting hard to do as more and more places are going to a ticket-on-the-dash system.

In short, there is a mix of easy/simple ways to be nice. You just have to look for them and be inspired!

Flashman and the Tiger

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Fraser, George MacDonald. Flashman and the Tiger.

Reason read: to FINISH the series started in April in honor of Fraser’s birth month finally, right?). While the series might be ending for me there is one more book I will read in honor of GMF but it wasn’t written by him: Tom Brown’s School Days by Thomas Hughes. Fraser took the bully character from School Days and created the Flashman series. Clever.

The premise for Flashman and the Tiger is simple…sort of: This set of papers is actually made up of three different time frames with three different titles: “Road to Charing Cross” (1878 – 1883-1884), “Subtleties of Baccarat” (1890-1891) and “Flashman and the Tiger (1879 & 1894). This is the first time in the Flashman papers that there has been a change in pattern. Each of these sections is only a minor episode in Flashman’s career. In “Road to Charing Cross” Flashman has found himself, once again, in an adventure he didn’t count on. He goes to France for President “Sam” Grant, who can’t speak french. The plot thickens when he agrees to help a Times reporter by the name of Blowitz. Blowitz wants to be the first to scoop the story of the amendment of the San Stefano Treaty. For the history bluffs: Flashman is one of the first to ride the famed Orient Express, only he isn’t impressed. He prefers the steamship.
In “Subtleties of Baccarat” the Prince of Wales is accused of cheating at baccarat, a French card game. Flashy is caught in the middle when a group of five men ask that he confront the cheater for an explanation.
In “Flashman and the Tiger” confronts Tiger Jack, someone he met earlier (1879). At this point the year is 1894 and Flashy is now 72 years old. Tiger Jack is not out to get our man Harry directly. Instead, he is looking to ruin Flashman through the ruination of Flashman’s teenage granddaughter. For the history buffs in the crowd, Oscar Wilde makes an appearance at the end.

New to the series: Fraser presents the reader with Flashy’s vitae so far. It’s a nice recap of everything that has happened in the previous nine books.

Typical Flashy lines: “I’d come to France to skulk and fornicate in peace, not to travel; on the other hand, I’d never visited Vienna, which in those days was reckoned first among all the other capitals of Europe for immoral high jinks, and a day and a night of luxurious seclusion with Her Highness should make for an amusing journey” (p 58), and “So we talked cricket while waiting for the attempted murder of the Austrian Emperor” (p 133). One more: “You think twice about committing murder when you’re over seventy” (p 295). I would think so!

Author fact: George MacDonald Fraser died three years after the publication of Flashman on the March. Had he lived, I am quite sure Flashman would be in many more adventures.

Book trivia: This is the 10th book in the Flashman series and the last one I will read for the challenge. The series continues with Flashman on the March.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “George MacDonald Fraser: Too Good To Miss” (p 93).

Bless Me, Ultima

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Anaya, Rudolfo. Bless Me Ultima. Read by Robert Ramirez. Prince Frederick, MD: Recorded Books, 2004.
Anaya, Rudolfo. Bless Me, Ultima. New York: Grand Central Publishing, 1999.

Reason read: New Mexico became a state in January. I read this as an e-book and listened to it on audio at the same time.

This is the story of Antonio Juan Marez y Luna and his relationship with a shaman/witch called Ultima. It is also the story of the young boy’s call to religion. Ultima’s role in the story is to open Antonio’s eyes to the world around him. While she is a physical presence in his life, she also comes to him in dreams. When we first meet “Tony” he has just starting school and learning to read, but already his young life has been filled with hard knocks life-knowledge. His brothers are away fighting in World War II. Closer to home, he has witnessed the retaliation murder of a veteran suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder and he has seen Ultima’s magic first hand. The real coming-of-age comes when the priesthood starts calling to Tony in the third grade. It was at this time that a dying man asks Tony to hear his confession. Tony’s brothers come home, shell-shocked and weary. Heavy stuff for a kid!
There is a lot of imagery, myth and magic throughout Bless Me, Ultima. Ultima’s spirit animal is the owl and Tony can hear it in times of danger. It even comes to him in dreams to warn him of the future. When citizens of the community accuse Ultima of being evil (because she has healed people in inexplicable ways) it is the owl that diffuses the situation.
When I first started reading Bless Me, Ultima I thought this would be a book for kids or young adults, but the inclusion of violence and prostitution has since made me think otherwise.

Line I liked: “The man they hunted had slipped away from human understanding” (p 23).

Author fact: Anaya says in his introduction that parts of Bless Me, Ultima are autobiographical. It was his first novel so that’s pretty typical, I would think.

Book trivia: Bless Me, Ultima is the first book in a trilogy and, because of the language and sexual situations, is on the list for the most challenged books in the United States. Go figure.

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter simply called “New Mexico” (p 167).