Tag: september

Optimist’s Daughter

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Welty, Eudora. The Optimist’s Daughter. New York: Random House, 1972.

Southern story broken into four distinct sections.
Part I – Laurel McKelva Hand comes from Chicago to care for her elderly father after eye surgery. Judge McKelva subsequently dies and Laurel is left to deal with her young, silly stepmother, Fay. Part I sets the tone for Laurel and Fay’s strained relationship.

Part II – Laurel and Fay bring Judge McKelva home for the wake and funeral where Laurel is heartily welcomed and supported by her friends and community. Fay’s family comes from Texas and brings out the worst in Fay. Part II illustrates southern charm and manners.

Part III – Laurel has to come to terms with her father’s new, young wife. As silly as she is, Laurel’s father adored her. Laurel also has to come to terms with the death of her mother ten years prior.

Part IV is all about Laurel’s introspective growth and acceptance of the future. The burning of her mother’s letters and the letting go of the breadboard are very significant.

BookLust Twist: From Book Lust in two different chapters. First, from “100 Good Reads, Decade by Decade:1970s” (p 178), then in “Southern Fiction” (p 222).

PS ~ I liked knowing a little about the authors I read. It was fun to discover Welty had connections to Smith and was a Guggenheim fellow (just like Robert Michael Pyle).

Tinker Tailor

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Le Carre, John. Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy. Toronto: Bantam Books, 1975.

I have seen this book peering out at me from my parents bookcase for years and years. I was always fascinated by the title, but scared of the plot. As a teenager I could never get into spy books. I don’t think it had anything to do with being a girl because I read the Hardy Boys just as readily as Nancy Drew. I think it was the fear of spies in general. I mean, think about it – a spy is someone you think you know, but don’t. A spy is someone completely different than who they appear to be. That scares the crap out of me.

To be honest Tinker Tailor was one of the most confusing books I have ever tried to read. For starters, it’s one of those start-in-the-middle-of-the-plot books. The only successful way to catch the reader up on what has been missed is a series of flashbacks. I kept getting the flashbacks confused with the here and now. Another thing I kept getting confused was the language. le Carre has a whole series of secret words to describe the Cold War spy game. For example, a babysitter is really a bodyguard.The plot itself is really straightforward inasmuch as an espionage thriller could be. George Smiley is pulled out of retirement as a British Intelligence officer. He is recruited to uncover a Russian mole deep in the BIA’s ranks. Of course, that it the simplest, dumbed-down plot synopsis I could make. Many reviewers have called Tinker Tailor “complicated” and I would have to agree.

I did manage to find a favorite line in the 50 pages I did read, “Only food could otherwise move him so deeply” (p 23). Go figure.

BookLust Twist: From Book Lust in the chapter called, “Cold War Spy Fiction” (p 61).

Interesting sidenote: John le Carre is the pen name of David John Moore Cornwell.

Wild Life

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Gloss, Molly. Wild Life.New York: Simon & Schuster, 2000.

I suppose I could make some wiseazz crack about my college days, but I will refrain 🙂 for your sake.

Wild Life takes place in the wilds of Oregon/Washington state in the early 1900s. Charlotte Bridger Drummond is a feisty, independent, feminist, single mother of five (all boys) who supports her children by writing dime store novels. She has a bit of an ego and flies the feminist flag a little too frequently, but has a good heart. When her housekeeper’s granddaughter goes missing in the logging hills of the Oregon/Washington border she bravely joins the search believing her strength and savvy will bring the child home. To her utter surprise Charlotte gets lost herself and must depend on a group of shy Big foot-like beasts for survival. While the overall premise of Wild Life is fascinating and the strength of Gloss’s writing is intoxicating, the mishmash of storytelling misses its mark. Interspersed between Charlotte’s tale (in the form of a diary) of her search for the missing child and her adventure with the wild ones is a third-party narrative about barely related characters, short literary quotes, science related newspaper and journal clippings, and substantial excerpts from CBD’s current in-the-works novel. Much like I wanted to see the Ya-Ya scrapbook in The Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood by Rebecca Wells I think Wild Life would have benefitted from a scrapbookish approach (think Nick Bantock).

I am in love with how Molly Gloss writes. Here are a few of my favorite one-liners. First, “They wrestled daily over important matters such as whose arrow came nearest to killing a particular Indian or slavering wolf, and trivial matters such as who wiped whose snot on whose trousers” (p 25). I instantly thought of Silas and Atticus. Here’s another, “There is something about a lighted room when you are standing outside it in the cold night” (p 32); and one more, “I’m a notoriously poor friend where tears are concerned” (p 54).

BookLust Twist: From Book Lust in the chapter called, “Companion Reads” (p 63). I’m reading Where Bigfoot Walks by Robert Michael Pyle as the companion to Wild Life.

Between Parent and Child

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Ginott, Dr. Haim G. Between Parent and Child: the Bestselling Classic That Revolutionized Parent-Child Communication. New York: Three Rivers Press, 1965.

This book starts off with the best introduction, “No parent wakes up in the morning planning to make a child’s life miserable” (p 1). As soon as I read that I knew I was in for a good read. Between Parent and Child is all about psychological perception and what you say (as a parent), how you say it, and even what you don’t say, can influence a child both at that moment and years down the road. What Dr. Ginott offers up is common sense advice about how to communicate with small children and even teenagers. His advice is no-nonsense and extremely practical. It is so straightforward it seems simple, a no-brainer, if you will. The ah-ha moment is not in what to say, it’s how to say it to avoid conveying a message you do not intend. Choosing tone as well as the right words are crucial to emotionally intelligent communication with a child. My one naysayer comment? Many, many times Dr. Ginott suggests mirroring the child’s emotion to illustrate understanding. The go-to catch phrases are “You wish you could play with Sam,” “You wish you could have ice cream for dinner,” and, “You’re angry about losing the game.” Here’s where I would get annoyed. I dislike anyone telling me how I feel. As a small child I probably would have connected with someone “understanding” me… but as a teenager I wouldn’t appreciate dad calmly regurgitated what I just angrily spit out.

I would recommend Between Parent and Child to anyone – parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, teachers. In short, I would recommend this book to anyone who is around children of all ages. If I were planning to have a child I would also plan on reading Between Parent and Child several times over. Once while pregnant and definitely more often during my child’s formative years. Maybe even during labor just for good measure.

Favorite quote, “Often after getting angry at their parents for not listening to their argument, children will present their case in writing” (p 56). Yes, but what Dr. Ginott doesn’t mention is that after getting said missive parents often ignore it.

BookLust Twist: From Book Lust in the chapter called, “Babies: a Reader’s Guide” (p 30).

Moo

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Smiley, Jane. Moo. New York: Fawcett Columbine, 1996.

Moo had its moments of being incredibly bogged down, sluggish even. I found myself getting bored with the wordiness of some of the chapters, as if there were too many subplots.

Moo is an agriculture university somewhere in the midwest (my guess would be Iowa). Characters range from four in-coming freshmen girls to administrative bigwigs and everyone in between. Moo is a satire that is incredibly silly in places. Superficial relationships collide and somehow become meaningful. What makes the story so interesting is the drama, the scandals, and mischief the campus seems to promote. Everyone has a secret. Everyone has someone they would either like to kill or screw. The word everyone uses to describe Moo is “wicked” and it fits.

Favorite lines: “Diane wondered if Mrs. Johnson had understood that was making her pregnant” (p 12), and Under her own version of Ivar’s signature, Mrs. Walker had, over the years, authorized the library to buy as many available databases as they could. She had actually transferred funds out of the athletic budget into the library from time to time…” (p140). Don’t I wish!

BookLust Twist: From Book Lust in the chapter called, “Academia: the Joke” (p 3) and again in the chapter called, “Growing Writers: (p 107).

View From Pompey’s Head

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Basso, Hamilton. View From Pompey’s Head. New York: Doubleday, 1954.

For the longest time I pictured someone standing on someone else’s head whenever I read the title of this book. I figured whoever Pompey was he must have had one hell of a headache. I don’t think I’ve ever heard of Pompey’s Head as a place, but southernly speaking that makes sense. South Carolina has Hilton Head. Georgia has Pompey’s Head or so Hamilton Basso has created it.

View From Pompey’s Head was a best seller and made into a movie the year after it was published. It’s smart and sexy with enough drama to make it interesting on the big screen. Anson is a stuck-in-a-rut lawyer in New York City. Married with a family he is trying to make his way in the big city despite being a small-town southern boy who hasn’t been home in 15 years. It’s not that he was running away from Old Pompey, Georgia – but trying to outgrow it. That’s his story on the surface, anyway.
Through a series of coincidences Anson has a work assignment that returns him to his old stomping grounds. A client of his law firm is being sued for embezzlement. Royalties from an author have gone missing. It looks bad for the firm because the client is dead and can’t defend himself and what is worse, all evidence points to his guilt. Anson, having ties to the author’s remote hometown, is picked to try to get to the bottom of the mystery.

I think it’s important to mention first that View from Pompey’s Head was a best seller and was made into a now hard-to-find movie.

BookLust Twist: In Book Lust twice. Once in the chapter called, “Hamilton Basso: Too Good to Miss” (p 33 & 34), and once in “Southern Fiction” (p 222). Yes, I read two from this category. Sue me.

Native Son

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I don’t know what my problem is. As if September isn’t hard enough I have to go and read a series of really depressing books. First I read Out of the Blue by Richard Bernstein – about the tragedy of September 11, 2001. Then I read The Johnstown Flood by David McCullough- about the tragedy of May 31, 1889. Then I read Off Balance by Suzanne Gordon – about the tragedy of the world of ballet. Now I have read Native Son by Richard Wright – and even though it is fiction (unlike the other books) it is still a tragedy. I just couldn’t believe the trouble main character Bigger gets himself into.

I realize the point Richard Wright is trying to make is one of social injustice and how racism can lead innocent people down the wrong path. I realize there is a sociological lesson to be learned from Native Son. Bigger Thomas is portrayed as a 21 year old African American sent out to work for the white man so that his mother and younger siblings have a place to live. With the 1930s as the backdrop it is portrayed that the African American man of that era has a choice – either be a church-going, loyal and submissive type, or a jaded, violent, hardened criminal type. There is no chance for anything in between. Yet, Bigger tries. He is constantly trying. Unfortunately, he is haunted by a paranoid hatred of white people. His fear that they are always out to “get him” gets him in touble time and time again. He is constantly thinking the worst of everyone around him and that causes him to make terrible decisions. There is rape, murder and the death penalty in this book.

BookLust Twist: From Book Lust in the chapter called, “100 Good Reads by Decade: 1940s” (p 177).

Student of Weather

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Hay, Elizabeth. A Student of Weather. Washington D.C.: Counterpoint, 2000.

A Student of Weather is a car without brakes. No. A Student of Weather is a car without brakes set at the top of a very tall hill. No. A Student of Weather is a car without brakes set at the top of a very tall hill…and someone gives it a push. This is what is was like to read Elizabeth Hay’s first novel. It started off easy enough, slow enough, gentle enough, harmless enough. Then, without any warning at all it is careening crazily almost out of control. Impossible to stop. Stopping the read proved impossible, too. I seriously couldn’t put it down.

As mentioned before, the story starts out simply. Maurice Dove is a researcher, come to study the weather of Saskatchewan. He stays with the Hardy family – Ernest and his two daughters Lucinda and Norma-Joyce. Both daughters, despite being very young, fall in love with Mr. Dove. From there, simplicity comes to a halt.  A Student of Weather is a novel full of contrasting themes. While Lucinda is fair-haired, beautiful and virtuous Norma-Joyce is dark-haired, impulsive and outspoken. While both sisters find ways to fall in love with their visitor, both also find ways to hate each other. Even the landscapes within the story are contrasting. Norma-Joyce’s childhood prairie home cannot compare to the bustling city of her adulthood, New York City. As time progresses and Norma-Jean grows to be a woman with a child of her own, even her child is a conflicted in personality – both shy and loud simultaneously.

On the surface this seems like a love story – two sisters vying for the affections of a traveling man who loves neither of them. Digging deeper it is a story of betrayal and survival. It is the story of pain and loss and the idea that not every broken heart gets mended.

There were many, many, many favorite lines. Here are some of the best:
“Had she been able to , she would have kept the water he washed in, the skin that flaked away, the warm breath that hovered in the cold air above his head, his footprints in the snow” (p 96). I love how each item becomes something less obtainable. Had I written the line I would have reversed the order of the last two items.
“Maybe that’s all anyone wants in the end, to be remembered rather than overlooked’ (p 112). Simple line, but I loved it.
“She understood that you can pass from summer to winter in someone’s mind without even leaving the room” (p 172). Tragically beautiful. Been there, but who hasn’t?
“But returning is never easy, and nor is September” (p 283). Since I can add a car accident and a death to September sadness, I agree. Completely.

BookLust Twist: From Book Lust in two different chapters. In ” Canadian Fiction” (p 50) and again in “First Novels” (p88).

Sarah Canary

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Fowler, Karen Joy. Sarah Canary. New York: Plume Book, 2004.

In a word – fascinating. On the first day reading this book I got 50 pages in before I realized I had only wanted to read the first chapter. I wanted to get my toes wet – not jump all the way in. From the moment Sarah Canary begins there is nonstop action in the most surreal way. The entire book is written like a mystery. For starters, there are the poems of Emily Dickinson at the beginning of each chapter. They are not there for show. Each poem serves as a clue to the storyline. Then, there is the structure of the story itself. Fowler writes in such a lyrical manner that it was easy to want to quote the entire book: “Chin was a small ant, picking his way over the melodic body of the world” (p 12), for example. Another aspect of Sarah Canary I enjoyed is the idea that every main character is an outcast of sorts. It is interesting to try to discover the peculiarity of each character. It becomes easy to do because character development throughout the story is strong. Sarah Canary is not without humor, as well: “Dr. Carr would have liked to see the insane on horseback, too…but he tried to deal in realities” (p 38).
It all begins when a strange woman wanders into Chin Ah Kin’s railroad camp. She is dirty and wild-looking and speaking in a series of chirps, clicks, grunts and sighs. As a white woman she is an unwelcome sight in a Chinese labor camp. Chin unwillingly becomes responsible for taking her back, but back to where is unknown. Along the way Chin and the wild woman (nicknamed Sarah Canary because of her sing-song noises) encounter different people who, in their own inexplicable way, are drawn to Sarah and develop an overwhelming desire to become attached to her for one reason or another.

Some of the many, many quotes I enjoyed: “His heart refused to  return to his chest” (p 15), “If you let go for an instant, your soul would fly to it. If you could walk inside that combination of light and ice, its beauty would blind you” (p 32), and “Chin was stabbed with the sharp edges of homesickness” (p 245).

BookLust Twist: From Book Lust in the chapter called, “Real Characters” (p 197). Pearl called this a book people either loved or hated…sorta like cilantro.

ps ~ I enjoyed Sarah Canary so much that I added Karen Joy Fowler as a favorite author on LibraryThing.

Off Balance

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Gordon, Suzanne. Off Balance: the Real World of Ballet. New York: Pantheon Books, 1983.

Yet another book I wasn’t supposed to read this month. I have no idea how it got on the list because it’s designated for October – National Art Month. Woops. Luckily, this was easy to read and I got through it very quickly. It didn’t take away from the books I was supposed to read.

I had only read one book about ballet and all about how difficult it is to be a dancer before reading Off Balance. Off Balance: the Real World of Ballet  was pretty much the same theme. I found the entire book to be well written but extremely depressing. Having no experience with the world of ballet (“real” or otherwise) I had to take Gordon’s word for it. According to everything I have read dancers are unhealthy, prone to injury, anorexia, and mental issues; they are socially stunted and obsessed with pleasing their teachers. Dancers don’t have formal educations, family lives, or productive interests outside of dance. The family of a dancer makes sacrifices above and beyond normal expectations. Dancers earn woefully little and they don’t get vacation pay. Workloads are exhausting yet they can get fired at a moments notice. The entire book is like this. Open any page and you will find something negative about the world of ballet. It got to be so depressing and negative that I couldn’t wait to finish the last page. I started to believe that any self-respecting person should not want to be involved in the world of ballet and if he or she did it was sheer stupidity that drove ambition. After all, as Gordon herself writes, dancers don’t think for themselves – they receive constant direction from their teachers.

BookLust Twist: From More Book Lust in the chapter called, “Dewey Deconstructed: 700s” (p 74).

Johnstown Flood

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McCullough, David G. The Johnstown Flood. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1968.

I have no idea what possessed me to read about two large scale disasters in the same month. The tragedy of September 11, 2001 cost the United States over 3,000 lives and was entirely a man-made nightmare, The tragedy of May 31, 1889 cost the town of Johnstown, Pennsylvania over 2,000 lives and was a combination of man and nature coming together to create a different kind of nightmare. I instantly thought of Hurricane Katrina descending on the levies of New Orleans.

In the case of the Johnstown Flood, it was the man-made dam that held back the waters of Lake Conemaugh. As long as the dam held, the bustling valley town of Johnstown below was safe. While the dam was surrounded in controversy – those who thought it was perfectly safe versus those who thought it needed a makeover – no one could have predicted the amount of water the heavy rainstorms of May 31st, 1889 would bring. By midday the dam was in serious trouble. Despite frantic efforts to bolster its walls, by late afternoon it was too late and the dam gave way. It was impossible stop the deluge of millions of tons of water rushing down the mountainside. In a matter of hours an entire town was demolished. McCullough does an amazing job tying personal stories with the facts of the events. His recreation of the chain of events is stunning and almost unbelievable.

For some reason, it’s the examples of innocence right before the disaster that touched me the most. “The distance between the two houses was only about five feet, so he [Horace Rose] had put some candy on the end of a broom and passed it over to her [Bessie]. That was so successful that he next passed across a tin cup of coffee to Bessie’s mother in the same way. She was just raising the cup to her lips when the first crash came” (p 145).
  The truest line of the book: “All ordinary rules of decorum and differences of religion, politics and position were forgotten” (p 187). Isn’t that what happened after September 11, 2001?

BookLust Twist:From Book Lust in the chapter called, “What a (Natural) Disaster” (p 124).

Short Walk in the Hindu Kush

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Newby, Eric. A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush. New York: Penguin, 1986.

I think the most endearing aspect of A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush is the fact that Eric Newby readily admits he had no idea what he was doing when he and a friend decided to explore the Nuristan mountain range in Afghanistan. With very little training and an unclear vision of what was in store, Newby’s A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush is little more than a witty, humorous journal. Yet, almost by default it offers intelligent, observant insight into Afghan cultures and terrains few Westerners have ever experienced. Newby begins his tale with the idea of exploring the Hindu Kush mountain range. Recruiting his friend Hugh, they “practice” climbing by scrambling up and down a rock face in Wales. There they learn the tools and of trade and suddenly they are experts. From there, with tongue-in-cheek humor, Newby delightfully journals their subsequent adventures in northeastern Afghanistan.

Best funny lines: “He sounded almost shocked, as if for the first time he had detected in me a grave moral defect. It was a historic moment” (p 30) and “I smothered an overwhelming impulse to ask him why we had come this far to find out something he already knew, but it was no place for irony; besides, the view was magnificent” (p 149).

BookLust Twist: From Book Lust in the chapter called, “Armchair Travel” (p 24).

Out of the Blue

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Bernstein, Richard, and the staff of the New York Times. Out of the Blue: the Story of September 11, 2001 From Jihad to Ground Zero.  New York: Times Books, 2002.

Today was a day just like September 11, 2001. Crystal bright blue skies. Not too warm, not too cold. Almost perfect weather. Weather like that makes me suspicious – on edge. Every since 9/11/01. You probably feel the same way. Not a cloud in the sky makes me nervous. I stare up expecting it to fall down. I still can’t watch CNN reports from that day. It’s still too fresh in my mind, still too soon. Eight years later and I’m thinking it’s almost too soon to be reading Out of the Blue. Still.

Out of the Blue takes us chapter by chapter through what on September 11, 2001 – from the transformation of Osama bin Laden and the emergence of Al Qaeda to the trainings of the terrorists and finally, to the day we will never forget. A day that some are calling the end of innocence. Intermingled in this “explanation” for what happened and how it all began are the personal biographies of some of the victims. It is not clear how Bernstein chose these Americans to be included in Out of the Blue, but the inclusion of their stories illustrates just how unexpected these attacks really were. Normal, everyday routines carried out by normal everyday people were shattered in the blink of an eye. Bernstein documents the terrible reality of when the planes hit; the choking smoke, the inferno flames, the lethal leaking fuel, the rescue workers rushing into the buildings while terrified victims either rushed out or jumped to their deaths. The entire New York Times staff is to be applauded for their thoroughness for facts and details that make Out of the Blue more of a matter-of-fact (and less of a sensationalized) account of a mind numbing tragedy.

Aside from the typo on page 246 I enjoyed Out of the Blue as much as I could…considering the subject matter.

Tragic lines: “Whole families, traveling together on the hijacked planes, were obliterated together” (p 7), and “After denying for months that there would have been any way for American law enforcement or intelligence  to have detected  the terrorist plot beforehand, he [Director of the FBI, Robert S. Mueller] admitted that important clues to the coming disaster were ignored or neglected by the FBI” (p 157). 

BookLust Twist: From Book Lust in the chapter, “9/11” (p 171).

Reivers

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Faulkner, William. The Reivers. New York: Vintage, 1990.

I’ve never had great luck with Faulkner. It takes me longer to read anything he has written because of his plots, character genealogies, and confusing dialogues. The Reivers was no different. Scottish for robbers, The Reivers blends a tangle of genealogies – everyone seems to have some blood link to someone else- with a complicated, detail packed plot and lots of run-on, rambling conversations. The Reivers is told from the point of view of eleven year old Lucius Priest. He gets involved in first the theft of Grandfather’s automobile, then after running away to Memphis, prostitutes, horse smuggling and the long arm of the law.  Then there is something about a stolen gold tooth. Trust me, it’s funny. In the beginning I found plot and dialog cumbersome. It took me several chapters to get into the cadence of Faulkner’s writing, but once I settled in and became familiar with his style it was highly enjoyable.

Moments I liked: “I’m sure you have noticed how ignorant people beyond thirty or fourty are” (p 5). I have no idea why this struck me as funny…I’m beyond 30 or 40!
“…they-we-would load everything into pickup trucks and drive two hundred miles over paved highways to find enough wilderness to pitch tents in; though by 1980 the automobile will be as obsolete to reach wilderness with as the automobile will have made the wilderness it seeks” (p 21).

BookLust Twist: From Book Lust in the chapter called, “Southern Fiction” (p 222). You don’t get more southern than Faulkner!

Incidentally, this was Faulkner’s last book. Somehow, I find that sad.

Metamorphosis

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Kafka, Franz. “Metamorphosis.” Franz Kafka: the Complete Stories.Ed.Nahum N. Glatzer. New York: Schoken Books, 1971. 89-139.

What a freaking sad, sad story (or novella, if you will). Even though I read this once in high school and twice in college I wanted to refresh my memory about the details. From my previous readings I remember Gregor woke up one morning to find he had transformed into a bug. Instead of being concerned about the multiple legs, hard shell and the fact he couldn’t turn himself over, Gregor was more upset about sleeping late, missing the train and being late to work as a traveling salesman. This was a key point in the story. I also remember his parents and sister not being all that supportive of his transformation. This also was a huge point in the story. His family was repulsed by his appearance and refused to consider him part of the family. Their neglect of him gets worse and worse until dirty and broken, he succumbs to starvation and the injuries sustained when his father threw an apple at him. What I didn’t remember was the nitty-gritty psychology of it all. Gregor’s resentment about being the bread winner for the family, how underneath it all he felt like a bug even before the metamorphosis, and ultimately his family’s complete exclusion of Gregor as an insect. The other detail I had completely forgotten was how freeing Gregor’s death was to the family. They moved on without a single regret.

To mark Gregor’s severe denial of bugness: “This getting up early, he thought, makes one quite stupid. A man needs his sleep” (p 90). Only Gregor is no longer a man, but an insect.

BookLust Twist: From Book Lust twice. Once in the chapter called, “Czech It Out” (p 70), and once in the chapter called, “100 Good Reads, Decade by Decade (1910s) (p 177).