| BOOK FEAST: 2004 |
[18 Oct 2000|10:06pm] |
on my fork:
our lady of the lost and found by diane schoemperlen
On an otherwise typical Monday morning, a middle-aged writer enters her living room and finds a woman standing by her fig tree. The woman is wearing a blue trench coat, white sneakers, and a white shawl over her hair. She is holding a purse and a suitcase. She is the Virgin Mary-and after 2000 years of petition, adoration, and traveling, she's in need of a little R&R.; Invited in for lunch, Mary decides to stay for one week, during which an unlikely friendship develops. As our narrator learns the remarkable history of one of the most influential and complex women of all time, she is moved to examine life's big questions and her own capacity for faith. Witty and gently ironic, this inventive novel is an inspiration to believers and nonbelievers alike.
on my plate:
household saints by francine prose
The setting is New York's Little Italy in the 1950s -- a community closely knit by gossip and tradition. This is the story of an extraordinary family, the Santangelos. There is Joseph, the butcher, who cheats in his shop and at pinochle, only to find the deck is stacked against him; his mother, Mrs. Santangelo, who sees the evil eye everywhere and who calls on her saints; and Catherine, his wife, whose determination to raise a modern daughter leads her to confront ancient questions. Finally, there is Theresa, Joseph and Catherine's daughter, whose astonishing discovery of purpose moves the book toward its unpredictable conclusion.
hard laughter by anne lamott
Anne Lamott's poignant first novel, reissued in an attractive new edition.
Writer (and sometime housecleaner) Jennifer is twenty-three when her beloved father, Wallace, is diagnosed with a brain tumor. This catastrophic discovery sets off Anne Lamott's unexpectedly sweet and funny first novel, which is made dramatic not so much by Wallace's illness as by the emotional wake it sweeps under Jen and her brothers, self-contained Ben and feckless, lovable Randy. With characteristic affection and accuracy, Lamott sketches this offbeat family and their nearest and dearest as they draw ever closer in the intimacy Jen prizes "among the other estimable things: good music, good hard laughter, good sex, good industry, and good books."
everything is illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer
The simplest thing would be to describe Everything Is Illuminated, Jonathan Safran Foer's accomplished debut, as a novel about the Holocaust. It is, but that really fails to do justice to the sheer ambition of this book. The main story is a grimly familiar one. A young Jewish American--who just happens to be called Jonathan Safran Foer--travels to the Ukraine in the hope of finding the woman who saved his grandfather from the Nazis. He is aided in his search by Alex Perchov, a naïve Ukrainian translator, Alex's grandfather (also called Alex), and a flatulent mongrel dog named Sammy Davis Jr. Jr. On their journey through Eastern Europe's obliterated landscape they unearth facts about the Nazi atrocities and the extent of Ukrainian complicity that have implications for Perchov as well as Safran Foer. This narrative is not, however, recounted from (the character) Jonathan Safran Foer's perspective. It is relayed through a series of letters that Alex sends to Foer. These are written in the kind of broken Russo-English normally reserved for Bond villains or Latka from Taxi. Interspersed between these letters are fragments of a novel by Safran Foer--a wonderfully imagined, almost magical realist, account of life in the shtetl before the Nazis destroyed it. These are in turn commented on by Alex, creating an additional metafictional angle to the tale.
If all this sounds a little daunting, don't be put off; Safran Foer is an extremely funny as well as intelligent writer who combines some of the best Jewish folk yarns since Isaac Bashevis Singer with a quite heartbreaking meditation on love, friendship, and loss.
the devil in the white city by erik larson
Author Erik Larson imbues the incredible events surrounding the 1893 Chicago World's Fair with such drama that readers may find themselves checking the book's categorization to be sure that The Devil in the White City is not, in fact, a highly imaginative novel. Larson tells the stories of two men: Daniel H. Burnham, the architect responsible for the fair's construction, and H.H. Holmes, a serial killer masquerading as a charming doctor. Burnham's challenge was immense. In a short period of time, he was forced to overcome the death of his partner and numerous other obstacles to construct the famous "White City" around which the fair was built. His efforts to complete the project, and the fair's incredible success, are skillfully related along with entertaining appearances by such notables as Buffalo Bill Cody, Susan B. Anthony, and Thomas Edison. The activities of the sinister Dr. Holmes, who is believed to be responsible for scores of murders around the time of the fair, are equally remarkable. He devised and erected the World's Fair Hotel, complete with crematorium and gas chamber, near the fairgrounds and used the event as well as his own charismatic personality to lure victims. Combining the stories of an architect and a killer in one book, mostly in alternating chapters, seems like an odd choice but it works. The magical appeal and horrifying dark side of 19th-century Chicago are both revealed through Larson's skillful writing.
ladder of years by anne tyler
Delia Grinstead, the baby of the family, has lived all her 40 years in the same rambling Baltimore house. She doted on her father, a doctor, then married his serious assistant when she was only 17. A petite, freckled, self-effacing woman, Delia was the perfect mother and wife until her kids reached young adulthood, her husband started to seem like an old man, and she realized that she had become nearly invisible. So she leaves. She simply walks away and ends up in a small town where she creates a quiet new life for herself and discovers just exactly who she is. That's the bare-bones version of this charming, often hilarious, and astute novel. Tyler is in top form here. Her seemingly effortless prose is, like silk, rich in subtle hues and sheeny with dancing light. As Delia's quest for independence and respect unfolds, Tyler offers keen and provocative insights into the cycles of family life, shifting emotional needs, and the process of aging. She also presents us with the sort of quandary other personalities often evoke. We like and sympathize with Delia, but we'd also like to ring her little neck. She's so stoic, so slow, so sexually tentative. Then again, we admire her determination, her generosity, her self-containment, her ability to change and forgive. People are difficult, Tyler tells us, but many are worth the trouble.
getting over getting older by Letty Cottin Pogrebin
Not everyone--not even every feminist--holds to the belief that age brings wisdom, power, and its own beauty. Faced with turning 50, Letty Cottin Pogrebin, founder of Ms. and author of several books including Growing Up Free, says her reactions ranged "from astonishment to anger, from confusion to curiosity, from denial to disgust." Using herself as a compass and adding many other well- known voices, Pogrebin's irreverent book takes on friendship, sex, love, dieting, mothering adults, the physical and emotional depredations of aging, and mortality. Rather than stubbornly toeing the line on spurning plastic surgery, for example, she thoughtfully explores "the tension between artificiality and authenticity." In the end, she concludes, one can devote one's remaining years to lamenting and running after lost youth or put that time to far better uses. Despite a glib, overly playful tone that trivializes certain issues, Pogrebin's desire to share downplayed truths is a boon.
eaten up already:
middlesex by jeffrey eugenides
"I was born twice: first, as a baby girl, on a remarkably smogless Detroit day in January of 1960; and then again, as a teenage boy, in an emergency room near Petoskey, Michigan, in August of 1974." And so begins Middlesex, the mesmerizing saga of a near-mythic Greek American family and the "roller-coaster ride of a single gene through time." The odd but utterly believable story of Cal Stephanides, and how this 41-year-old hermaphrodite was raised as Calliope, is at the tender heart of this long-awaited second novel from Jeffrey Eugenides, whose elegant and haunting 1993 debut, The Virgin Suicides, remains one of the finest first novels of recent memory.
Eugenides weaves together a kaleidoscopic narrative spanning 80 years of a stained family history, from a fateful incestuous union in a small town in early 1920s Asia Minor to Prohibition-era Detroit; from the early days of Ford Motors to the heated 1967 race riots; from the tony suburbs of Grosse Pointe and a confusing, aching adolescent love story to modern-day Berlin. Eugenides's command of the narrative is astonishing. He balances Cal/Callie's shifting voices convincingly, spinning this strange and often unsettling story with intelligence, insight, and generous amounts of humor:
Emotions, in my experience aren't covered by single words. I don't believe in "sadness," "joy," or "regret." … I'd like to have at my disposal complicated hybrid emotions, Germanic traincar constructions like, say, "the happiness that attends disaster." Or: "the disappointment of sleeping with one's fantasy." ... I'd like to have a word for "the sadness inspired by failing restaurants" as well as for "the excitement of getting a room with a minibar." I've never had the right words to describe my life, and now that I've entered my story, I need them more than ever.
When you get to the end of this splendorous book, when you suddenly realize that after hundreds of pages you have only a few more left to turn over, you'll experience a quick pang of regret knowing that your time with Cal is coming to a close, and you may even resist finishing it--putting it aside for an hour or two, or maybe overnight--just so that this wondrous, magical novel might never end.
1/2005what a wonderful book. i didn't know what i was in for but the writing is extraordinary and the characters are fully formed and complex.
writing down the bones by natalie goldberg
Wherein we discover that many of the "rules" for good writing and good sex are the same: Keep your hand moving, lose control, and don't think. Goldberg brings a touch of both Zen and well... *eroticism* to her writing practice, the latter in exercises and anecdotes designed to ease you into your body, your whole spirit, while you create, the former in being where you are, working with what you have, and writing from the moment.completed (ort of) 10/04insightful, etc. read off and on for the better part of the year, i hope it will assist me in my writing.
the little friend by donna tartt
Widely anticipated over the decade since her debut in The Secret History, Tartt's second novel confirms her talent as a superb storyteller, sophisticated observer of human nature and keen appraiser of ethics and morality. If the theme of The Secret History was intellectual arrogance, here it is dangerous innocence. The death of nine-year-old Robin Cleve Dufresnes, found hanging from a tree in his own backyard in Alexandria, Miss., has never been solved. The crime destroyed his family: it turned his mother into a lethargic recluse; his father left town; and the surviving siblings, Allison and Harriet, are now, 12 years later-it is the early '70s-largely being raised by their black maid and a matriarchy of female relatives headed by their domineering grandmother and her three sisters. Although every character is sharply etched, 12-year-old Harriet-smart, stubborn, willful-is as vivid as a torchlight. Like many preadolescents, she's fascinated by secrets. She vows to solve the mystery of her brother's death and unmask the killer, whom she decides, without a shred of evidence, is Danny Ratliff, a member of a degenerate, redneck family of hardened criminals. (The Ratliff brothers are good to their grandmother, however; their solicitude at times lends the novel the antic atmosphere of a Booth cartoon.) Harriet's pursuit of Danny, at first comic, gathers fateful impetus as she and her best friend, Hely, stalk the Ratliffs, and eventually, as the plot attains the suspense level of a thriller, leads her into mortal danger. Harriet learns about betrayal, guilt and loss, and crosses the threshold into an irrevocable knowledge of true evil. If Tartt wandered into melodrama in The Secret History, this time she's achieved perfect control over her material, melding suspense, character study and social background. Her knowledge of Southern ethos-the importance of family, of heritage, of race and class-is central to the plot, as is her take on Southerners' ability to construct a repertoire, veering toward mythology, of tales of the past. The double standard of justice in a racially segregated community is subtly reinforced, and while Tartt's portrait of the maid, Ida Rhew, evokes a stereotype, Tartt adds the dimension of bitter pride to Ida's character. In her first novel, Tartt unveiled a formidable intelligence. The Little Friend flowers with emotional insight, a gift for comedy and a sure sense of pacing. Wisely, this novel eschews a feel-good resolution. What it does provide is an immensely satisfying reading experience.
completed 10/04 i loved this book. i put it down for awhile when things got hectic at work because it's a tense story, but when i got back to it, i couldn't put it down. it's glorious in it's conflicts and realizations. the characters are compelling, and the visuals are imparted beautifully. i got several vocab words out of it too!
bird by bird by anne lamott
Lamott (Operating Instructions, LJ 3/15/93) makes her living by selling magazine articles and books. She also teaches writing. Reading this work is like sitting in on one of her workshops. While discussing elements of the craft such as character development, plot invention, and rewriting, she presents much more than an instruction manual in this small text. Writing is by nature a personal and solitary trade, and Lamott offers thorough examples and anecdotes that explain how she copes with self-doubt, writer's block, professional jealousy, and the discipline necessary to turn thoughts into words on a page. Her work is an honest appraisal of what it takes to be a writer and why it matters so much. Collections supporting creative writing will want to include this because it offers unique inspiration to would-be and struggling authors.
9/04great book. i think i can tell that the writer is, not just a spiritual person, but a fairly traditional christian...a thomas merton sort who combines some buddhism with her christianity. this doesn't bother me, but it colors my view a bit because it seems a little
lovey-dovey on that count. most of the advice is practical, however, and i gleaned a lot from it.
12,000 Miles in the Nick of Time: A Family Tale by Mark Jacobson and Rae Jacobson
At the end of the previous millennium, noted journalist Mark Jacobson and his wife, Nancy, decided they couldn't take another moment of watching their three children get any stupider. They decided that Rae (sixteen), Rosalie (twelve), and Billy (nine) had become prisoners of the idiot culture, which seemed a terrible waste of perfectly fine DNA. There was only one recourse: to declare war. To get away, far away. To go around the world. 12,000 Miles in the Nick of Time is the story of this three-month trip, a trek through Thailand, Cambodia, Nepal, India, Jordan, Israel, France, and England. The itinerary was planned around places that have stood the test of time -- the Angkor Wat, Durbar Square in Kathmandu, the ancient Hindu city of Varanasi, Petra in Jordan, the Pyramids at Giza, the Holy City of Jerusalem. The concept: to contrast these immortal works of man with the crap on TV. But it is also a wider journey, stretching across generations, an expedition into the minds of five family members as they make their way through a succession of cramped cars, seventeen-hour train rides, seemingly endless walks through teeming metropolises -- and one more bowl of curry.
buddha da: a novel by anne donovan
Anne Marie's dad, a Glaswegian painter and decorator, has always been game for a laugh. So when he first takes up meditation at the Buddhist Center, no one takes him seriously. But as Jimmy becomes more involved in a search for the spiritual, his beliefs start to come into conflict with the needs of his wife, Liz. Cracks appear in their apparently happy family life, and the ensuing events change the lives of each family member. Donovan completely captures these lives in her clear-eyed, evocative prose, rendered alternately in the voices of each of the main characters. With seamless grace and astonishing veracity, Buddha Da treats serious themes with humor and its characters with humanity. From prize-winning writer Anne Donovan, this stunning debut novel was shortlisted for the Orange Prize and the Whitbread First Novel Award.
completed 5/04: i really enjoyed this book. it's a fanciful story, realistically portrayed, and the characters are rounded out well and interesting. getting to hear what the characters are saying to themselves gives the reader an omniscient overview of the story and of the motives of the main players.
escaping into the open: the art of writing true by elizabeth berg
Both autobiography and primer, Escaping into the Open interweaves Elizabeth Berg's story of her own journey from working mother to published novelist with encouraging advice on how to create stories that spring from deep within the heart. With wit and honesty, Elizabeth Berg provides numerous exercises that will unleash individual creativity and access and utilize all of the senses. Most important, she tells how to fire passion -- emotion -- into writing itself; to break through personal barriers and reach one's own outer limits and beyond.
unfinished 5/04: breaking through personal barriers, firing passion and emotion into writing.
...i hope ;) it's a pretty good tome, but i got distracted and put it down.
it's a good reference book- i'll pick it up again when i write that damn book. heh.
going to pieces without falling apart by mark epstein, m.d.
In the era of self-empowerment and the relentless glorification of self-esteem, Mark Epstein is questioning whether we have it all backward. As a psychiatrist and practicing Buddhist for 25 years, Epstein has come to believe that the self-help movement has encouraged us to spend enormous amounts of time, money, and mental energy on patching up our egos, rather than pursuing true self-awareness. Instead, Epstein suggests we carefully shatter the ego, as if it were a fat piggy bank, to see what's inside--a scary prospect for those who spend their lives in fear of falling apart. But fear not. Epstein artfully shows readers how to patch the pieces together again into a far richer and more meaningful mosaic.
completed 3/04: a buddhist perspective on wholeness, i see myself in these pages and want very much to incorporate this perspective into my own life. a former christian, i never had to face a fear of death until recently when it loomed larger than ever and broke me down in unexpected ways. the buddha's story of "the three messengers" is basically what has happened to me; aging, illness and death have opened a spiritual doorway for me and i am walking through it. i really want to explore buddhist principals more in depth. i'll re-read this book as well. and yoga plus meditation are in store.
the art of mending by elizabeth berg
Bestselling novelist Berg (Talk Before Sleep; Open House) explores memory, love and forgiveness in her flawed but moving 12th novel. At her annual family reunion, Laura Bartone, a 50-something "quilt artist," is forced to confront the secrets that have long haunted her family. Her emotionally unstable sister, Caroline, tells Laura and their brother, Steve, that their mother abused her as a child. As Laura and Steve whose own childhoods were reasonably happy struggle to make sense of Caroline's accusations and wonder how they could've been oblivious to or complicit in what happened, their father dies. This could be the stuff of melodrama, but Berg generally manages to avoid it. Her prose is often luminous and buoyant, and her insights can be penetrating. Her big ideas, though, are too frequently interrupted by the sort of domestic-detail overdoses that belong in less ambitious novels. Laura's thornier relationships with her mother and siblings are carefully rendered and compelling. Berg has written a nuanced account of a family's implosion, with enough ambiguity and drama to give book clubs, the book's likely audience, plenty to discuss and to keep any reader intrigued, right up to the fittingly redemptive ending.
completed 4/04: the synopsis appealed to me because of my recent family issues. the characters in this novel are middle aged and surprised, much as i have been, that the past still affects them so deeply. there are memories that have not been recalled in years and there are deep rifts which may or may not be mended. the similarities to my own circumstances make this book intriguing to me. the characters are well fleshed-out, but, ultimately, i was disappointed in the story. it's a valid story, but next to my own childhood memories and the way my upbringing has affected my life, not to mention my siblings, i was left wondering what all the fuss was about. somewhat satisfying but not insightful.
eyeing at the buffet:
the best awful by carrie fisher
Carrie Fisher's The Best Awful returns Postcards from the Edge fans to the often hilarious, occasionally tragic, but always captivating world of Suzanne Vale, a bi-polar, celebrity talk show host with a six-year old daughter, a gay ex-husband, an aging starlet mother, and an unbreakable will to survive. After Suzanne stops taking her medication, Fisher treats us to the wild, hysterical ride that follows Suzanne's manic episodes, including a search for Oxycontin in Tijuana with her tattoo artist and a new house guest in the form of Hoyt, a clinically depressed patient Suzanne picks up at her psychopharmacologist's office. Even after the inevitable psychotic break lands Suzanne at Shady Lanes, where she's the "latest loony to hit the bin," Fisher never deviates from her trademark wit and uncanny ability to find truth in every irony. An insider's look at the Hollywood most of us only read about in supermarket checkout lines, The Best Awful doesn't strive to be anything other than what it is--a rambunctious, honest, wise-cracking trip to rock bottom and back again. Supporting characters are just that, a backdrop against whom Suzanne hopes to find a plausible sense of self. For readers who can accept this novel for what it is, The Best Awful promises over 250 pages of uninhibited entertainment.
swing low by miriam toews
One morning Mel Toews put on his coat and hat and walked out of town, prepared to die. A loving husband and father, faithful member of the Mennonite church, and immensely popular schoolteacher, he was a pillar of his close-knit community. Yet after a lifetime of struggle, he could no longer face the darkness of manic depression. With razor-sharp precision, Swing Low tells his story in his own voice, taking us deep inside the experience of despair. But it is also a funny, winsome evocation of country life: growing up on farm, courting a wife, becoming a teacher, and rearing a happy, strong family in the midst of private torment. A humane, inspiring story of a remarkable man, father, and teacher.
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