Colleen Mondor's Blog, page 10

What George Eliot said...

That is National Geographic photo archivist Bill Bronner in a lovely super short film from the magazine about his job. In an accompanying article, Kathryn Carlson writes about meeting him and the impact one of his photos had on her:

The first time I went downstairs to film Bill for this video, he was busy searching for old photos about South Africa, at the request of a magazine editor. One of the unpublished images he pulled has stuck with me. It was taken during the apartheid era at Christmas time, and it showed dozens of white men standing along a pool's edge, tossing money into the water where black mine workers were fighting for their Christmas bonuses. It was a simple photograph, but it thrust me into the small, yet appalling moments of racism. There were no broken bones, no starving children, no corrupt cops. But there was degradation. There was merciless humor. There was struggle, strength, pride, hope, pain, entitlement, hate. That photo showed me apartheid. And Bill remembers that image, and those people, and the photographer every single day. He pays homage to their lives by keeping these moments safe in his memory, and sharing them with anyone who wants to learn.

In another life, I'm sure I was an archivist. So much of what I love is connected to the past and the truths I pursue, both in what I write and in how I live, are connected to the past. Right now I have hundreds of photographs spread out in my office tracing my Irish American family back over 100 years, my French Canadian one back to my father's childhood.

Last week, I was working (finally) on my own photo albums.

For my next book (still horribly untitled - nothing fits!), I have been looking both at the reports of a long dead scientist/mountain climber and the work of a pilot who filled the map through a critical mountain pass and then later disappeared on a final flight. (The irony that he filled in the map for everyone else only to lose himself less than a year later boggles my mind if I dwell on it.)

In his "cartographic" memoir, In the Memory of the Map, Christopher Norment writes of his lifelong love of maps. It was here that I found the wonderful quote from George Eliot about "the unmapped country within us." (I have not read much Eliot at all and must rectify that.)

Norment also quotes Michael Ondaatje: "All that I desired was to walk upon such an earth that had no maps." Norment himself is fascinated with unmapped terrain, "a vanished world". He writes, "Mapping the last of the lost and lonely places would be more than a simple act of filling in a blank space; it would be a potent symbol, an admission that there are personal and collective limits on our options."

It's a very interesting book and I enjoyed reading it. But at the end of the day, with a life that has been so dominated by road maps and aircraft sectionals (aviation maps), I have come to treasure a solid, accurate map. I don't see romance in unmapped places but rather a world to get lost in - a place to disappear without a trace.

I don't like disappearing.

On my office wall is a family tree, the country of where I come from going back to 1860. I have names, places, photographs. I have a record of loves and lives and hopes and dreams that crossed an ocean.

So many things make a map, so many people. I never made it as a professional archivist but in my own world, it is what I am on every level. It is, my truest self.

"Zina would go out on an adventure every day...."

Outside ran an amazing piece last week by Grayson Schaffer on the life and tragic early death (from a hiking accident) of the amazing artist/creator Zina Lahr. I don't know how you can watch this and not fall in love with this girl--she was really something special and the world is a sadder place without her in it.

I've been thinking about the struggle to embrace a creative life for the past few days. I made hotel reservations for the Association of Writers & Writing Programs conference in Seattle and it's been hard not to feel selfish about that. This is a total indulgence; it's meeting up with friends, attending panels on subjects that interest me and talking about writing for hours and hours. I'm not getting paid for this and it has been hammered into my life forever that writing is a hobby unless you are paid for it.

I started hearing that when I was 12 and it hasn't left my brain since. (My husband does not feel this way at all and totally supports my trip.)

The funny thing is, I likely will make contacts at AWP, it's the nature of these conferences after all. And I am attending specific panels that I think will help me with my writing. So technically, this actually is work-related. But still, I can't silence those powerfully critical that echo in my head; the ones from so long ago and the ones that still occasionally are uttered around me. I just need to watch this video enough times I think, chant "Zina Lahr" over and over again, reflect on all that she accomplished and attempted, and perhaps finally the guilt will evaporate.

She was really someone special, wasn't she?

On the eve of my final column...

Just a note to let you know that my final column at the literary site Bookslut will go live in March. The column is being discontinued, not changing hands, and after 103 consecutive months (whew!), I'll be letting it go. I've really loved writing that column and shining a light on books for children and teens that might otherwise be a bit overlooked. Sometimes I have written about the big releases, (Libba Bray and Holly Black come to mind), but by and large the column has been about offbeat choices as much as possible. I hope that many of you found some wonderful books through my reviews and that all the authors whose books I wrote about know how very much I enjoyed reading their words.

It was a good run, wasn't it? And a whole lot of good reading was had along the way....

ETA: I just looked back over the site and my first piece ran there in May 2004 on the works of Antoine de Saint Exupery. (My first column in September 2005). So very nearly ten years of writing for the site. Wow.

The search for French Canada's greatest hero

The intrepid folks in this picture are engaging in the annual Winter Carnival canoe races in Quebec City. That fact that people will be get into canoes for any reason - race or not - when the river is full of ice both inspires me and makes me cringe. Are they brave or crazy? Go Canada!

I did something a couple of weeks ago that I rarely do - went into a couple of bookstores and bought some books. So many books come my way for review that I rarely buy titles. If there is something I really want to read that I won't be reviewing then I hit the library and I'm good. But there were some books I wanted to read and was fairly certain I wanted to own (so I could reread). They are the leftovers from my Christmas list (where everyone always says "Why should we buy you books?) and I didn't want to wait for the next holiday to get them.

So we went book shopping and I LOVED IT.



Bury Your Dead by Louise Penny is from the Chief Inspector Gamache series. I have never read any of the Gamache mysteries before but the premise of this one (and its starred Booklist review) really caught my attention. Set in modern day Quebec City, the main plot concerns the murder of a Frenchman in the basement of the Literary and Historical Society. The dead man was a historian (and a bit of a crackpot) on Samuel de Champlain, the founder of Quebec whose gravesite is still unknown. The Society is dedicated to English Canada and in Quebec, the French and the English are two very different things.

You can see how this particular body in this particular place might raise a few eyebrows.

Our hero is struggling with the after affects of the previous novel and a case that might have been decided the wrong way as well as the deaths of some people who mattered to him. Lots of wounded folks here and the search for Champlain is a good excuse to muck about in history without dwelling on recent events.

Even thought I haven't read the last book, I've been fine with following Bury Your Dead and actually, really really loving it. I am equal parts French Canadian and Irish American and both of those ancestries came to me with a lot of history and tradition. I have heard about Quebec all of my life and used to teach about Champlain (who figures into American history as well). What I love about this novel though is the way history plays such a big part of the story and how beautifully Penny immerses readers into the workings of the Society and the many scholars who have long been intrigued by Champlain. You really feel like you are walking the streets with Gamache (and his dog Henri) and hunting for clues into Champlain's location.

This is the best sort of light reading for me: smart, interesting and full of historical research. I'm adoring every bit of it and can't wait to find out who did it. (Halfway through and still not idea who the murderer is!)

Rounding up, catalogging & Yes, Virginia - writing is a real job

The last few weeks have been fraught with deadlines, several of which I am still pursuing. But in the midst of all these jobs, I find myself carefully considering the work I now do. I have been going through a consideration of my professional goals lately - writing another book is good but a freelance museum job, a small offer from NPR, editing some titles for Shorefast Editions, aviation articles for Alaska Dispatch - these are all real writing jobs too. I am finding myself suddenly, unexpectedly, a professional writer. It takes a very long time to finally refute all those naysayers from 20-30 years ago; yes, being a writer is a REAL job.

You learn something new everyday, even about yourself!

Now onto a few odds & ends:

1. From the Spring/Summer catalog for Coffee House Press includes The Devil's Snake Curve by Josh Ostergaard described as "The baseball book Howard Zinn would have written-if he had hated the Yankees" and How a Mother Weaned Her Girl From Fairy Tales, a new story collection from Kate Bernheimer. Both of these sound especially interesting to me (for reasons obvious to readers of this blog).

2. From the First Second 2014 catalog (the best graphic novel publisher around in my book) I was delighted to see Shackleton from Nick Bertozzi (all about Antarctica), In Real Life by Cory Doctorow & Jen Wang (a girl, some gaming, a global spanning crusade to stop exploitation online - typical Doctorow of course!), Andre the Giant by Box Brown (fans of The Princess Bride rejoice over this bio!), The Undertaking of Lily Chen by Danica Novgorodoff (they had me with the author) and Above the Dreamless Dead - an anthology of adaptions from WWI poetry from the trenches.

3. I have started a new class at the gym. I'm kinda dying right now.

4. My new column is up with lots of fab graphic novels - check it out. :)

5. In case you missed this: Read 12 Masterful Essays by Joan Didion for free.

6. Courtesy Sarah at Bookworm Blues - some speculative fiction she is watching for this year and you should likely check out as well.

7. I fall more in love with the simple organization offered by Field Notes everyday and now their books have made it to the South Pole! Huzzah!

8. Today I have 2 reviews for Booklist, an article (or 3) for Dispatch and some editing. But a big project was turned in over the weekend for which I am very relieved. I also need to get my husband a Valentine's Day card because, well, he really is a good guy and cards are a very civilized thing to give someone you love. :)

Utterly charmed by "The President's Hat"

I lucked into a copy of The President's Hat by Antoine Laurain, (translated by Gallic Books, who published it in English), and found it to be one of the more charming and quietly funny books I have come across in ages.

It's such a simple premise: French President Francois Mitterrand forgets his hat in a restaurant where it is taken as a souvenir by a nearby diner and then, in succeeding sections, passes in ways accidental and purposeful from one person to the next and all of them enjoy some rather amazing experiences while possessing it.

Is the hat magical? Not in the modern paranormal fantasy sense. It just seems to carry a whiff of good luck that turns each life into an engaging (and not utterly unexpected) direction. One man gets back on track, a woman finds an idea that leads to professional success, another man finds his voice, and on and on. Nothing spectacular here - no monsters slayed or mountains climbed. And yet all of these changes result (as the final pages reveal) in wholly new and exciting lives. Essentially, good things happen to some find decent people and in one way or another, the hat is key.

A lot of reviewers have praised The President's Hat, as they should, but one thing I don't think has been stressed is how adult the novel of connected lives is. Every character is facing a questioning moment in their life about job or calling or romantic relationship, and actions taken with the hat propel them into one choice or another.

There was one section in particular, about husband and father Bernard, that especially resonated with me. Sitting through another endless dinner with some insufferable acquaintances, Bernard voices his honest opinion on a political subject. In the withering silence that follows and the subsequent shock of his wife on the drive home, Bernard starts to reconsider what kind of person he is. There is nothing in his home that is unexpected, nothing she says or does that isn't mindful of what others think. He has become someone he never wanted to be and resolutely sets forth to change that in ways big and small. (The furniture has to go!)

While everyone goes through moments like this, I think you really have to be on the far side of 40 to grasp that if you want your life to be different then you have to start living it differently now. In several different ways, The President's Hat is about the little leaps of faith needed to make change happen. That Laurain puts so much sly humor into his novel and makes it a delight to read is an extra treat on top of the rather thoughtful narrative.

A metaphorical turn in Mitterrand's hat would be good for all of us I think. I know I've been thinking about how I would fit into this title since I finished it a couple of weeks ago. What would I change, what I would try, what would i make happen in my life? Just think about that for a minute - imagine the possibilities. Dream a little and if you need a push, read this lovely book.

Once more into the fray with Claire DeWitt

One of the Christmas gifts I was most pleased to unwrap was Sara Gran's recent book, Claire DeWitt and the Bohemian Highway. A sequel to the fabulous Claire DeWitt and the City of the Dead, this one picks up with our heroine (described as "a cool blend of Nancy Drew and Sid Vicious" by Alafair Burke) back home in San Francisco and facing a personal meltdown as an old flame is found murdered in his home. She has to solve this case - she has to - but none of the clues are coming easy and the emotional impact of this death is enough to kill her.

Welcome to the world of a seriously drug addicted detective who is still wrapped up in the disappearance of a childhood friend, the death of her mentor, and the crushing concern that maybe she won't save the world even though it is pretty much her calling. (This is especially hard for her as she is a world class cynic.) Welcome to Claire DeWitt whom I unabashedly adore.

How do I explain the depth of this character and the stories Gran creates around her? There is not only the active murder investigation of her friend, but also a mystery surrounding some dead miniature ponies, a collection of girl detective comic books from the past that have an enduring connection to Claire's life and the long unsolved disappearance of that childhood friend that continues to haunt her and provides a powerful subplot that returns in this title. Basically, you never know what each page will present, not because the mysteries themselves are outlandish (they could be found in any Spenser for Hire mystery), but because they all come at once and Claire approaches and solves them in such an unorthodox way and because Gran manages to walk the finest of lines between straight-up hardboiled detecting and something more surreal. It's not paranormal, but it's definitely different; and it keeps readers on their toes.

As a lifelong mystery lover (got my start with Trixie Belden!), I can't get enough of Claire DeWitt. Gran makes me think about a lot of different things; she has something very good going on here and if you don't mind your characters flirting with some serious self-destructive tendencies, (Liz Hand mystery fans will love these books), then Claire's world is one you. I'm waiting now on book #3 and looking forward to wherever this author takes me next.

Indexing

Jenny D. posted several entries on her blog a couple of weeks about about the indexing of of her upcoming book Reading Style: A Life in Sentences. (I'm quite excited about this one; always intrigued to delve into the writing subject especially from a writer whose work I enjoy.) Here's a bit of what she has to say on the subject:

Indexing has an incredible allure for me. I have been marking up references on post-its and sticking them in the margins of the proofs; this morning I consolidated the individual entries into alphabetical stacks, then began typing in one letter at a time (Word will alphabetize once I type in entries, but I need to do it letter by letter so that I can keep track of which individual entries to consolidate - if you typed them all in higgledy-piggledy, you would end up with a good deal of subsequent reformatting still needed).

Probably nobody but myself and perhaps a copy editor or two will ever look closely through the index, but I like the way it presents an alternate route through the book, with each letter of the alphabet - in this case of this sort-of-memoir - representing a kind of self-portrait in miniature.

Via a link from Jenny, there is more on indexing from David Lull for his upcoming book on Robert Frost. He has many links in his delightful entry, all again on the allure of indexing.

We had to redo the index for The Flying North before Shorefast Editions reissued it and it was both a frustrating and interesting process. The page numbers had obviously all changed with the new design and we added some footnotes that caused further adjustments plus the original index was a bit crazy. For example, it seemed odd for a book on Alaskan aviation to have an entry for "Alaska". (Needless to say there were dozens of page numbers listed for it.) Plus some of the people in the index were exceedingly insignificant and appeared only in passing mention. Anyway, it was redone and I must say one does put their own perspective into a chore like this; it truly becomes how you see the book in a way, and a personal vision does take hold.

I do find it interesting that you can hire someone to do your book index for you. I can understand wanting to save time this way but can't imagine contracting out for such a personal aspect of your work. And I don't see how a computer could do it either. Often a word would appear on a page in passing - or a name that could be both a person and place. And there are some aspects of the book you don't think of as entries unless you are immersed in the work itself and know the context. For me, the index was one of the more intimate aspects of writing and editing; it's sort of the heart of what has been put on paper.

(We were convinced in the end that Jean Potter, who wrote The Flying North, could not have done the book's index. It did not read like her at all and likely was done by the publisher.)

While googling "indexes" I came across this interesting analysis of a Willie Mays biography and its problematic index. Much of what is mentioned here is what we found initially in The Flying North. This of course brings me back to Jenny D.'s blog and this look at "The Letter S" from her index. Of course that raises the real point of this blog entry which is that Jenny's book sounds great and I'm really looking forward to reading it.

Sherlock and the Nile but not as you would expect

A couple of things I have a literary softspot for: pre WWII Egypt and curious women. This is largely due to my childhood fascination with all things Egyptian archaeology but mostly because of Amelia Peabody. (If I have to tell you who Amelia Peabody is then I don't think you should be on this blog.) (Okay, that's rude. Read all about her here.)

When I find a new book that is the slightest bit Peabody-esque then I pounce on it like a tiger. (A tiger who looks like a woman and is standing in a library but you get my drift.) Shadows On the Nile by Kate Furnivall is set in 1932 when Jessie Kenton's brother Tim, an archaeologist, disappears after attending a seance. Jessie follows the thread of his disappearance--left in Sherlockian clues from their childhood that only Jessie would understand--all the way to Cairo and Luxor and the tomb of King Tutanankhamun. Along the way there are thrills and chills and bad guys and maybe good guys (but do you ever really know?) and THE guy.

THE guy is the only weakness in this novel. He's actually a pretty good character but the romance doesn't work. You have Jessie & hero guy charging all over everywhere trying to find Tim and then there is a bombing (Egypt had some issues with their British colonial overlords in 1932) and then they just fall into each others arms. This read to me a bit like "insert major romantic leap here". The bombing (although it fits with the politics) also seemed designed solely to force the romantic moment. Our guy and girl work as a couple of sleuths and friends and potential romantic partners, but not this much, not this fast.

But...that's okay. The couple bit is a small bit, a tiny quibble, and it's mostly okay. The overall plot, which includes a wonderful subplot about Jessie's other brother who went missing when they were children and got found without her knowing, is splendid. I love that subplot. I also enjoyed the politics, the train ride, Jessie's awful parents and everything Egypt.

So, in review: Shadows On the Nile is a good mystery full of lots of interesting characters, some killer settings and a message about family that resonates long after the final page is turned. The romance is iffy, but the rest is more than enough. In fact, a sequel would be most welcome (and then the romance would work!)

Because Tammy Wynette is everyone's secret heroine

I grew up on country music. I grew up on Marty Robbins and Loretta Lynn and Johnny Cash and Dolly Parton and Waylon Jennings and Willie Nelson and Tammy Wynette and George Jones. My mother played music from the 50s sometimes on the weekends and had a longstanding crush on Elvis, (Blue Hawaii is still one of my all time favorite movies), but the soundtrack to my childhood, the recurring music in the car and the house and on the beach blanket radio was always country. I hear Kenny Rogers sing "The Gambler" and I'm in a little ranch house on a two lane road that I can hardly bear to drive by anymore because it hurts too much to see how much it has changed.

I listen still to the music of my childhood because the reality of that place and time is too far gone and away.

Emily Arsenault's Miss Me When I'm Gone is a subtle mystery about an author who might have slipped and fallen after speaking at a library or might have been pushed. Gretchen Waters had a surprise bestseller with a post-divorce memoir about driving around the south while visiting places connected to some female country music icons.

"Tammyland" was dubbed the "honky-tonk Eat, Pray, love" by Gretchen's publishers. She was at work on her second book, another memoir this time about finding her [unknown] father. But then Gretchen fell (or was pushed), and her family asked her old friend Jamie to serve as literary executor and put together her notes. What Jamie finds in the boxes of papers and notebooks and computer files is that Gretchen was writing about her murdered mother as much as her mystery father. She was also missing all of her deadlines and nowhere near a structured manuscript. Gretchen was drowning in her past and Jamie, sadly, did not know in time to toss her a line.

Arsenault does a great job of subtly building the thriller aspect of the narrative, of taking Jamie along as she catches up on her old friend's life which includes immersing herself in "Tammyland". Readers thus get not only bits and pieces of Gretchen's current work, (and Jamie's sleuthing as she visits the same places and meets the same people), but also read excerpts from the previous book. This gives you great words like these about Tammy Wynette:

Tammy's life--like her music--conveys a vulnerability that I think many of us are not comfortable with. You can hear the "teardrop" in her voice, and think, That's beautiful and honest. Or you can hear it and opt for the safer response: That's pathetic and maudlin, to which I am too cool and self-assured to relate. And for that reason, Tammy will never be hip like Johnny Cash or Loretta Lynn have become.

There.Is.So.Much.More. Arsenault writes so much great stuff about Tammy and Loretta and Dolly and even--YEA!--Dottie West! She gets under the skin of who they were when they made it big and what their songs were about and why so many of us connect so much with them. In reading about Gretchen's reaction to these women, Jamie discovers why her friend was set out on such an unexpected path in her new book and that discovery leads her down the same path which, of course, leads her to the answers about what happened that last night.

I really enjoyed the hell out of this book, loved the characters and the Nancy Drew-ish nature of the plot. But man, did I madly love everything that was written about the ladies of country. I wish "Tammyland" was a real book so I could read it again and again. I'll have to satisfy myself with the comforts of rereading Miss Me When I'm Gone and also, of course, from hitting YouTube.

Here are Tammy & Dolly being wonderful, just as you would expect: