Devon Trevarrow Flaherty's Blog, page 51

Book a Day: Adventures in Prayer

[image error]I should have read this book a really long time ago. Someone whom I admire and love gave it to me with a meaningful inscription in the front, telling me how much it has meant to them. I was younger then, and perhaps a lot less mature. Maybe I wouldn’t even have been able to appreciate it the way I now do.

Catherine Marshall is not exactly a name you hear thrown around these days, even among Christians. When I mentioned it in company, only an older woman lit up with recognition (and affection), which was not surprising.  Marshall was a non-fiction, inspirational writer from mid-century up through the 1960s and 70s. Her most famous books were A Man Named Peter–one of several books about her husband, the pastor to the senate before his untimely death–and Christy, which was adapted to the screen in a popular 1990s series. Marshall wrote more than thirty books, altogether.

[image error]I can tell you, I have never been tempted to read Christy or watch the series, but now I wonder what I missed in my snobbery. Adventures in Prayer is just so simple and honest and straight-forward, and at the same time insightful and empathetic and empowering. I want to stay with Catherine Marshall, because she is so level-headed and wise, and she also wants me to come out on top. I can tell. I feel comforted and comfortable.

I grabbed Adventures in Prayer from the shelf because it was of the correct length for my Book-A-Day reading. While I read through the stack of books I had picked, we started a series at our church called “40 Days of Prayer.” Imagine that. The book, obviously, really fit into my life-at-the-moment. It acted as a supplement to the journaling, the sermons,  and the small groups. So I was ready for it, and for me the timing couldn’t have been better.

But more than that, this is an excellent book. If I were to receive a request for recommendations for books on prayer, I would happily recommend this book and God Guides by Mary Geegh. There are plenty of great books I haven’t read, on prayer, but these two I have found to be important and–in their way–enjoyable. Perhaps “joy-bringing” is a better word for it. And challenging. And honest.

The only thing this book isn’t is an introduction to prayer. It would be best-suited for a Christian already fairly grounded in their faith. But I could be wrong. Each chapter concentrates of a different type of prayer. Each chapter, then, is full of anecdotes and personal experience, and ends with a sample prayer (which I found to be spot-on to use word-for-word). The types of prayer covered are asking, dreaming, helplessness,  waiting, relinquishment, secret, blessing, and claiming. The subject matter is timeless, as are the truths, but there is a whiff of the old-fashioned about the book. Still, there are real gems to be found here.

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QUOTES:

“The characteristic position of childhood is that of simple asking” (p10).

“God uses our most stumbling, faltering faith-step as the open door to His doing for us ‘more than we ask or think'” (p13).

“…this hemming-in [is] one of God’s most loving devices for teaching us that He is real and gloriously adequate for our problems” (p18).

“…all of this goes on quite apart from man–little man who struts and fumes upon the earth” (p20).

“But when God’s other wing of adequacy is added to our helplessness, then the bird can soar triumphantly above and through problems that hitherto have defeated us” (p23).

“Hand your dream over to God then leave it in His keeping” (p41).

“Thus the Lord seems constantly to use waiting as a tool for bringing us the very best of His gifts” (p50).

“Waiting works. It is a joining of man and God to achieve an end, and the end is always a form of the Easter story” (p54).

“Gradually, I saw that a demanding spirit, with self-will as its rudder, blocks prayer” (p61).

“Resignation lies down in the dust of a godless universe and steels itself for the worst …. But I’ll also open my hands to accept willingly whatever a loving Father sends. Thus acceptance never slams the door on hope” (p63).

“I know now that my prayers were not prayers at all, but accusations” (p67).

“Look squarely at the possibility of what you fear most” (p69).

“Secrecy helps us get rid of hindrances to praying with our spirit” (p78).

“God asks that we worship Him with concentrated minds” (p78).

“But the point is that self-righteous prayers or accusing prayers do not change men from bad to good. Only joyous love redeems” (p93).

“For the purpose of all prayer is to find God’s will and to make that will our prayer” (p111).

“He Who will not let us down also will not let us off…” (p112).

Book a Day: Bridget Jones’ Diary

[image error]I don’t know what made me think that this was a Book a Day book. I mean, it’s got a normal amount of writing on every normal-sized page, and weighs in at 236 pages. This is not on par with all the other books I pulled.

Still, it was in the pile and I just blinding grabbed it and started reading.

Aaaand I managed to read it in less than two days.

This is exactly the type of book I was reading fifteen years ago, by which I mean I was reading whatever interesting-sounding and super-popular books popped up on the new releases table. So I did read it then, and the copy was still on my book shelf. The movie has become an annual favorite (which I watch, alone, every year, with maybe a glass of wine and definitely in my pajamas), so I was interested to see how the book (which I couldn’t recall very well) would stack up to the movie and also to the literary snobbishness that I possess on some days and not on others.

The story was so different from the movie! I mean, of course the girl gets the guy, but the road there is v. different. And really, all the characters, including to an extent Bridget, are also v. different.

Let’s talk about the story, then (which is loosely based on Pride and Prejudice.) Bridget is about 30 and is single. She lives in London and both her family and relationship lives are complicated. She can’t see to “land a man,” much to the chagrin of the “smug marrieds” around her, and she also can’t seem to stop smoking, drinking, and eating empty calories. So she gets a journal and makes some resolutions. What we get is a year of journaling, in the form of an epistolary novel. Bridget is cheeky, funny, witty, and well-loved, despite claims to the contrary. She is pretty horrible at keeping her resolutions, but keeps doggedly pursuing the next dead-end avenue to happiness which her friends and community proffer. We can all relate, even if we’re not single.

I did laugh out loud some. I did cheer for the heroine. I did get sick of the counting at the beginning of each entry. I did sorta want to get away from the epistolary form but also kept thinking that it was one of the only times I could think where epistolary form actually worked well. The issue with it was that certainly much of what was in the journal would only have ever been in Bridget’s head, or took too many words for the time allotted, or was written at a moment when you are sure she would not have had her journal poised on her knee. You just have to let it be, I suppose. Don’t overthink it.

There certainly was a lot that I couldn’t relate to or even condone. But Bridget’s charm has always been that she is very realistic, as are all her friends and family. Which makes Diary a comedy of the best type. You get LOL tears in your eyes, like “Yeeaaas!” but you do it through a character. Plenty of social commentary, although some of that is getting, dare I say it, outdated. At heart, though, Bridget suffers and triumphs where many modern people are sure to continue to. Diets, for example: “Have reached point where nutritional ideal is to eat nothing at all and that the only reason people eat is because they are so greedy they can not stop themselves from breaking out and ruining their diets.” Or marriage: “’All these years your father’s made such a fuss about doing the bills and taxes—as if that excused him from thirty years of washing up.’” Or motherhood: “Competitive Child-rearing.”

It’s a light read, meant for a vacation or the beach or just for that type of reader. It’s a sort of classic of popular fiction, and I did enjoy it. Not an amazing book, but fun and funny.

(There is a sequel, Bridget Jones: Edge of Reason, that I am reluctant to read because the movies go so far afield of our happy ending, I just don’t know if I can. We’ll see.)

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[image error]MOVIE

Like I said, I watch this movie every pre-Christmas holiday. It is, like its counterpart, a classic of popular cinema. It is similar in tone to the book, although, like I said, the story itself is pretty different, borrowing scenarios from the book more than actual story. Zellweger famously put on weight for her role, and everyone does a great job acting out the people who rotate around her. Full of classic scenes (which were not usually from the book). Grant plays a great rogue. Darcy a great, bumbling but accomplished nice guy. Etc. It’s a well-put-together romantic comedy of the blockbuster sort. And if you’re an Anglophile…

Easter egg alert: Both Hugh Grant and Colin Firth are mentioned in the book, which is awesome because they became the two actors who played the male counterparts to Renee Zellweger’s Bridget.

In the end, both the movie and book have something to offer, and they are different enough that you can enjoy both, each in their own way.

(There are two more movies, The Edge of Reason, and Bridget Jones’ Baby. I saw the first one and was so irritated that the same rogue kept popping up, I didn’t really enjoy it (although it was funny). There is no way I am ever going to see that third movie because he is back again, inserting himself into what should by now be a mostly-stable marriage. Bahr.)

Book Review: Harry Potter and the Cursed Child

[image error](Bit slow on the up-swing, I know. I read this book as quickly as I could get my hands on a decently-priced copy, but I missed it in reviews. Here it is.)

I am a Potter fan. I mean, who isn’t? It was a whiplash ride from passively observing the mania to, well, becoming manic, but here I am. Read the books repeatedly. Have been to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter twice. Movies play on our telly all autumn long. Titles painted on my “book spine” staircase. Etc.

I reviewed Rowling’s attempts at writing after Harry pretty harshly. (See HERE.) Then came the exciting news that she would be sort of returning to the world of Potter, just in the form of a play, which she partnered to do. So scared. I really thought that returning to Potter fantasy was her best bet, but now, would it deliver? And would people read a play? (Of course they would, but would they like it?)

This play was a nice surprise. I have never minded reading plays, as my love for Shakespeare can vouch for. And yet, in a play, it is hard to get the depth you would get in a full-length novel. In a way, The Cursed Child is less deep than Rowling’s novels, but I found it to be a fun and fulfilling way to work with an older Potter and keep the franchise turning. Rowling’s deft touch is here, in this play, as it was in the original series.

Taking place nineteen years after Harry defeated Voldemort in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (or, more accurately, beginning with the nineteen-years-later scene at the end of said book), Harry is married, middle-aged, father to three, and a working stiff. He has usual middle-aged problems, including relationship issues with his youngest son, Albus. The book is really about Albus, and how he must deal with being Harry Potter’s son and a conflicted teenager. Adventure and magic explode all over the place, and I have no idea how you actually take the larger-than-life scenes (and constant scene changes) and make that work on the stage. It takes a little time to warm up, but warm up it does.

I guess that would be the influence of Rowling’s less-mentioned partners, John Tiffany and Jack Thorne.

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If you are a Potter fan or if you just like reading plays, this is a fun read which does a great job at taking Potter into the grown-up world while still keeping a younger face central.

(I remain bummed that there is no way for Potter fans to actually see the play, either on video or on an extensive American tour.)

(I have already reviewed the later-released, beginning to the Fantastic Beasts series. See HERE. See review of the original Harry Potter series HERE.)

Book a Day: Anthem

[image error]When I was fresh from college and could read whatever the heck I wanted all the time, somehow I picked up a copy of Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged. The heft of it was a bit daunting, but I just about ate it up (around the same time I also devoured The Stand.) It was so entertaining. Then again, I hadn’t read much of anything that wasn’t philosophy or literary fiction in a while. (Yes, you could argue that Atlas Shrugged is indeed both, but at heart it is still a novel. Which leads me to…)

Anthem. Which is, as I understand it, like the more philosophy-heavy novella which would lead Rand down a road of gradually tucking her philosophy into a more reader-friendly package. Atlas Shrugged was her final draft, in a way, on her quest to put the pill into the peanut butter.

Anthem is interesting, and I enjoyed it as a novella. But is also a bit heavy-handed on the preaching, especially when you just wish you could spend more time with the characters, setting, and story. On another level, though, the preaching works since the novella is in epistolary form, and what we are hearing is not just a story, but the anthem of a man.

Not my favorite book, but definitely worth the read if you enjoy dystopic fiction. I got lost a bit when Rand started wandering into the weeds of objectivism, me, me, me, blah, blah, blah… But if you want a book to read in a day, to pass some time (or you just enjoy the shorter form), this is one that might do you. I enjoyed it.

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Book Review: The Giver

[image error]This book haunts me. It has taken me nearly two years to write the review (can it be?!?). It is one of the rare occasions when I am reviewing a book I do not own, so every time I see it in the book store I have this dilemma over buying a book I won’t read right away. It comes up in conversation because it is one of only two books I have ever “read” in the audio form. And it haunts me just because the story is, at heart, a haunting one.

This is how it went down: I was about to head home from upstate New York to North Carolina. For once, I was leaving my husband behind and driving with just two kids in tow: ages eight and eleven. My plan for fighting boredom and fatigue was stopping by a Cracker Barrel to rent some audio books, which can be returned to any Cracker Barrel, anywhere, and so could be returned in North Carolina. The choices were largely lousy; easy-to-digest crimes, mysteries, horror, and romance. Some self-help. But there were a few, shining titles which held potential. Then I had to narrow it down to books which would not scar the children should they start listening. I ended up with Holes and The Giver.

I now congratulate myself on those choices.

I don’t know what I expected with Lois Lowry’s The Giver, but my expectation had something to do with a rabbi. It was the cover, I think, that I had seen most. Maybe like Chaim Potok’s The Chosen? It’s dystopian science fiction! You probably already knew that, but I found it to be a head-jerking shocker.

And it really is one of the best science fiction novels ever written.

For kids? Sure, whatever. YA especially. But there is so much here for readers of all advanced ages to love. It’s just so clean, the writing masterful. The story is riveting. The weaving of the story keeps you on tenterhooks. The lessons are applicable and serve as dire warnings for future civilization. You just have to let this story unfold on its own. Be patient. It will reward.

I don’t know what more to say. There is a sense that the book has two distinct parts, and that the second is more of an addendum than the continued story. There is also the possibility that the ending is a bit goofy and could have been omitted. I’m torn on the ending, myself. If anything, the tone of the first part, second part, and ending all seem so different.

The characters are memorable, but I really think it is the story and the writing that steal the show. If you enjoy science fiction, you’ve probably already read it. I mean, it’s on the “summer reading” tables in bookstores every year. It has won various awards, including a Newbury Medal, and is consistently on best book lists. This is a book for everyone, and a book for the ages.

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QUOTES

Regrettably, since I “heard” this as an audiobook, I did not get to do any underlining. Drats.

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[image error]MOVIE REVIEW

There is a movie adaptation of The Giver that came out in 2014. I loved the book so much, we watched the movie shortly after. Alas, I do not remember the movie so very well. I think I enjoyed it to a point. There were parts of the story that I found too simplified, and some things were just not as I imagined them. As a movie, in and of itself, I would have found it lackluster. A fine movie to play for an English class which has just read the book, I suppose. But you could skip it.

Book a Day: Anne of Green Gables, a Graphic Novel

[image error]Another day, another book. Graphic novels take a remarkably short time to devour, which is why I don’t return to them very often. The pacing is not what I prefer. However, I do enjoy the occasional graphic novel, if only for reveling in its artistic expression.

I have read Anne of Green Gables (L. M. Montgomery) and the rest of the Anne series more times than I can say. In fact, I have read them more than any other books, hands down. I went grudgingly to the movies and the TV series, so what could I possibly gain from reading an Anne graphic novel? I didn’t know, when I started. But now I do.

This Mariah Marsden and Brenna Thummler graphic novel is a great contribution to the Anne world. It doesn’t do anything super-new with Anne or the story–thank goodness!–but the illustrations are lovely. They complement the story without destroying it. There were occasions when I thought, “The writer didn’t quite get that right,” but overall, I was more impressed with the authenticity than I thought I would be.

I actually got lumps in my throat and misty eyes, which is saying a lot when you’ve read a book as many times as I have.

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My one complaint? Anne’s nose and the characters’ eyes. Particularly since Anne very specifically is supposed to have a handsome nose, I don’t know why the main character has such a squashed, pink nose. It’s distracting. And all of their eyes are just vacant circles. It is the artist’s style, yes, but it doesn’t seem to match the fanciful and luxurious, flowing feel of the rest of the illustrations. For such a soulful book, why neglect the windows to the soul? So much could have been expressed here, graphically speaking.

Otherwise, beautifully and carefully rendered. Loved the style and loved the scenery and outfits, especially. Although Anne doesn’t get quite enough time (because of the limitations of the medium) to expand as a completely contoured character, I thought Matthew and Marilla were near-perfect. A great companion for an Anne fan, and a great starter for the middle grades.

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OTHER REVIEWS:

Anne of Green Gables, complete book series
Anne of Green Gables , the Megan Fellows movie
Anne with an E, TV series

Book a Day: Ghosts

[image error]As mentioned before, I grabbed a few graphic novels from the library to add to the Book-a-Days, but they are not necessarily the ones from the TBR. Then again, I was bound to eventually read this Raina Telgemeier as well as the other review you have coming, Anne of Green Gables: a Graphic Novel.

I have read all of Telgemeier’s other graphic novels, and I find that my reaction to this new one, Ghosts, falls right in line. When I realized that her new novel was about a child with a genetic disease framed by the Day of the Dead, I was not enthusiastic. The reason? Kids with chronic diseases or deformities is a thing in YA literature right now, and Dia de los Muertes seems to be a national entertainment obsession. The idea, though important, felt stale.

Not when I read it, though. Telgemeier made everything in this book–dealing with degenerative disease, Mexican holidays, family, first love, friendship, moving–feel fresh. In so few words, you feel close to these characters and you get wrapped up in their story.

The contrast between a child with a fatal illness and the presence of ghosts, though, can be a bit disconcerting. Using magic realism can be an effective way to peel back the layers and deal with reality, but its use has to be deft. I think that Telgemeier mostly accomplished something special here, with the more obvious sick-girl-meeting-ghosts versus reality-versus-fantasy. All in all that’s what I would call this book: special. Playful and poignant.

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Although I really enjoy Telgemeier’s handling of story and character, I still have the same complaint that her illustrations are, while clean, also simplistic. Especially when compared to the depth of her sketches, they feel a little too cartoony for the story and its intended audience. Meanwhile, middle grades and YA readers keep reaching for the Telgemeier, and she remains a force to be reckoned with in graphic novels.

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THE OTHER REVIEWS:

Smile
Sisters
The Babysitters Club
Drama

 

Book a Day: The Old Man and the Sea

[image error]I know I’m always claiming I started a book for high school reading but never finished it. Thanks to untreated ADHD and an uncanny ability to predict stories, this is largely true. But I must have read some of these books in order to ace AP English, right? Unknown. What I do know is that while I was fairly certain I had never finished The Old Man and the Sea, my gut-level memory is good enough that I am doubting that assertion.

Dread.

That’s what you feel when you read The Old Man and the Sea.

I am exaggerating, as well as channeling my less-nuanced, teenage self. Yes, the tension felt while reading this book mimics the near-breaking-point of the fishing line that holds the Old Man’s great fish. But there are other (often quite tight) emotions that float this masterpiece above most other books you will read in your life. There is patience. And love. And strength. And a compassionately etched portrait of humanity which is just so, so amazing.

And in the end, there is a type of victory and a type of hope, even though there is tragedy. (And don’t go saying I gave anything away. Any careful reader will know from the first sentences that this book is not a comedy.)

My favorite part of The Old Man and the Sea are two of the best, most honorable characters in all of English writing. It’s not that a tremendous amount is said about them. Hemingway’s writing is always close-cut and sparse. But we draw so close to them in the few scenes that are shared, and we find them heroic in a very modern and yet very primal way. Other favorites? The loving treatment of language itself. The beautiful scenery that pops up from that same language, describing everything from the mounting clouds over the sea to the shining, iridescent bodies of every fish the Old Man encounters.

Part of the dread I remember feeling while reading The Old Man and the Sea, I admit, came from having to return to the same scene, over and over. It is almost completely a one-act story, which takes place on a single boat with only one (arguably two) character(s). I am always surprised and amazed, though, when artists pull this off, and Hemingway does much more than pull this off. Can you imagine the pitch for this book? Old Man goes fishing, hooks a big fish, and spends majority of novel bringing it in. I can just imagine the endless line of editorial eye-rolls and sighs. Yet, at least as my adult self, I stayed glued to this story, which played out relatively fast in only 127 pages. It was harrowing! It was exciting, while also driving home the length of the adventure. We never would have seen the Old Man’s patience and strength, his humanity and manhood, without feeling a little of the monotony and blankness. But blankness isn’t really the word, because I was utterly wrapped in the sky and the sea and the skiff the whole time, feeling tired and cramped and thirsty.

I don’t know as I need to say any more. This is a wonderful book. You might not like it because you want something a little easier or flashier. Otherwise, this is a book I would put in a time capsule for our future selves, for sure.

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QUOTES:

“He was too simple to wonder when he had attained humility. But he knew he had attained it and he knew it was not disgraceful and it carries no loss of true pride” (p13).

“But I try not to borrow. First you borrow. Then you beg” (p18).

“‘I may not be as strong as I think,’ the old man said. ‘But I know many tricks and I have resolution'” (p23).

“‘Age is my alarm clock,’ the old man said. ‘Why do old men wake so early? Is it to have one longer day?'” (p24).

“The moon affects her as it does a woman, he thought” (p30).

“But I would rather be exact. Then when luck comes you are ready” (p32).

“”But I’ll do something. There are plenty of things I can do” (p45).

“No one should be alone in their old age, he thought” (p48).

“You shouldn’t be that tired after a windless night. What are birds coming to?” (p55).

“Let him think I am more man than I am and I will be so” (p64).

“I am glad we do not have to kill the stars” (p75).

“Nor was he really resting except comparatively” (p76).

“He took all his pain and what was left of his strength and his long gone pride and he put it against the fish’s agony” (p93).

“Sail on this course and take it when it comes” (p103).

“Now is no time to think of what you do not have. Think of what you can do with what there is” (p110).

“Luck is a thing that comes in many forms and who can recognize her?” (p117).

 

Book a Day: Animal Farm

[image error]I have been surprised just how many books I already owned have surprised me in the past several weeks. Yes, I meant that sentence to read that way, but now it strikes me as awkward. Ah, well.  Since I started Book a Day (which would be going much better if I didn’t keep misplacing the books I am currently reading–curse you ADHD), I have read a number of novellas which I pulled off the shelf one fanciful day in January. Nearly all of them were not what I imagined them to be when I become their owner (often by gifting) or what I foresaw through their innocent spine. Animal Farm was another surprise.

(Fun fact: out of all the random, short books I could have grabbed off my somewhat random shelves and out of all the orders I could have stacked those books in, I read Animal Farm at the same time my daughter was assigned to read it in seventh grade. Perhaps I’ll let her have her say here, later.)

Nearly everyone knows the gist of Animal Farm, right? George Orwell–author of Nineteen Eighty-Four–used childlike, pastoral, fairy tale to expose political realities. The book is bleak and alarmist, in the sense that Orwell (not to be confused with Orson Welles (whose real name was George and directed Citizen Cane and broadcasted War of the Worlds) or even H.G. Wells, who was also a political novelist and wrote The Time Machine, The Invisible Man, and–drumroll–War of the Worlds) is trying to warn people about something menacing, something devious while also exposing the truth behind an existing system. So why would my read have been surprising?

Surprise number one: It was engaging and fun to read. I expected a political satire to be dry. I didn’t expect a pastoral setting, memorable characters, and for everything from friendship to violence to crash up onto the screen of my imagination. It wasn’t as gripping as a John Grisham (I’ve never actually read one, but you know), but it was more entertaining than expected.

Surprise number two: It mostly just felt like a story, not political satire. While consciously meant as a critique of Stalin, the portrayal of human nature (which is made more clear by humans allegorically being animals) is universal. We can all learn that while a regime or even revolution may have inclusive and high-thinking goals, there are always going to be people who can exploit that for power, for monetary gain, for whatever. And that’s only the surface of the lesson, as there are many layers to peel on this onion, many facets to explore. (Please excuse the mixed metaphor.)

Surprise number three: It just dove right in there with the whimsy and magic realism. (Maybe this would be categorized as fantasy as opposed to magic realism, but the point is it has that feeling like, oh this is just an ordinary life that I recognize and–whoops!—there goes a pig plowing the field and calling rebellion meetings.) Even though the magic part of it eventually leads to more shocking scenes, and all the characters are despicable in their own way (some more than others), still I enjoyed the playfulness.

Surprise number four: The political satire was funny and though-provoking. For an adult. It is almost a pity that they assign this book so much to kids in junior high and even high school because it would take a very specific child to even half-appreciate this book for what it is. Then again, there aren’t too many adults reading assigned books, and if you missed it earlier the chances of picking it up are probably somewhat small. Then again, you would likely have underappreciated it as a teen, and would be predisposed to not read it later. It’s a lose-lose, and I think this book is most poignant to adults, especially from middle ages on. (In another sour twist of fate, Animal Farm could do the most good by educating the kids and teens, but I just think–like much of history–the broader scope is lost on most, if not all of, them until they have more experience. But maybe I’m just not giving teens enough credit. Perhaps it does make some impression on them through internal images of green flags and the windmill, somewhat how I remember the eye of Nineteen Eighty-Four.)

As the book progresses, it does get more obviously political and allegorical. Still, I was just dying to know what was going to happen to these animal characters, and kept on chuckling and gasping until I had finished the story out to its somewhat hackneyed end.

 

Book Review: Falling Cloudberries

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I apologize if you saw this review and clicked on it because you thought, Look at that beautiful cover, and “falling cloudberries?” Poetry? Literary fiction? That sounds super intriguing. Because this is not a novel, and since no one can read the cute-yet-obnoxious font that was chosen for the subtitle, you didn’t know that the full title is: Falling Cloudberries: A World of Family Recipes, by Tessa Kiros.

(Incidentally, the font choice may be the only thing I don’t like about this book. I’m with everyone who thinks the font looks great, but when you try to read the chapter headings to get your bearings (since you are moving around the world,) fuggehtaboutit. It’s illegible.)

I was predisposed to like this book. A friend brought it up in conversation months ago, telling me it was the cool cookbook in the Ireland of a certain time, and that many Irish families had a copy on their shelves. She thought I would like it. And perhaps she wanted to inspire me with more dessert recipes, as she cozied up on my couch week after week with fresh-out-of-the-oven cupcakes, tarts, and cookies. A couple months later, and she texts me to say she has a gift for me, so make sure I connect with her. I was intrigued. The next day, there she was, sashaying down the hall with a heavy parcel, wrapped aptly in an antiqued map of the world. I opened it and was delighted to find a copy of Falling Cloudberries, which is a beautiful book, decorated with vintage prints and colorful, laser-sharp photography, enjoying it before I had even cracked it open by feelings of both nostalgia and adventure.

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In some ways, this book is less a cookbook and more a travelogue. It took me almost until the end of the book to realize that the writing was probably pulled directly from the diaries that Kiros kept while growing up in several different cultures and countries (sometimes permanently, sometimes on regular trips). Without her life story, the collection of recipes makes no real sense, so we go along with her, drinking in the larger-than-life photography and the poetic strands of words. The book is divided into sections:

Finland
Greece
Cyprus
South Africa
Italy
World

I have to admit that I found her actual writing to be bordering on affectation, at times. I think, now, that this can be explained by having pulled the writing straight from journals. But I lamented those paragraphs, knowing that in time, Kiros could become a much better writer, and I wouldn’t feel like she was trying too hard and ending up with a slightly immature voice. If you can just let that go–the trying too hard–you can really get lost in the atmosphere of this cookbook and possibly even come to treasure it.

I loved flying with Kiros across seas, across time, to share her vivid, almost tangible memories. She paints all of them in bright and pleasant colors, and there’s no way to escape without marking nearly all her recipes with a star. I haven’t actually tried a recipe yet (I am making the berry cheesecake on Tuesday), although there is nothing super-fancy about them. The recipes are simple and straightforward and–as she points out–without wonderful ingredients, your attempt will fail. I also think it likely she cooks with that brimming scoop of love in every recipe, which you will need as well.

Not to downplay the recipes, for they are very well-chosen. You could own this one cookbook and be okay. You would have, all in one place, simple foods, impressive foods, foods with varying taste profiles, and sturdy recipes which can make up the bedrock of a gustatory life, which is exactly what these recipes have been for Kiros. Some of the ingredients may prove hard to get in the U.S., but I believe the majority of the recipes are accessible to the same sort of person who would pick up this book and take it along to the market, and could create the basis of a young person’s kitchen repertoire, especially for entertaining. It would make a fine wedding gift.

A Random Assortment of the Recipes:

pizza
red pepper soup
lemon vanilla jam
millefeuille with oranges
chicken soup with egg and lemon
hassleback potatoes
pork schnitzel
pastitsio
charlotta
chicken wings
biscotti
caramel ice cream

My affection for this book is not usual. What I mean is that I love-to-pieces my quantity-heavy books, and I also tend to eschew cookbooks with too many pictures. This book, though, is meant to be the most useful coffee table book that you own. It is both presentable and pragmatic, and the marriage is a bit magical. Love it. And I think you will too.