Doug Lewars's Blog, page 54

Gone to Pot

Gone to Pot by Jennifer Craig

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


*** Possible Spoilers ***

Gone to Pot isn’t a bad book but it’s up for an Evergreen Award and it certainly isn’t award material. The plot involves an elderly woman who finds herself out of work and can’t get a job due to her age; so, faced with imminent poverty she turns to starting a marijuana grow-op in her basement. The plot is a little thin and, as a result, the author had to pad the book a bit – in this case, with what amounts to a fairly comprehensive reference manual regarding the growing of pot. Since I’m not particularly interested in that particular subject, I found it rather boring in some places. I did learn, however, that there’s an awful lot of work in managing a grow-up so I suppose that if the author was attempting to dissuade readers from trying it she certainly succeeded in my case.

The principle character is an older woman, self-reliant, fiercely independent, innovative and frugal – all attributes I can relate to; however, I found the heavy-handed way in which the author promoted any number of politically-correct ‘causes’ to be tedious in the extreme. It was as if she started with a list and proceeded to check off each ideological point as she came to it. Every individual has biases which means that every author has them too and it’s fine to express values in a story but it’s important to either let the reader discover them for him or herself or to exaggerate them to such an extreme that the story become satire. In this case it was merely annoying.

There isn’t a villain per se in the novel; however, the daughter-in-law is painted as being extremely conservative, rather repressed and exceedingly focused on rules – not only laws but correct parenting, correct housekeeping and, in general, correct living. So when this individual discovers the protagonist’s secret she naturally reacts negatively; however, nothing comes of the clash. Threatened with the breakup of her marriage she chooses to keep the secret and eventually comes to forgive and forget. I found that rather unrealistic. Still this is a work of fiction so perhaps realism can, and should be set aside. Nevertheless, by the time I reached that stage in the story, I found myself cheering for the daughter-in-law because the protagonist had become so annoying.

Read this book if you want. It’s not bad. It’s not great. It has a happy – or perhaps maudlin ending. I’ve read far worse but I’ve also read an awful lot better.




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Two Years Eight Months and Twenty-Eight Nights

Two Years Eight Months and Twenty-Eight Nights by Salman Rushdie

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


*** Possible Spoilers ***

If you happen to be a writer, you've been told time and time again - don't tell, dramatize. This book tells, or, more accurately is narrative fiction. Think of a combination of John Irving and Terry Pratchett. The narration, however, is quite a bit slower and the satire more subtle. Still, it's all there.

The plot involves a war between the Jinn and humans - although some of those humans have jinn powers that they use to defeat the dark jinn. There are a number of love stories that come and grow. This book covers a LOT of time. In addition, it is written from a perspective a thousand years after the action occurs.

The author uses the bad guys to influence humanity and he likes to satirize various institutions by suggesting that they are under control of these entities.

Don't expect a fast read. The author crafts his story to be something like a dream. It proceeds slowly and carefully. In most modern novels the pacing is fast. Her it is slow - deliberately so. Although not poetic, Dylan Thomas might be a good reference.

The only problem I encountered was that the author covers so much ground I was unable to keep up with various aspects of the tale; nevertheless, I don't think I lost out on much and it was enjoyable. I highly recommend this novel.



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Little Fires Everywhere

Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


*** Possible spoilers ***

This is a great book. I’m surprised to be saying that because this book is on the short list for an Evergreen award. I’ve been working my way through that list and every other book I’ve encountered has been less than impressive. To be nominated a book needs to be politically correct in the extreme but Celeste Ng managed that without being heavy handed. True, the author doesn’t much care for upper-middle-class white suburbia, but she doesn’t use tropes. Her characters may not always act in a well-behaved manner but they have their reasons and those reasons have been well thought out by the author. This is true for every single character in the story. Even bit characters are thoughtfully drawn. There is one scene in which Mrs. Richardson wants a look at some very confidential medical records. She puts pressure on a schoolgirl companion but that woman, who now runs the clinic, suddenly finds a will of her own. We see the mental process she goes through as she comes to the conclusion that not only would it be illegal to divulge the information Mrs. Richardson seeks but it would be ethically wrong. Every character is well drawn. Every character has a backstory in which we see the roots of future actions. That’s quite impressive.

The plot is complex and moves from character to character as they go about their daily lives. One thing influences another. A small fire starts here. An ember moves there. A false name entered in desperation as a requirement for admittance to a clinic has an impact later on. There are plenty of misunderstandings and they, too contribute to the development of the story.
The pacing was excellent and even though the book is fairly long I didn’t grow tired, could read it for hours without taking a break, and was never bored.

I suspect that it was in the works for some time. Little Fires Everywhere was published in 2017 but it makes reference to the search engine AltaVista. This seems strange because most people would search through Google or one of the similar ones. In addition, AltaVista was shut down in 2013.

If you enjoy looking behind the scenes and understanding people’s motivations then I highly recommend this book.




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Sylvie and Bruno

Sylvie and Bruno by Lewis Carroll

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


*** Possible spoilers ***

This is one of Lewis Carroll's lesser known works - so lesser known that I hadn't even known it existed until I stumbled upon it quite by accident. It isn't as much fun as the Alice novels so that's why it's probably been pushed aside.

There are two plot lines - one in the real world and one on fairy. Actually the one in the real world seems rather like fantasy as well but, although I don't know the history, I suspect that Carrol is satirizing certain aspects of political life. In any event it reminded me of the feel of the early Harry Potter books when, in the summer, he's living with his aunt and uncle. Those characters are drawn in a cartoon fashion as are the characters in the early part of Sylvie and Bruno. Still there is a clear demarcation between real and fantasy.

As the book progresses however, the line begins to blur. I think Carroll did that quite deliberately because he wanted the reader to get a sense of the period between sleeping and waking just before a dream has evaporated and reality set in. It was effective too because there were times when I was unsure just which world we were in. He may have been exploring a type of mental illness where normal items take on a form of mysticism that causes certain individuals to become unclear as to what is and is not real. Whatever the case I found it fascination.

As I said, this isn't as much fun as the Alice stories but it is quite interesting and worth reading.



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The Dark and Other Love Stories

The Dark and Other Love Stories by Deborah Willis

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


*** Possible spoilers ***

This book was difficult to rate. Some of the stories I liked while others I didn't so I selected a 3 as the midpoint. The author's writing was crisp and her pacing good. In some cases she tried a bit too hard to emulate Franz Kafka. For example in one story a woman finds a hole in her living room floor. Eventually it grows so large that she and her husband have to be careful not to fall in as they gingerly navigate its perimeter. Presumably it was symbolic of a gulf in their marriage but I found their unwillingness to simply call a carpenter to be more annoying than thought provoking. However there were other stories that were quite well done so, while I don't consider this book to be great, I think it's worth the time spent reading it.



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Scarborough

Scarborough by Catherine Hernandez

My rating: 1 of 5 stars


*** Possible Spoilers ***

This novel is slightly misnamed. A better title might be ‘A Small Piece of a Very Large Municipality’. If I believed that these stories represented Scarborough in its entirety I would make a point of never going near the place; but, in fact, most of the individuals who live there are perfectly normal. If you have doubts, pull up Google maps and street view, select any small street at random and you'll likely see standard houses occupied by regular people. Yes, there are pockets of poverty but they aren't representative of the whole community.

I don’t believe that Ms. Hernandez has ever met a cliché she didn’t like. Admittedly, she somehow missed having a little brown-skinned girl standing outside Victory Park Subway Station in two feet of snow selling matches, but I think she got the rest. Even though the cast is huge, there are no characters in this story – just a large number of tropes that are used to score political points. And make no mistake, this is not a novel, it’s a political polemic. Personally, I don’t have a problem with that. It’s perfectly valid to address ideology through a novel – or, through a series of vignettes as is the case here; however, that doesn’t mean I have to like the book and I don’t. But then it was never written for any demographic into which I might fall.

At first I thought that the author merely hated white people; but as I progressed, it seemed she hated pretty much everyone. The children are placed on pedestals and the adults dragged through the sewers. Admittedly, in a couple of cases she portrays adults in a favorable light, but she generally finds some means of disparaging them before or after. Even Hina Hassani, who is given the kindest treatment in the entire book, is shown as being unwilling to go beyond the strict union definition of her job even at the expense of the children she professes to care about. Most of the children are portrayed as saints. Only one child received a negative treatment and that was Clara. She was white. Yawn.

This book is meant for trailing edge millennials, far left ideologues, or leading edge Gen Z – particularly those that are part of a university humanities program and all that implies. Others might find it suitably touchy-feely, but any careful consideration of the content will demonstrate the facile nature of the stories.

Scarborough is a candidate for the Evergreen awards. It was also on the long list for Canada Reads and, frankly, I don’t know how it failed to make the cut. It seems like the sort of book the CBC would drool over. If this represents the present state of Canadian literature then Canadian literature has certainly fallen on hard times. Of course it isn’t representative at all. It merely satisfies the bias of literary award committees and that’s sufficient for it to be nominated.

The only good thing I can say is that the author’s pacing is crisp and her wordsmithing is well done. However, I do not recommend wasting your time on politically correct drivel.




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The Last Neanderthal

The Last Neanderthal by Claire Cameron

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


*** Possible Spoilers ***

Four stars is a little high but they don't allow for 3.6 so 4 it will have to be.

This author is capable of telling an interesting story and that's probably the most important thing for an author to do. Actually, this book consists of two narratives woven together. There's one about an archeologist on a dig finding various bones and artifacts and there's a story set some thousands of years in the past about the owner of those bones and how she lived. The latter is by far the more interesting. The author attempts to draw parallels between them but I'm not so sure that worked. There's the Neanderthal woman trying to obtain meat while not becoming dinner for some other predator and there's the modern woman trying to navigate the politically charged field of scientific research. They both have their problems but I found the struggle not to be eaten by leopards was more compelling than the battle over academic credits. Nevertheless, I'm not attempting to survive in academia so maybe there is a case to be made.

During the course of the story, both women give birth. The author provides a particularly powerful description of the birth process but being male, I can't judge the veracity of it; nevertheless, I was impressed by the powerful feelings her description evoked. Mind you, I still don't think I'd care much for the experience at a personal level.

That said, the modern protagonist was not a likeable character. She was defensive and obsessed with her work. There's nothing wrong with a little obsession when it comes to work but if one is going to go that route, it's a really bad idea to have children. The reader gets the feeling that this character viewed childbirth rather like the flu. It's unpleasant while it lasts but once it's over you can forget all about it and get back to work. It doesn't work that way and her frustration built up to the point that she was just about to murder the baby when she was rescued by a colleague. Perhaps the author intended for us to feel sympathy for her situation and struggles. If so, it didn't happen. I find her merely annoying. If I had to rate the book purely on her story it would have received a one.

One thing that I found a little confusing was that the author suggests her Neanderthal characters had some small telepathic talents. They shared dreams. They sensed each other's presence not only by sight, sound and smell but they knew at an intuitive level when others were around. This was a work of fiction so there's nothing wrong with suggesting that. It's just that it didn't add anything to the story so why bother?

I can't say that this is a great story and the reason I read it was because it's on the list for the 2018 Evergreen awards and I wanted to work my way through that list in order to have a look at the state of Canadian literature as selected by librarians. That state appears to be rather sad but I've still got several books to go so things may pick up. This one was okay but I probably wouldn't have bothered with it had I just come across it at random.



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Glass Beads

Glass Beads by Dawn Dumont

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


*** Possible Spoilers ***

I was probably generous is giving this book a three. The first third warrants a one but after that it improves and some of the stories are really quite enjoyable.

This book consists of a series of themed short stories, each one dealing with one of four closely related characters. It covers a time span of about 15 years. I can't really tell but I think the author has done a pretty good job of characterizing these individuals and developing their characters as they grow and mature. That said, the bar is set pretty low to start with. In the first few sorties the characters are so unlikable that I'm surprised I was able to continue reading and not give up in disgust. Even when they are adults they are still less than impressive.

By the time we get to the end, one individual has become a lawyer and is proceeding nicely in her career while a second has gone into politics and has a six-figure salary. Now that's impressive by any means but the latter has a drinking problem and beats his significant other. The former is still utterly lacking in self confidence.

The author grew up in Okanese First Nation in southern Saskatchewan and if what she writes is reflective of aboriginal culture then count me out. The characters are unpleasant. Their lives are unpleasant. Pretty much everything about them is unpleasant. We are told that aboriginals are close to the land. I get the impression that these individuals never encountered a fish that didn't come out of a tin or cello wrap and, it is possible, that cooking anything more than take-out is beyond them.

This particular book is a nominee for the Evergreen Award, part of the Forest of Reading program from the Toronto Public Library. From the press release, "The Ever green Award reading program is comprised of the best titles in Canadian fiction and non-fiction for adults of any age". My God! This is it? This is the best Canada can do?! It appears that writing has fallen on hard times in Canada. Of course this is a carefully selected collection of Canadian books by - again from the press release - "A committee of library professionals". Now I've always been a big fan of librarians and I'm certain that there are plenty of rational individuals among them; however, by the time you get to selection committees it appears that rationality has been replaced by a desire to conform to current societal catch phrases - you know - inclusiveness, diversity, self-empowerment (provided that doesn't lead to individuality but conforms to the first two). Most of the names of committee members were sufficiently generic so that positive identification was impossible but the one I was able to track down was a millennial and that possibly explains some guiding principles behind the selection. In any event, it's pretty clear that this book is targeted at rather young demographic and is probably a waste of time for older folk.




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Solitude: In pursuit of a Singlular Life in a Crowded World

Solitude: In Pursuit of a Singular Life in a Crowded World by Michael Harris

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


*** Possible Spoilers ***

I think this book might be better suited to a younger audience. For me, the author was pretty much preaching to the converted. The principle thesis is that a world exists outside of the internet where the latter includes digital technology in general. He suggests that people need to periodically get away from their phones, their computers and all the noise and bustle of daily life and spend some time alone. Since I spend probably 80% or more of my time alone, his words of wisdom fell just a little flat. I think he has done his research correctly and I agree that there is something to be said for solitude but one thing he missed was relating it back to extroversion and introversion - something I think would probably affect his argument. Not only did he fail to do that, but he neglected to perform any research as to the breakdown in degree of self-containment by age and demographic. He noted accurately and early that individuals who have grown up surrounded by digital technology are heavily reliant on it and he cites himself as an example; however, I suspect that older people - those who have not been exposed to it throughout their entire lives - are not nearly as dependent as those who are younger. For example, when I was growing up, we didn't even acquire a television set until I reached the age of 11. As a result, I was forced to read or make up stories for myself - something that has served me well over the course of the years.

The book was well-written and there's nothing specific I can complain about but for me, it just sort of seemed self-evident.



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Who Wants to be the Prince of Darkness

Who Wants to be The Prince of Darkness? by Michael Boatman

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


*** Possible spoilers ***

Although the writing might have benefited from a bit more editing in some places, overall it was a good, fast-paced adventure that keeps things interesting right to the end. The characters were a little flat but since the pacing was pretty well done I think readers can live with characters who might be just a little bit two dimensional. I quite enjoyed the world-building.

One problem is that the title suggests that this book will be a satire on reality television. To some extent that's true but satire seems secondary to the story and added mostly as a hook to get things going. Overall, however, if you're looking for a fairly well-written book to while away a few summer hours then I think I can recommend this one.



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