What are You Reading / Reviews - April 2017

[Book Concierge]

.
Read any good books lately? We want to know about them.

Enter your reading list and/or reviews here. Did you like it? Hate it? Feel lukewarm? Share your thoughts with us.

Happy reading!

.

[Beverly]

Yellow Star by Jennifer Roy
3 stars

A quick read that satisfied a reading challenge. This is the true story of the Polish city of Lodz, particularly one family whose young daughter, Syvia, was one of only 12 children to escape from the ghetto at the end of the war. I liked the straight forward, first person narrative of this book. It was told in free verse from the view point of Syvia and although there were certainly some things that a child should never have to talk about, there was a certain innocence in the way the story was presented. The author is actually the neice of Syvia (her name is now Sylvia Perlmutter) and both she and her aunt felt that the time was right to finally tell her story.

[Book Concierge]

A Night to Remember – Walter Lord – 5*****
This is a first-hand account of what the people aboard the Titanic recall of the night she sank. It’s a gripping story, and Lord does a great job of bringing all these people to life. I get a real sense of the confusion and disbelief when the ship first strikes the iceberg. And later, of the chaos and panic when it is clear she will go down.
LINK to my review

[James]

Alfred de Vigny, Cinq-Mars: une conjuration sous Louis XIII [1826] 516 pages [in French]

The first historical novel, and one of the first Romantic novels, in French literature, obviously imitating the style of Sir Walther Scott, this is the story of the (actual) conspiracy of the Marquis de Cinq-Mars against Cardinal Richelieu. Like the other earlier Romantics (other than Stendhal) such as Novalis and Lamartine, de Vigny is a Royalist who idealizes the feudalism of the Middle Ages, and thus sees the conspiracies of the suppressed feudal nobles as a good thing, and the centralizing tendencies of Richelieu as totally wrong and evil, as leading to the undermining of the monarchy itself and eventually the French Revolution. Which they did, and of course that was progressive, despite the many admittedly evil things that Richelieu did -- like any politician of the time. De Vigny's version of the politics of the period influenced the less serious but much more popular novels of Alexandre Dumas, such as Les trois mousquetaires and its sequels (although in his last, unfinished novel, Le Sphinx rouge, Dumas reverses this and treats Richelieu as the hero and the Queen and the duc d'Orleans as the villains, probably a more historically accurate version.) De Vigny changes some of the facts and of course makes a love story the basic motivation for the conspiracy; but the novel is well-written and more worth reading than Novalis or Lamartine.

The version I read, the eleventh edition printed in 1855 (during de Vigny's lifetime) contains his "Reflexions sur la verite de l'art" as a preface and his reception discourse when he was elected to the Academie as an appendix; it also has his notes to the book. There is no preface or introduction or other material by anyone else.

[Book Concierge]

44 Scotland Street – Alexander McCall Smith – 3.5***
I love this kind of ensemble piece. Not much happens, and everything happens: love found, lost and found again, awkward encounters, a hidden masterpiece, a new job and therapy sessions. I want to know more about them, especially Pat and Matthew
LINK to my review

[Terris]

Lilac Girls by Martha Hall Kelly, 4****s
I really enjoyed this book!
It is the story, set during WWII, of three different women: one American, one Polish, one German. The German woman is a doctor who does medical experiments on the Polish women at Ravensbrück, the Polish woman in our story being one of them. It is a very interesting story, well written, and although it's almost 500 pages, it moves right along.

I personally liked this better than The Nightingale and All the Light We Cannot See. Also, it's based on a true story with several of the characters being real people using their real names. That Carolyn Ferriday (the American character in the book) was certainly an amazing person! It is interesting to read on-line of all the philanthropic things she did in her life. You can also take tours of her home in Bethlehem, Connecticut. It is mentioned quite a bit in the story.
I would highly recommend this book to all! :)

[Beverly]

Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell
5 stars

In my opinion, an extraordinary book. I loved this tale of 2 high school students neither of whom quite fit in but find that they fit together just fine. Their backgrounds are totally different but they discover they like the same type of comics and music and the longer they remain friends, the stronger their bond becomes. Eleanor is a big red-head who wears the strangest clothes. She lives with her mother, stepfather and 3 siblings. All the kids sleep in the same room and try to stay our of their "dad's" way. Park is Asian and he lives with his parents and brother in a fairly typical home. They are only 16 and trying to form a lasting relationship--which neither of them thought would ever come about--but it's a difficult age for a life commitment especially with the interference that comes from other people in their environment. I really felt this was an amazing insightful story of a young couple in love. It all just rang so true to me and I encouraged my teen-aged granddaughters to read it.

[Terris]

Beverly wrote: "
Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell
5 stars

In my opinion, an extraordinary book. I loved this tale of 2 high school students neither of whom quite fit in but find..."

I liked this one too! I've liked all of Rainbow Rowell's so far :)

[Beverly]

Terris wrote: "Beverly wrote: "
Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell
5 stars

In my opinion, an extraordinary book. I loved this tale of 2 high school students neither of whom quite..."

And I really also enjoyed Lilac Girls--we just have such similar tastes!! :)

[Terris]

We sure do! ;)

[Melissa]

An Author's Odyssey
The Land of Stories #5
by Chris Colfer
4 ★

In the highly anticipated continuation of the Land of Stories series, Conner learns that the only place to fight the Masked Man's literary army is inside his own short stories!

When the twins and their friends enter worlds crafted from Conner's imagination, finding allies no one else could have ever dreamed of, the race begins to put an end to the Masked Man's reign of terror. Can the twins finally restore peace in the fairy tale world?

My Thoughts
Although this was an enjoyable read, I think it took a step away from the main story line from the previous books. There is a reason for Conner and Alex to travel into his stories, but I missed the fairy-tale world and characters. It felt like everything came to a standstill on the fairy-tale world. I did like that the twins mother was involved more in this book. She has been a back character for far too long. The characters in Conner's stories are amazing. The adventures are also pretty cool. They were stories that I would enjoy reading about in a novel. The book ends with a cliffhanger, so I'm looking forward to the next book.

[Book Concierge]

Gutenberg’s Apprentice – Alix Christie – 3.5***
In her debut novel, Christie explores one of the most momentous events in history: the invention of the printing press. I did find the information about the conflicts between the guilds, the ruling class, and the Church interesting, but it went on for so long that I grew tired of the political and personal intrigue. Still, in this age of digital print, it is all the more wonderful to imagine the creativity, skill and hard work that went into this marvelous invention.
LINK to my review

[Book Concierge]

Terris wrote: "Lilac Girls by Martha Hall Kelly, 4****s
I really enjoyed this book!
It is the story, set during WWII, of three different women: one American, one P..."

I have this on my "priority" TBR list ... must get to it.

[James]

Alfred de Vigny, Chatterton: drame [1835] 100 pages [in French]

De Vigny's best known play, this is based very loosely on the life of the minor English poet Thomas Chatterton, who committed suicide in 1770 at the age of seventeen. The thesis of the play is that (Romantic) poets are of great importance to the world and should be subsidized because their poetic talent makes it impossible for them to make a living at any other occupation. He also confuses the issue by combining it with a love story. The play was controversial at the time because of its apparent defense of suicide. While too declamatory for modern tastes, it is much more restrained than his contemporaries such as Victor Hugo and Alexandre Dumas, and concentrates on the psychology of the characters rather than on melodramatic events and spectacular effects. His satire of the industrialist husband is somewhat humorous, although vitiated by a few anti-Semitic lines (oddly, since Vigny's circle of friends at that time were mostly Jewish; but they were Christian converts, so perhaps he is only intending the religion and not the ethnic group.) The situation is not really self-consistent or convincing, but after all it is Romanticism and not Realism. This was the work that represented Vigny in the survey course I took in college, so it is a re-read after about 45 years. The edition I read was in the Classiques Larousse series, so it had all the notes and so forth that one expects from that series.


Alfred de Vigny, Les destinées [1837-1863, publ. posth. 1864] 161 pages [in French]

Written over a period of a quarter of a century, de Vigny's final collection of poetry was published the year after his death, but probably in the order he intended. It is primarily concerned with poetry and metaphysics, with some political satire thrown in. Considered just as poetry, it is far better than Lamartine, if not quite up to the level of the best of Victor Hugo. In regards to the content, I wasn't too impressed. The political satire of the bourgeois politicians was accurate if from the wrong direction (de Vigny went beyond Royalism and even Legitimism, preferring the long dead feudal monarchy of the Middle Ages) -- it reminds me of a conservative Republican (or in view of its unreality, a Libertarian) satirizing the corruption of a Hillary Clinton, you have to agree with what he says but not with where he's coming from. The metaphysical poems, especially "Le Mont des Oliviers", made it clear that he was the kind of agnostic that Christians love -- the kind that takes religion seriously, despairs that he can't believe, and converts on his deathbed. The attitudes toward colonialism and women are as backwards as one could imagine. The poetry about poetry is better, but entirely Romantic. (In case you haven't guessed, I have a prejudice against Romanticism.) Now on to Balzac . . .

[Terris]

Book Concierge wrote: "Terris wrote: "Lilac Girls by Martha Hall Kelly, 4****s
I really enjoyed this book!
It is the story, set during WWII, of three different women: one ..."
I think you'll like it!

[Leah]

Elevating Child Care: A Guide to Respectful Parenting by Janet Lansbury
151 pages

★★

I tend to have issues with self-help books, mostly because I have rarely found one that speaks to me (the one exception being Empty Cradle, Broken Heart: Surviving the Death of Your Baby). Sure, there’s sections that may grab you but finding a whole self-help book that is you is rough. And I think it’s that much more difficult with parenting help. I think most parents feel they can or want to do better but I also think there’s a deep-seeded need as a parent to say, “Don’t tell me how to parent MY child!” because hey, it’s my child. But this one was recommended to me when I mention my struggle with my stubborn toddler and gave it a try.

Ok, so I like the concept of this one. As from the book cover – “Janet’s insightful philosophy lays the foundation for a closer, more fulfilling parent/child relationship, and children who grow up to be authentic, confident, successful adults.” Cool! But let’s admit it, if you have a kid or two or more, what works for one child certainly doesn’t work for the next. So any book stating that’s how it has to be done..well…no. It’s easy to write and say “be patient, be respectful, don’t yell” but perhaps not as always easy to push through. This is a popular book with good rating but it just didn’t speak to me in too many chapters. Also, this is nothing more than a collection of posts from the author’s website and it feels like it. As with many self-help books, it’s repetitive to the point of annoyance. And a good chunk is just quotes from the founder of this certain parenting movement, Magda Gerber. If you are interested in this movement, cool, but just go to the source – Magda Gerber, just as easy and probably written better. I got a few good pieces of advice, saving it from the dreaded one star rating.

[Book Concierge]

The Penelopiad – Margaret Atwood – 3***
Atwood takes the story of the faithful Penelope, waiting 20 years for Odysseus to return from the Trojan War, and reimagines it. I liked this intelligent, savvy woman.
LINK to my review

[James]

Honoré de Balzac, L’avant-propos de la Comédie humaine [1842] 24 pages [in French, Kindle]

This is the general introduction to Balzac’s Comédie humaine, a group of about 75 interconnected novels and novellas, and it is also a sort of manifesto of the Realist movement in literature which arose in reaction to Romanticism. Balzac begins by comparing the evolution of animal species, as proposed by Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire, and the evolution of human societies, and explains that his intention is to describe the “species” or conditions of people in modern society. Thus, unlike the Romantics who wrote about extraordinary individuals in extraordinary situations, he proposes to write about typical individuals in their usual social roles. He then defends his realist program against those critics who insisted that literature should describe “moral” characters and situations rather than the way people and society actually are. He also honestly admits his own standpoint as a Catholic and monarchist.

I have never particularly liked Romanticism, and having just finished reading some representative writings of Lamartine and de Vigny, it is with a certain feeling of relief that I am beginning to read Balzac. My intention is to read the whole of the first division of the Comédie humaine, the “Scenes de la vie privée”, and a few of the more important works of the other divisions; this may change if I decide that it is too much and abridge it, or really get into it and decide to read more. I have read a few books of Balzac back when I was in college and may or may not re-read those in their proper order; I am also going to start with Le Père Goriot out of order because it is this month’s read for the Constant Reader group on Goodreads. Then I will go back to the beginning and start reading them in the order Balzac intended (which is not the order they were written in; actually he modified them all in different editions to unify the whole collection). Since this is only one among many reading projects, I expect it will be a couple years before I get through what I want to read. I will post my reviews as I go along.

[Book Concierge]

Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell – Susanna Clarke – 3.5***
Fantasy is really not my thing, but I did enjoy this book. I liked the play / counter play between the two magicians, and particularly enjoyed the scenes where they are influencing the Napoleonic Wars. That being said, however, this was just way too long. I found my mind wandering as much as the plot did. I certainly understand the popularity of the novel, but I wouldn't go out of my way to read another novel by Clarke.
LINK to my review

[Terris]

The Best of Adam Sharp by Graeme Simsion, 3***s
I gave it 3 stars meaning it was just OK.
I had read the two Rosie books and they were so entertaining. This was really very serious.
It was about a couple who had been together for a short time in their early twenties, but because of his job and her already being married, they went their separate ways.
Then 22 years later they get a chance to be together again and decide if they would like to rekindle the relationship.
There is a lot a music information and referencing, which I liked quite a bit. But it just wasn't what I was expecting, and I was a little bored. Lots of sad relationship stuff with his current wife and her current husband. Sorry, but it was kind of a downer :(

[Book Concierge]

Wolf by Wolf – Ryan Graudin – 2.5**
This is interesting speculative fiction dealing with “what might have been” had Germany & Japan won WW2. The plot moves as quickly as the racers bound from Germania to Tokyo. Yael is a strong heroine – resourceful, intelligent, physically and mentally fit for the challenge. I thought there were several holes in this plot, and I think I would have enjoyed this kind of speculative plot without the “skin shifting” aspect. While I recognize the appeal for the target audience, it really wasn’t the book for me.
LINK to my review

[Terris]

The Man Who Fell to Earth by Walter Tevis, 4****s
Written in 1963, this is a "futuristic" story set in the 1980's of an alien who comes to Earth to try to save his the people of his own planet and Earth's people too. Of course, it doesn't turn out exactly as he expects. I liked how it was written, how the author tried to write it as set in the future, but you could tell he was still in a 1960's mindset. It is short and an interesting read. I first read it in 1978 and still enjoyed it in "the future" of 2017!!

[Beverly]

Crooked Heart by Lissa Evans
3 stars

This was just an ok read (or listen) for me. The audio was performed by Karen Cass and I didn't have any problems with her performance, I just had a difficult time getting into the story until right at the end. Ten year old Noel has been living with his godmother Mattie in London. When he's sent away during the blitz, he ends up living with Vera Sedge, a middle aged woman who is trying to make ends meet. She decides that she and Noel can make some money running some scams. Although this is somewhat successful, their behavior puts them in contact with some characters who are less than desirable. Noel may not be any safer with Vera than he was in London.

[Book Concierge]

The Coincidence of Coconut Cake – Amy E Reichert – 4****
What a deliciously delightful foodie romance! I liked the characters, and was invested in their story from beginning to end. The food descriptions made me hungry, and I loved the way Reichert described the joys of Milwaukee (my home town).
LINK to my review

[Melissa]

Killer Chef by James Patterson
3 ★

Eat, drink, and be murdered.

Someone is poisoning diners in New Orleans' best restaurants. Now it's up to chef and homicide cop Caleb Rooney to catch a killer--who has an appetite for revenge.

My Thoughts
Nice quick read with good characters. I hadn't planned on reading any of James Patterson's Bookshots, but this one caught my eye and I'm glad I did. The mystery was there along with some romance, although I think it could have done without the romance. It really didn't add much to the story. I was surprised by the conclusion. I thought that with it being a short book that the villain would be obvious. I look forward to read more of these Bookshots.

[Book Concierge]

West With the Night – Beryl Markham – 5*****
Markham was an independent woman who lived life to the fullest, and on her own terms. While there has been significant controversy over whether she actually wrote this memoir (vs her third husband ghost-writing it for her), I still highly recommend it! Full of vivid imagery and really gives a sense of what life was like for the colonialists in Kenya in the early part of the 20th century.
LINK to my review

[Beverly]

Fire in the Water by James Alexander Thom
4 stars

This is a great novel of historic fiction. I really enjoy Mr. Thom's writing anyway...he's from Indiana and this was a great addition to my list of reads by him. Basically this is the story of Paddy Quinn who is a war correspondent. He has decided that covering the death and funeral of Abraham Lincoln will be his last assignment. He has a new wife and they are going to travel on the steamboat Sultana up the Mississippi River to Illinois to meet the funeral train which is traveling across the eastern United States carrying the deceased president so that as many people as possible will be able to get a last look. When the steamboat stops in Vicksburg, they pick up 2,000 survivors from the notorious Andersonville prison camp. The boat is overcrowded and they've already had to patch one of the boilers. Quinn is treated like royalty on the boat which eventually leads his new wife to realize that he may have a problem with consuming too much alcohol. He spends his time drinking with and interviewing the Andersonville survivors to help beef up his final story. He becomes exceptionally close to one, Robb Macombie, who seems to barely be alive. Robb's goal was to return home and be buried among his long gone relatives but once he meets Paddy he decides he wants to see the president's body lying in state before he returns home for his own death. That's the plan...but will the explosion of the steamboat's boilers put a hitch in their plans? They are both blown into the river and struggle to live out the night. You'll have to read the book to see what happens!!

[Terris]

See You at Harry's by Jo Knowles, 4****s
I read this for a group read for "The Top 100 Children's Books on Goodreads." It is written for Grade 7 - Up. It is a family story of what looks to me like a fairly typical family. These could be any of us living our everyday lives. So there is "happy" in the book, but "sad" also comes in and hits pretty hard. I don't want to give away any spoilers, but this book tackles some pretty heavy topics. However, as it is narrated by a seventh grade girl, it is told in a very real way. It is well written and easy to read. I would highly recommend it for middle school and early high school, but even as an adult, I liked it a lot. It made me laugh, but I also cried. I think you will too :)

[Melissa]

Fates and Traitors by Jennifer Chiaverini
5 ★

The New York Times bestselling author of Mrs. Lincoln’s Dressmaker returns with a riveting work of historical fiction following the notorious John Wilkes Booth and the four women who kept his perilous confidence.
John Wilkes Booth, the mercurial son of an acclaimed British stage actor and a Covent Garden flower girl, committed one of the most notorious acts in American history—the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln.
The subject of more than a century of scholarship, speculation, and even obsession, Booth is often portrayed as a shadowy figure, a violent loner whose single murderous act made him the most hated man in America. Lost to history until now is the story of the four women whom he loved and who loved him in return: Mary Ann, the steadfast matriarch of the Booth family; Asia, his loyal sister and confidante; Lucy Lambert Hale, the senator’s daughter who adored Booth yet tragically misunderstood the intensity of his wrath; and Mary Surratt, the Confederate widow entrusted with the secrets of his vengeful plot.
Fates and Traitors brings to life pivotal actors—some willing, others unwitting—who made an indelible mark on the history of our nation. Chiaverini portrays not just a soul in turmoil but a country at the precipice of immense change.

My Thoughts
I'm not usually a fan of historical fiction, but I really enjoyed this book. I found myself searching the internet many times to learn more about the events, but the author did a really good job with her research. Not many people know much about John Wilkes Booth and his life leading up to Lincoln's assassination. We learn a lot about the people in his life and his love for Lucy. Although the dialogue is mostly fiction, I found it very relevant to the situations. The whole book was intriguing and kept my interest more than most historical fiction I have previously read.

[James]

Lorna Goodison, From Harvey River: A Memoir of My Mother and Her Island [2007] 306 pages [Kindle]

The current read for the World Literature Group on Goodreads, Lorna Goodison represents the "middle generation" between Claude McKay (whom she read in school as a "classic") and the more recent Jamaican writers we have been reading for the group (such as Kei Miller and Margaret Cezair-Thompson); she is a poet and story writer who now teaches in Ann-Arbor (unless she has retired or died in the last ten years). To make a more personal connection, she was born about midway between my parents and myself, and her mother was almost exactly contemporary with my maternal grandmother. I read one of her poetry collections earlier, and will be reading a collection of her short stories next. The subtitle is somewhat misleading, as the book deals with her entire family, and is almost more about her grandmother Margaret and her many aunts and uncles than about her own parents (her mother was one of eight children, and the author has eight siblings of her own). This is a Jamaica which is poor but less violent than the Jamaica of Cezair-Thompson and Marlon James, perhaps because much of the book takes place in Harvey River, a rural area where the Harveys (her mother's family) are the original founders, although the later chapters move to Kingston; perhaps because she moved to the continent (New York, Michigan and Toronto) about a decade before the violent period described by those authors. As with her poetry, it is less political and more personal than the other Jamaican writers I have read. The book is largely about people, and she brings them to life, not only the family members but even those neighbors and others who only feature in one or two paragraphs; the style is more like fiction than I expected in a memoir (and she admits to have adjusted some details, especially of chronology, for the sake of the narrative.)

[Book Concierge]

Baking Cakes in Kigali – Gaile Parkin – 4****
This is a delightful debut novel. I love Angel – she’s wise, discreet, confident, compassionate, decisive and a great friend and mentor. There are several humorous episodes and several touchingly sad ones, but Angel deals with any situation with aplomb and compassion. Parkin peoples the novel with a wide array of characters who form a community and celebrate together with one of Angel’s excellent cakes.
LINK to my review

[Book Concierge]

The World’s Strongest Librarian – Josh Hanagarne – 4****
I really enjoyed this memoir of one man’s struggles to come to grips with his Tourette’s, and to find balance in his life, his work, his family and his faith. I loved all the literary references!
LINK to my review

[Terris]

The Jungle by Upton Sinclair, 4****s
I really am glad that I finally got to this book that has been on my list for years. It was really eye-opening about the meat packing industry and the Chicago "machine" that was in charge of everything in Chicago in the early 1900's. The poor people and immigrants that lived and worked there during that era were under the thumbs of the people in charge, and there was no way for them to get ahead -- almost no way for them to stay alive! The back of my book says "Published in 1906, The Jungle aroused the indignation of the public and forced a government investigation which led to the passage of the pure food laws." So, thank goodness, we may thank this book and author for helping to regulate the purity of the food we eat today, because you sure wouldn't have wanted to eat anything that came out of those places back then!
Not a happy story, but very educational, and surprisingly, it was hard for me to put it down!

[Terris]

Book Concierge wrote: "

The World’s Strongest Librarian
– Josh Hanagarne – 4****
I really enjoyed this memoir of one man’s struggles to come to grips with his Tou..."

I enjoyed this one also!

[Terris]

The Lilies of the Field by William E. Barrett, 4****s
Just a short, simple book about a man who stops to help some German nuns, in the American southwest (maybe in the 1950's or 60's?) and stays to build a chapel for them. They feel that God has sent him to do this. He disagrees. He says he's not here to stay, he's a Baptist, and he has no idea how to do this by himself and has no materials -- yet he does it! He just keeps feeling compelled to stay and do a little more, he enjoys getting to know the nuns and helping them learn English. He becomes a legend, after he leaves, as the man who Mother Maria Marthe has prayed for to build their church. It is a very inspirational story. I enjoyed it a lot! Sidney Poitier plays the main character in the 1963 movie. I can see that he would do a very good job portraying this man.

[James]

Honoré de Balzac, Le Père Goriot [1835] 479 pages

Enfin Balzac . . . One of Balzac's best known novels, Le Père Goriot, set in 1819 (though originally intended to be set in 1824, which causes some anachronisms in the text) is considered the keystone of the "Scenes de la vie privée", the first and largest division of the Comédie humaine.

Considered in itself, this is the novel of Père Goriot, a nineteenth century version of King Lear, who impoverishes himself for the sake of his two ungrateful daughters and their husbands, who despise him once he has deprived himself of his fortune for their benefit. It is a Lear without a Cordelia, unless we can consider Victorine as the Cordelia to her father, who has disinherited her -- granted she defends his actions, but she never has the opportunity to serve him like Shakespeare's heroine. The novel throughout is a somewhat bitter satire of the social structure and mores of the higher stratum under the Restoration monarchy -- like de Vigny, Balzac is a royalist who by implication idealizes a much earlier period of the monarchy, although he is rather cynical about human nature in general (hence the overall title of the human comedy).

Considered from the point of view of the cycle as a whole, however, it is much more the novel of the young Rastignac, detailing the corruption step-by-step of a figure who is apparently important in many of the later novels. Many characters are returned from earlier novels, or were added to the earlier novels after this was written, and many reappear in later books. (Admittedly, I haven't read many of these yet, and the ones I have read were decades ago, so I'm going by the notes in the Classiques Garnier edition.)

The style is obviously more realistic than the Romantics, and has much less "purple prose" than Lamartine or de Vigny, although there is a certain holdover of Romanticism in the way the author orients the reader about how to judge the characters and events -- we are still closer to Stendhal than to Flaubert. The reading is somewhat difficult because of the amount of slang he uses, much of it already outdated at the time it was written, but most of it is explained in the notes to the edition I read. I read this for the Constant Reader classics discussion, and it is definitely one of the classics of French literature.

[James]

Lorna Goodison, By Love Possessed: Stories [2011] 275 pages [Kindle]

This is a collection of mostly previously published stories by the author of Supplying Salt and Light and From Harvey River. The tone is similar; the stories are focused on characters in their personal relationships with husbands, wives, lovers, parents and other relatives, without emphasizing larger social issues, although they are present in the background. Goodison somewhat reminds me of Alice Munro in her choice of subjects, although the treatment is different. Some of the stories have a tragic outcome, while others are rather upbeat or even humorous. It was an enjoyable read but probably not a book I will remember as much as the books by Miller, Cezaire-Thompson, and James that we are reading in the same group.

[Book Concierge]

My Name is Lucy Barton – Elizabeth Strout – 5*****
I love character-driven novels such as this one. Strout writes beautifully, with prose that reveals her characters to the reader with nuance and grace. Lucy’s recollections and probing questions lead her mother to reveal some of the “why” behind how Lucy came to be the woman she is.
LINK to my review

[Book Concierge]

Terris wrote: "The Lilies of the Field by William E. Barrett, 4****s
Just a short, simple book about a man who stops to help some German nuns, in the Ameri..."

I remember when Poitier won the Oscar for his portrayal. I've always wanted to read this and never gotten around to it. I'm going to add it to my tbr right now!

[Terris]

Hag-Seed by Margaret Atwood, 4****s
I really enjoyed this! It is the re-telling of Shakespeare's "The Tempest" by Margaret Atwood for the Hogarth Shakespeare project.

It is the story of Felix, the director for a local theater, who puts on wonderful plays for the yearly Shakespeare festival, that plays an important role in the community. Until Tony, one of his assistants, becomes too ambitious and has Felix fired, and Tony becomes the new director.
So, Felix mopes around for awhile until he is offered a job as instructor of the "Literacy through Literature" program at a local prison.

He begins by having the inmates put on Shakespeare plays, and the program becomes very popular. It is considered a privilege to be accepted into his class and perform in one of these plays. During this time Felix is trying to figure out how to get revenge on Tony & others who were behind his firing, all of whom have gone on to become government officials.

As "The Tempest" was to be Felix's grandest production and pet project right before he was ousted from his previous job, he puts on this play, with the help of the inmates, as a way to get his revenge on these official (his arch enemies!) since they are coming to view the play at the prison.

They do put on the play, but Felix's whole life is also based on "The Tempest" story, so there are kind of two "Tempest" stories going on at the same time. Also, the aura of Felix's daughter "Miranda," who died at the age of three, hovers within Felix's sphere of consciousness. She is a very important part of his life, even though she is not there (or is she?).

It helped me a lot to have just read "The Tempest," and "Hag-Seed" helped me to understand the play better. It was very enjoyable, fun to see Felix get his revenge, and a really easy read. I didn't want to stop reading!

[Book Concierge]

The Route – Gale Sears – 2.5**
This was okay, but I found little substance here and I felt it was predictable. Some of the patrons on Carol’s route were charming, some were irascible. A few needed more help than Carol could provide, and a couple of them helped her more than she helped them.
LINK to my review

[Book Concierge]

The Yonahlossee Riding Camp For Girls – Anton DiSclafani – 3***
The story is told in alternating time frames: the events back home in Florida, and the events at the school during Thea’s year at Yonahlossee. As Thea related what is happening and how she felt, I found myself worried for this emotionally distant girl, who seemed unable to control her impulses or to recognize the potential consequences of her actions.
LINK to my review

[Book Concierge]

April 29 - Currently Reading

TEXT – Death in the Clouds by Agatha Christie
AUDIO in the car – Eligible: A Modern Retelling of Pride and Prejudice by Curtis Sittenfeld
MP3 Player AUDIO - Rocket Boys by Homer Hickam

[James]

Alexandre Dumas, La tulipe noire [1850] 312 pages [in French, Kindle]

As are all of the older Dumas's novels, La tulipe noire is a historical thriller, and although considered a classic today it was essentially popular rather than literary fiction. Dumas is a good writer in that mode, and this novel is still a page turner after well over a century and a half, despite all changes of taste and style. It is in the Romantic tradition (which continues to be the style for most genre fiction even today), with improbable coincidences (though less than in Dickens or Hugo) and a focus on unique individuals and dramatic events without much depth of social or political background. The context of the history is the overthrow of the Dutch Republican government of the de Witt brothers in 1672 and the return to power of the hereditary Stathouder William of Orange (also known to history as William the Silent), the ancestor of the present day British royal house. (This is not a part of history that I am very familiar with, although I did read one history many years ago.) The novel begins with the murder of Jean and Corneille de Witt, and then turns to the arrest and imprisonment of the protagonist, Cornelius van Baërle, who is a godson of Corneille de Witt (and as far as I know not a historical character), for allegedly participating in a conspiracy against William. The protagonist is a tulip fancier, who has just succeeded in creating a new variant of tulip, the black tulip, which is the object of a prize of one hundred thousand florins from the Harlem Horticultural Society. The basic plot is taken quite obviously from Stendhal's La Chartreuse de Parme: the love story of the prisoner and the jailer's daughter (but without any of the historical detail or subtlety of Stendhal's novel, which is a real classic in every sense.) To avoid spoilers, I will not go any further in the description, except to say that the plot develops about as one would expect. A good book to read if you like thrillers, but not an essential reading.


Chen Guancheng, The Barefoot Lawyer: A Blind Man's Fight for Justice and Freedom in China [2015] 330 pages

A memoir by Chen Guancheng, a blind man who became a democracy activist in China. He began by working for the rights of the blind and other disabled persons in China, insisting on the enforcement of laws which were already on the books, and throughout the book the emphasis is on the struggle for legality against the indifference and even hostility of the Chinese Communist Party bureaucracy, which controls the courts and legal structure of the country. As he became known as an activist, and acquired a basic command of law ("barefoot lawyer" is a Chinese expression, by analogy to the "barefoot doctors", for a person who has no academic training or official status, but aids the peasants in local struggles), he was contacted by others who were being oppressed by the government, and ultimately became involved in the struggle against forced abortions and sterilization as part of the Chinese "Family Planning Campaign", also known as the "One Child" campaign. This brought him into direct conflict with the bureaucracy, and he was imprisoned for four years and then subjected to an extremely brutal "house arrest" for another three years, before escaping to the U.S. Embassy and ultimately to the United States.

The book is very interesting, not only for his personal experiences but for the light it casts on the Chinese government in the last forty years and the opposition movements which exist in China. Often, people in the West believe the propaganda that the Chinese government has become less oppressive because it has abandoned many of the socialist economic ideas it embraced in the earlier years under Mao for a more "market economy" and increased ties with the capitalist West, but the reality is quite different -- like Russia, it has thrown out the baby and kept the bathwater, being less than ever in the interests of the peasants and workers. Parts of the book are really painful to read. To keep the interest of the less political reader, the book begins with his dramatic escape from a heavily guarded community, making his way by sound (remember he's blind) out of the village and to the next village where there are other activists who can help.

For an American, once of the most important aspects of the book is his description of how the Obama-Clinton administration tried to sell him out after he reached the Embassy, but were forced by public pressure in the U.S. to negotiate his leaving the country for the U.S. One of the best quotations from the book:

"Apparently, at a meeting on April 27 of the National Security Council with President Obama in the White House, the "policy had changed." The new directive was that from then on, no one was to help me go online, which given my disability, made it impossible for me to know what was happening beyond the confines of the embassy. Moreover, it was agreed that my case shouldn't damage the relationship between the United States and China, and thus my situation should be resolved immediately--language I took to indicate that the White House no longer supported me and that I was to leave the embassy in short order. Most disturbingly, I learned, some officials at the meeting had suggested that democracy and human rights in china were not in America's best interests. Apparently, not a single person at the NSC meeting had spoken up to argue that America should protect human rights or to insist the the U.S. government should stand up for its founding doctrines and essential values."

-- Welcome to the real world. He talks about how (like many dissidents in foreign countries, especially in the present and former Stalinist "Communist" countries) he had previously idealized the U.S. government as supportive of democracy and human rights; after this experience, he concludes that the only real supporters of human rights anywhere are the people, not the governments. A good lesson for all of us -- and just to reiterate, this was Obama and Hillary, not Donald Trump. He ends the book by emphasizing that the support of everyday Americans and others around the world is the most important thing for any movement for human rights -- the struggle is international. He may not draw all the right conclusions or go far enough, and he gives no analysis of why things are the way they are, but it was a good and inspiring book which I would recommend to anyone interested in China or human rights in general.

This was the reading for the Utah State Library/Library for the Blind discussion group for next month.

[James]

Honoré de Balzac, La maison du Chat-qui-pelote [1830] 61 pages [in French, Kindle]

First published in 1830 as Gloire et Malheur and modified throughout the author's lifetime, this is the first novella of the "Scenes de la vie privée", the first division of the Comédie humaine, and hence the real beginning of my Balzac project. It deals with the marriage of a daughter of a rich but very traditionalist merchant with an artist, and besides describing the lives and outlooks of different social strata it also deals with the problems of marriages between people of differing cultural levels and education.

[Book Concierge]

Epitaph – Mary Doria Russell – 4****
In a sequel to her earlier novel, Doc, Russell explores what REALLY happened at the OK Corral. I love Russell’s writing. She does extensive research and is not content to give us only one side of the issues, or one facet of the characters. The novel focuses on Josie Marcus and Wyatt Earp, but every character fairly leaps off the page.
LINK to my review

[Book Concierge]

One Two Buckle My Shoes – Agatha Christie – 3***
Christie always delivers a well-constructed plot, with plenty of red herrings to keep the reader guessing. While I did catch on to a few of the tricks, I didn’t figure out the real culprit until Poirot revealed the answer.
LINK to my review

[Book Concierge]

Expecting Adam – Martha N Beck – 4****
3.5*** rounded up. The subtitle of this memoir is: A True Story of Birth, Rebirth, and Everyday Magic. Beck writes well, and she is very honest about what she went through. Her self-deprecating humor is refreshing, and a few scenes had me laughing out loud.
LINK to my review

[Beverly]

The Forgetting Time by Sharon Guskin
4 stars

An absolutely fascinating book, to me at least since it deals with reincarnation. Young Noah is a handful...he won't take a bath, he has nightmares, he rarely lets his mother out of his sight. He calls his mother Mommy-Mom and is always asking when he can see his other mother. The pair come to the attention of a gentleman who is writing a book about reincarnation and soon they are on a journey that they never expected. A journey that is not only eye-opening for Noah and his Mommy-Mom, but solves the mystery of a missing boy.

[Book Concierge]

The Love Song of Miss Queenie Hennessy – Rachel Joyce – 5*****
Oh, I love Queenie! She admits that her first instinct when faced with a difficult situation has always been to flee. Now, at the end of her life she faces the secrets she has been hiding, and hiding from, with courage and grace, and pours out her heart in a long letter of love and forgiveness.
LINK to my review