What Are You Reading / Reviews - April through June 2021

[Book Concierge]

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This Time Together – Carol Burnett – 4****
Subtitle: Laughter and Reflection. In this memoir Carol Burnett chronicles her show business career, from her early roles in New York, to headlining her incredibly popular variety show and beyond. I love Carol Burnett. She is truly an American Treasure. I can’t remember the last time I read a book that had me both howling out loud in uncontrollable laughter (my husband came from the other side of the house to see what was going on), and crying to the point where I had to put it aside for a moment because I literally could not see the words on the page for my tears. That speaks, I think, to the genuine person Burnett is, and to her generosity of spirit to lay it all wout there.
My full review HERE

[Book Concierge]

Caddie Woodlawn’s Family – Carol Ryrie Brink – 3.5***
This sequel to the popular Caddie Woodlawn book was originally titled “Magical Melons.” Set in the late 1800s, in Western Wisconsin, the books chronicle life in the Woodlawn family, primarily from the perspective of Caddie, who is almost 13 in this episode. She and her five siblings have great fun in and around their farm and the land surrounding it. Like the “Little House on the Prairie” series, these books provide a reasonable look at life in those pioneer days, though stories involving the native Indian population make me cringe.
My full review HERE

[Book Concierge]

An Irish Country Village – Patrick Taylor – 4****
Book two in the popular Irish Country Doctor series, relating the trials and tribulations of young Dr. Barry Laverty as he begins his practice as a country GP in the mid-1960s in Ballybucklebo, a fictitious community in Northern Ireland full of eccentric and memorable residents. Taylor has a gift for making his character so alive they fairly jump off the page. I also love the descriptions he gives of the landscape; makes me feels that I’ve actually been to Northern Ireland. Will definitely keep reading this series.
My full review HERE

[Book Concierge]

A Stab In the Dark – Lawrence Block – 3***
Matthew Scudder series, number four. Block writes a tight, fast-moving, noir police procedural. Scudder is something of a mystery himself. Oh, we know why he left the force and we’re privy to his demons, but he plays his cards close to the vest. Watching him ferret out the truth is engaging and fascinating.
My full review HERE

[James]

Antoine Galland, tr., Mille et Une Nuits [1704] tome 1 529 pages; tome 2 488 pages; tome 3 544 pages [Kindle, in French]

The first translation of the Thousand and One Nights into a Western language, published between 1704 and 1717 in twelve volumes. I'm guessing that that is why the three volumes I read are titled first, second and third of twelve, even though comparing the contents to the list of stories on Wikipedia these three volumes contain the entire contents of the twelve original volumes. The first half of the book is a fairly close translation of the original Syrian version which I read last month in the recent English translation by Haddawy; I was surprised how close it was, the only adaptation really was omitting the poetry, which doesn't really work in translation, and some of the more explicit sexual or scatological passages which weren't in accord with eighteenth century French taste. The second half of the book contains other stories which were part of the Egyptian versions or originally independent stories -- the Seven Voyages of Sinbad, Aladdin and the Lamp and Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves, among others. Galland's translation is worth reading as a classic of French as well as Arabic literature.

[James]

Sinan Antoon, The Baghdad Eucharist [2012, tr. 2017] 129 pages

Antoon's third novel, The Baghdad Eucharist tells the story of a Christian family caught up in the sectarian violence in Iraq under the American occupation. The original Arabic title was Ta Maryam -- Hail Mary. A very powerful short novel about the hatred that religious differences cause when secularism is abandoned.

[James]

William Shakespeare and George Wilkins, Pericles, Prince of Tyre [1608 or 1609] 110 pages [Kindle]

As always this time of year, I am rereading the plays which I will see in a month at the Utah Shakespeare Festival. Although not included in the First Folio, perhaps because Shakespeare was not considered the primary author, this was added in the Third Folio (along with seven plays now considered "apocryphal"), and has since been considered part of the "canon", unlike The Two Noble Kinsmen, his collaboration with John Fletcher, which has only recently been promoted to that status, and Edward III on which the jury is still out. I would have to agree with most critics from Ben Jonson through the last century that it is one of his least well-written plays, although it has always been one of his most popular -- without the subtlety and ambiguity of his best plays, and with a happy ending, it fits with what makes a popular "best-seller".

The first of the so-called "Romances", this is a late work, but one which has many similarities to what is possibly his first play, The Comedy of Errors (also being performed at USF this summer.) Both plays are about a father who loses his wife and child, and is reunited with them at the end; in both plays, the wife has become a priestess/abbess at the temple/church of Ephesus. Both works are based fairly closely on classical sources, The Comedy of Errors on Plautus' Menaechmi and Pericles on the story of Apollonius of Tyre (probably originally a Greek "novel" of the second century, although only extant in Latin from about the fifth century), as translated into English poetry ca. 1400 in John Gower's Confessio Amantis and rendered into prose in 1572 in Lawrence Twine's The Pattern of Painful Adventures.

Wilkins and Shakespeare have deliberately given the play a somewhat "archaic" treatment, with John Gower appearing as a "chorus" to explain the action in rhymed verse. With a story starting with incest, having two tournaments, two shipwrecks, pirates, foiled murders, and so forth, it is an adventure story more about plot than character, although modern critics manage to find profound and religious meanings in it all.

[Melissa]

Tales from the Shadowhunter Academy by Cassandra Clare
5 ★

Simon Lewis: ex-vampire, best friend of Clary, boyfriend of Isabelle Lightwood. Also, he has no memory of any of it. His memories were stripped by a demon and Simon now feels out place, confused and lonely. He decides then to attend the Shadowhunter Academy and become a Shadowhunter.

There are so many great stories in this book and so much history. Tessa Gray makes an appearance and I loved her story. Tessa has always been my favorite character. Magnus and Alec are in a story together that has a surprise for everyone and it just warmed my heart. I really look forward to seeing this story line expand. This book also introduces the reader to a handful of new characters that I hope we get to see again.
The biggest disappointment for me was an event at the end. I was deeply saddened by this event, but I do see how it affected Simon and how it will stay with him forever and possible help shape him. I love the Shadowhunter name Simon chooses also. It’s a name that will bring back memories from this book every time I hear it.
This book also gives the reader insight into the Dark Artifices trilogy and I can’t wait to start it.

[James]

Naguib Mahfouz, Love in the Rain [1973, tr. 2011] 132 pages

This short novel interweaves the stories of three pairs of lovers and others connected with them; all the stories contain some tragedy, although some have somewhat happy endings. The novel takes place against the background of the defeat of June 1967.

[Melissa]

American Rose: A Nation Laid Bare: The Life and Times of Gypsy Rose by Karen Abbott
4 ★

This book is so much more than just the life and times of Gypsy Rose Lee. It’s the history of vaudeville and the rise of burlesque. It’s the story of the Minsky brothers and their burlesque houses. How they created a legacy and fought the law. It’s an amazing history lesson from the Depression era that you won’t learn in school.
I am amazed that June and Louise (Gypsy Rose) survived their mother, Rose. She was quite the spitfire who lived vicariously through her children and pushed them so hard. Rose’s determination for the girls to be stars was what every mom wants, but she went too far. The girls were hungry all the time due to lack of money and Rose had June in toe shows before she could walk well. June’s feet would bleed from performing. Some of Rose’s antics are quite shocking and disturbing. It was sad seeing June and Gypsy Rose try so hard to be not just sisters, but also friends. The older they got, the harder it was.
Gypsy Rose led a pretty amazing but lonely life. I was awed by her determination and she worked very hard to get where she was. She was not Rose’s favorite daughter and I felt like she did it to prove herself to her mom. June and Gypsy never did realize that nothing they did would be good enough for their mom unless she got something out of it.
I found the history of burlesque quite interesting. I searched many items throughout the book for pictures of performers who were mentioned and the places they performed. These women worked hard throughout the depression and made life a bit more relaxing for many. They were talented and enjoyed what they did. Burlesque dancers are a strong group of women who did not get the support or recognition they deserved due to the restrictions during that time period.

[James]

William Shakespeare, The Tragedy of Richard the Third [1592 or 1593; Mark Eccles, ed., Signet Classic ed., 1964] 256 pages
Taylor Littleton and Robert R. Rea, edd., To Prove a Villain: The Case of King Richard III [1964] 206 pages

Both of these books contain the text of Shakespeare's play, which I will be seeing performed next month in Cedar City. It was Shakespeare's first real popular success, and a sort of sequel to his trilogy of plays about Henry VI.

The Signet edition has a short excerpt from Thomas More's The History of King Richard III and a longer series of excerpts from Holinshed's Chronicles; the Littleton-Rea book has a long excerpt from More and a shorter one from Holinshed. More and Holinshed, Shakespeare's sources, are about the same since the latter is virtually a reprint of the former for the period in question.

The Signet edition also has some short excerpts from Charles Lamb, as well as a chapter from Lily B. Campbell, Shakespeare's "Histories": Mirrors of Elizabethan Policy and A.P. Rossiter's article "Angel with Horns: The Unity of Richard III", both from 1947.

The Littleton-Rea book is more concerned with the historical Richard III and contains excerpts from an anonymous "Praise of King Richard III", Polydore Vergil's English History, The Chronicle of the Abbey of Croyland, A Mirror for Magistrates, and Sir Francis Bacon's History of the Reign of King Henry VII; and from the two "rehabilitations" of Richard, Horace Walpole's "Historic Doubts on the Life and Reign of King Richard the Third" and Clements R. Markham's "Richard III, A Doubtful Verdict Reviewed" as well as a middle-of-the-road article, A.R. Meyers' "The Character of Richard III". Somewhat bizarrely, it also reprints an entire novel, Josephine Tey's The Daughter of Time, which simply repeats Markham's arguments verbatim although written fifty years later, with no mention of any of the refutations of that book or any later evidence.

[Book Concierge]

The Bookshop Of the Broken Hearted – Robert Hillman – 3.5***
In 1968 in rural Australia, Tom Hope runs his farm, milks his cows, tends his sheep and tries to find a new purpose in his life after his wife, Trudy, left him and took her son, Peter, with her. Then he meets Hannah Babel, a survivor of Auschwitz and some 15 years his senior, who hires him to build bookcases for her new bookshop. I really liked how Hillman drew these broken-hearted people, how he revealed their pain and their efforts to heal and move forward. Yet, I wasn’t sure I understood Hannah all that well.
My full review HERE

[James]

Naguib Mahfouz, Karnak Café [1974, tr. 2007] 101 pages

Set immediately before and after the June 1967 defeat, this is one of Mahfouz' most directly political novels. Three of the regular customers at the Karnak Cafè. two young men and a young woman, are arrested by the regime on vague political charges. The book is an indictment of the repressive policies followed as the 1952 Revolution degenerated.

[Book Concierge]

Finding Dorothy – Elizabeth Letts – 3.5***
Letts mines history to go “behind the scenes” on the making of the 1938 movie that launched Judy Garland’s star - The Wizard of Oz - and, more importantly, the story of how L Frank Baum came to write the series that captured the imaginations of millions of readers. I was engaged and interested from the beginning and felt that I learned much about both the making of the movie and about the people Maud and Frank Baum were.
My full review HERE

[James]

William Shakespeare, Cymbeline [about 1609-1610?] 150 pages

The last of the four Shakespeare plays I will be seeing in about three weeks at the Utah Shakespeare Festival. The other three are The Comedy of Errors, Pericles, Prince of Tyre and The Tragedy of King Richard III. Since Pericles is essentially a retelling of the same plot as Comedy of Errors (father reunited with his lost wife and child in Ephesus), it occurred to me that there was possibly a similar relationship between the two Milford Haven plays, and that Cymbeline is essentially a "happier" retelling of Richard III: the two princes come back from apparent death in the Tower/cave, kill Richard III/Clothen, and together with their sister Elizabeth/Imogen join the army of Henry VII/Posthumus at Milford Haven. Posthumus even has a dream before the battle where he is blessed by family members killed by the Romans. The play also seems to reverse Shakespeare's other tragedies: Othello/Posthumus doesn't succeed in killing Desdemona/Imogen, Juliette/Imogen awakens from her fake death to find the corpse of Romeo/Posthumus (she thinks) but doesn't commit suicide, King Lear/Cymbeline is reunited with his estranged daughter. . .

Which is not to say it isn't also about James I and all the other things that the critics see in it.

[Book Concierge]

The Accidental Tourist – Anne Tyler – 3.5***
Tyler excels at writing character-driven works that give us a glimpse of their lives in all their messy complexity and banal ordinariness. I love the scenes she creates that reveal so much of family dynamics; the Thanksgiving dinner is priceless, as is Rose’s wedding, and Christmas at Muriel’s mother’s house.
My full review HERE

[James]

The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night (Alf Laylah wa-Laylah) (Richard Burton tr.) v.1 [Kindle, Project Gutenberg] 668 pages

The classic Richard Burton translation of the Thousand and One Nights, based on the much longer Egyptian version (I've already read the shorter Syrian version which is equivalent to the first volume and a half of this), published in ten volumes plus six supplementary volumes. Since this is a Project Gutenberg e-book, there are no page numbers, but going by the print edition I have of the third and fourth volumes, the first two volumes average 668 pages each so I'm using that. I will wait until I finish the whole series (hopefully over the next three or four months) to write a real review.

[James]

Hala Alyan, Salt Houses [2017] 314 pages

Salt Houses, Palestinian-American poet Hala Alyan's first novel, is the story of four generations of a relatively well-to-do Palestinian family in the diaspora. The novel is told from the viewpoints of different family members. it begins in 1963 in Nablus, where the family settled after being driven out of Jaffa by the 1948 Israeli invasion of Palestine, with Salma, eventually the great-grandmother, preparing for the wedding of her youngest daughter Alia; other chapters are from the perspectives of Alia, her older sister and brother Mustafa, her husband, her three children and her three grandchildren. The family flees to Kuwait City after the 1967 war, when persecution of Palestinians increased, then flees again when Saddam invades Kuwait. The youngest daughter Su'ad is in the Boston at the time of the September 11 attack. Many of the family are in Beirut at the time of the Israeli attacks. In the end they are scattered between the United States and Amman, which becomes the center, where Alia and her husband Atef end up. The novel is about the confusions of identity, the longings of each family member for the places where they grew up. The book is a very well-written first novel.