The Essex Serpent & Whose Body

 The Essex Serpent by Sarah Perry

This is a book I should have liked. It's an unusual story, about a woman and her slightly creepy young son moving to a village where a rumored creature in the water is being blamed for various recent misfortunes. The woman and the local minister become friends - maybe more - and her son forms a bond with the minister's ailing wife, who since her illness has become infatuated with the colour blue. There are several other romantic storylines but this is not a romance per se. Well, maybe it is, but it also touches on socialism, abuse, geology, social justice, medicine, and a woman's place in society.

So, a good story, interesting characters, and excellent writing. The first two pages, in which she writes about time and how it affects people in different situations, were breath-taking. I couldn't wait to read on, but then something seemed to stall. I can't explain it. It had everything it needed to be a good book, but I had a hard time getting into it. I pushed on and found the middle section held my attention better, but then it seemed to sort of fizzle out at the end. 

Maybe at a different time in a different frame of mind I'd have seen more in it and I wouldn't have to say with some regret that I didn't like it. Do read this outstanding review at  Kirkus Reviews though to see all the reasons why you might like it very much indeed. 

Whose Body by Dorothy L. Sayers

This is the first of Sayers's Lord Peter Whimsey novels and I'm not quite sure I like Lord Peter. My book club read Busman's Honeymoon, which I think is #11 in the series, a couple of years ago and I very much liked it, and him, so maybe he'll grow on me as the series progresses. 

In this first book he's flippant, a little too self-confident, and his diction seemed strange. He's upper class British, but leaves the last letter off of some words, so that going becomes goin' and reading is readin'. I was hearing it in the accent of the southern U.S. and seeing him as plantation owner rather than British Lord. It was...odd. However, I love the way Sayers writes - a little less cozy than Agatha and with a bit more of an intellectual bent - and will probably try another after a while. 

It might be a long while. I still have two shelves of unread books, two dozen audio books and 4 dozen e-books waiting, almost 300 titles on my Goodreads want-to-read page, and over 160 on my wish list at the local library. And then there's a spread sheet with another 20 lists or so of authors and titles I want to check out when I get a chance. I might live long enough to read them all if I never add another title to any of those lists, but that seems unlikely. And anyway, I like lists and these ones are comforting in some way.

About Whose Body I'll just say I didn't enjoy it but I hope to try another. 

The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket

 The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket by Edgar Allan Poe

This book is on so many "must read" lists that I felt almost obligated to read it. I'm not familiar with much of Edgar Allan Poe's writing, but I did like The Fall of the House of Usher and his poems Annabel Lee and The Raven. I knew this one, too, would be dark but looked forward to some excellent writing.

It started out as a sea-faring adventure that became a sea-faring disaster and finally a sea-faring horror story. Every time I thought the situation couldn't get worse, it did, and then it got worse than that. When they drew straws to see which of them to kill and eat I really wished they'd just jump overboard and let themselves be swept away by the tides. Wouldn't that have been easier?

I'm sure it's an important piece of literature - people more astute than I find much to admire in it - but I did not enjoy it. At all. Even with the excellent writing.

 

Education of a Wandering Man

 Education of a Wandering Man by Louis L'Amour

This wasn't a book I'd have picked up on my own but it was on our book club schedule this year and it turned out to be a pleasant surprise. I'd only known the name Louis L'Amour as a writer of old westerns, not my thing at all, and I wondered if I might find it boring. Instead I discovered a good writer with a wild personal story and wise thoughts on reading and education. 

For years L'Amour wandered the world getting work wherever he found it. At various times he was a seaman, mine caretaker, soldier, boxer, reviewer of books, and teacher. Upon marrying and starting a family he stopped wandering and settled down to a full time writing career, publishing over 100 books. He was a voracious reader of books of all genres. At the back he lists those he read from 1930-1935, and then in 1937. From Voltaire and Homer to H.G. Wells and Ellery Queen - history, plays, philosophy, fiction, poetry, science - there was nothing he wasn't interested in. He left school early, but had no lack of education. 

He makes it clear he's not writing an autobiography but a book about education - both his own and his theories on what education should be. I have to admit that those sections were the best part of the book for me, and when several consecutive pages were about his shipboard experiences or how the American west was settled, I'd be flipping ahead to see when he'd get back to the good stuff. But that's on me, not the author, and I recommend it as a book with much in it to appeal to most readers.   

A few quotes:

"Education should provide the tools for a widening and deepening of life, for increased appreciation of all one sees or experiences. It should equip a person to live life well, to understand what is happening about him, for to live life well one must live with awareness. No one can "get" an education, for of necessity education is a continuing process."

 "I suppose I was lonely. I know that often I longed for someone with whom I could talk of books, writers, and things of the mind."

"He expresses dissenting ideas, and it is no matter whether they are important, simply that they offer a different viewpoint and so are an incentive to thinking."

Saving CeeCee Honeycutt

 Saving CeeCee Honeycutt by Beth Hoffman

It's been a couple of months since I read this and now I've forgotten the details. I try to organize my thoughts about a book as soon as I've finished it, but have been plagued with interruptions and distractions lately. What I do remember is enjoying reading it.

CeeCee is 7 yrs old as the story opens, and living with her unstable mother and uninvolved father. When her mother is hit and killed by an ice-cream truck, her father decides CeeCee is too much for him and hands her off to Great Aunt Tootie. This turns out to be the kind of fairytale-come-true that only happens in books. Tootie is kind, gentle, loving, generous, and wealthy. She has a cook, Oletta, and wonderful neighbours who come to love and be a family to CeeCee. 

I wouldn't call it fluff as it does touch on more serious themes - family dysfunction, racism and mental health - but with lots of down-home wisdom and a few life lessons sprinkled throughout, it is a sweet story. 

A little unrealistic but very pleasant reading. 

North And South

 North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell

When Margaret Hale's father gives up his post as Vicar in a quiet English village, she and her parents move to a factory town where he hopes to find work as a tutor. His first student is John Thornton, the owner of a local mill where there is unrest among workers dissatisfied with inadequate pay and poor living conditions.

Note - if you haven't read North and South yet, it would be best to stop here as the ending will be mentioned.

Margaret, taking the side of the workers, at first finds Mr. Thornton arrogant and unlikeable,  She befriends the family of a disgruntled mill worker whose daughter's health is failing, but then becomes an unexpected advocate for Mr. Thornton when a strike mob threatens him. 

The more she gets to know Mr. Thornton the more her feelings toward him soften, but a series of devasting losses in Margaret's life seem to put more distance between them. We don't find out if they'll get together until the final pages of the book but there's so much else going on that you almost don't mind the wait. Almost.

I did wish there were a few more chapters. By the end of the book their circumstances have been reversed, Margaret having come into money and property and John having lost everything, and it would be nice to read more about their life together, how they handled those changes, etc.

I listened to an audio version of this book narrated beautifully by Juliet Stevenson, who gave each character a distinct, authentic voice and brought this book to vibrant life. Her reading - performing, really - made these people so real that I missed them terribly after I finished. A week later, I still miss them, their world, and her perfectly modulated voice and lovely English accent. I'd listen to her read anything. 

I loved North and South and highly recommend it, in print or this audio version. Then watch the mini-series with Richard Armitage as John Thornton. They are all wonderful. 

The Music Shop

 The Music Shop by Rachel Joyce

Frank owns a rundown music shop on a back street lined with a few more old businesses and dilapidated houses. His suppliers are beginning to avoid him because he refuses to stock CDs, believing the truest sound can only be heard on vinyl. They tell him he soon won't be able to get records and will have to switch to CDs, but Frank is adamant.

Blessed with an uncanny ability to sense what people are feeling and which record would meet their need at that moment in time, he suggests Aretha Franklin to one, something classical for another, or maybe jazz, and he's never wrong. He doesn't make much money, but he likes that he's able to help people 

Also in Frank's out-of-the-way neighbourhood are a funeral parlour run by the Williams Brothers, Mr. Novak's Bakery, Maud's Tattoo Parlour, and the gift shop of ex-priest Father Anthony. Rounding out the cast is Mrs. Roussos, who owns a home on the street and is a frequent visitor to the shop, and Kit, Frank's clumsily enthusiastic young assistant. In flashbacks we are introduced to Peg, Frank's eccentric mother, and learn something of the upbringing that gave him his love for music and explains why he has trouble opening up to people.  

Into this declining neighbourhood comes Ilse, a beautiful woman recently arrived from Germany, who faints outside the music shop window and is taken inside to recover. Once she does, she departs quickly, leaving everyone wondering who she is, where she lives, and why she's here. Though she returns and they get to know her a little, her hesitancy to speak about herself keeps them wondering. and conjecturing. 

With Frank falling for Ilse and a development firm using shady tactics to buy up local properties, things get complicated. Ilse is supposed to have a fiancée back in Germany, but won't talk about him. Some of the shop owners, faced with harassment and even violence, are getting scared and selling out. Frank's shop could be the next target.

This was a touching story with authentic, relatable characters you'd want for friends. Frank and Ilse could be frustratingly reticent - just SAY it for Pete's sake! - but I loved the parts where he spoke about various pieces of music and how to listen to them properly. I want to play some of the ones mentioned and try to hear what he said to listen for. I'm afraid it will be on CDs though. Don't tell Frank. 

Attribution

 Attribution by Linda Moore

Cate, art history student, finds an old and possibly valuable painting in a storeroom at the university. She thinks she recognizes a Spanish artist's style but can't find any mention of it in lists of his works. Telling no one of her discovery, she disappoints her parents who wanted her to come home for Christmas, and instead takes an impromptu trip to Spain to do some research. There, in an apparently serendipitous moment, she meets Antonio, who will become a romantic interest and in whose family home Cate's painting once hung. To begin her research she contacts a local professor who seems willing to help but in fact has her own agenda for the painting. 

I love a book that immerses me in a place, time or culture not my own. Living in the art world of this book for a few days and learning a little about artists and their paintings made this a great reading experience for me. The story is good as well, though I thought it a bit too much of a coincidence that the man she just happened to sit beside on the train also just happened to be the one who's family had a history with her painting. Still, it made for an intriguing story and I very much enjoyed it. 

Close Enough To Touch

 Close Enough to Touch by Colleen Oakley

The story begins "I kissed a boy once and almost died." And she's not kidding. Jubilee Jenkins has an allergy to all skin cells but her own and kissing that boy almost killed her. She swelled up, went into anaphylactic shock and ended up in the hospital. 

She's been a recluse now for the past seven years, but when her mother (who has been supporting her) dies, Jubilee has no choice but to brave the outside and look for a job, which she finds at the local library. There she meets harried single father, Eric, and his quirky son, Aja, who has a sometimes disastrous (but really interesting) fascination with telekinesis. Jubilee and Aja form a connection, but because of her condition they cannot touch. She likes Eric once she gets to know him, but understands she can't get into a relationship with him or with anyone. She's given up hope for a cure, the only possibility left being an experimental treatment she has already considered and rejected.

It's a unique plot with affecting characters and it's only timing that kept it from having the impact on me that other recent reads have had. North and South, Haven, and Fellowship Point are outstanding novels and hard acts to follow. Even a good story like Close Enough to Touch is bound to pale a little in comparison, but it is good and I do recommend it.     

Indians on Vacation

 Indians on Vacation by Thomas King

Mimi and Bird, a middle-aged indigenous couple, are on vacation in Prague. This is one of many trips they've taken in an attempt to discover something about Mimi's uncle Leroy, who left home when he was young, taking the family's sacred medicine bundle with him. He sent postcards home from various locations around the world and Mimi, following his path, hopes to find out more about his life after he left or maybe even find the bundle itself. 

Mimi is an enthusiastic traveler who loves to explore the cities they visit; Bird just wants be home. His grousing about it wore a little thin but the story was interesting otherwise with alternating chapters about other trips they've taken, Bird's youth, and Mimi's mother. And then there are the demons Bird fights continually: catastrophizing, self-loathing, depression, despair, and touchiness. Mimi names them all - Kitty, Eugene, twins Didi and Desi, and Chip - which starts Bird seeing them as actual (though invisible to anyone else) people. His encounters with them are the funniest parts of the book. 

I liked the book's off-beat feeling but didn't find it as hilarious as other reviewers have. Indeed it was quite sad, but Mimi's endearing character and Bird's demons made it real and relatable. 

Not too dark and not too funny, just a good story.    

Fellowship Point

Fellowship Point by Alice Elliott Dark

This is one of those wonderful books that when I finished I wished I could read again for the first time. I will read it again, as an old friend then, but there won't be that sense of discovery, of surprise at finding a treasure. I loved the two main characters and narrators Agnes and Polly, in their eighties and friends for years, and the beautiful location, an unspoiled point of land on the coast of Maine.

Agnes, an unmarried author of children's books, and Polly, wife to a demanding husband and mother of 3, grew up spending their summers at family 'cottages' on The Point. They worry about development ruining the natural beauty of the place, especially the large sanctuary of land, "the Sank", that sits between the houses and the sea. Home to various bird species, including a colony of eagles, and varieties of flowers and trees, it is the heart of Fellowship Point and they want to protect it for future generations. Leaving it to a land trust is one possibility, but because of by-laws set when the houses were first built, nothing can be done without the agreement of all the homeowners together. That's going to be a problem.

A third narrator enters the picture when Maud, assistant to Agnes' editor, asks Agnes to write a memoir, an idea Agnes won't even consider. Maud's story - she has a 3 yr old daughter and a mother who suffers from bouts of mania/depression - adds another layer to the story as she becomes an integral part Fellowship Point life.

This beautifully written story, it's engaging characters and stunning location are a gift. By the time I'd finished I could say with Agnes "I feel so saturated with Maine...". The trees, the wind, the eagles, the water, the characters - I felt saturated with all of it and was truly sad to come to the last page. This one is going on my Favourites list.

A few quotes:

"They were too old not to be friends. Fallings-out were for those who had time to meet new people."

"People had no manners anymore, or even a notion of their utility - how good manners evened out the imbalances between personalities, how they bolstered the shy by making it clear what to do, and how they held the aggressive in check."

"...she still loved the sound of eagle wings beating the air. They cleaved the atmosphere and created temporary yet provocative blank spaces that drew the imagination upward to explore their wake."

Upgrade

Upgrade by Blake Crouch

A novel about gene-editing in humans. Like the future isn't terrifying enough already. 

Logan Ramsey is an agent for the Gene Protection Agency. Gene editing became illegal after scientist Miriam Ramsay, Logan's mother, believing she could increase food production in poorer countries, infected crops with modified genes she'd engineered. Crops died, famine followed, and 200 million people starved to death.

Logan, who'd been working in her lab at the time, went to prison for two years for his part in the disaster and now works with the agency to make sure nothing like that ever happens again. In the course of a routine investigation (if any of this can be called routine) he is infected with unknown genes; in essence, his DNA is hacked, and no one knows what it will do to him or what he might become. He's detained in a lab and subjected to continual testing, but someone breaks him out and they join forces to find out who did this to him and why. Logan has to cope with the frightening changes taking place in his body and mind, and face a revelation about his mother and how it has led to him being in this precarious situation.   

It's written in the abrupt, almost in-your-face style I've seen in other detective novels and I can't say I like that kind of writing, but there were moments that stood out, like this one for its great imagery:

"A violence of black skies, wind, and rain - the final nail being hammered through the heart of autumn."

And this one, simply because it's exciting to learn such things:

"While there are approximately twenty-five thousand known genes, the variance of their interactions approaches infinity. And beyond the known genes, our genome contains numerous control regions and so-called junk DNA, which aren't junk at all but a collective, self-adjusting web of systems, evolved under the selective pressure of existence for more than three billion years. It added up to a system of unimaginable complexity, one where any single change - let alone thousands - might express itself in dozens of unforeseen ways."

Both the plot and the science were mesmerizing. I stayed up too late reading, needing to find out what would happen to him. If the concept of hacking DNA peaks your interest, I think you'll like this chilling, but believable, sci-fi story - a story that may not be fiction much longer and perhaps isn't even now.

My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry

My Grandmother Asked Me To Tell You She's Sorry by Fredrik Backman

Elsa, 7, has been hearing stories about the Land of Almost Awake from Granny for as long as she can remember. Its Seven Kingdoms are inhabited by a number of mystical creatures: wurses, norweens, enphants, snow angels, sea angels, a monster, a dragon, and a brave hero, Wolfheart, who once destroyed the evil Shadows and saved the Seven Kingdoms.

Granny is Elsa's best and only friend, and when she dies Elsa is heart-broken and angry. But Granny leaves Elsa a puzzle to solve involving many of the eccentric residents who live in their apartment building and Elsa, though still mad at her for leaving, can't resist. As one clue leads to another, she begins to understand that each resident's story is part of Granny's fairytale. People and events in the Land of Almost Awake are symbolic of things that actually happened in their shared history. Elsa will find consolation in unraveling the truth and in the friendships that develop along the way.

It's sad and funny and complicated, about family and sacrifices made to serve a greater good. Like the other Backman books I've read it's a good story, well told and quirky in all the best ways. 

Haven

 Haven by Emma Donoghue

The story of three monks who set out by boat from an established monastery to search for an uninhabited island on which to found another. Artt, a priest and scholar the other two call Father; Cormac, advanced in years but still handy with tools; and Trian, a boy whose parents abandoned him at the monastery because he was different; are led by Artt's vision to a small and barely livable island of mostly rock. It has only one tree, little soil for planting, and no fresh water - but Artt believes that if God has chosen this place, He will provide what is needed to survive there.

Cormac builds a cistern to collect rain water and grows a few greens in a shallow garden, while Trian hunts birds and catches what little there is from the sea for food. Hunger becomes a constant companion and distraction from the tasks Artt has set for them. Trian is to begin a new copy of the Scriptures and Cormac to carve a cross from stone to mark the island for Christ. Shelter for themselves and the meagre supplies they brought with them must wait.

They struggle through the summer, but as the weather cools and birds leave the island, Cormac begins to doubt they can survive the winter. And he questions Artt's decisions, who refuses to let them go for supplies, insisting "We've looked our last on the filthy world."

Tension builds slowly, so slowly I found myself looking ahead to see if something, anything, was going to happen, but as their situation become more desperate and Artt's sanity more doubtful, it got intense.

A thoughtful story that raises questions about isolation, faith, and the line between blind obedience and common sense. Trian and Cormac got into my head and my heart and will stay there a long time I think. Wonderful characters. Great story. 

The Cartographers

 The Cartographers by Peng Shepherd

What a riveting story...if you're open to a bit of magical realism. At the first sign of it I was inclined to roll my eyes, but once I reminded myself that I read fiction because I want to experience different realities and stretch my imagination, I settled in to enjoy the story. And then I had a hard time putting it down. 

Nell Young, cartographer, was fired from her job at the New York Public Library by her own father after they disagreed on the value of some old maps. Seven years later, when her father is found dead in his office, Nell finds one of those maps hidden in his locked desk drawer and sets out to discover why it was significant to him. What she uncovers is beyond anything she could have imagined - a stunning family secret, a conspiracy of silence that threatens to become dangerous, and an empty town that exists in defiance of the laws of physics. 

I was drawn to this book by the promise of maps and libraries, but with its unusual plot and mounting tension it was even better than I expected. Good reading.    

Angel Landing

Angel Landing by Alice Hoffman

Natalie is a therapist whose lawyer boyfriend, Carter, heads up an environmental group opposed to a nearby nuclear power plant, the same power plant recently damaged by a small explosion that put it out of commission.

Michael, an employee of the plant, walks into Natalie's office soon afterwards and confesses to having deliberately caused the explosion, albeit not for environmental or political reasons. 

Things get complicated when Natalie begins to fall for Michael, risking her career and her relationship with Carter. Carter agrees to defend Michael, remaining oblivious to Natalie's feelings. 

An interesting premise, but I found the characters unrelatable, even unlikable. Finishing it only to see how it ended, I'd give it a 2 out of 5.

Women Talking by Miriam Toews

 Women Talking by Miriam Toews

A group of women in a Mennonite community meet secretly in the loft of an old barn to talk about the attacks they are being subjected to nightly. Men have been using an animal sedative to knock out entire families so they can then rape their women and children. One of their victims is a 3 year old child. They wake up sore and sick from the drug with rope burns on their wrists and ankles, wondering what had happened to them. 

At first the leaders of the community (all men) tell them they must be imagining it, or it could be they're being punished for their sins, but eventually there is too much evidence to ignore and the police are called. As the rest of the men raise bail money to get the perpetrators released, the women meet to decide what their response will be. Will they do nothing, stay and fight, or leave the community? Pros and cons of each option are weighed with careful consideration of their duty to their children and to God. Forgiveness, what it means and how to do it, is a major factor in their deliberations. They believe that if they don't forgive they will not be forgiven, and will risk losing their place in Heaven.

Back stories come out in their conversations, and some of them are hard to hear. Maybe like me you'll get so angry you want the women to exact a vicious vengeance, or maybe you'll be compassionate and graciously want healing for both victims and offenders. Either way, their story - knowing these crimes really happened to real women and children - will break your heart.

It does conclude on a hopeful note, but only in the book. The real story is more grim. Though the women were offered state counseling, the leaders refused it saying it wasn't needed since they were asleep while being raped. The rapists went to prison, but one article I read said they still claim their innocence, and that even with them out of the community, attacks continued. You can read more of the story here.  

This is a hard one to read - for the subject matter not the writing - but it is worth it. I'll be thinking about it for a long, long time.  

The Librarianist

 The Librarianist by Patrick deWitt

Bob Comet, retired librarian, steps into a convenience store where the clerk tells him a woman has been standing staring at the beverage cooler for the last 45 minutes. Bob stands next to her and asks if she's alright but gets no response, then notices the tag she's wearing that identifies her as a resident of a local senior's home.

He helps her back to the home and then wonders if he might be of some use as a volunteer there. Having no family or friends it might be good for him to be around other people.

"Bob had long given up on the notion of knowing anyone, or of being known. He communicated with the world partly by walking through it, but mainly by reading about it."

He asks Maria, the woman in charge, if he may come and read stories to the residents, but when his first book selection proves so dull it drives listeners from the room, she tells him to forget the books and just mingle and chat. Being neither a mingler nor a chatter, Bob is unsure, but he gives it a try and begins to make friends.

Then the wandering lady goes missing again, on page 83, and we don't get back to that story until page 379. Instead we move into Bob's past - his growing up years, finding a best friend - the only one he ever had, and meeting, marrying, and losing his wife, Connie. Then we go even further back to an incident in his childhood when he ran away from home and spent four somewhat unlikely days in the company of two actresses preparing for a play. When we finally do get back to the missing senior, it's close to the end of the book. 

The intervening stories are good - so interesting that when the first story picked up again on 397 I had almost forgotten about the wandering lady. I don't know why it's structured the way it is, but in the end it all does come together.

And the writing! I paused often to appreciate the phrasing. He has a way of articulating his thoughts with simplicity and accuracy that makes what he's saying easily relatable. An enviable gift. I would sigh and think 'I wish I could have said that'.

"There had been evidence of an odd-shaped fate running through the day, and both Linus and Bob were taken by unspoken potentiality." 

"It felt paranoiac, by also commonsensible..."

"It was a very small post office with a single employee sitting behind the counter wearing the somber look of a man wondering where the magic had gone."

"An hour and a half passed, and he paused, looking out to sea and having looking-out-to-sea thoughts.

The story was great but the ending felt vague - more like a pause in the middle of a continuing story - so I'm wondering if there will be more. I would like to get better acquainted with some of those quirky residents. 

In any event, this one is very good on its own. 

Delta Wedding

Delta Wedding by Eudora Welty

In the heat of a Mississippi summer, the Fairchilds, a busy household of ten plus servants and extended family coming and going, are making preparations for the wedding of their daughter, Dabney. Visiting is 9 yr. old Laura McRaven, daughter of the recently deceased Annie Laurie Fairchild. She arrives by train, having traveled from Jackson by herself, and tries to fit into this boisterous family who all talk at once and seldom hear what anyone else is saying. They're kind, but not what we would call emotionally present. 

They seem a happy family, and think of themselves that way, but in occasional moments of solitude they question themselves and one another.  There is little time, or inclination really, for introspection and any doubt or sadness that rises is soon dismissed again in the busyness of everyday life. This quote says it all: "Now he was dancing, even a little drunk she believed - this was a time for celebration, or regret, not for talk, not ever for talk." This happy family, celebrating a happy occasion, left me sad. 

There were so many characters it took me a while to sort them out. There's the main Fairchild family, the father's brothers and sisters and their families, the servants, and a number of dead relatives who are referred to enough that you have to know where they fit. As I do with a lot of books now, I made a list to keep them straight and remind me how they were all related. Still, at the end I was left with questions. Why did daughter, Shelley, refer to her parents as both Mama & Papa and Aunt Ellen & Uncle Battle? Why is cousin Mary Denis' little girl called Lady Clare? And why is Aunt Jim Allen called Jim Allen? 

Most of the characters were interesting enough, though not terribly likeable. They seemed shallow people who thought mostly of themselves, with very few showing any evidence of a more thoughtful, inner life. Connections with each other were formed more from habit and history than from any deep feeling for one another, which I suspect is true of many families, even most. Cynical perhaps, but it's what I've seen; most of the deeply connected and loving families I've encountered are in books or on tv.  

But I digress. I enjoyed reading the first half of this book, then in the latter part I began to wish it would hurry up and come to an end. I grew tired of their easy dismissal of one another, but was also disappointed in myself for not getting more from the book. This is my first of Eudora Welty's and it came highly recommended as her best, so I'll attempt one more and try to do better. 

Heat Wave

Heat Wave by Penelope Lively

A novel of perception, subtle, quiet, and deeply moving. Tension mounts through restrained dialogue, wordless eye contact, and the  perfectly articulated thoughts of the narrator.

The story is simple: a mother watching her son-in-law stray from his marriage to her daughter in much the same way her own husband had been faithless to her. But what happens on the surface is only the ten percent of the iceberg that is visible; it's what doesn't get addressed that creates a taut undercurrent of tension running though every page, and that's the brilliance of this book and of Penelope Lively. Her acute observations are elegantly understated while pin-point sharp. 

I've read two others of hers, The Photograph and Judgement Day, and both have the same quiet eloquence and keen insight. This one, though, is something else; it should be studied in writing courses. I really have to read the rest of her books now.   

Very, very good reading.

Devorgilla Days

 Devorgilla Days by Kathleen Hart

The journal of a woman who has suffered more than most and found help and healing in a remote Scottish town. Wigtown and its people (Devorgilla is her cottage, named after a fierce Scottish princess) gave her time and space to process all that had happened to her and to transition from an invalid to a vibrant woman living life on her terms. What she went through with her health and all the repercussions from that is unthinkable; it's incredible that she survived it at all, let alone to thrive the way she does now.

I loved this book. Her candor is refreshing, and her descriptions of life in rural Scotland - the way people took her in, the countryside, the flora, the lochs, the forests - I want to be there. I am homesick for a place I've never been. 

Read this one. 

Judgement Day

 Judgement Day by Penelope Lively

In the quiet English village of Laddenham, Clare Paling is trying to settle into a new lifestyle. Her husband's career made this a favourable move for their family but it's left her rather at loose ends. In the local church, examining a medieval work of art depicting judgement day, Clare, avowed atheist, meets the Vicar, a man wavering in his faith who is both oddly attracted to and annoyed by the new neighbour. 

Besides Clare and the Vicar, two other characters stand out. One is Stanley, a retired veteran and now churchwarden, a sullen man who has lived alone for many years after losing his wife and child in a freak accident. The other is Martin, a neglected teenage boy in a fragile family situation. Circumstances lead to Martin being in Stanley's care for a time, which sees both of them begin to heal, until...

It's a straightforward plot with a rumbling undercurrent of tension that reveals more than the words do and asks some weighty questions about life. How much is choice, or chance? And why struggle with choices at all if life is ultimately uncertain and often cruel? 

An easy read, but by no means a light one.  

Ellen Foster and Table For Two

 Ellen Foster by Kaye Gibbons

A short novel - 126 pages in my copy - with a lot of heart. Nine year old Ellen is someone you simply must meet. Living in circumstances too hard for any child, she faces them head on with pluck and humour, and breath-taking honesty. Seeing life through Ellen's eyes is an experience you shouldn't miss. It's heart-breaking, and heart-warming, and altogether wonderful. You will love her.   

Table For Two by Amor Towles

Amor Towles is such a good writer - A Gentleman in Moscow was radiant - but the stories in this collection didn't appeal to me. I don't seem to have much luck with short stories, I think because I don't get to know the characters as well as I'd like before we're on to a new group of people, and I always want to know more than a short story has room to tell. I did like a couple of these stories, but the plot of the last one just wasn't my cup of tea and it was the longest by far. I could still appreciate the crafting of it though, to the point where I feel a little guilty about not liking it. The fault is with the reader, not the writer.

Changing Our Mind

 Changing Our Mind by David P. Gushee

As with Why Not Women I'll begin by saying I am not a Biblical scholar, nor have I done extensive personal study of the Bible's stance on same-sex marriage. I've always taken a few verses at face value and drawn my conclusions from those, which was comfortable because most of the people I know had come to the same conclusions, and if a question was raised those verses seemed to clearly answer it. 

Recently I've been challenged to at least consider other viewpoints, not to change my beliefs but simply to listen to those who have drawn other conclusions from what the Bible says. And so I read Changing Our Mind, praying to not be swayed from the truth by fine-sounding arguments. (Col. 2:4). I want to know and believe the truth, whatever it may be. 

It was well written and thorough in its explanations, but when I came to the end of it a lot of things still weren't clear to me. Then I read the section at the back entitled "Response to Critics", where the author talked about things I'd never before considered. I'm still not sure where I stand on every question, but my perspective has been changed. I won't go into a lot of detail because I think it's better for each one to read it and think through it themselves, but when he asked us to look at the situation in light of other, similar issues we once took a firm stance on and have now reconsidered, I found wisdom - truth - in that and it has helped me in thinking about this. There's simply no getting around the fact that we have changed our position on other issues: women going to church with their heads uncovered, women speaking in church, divorced couples being accepted into membership, and divorced people being accepted as pastors. 

If after prayer and study we find ourselves still unable to accept same-sex marriage within the church - and we must each heed our own conscience - we can find Biblical encouragement to love and treat with dignity those who do. The bottom line for Christians is always love, for it is the way of Christ.  

After I've had some time to digest all I've read in this book, I'll read it again to see if I can get a little more clarity on things I'm still unsure about. He presents an honest challenge, not for those looking to back-up what they already believe, but for those of us who are sincerely conflicted about this issue. If that's you, Changing Our Mind might be of help.

Sleeping Murder and 7 Mondays

 Sleeping Murder by Agatha Christie

Miss Marple takes on an eighteen year old mystery when a young woman, Glenda, has unnerving flashbacks after moving into the house where she lived as a child. Her father's young wife disappeared years ago and was rumored to have run off with another man, but her husband believed himself guilty of murdering her and Glenda has had a brief flashback of a dead body on the front hall floor. Glenda and her husband, alarmed but intrigued, are happy to have Miss Marple's assistance with a quiet investigation into who knew what and when, and how it all fits together. 

I'm afraid didn't find it particularly interesting, but I do like the Miss Marple stories generally. This was a bit flat, with a lot of repetitive conversations and characters who weren't quite likeable. Not one of the better ones.       

7 Mondays by Students of Mount A. University

This is Vol. 27 of a journal showcasing literary and photographic art by students of Mount Allison University in Sackville, N.B. I haven't read any of the previous volumes, in fact I didn't know of their existence, but I was kindly given this one by a friend and found it interesting. I'm not an avid fan of modern poetry - I can seldom unravel the cryptic language to get to the message beneath - but there were some interesting ones here. 

One in particular called Dear Mr. Irving is addressed to the family of mill owners cutting down our New Brunswick forests. In it the narrator, a tree, reminds them that we need trees to cleanse the air and help us breathe, and warns what the consequences might be if too many are lost. It makes a good point, but I know too little about the situation to know if the scenario suggested is a real possibility. I've read about the Irving company re-planting trees and working at forest management, but how effective those efforts are against what is being taken from the forests I don't know. 

Again, I didn't understand some of these poems, but I am glad the students have the opportunity to put their art out there. Poetry often doesn't get a fighting chance, so it's nice to see it still being written and read.

A Quiet Life

 A Quiet Life by Ethan Joella

A Quiet Life is a gentle, but affecting story of three grieving people whose lives, intersecting in quite ordinary ways, are profoundly changed when they let the others in.

Ella waits anxiously to hear from the police any word on her little girl's whereabouts after she was pulled from school and taken away by her father months ago. Now living in a run-down apartment because she couldn't afford to keep their home without her husband's income, she works one job at a bridal salon, and another delivering newspapers in the early morning hours to make ends meet.

Chuck is one of her delivery customers. She sees his light on early every morning and wonders about him and why he isn't sleeping at this hour. Inside, Chuck is drowning in grief over the loss of his beloved wife, can't sleep, and can't work out how to live without her.

Kersten works at Rescue Ranch, taking care of the animals, arranging adoptions and managing the office. She stays busy, but none of it fills the emptiness caused by the loss of her father eight months prior, killed in a gas station shooting, a bystander in the wrong place at the wrong time. I'm writing this some weeks after reading it and can't quite remember how she is connected to the others but it does all make sense when you read it. 

This was a hopeful story with characters who felt real and drew an emotional response, mostly. I didn't quite understand Kerstin, but it takes all kinds to make a world, even a fictional one. As the title suggests, it's a story of three people quietly struggling to find a way to carry on when it seems impossible. What goes on in their heads and their hearts as they find their way, together and individually, back to living again is what good stories are made of. 

A very nice read.  

Kubrick's Game

Kubrick's Game by Derek Taylor Kent

It's been a while since I've read a page-turner and I forgot how much fun they are. This was exciting, if slightly baffling in spots.

15 years after Stanley Kubrik's death, several students at different film schools receive a letter from him with a cryptic message they must decipher. Once they do, it leads to a further clue and then another, with increasingly difficult challenges that will test their knowledge, deductive capabilities, and physical and mental courage.  

Deciphering the messages involves many hours of watching Kubrick's movies, searching for hidden symbols or connections to other movies and then racing to whatever location those things reveal before competing teams get there. It's quite a complex game that I could more or less follow, until close to the end where I got completely lost for several pages. After that it sorts itself out as the game wraps up and comes to a not totally unexpected, reasonably satisfying, ending.

It left me with questions, but then page-turners are all about action-packed plots, not tying up details. This plot is pretty wild, taking turns that elicited a number of right-out-loud "Yikes!". The main character is Shaun, an 18 year old film-wiz on the autism spectrum, whose straightforward manner and difficulty relating to people endeared himself to me right from the start. Some of the others, though interesting, are written with less depth and so are less relatable.  But again, this one is about plot.

I learned a good deal more about Stanley Kubrick's movies than I ever knew before, which you'd think would have tempted me to watch or re-watch some of them, but no. He was brilliant and made movies chock full of symbolism and other tricks to send your brain into overdrive, but with this book I think I've had my fill, for now anyway. His most recognizable titles are Spartacus, Lolita, Dr. Strangelove, 2001: A Space Odyssey, A Clockwork Orange, The Shining, Full Metal Jacket, and Eyes Wide Shut, all of which are used within the game. You don't need to be familiar with them to enjoy the book, but if I was to read it again I'd watch 2001: A Space Odyssey and A Clockwork Orange first.

O Come Ye Back to Ireland - Our First Year in County Clare

O Come Ye Back To Ireland by Niall Williams and Christine Breen

Travel memoirs are some of my favourite books, especially those about moving to a distant place, full of observations about the new country and the people and way of life there. I've come across very few that weren't wonderfully entertaining. 

Niall had lived in Ireland as a child, and Christine's family had history there as well. Uprooting from New York and settling in rural Ireland would be a dramatic change of lifestyle, but to both it felt like "going home" in some ways. On arrival the practicalities of life were quick to displace any romantic idea of country life they'd carried with them, but through all the ups and downs - and there were such downs -  their determination and the generous help of their salt-of-the-earth neighbours, carried them through.

From learning how to cut peat for their winter's fuel, dancing at a ceilidh and starting a local theater group, to raising (and having to slaughter) their own chickens, they paint a picture of Irish country living that made me alternatively envious and dismayed. But, oh, the wonderful people. You could live anywhere and face anything with good-hearted people like that around you.  

Persistent heavy rain and fog darkened their first summer (the worst summer in decades, the radio told them), and I admit to finding those chapters of rain after rain after rain a bit tedious in the reading, at the same time feeling guilty for even thinking that. I had only to read it while they suffered real hardship that summer. The only excuse I can offer is that similar dreary conditions outside my own window the entire time I was reading this book had me longing for sunshine somewhere.  

I did enjoy spending this time among the lovely people and places I've always wanted to visit. Though my travel book shelf is already crammed and I have to be picky about what can stay and what must go, this one will stay.

Demon Copperhead and Wuthering Heights

 Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver

This is a contemporary re-telling of Charles Dickens' David Copperfield, with many parallels to the original but told with so much swearing and salacious language that it got tiring. I have a reasonably high tolerance for vulgarity, probably higher than it should be, but this one is a bit much. I've always found good writers able to get their point across without resorting to detailed descriptions of sex and constant cursing. Barbara Kingsolver is an excellent writer, and as a member of my book club put it, “She’s better than this.” I’ve heard the argument that such language makes the story realistic, and maybe it does, though I’m sure people in Dickens’ time swore like sailors and he made David Copperfield painfully realistic without it.   

Demon’s story is heart-wrenching for sure, and a tragic picture of what kids in the foster system can endure. The story is great, I just got tired of the cursing and sex talk. Call me old-fashioned – I’ll take it as a compliment – but I don’t like my reading this gritty. Life is more than gritty enough as it is.

 

Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte

I read this years ago and remembered it for its good writing and dark tone. Lately it’s become quite popular again – or maybe it always has been and I just haven’t been paying attention – and I’m hearing people say what a beautiful story of romance it is, it’s their favourite book, they read it every year, etc. My memory of it was so completely different I thought I’d better read it again.

 I am completely baffled. Where is the romance, the beauty? Catherine and Heathcliff are in love, yes, but it’s more of a selfish obsession than anything. They are both awful people who do awful things to everyone but each other. His cruelty and abuse of others would land him in prison today. 

There are a few romantic (when taken out of context) quotes, but only a few, and everything in between is great writing of a horrible story. How anyone can see it as a beautiful love story or want to read it every year is beyond me. But, then, many things are beyond me, and isn't it our differences that make people, and life, and reading so interesting?

 "In literature as in love it is astonishing what is chosen by others." 

  Andre Maurois

The Null Prophecy

 The Null Prophecy by Michael Guillen

A science fiction novel with an interesting premise but  characters who come across as not quite real.

Scientists are predicting the sun will soon experience a solar storm so intense the EMP will cause blackouts, damage to technological infrastructure, and even disruption of essential services. But it gets worse...with large gaps now in the earth's magnetosphere, certain spots around the globe are unprotected and could suffer horrible loss of life and property. (I didn't check the science on any of this, just accepted it as a reasonably credible scenario for disaster. Have no idea if it actually is.) 

There are skeptics who deny it all and insist there is no danger, but others who believe it a such a momentous event that it will herald no less than the Second Coming of Christ. One man, who believes himself responsible for the damage to the earth's magnetic shield, hopes he and his super-powerful new machine/boat/thing, which he's named "Hero", can save the day. He can't stop the sun from erupting, but just maybe, he, with the help of an intrepid reporter and her unwavering faith, can at least limit the damage.

This book's dramatic style of dialogue sometimes made me think of tv shows from the 50s and 60s, shows like The Twilight Zone or Outer Limits, not a bad thing at all. They were good shows. But in places it felt forced, and the characters lacked relatability, never developing into more than made-up people in a story.

It builds tension with each chapter heading counting down the days and hours left, so I had to finish it to see how it would end, but with writing that is mediocre at best I can't say it's a great book, just not bad.