Do you ever go back over your old reviews. One pleasure of running Dakota's Favorites is getting the chance to rediscover books I read, loved and have since forgotten about. The Lost Boy by Thomas Wolfe is one. I never would have read it all if it weren't for The Novella Challenge and would have forgotten it completely if not for keeping this blog and running Dakota's Favorites twice a month. Go back and look over your old reviews sometime. You may find a few forgotten gems.
The Lost Boy, a novella by Thomas Wolfe is a surprising gem of a story. A fictionalized portrait of the author's elder brother, Grover, who died of typhoid fever at age twelve, the novella consists of four parts each told from a different point of view. The first is a third person narrative that presents an important afternoon in Grover's life. We see him at home, roaming around the town square, going from shop to shop. He builds up his nerve and purchases 15 cents worth of fudge from the stingy candy shop owner who is angered that Grover pays him in stamps and insists on keeping three one cent stamps the boy mistakenly gave him. Afriad that the store keeper will accuse him of stealing the stamps, he confesses to his father who takes dramatic action to correct the situation.
The second and third parts look at Grover from the point of view of his mother, who has always held that Grover was the smartest of her children, and his sister, who can't quite believe that the author does not remember Grover more than he does. The interesting story here is that of the mother. She relates the tale of a train ride from St. Louis to Indiana and how proud she is that her son insists a black man return to the proper passenger car once they enter Indiana even though Jim Crow laws do not apply there. This part of the novella was excised by Wolfe's editors in early editions, but I'd have to support it's inclusion in this version. Wolfe is telling it like it was, showing us that his mother's belief that Grover was the best of her children is wrapped up in the prejudices they shared. It's not a flattering portrait but it does help explain why she felt his loss so deeply.
It's in the final part of the novel, a largely first person account of the author/narrator's attempt to visit the St. Louis house his family lived in and his brother Grover died in, that the particular power of this novella and Wolfe's writing comes to fruition. That you can't go home again comes as no surprise to any fan of Thomas Wolfe, but no one portrays that particular sense of loss as well as he does. In The Lost Boy we not only morn the passing of the world and people of our youth, we morn a particular loss, a particular person. It's not just the sometimes vague, sometimes tangible sense that something has passed out of our lives forever, there really is someone missing this time.
I found The Lost Boy by Thomas Wolfe compelling, touching and haunting. I'm giving it five out of five stars.
God* comes to you and tells you that, from this day forward, you may only read ONE type of book–one genre–period, but you get to choose what it is. Classics, Science-Fiction, Mystery, Romance, Cookbooks, History, Business … you can choose, but you only get ONE.
What genre do you pick, and why?
Talk about moving in mysterious ways......
My initial gut reaction is to select classics. Most classics are classic for a reason, so a certain level of literary quality is guaranteed. But at this point in my life, I've already read most of the classics I want to read. There are many I'd like to re-read someday, but if God decides otherwise, I can take comfort in knowing I got to read them all once.
I'd hate to never get my hands on another good detective novel or espionage thriller, and I do like to dabble in science fiction and fantasy now and then. I read Young Adult novels for work, but I've grown to enjoy them, so much so that I read lots of books I know I could never use with my seventh graders.
I've two main concerns with this choice: one that I'd read all the good stuff in the genre and then be forced to choose from a lot of mediocre leftovers and two that I'd never get to read anything new again. The thing I'd miss most, if I chose classics, is never getting to read about my own life and times. Classics, in general, do not address the experience of gay and lesbian people. You can find us in classic literature here and there, if you're willing to look, but you'll have to look pretty hard after a while. (There are many other groups of people excluded from "classics" whom I'd miss reading about as well.)
So I'm going to choose "contemporary classics" as my genre. I'd include books by David Leavitt, Armistead Maupin, Wallace Stegner, Salmon Rushdie, Carol Shields, Iris Murdoch, etc. These books have not stood the "test of time" but they have stood the "test of a decade or two" so I can be reasonably assured of their quality. While they don't speak to "today" they do speak to the "day before yesterday" which is a compromise I think I could live with.
But let's pray we never have to really make this choice.
Opening line to The Painted Veil by Somerset Maugham
This is the meanest book I've read in a long time.
The Painted Veil opens with a husband arriving home early to find his wife, Kitty, the main character, in bed with his boss. He does not confront the two lovers, but he later forces Kitty to either leave Hong Kong with him for the remote, Cholera ridden town of Mei-tan-fu or convince her lover to marry him otherwise he will file for divorce causing a great scandal.. She's completely wrong about her lover who won't leave his wife, won't risk his position, and is happy to send her off with her husband to Mei-tan-fu though everyone knows she could easily die of Cholera if she goes along. In fact, that's why her husband wants her to go with him in the first place, a sort of murder suicide.
The section in Mei-tan-fu reminded me of Thomas Mann's Death in Venice. The whole novel has a static atmosphere. Everyone seems to be removed from time and the world around them. In the early chapters, set among the British nationals who live and work in 1920's Hong Kong, there's a constant feeling that the season is long over and everyone should be going back home. This feeling is much stronger in Mei-tan-fu. That Mei-tan-fu is suffering a Cholera outbreak adds an additional echo to Death in Venice. I imagine Mr. Maugham must have at lease heard of Death in Venice if not read it. The two novels share a tonal atmosphere, though their stories are quite different.
I had many problems with The Painted Veil. First, some of the dialogue is just not to be believed. I can accept that the characters are the way they are and treat each other the way they do, but, oh, do they say "oh" a lot. There are several scenes that would be difficult to read out loud without laughing and a few points when characters openly preach. Waddington, the white man with a Manchu wife who lives in Mei-tan-fu, gives the main character a little lecture on Tao and the Mother Superior who runs the orphanage in Mei-tan-fu gives Kitty several homilies about duty and faith.
The nuns Kitty works with in Mei-tan-fu are presented as truly devote with no sense of irony on the narrator's part what-so-ever. I've the feeling that Mr. Maugham was a devout Catholic because there is no reason for Kitty or for the reader to ever doubt the sincere intentions of the nuns, nor of the rightness of their actions. Of the seven original nuns who went to Mei-tan-fu from France, only three survive by the time Kitty arrives. One of these is the mother superior who left a very wealthy family back in France, one with several chateaux.
Lastly, Kitty experiences the most profound character growth I've ever witnessed in a novel. She begins as an empty headed party girl who played around with men's hearts until she was too old to make a good marriage. She marries Walter, whom she knows she will never love, because her younger sister is about to marry a Baron. She cheats on Walter frivolously the first chance she gets and falls in love with a man as emotionally bankrupt as she is. But once she is in Mei-tan-fu where she is the only white woman who is not a nun, she has a series of epiphanies. She sees herself and Walter for what they both are, understands how meaningless her own life has become, recognizes that there is not a single person in the world who really cares if she lives or dies, and falls under the spell of the nuns and their Catholic sense of duty and Mr. Waddington's Taoist acceptance of whatever comes along. All of this leaves her much more ready to accept the traditional role of wife/mother than she ever was.
Much of this would be hard to take, much of it should be hard to take, but The Painted Veil is a clear case of whole being greater than the sum of its parts. I recognize all of the novel's flaws, and I'll argue they are actual flaws, but in spite of them, the book is a powerful one. Kitty Fane is a character who'll stay with me for a while. While this book is a B+ book, I expect it will end up on my best reads of 2010 list.
I loved it.
The movie not so much.
I don't expect filmmakers to be totally faithful to the book. A book with as many flaws as The Painted Veil could surely use some improving. But the changes made for the Edward Norton/Naomi Watts 2006 film somehow created a whole that was less than the sum of its parts.
The 2006 movie makes Walter Fane a hero, expanding his "on-screen" time, placing his story in the midst of China's 1925 Nationalist Movement, expanding the depiction of his work fighting Cholera. While the novel is focused entirely on Kitty Fane and ends with her firmly replace back within the framework of what a traditional good woman should be, the 2006 movie goes for a more feminist tone, removing most of the religion from the story, cutting down the Mother Superior role to almost a cameo and making Waddington's "wife" into more of a devoted mistress and Waddington into something of an opium eater. All of this takes what was a very quick read and makes it a 128 minute marathon. I confess, I was hitting the fast forward button a few times towards the end.
There is, however, lots of gratuitous scenery, and it is very beautiful. Here is the trailer.
My book club meets later today to discuss Caucasia by Danzy Senna, my choice. I hope everyone liked it. I don't like this whole idea of taking turns with choices. It's nice that everyone gets a turn and all, but it's just too much pressure. I think it was better when everyone brought in a book or two and we all reached a consensus. But it's not up to me.
I'm in the middle of three books at the moment. I started Let the Great World Spin by Colum McCann, selected from my ARC pile. The opening section is a wonderful depiction of the day in 1974 when tightrope walker Philip Pettit walked across the Twin Towers in New York City. I lived in San Francisco for just over 10 years, and while I never saw anything as amazing as that, I do know what it's like to be in a crowd of city dwellers when something wonderful and spontaneous happens. I think that's why so many of us chose to live in big cities. One reason at least, that communal feeling that I've not found in the suburbs. Let the Great World Spin then moves on to the story of two Irish brothers. I expect it will get back to New York City, August 1974 by the end of the book.
I think this book would make an excellent Book/Movie Challenge selection in tandem with Man on a Wire. If you've not seen Man on a Wire, the documentary about Philip Pettit you should. It's wonderful. Preview below.
I'm doing some prep-work for my upcoming summer at Yale studying Chaucer. We're not required to do any reading ahead of time but the professor in charge did recommend two books, The Making of the Middle Ages and The Waning of the Middle Ages. Both are classic works of history. I'm in the middle of The Making of the Middle Ages by R.W. Southern at the moment. It's very interesting, not at all dry as I feared it would be. Mr. Southern gives the big picture overview of how things in Medieval Europe came to be the way they were. I've learned several things already. His chapter on the church's struggle to assert its independence from the nobility is especially good.
But the book I've found myself unable to stop reading is Company of Liars by Karen Maitland. This is historical fiction, but the kind I like. I don't like historical fiction that deals with major figures of the time. I find the idea of making someone like King Henry VIII the subject of a novel, portraying his interior life and claiming to know what really happened, suspect. But Company of Liars is about a group of ordinary people, no one famous in the bunch. A group of nine strangers band together to try and flee the Black Plague as it spreads across England in the mid-14th century. Each one is keeping a deadly secret from the others. I'm loving it. Yesterday I read almost 300 pages.
I read three very funny Grace Paley short stories this week all from The Collected Stories. All three were unexpected. All three were fun.
In "The Loudest Voice" the local grammar school presents its annual Christmas pagent. This year young Shirley Abramowitz will get the leading role, because she has the loudest voice. Her Jewish mother is horrified to find her daughter starring in a Christmas pagent. Her Jewish father thinks it's nice that all the children will learn the culture of their new home. The rest of the local Jewish community is divided, but they all attend the show, proud parents that they are.
In "The Contest" a man who never married, what with one thing and another, is reunited with a girl he liked in high school. She wants him to help her make some real money by entering a newspaper contest the local Yiddish paper is holding. For the contest they have to identify three Jews in the News based on only the vague hints the paper prints each day. Every day for several weeks, the two meet and review that day's clues. The prize is 5000 dollars and a trip for two to Isreal and three of the major capitols in the Free West. But they can only go together if they are married.
"An Interest in Life" opens with a man leaving his wife, Virginia, and their four children. Afterwards, Virginia has to deal with her neighbors, her family, the welfare people. It all leaves her feeling a bit lonely. Every Thursday, John Raftery comes to visit his mother who lives in the same building Virginia does. His mother insists that he meet her and soon the two are meeting every Thursday. Virginia suspects her husband will never come back home, but he is hesitant to take her relationship with John to a more physical level. John is great with her children, good to her, probably falling in love her. What's a mother to do?
I honestly expected Grace Paley stories to be stodgy. I thought they'd be hard work. Instead, I've found that they are great fun. Her characters are funny, her stories take the reader in unexpected directions, even when the premise is cliched like it is in "An Interest in Life." Her writing is a hoot. Some examples:
From "The Loudest Voice" Marty's father said: "You know, he has a very important part, my boy." "Mine also," said Mr. Sauerfeld. "Not my boy!" said Mrs. Klieg. "I said to him no. The answer is no. When I say no! I mean no!" The rabbi's wife said, "It's disgusting!" but no one listened to her. Under the narrow sky of God's great wisdom she wore a strawberry-blond wig.
From "The Contest" Up early or late, it never matters, the day gets away from me. Summer or winter, the shade of trees or their hard shadow, I never get into my Rice Krispies til noon. I am ambitious, but it's a long-range thing with me. I have my confidential sights on a star, but there's half a lifetime to get to it. Meanwhile I keep my eyes open and am well dressed.
From "An Interest in Life" "Don't be so cruel on yourself, Ginny," he said. "Children come from God." "You're still great on holy subjects, aren't you? You know damn well where children come from." He did know. His red face reddened further. John Raftery has had that color coming out on him boy and man from keeping his rages so inward.
This morning the most extraordinary opportunity has walked out of the forest and into my life.
Opening to Wild Boy by Jill Dawson.
On January 8, 1800, a wild boy emerged from the French forest of Aveyron. He had been spotted several times, and twice captured over several years, but he had always escaped before. Apparently deaf, unable to speak, bearing scars that told of an abusive history, the boy, christened Victor, eventually ended up in the home of a young medical student Jean Marc Gaspard Itard where he was cared for by Dr. Itard's housekeeper Madame Guerin. Though he worked with Victor intensively for many years, Dr. Itard was never able to teach the boy more than two words: milk and oh, God.
From this history, Jill Dawson builds her captivating novel Wild Boy. Ms. Dawson places Dr. Itard and Madame Guerin in Parisian school for the deaf. The doctor is only 27 when he first meets Victor. Young, inexperienced, shy to a fault, a stutterer, the doctor is almost incapable of functioning in the society outside the school for the deaf where he works. Madame Guerin lives in the school with her ailing husband. Her grown daughter works there as a nurse but is not allowed to live with her mother and father. Dr. Itard places Victor in Madame Guerin's care, moving him into the apartment she shares with her husband.
Dr. Itard, Madame Guerin and Victor form an unlikely triangle of characters. They each share the narration of Wild Boy, providing alternate views on the nove'ls action. Dr. Itard is caught up in the high minded idealism of his time. To him Victor represents an opportunity to prove philosophical ideas. Victor is man in his natural state. Whether or not he can be civilizaed and just how that process will affect him could prove whether or not the Enlightenments theories about man's natural state are correct. Rosseau believed man in nature would be a noble savage, gentle and innocent, inacapable of guile, desirous of solitude. Dr. Itard hopes to prove these ideas, but he must first prove that Victor is not an 'idiot' as many others believe.
Madam Guerin brings the novel down to earth, hard. She has no interest in high minded theories. She must take care of an uncontrollable child. One who does not respond to words or commands of any kind, one who attempts to run outside at every turn and refuses to eat anything but milk and beans. These two alternating first person narrations are interrupted by Victor's story, told in third person. While the adults around him argue theory vs. pragmatism, Victor longs for a return to the forest, to the simple joy he found running in new fallen snow.
From a modern perspective, it is clear that Victor has a severe form of autism. Madame Guerin and Dr. Itard complain that the boy does not look them in the eye, will not bond with either of them. Dr. Itard believes this is brought on by his childhood spent alone in the forest. Over their years together, Victor does repond to both Dr. Itard and Madame Guerin, but he never becomes the civilized man so many hoped he would.
What is most interesting and most admirable about Wild Boy is the way Ms. Dawson uses her two narrators to illuminate Victor's situation. In one scene, Dr. Itard takes Victor to a high society dinner at the invitation of the most beautiful woman in Paris. Victor is clearly out of place. Before the dinner is over he has taken off most of his clothes, climbed up a tree and refused to come down. But Dr. Itard, in his own way, is just as misplaced. Painfully aware of his shyness and his stutter, he is unable to engage the dinner party in the conversation they expect, unable to flirt, unable to debate. He is certainly shocked by Victor's behavior but he is just as shocked by the dinner guests's and by the fact that they are not offended by Victor. Dr. Itard is drawn to Madame Guerin's daughter but he is so awkward around her that he offends her several times, spoiling what could have been a relationship that led to marriage. In the end, he is less capable of showing his affection than Victor is, condemned to live alone. His tragedy is that he knows this.
Madame Guerin brings the trauma of the French Revolution into the novel. She lost her only son to it. He was only five years old at the time and already exhibiting signs that he was a child like Victor. She later participated in the excesses of The Terror; something she looks back on now with great shame. She views Victor as a second chance, an opportunity to redeem herself for what happened to her son and for what she did during The Terror.
This is all conjecture on the part of Ms. Dawson. Little is known of Dr. Itard's personal life. Madame Guerin is only briefly mentioned here and there so much less is known of hers. Nothing is known of how Victor came to be living in the Forest of Aveyron. Diagnosing him as autistic seems reasonable, but there is no way to know with certainty. However by just a few pages into Wild Boy none of this matters. The story is so fascinating, Ms. Dawson's characters so compelling, her book so well written that the reader is drawn into the book certain that everything in it is true.
Full Disclosure: The pictures of Victor and of Dr. Itard came from Wikipedia. As far as I know, no pictures of Madame Guerin exist.
Earlier this week Farm Lane Books caused quite a stir with a post comparing bloggers in the United States with bloggers in the United Kingdom. If you're not a regular FarmLaneBooks reader you can find the post here. You should also consider becoming a regular reader; FarmLaneBooks is a terrific blog. The post generated close to 300 comments, which I think may be the record for a book blog.
I'm not going to wade into the UK vs. USA fray because enough has been said in the comments at Farm Lane Books. Some of it not very nicely. I will say that I found myself becoming more and more defensive as I read the comments because so many of the "complaints" against US blogs were about things I enjoy doing. Things like reading challenges and giveaways and author interviews. The whole thing left me feeling a little bit snarky.
So, in the spirit of snark, I thought it would be fun to do everything the commenters disliked about American blogs for today's Sunday Salon.
It takes the form of a meme.
Do you participate in memes? Not so much. Just Booking Through Thursday now and then. I look forward to reading the Monday Movie Meme at The Bumbles and I often enjoy the Great Wednesday Compare at The Book Mine Set. If you're starting out as a book blogger, I think memes are an excellent way to find other bloggers and to get other bloggers to find you. Long live the meme! Pass it on!
Do you participate in Book Tours? What about ARCS? If participating in a book tour is good enough for Oprah Winfrey, then it's good enough for me. Who am I to question Oprah? It took me over a year to get my first Advanced Review Copy and I can honestly say I hated it. But Benediction, one of my recent favorite books, was an advanced review copy. I think book blogs are still at the bottom of the publicity food chain, so few of us get ARC's of top tier literature. If we did, it would be a different story. Maybe someday. I hear Oprah is retiring....
Do you encourage followers? Do you follow? If I like a blog and it reviews the sort of books I like, I click the little follower button. Last month I got my 100th follower. I was excited-- I admit it. I did a little happy dance at my computer terminal. Gave Dakota an extra dog treat. I like followers. So, if you are not a follower of Ready When You Are, C.B., please consider becoming one today.
What do you think of giveaways and other contests? I held my very first giveaway because Eva at A Striped Armchair said they would help me get more readers. (If you're not reading Eva's blog you really should. She reads more than just about anyone out there. And if she hadn't posted a link to my first giveaway on her blog, noboday would have heard of it and I'd still have the book.) I like giving books away. It's fun and it puts me in a good mood. And my local post office is across the street from my local library. Sometimes I give away large stacks of books. I can't always afford to open giveaways up to the entire world , but I have sent prizes to Italy and to India as well as to Canada and the United Kingdom. If I had more money, I'd give away more books. I'd also travel more. And maybe buy a pony.
Do you read and/or conduct author interviews? I've written about this before. Basically, I enjoy doing interviews, though I know most people don't read them. I think they are lots of fun to do and everyone should do one even if none of us read it. Don't we all say we blog for our own amusement? Pick an author you really like and send them an email. Ask for an interview. I promise to read it.
Do you enjoy challenges? I'm running one this year, the Read the Book, See the Movie Challenge. I enjoy challenges. Because of them, I've read lots of very good books that I would not have read otherwise. I've also won a few prizes. So--fun, good books, prizes. Aren't Americans awful!
Do you like giving/getting awards? I was very pleased to get my first award. I thought it was kind of a big deal. I was very happy to be nominated for a Book Bloggers Appreciation Week award last year and hope I get a nomination again this year. Just not for snarkiest blogger.
What is your opinion of cat videos? I don't have anything against cat videos, but apparently there is a lot of animus against them overseas. I post videos of my dog Dakota here regularly and will continue to do so no matter what the whole world says. Dakota and I are rebels. Back when were fostering Bruno, we made a cat video. I've posted it below.
Be warned, the video below is a cat video. It features a fully grown Basset hound chasing a tiny kitten around as he walks under her. It's insanely cute. And apparently very American.
Okay. I feel much better now.
Full Disclosure: The photograph of the two flags comes from the British Broadcasting Company. So did The Benny Hill Show and The Weakest Link.
This year is the first one in many that I have not taught Alice's Adventures In Wonderland. I've no clear reason why, I just decided to give the book a break this year. I expect I may add it back to the reading list in the fall, though. I've missed it. The following review first ran back in March of 2008.
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll has become an annual rite for me. I've been reading it with one of my classes for several years now and while the students reaction to it runs hot and cold, I've grown more and more fond of it over time. I've even been accused of being obsessed with it.
I suppose everyone knows the story by now, along with most of the commentary on it, so what can I possibly add to the discussion? Each time I read a great book I find something new in it, some new way to read it. This time around what struck me is how clearly Alice grows throughout the story, how she comes to take charge of Wonderland, and by doing so, of her dreams. This is not a new interpretation, just the one that stood out this time around.
Initially, Alice is completely perplexed by the creatures that she meets in Wonderland, unable to determine what to make of them or even how to interact with them. Everything she says is taken as rude, threatening, or stupid and the other characters do not hesitate to let her know what they think of her. Alice begins to doubt herself, to remain silent rather than to risk offense. But once the trial sequence begins and Alice starts to physically grow back to her full height, she realizes that there is no reason to fear the creatures in Wonderland, they are just a pack of cards after all. (By the end of the second book, she will be queen of Wonderland.)
I've long held that Lewis Carroll is writing a commentary on how children see the adults around them and how they interact with them. At first, the adult world is frightening, full of characters that act in incomprehensible ways, talk down to children, tell them how stupid and rude their behavior is. Eventually, as the children grow, they learn how to deal with the adult world, to see through it's bluster to see that it's nothing more than a pack of cards after all. They can then become the masters of it.
Along the way, there is so much in Alice to enjoy: the wordplay that runs throughout the book, the mad characters and their crazy actions, the parodies of children's poems. What's not to like? To be honest, I think my students are both too old and too young to enjoy the book thoroughly. It's too late for them to enjoy mad characters for their own sake. They expect too much reason in their stories now, even in their fantasies. And they are not old enough to look back on the idea of childhood and appreciate the tale for it's humor and insight into how children view the world. I keep using the book year after year because I happen to have a class set and because I enjoy it so much. Maybe some of that will rub off.
In any case, once again, I'm giving Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll five out of five stars.
In general, do you prefer the beginnings of stories? Or the ends?
If you're a long time reader of this blog you probably think I'm going to say beginnings. I do start every book review with the first line of the book. I've two reasons for this--one, I genuinely like first lines and two, it helps set this blog off, gives it a sort of trade mark format. I've been doing it for several years now and I've come to enjoy it. I should do an end of the year post about the top ten first lines. Sounds like fun.
But, in all honestly, I prefer the endings. The emotional punch a novel has comes strongest at the end. A well constructed story leads to an inevitable end, but also to an unexpected one. When an ending has that twin sense to it--I never expected that/I should have known all along--I love it. Henry James does this like no one else can in his short stories.
I've long suspected that I would be the last person in America to buy a eReader. But today I saw this little video on Andrew Sullivan's Daily Dish and, well, I'm tempted. Maybe the iPad is the future of pop-up books.
Has anyone out there with an iPad bought this? Is it as much fun as it looks? Inquiring minds want to know.
I don't follow boxing, but I like reading about it. There is an inherent drama in sports, especially in boxing, that is difficult to resist. Two opponents engaged in a struggle against each other with no one to aid them, nothing but themselves to rely on. Boxing used to be something everyone in American followed, at least a little bit. At one time it was impossible to avoid. It's still a popular sport, but not like it was in the 1940's when newspapers featured daily boxing columns in their sports pages.
The Distance is a noir novel, not quite a mystery, but its noir is built on nostalgia. Throughout the book there is a longing for the old days, when there was a local boxing scene, when San Francisco had seven daily papers, when it was possible for someone with just a high school diploma and enough gumption to earn a daily column in the sports pages. Billy Nichols, the narrator of The Distance, writes a daily boxing column for the San Francisco Inquirer circa 1948. The regional boxing scene is on its last legs, about to be done in by television and it's national coverage.
Late one night Billy Nichols gets a call from boxer Hank Escanlante. Escalante, a decent fighter and a good guy, has gotten into an argument with his manager Gig Liardi. The argument ended with a single punch that dropped Liardi against a table killing him. Nichols believes Escalante is innocent of murder so he helps the fighter dispose of Liardi's body. Afterwards, Nichols returns to his job at the paper and his troubled marriage while Escalante continues his struggle to get a shot at a decent fight, one that will give him a career that can support his wife and children. Of course the body is discovered, the police become involved, things turn out to be much more complicated than Nichols believed they were. Drama ensues.
It's difficult to assign The Distance a genre. It was marketed as a detective fiction, even won several awards in this category, but there is no detective in the novel. The narrator is involved in a crime but he doesn't solve it. In fact, his goal is to find a way to get away with it. The Distance is set in the world of boxing, but there is too little actual boxing to call the book a sports novel. Only one fight is described in detail, and the day to day reality of boxing plays only a small part compared to the fiction of F.X. Toole who wrote "Million Dollar Baby." The Distance is close to being a newspaper novel, but again the hero spends too little time at the paper. The historical time and setting figure strongly in the novel, enough to call it historical fiction, but I'm not sure the late 1940's is historical enough to fit into this genre. But whatever it is, The Distance is a fine read. One that I enjoyed. There is a second Billy Nichols book called Shadow Boxer that I'll have to add to my TBR stack.
Congratulations and good morning to everyone who participated in this years Dewey's Read-a-thon. Once again, I failed to participate as much as I wanted to. Yesterday was the first day of spring break, so I have no excuses to offer in my defense. I've been lost in the Internet since buying a new laptop and have only recently reemerged and begun reading again. And I just didn't get around to signing up for the read-a-thon. Like I said last time, maybe next time.
Yesterday, C.J. and I went to the open house at the farm that grows our vegetables. For the last six months or so we've had fresh organic produce delivered to our home twice a month from Farm Fresh to You. Yesterday was their monthly open house/farm tour day so we drove up to the Capay Valley to take a look. (Capay is pronounced K-Pay.) Those of you who grew up around farms probably think we're a couple of yuppified city-folk, if only we made that much money, but we had a good time. We got to pick our own radishes and asparagus. Did you know asparagus takes three years to produce and then continues to produce for six seasons? Not something you'll catch me planting in my yard. The farm is a much bigger operation than we expected. I'd thought organic farming was more of a backyard kind of operation, but this is a full scale business with a substantial amount of acreage.
And the Capay Valley is an undiscovered gem. There are quite a few charming communities along highway 16 through the valley. We had lunch in Esparto, a town of just under 2,000 and spent the morning walking around downtown Woodlands on the way to Capay. Woodlands is a treasure trove of wonderful old Victorian houses. I was impressed.
And we beat the rain home. It's very windy outside this morning and we're all expecting more rain today, hoping it will be the last of the season. I've three books I'll be reading today. My own, private read-a-thon.
The first is The Distance by Eddie Muller. The cover says its "A Billy Nichols Novel" so I guess it's the first in a series. Billy Nichols is a reporter for the San Francisco Inquirer who has a daily boxing column in the sports section. Back in the 1940's, when the novel takes place, boxing was a regional sport as were most sports in those days. Billy Nichols becomes involved with boxer Hack Escalante's attempt to cover up the murder of Hack's manager Gig Liardi. Billy feels sorry for Hack, a boxer who never quite made the big time. He believes Hack's story that Liardi's death was accidental, caused during an argument when Hack punched him and he fell back into a table. The Distance is more of a boxing novel than it is a crime novel, but things are getting complicated, people are not what the first seemed to be, just like one would expect in a mystery set in 1940's San Francisco.
I've also started Wild Boy by Jill Dawson. There was some buzz about Wild Boy a few years ago, and I picked up a copy. I've decided to work through my TBR stack which is where Wild Boy has been sitting for almost a year. Told from multiple points of view, Wild Boy is the story of the wild child of Averyon a boy discovered living alone in the forests of France, eight years after the Revolution. The boy, aged 12 or so, could not speak and behaved as though he had never been among people before. Wild Boy begins with his arrival at a Parisian school for deaf boys where he is cared for by one of the women who works there and treated by one of the doctors. What I find most interesting so far is the contrast between these two points of view. The doctor sees his work as a noble calling and places the woman caretaker on something of a pedestal. The woman is completely worldly. The only reason she puts up with the boy at all is the hope that the doctor will provide free medical care for her husband. While the doctor raves about the slightest bit of progress the wild boy makes, the woman sees only an uncontrollable child who doesn't know how to correctly use a chamber pot.
That makes two novels that are essentially historical fiction. The third book I'm currently reading is fantasy, which I consider to be the moral equivalent of historical fiction. Stalking Darkness by Lynn Flewelling is the second book in the Nightrunner series. I'm not making any claims for greatness here. I'm just reading it for fun. The hero of the story is Seregil, a rogue thief who may be noble. He travels with his young apprentice, Alec. There's a mysterious wizard, a beautiful queen who may not be entirely trustworthy, an impending war, shadowy heritages. And the author keeps dropping hints that Seregil may be in love with Alec.
It's fun. I hope the rain keeps me indoors all day.
Plots? Or Stream-of-Consciousness? Which would you rather read?
If you pin me to the floor and force me to choose, I'll probably pick plots. But then my mind will start to wander and......
Just yesterday I was trying to choose a book from my TBR shelf. I have an old paperback copy of The Catcher in the Rye which I've been meaning to re-read since J.D. Salinger died a few months ago. I almost started reading it--it's fairly short, I know I liked it the first time around and it's a quick read. But it doesn't really have a plot. It has a plot, but not a plot plot. So I went with The Distance by Eddie Muller a detective story set in the world of 1940's San Francisco boxing.
I want to say that Danzy Senna writes about the margins of race. Does that convey what I'm thinking? Towards the end of her novel, Caucasia, several characters discuss whether or not race really exists. Is it something real, or just something society has constructed?
This question is vitally important to Birdie Lee, the narrator of Danzy Senna's novel Caucasia. Birdie's mother is white, the daughter of Boston Brahmans, born to wealth and priviledge. Her father is black, an academic and radical who teaches at Harvard. Birdie looks white like her mother. Her older sister, Cole, looks black like her father.
While Birdie is favored by their rich white grandmother who only refers to Cole as your sister, Cole is favored by their father and by many of their black family and friends. The novel is set during the fading years of the 1960's and 70's Black Power movement which both of Birdie's parents are heavily involved in. They send their daughters to an all black school with a Pan-African curriculum. In spite of her nearly white skin, Birdie is basically raised as a black girl.
When her mother goes into hiding to escape the F.B.I. who want her for her involvement with violent radical groups she takes Birdie along. Her father keeps Cole. Years go by and Birdie never hears from either. Meanwhile, her mother gives her a new identity, as a Jewish girl named Jesse. The two settle down in rural New Hampshire where Birdie finds a kind of normalcy attending the local public schools and making friends with the white girls she meets there.
Because they think she is white the people she meets, even her close friends, feel free to openly be their racist selves. Since she believes her mother will be in danger if anyone ever finds out who she really is, Birdie must keep quite while her classmates make fun of the only black girl in the school and while her mother's boyfriend makes a casual remark unaware of how racist he is.
But none of this is why I like Caucasia so much. At its heart Caucasia is a book about family. What makes the first half work so well is the wonderful relationship between Birdie and her sister Cole. The two are fully drawn, complex believable characters, but there is a fantastic element to them, something kind of magic. Big sisters protect little ones, little sisters look up to big ones, but these two have a secret language. Their bond goes much deeper than blood, certainly deeper than skin color.
Once Birdie and her mother go underground together, the novel becomes a mother/daughter story. This bond is certainly deep, but it's not as wonderful. Birdie's mother is not someone who can be completely trusted. We never know what she did, in fact we soon begin to suspect that the only F.B.I. agents chasing her may be in her head. Birdie loves her, as any child loves her mother, but her love includes a healthy dose of hate. Did her mother only take her along because she couldn't go into hiding with a black daughter? Was Birdie her second choice? The second half of the novel is a portrait of this mother/daughter pairing. I was reminded of Mona Simpson's wonderful novel Anywhere but Here. Like that novel, I found reading Caucasia to be like spending time with friends. My favorite kind of character driven novel.
I picked Caucasia for my book club to read. I've yet to hear from any of them about what they think. I hope they all liked it, but even if they all turn against me and tell me they hated it, I'll stand behind my choice. I think it's a wonderful book.
When we got Dakota, our book eating Basset hound, she was about age five and about ten pounds overweight. That's a lot for an animal that should weigh just over 40 pounds. Our vet explained the long term benefits out weight loss and showed us how to see if a dog weighs too much. I had thought Dakota looked pretty fit for a Basset hound.
We put Dakota and a reasonable diet, stuck to it, fed her less if she'd had treats that day, starting taking her out for regular walks. She lost just under ten pounds in just a few months. Now she can run with the best of them, jumps into the car without help, and is clearly one happy dog. (See video below.)
We told our vet that we could be just as fit if we had someone measuring out our food like Dakota does. She said we could. So we did. We spent the next year limiting our food each day to a reasonable amount and making our meals smaller if we've had treats. Less than a year later, I've lost just over 40 pounds. I don't jump into the car but I could if I wanted to.
All this makes Ready When You Are, C.B. a fitting place to start the virtual book tour for Chow Hounds, Ernie Ward's new book about obesity in American dogs.
I decided to start our interview by showing Dr. Ward a short video of Dakota just to see what he thinks of her.
Fantastic! She looks lean and healthy with great mobility. Well done and kudos to you for recognizing the importance of maintaining a healthy weight in an extremely obesity-prone breed such as Basset hound.
We do pay attention to how much Dakota eats but not really to what she is eating. Limiting her to just about two cups of food a day brought her weight down to 44 pounds. We do try to mix up her diet which is basically kibble with various meats and vegetables. Our vet advised us to try cooking a little bit more of whatever we are eating each night and giving some to Dakota. This happens once or twice a week. For treats we usually use baby carrots and sliced bananas. Does this sound like a good diet to you? Should we be more concerned with how much she eats or with what she eats?
I love adding whole foods to any dog’s diet – as long as you’re still counting calories. The single biggest mistake is to share your dinner plate with an already full dog bowl. I advise my clients to add whole foods to their dog’s diet, just reduce their kibble by the appropriate amount to avoid feeding too many calories. For treats, veggies always trump fruits in terms of healthy low-calorie treats. Use fruits sparingly and your dog will benefit from the important phytonutrients and reduced calories found in these healthy alternatives to dog bones and pig ears.
I'd like to know if you've seen any trends in how people feed their dogs since the job market has become so bad? Dakota used to eat much better food, but lately we have had to reduce our household budget. None of us are eating like we used to. Has this become a problem for many dog owners in America?
Everyone has been affected by the down economy – even our pets. Surprisingly, the pet food industry grew by 5 percent in 2009 – someone is buying dog food! The latest industry data shows that premium dog and cat food sales were the primary winners in 2009. Humans continue to purchase organic, sustainable foods – often at a higher cost. According to the Organic Trade Association, the organic food industry has continued to grow over the past two years at an incredible pace (17 percent in 2008 and an estimated 8.7 percent in 2009).
While we’re definitely pinching pennies, there seems to be a renewed interest in healthy living. We are what we eat. Food for people and pets is an important part of staying healthy – and saving money due to illness or missed work. I’ve never understood how our society felt comfortable bragging about designer clothes and expensive cars but not interested in eating the highest quality foods. Perhaps one of the lasting lessons from this recession will be a return to the basics: good food, good relationships and good health.
You seem to be generally against raw meat and meat bones. I understand your argument against raw meat but aren't bones necessary to keep dog's teeth clean? We try to give Dakota a beef bone to chew on once every two weeks. We take it away from her after an hour or so. Is this okay? What should we do for her teeth if she can't have raw bones?
Raw meats carry significant risks to both humans and pets. The research (and common sense) on the topic are clear – raw has risks. When it comes to feeding bones, dog lovers need to understand that they’re subjecting their dog to considerable risk with almost no benefit. Chewing bones is one of the leading causes of broken teeth, intestinal obstruction and raw bones present the risk of bacterial contamination. Further, there’s no convincing scientific evidence that chewing bones cleans more that the tips of the teeth.
I have clients who tell me they’ve always fed bones to their dogs with absolutely no problems. I tell them that many smokers can go years without having a problem and some may even live to be 100. To me, that doesn’t mean it’s ok to smoke. In today’s world there are simply too many safer alternatives to bones. Crunchy vegetables, safe chew toys and food puzzles are just a few of the ways I suggest entertaining the jaw while protecting the body. We've a long running debate about dogs and chocolate in our house. My husband won't let either of our dogs anywhere near chocolate. I don't feed it to them because I know it does make them sick, but should dog owners be panicky over a 44 pound dogs who gets ahold of a couple of pieces of chocolate? I remember a childhood dog, also a Bassett, that once ate two pounds of Sees chocolate, a Christmas present that was left under the tree while we went to church Christmas morning. We come home to find a very sick dog, but he lived for many years afterwards. Just how fatal is chocolate and how much would a 44 pound dog have to eat before we should rush her to the emergency room?
Chocolate toxicity is a combination of the amount ingested, size of the dog and type of chocolate. Dark or baking chocolate is the most toxic while milk chocolate carries the least risk. Most dogs that eat chocolate won’t die; they often develop vomiting and diarrhea, tremors and seizures.
Most pet owners have heard that chocolate can be harmful to dogs and cats. What few pet owners know is how little chocolate can be toxic. Here are some general guidelines:
A 5 pound pet that eats as little as 1 ½ ounce of milk chocolate, just over half an ounce (0.6 oz) of semi-sweet or 0.2 ounce of baking chocolate can have a moderate to severe reaction.
A 10 pound pet needs to eat only 3 oz of milk chocolate, a little over one ounce (1.2 oz) of semi-sweet or less than a half-ounce (0.4 oz) of baking chocolate to become seriously ill.
A 20 pound dog that eats 6 ounces of milk chocolate, 2.4 ounce semi-sweet or 0.8 ounces baking chocolate can end up in trouble.
A pet that ingests even half these amounts of chocolate can experience diarrhea and vomiting.
Chocolate is primarily toxic to pets because it contains the alkaloid theobromine. Theobromine is similar to caffeine and is used medicinally as a diuretic, heart stimulant, blood vessel dilator, and a smooth muscle relaxant. Theobromine can be poisonous in large amounts. The amount of toxic theobromine varies based on the type of chocolate. Cooking or baking chocolate and high quality dark chocolate contains about 390-mg of theobromine per ounce while common milk chocolate only contains about 58-mg/oz of theobromine.
The signs of chocolate toxicity include increased thirst, vomiting, diarrhea, bloating, and restlessness. These signs quickly progress to hyperactivity, increased urination, stumbling, tremors, and seizures. Other effects include rapid heart and breathing rates, abnormal heart rhythms, fever, and coma.
If your pet eats chocolate, save the wrapper and contact your veterinarian for medical advice. Treatment often involves emptying the stomach and fluid therapy.
Dakota is known to eat books. I regularly feature posts about the books she has eaten. So I like to end each interview by asking if you ever had a dog or other pet that ate your books.
The closest I ever came to a “dog eating my homework” was the time as a child when I was rushing to feed the chickens before catching the bus. I had gotten up late and was rushing around the property completing my chores with my book sack on my back. As I hurried around the chicken yard (we used them to produce eggs – that was when “organic,” “cage-free” and “free-range” meant something) scattering feed, my book sack fell open and into the yard spilled my geography homework. No sooner had it hit the ground than six or eight hens pounced. Needless to say, I had some explaining to do! Thankfully my teacher understood and allowed me to complete another assignment. No dogs eating books but top that!
My thanks to Dr. Ward for agreeing to an interview. If you'd like to know more about dogs and what to feed them, Chow Hounds is an excellent resource. Dr. Ward covers every thing about food and nutrition that I could think of in an entertaining, understandable fashion. Chow Hounds is not a book most people will want to read cover to cover, but it is one dog lovers will want to keep around as a reference. Its encyclopedic coverage of canine nutrition is likely to settle just about any argument anyone might have about what to feed their dog.
You can find out more about the Chow Hounds Virtual Book Tour here.
Full Disclosure: I recieved a free copy of Chow Hounds for participating in this book tour.
Thursday morning, I found out that I've been selected to attend a National Endowment for the Humanities Summer Seminar at Yale University. This is a bit of a big deal since they only take 16 people from a nationwide application pool. I'll be studying Chaucer's Canterbury Tales for six weeks. The first two weeks are spent in the language lab learning how to read the original Middle English then four weeks studying the Tales. I should have access to all of the Yale libraries the entire time.
Egghead Heaven. Bookworm Paradise.
I do have a small list of rare books I'd like to get a chance to read.
I've not been reading much this last week because I bought a new laptop. You know how a new laptop makes even the most mundane computing task interesting enough to spend hours doing it? I've been on-line downloading cool wallpaper to use as desktop backgrounds. On-line for hours. Typical male, right? While there have not been many book reviews posted here lately, I do have some very cool wallpaper.
I have found a book I'm enjoying. Good thing, too, because it was the one I picked for my book club to read. Caucasia by Danzy Senna is about two mixed-race sisters. Set during the closing days of the radical Black power movement of the 1960's/1970's it features one sister who can pass as white and one who is clearly black.
The story is narrated by the "white" sister who stays with her mother when she goes on the run, hiding from the authorities because of her involvement with violent radical groups.
It's much more a mother/daughter portrait than it is a thriller. It reminds me of Anywhere But Here by Mona Simpson.
Finally, please tell me, honestly, what do you think about the background color of this blog? I like the way it looks on my new laptop, but I hate the way it looks on my computer at work. How does it look on your computer?
When a book haunts me long after I've finished reading it, I consider that a marker of greatness. The Lost German Slave Girl by John Baily has stayed with me since I read it back in March of 2008. A fair-skinned slave living in New Orleans is approached by a German immigrant who claims the slave is really Salome Mueller who 20 years earlier was sold into bondage to repay her family's passage from war-torn Europe. Is she really German, or is she simply going along with those who think she is in order to win her freedom? The Lost German Slave Girl is a non-fiction page turner.
The Lost German Slave Girl by John Bailey tells the incredible true story of Sally Miller and her fight for freedom in New Orleans of the 1840's. While in her 20's Sally Miller was discovered by a local German woman who recognized her as Salome Mueller, a German redemptioner last seen some 20 years prior when a ship load of German immigrants arrived in New Orleans and were sold into bondage in order to repay their passage.
The local German community is horrified that his girl ended up living in slavery. Convinced that a great injustice has been done, they take up her cause and hire lawyers to sue not only for her freedom, but for legal recognization that she is white. Her owners, convinced by long years of ownership during which Sally Miller had four children who were also slaves hire their own lawyers and a trial ensues.
The bulk of the book is based on surviving transcripts, there was one witness who diligently wrote down every answer to every question though he did not write down the actual questions. Both the initial trial and the inevitable appeal make for fascinating and suspenseful reading. Fans of shows like Law and Order will find much to enjoy in The Lost German Slave Girl. The story truly is stranger than fiction and the surprises keep on coming right up to the end of the book. John Bailey does his homework; he presents all of the evidence and makes us both believe the story and root for Sally Miller.
John Bailey provides enough general and specific background that we don't ever completely lose sight of slavery in America itself. I did ask myself why we should be so compelled to read about how this one white woman suffered when so many millions of black men and women suffered far worse with no hope of ever gaining freedom. The author answers this question in the end of the book, but I cannot give it away here. Mr. Bailey saves his final surprise twist for the last page of The Lost German Slave Girl.
