More on Julia Spencer-Fleming

After my recent post about author Julia Spencer-Fleming and her Clare Fergusson mystery series, I received a nice email from Ms. Spencer-Fleming:

Thank you so much for featuring me on your blog -- and for letting me know! I'm delighted you're enjoying the series. There is another on the way; I'm working on One Was A Soldier right now, and it should be out in fall '09 or winter '10. In it, a group of Iraqi War vets try to pick up their lives and relationships in Millers Kill. When Russ Van Alstyne rules the death of one of the group a suicide, Clare goes against him and the MKPD to prove the soldier was murdered. (I always feel I should add, "Or was he..?" after that breathless description. I'm terrible at boiling down my own work into a single sentence.) I hope you find the later books as satisfying as the first three! Yours, Julia

The new book sounds great. I will get to work reading the next three on my list so I am caught up with the series when the new one comes out.

Opening Sentence of the Day: Top Ten Myths of American Health Care

"Few issues in American politics capture more attention – and passion – than health care." The Top Ten Myths of American Health Care: A Citizen's Guide by Sally C. Pipes True. And timely. Let's see what Ms. Pipes has to say. Her first book on the subject, Miracle Cure, was packed with interesting and intriguing information. I am sure I will learn a great deal from this one as well.

Books for My Birthday

My birthday was this week, and I am happy (but not surprised) that I got books for presents. My sister gave me Kristin Lavransdatter by Nobel Prize winner Sigrid Undset, a book that has been on my TBR list ever since I gave it to Sis for Christmas a few years back and she really liked it. Hubby gave me two books: Warlord: A Life of Winston Churchill at War, 1874-1945 by Carlo D'este and The Reagan I Knew, the book William F. Buckley Jr. was writing when he passed away. I look forward to both, but I suspect that Hubby may get around to the Churchill book before I do. But by far my favorite reading-related gift was from my sister -- a "mudflap girl for the smart set" decal:

Review of the Day: Entre Nous

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There is plenty to love about Debra Ollivier's Entre Nous: A Woman's Guide to Finding Her Inner French Girl, but you have to take it with a grain of sel.

French women are justifiably famous for their poise, style, and general savoir-faire, so there is appeal in a book that sets out to teach American women how to emulate their Gallic sisters. But the sisterhood Ollivier holds up as a model is laughably elite. The "French girl" she describes lives in Paris, works at some chi chi job like "restor[ing] the muted shades of an eighteenth century fresco," and has a family chateau in a medieval village in Dordogne. That would be like saying a typical "American girl" is a San Francisco magazine editor with a family vineyard in Napa, or a handbag designer in Manhattan who escapes to the 25-room family "cottage" Down East for the summer.

But if you can accept Ollivier's idealized vision of the emblematic French female – which spills over to a generally romanticized view of all things French, especially its socialized economy – you can appreciate her suggestions on how to attain the je ne sais quoi French women do seem to enjoy.

For instance, Ollivier discusses how to develop a sense of self-possession French women demonstrate, how to appreciate life more sensually, how to value quality over quantity, and how to cultivate a deep discretion about your personal and family life. Ollivier discusses these qualities as they relate to several areas, including personal satisfaction, friends and entertaining, and careers.

Most enjoyable were the sidebars throughout the book that provide mini-biographies on French women, film and book recommendations, suggestions on how to follow the example of French women, and information about French life and customs.

There is an inherent irony a self-help book purporting to teach American women to be more like French women who, Ollivier tells us, are so bien dans sa peau – comfortable in their own skin – that they would never read a self-help book. C'est la vie.  

NOTES

I enjoyed this book so much it inspired me to create a French Connections book list.

OTHER REVIEWS

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Happy Valentine's Day!

Book Notes: Finnegans Wake

Two years ago, I set out determined to finish the Modern Library’s list of Top 100 Novels of the 20th Century – a list I had been lackadaisically working on since it was published in 1999. At that point, I only had about 30 or so to go of the 121 books on the list. The largest boulder in my path at that point (or at any point on my journey to reaching this goal) was Finnegans Wake by James Joyce.

Before I started FW, I knew nothing about how it was written and had no idea that it was so crazy. I knew that it is Joyce’s magnum opus, that it took him 17 years or so to write, and that he had staff helping him research. I also knew from reading about FW that it all takes place in one night, but is a history of all time, and that the main dream character feels guilt about something he did in a park with two "temptresses" and for vaguely incestuous feelings he has towards his daughter.

I "knew" these ideas only in the sense that I read about their existence. But by 100 pages or so into the book itself, I still had no actual comprehension of them. Or anything, for that matter. The closest I could get would be a vague suggestion of some of these themes from sentences like this:

And so they went on, the fourbottle men, the analists, unguam and nunguam and lunguam again, their anschluss about her whosebefore and his whereafters and how she was lost away away in the fern and how he was founded deap on deep in anear, and the rustlings and the twitterings and the raspings and the snappings and the sighings and the paintings and the ukukuings and the (hist!) the springapartings and the (hast!) the bybyscuttlings and all the scandalmunkers and the pure craigs that used to be (up) that time living and lying and rating and riding round Nunsbelly Square.

Yep. That's what the entire book is like. All 620 pages. Made up words, foreign words, amalgamated words – crazy stuff.

I never understood an entire paragraph; only occasionally comprehended an entire sentence, and definitely only short ones; and was delighted at every word I caught. I read it for the experience of reading it, but gave up trying to understand it after the first page. Yes, I tried reading it out loud, and that helped – but only to a point. I decided to just let it flow over me and enjoy the sounds like poetry or music.

And I was so pleased with myself for finishing it. I was free to "shun the Punman" after months of effort. I was also a little concerned, because I seemed to understand it better after about page 500. I hoped this meant it just hits an easier patch as it gets to the end. I hoped it did not mean that I had learned enough FW language to comprehend more, because then I would have been tempted to start over at the beginning!

Of course, that is what Joyce intended. He wanted to publish FW in a spiral binding without covers, so there would be no official beginning or end and people would read it non-stop. As it is, it starts in the middle of a sentence. The final sentence in the book is the beginning of the sentence that starts the book.

Finnegans Wake was definitely the most difficult book I have ever read. It is not that I hated it. It was incredibly frustrating, but it has poetic beauty. I do not think anyone should read it unless they are compulsive about finishing their book lists (like me), or are really into James Joyce. But I like the idea that there is a structure to it (even if I couldn't follow the structure).

For me, it was like that famous Hieronymus Bosch triptych, The Garden of Earthly Delights. I do not like it. I think it is weird. It takes too long to look at and there are so many things in it that I do not understand. But, I admire the mind and talent that created it.

That said, I was thrilled to be done with FW! When I finished it, I keep thinking of that joke about the 85-year-old, widowed rabbi who goes into the confessional at St. Mary's and says to the priest, "Father, I just had sexual relations with a 24-year-old aerobics instructor." The priest says, "But Rabbi, why are you confessing? You aren't Catholic." The rabbi says, "Confessing? Are you kidding? I'm telling EVERYBODY." That was me – I told EVERYBODY.

And now you can "suck it yourself, Sugarstick"!

OTHER REVIEWS OR ESSAYS ON FW

The Clerk Manifesto: Seven Pleasures of Finnigans Wake

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Review of the Day: Gilead

Gilead, Marilynne Robinson's Pulitzer-winning novel, is surprisingly entertaining for an epistolary novel consisting of only one, long letter from a 77-year-old minister to his seven-year-old son. Certainly letters from dead, Midwestern pastors are not the typical stuff of contemporary novels. But Robinson makes it work.

In his letter, the father writes about his own youth and his relationship with his father, his scallywag of a grandfather, his best friend and that man's ne'er-do-well son, the history of his Iowa town as a stop on the Underground Railroad during the Civil War, and his two marriages. Throughout, he ties in the themes of grace, forgiveness, and man's fallibility.

Particularly striking were the narrator's discussions on how much he enjoyed his life. He writes the letter to his young son knowing that he will not be around when his son is an adult. But, although he is approaching death and anticipating his heavenly afterlife, he makes it clear that he appreciated the temporal pleasures of his life -- the beauty of the prairie, his books and education, falling in love, baseball, and his town. His reminiscences and the lessons he imparts to his son are elegant and timeless. Gilead is a beautiful story.


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Musings

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Book Tour: Citadel of the Spirit

Oregon's 150th birthday is this Saturday, February 14th -- Valentine's Day. And what better way is there to say "I love you" to your Oregonian sweetheart than with a copy of Citadel of the Spirit: Oregon’s Sesquicentennial Anthology? The book is a collection of essays by Oregon writers about Oregon, as well as excerpts from primary documents related to Oregon history. Perfect for lovers in Oregon and lovers of Oregon, wherever they may be. The full list of the book's contents is here. Editor Matt Love has kicked off an ambitious six week book tour to promote his monumental literary tribute to Oregon. The full schedule is here on the Nestucca Spit Press website. Matt will be at Powell's Books on Burnside this Friday, February 13, at 7:30, along with authors Gina Ochsner, Brian Doyle, Bart King, Kaia Sand, David Horowitz, Katrine Barber, and others. Like the other tour events, this "Oregon birthday party" will feature readings, a slide show, a trivia contest, and more.

Opening Sentence of the Day: Entre Nous

"How to sum up in one book the particularities and essential qualities of the French girl?" Entre Nous: A Woman's Guide to Finding Her Inner French Girl by Debra Ollivier. Mon Dieu! Show me the way.

Contest of the Day: School Choice

The Cascade Policy Institute is sponsoring a contest to promote school choice in Oregon. Here is the description from the contest web site:

School Choice is simply the ability to choose a school other than the local public school near where you live. It might be a religious school, a private school, a virtual (online) school, a charter school, or even another public school in the same or different district than the one you’re assigned to. It might also mean home schooling. Most Oregon families send their children to the local public school, yet a recent poll found that only 13 percent would make that choice if they had other options. The Oregon School Choice Video Contest lets Oregon students and families tell your stories, and possibly win $10,000 to help make your school choice dreams come true. We picked $10,000 for the top prize because Oregon’s public schools already spend more than that each year, on average, for each student. Yet, when asked in our recent poll, 92 percent of Oregon voters thought the public schools spent less than $10,000 per student. So, now it’s your turn: Tell us your story in a short video. Entries will be judged on authenticity, sincerity, passion and creativity; not on the production value of your video. So don’t worry about making a professional-looking film. Just be yourself, tell us why you need school choice or what school choice has already meant to you if you or your family already have it. Be creative, be sincere, and use your video to make the case for school choice.

The deadline is March 25, 2009.

Details and rules are available on the Oregon School Choice Contest website.

Cookbook Library: The Amish Cook at Home, redux

Apparently my review of The Amish Cook at Home had the book's co-author, Kevin Williams, rolling his eyes. I was amazed at the spike in my blog hits after my review went up, and was astounded to find that almost all of my new visitors were coming from The Amish Cook website. Yes, The Amish Cook has a website. And it is great! Full of information and recipes and all kinds of stuff worth reading. I am returning Kevin's favor by providing a link to the website here. But I am afraid my review offended several people when that was not my intent. Let's be clear, I think The Amish Cook at Home is a beautiful book. My only quibble is that some of the recipes are not quite as elegant as the book itself. That does not make them bad. Rest assured, I did not turn to an Amish cookbook looking for frou frou recipes. I grew up in the Midwest -- I long for casserole down to my genes. And I understand that Amish cooks shop at grocery stores and use pre-made ingredients just like everyone else. I simply meant to point out that the book may appeal to a wider audience if the recipes matched the beauty of the photographs and narrative. Many of them did. But there is a segment of the fancy-cookbook-buying population -- call them foodies; or the health-conscious; or West Coasters; or, more simply, snobs -- who would be put off by the recipes calling for Miracle Whip, or canned cream of mushroom soup, or margarine, or the like. Again, that does not mean that the recipes are not good or that they do not appeal to a broad spectrum of home cooks. But I think that there is a divide between those foodies willing to shell out $29.99 for a glossy cookbook, and home cooks looking for yummy recipes to feed their families. The Amish Cook at Home tries to straddle that line.

Opening Sentence of the Day: Native America, Discovered and Conquered

"The New World was colonized under an international legal principle that is known today as the Doctrine of Discovery." Native America, Discovered and Conquered: Thomas Jefferson, Lewis and Clark, and Manifest Destiny by Robert J. Miller. Well, OK. And I have eight days and about 186 pages (not counting notes and the index) to learn all about this Doctrine of Discovery before I attend a seminar with Professor Miller to discuss his book.

Book Give-a-Way: The Italian Lover

With all the dozens of book give-a-ways hosted by generous book bloggers, I don't usually keep track or get involved. But I want a copy of The Italian Lover by Robert Hellenga and Luanne at A Bookworm's World is giving away five copies of it. I get an extra entry if I post something on my blog. Shameless. Leave a comment here on A Bookworm's World if you want to enter the contest. Not that I want the competition . . . The Italian Lover is Hellenga's sequel to The Sixteen Pleasures, a marvelous book about a young American book restorer who, while in Florence rescuing books after a flood, finds a long lost volume of 16th Century erotica. I can't wait.

Cookbook Library: The Amish Cook at Home

So I admit, my initial reaction to seeing The Amish Cook at Home was the culturally insensitive question, “Where else would they cook?” It’s not like there is an Amish restaurant on every corner. The introduction clarified that this is not a book about the Amish people cooking, it is a book featuring the recipes of one particular Amish cook, Lovina Eicher, who writes a newspaper column called The Amish Cook. Ahhhh . . . now I get it.

Overall, I enjoyed this book, which I read cover to cover. I liked the whole idea of the seasonal cooking (sort of like Animal, Vegetable, Miracle but without the lecturing), the stories about the family and their traditions are interesting, and the pictures are absolutely beautiful.

But the recipes themselves were a little disappointing. They may be authentic, but they are pretty pedestrian – the standard Midwest recipes you find in every church auxiliary cookbook. Now, that is not necessarily a bad thing. I also have The Beverly Lewis Amish Heritage Cookbook – as well as a dozen church auxiliary cookbooks – that I turn to often for recipes I remember from my Nebraska childhood. But the Beverly Lewis book does not oversell itself. The Amish Cook, on the other hand, is over-sized and all fancy like a coffee table book, with glossy pages and evocative, soft-filter pictures.

The clash between the slick packaging and everyday recipes like pea and ham salad with Miracle Whip was too jarring for me – like seeing a beautiful bride wearing Nikes with her wedding dress.

Opening Sentence of the Day: Out of the Deep I Cry

"Russ Van Alstyne had just gotten a tug on his line when he saw the old lady get up from between the headstones she had been trimming, lay down her gardening tools, and walk into the reservoir." Out of the Deep I Cry by Julia Spencer-Fleming. This is a terrific first sentence, but for one irritating glitch -- the old lady was not "trimming" headstones. She may have been trimming weeds from around headstones, but she was not trimming the headstones themselves. That kind of verbal slip is unusual in Spencer Fleming's books. This is the third in her Clare Fergusson series, which is notable as much for the seamless flow of the writing as having a female Episcopalian priest as the hero. She writes really well and in the style I prefer, particularly in mysteries -- no verbal gymnastics, no fancy stuff, just a clean, well-balanced narrative that gets in lots of story without distracting the reader.

Review of the Day: Blackbird, Farewell

 

Blackbird, Farewell is the seventh novel in Robert Greer’s mystery series featuring bail bondsman C.J. Floyd. The specs look good – set in Denver instead of a more typical mystery locale; a hero who is neither a cop nor a lawyer (and, in this installment, out of town on his honeymoon, leaving his female, ex-Marine partner and an amateur-sleuth sidekick to solve the case); several entrenched characters, mostly from Denver’s old-school African American community; and the double homicide of a Pulitzer-winning journalist and a freshly-minted NBA star. 

Great set up. The problem is in the execution. This reads like a first novel, not a seventh. The narrative is clunky, making it almost impossible to be absorbed in the story.  Greer tries to pack too much back story into single sentences, leaving them unnavigable on a single read through. This habit is particularly irksome when the clunkers are incorporated into the dialog. Greer does a decent job with casual speaking voices, but no conversation between two long-time friends and business partners includes sentences as long winded as this:

But ever since Pinkie saved Damion’s behind last summer up at the Pawnee grasslands when Damion got himself all tangled up in that Eisenhower Tunnel murder case I was working, they’ve been as tight as Dick’s hatband.

Sentences like that taunt me to brush off the diagramming skills I learned in high school, but they do nothing to pull me into the story. Unfortunately, Greer drags the reader over several boulders just that big. 

Things smoothed out and picked up in the second half. There were a couple of solid plot twists, a reasonably exciting climax, and generally good overall resolution. But these improvements were not enough to salvage what, at best, is a mediocre mystery novel.

Review: Animal, Vegetable, Miracle

Popular author, Barbara Kingsolver, and her family made the decision to spend one full year “eating locally” – primarily by raising their own food – and to write about their experience in Animal, Vegetable, Miracle. Kingsolver wrote the main narrative; her husband, Steven Hopp, provided nerdy, information-packed sidebars; and her teenage daughter Camille covered the nutritional angle and recipes.

Kingsolver is a talented writer and she makes a year of gardening and poultry husbandry entertaining and even, at times, fascinating – her descriptions of natural turkey procreation are enough in themselves to make the book worthwhile. She augments the “life on the family farm” memoir with stories of family road trips, holiday and birthday celebrations, her second honeymoon in Italy, and general reminiscences. She makes an excellent culinary case for eating what local food is in season, and only when it is season.

Unfortunately, Kingsolver and crew also lard the book with offputting lectures about “food politics” and “ethical” food choices, disparaging opposing views. I am all for eating locally grown produce, meat, poultry, and fish. I am fortunate enough to live in Oregon, a state with natural bounty enough to keep me fat and happy year round. This local food is fresher and tastes better than the same types of things shipped in from half-way around the world. And I am happy to support Oregon’s always anemic, now suffering economy.

But Kingsolver and Hopp’s holier-than-thou attitude about eating local food rubs me the wrong way. They beat the readers over the head with dire warnings about the imminent catastrophe of global warming, large-scale agriculture, and Big Oil, always following the party line to the letter. Whether they are right or wrong, they are boring. Nobody likes a scold. I found myself arguing with them even when I agreed with them, just because they got my back up with all their bossing.

OTHER REVIEWS

My Book Retreat

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Cookbook Library: Creme de Colorado and Greens

Following the phenomenal success of my "no carb left behind" holiday campaign, I have been combing my cookbook collection for low-carb recipes to undo some of the damage. My favorite Junior League and vintage cookbooks are generally pretty starch-centric. But there are options. So far, I have found a couple of great recipes that are destined to be standards in my kitchen. One is Best Ever Brisket from the Creme de Colorado Junior League cookbook; another is Warm Red Cabbage Salad from The Greens Cookbook. My plan is to post those recipes here. But I will have to wait and do an update late -- both books went into a box this weekend in preparation for moving house.

Book Give-a-Way: Washington Square

Laura Grimes continues her rocky literary relationship with Henry James, here. After being ready to dump him for good, Grimes's interest was piqued when she discovered that others were enamoured of him -- isn't that so typical? Jealous of these rivals -- her neighbors, no less -- Grimes buckled down with Washington Square last weekend, and discovered that she liked it! Grimes is now hosting a contest to give away a nice little Modern Library edition of Washington Square. To enter, leave a comment to her article addressing specific questions she raises about Washington Square. You have to register to leave comments, but you do not have to subscribe to The Oregonian. The deadline is February 3. Good luck!

Author of the Day Redux: John Updike

John Updike passed away today. He was 76. R.I.P. Ever since he captured my fancy (and informed my adult sex life) with Rabbit, Run, Updike has been a favorite of mine. He is on my relatively short list of authors whose works I plan to read in their entirety. Sadly, that task became easier today. Salon has a terrific and lovely retrospective.

Review of the Day: Franny and Zooey

If John Cheever and Paul Coelho had set out to collaborate on The Royal Tenenbaums, the result would have been Franny and Zooey.

J.D. Salinger’s short, two-part novel is the story of sister and brother, Franny and Zooey Glass, the youngest of seven precocious whiz kids who grew up on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. Ostensibly, Zooey is trying to help Franny, who is in the midst of a breakdown. It soon becomes clear, however, that both have been unmoored by the suicide of their oldest brother Seymour and the related, self-imposed academic exile of their next-oldest brother Buddy.

The problem lies in the supplemental religious education Seymour and Buddy sought fit to bestow on their youngest siblings. Frightened “at the statistics on child pedants and academic weisenheimers who grow up into faculty-recreation-room savants,” Seymour and Buddy decide to set the youngest two on a Zen-like quest for “no-knowledge” – a quest to be with God in a state of pure consciousness, or satori. As Buddy later explains in a letter to Zooey:

We thought it would be wonderfully constructive to at least . . . tell you as much as we knew about the men – the saints, the arhats, the bodhisattvas, the jivanmuktas – who knew something or everything about this state of being. That is, we wanted both of you to know who and what Jesus and Gautama and Lao-tse and Shankaracharya and Hui-neng and Sri Ramakrishna, etc., were before you knew too much or anything about Homer or Shakespeare or even Blake or Whitman, let alone George Washington and his cherry tree or the definition of a peninsula or how to parse a sentence. That, anyway, was the big idea.

All this mystic education, or “religious mystification” as Salinger describes it, estranges Franny and Zooey from their childhood and college compatriots, leaving them lonely and angry. Zooey insists that they are both “freaks” incapable of being around other people as they both cling to their intellectual superiority.

When Seymour’s suicide demonstrates that the supposed wisdom that comes from the quest for pure consciousness is not enough to make life worth living, the metaphysical rug gets yanked from under Franny and Zooey’s feet, precipitating their mutual breakdown.

Salinger’s book is clever, heartfelt, and sad. The value of its final lesson lies, not in understanding the details of Franny and Zooey’s existential arguments, but in appreciating the emotional crisis the siblings face. The idea that we should strive to be our best for God’s sake – and not our own satisfaction in acquiring wealth, knowledge, prestige, or even wisdom – may not be original, but it is an idea worth contemplating.

OTHER REVIEWS

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NOTES

Franny and Zooey appears on Radcliffe's Top 100 and Boxall's 1001 Books.

List of the Day: The Guardian's 1000 Novels Everyone Must Read

A new list! The Guardian newspaper just published a list of 1000 Novels Everyone Must Read:

Selected by the Guardian's Review team and a panel of expert judges, this list includes only novels – no memoirs, no short stories, no long poems – from any decade and in any language.

The list is organized around seven themes: love, crime, comedy, family and self, science fiction and fantasy, war and travel, and state of the nation. I will never read all of these (too much sci fi for me and it includes American Psycho, which I will not read), and I will likely never post the list on this blog. But a new list is always exciting and I will keep lackadaisical track of my progress here. Hat tip to Michelle at Fluttering Butterflies for bringing this list to my attention.

Issue of the Day: Sam Adams

Rose City Reader is a book blog -- not a political blog. I generally avoid politics here. But the Sam Adams thing has me riled up -- The Oregonian even published a Letter to the Editor that I submitted. And while this is a "political" issue, it is not a partisan issue, so pardon this brief departure from books. Sam Adams is the mayor of Portland. He now admits that, when he was 42 and a city commissioner, he had a romantic relationship with a 17-year-old (who described a couple of dates and make-out sessions), which became a sexual relationship only after the kid turned 18. Adams lied about the whole thing before last fall's election, not only denying the accusations, but accusing anyone who believed them of, essentially, gay bashing. Most people seem pretty outraged by the whole thing, but some take the position that it is no one's business if a 42-year-old public figure has sex with an 18-year old. I fall into the majority camp. Call me a prude, but I don't think 40-somethings should date high school students. And when a particular 40-something is an elected official, I think it is fair to expect them to be on their best behavior. Portland already had one mayor who had sex with a teenager, which is one over our quota. Is there something in the water at City Hall? We are going to get a reputation as a pedophile-friendly zone. True, I may be more sensitive to pedophilia issues because most of my law practice involves representing the victims of childhood sexual abuse in lawsuits against the perpetrators and institutions that turned a blind eye to such abuse. But just because I am overly sensitive, does not mean I'm wrong. Here is the letter that The Oregonian printed:

Adams Seduced Teen Sam Adams used his position and age -- and the glamour that came with them -- to seduce a teenager. Whether or not Adams waited until Beau Breedlove turned 18 to have sex with him, the relationship he nurtured when the young man was 17 is what gave him the opportunity and authority to seal the deal. In my line of work (I represent the victims of childhood sex abuse in lawsuits) we refer to a perpetrator's befriending and "mentoring" of a young victim as "grooming." It's key evidence used to prove a case of child molestation. Does Portland really need a mayor whose pastime is grooming teenagers for sexual adventures?

Opening Sentence of the Day: Franny and Zooey

"Though brilliantly sunny, Saturday morning was overcoat weather again, not just topcoat weather, as it had been all week and as everyone had hoped it would stay for the big weekend -- the weekend of the Yale game." -- Franny and Zooey, J.D. Salinger. I'm in. It hooked me.

Review of the Day: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

It took me years to get around to reading The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Once I did, I understood why it is so popular -- and why I do not like science fiction. Stories about other planets and other kinds of creatures, with lots of whiz-bang gimmicks are just not interesting to me. This one in particular had some appealing sophomoric humor, but overall it was too smart-alecky for my taste.

List: 100 Greatest Books Ever (Easton Press)

"The most renowned works of literature by history’s greatest authors," according to the Editorial Advisory Board of Easton Press.  It is an interesting mix because it goes back to ancient times, covers the globe, and includes fiction, nonfiction, and poetry.  Easton Press sells the whole set in very fancy covers, but all of these books are available in about a zillion different editions.

Those I have read are in red.  I've read 63 of them, plus bits and pieces of others in high school or college, but I don't count those as finished.  Those currently on my TBR shelf are in blue.

As always, if anyone else is reading the books on this list, please feel free to leave a comment with a link to your progress report and I will add it to this post.

Twenty Thousand Leagues Under The Sea by Jules Verne

The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson

Walden by Henry David Thoreau

Gulliver's Travels by Johnathan Swift

Moby Dick by Herman Melville (reviewed here)*

A Farewell To Arms by Ernest Hemingway

The Red Badge of Courage by Stephen Crane

The Jungle Books by Rudyard Kipling*

The Odyssey by Homer

The Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan

A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce (reviewed here)

Paradise Lost by John Milton

Tales From The Arabian Nights by Richard Burton

Great Expectations by Charles Dickens (reviewed here)

Candide by Voltaire

Oedipus the King by Sophocles

The Hunchback of Notre Dame by Victor Hugo

The Last of the Mohicans by James Fenimore Cooper*

The Sea Wolf by Jack London

Cyrano De Bergerac by Edmund Rostand

The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer

Collected Poems by Robert Browning

Essays by Ralph Waldo Emerson

The Portrait of a Lady by Henry James

Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe (reviewed here)

Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson

Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Collected Poems by John Keats

On the Origin of Species by Charles Darwin

Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Collected Poems by Robert Frost

The Legend of Sleepy Hollow and Other Stories by Washington Irving

Animal Farm by George Orwell

Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë

She Stoops to Conquer by Oliver Goldsmith

Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck

Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky

Les Misérables by Victor Hugo

The Iliad by Homer

Lady Chatterley's Lover by D.H. Lawrence

The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas*

Brave New World by Aldous Huxley

Aesop's Fables by Aesop

Lord Jim by Joseph Conrad

The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin by Benjamin Franklin

The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas*

Politics and Poetics by Aristotle

The Aeneid by Virgil

Madam Bovary by Gustave Flaubert

The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli

Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë

Hamlet by William Shakespeare

Pygmalion and Candida by George Bernard Shaw

Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe*

Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare

The Cherry Orchard and The Three Sisters by Anton Chekhov

The Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri

The Analects of Confucius by Confucius

A Midsummer Night's Dream by William Shakespeare

Collected Poems by William Butler Yeats

The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde

Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray

The Decameron by Giovanni Boccaccio

Beowulf

Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy

The Necklace and Other Tales by Guy de Maupassant

The Time Machine by H.G. Wells

Fathers and Sons by Ivan Turgenev

Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad

War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy

The History of Early Rome by Livy

Little Women by Louisa May Alcott

The Talisman by Sir Walter Scott

Tess of the D'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy

Alice's Adventure in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll

Dracula by Bram Stoker (reviewed here)

The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám by Omar Khayyám

The Red and the Black by Stendhal

A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens

The Republic by Plato

Collected Poems by Emily Dickinson

Faust by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Tom Jones by Henry Fielding*

The Federalist Papers by Alexander Hamilton, James Madison and John Jay

Silas Marnerby George Eliot

The Rights of Man by Thomas Paine

Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman

Billy Budd by Herman Melville

The Confessions by St. Augustine

Tales of Mystery and Imagination by Edgar Allan Poe

Ivanhoe by Sir Walter Scott

The Way of All Flesh by Samuel Butler*

The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner (reviewed here)*

Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky

Grimm's Fairy Tales by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm

Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain*

Frankenstein by Mary Shelley

David Copperfield by Charles Dickens

NOTES

* Marks those that I have in the fancy Easton Press edition, thanks to a lovely Christmas gift from Hubby.

Last updated on August 7, 2015.

OTHERS READING THESE BOOKS
(If you would like to be listed here, please leave a comment with your links to any progress reports or reviews and I will add them here.)

Sometimes a Great Notion . . .

. . . ends. And just in time for Book Club tonight. This is an amazing book. There were parts I really had to wrestle with. And I am still mulling over its bigger ideas and pondering what the "take away" is. But this one will stick with me for a long time.

More on Justice Denied

The Internet Review of Books published a short version of my review of Justice Denied by Marci Hamilton in the January issue. They ran it in the "Brief Reviews" section (f.k.a. "Worth Mentioning"). There are some interesting books reviewed in this issue. I plan to go back and spend some time.

Opening Sentence of the Day: Blackbird, Farewell

"The $4 million Nike athletic-shoe contract in Shandell Bird’s shirt pocket wasn’t about to solve his problem – couldn’t even put a dent in it – and neither would the $3.2 million he expected to start drawing in October, once the NBA season started." -- Blackbird, Farewell by Robert Greer. Tantalizing ideas, but a little clunky. This is the seventh in Greer's C.J. Floyd series of mysteries, but only the first one I have read. I am only on the first chapter, so cannot tell yet if it is going to grab me.

Literary Lushes: Part II

Bob from ArtScatter contributed so much to my list of Dipso Lit that I couldn't leave his valuable information languishing in the comment section. Here are Bob's thoughts on the subject, with a few links added by me:

Oh, what a fun list for a cold winter's day! Lots of possibilities out there: Of course, there's Bond, James Bond, but I don't read the books, I only watch the movies. And, anyway, stirred's just fine by me. You could categorize: desperate drinking, civilized drinking, drinking for comic effect (the last of which can shade both ways). And of course, there's plain old habitual drinking. Among the desperates: Malcolm Lowry and Under the Volcano; William S. Burroughs; lots and lots of Hemingway and, with a touch more glamour, Fitzgerald; Henry Miller, most of whose desperate sexual exploits were accompanied by the bottle. Among the civilized: J.R.R. Tolkein and his tippling Hobbits, whose English love of a small sip is echoed in Agatha Christie's murder-mystery cozies and John Mortimer's plonk-obsessed barrister, Rumpole of the Bailey. For comic effect: the rip-roaring idiot savant Svejk and his various and assorted captains and companions in Jaroslav Hasek's wonderful World War I satire The Good Soldier Svejk. And the great Falstaff, through the Henry IV/V plays and The Merry Wives of Windsor (a lot of people drink a lot of booze in a lot of Shakespeare). Intriguingly, for all of his comic relief and fascinating wisdom-of-the-cowardly outlook on life, Falstaff becomes almost a tragic figure at the time of his death in Henry V, and the bottle has a lot to do with that.

So much to think about and so much to read! My thoughts: I cannot believe that I forgot about Under the Volcano. I feel hungover just remembering that book. And I often think about how they incorporated hot peppers into the tequila, lime, and salt ritual. Intriguing. Reading Hemingway always makes me want to drink during the day. Sort of like reading Raymond Chandler makes me want to drink rye (and sock anyone who cracks wise). And along the same Prohibition era line as Fitzgerald, the cocktail-centered scenes in The Thin Man are over the top. Bathtub gin never sounded so fun. My plan is to tackle The Lord of this Rings this year -- I am sure I will enjoy the tippling hobbits much more than the orcs, or even the walking trees. Do the trees drink? The Good Soldier Svejk is also on my TBR shelf, as antidote to All Quiet on the Western Front. Glad to hear it really is funny. And finally, I have never really thought of the drinking that goes on in Shakespeare, but I think I'll start counting the bottles. Thanks Bob! My further pondering led me to an entertaining article in the Portland Examiner about "pairing books with cocktails and hard liquor." In it, author Michelle Kerns takes the opposite approach from mine -- instead of letting literature inspire her choice of libation, she suggests books to go along with particular drinks. And she includes my favorite cocktail quote: "I like to have a martini, two at the very most. After three I'm under the table, after four I'm under the host." From The Portable Dorothy Parker. Wise woman, that Dorothy Parker. Cheers!

Literary Lushes

Heading into another cold, soggy Oregon winter weekend, my thoughts have turned to hooch. I'm planning to snuggle up in front of the fireplace with a warm Hubby, a cold martini, and a good book. Ever since I posted my review of Martin Amis's Money, I've been mulling over the notion of books about booze. Not books that are officially about alcoholic beverages, but books by drinkers about drinkers. Maybe because I've become a lightweight myself, I sometimes enjoy a good sodden literary romp -- like Money. The Martin Amis apple did not fall far from the Kingsley Amis tree. Amis, père is my all-time favorite literary lush. Lucky Jim's drunken "Merrie English" speech is hilarious. And his description of a hangover as a huge raw egg rolling around inside his skull has stayed with me my whole drinking life. Amis's other books are similarly alcohol-centered. His Booker Prize winner, The Old Devils, involves a group of older friends who spend most days drinking. The inn keeper hero of The Green Man devotes a lot of energy in hiding the quantity of booze he puts away. Amis even has a dipsomaniacal collection of short pieces called Everyday Drinking. But the Amis clan does not have a lock on libation literature. There must be others. Please share your suggestions. And I'll keep pondering. Jim Harrison springs to mind. Others?

Review: Water the Bamboo

“Water the Bamboo is a metaphor for success,” writes Greg Bell, a former lawyer, now a “speaker, trainer and facilitator” who works with companies and organizations to improve communication and relationships.

The bamboo analogy is based on the idea that giant timber bamboo takes three years of nurturing without any sign of growth before it peeps out of the ground, but once it starts, it grows to incredible heights in only 90 days.  Bell ties his “21 Strategies for Extraordinary Results in Your Profession or Team” to this central theme of bamboo farming in order to show that “overnight success” really takes years of focus and effort to achieve.  Bell does a good job of using the bamboo metaphor with a light but consistent hand – neither straining nor muddying it.

Given the premise, it is no surprise that Water the Bamboo is not a quick-fix, self-help book. Like the best of its genre, it emphasizes values, integrity, and long-term diligence over slick tricks and fancy packaging. Bell’s “strategies” include working from core values, setting effective goals, tending relationships, and developing self-discipline. Seven Habits enthusiasts will appreciate much of Bell’s approach.

Bell goes beyond outlining the concepts by suggesting practical exercises to implement his strategies. He recommends keeping a journal in conjunction with reading the book, and using the journal to complete the exercises in each chapter. Other hands-on suggestions include forming a “Bamboo Circle” – “a group that meets on a regular basis who listens and brainstorms solutions and strategies, and generally supports and helps each other be accountable.”

Bell’s enthusiasm and good will shine through in his upbeat writing style. No dense passages of leaden prose slow the quick tempo of the book. If anything, it moves a little too fast in parts. A few more real world stories – apocryphal or biographical – would slow things down enough to let more sink in. Likewise, Bell could do more in places to tie some of his more minor strategies to the larger, overriding principals behind the major strategies. For example, including more reminders of how core values should guide the other strategies would give more cohesion to the book as a whole.

But these are minor quibbles with what is, overall, a solid and helpful book. A lot could be gained by reading it through once, then going back and completing the practical exercises, then keeping it around for reference. After all, it takes a long time to grow bamboo – but the payoff is spectacular.

Opening Sentence of the Day: The Quotable Ronald Reagan

"This book had its beginnings in January 1993, although I did not realize it at the time." -- The Quotable Ronald Reagan by Peter Hannaford (Ed.) Not a gripping opening sentence. I wonder if I should consider the first sentence of the actual book, or the first sentence of introductions. If someone else wrote an introduction for a book, that's easy -- do not count that as the opening sentence. But if the author wrote an introduction contemporaneously with the book (not added in a later edition), then I think that counts for the opening sentence. Which means that some, like this one, are not going to be real sizzlers.

Opening Sentence of the Day: Water the Bamboo

"Water the Bamboo is a metaphor for success."

-- Water the Bamboo by Greg Bell

There are the 2009 Books!

Finally! There is finally a book over there on the right side because I finally finished a book in 2009. Not that I set out to start off 2009 with the incredibly grim All Quiet on the Western Front. I actually started the year reading Sometimes a Great Notion and The Mists of Avalon, both very long and slow (SAGN in an intense, involved, good way; TMOA in an overwrought, fantasy/romance kind of way). I still have both of them to finish before their covers will pop up on my 2009 list. All Quiet is the second book I finished this year. I finished Water the Bamboo by Greg Bell two days ago, but there is some kind of gremlin in my LibraryThing widget that prevents the cover from appearing.

Award of the Day: The Premios Dardo Award

The Premios Dardo Award! I do not know who started this award, but I thank No BS Book Reviews for recognizing my blog by "awarding" it to me. I will now pass along the good fortune. (I confess that I am artistically challenged -- it took me quite a while to figure out that the cool picture is a typewriter with words coming out.) This award "acknowledges the values that every blogger shows in his or her effort to transmit cultural, ethical, literary, and personal values every day." The rules to follow are: 1) Accept the award, post it on your blog together with the name of the person who granted the award and his or her blog link. 2) Pass the award to 15 other blogs that are worthy of this acknowledgment. Remember to contact the bloggers to let them know they have been chosen for this award. Here are the blogs that I would like to acknowledge (if you have already received this award, sorry for making extra work, but be thankful you are so well regarded): Art Scatter Bookoholic's Boklista Books 'N' Border Collies BurmudaOnion ChainReading Fluttering Butterflies Fresh Ink Books Hotch Pot Cafe The Internet Review of Books Blog J. Kaye's Book Blog Julia Hedge's Laces Letters on Pages Linus's Blanket Rebecca Reads Tip of the Iceberg Great blogs -- I encourage you to visit them all.

Review: Sister Carrie

Although Theodore Dreiser finished Sister Carrie in 1900, years of stutter steps on the part of various publishing companies delayed its full American publication until 1908. Even then, as Dreiser describes, “the outraged protests far outnumbered the plaudits.” Dreiser’s new “realism” was shocking to readers.

While Sister Carrie may not pack the same punch 100 years later, the story is sprightly and still relevant. It moves right along, with plenty of dialog and even some exciting adventures. The period details of Carrie’s life may be particular to fin de siècle New York, but the story of Carrie’s efforts to rise above her situation, in contrast to the pathos of Hurstwood’s decline, is still compelling.

The only off-note was the last minute “moral of the story” message that seemed tacked on in the last two pages. That money cannot buy happiness is a common message, but a little hard to go along with when weighed against the alternative presented by Hurstwood’s fate. Compared to the pages and pages of sermonizing that wrap up Dreiser’s American Tragedy, however, the final homily is blessedly short.

OTHER REVIEWS

If you would like your review of this book listed here, please leave a comment with a link and I will add it.

NOTE

Sister Carries made it to the Modern Library Top 100 list.  I am particularly fond of my Modern Library edition because it has the funky dust jacket image.