State of the Blog, Part One: The Lists

I love fall, with that back-to-school snap in the air that always fills me with energy.  I am invigorated by autumn and always feel like I can accomplish a thousand things before the end of the year.  With that in mind, let's see how much I've accomplished so far.

This is the first of my quarterly blog assessment posts.  This first part addresses the book lists. Part Two, coming soon, will take a look at the author lists.  Part Three will deal with the challenges I joined this year.

My List of Lists is over in the right-side column. These are Prize Winners, Must Reads, and other lists of books I have read or intend to read for some reason or another. Also in the right-side column is a list of my favorite authors. I add to both lists from time to time.

So far in 2010, I have read a total of 28 books from my various book lists. That is better progress than I would have guessed, but I am still daunted by the number of books on my TBR shelves. I should spend more time reading and less time playing with my lists.

THE LISTS


1899 Top 100
Books read so far: 7/100
Books read in 2010: one, The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexander Dumas
Books I hope to read in 2010: one more, either:

1. The Moonstone by Willkie Collins, or
   
2. Quo Vadis by Henryk Sienkiewicz

Books on my TBR shelf: 16

All-TIME Top 100
Books read so far: 75 and 2/3 of 100
Books read in 2010: 2 and 1/3

1. The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler
2. Play It As It Lays by Joan Didion (reviewed here)
3. The Two Towers by J. R. R. Tolkien (one-third of The Lord of the Rings)
   

Books I hope to read in 2010: no more
Books on my TBR shelf: 14

Anthony Burgess
Books read so far: 28/99
Books read in 2010: 2

1. A Single Man by Christopher Isherwood (reviewed here)
2. Titus Groan by Mervin Peake (reviewed here)

Books I hope to read in 2010: one more (The Mosquito Coast by Paul Theroux)
Books on my TBR shelf: 20

BBC's Big Read
Books read so far: 57 and 2/3 of 100
Books read in 2010: 5 and 1/3 (wow!)

1. Black Beauty by Anna Sewell
2. Gormenghast by Mervyn Peake (reviewed here)
3. Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbons (reviewed here)
4. The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexander Dumas
5. The Two Towers by J. R. R. Tolkien (one-third of The Lord of the Rings)
6. Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier (reviewed here)

Books I hope to read in 2010: no more, but I'm on a roll, so who knows
Books on my TBR shelf: 7

Book Club
Books read so far: 18/18
Books read in 2010: 3

1. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz
2. The Red Tent  by Anita Diamant
3. Small Island by Andrea Levy (reviewed here)

Books I hope to read in 2010: one more (but I don't yet know what it will be)
Books on my TBR shelf: none

College Board
Books read so far: 76/101
Books read in 2010: one (Beowulf, translated by Seamus Heaney)
Books I hope to read in 2010: one more (The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath)
Books on my TBR shelf: 18

Costa Book of the Year
Books read so far: 6/24
Books read in 2010: 3

1. The Secret Scripture by Sebastian Barry
2. Beowulf, translated by Seamus Heaney 
3. Small Island by Andrea Levy  (reviewed here)

Books I hope to read in 2010: no more
Books on my TBR shelf: one

Easton Press
Books read so far: 57/100
Books read in 2010: 2

1. The Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan
2. The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexander Dumas 

Books I hope to read in 2010: no more
Books on my TBR shelf: 32

Edgar Award
Books read so far: 8/56
Books read in 2010: 3

1. New Orleans Mourning by Julie Smith
2. Citizen Vince by Jess Walter (reviewed here) 
3. Down River by John Hart

Books I hope to read in 2010: no more, I don't think
Books on my TBR shelf: 4

Erica Jong
Books read so far: 32/100
Books read in 2010: 3

1. Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbon (reviewed here)
2. Play It As It Lays by Joan Didion (reviewed here) 
3. Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier (reviewed here)

Books I hope to read in 2010: 3 more, if I'm lucky

1. Orlando by Virginia Woolf
   
2. The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas by Gertrude Stein
3. The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath

Books on my TBR shelf: 22

French Connection
Books read so far: 46/112 (and counting -- there are more books to add to the list)
Books read in 2010: 4

1. The Flaneur: A Stroll Through the Paradoxes of Paris by Edmund White (reviewed here) 
2. L'Affaire by Diane Johnson
3. My Life in France by Julia Child (reviewed here)
4. The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexander Dumas  

Books I hope to read in 2010: one more (The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas by Gertrude Stein
Books on my TBR shelf: 25

Guilt List

Books read so far: I don't keep track, because I delete them after I read them
Books read in 2010: same
Books I hope to read in 2010: 13 more (I'll be busy)

1. The Night Gardener by George Pelecanos
2. The Art of Disappearing by Ivy Pochoda
3. The Evolution of Shadows by Jason Quinn Malott
4. Soldiers in Hiding by Richard Wiley
5. Jumptown: The Golden Years of Portland Jazz 1942-1957 by Robert Dietsche
6. Another Way the River Has: Taut True Tales from the Northwest by Robin Cody   
7. An Architectural Guidebook to Portland by Bart King 
8. The Lost Summer of Louisa May Alcott by Kelly O'Connor McNees
9. A Geography of Secrets by Fredrick Reuss  
10. To the Woods: Sinking Roots, Living Lightly, and Finding True Home by Evelyn Searle Hess 
11. 42 States of Grace by Maureen Hovenkotter

Books on my TBR shelf: 11

James Tait Black Memorial Prize
Books read so far: 8/96
Books read in 2010: one (The Secret Scripture by Sebastian Barry; for my Battle of the Prizes, British Version challenge)
Books I hope to read in 2010: 3

1. G by John Berger; also for my Battle of the Prizes, British Version challenge
2. Brazzaville Beach by William Boyd
3. The Mosquito Coast by Paul Theroux

Books on my TBR shelf: 11


LT Early Reviewers
Books read so far: 27/30
Books read in 2010: 8

1. A Single Man by Christopher Isherwood (reviewed here)
2. Maimonides: and the Biblical Prophets by Israel Drazin
3. Homer and Langley by E. L. Doctorow (reviewed here)
4. The Wall in My Head: Words and Images from the Fall of the Iron Curtain, published by Words Without Borders Anthologies (reviewed here)
5. Short Stories, Book I by Anton Chekhov (reviewed here)
6. A Week in December by Sebastian Faulks (reviewed here) 
7. Burmese Lessons: A True Love Story by Karen Connelly (reviewed here)
8. Peaceful Places, Los Angeles by Laura Randall (reviewed here)
   

Books I hope to read in 2010: 2 more

1. The New York Stories by Elizabeth Hardwick
2. Beautiful Maria of My Soul by Oscar Hijuelos 

Books on my TBR shelf: 2

Man Booker Prize
Books read so far: 21/43
Books read in 2010: one (The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga)
Books I hope to read in 2010: 2 more (for my Battle of the Prizes, British Version challenge)

1. G by John Berger 
2. The Sea, the Sea by Iris Murdoch

Books on my TBR shelf: 15

MLA's 30
Books read so far: 22/30
Books read in 2010: 1 and 1/3

1. (The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver
2.  The Two Towers by J. R. R. Tolkien (one-third of The Lord of the Rings)

Books I hope to read in 2010: no more
Books on my TBR shelf: 4

Modern Library
Books read so far: all of them!
Books read in 2010: zero (finished this list a couple of years ago)
Books I hope to read in 2010: none
Books on my TBR shelf: zero

National Book Award
Books read so far: 26/64
Books read in 2010: zero
Books I hope to Read in 2010: 2 (for the Battle of the Prizes, American Version challenge)

1. Them by Joyce Carol Oates
2. The Collected Stories of Katherine Anne Porter

Books on my TBR shelf: 13

NBCC Award
Books read so far: 16/34
Books read in 2010: one (The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz)
Books I hope to read in 2010: one more (Counterlife by Philip Roth)
Books on my TBR shelf: 11

Nobel Laureates
Authors read so far: 20/106
Books read in 2010: one (Beowulf, translated by Seamus Heaney)
Books I hope to read in 2010: one more (Kristin Lavransdatter by Sigrid Undset)
Books on my TBR shelf: 32 (but most by authors already read)

Observer's Top 100
Books read so far: 59/100
Books read in 2010: 3 and 1/3

1. Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan
2. The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler 
3. The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexander Dumas
4. The Two Towers by J. R. R. Tolkien (one-third of The Lord of the Rings)

Books I hope to read in 2010: no more
Books on my TBR shelf: 18

Orange Prize
Books read so far: 3/14
Books read in 2010: 2
Books I hope to read in 2010:

1. Small Island by Andrea Levy (reviewed here)
2. The Idea of Perfection by Kate Grenville (reviewed here)

Books on my TBR shelf: 4

Oregon Books
Books read so far: 3/20
Books read in 2010: zero
Books I hope to read in 2010: maybe none
Books on my TBR shelf: 2

PEN/Faulkner

Books read so far: 7/30
Books read in 2010: zero
Books I hope to read in 2010: 2

1. Soldiers in Hiding by Richard Wiley (also on my Guilt List)
2. Seaview by Toby Olson

Books on my TBR shelf: 12

Pulitzer Prize
Books read so far: 40/85
Books read in 2010: one (The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz)
Books I hope to read in 2010: at least 2 (for the Battle of the Prizes Challenge) 

1. The Collected Stories of Katherine Anne Porter
2. Breathing Lessons by Anne Tyler

Books on my TBR shelf: 19

Radcliffe's Top 100
Books read so far: 88/100
Books read in 2010: 4 and 1/3

1. Where Angels Fear to Tread by E.M. Forster (reviewed here)
2. O Pioneers! by Willa Cather
3. The War of the Worlds by H. G. Wells (reviewed here)  
4. The Two Towers by J. R. R. Tolkien (one-third of The Lord of the Rings) 
5. Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier (reviewed here) 

Books I hope to read in 2010: 2

1. Orlando by Virginia Woolf
2. The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas by Gertrude Stein

Books on my TBR shelf: 8

RCR Top 10
Books read so far: 10/10 (it's my list)
Books read in 2010: one (Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbon; reviewed  here)
Books I hope to Read in 2010: probably none -- one change this year is a big step already
Books on my TBR shelf: who knows?

Well-Stocked Bookcase
Books read so far: 35/60
Books read in 2010: zero
Books I hope to Read in 2010: 2

1. The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath
2. Them by Joyce Carol Oates

Books on my TBR shelf: 13

Opening Sentence of the Day: Echoes

"It was sometimes called Brigid's Cave, the echo cave, and if you shouted your questions loud enough in the right direction you got an answer instead of an echo."

-- Echoes by Maeve Binchy.

Sometimes I like nothing better than to sink into a  Maeve Binchy "Aga saga" and enjoy myself.

Opening Sentence of the Day: Proof

"Agony is socially unacceptable."

-- Proof by Dick Francis.

I am on a Dick Francis roll this year. He has definitely caught my fancy.

Awards: Thanks Bev!

I really shouldn't be given blog awards. I always appreciate them, but I am not good with the requisite follow up.  But Bev at My Reader's Block passed on several nice awards to me, so I will make an effort here. Geesh! I don't want to be a total wet blanket.

Now the follow up part: I list 10 things about me and then pass the awards on.

10 (Bookish) Things About Me

1. According to my LibraryThing tags, there are 1142 books on my TBR shelves.

2. I have never read Anna Karenina, Don Quixote, or War and Peace, all to my shame. And, yes, they are all on my TBR shelves.

3. A Dance to the Music of Time by Anthony Powell is my favorite “book” even though it is really 12 separate novels.

4. Jim Harrison is my favorite living American author, with Philip Roth as a close second.

5. I have read all 121 books on the Modern Library’s list of Top 100 Novels of the 20th Century.

6. Although I resisted Twitter, I now admit it is a very fun book-related time suck.

7. David Lodge is my favorite living British author, with Ian McEwan as a close second.

8. I have on a couple of occasions – and usually by accident – read a mystery from a series out of order, but it makes me very uncomfortable.

9. I am currently working on 27 books lists of prize winners or other “must reads,” all listed over in the right column.

10. If I had to define my favorite genre, it would be Mid-Century novels by dipsomaniacal, male British authors.

My Choices for Award Winners

I chose a few of my favorite Pacific Northwest bloggers:

At Home With Books
The Book Pirate
The Life and Times of Michael5000
We Be Reading
Whimpulsive
Worducopia

Teaser Tuesday Trifecta

My books are stacking up, going teaser-less. I'll catch up here with three books that have inspired my recent travel and cooking dreams:

It should come as no surprise that the residents of the multimillion-dollar apartments and town houses at this world-famous address don't want you to know about the small riverside park that's accessed from a hidden, unmarked spot. Ask where the entrance is, and you're likely to be met with a shrug and a Cheshire cat smile.

-- Peaceful Places, New York City: 129 Tranquil Sites in Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, the Bronx, and Staten Island by Evelyn Kanter (already reviewed here).

It's all about knowing where your ingredients come from (often local, family-owned farms) and respecting the ingredients enough to take time to see them through every step of the way.

Luckily the fertile Willamette Valley, as well as the diverse growing regions throughout the state, result in incredible, year-round food.

-- Food Lover's Guide to Portland by Liz Crain.

Many of the recipes in the book were adapted from dishes served on the boat.  Others were inspired by the home packs we brought back with us: king crab and salmon, scallops and shrimp filled our freezers back on land.

-- Fishes and Dishes: Seafood Recipes and Salty Stories from Alaska's Commercial Fisherwomen by Kiyo Marsh, Tomi Marsh, and Laura Cooper.



Teaser Tuesdays is hosted by Should Be Reading, where you can find the official rules for this weekly event.

Mailbox Monday

Thanks go to Bermudaonion for hosting Mailbox Monday this month, and to The Story Siren for hosting In My Mailbox.

Thanks to a lunchtime walk to Powell's, I have one book to list.

These Granite Islands by Sarah Stonich (this is the debut novel by the author of The Ice Chorus, which I enjoyed and reviewed here)

List: Erica Jong

In response to the publication of the Modern Library’s list of Top 100 Novels of the 20th Century, Erica Jong wrote an article for The Nation in which she discussed the relatively few number of books written by women that made it to the Modern Library’s list.

She also included a list of the Top 100 20th Century Novels by Women, compiled from votes cast by those “250 or so distinguished women writers and critics” and “about thirty male novelists, critics and poets” who Jong solicited directly and participants in “the rather lively writers’ forum” on Jong’s website. The results, while not scientific, would provide for some good reading. The list is in order of the number of votes received.

Those I have read are in red. Those on my TBR shelf are in blue. As always, if anyone has undertaken to read all the books on this list, I am happy to post a link to your progress reports. Just leave a comment with the link address.

Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell

Interview With the Vampire by Anne Rice

To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf

Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf

The Waves by Virginia Woolf

Orlando by Virginia Woolf

Nightwood by Djuna Barnes

The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton

The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton

Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton

The Well of Loneliness by Radclyffe Hall

Burger's Daughter by Nadine Gordimer

The Dollmaker by Harriette Simpson Arnow

The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood

My Ántonia by Willa Cather

Fear of Flying by Erica Jong (reviewed here)

Fanny by Erica Jong

Obasan by Joy Kogawa

The Golden Notebook by Doris Lessing

The Fifth Child by Doris Lessing

The Grass Is Singing by Doris Lessing

To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

Woman on the Edge of Time by Marge Piercy

A Thousand Acres by Jane Smiley

Her First American by Lore Segal

The Color Purple by Alice Walker

The Third Life of Grange Copeland by Alice Walker

The Mists of Avalon by Marion Zimmer Bradley

Memento Mori by Muriel Spark

The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie by Muriel Spark

Bastard Out of Carolina by Dorothy Allison

Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys (reviewed here)

Anya by Susan Fromberg Shaeffer

Trust by Cynthia Ozick

The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan

The Kitchen God's Wife by Amy Tan

Chilly Scenes of Winter by Ann Beattie

Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston

A Book of Common Prayer by Joan Didion

Play It as It Lays by Joan Didion (reviewed here)

The Group by Mary McCarthy

The Company She Keeps by Mary McCarthy

The Little Disturbances of Man by Grace Paley

The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath

The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers

The Death of the Heart by Elizabeth Bowen

Wise Blood by Flannery O'Connor

Anywhere But Here by Mona Simpson

Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison

Beloved by Toni Morrison

Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbons (reviewed here)

Mr. Fortune's Maggot by Sylvia Townsend Warner

Ship of Fools by Katherine Anne Porter

Progress of Stories by Laura Riding

Heat and Dust by Ruth Prawer Jhabvala (Booker winner)

The Blue Flower by Penelope Fitzgerald

The House of the Spirits by Isabel Allende

Possession by A.S. Byatt

The Ghost Road by Pat Barker

Rubyfruit Jungle by Rita Mae Brown

Hotel du Lac by Anita Brookner

Nights at the Circus by Angela Carter

Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier (reviewed here)

Geek Love by Katherine Dunn

We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson (reviewed here)

Excellent Women by Barbara Pym
 
Ceremony by Leslie Marmon Silko
 
Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant by Anne Tyler

The Accidental Tourist by Anne Tyler

Things Invisible to See by Nancy Willard (reviewed here)

Sexing the Cherry by Jeanette Winterson

Disturbances in the Field by Lynne Sharon Schwartz

Civil Wars by Rosellen Brown

Stones for Ibarra by Harriet Doerr

The Mountain Lion by Jean Stafford

Novel on Yellow Paper by Stevie Smith

The Shipping News by E. Annie Proulx

The Mind-Body Problem by Rebecca Goldstein

The Children of Men by P.D. James

Stones From the River by Ursula Hegi

The Life and Loves of a She-Devil by Fay Weldon

Collected Stories by Katherine Mansfield

Life in the Iron Mills by Rebecca Harding Davis

The Beet Queen by Louise Erdrich

The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin

The Country Girls Trilogy by Edna O'Brien

Realms of Gold by Margaret Drabble

The Waterfall by Margaret Drabble

The Locusts Have No King by Dawn Powell

The Women's Room by Marilyn French

The Optimist's Daughter by Eudora Welty

The Stone Diaries by Carol Shields

Annie John by Jamaica Kincaid

Tell Me a Riddle by Tillie Olsen

The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas by Gertrude Stein

A Severed Head by Iris Murdoch

Clear Light of Day by Anita Desai

The Drowning Season by Alice Hoffman

The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole by Sue Townsend

The Pumpkin Eater by Penelope Mortimer


NOTE

Updated on July 18, 2016.

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.

Cookbook Library: The Fishes & Dishes Cookbook

Sisters Kiyo and Tomi Marsh worked together for years on the F/V Savage, a fishing boat Tomi bought in 1990. In additional to living and working on the boat year round, they found that they enjoyed “cooking in the ditch” (the trough between the waves) and developed recipes featuring the ocean bounty they brought in.

Working with author Laura Cooper, the sisters polished their own recipes and gathered other stories and dishes from fellow commercial fisherwomen and like-minded enthusiasts. The result is a real adventure called The Fishes & Dishes Cookbook. The book is subtitled “Seafood Recipes and Salty Stories from Alaska’s Commercial Fisherwomen,” which only hints at the fascinating lives of these daring women.

The recipes range from homey standbys like a Hangtown Fy, to more exotic fare such as Jade Dumplings with Citrus Ponzu Sauce or Octopus and Roasted Red Pepper Salad. The book also includes helpful general instructions on choosing and prepping sea creatures in a section called “Fish Basics for Greenhorns.”

Reading the stories about the fisherwomen opens up a very wide world. Their tales of fishing for halibut bigger than them, running from Russian mafia ships, braving storms, finding love aboard ship, and other adventures adds extra spice to the recipes offered.

WEEKEND COOKING

Hosted by Beth Fish Reads

I haven't tried any of the actual recipes in this book yet, although Crab Rangoon is a favorite of mine, so I look forward to trying those at home. And I love their idea of adding crab to a Japanese cucumber salad. Can you tell Dungeness crab season is approaching and I am getting excited?

But we have recently used this cookbook to teach us how to grill a whole salmon.  We bought a Columbia River Indian-Caught Salmon when we were driving through Cascade Locks earlier this summer.  It was a beautiful fish and we didn't want to do anything to it besides grill it with some lemons and basil.  Thanks to the instructions in Fishes & Dishes, we got it off the grill before it turned into wood. 

NOTES

I am pleased to add this cookbook to my Cookbook Library. I am also pleased to be able to scratch one off my cookbook project list.

Review of the Day: The Razor's Edge

The Razor's Edge by Somerset Maugham has always made me skittish because I thought it was a boring book about a WWI veteran's search for inner peace and enlightenment. (Not that a search for inner peace and enlightenment is boring – at least not for the person doing the searching – but it’s not a page turner.)

No need for such worries. Larry's quest is only one part of the book and is woven into a lively story about Chicago millionaires, 1920s Paris society, marriage, art collecting, the stock market crash, and life on the Riviera. There are half a dozen remarkable characters and a lot going on.

Elliott Templeton, an American expatriate living in Paris, is the central character who brings the other characters together. He is an arbiter of style and taste, a social butterfly, a discrete dealer in art and antiques, a Catholic convert, and an unrepentant snob. Altogether, he is one of the most complex and interesting characters in modern literature.

The cast of minor characters is equally impressive, including the tragic Sophie MacDonald who has a taste for liquor and rough trade:

She was outrageously made up, her cheeks rouged to the eyes and her eyelids, upper and lower, heavily blued; her eyebrows and eyelashes were thick with mascara and her mouth scarlet with lipstick. . . . She looked more of a slut than any woman there and I had a suspicion that she was not only drunk but doped.

Her eyebrows were mascaraed. Now, there’s a scene that sticks.

There is also a fascinating metafictional angle to the book because Maugham himself is the narrator. He starts with this: "I have never begun a novel with more misgiving." He writes about his other novels, he gets introduced to the various characters because he is a famous novelist, and they interact with him as an author, although not an author writing about them – his perspective is definitely historical. The technique might be gimmicky if tried by a new author, but Maugham pulls it off.

The narrative sags a little during Larry’s long description of his trip to an ashram in India. His discussion of Eastern mysticism and reincarnation was, no doubt, avant-garde and even provocative back in 1944, but hasn’t aged well. The whole passage has a Buddhism for Beginners feel to it.

But this is a negligible criticism. The Razor’s Edge is a terrific novel, worthy of being read and read again.

OTHER REVIEWS

The Story Girl

(If you would like your review of this or any other Somerset Maugham book listed here, please leave a comment with a link and I will add it.)

NOTES

The Razor's Edge is on Anthony Burgess's list of Top 99 novels. That's 29 down, 70 to go.

I have been on a Maugham jag ever since listening to Ten by Maugham, a collection of short stories.  That led me to crack open my two volume set of short stories and get going on some of the novels.  I really need to add him to my list of authors. And I may have to re-read Of Human Bondage.

Oh, my goodness. There really is a book called Buddhism for Beginners.  I had no idea.

Opening Sentence of the Day: Another Way the River Has

Nobody ever called the Clackamas "old man river."

Another Way the River Has: Taut True Tales from the Northwest by Robin Cody (published by OSU Press).

Cody is best-known for his novel Ricochet River, a coming-of-age story set in a small Oregon lumber town in the 1960s. This is a collection of his nonfiction, including several pieces not published before.

Review of the Day: Burmese Lessons

Burmese Lessons: A True Love Story  is Karen Connelly's very personal story of traveling to Burma and working with Burmese refugees in Thailand. She starts out with the idea of writing some articles about artists and political prisoners in Burma, then broadens her scope to write a book.

While in Thailand, Connelly fell in love with a Burmese dissident leader. She uses their personal relationship as the framework for her larger story about the struggle for democracy in Burma and the hardships faced by the refugees. But her book is still personal.  It is the story of a Western woman's adventure in Burma and what she learned -- as much about herself as the Burmese people.

The only weakness to this fascinating story is that it lacks defining context early on. What I knew about Burma is written on the menu at Burma Super Star, but I don't think I am alone in my ignorance.  Burma, its history, and even its geography are not commonly known to most Western readers.  The book would benefit from a map and a brief explanation early on of Burma's political history. Connelly includes just such a paragraph eventually -- but not until about two-thirds of the way through the book.

Likewise, the book lacks temporal context. Connelly never explains that the story takes place in 1996 and she further obscures that fact by writing about most of the action in the present tense. This makes the book more immediately engaging, but is less historically honest.

This lack of context does not detract from Connelly's writing or her story, but it is distracting. 

Connelly is a poet and novelist, which shows in her eye for beauty and drama.  While not a thorough analysis of Burma's history and politics, Burmese Lessons is an absorbing memoir.

OTHER REVIEWS

(If you would like your review listed here, please leave a comment with a link to your review and I will add it.)

NOTES

I got this book through the LibraryThing Early Reviewers' program.  One more I can cross off that list.

Opening Sentence of the Day: The Truth About Obamacare

On Tuesday, March 23, 2010, surrounded by flashing cameras and cheering fans, Barack Obama signed into law a bill that will lead to the largest expansion of government in the history of the United States.

-- The Truth About Obamacare by Sally C. Pipes.

Good, bad, or otherwise, that's probably an accurate statement. Let's see what Ms. Pipes has to say . . .

Teaser Tuesday: The Razor's Edge

"She was outrageously made up, her cheeks rouged to the eyes and her eyelids, upper and lower, heavily blued; her eyebrows and eyelashes were thick with mascara and her mouth scarlet with lipstick. . . .  She looked more of a slut than any woman there and I had a suspicion that she was not only drunk but doped."

The Razor's Edge by Somerset Maugham.

That's the mascaraed eyebrows scene that so stuck with me. Even though I didn't remember reading the book, when I got to that scene, I knew I had.

Poor Sophie MacDonald!

Teaser Tuesdays is hosted by Should Be Reading, where you can find the official rules for this weekly event.

Mailbox Monday

Bermudaonion is hosting Mailbox Monday this month. Thanks Kathy! I also remembered this week to post to In My Mailbox, hosted by The Story Siren.

One book came into my house last week:

42 States of Grace: A Woman's Journey by Maureen Hovenkotter.




A mutual friend suggested that the author send me a copy of this book.  I'm afraid it is going to make me cry, but it looks very good. She was a free-lance writer and an aide to a U.S. Senator.  When her husband died unexpectedly, she set off traveling around America in an RV with her dog Charlie.

This is the sort of random, real-person memoirs that I really like.  

Review of the Day: Peaceful Places, New York City

In Peaceful Places, New York City Evelyn Kanter explores “129 Tranquil Sites in Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, the Bronx, and Staten Island” and throws in a bonus section of four peaceful day trips outside of the city. The sites are listed alphabetically, but cross-indexed by neighborhood and category.

There are many categories include Enchanting Walks, Museums & Galleries, Parks & Gardens, Quiet Tables, and Spiritual Enclaves. Decent maps help pinpoint locations and Kanter gives directions to get to every place on public transportation.

Kanter is a travel writer and photographer with an active lifestyle, which shows in her choices of peaceful sites. She tends to favor hiking trails and open spaces to reading rooms or quiet chapels. For this reason, the book is as of much use to residents looking to discover the hidden corners as to visitors looking for a respite from the hustle and bustle of the Big Apple. Her descriptions of “2,800 acres of forests, meadows, ponds, hills, and valleys” or “dunes and beach grass creat[ing] the only canvas” are enough to entice explorers to Staten Island or Queens, but probably not a visitor looking to cram the most into a weekend.

Out-of-towners may prefer her tips on finding garden atriums and “vest pocket” parks hidden between the skyscrapers of Midtown. Or her short but convincing list of places for quiet cocktails. If even these oases fail to sooth city-jangled nerves, there’s always the option of becoming “temporarily vegetative in total relaxed bliss” with a YeloNap at the Yelo Spa.

Peaceful Places is an inspiration anyone planning a visit to New York, and a must-have book for any New Yorkers looking for adventure in the farther reaches of their grand city.

OTHER REVIEWS

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

NOTES

If Peaceful Places, New York City appeals to you, you may also like Secret New York: The Unique Guidebook to New York's Hidden Sites, Sounds, & Tastes, which was published in 1999 but is still my favorite NYC guidebook; Romantic New York City: A Guide to the Most Romantic Clubs, Restaurants, Bars and Hotels in New York City, which is even more out of date but still inspires; and Up in the Old Hotel by Joseph Mitchell (reviewed here), which will never be out of date and may be the best book about New York ever.

Challenge: Daphne du Maurier

WRAP-UP: I only read two of the three books I signed up to read: Rebecca (reviewed here) and My Cousin Rachel, which I didn't review.  I enjoyed my introduction to du Maurier and plan to read several more of her books.  I added several to my TBR shelves during this challenge. Added January 9, 2012.


ORIGINAL SIGN-UP: Not that I need another book challenge, but the Daphne du Maurier Challenge hosted by Chris at book-a-rama looks like fun.  And it runs through April 19, 2011, so I have plenty of time.

But the real reason I am signing up now is because I can count Rebecca as my first book. I just read it and posted my review.  It was my first du Maurier book ever, even though several (at least nine, according to LibraryThing) have been sitting on my TBR shelf for decades.

I am signing up for the "Dreaming of Manderley" category: "Participants in this category, will read 3 of Daphne du Maurier's larger works, her novels or non-fiction. You can also count a collection of her short stories as one book."

MY CHOICES

Since I am still new to du Maurier, I'll start with the greatest hits:

1. Rebecca (reviewed here); 
2. The Flight of the Falcon; and
3. My Cousin Rachel.
   

Opening Sentence of the Day: The Razor's Edge

"I have never begun a novel with more misgiving."

The Razor's Edge by Somerset Maugham.

I am on a bit of a Maugham jag because I am working my way through the short stories.  I always thought that I had read this book before, but I got over half-way through it this time before anything was familiar.  It all seemed new to me until I remembered the scene with Sophie in the Parisian nightclub -- I always remember that scene because her eyebrows were mascaraed. Her eyebrows.

Review of the Day: The Fortress of Solitude

 

The Fortress of Solitude is the story of two friends, Dylan Ebdus and Mingus Rude, growing up in Brooklyn in the 1970s. Dylan is white, Mingus is black; both are growing up without mothers. Dylan’s father is an abstract artist who views himself as a sellout for painting cover art for sci-fi novels. Mingus’s father was the front-man for a Motown harmony group, but spends his days getting high and dreaming of a comeback.

Jonathan Lethem packs so much into the story that there are times reading it is like trying to drink from a firehose of 1970s culture. Dylan spends his days collecting comic books, perfecting street games, being “yoked” by older kids for his lunch money, and trying to hold his own with graffiti taggers, including Mingus. Drugs, sex, race, music, gentrification, crime, art – its all there, but all through the eyes of a kid.

The book has the multiple storylines and hard edge of a Don DiLillo novel, but without the unrelenting grimness because it is told from the point of view of a child who still has some optimism. The best thing about the book is how Lethem perfectly captures the half-perceptions and half-understandings that make a child’s memory.

In the second half of the book, the story flags. It is 1999 and Dylan is living in Berkeley. Mingus is in prison, where he has been off and on since turning to crack. Dylan fills in the details of the years gone by, but this part of the book all builds to a harebrained scheme to get Dylan out of prison.

Unfortunately, where the first part of the book is incredible in the sense of being amazing, the second part is incredible in the sense of not being believable. Dylan uses a “magic” ring he had since childhood to sneak into the prison, with tragic consequences. The ring made sense in the first part, where its magical powers could be explained as the alcoholic delusions of the derelict who passed it on to Dylan, or the fantasies of Dylan and Mingus who wanted to be superheroes. But when Dylan actually uses the ring to become invisible, the story takes a jarring turn to magical realism.

For readers willing to take whatever a story dishes out, the second half could be as entertaining as the first. But for those not willing to suspend disbelief to the point of accepting magic rings and invisibility, the ending will be a letdown.

OTHER REVIEWS

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

NOTES

I listened to the unabridged audio version of this book, which I suspect made me like it more than I would have had I read all 500+ pages. The narrator did a terrific job with all the voices and brought the kaleidoscope images into focus.

Review: Rebecca

Rebecca is a book that I had to give myself over to completely in order enjoy it. The whole experience depends on buying into the moldering, gothic suspense of it all.

Unfortunately, this requires putting up with the unnamed heroine being a hopeless ninny for the first two-thirds of the story. But once I set aside her fear of every person she encounters and her inability to talk to her own husband and went with the flow of the story, I was eventually swept away.

At the center of the story is Manderley, the seaside mansion of Max de Winter. The house is as much a character in the book as the people, providing atmosphere and an elaborate setting with closed-off wings, back passages, dark woods, and hidden coves. The house and all it stands for also motivates the characters and leads, eventually, to their undoing.

When brooding Max brings his new young bride to Manderley, both are haunted by his beautiful, vivacious first wife Rebecca – he in memory, the bride in imagination. By the time both shake loose from Rebecca’s beyond-the-grave grip, it is too late.

Even when the book is frustrating, it is admirable in its relentless adherence to the genre. Every detail layers on the suffocating suspense, from the spooky skull-headed housekeeper, to the relentless summer heat, to the rat-gnawn day bed in the boathouse. Daphne du Maurier created a perfect neo-gothic thriller in Rebecca.

OTHER REVIEWS

Hannah Soneham's Book Blog

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

NOTES

Rebecca is on the Radcliffe Top 100 list. This was the first of three book I read for theDaphne du Maurier Challenge hosted by Chris at book-a-rama.

Teaser Tuesday Two-fer

The kid read books like he was engaged in some kind of scavenger procedure, scowling in concentration, turning pages at improbable speed while he flayed away inessential flesh of prose and inspected the skeleton of story, the bare facts or crucial nonsense.  Dylan Ebdus didn't read, he filleted.

-- The Fortress of Solitude by Jonathan Lethem. What a terrific description of how a kid reads a book!

My other books for the week is the polar opposite of Lethem's funkadelic anthem to 1970's Brooklyn:

As I sipped my cold tea I thought with a tired bitter feeling of dispair that I would be content to live in one corner of Manderley and Maxim in the other as long as the outside world should never know.  If he had no more tenderness for me, never kissed me again, did not speak to me except on matters of necessity, I believed I could bear it if I were certain that nobody knew of this but our two selves.

-- Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier.Oh, the melodrama! It is still painful for me to watch this ninny feel sorry for herself and be afraid of her own shadow, but I am sucked hard into the story.


Teaser Tuesdays is hosted by Should Be Reading, where you can find the official rules for this weekly event.