Review: Siddhartha

I've been reading several books by Nobel Prize winners lately, in part because I signed up for this Nobel challenge, in part because I have a goal to read at least one book by every winner of the Nobel Prize for literature. Siddhartha was one more step forward on both counts.

I can't say that it did anything for me. Siddhartha is the hero of this allegorical tale of an Indian man's development, from Brahmin student, to mystic, to successful business man and pleasure seeker, to wise ferryboat tender. Maybe back in 1922 when it was first published, or even in the 1960s and '70s when American hippies took it to heart, the examination of Indian mysticism and Buddhism would have been fascinating. But now, when Indian culture is more familiar, it just seems pretentious and overwrought. Many people love it. It just is not my cup of tea.

Book Notes: John Stuart Mill

So, I am about halfway through John Stuart Mill: Victorian Firebrand, the new biography by Richard Reeves, and I still do not know if JSM was the Father of Libertarianism or the Father of Socialism. That's quite a philosophical conundrum! Individualism and collectivism are both central to his thinking. We'll see if these two theories can be reconciled before the end of the book. Some of my confusion may be the way Reeves uses terms such as "liberal," "progressive," and the like with their contemporary meanings when they had a different meaning back then. For example, the "radical reformers" Mill supported wanted a more laissez faire economy to encourage industrialization, while the "conservatives" thought industry was bad and wanted a return to nature. These definitions seem topsy turvey now. Hopefully I'll be able to make heads or tails out of all this so I can write my review for The Internet Review of Books. It's due for the October edition.

Review: America, America

America, America is Ethan Canin’s masterful portrait of American political life on the cusp of Watergate, balanced between the relative naiveté of amateur-driven, old school politicking and the cynical, scandal-worn future of professionally-run campaigns driven by instant access to information.

The story of Senator Henry Bonwiller’s 1972 campaign for President is told by Corey Sifter, son of working-class parents who is taken under the wing of the powerful Metarey family. The derailment of Bonwiller’s campaign (with its heavy tones of Ted Kennedy’s Chappaquiddick adventure) is more morality play than murder mystery. Through Sifter’s first-hand participation as a minor campaign worker and his later reminiscences touched off by the Senator’s death, Canin unfolds the parallel stories of how Bonwiller’s downfall played a key part in the country’s and Sifter’s political maturation.

This is not a fast paced book, but it is beautifully told, pitch perfect, and, particularly for readers who came of age prior to Watergate, poignantly captures the last glimmers of an earlier political era.

Summer Reading Lists: Status Report

In the six weeks or so since I adopted a Summer Reading List, I've read several of the books on the list, abandoned others, and added quite a few. So far, I've read: Bridge of Sighs by Olen Steinhauer. This is the first of his "Eastern Europe" series, in which various police detective heroes solve murder mysteries in an unnamed Soviet satelite country. The books are dark, gritty, and compellingly evocatove of Cold War Eastern Europe. Resistance Fighter by Jorgen Kieler about the Danish resistance movement in WWII, which I reviewed here. Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert, which I'd been avoiding but the book club chose. It didn't bother me as much as I anticipated, but I could have done without. The Cossacks by Leo Tolstoy, a 19th Century anthropological novel about the native people of the Caucasian Mountains. America, America by Ethan Canin, which I need to review. The Seven Dials Mystery by Agatha Christie, which I carried around in my car for emergencies and finally finished. House of Mondavi by Julia Flynn Siler, which I briefly reviewed here. Protect and Defend by Vince Flynn. Neon Rain by James Lee Burke. Night by Elie Wiesel. The Fracture Zone by Simon Winchester. Errors and Omissions by Paul Goldstein. John Paul the Great by Peggy Noonan.

Review: Secret Portland

Having greatly enjoyed Secret New York and Secret San Francisco from the same series, I was looking forward to reading Secret Portland by Ann Carroll Burgess. The New York book has successfully guided me to several hidden treasures. When I lived in San Francisco, that book was my invaluable guide to deep exploration of my adopted city.  But the Portland edition doesn't stack up to the other two.

As a Portlander, I am more picky than a visitor reading the book. Still, it just does not have the same insider flair that the New York and San Francisco books have. The other two were written by people who live in the cities they wrote about. It is obvious that this author does not live in Portland and has not spent much time here. The information is standard for any guidebook of the city. Chuck Palahniuk's Fugitives & Refugees is a much better, although seamier, resource for finding the quirky side of the Rose City.

In addition to only covering the "sites, sounds, & tastes" that you can find in any hotel room visitors' guide, Secret Portland is full of several small, but irritating, errors. For example, while the book includes a truly secret Portland gem, Martinotti's Italian cafe and deli, it misspelled the name as Marinotti's. Even more confusingly, several listings misidentify the neighborhood. For example, the book identifies many downtown locations in southwest Portland as being in the "Buckman" neighborhood -- a neighborhood across the river in southEAST Portland. The nail in the coffin was the author's tip on how to pronounce the name of Portland's river, the Willamette: "Want to sound like a local? Make sure to pronounce it "will-uh-met," with the accent on the "uh." Wrong-o! As any Portlander will tell you, "It's will-A-mitt, damn it!"

List of the Day: Books about Napa Valley

Ah, Napa Valley. In my mind, I love to hate it. The traffic, the commercialism, the tour buses, the conspicuous consumption -- there are so many things about the "Napa Lifestyle" that rub my essentially Puritan and agoraphobic nature the wrong way. But when I am actually in the Napa Valley, I love it. I really do. Napa itself is a charm-free zone, but Calistoga, up at the far end, is still funky and fun. And St. Helena may be the most adorable town in California. The whole valley is a gourmand's paradise, with all the wineries, restaurants, and Gucci groceries. Reading The House of Mondavi by Julia Flynn Siler has stirred up all these mixed feelings about Napa Valley. And it reminded me of several books about Napa Valley that I have greatly enjoyed. For instance, Sean Wilsey's delightfully quirky memoir Oh, the Glory of it All! perfectly captures San Francisco and Napa in the 1970s and early '80s, when he grew up with a goofy mix of socialite parents and stepparents. Both Wilsey and Siler share the anecdote about Wilsey's father flying his helicopter around Napa Valley, insisting on buzzing the Spring Valley Winery owned by his rival, famous as the opening shot in Falcon Crest. There is a "Napa Valley Mystery" series by Nadia Gordon that I particularly enjoy. The protagonist, Sunny McCoskey, is a chef and amateur sleuth with friends in the wine industry. I've read the first two, Sharpshooter and Death by the Glass, and am looking forward to Murder Alfresco, currently on my TBR shelf, and the soon to be released Lethal Vintage. Are there any other books about or set in Napa Valley that are worth reading? Late summer seems the perfect time to lounge on the porch with a glass of wine and a good Napa book.

Review: The Ambassadors

Henry James is not one of my favorite authors, although I feel compelled to read his books because he so powerfully influenced 20th Century writing. As I've mentioned before, his talent reminds me of artists capable of painting portraits on grains of rice.

I found The Ambassadors to be typical James sludge. For example, a convoluted paragraph a page and a half long that I had to read twice just to realize that all the guy was doing was wandering around, looking for a place to read a letter. Ugh! Slow going to the very last page.

Because I didn’t get the main point of the plot, so veiled was it in Jamsien fog, I didn’t care about any of the characters. Their dithering drove me up a wall.

As always, I am reminded of the famous observation by H.G. Wells that a novel by Henry James is

like a church lit but without a congregation to distract you, with every light and line focused on the high altar. And on the altar, very reverentially placed, intensely there, is a dead kitten, an egg-shell, a bit of string. . . . It is leviathan retrieving pebbles. It is a magnificent but painful hippopotamus resolved at any cost, even at the cost of its dignity, upon picking up a pea, which has got to the corner of its den.

Review: House of Mondavi

Starting with Ceasare Mondavi's first ventures in Napa Valley after World War II, through the family's tumultuous history, to ultimate riches but personal dissatisfaction, House of Mondavi by Julia Flynn Siler is a mesmerizing tale.

Like any family business saga, the story of who started the business, who ran it, and who runs it now is one that could be told adequately on the back of a restaurant menu. The Mondavi story itself could have been told well in a Vanity Fair-style magazine article. At close to 500 pages, this is a long book. But the details and diversions Siler includes add depth and richness that bring the reader right inside the Mondavis' world.

Review of the Day: The Studs Lonigan Trilogy

The Studs Lonigan Trilogy is James Farrell's masterwork and a classic of American "realism." Modern Library included the trilogy as one of the Top 100 Fiction Books of the 20th Century. It also shows up on the BOMC's list of 60 novels in it's Well-Stocked Bookcase. I understand readers who complain about the book seeming dated. The slang the characters use, their clothes, even some of their concerns, are anachronisms now. But it strikes me as a spot-on description of the rough world of second generation, Irish Catholic toughs in Chicago in the 1920s. Definitely not the glittery 1920s of Fitzgerald or Dorothy Parker! The final book of the trilogy, Judgment Day, is the longest of the three and my favorite. It has a lot more going on than just what is in Studs Lonigan’s head. This final volume really gives a compelling view of the Great Depression, focusing as it does on the middle class characters and what they lose because of the depression. Because these people have jobs, own their own businesses, invest in real estate, speculate on the stock market, they seem more familiar and relevant to me than dirt farmers (Grapes of Wrath), labor agitators (USA Trilogy), or other soup line characters from books and movies about the Great Depression. Except for compulsive list readers such as myself, I would recommend skipping the first two volumes and only reading Judgment Day. It stands alone and, I think, is the best of the three.

Review: Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man

Portrait is certainly more accessible than Ulysses or Finnegans Wake, but it lacks the delightful wordplay and zany, ambitious flights that leave the reader in wonderment. It has its obscure parts (of course, it's Joyce), but for the most part chronicles Stephen Dedalus's life from young childhood through college, recording everything that influenced him.

Some of these influences were recorded in more meticulous detail than makes for entertainment. For instance, the long, long passage giving the priest's sermon on sin and Hell was a flawless rendition of a classic fire and brimstone harangue.  To describe it is to describe the problem with it.

I thought I had read this in college, but listening to the audio version made me wonder.  If I did read it, I deserved a very bad grade for comprehension and retention.

Review: Resistance Fighter

An appropriate review for Independence Day!



Resistance Fighter by Jorgen Kieler is a commanding, first-hand account of the Danish Resistance movement during World War Two. After Germany invaded Denmark in April 1940 and a collaborationist government took control of the country, resistance fighters organized an underground opposition to occupation and collaboration.

Kieler, a medical student when the Nazis invaded, began his involvement by operating an underground press in Copenhagen with two of his sisters, his brother, and others. As the war intensified, they expanded their efforts – first by ferrying Jews and other refugees to neutral Sweden, then through increasing acts of sabotage against Danish factories producing Nazi war materials.

Keiler’s straightforward account of this unfamiliar part of the war is as interesting as it is inspiring. The efforts of Keiler’s group and others resulted in over 90% of Denmark’s Jews escaping to Sweden and the hampering of German war efforts. While Keiler is thorough in his identification of the key players in the resistance movement, the book does not become bogged down in exhaustive detail about the inner workings of the various resistance factions.

Eventually, the Nazis cracked down on the Danish resistance fighters, leading to the arrests of Keiler, his brother, two of his sisters, and their father. He and his brother spent six months as slave laborers in a concentration camp in Porta Westphalica. The camp was not one of the infamous death camps used for the mass execution of the Jews, but housed political prisoners, captured soldiers, and common criminals all being worked to death building bomb-proof underground factories for the Nazis. Keiler’s unadorned description of life in the camp is heart wrenching.

After surviving the war, Keiler became a doctor and spent years studying the effects of starvation and the stress-related disorder he labeled “Concentration Camp Syndrome.” He also testified at several war criminal trials and researched archival materials for this and an earlier history book. His intimate chronicle is tribute to those involved in Denmark’s struggle against the Nazis. But it is much more than that. By focusing on a lesser-known aspect of World War Two, Resistance Fighter also provides a fresh perspective on the harsh facts of German occupation and concentration camps, and the related ethical and political issues of collaboration, resistance, liberty, and citizenship.

Oregon Anthology

Matt Love, Nestucca Spit Press publisher and author of Red Hot and Rollin': A Retrospection of the Portland Trail Blazers' 1976-77 Championship Season, is publishing a new anthology of Oregon writing called Citadel of the Spirit: Oregon’s Sesquicentennial Anthology. According to the official description of this 700-plus page book, it "contains 60 original essays by many of the state’s finest writers and 55 excerpts from primary documents related to Oregon history. The book’s official release is slated for February 14, 2009, Valentine’s Day, exactly 150 years to the day Oregon joined the union. The title derives from a quote by Ken Kesey, 'Oregon is the citadel of the spirit.' The artist Henk Pander has agreed to design the cover." The full list of the book's contents is here. A special hardback, signed, numbered edition is available for pre-order. The $100 price tag is steep, but goes to the worthy cause of getting this historic work published. I ordered mine today.

Review of the Day: Empire Falls

Empire Falls is Richard Russo's Pulitzer-winning story of the Roby family of Empire Falls, Maine.

Russo tells the tale primarily from the point of view of the recently-divorced Miles Roby. Miles struggles to make a go of the Empire Grill, get out from under the thumb of the town doyenne, maintain his relationship with his teen age daughter, settle a feud with a local cop, understand his parents, and overcome his fear of heights so he can paint the church steeple.

This is an engrossing, meaty read. It is a great, old-fashioned yarn, meaning it has a strong, coherent plot; fully-developed characters; drama; a reasonable tempo; and more than a few thought-provoking ideas. Thoroughly entertaining.

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Review: All the Pretty Horses

All the Pretty Horses is the bastard offspring of a mating between Ernest Hemingway and Zane Gray, with some William Faulkner apparent in the DNA.

It was his horse. And it was a good horse. And he rode the horse. When it was night, he hobbled the horse by a stream and both boy and horse drank from the cold water of the stream . . . .

So, maybe that is not a direct quote, but it captures the essence.

Not that it is a bad book. There is plenty of exciting plot to keep it moving along, at least after the plodding first chapter. The story of John Grady Cole’s adventures in Mexico is riveting, involving vagabonds, a lovely senorita, her rich rancher father, Mexican prisons, murder, escape, and lots and lots of horses.

But the characters, with the exception of the fascinating aunt, are one-dimensional. Cole is a particularly wooden hero. It is apparent that McCarthy intended him as an archetype, but his approach of always doing the right thing, damn the consequences, becomes wearily repetitive. By the time he reaches his final soul-searching scene with a sympathetic judge back in Texas, he has become a stoic goody two shoes.

All the Pretty Horses won the National Book Award in 1992 and is the first of the three novels in McCarthy’s oft-praised “Border Trilogy,” followed by The Crossing and Cities of the Plain. Hopefully, the later books will keep the same spirit of adventure, but drop the Hemingway parody and add character development.

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Summer Reading Lists: Why Bother?

OK, the Summer Reading List I started with has gotten all cattywhompus in less than a week, so I am starting over. This new list reflects that I finished several of the books on the first list, I added a couple of early review books that I had forgotten about, and I decided on an arbitrary method of selecting which books on my iPod to listen to next. Here is the latest version of my Summer Reading List, which is really just a list of the next 10 books I plan to read (subject to change at whim) in roughly the order of reading them: Bridge of Sighs by Olen Steinhauer (Which I am listening to now); Resistance Fighter by Jorgen Kieler (about the Danish resistance movement in WWII); Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert (which I've been avoiding but the book club chose); The Cossacks by Leo Tolstoy (next up on my iPod); America, America by Ethan Canin (one of the early review books I forgot about); The Seven Dials Mystery by Agatha Christie (which I have been carrying around in my car for emergencies); The Interpretation of Dreams by Sigmund Freud (also on my iPod); Abbeville by Jack Fuller (another for which I need to write a review); My Uncle Oswald by Roald Dahl (so I can completely finish his Omnibus); and The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkien (because I have never read it and so plan to listen to the audio version).

Review: Midnight's Children

Midnight’s Children is the pseudo-autobiography of Saleem Sinai, the first baby born in independent India. Saleem tells the story of his life, as enmeshed in the history of the first 31 years of post-colonial India and entwined in the lives of the other 1,000 children born between midnight and 1:00 a.m. on the first day of the new country. Saleem describes this complicated, vivid, magical, funny, and disturbing mix as the "chutnification of history."

This was the first novel Salman Rushdie wrote and the first of his that I have read. I could kick myself for waiting so long. This book is a delight. There is a reason it show up on so many lists, including: Booker Prize Winners Modern Library's Top 100 Novels of the 20th Century Radcliffe's Top 100 Novels of the 20th Century

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Pondering on Life of Pi and Others

After reading a recent review of Life of Pi on The Complete Booker, I have been pondering memorable books in general and Booker winners in particular. I remembered that I really loved Life of Pi while I read it. I thought it was an incredible book. But I also realized that it is a novel that did not stick with me. I never find myself thinking about it, much as I loved it at the time. On the other hand, there are plenty of books that did not pack the same wallop, but I dwell on them for years after -- for example, Last Orders by Graham Swift (1996 Booker winner): Or, The Old Devils by Kinglsley Amis (1986 Booker winner): Why is this? Why do some books linger, while others might pop, but then fade?

Summer Reading Lists: Redux

Two days into my summer reading list and I'm already messing with it. I finished Hallam's War and am about to finish Water for Elephants, which will free up some space, so I may add a couple of titles. In the meantime, while searching my TBR stacks for Venusberg, I came across O, How the Wheel Becomes It, also by Anthony Powell. I started it last night and was immediately sucked in. It is a terrific lampoon of writers, publishers, and the whole Life of Letters idea, along the lines of Mauagham's Cakes and Ale or, more recently, McEwan's Amsterdam.

Review of the Day: Hallam's War

To describe Hallam’s War as an interesting, substantive Civil War novel is to explain both its strengths and weaknesses.

Elisabeth Payne Rosen writes well, knows her subject matter, and has crafted a story that explores the ambiguity of racial and political issues at the center of the Civil War. Through her efforts, the book rises above the requisite hoop skirts, hollerin’, and hacksaws of all Civil War novels, but not by enough to transcend the genre and become a novel of general appeal.

First, in the hoop skirt, or antebellum, section of the story, Rosen includes the necessary Southern belles, genteel society, class structure, loyal house slaves, angry field hands, and King Cotton. But the twist is that the Hallam family has turned its back on the charms of coastal Charleston for the quiet pleasures of their west Tennessee log home. There, Hugh Hallam experiments with modern farming methods in order to produce high quality cotton without destroying the land, with the dream of making his farm profitable without the need for slave labor. It is this angle that makes the book worthwhile.

Second, there is plenty of the typical hollerin’ in the way of demands for secession, complaints from teenagers that the war will be over before they are old enough to fight, rebel yells, and the cries of men wounded in battle. It is Rosen’s detail-laden coverage of the war as it moved through Tennessee that is either the best or worst part of the book, depending on the reader’s inclinations. For Civil War buffs, these details give the book the depth lacking in other novels; for general readers, these sections feel like being trapped in a Ken Burns documentary.

Third, in the hacksaw segment of the book, Serna Hallam, like all Civil War heroines, volunteers in the army hospital where she assists surgeons in amputating limbs using household tools and no anesthesia. Everyone is exhausted, the fields are barren, food is scarce, and profiteers smuggle luxury items to the spoiled elite. Rosen sticks to formula in this part of the story, which, while dramatic, feels like a time killer while waiting for the war, and the story, to wind to an and.

Which is a general problem with any book about a real war – everyone knows how it ends. Rosen chose to end her story with Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation, rather then the end of war itself, but the resolution of the personal story seems likewise arbitrary. It feels like the Hallams’ story wraps up because Rosen was coming to the end of the book, rather than the book ending because she had come to the end of their story.

For readers enthralled with all things Civil War, Hallam’s War will be a real treat. General readers may find the personal story compelling enough to finish the book, but it is no page-turner.

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Summer Reading Lists

Elizabeth at CvilleWords gave me the idea of creating a summer reading list. How could I resist? This is the list of the ten books that I will be tackling first this summer. They are in roughly the order that I will be reading them, but it is hard to predict exactly because I usually have a book book and an audio book in progress at the same time. I will likely get to a couple more before Labor Day, but these are the titles that are at the top of my TBR list: Hallam's War by Elisabeth Payne Rosen (a Civil War novel for which I have to write a review); Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen (on my iPod and almost finished); Venusberg by Anthony Powell (because his Dance to the Music of Time is one of my all-time Top 10 favorites); Resistance Fighter by Jorgen Kieler (about the Danish resistance movement in WWII); Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert (which I've been avoiding but the book club chose); The Seven Dials Mystery by Agatha Christie (which I have been carrying around in my car for emergencies); The Trial by Franz Kafka (I'm two-thirds of the way through the audio version and it is killing me); Abbeville by Jack Fuller (another for which I need to write a review); Wildfire by Nelson DeMille (as a treat for finishing The Trial); and My Uncle Oswald by Roald Dahl (so I can completely finish his Omnibus).

Big News for Rose City Reader

My full-length review of Franklin and Lucy has been published in the June edition of the Internet Review of Books. Most exciting. Here is the first paragraph from the review (longer than my blog review): In this age of kiss-and-tattle, when a politician’s every peccadillo is the stuff of instant CNN montage coverage and YouTube parodies, the idea that FDR could carry on a series of extra-marital affairs and intimate relationships without a peep from the press seems not just nostalgically quaint but astounding. But Joseph Persico avoids the temptation of writing a retroactive tell-all, aiming for a broader examination of this incredible President’s personal life.

List of the Day: 20 Best Oregon Books

Living in Oregon, it seems like a worthwhile goal to read books by Oregonians or about life in Oregon. According to Portland Monthly magazine, these are the "20 Greatest Oregon Books Ever."

So far, a couple of these are on my TBR shelf, and I have only read three of them.  Those I have read are in red; those on my TBR shelf are in blue.

Here is the list, from the October 2006 issue, compiled by Brian Doyle, editor of the University of Portland’s PortlandMagazine:

1. Sometimes a Great Notion by Ken Kesey

2. The Lathe of Heaven by Ursula K. Le Guin

3. Winter Count by Barry Lopez

4. The River Why by David Duncan

5. Wildmen, Wobblies & Whistle Punks: Stewart Holbrook’s Lowbrow Northwest by Stewart Hall Holbrook

6. The Country Boy by Homer Davenport

7. Ricochet River by Robin Cody

8. Stepping Westward: The Long Search for Home in the Pacific Northwest by Sallie Tisdale

9. Hole in the Sky by William Kittredge

10. True Believer by Virginia Euwer Wolff

11. The Nez Perce Indians and the Opening of the Northwest by Alvin M. Josephy

12. The Journals of Lewis and Clark by Meriwether Lewis

13. Oregon Geographic Names by Lewis A. McArthur

14. Ramona the Pest by Beverly Cleary

15. Fire at Eden’s Gate: Tom McCall & the Oregon Story by Brent Walth

16. The Jump-Off Creek by Molly Gloss

17. Every War Has Two Losers by William Stafford

18. Nehalem Tillamook Tales

19. To Build a Ship by Don Berry

20. In Search of Ancient Oregon: A Geological and Natural History by Ellen Morris Bishop


NOTES
Last updated on December 30, 2010.
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Fave Bookstore: The Title Wave

“The Title Wave” is the terrifically named used book store run by the Friends of the Multnomah County Library. Located in a charming former library branch at 201 NE Knott, the shop is a decent resource, but deserves only a mixed review overall. When it comes to library books stores – or any used book store – my criteria are price, quality, and selection. My goal is to find very inexpensive books in clean, “like new” condition. Good selection for me means heavy on literary fiction, especially prize winners and books on my other “must read” lists. The Title Wave earns high points for prices and condition, but loses out on selection. The prices are great – most hardbacks are $2 or $3. The condition of the books is very good considering that they are ex-library books. Most have the mylar covers, with tape, and library markings, but they are clean and still new-ish The big disappointment is the feeble fiction selection. The books are mostly recently published and unknown – duplicate copies of newer books that did not circulate much. Several books looked like they might be entertaining, if you are willing to take a flyer. But there is little chance of finding a particular book, especially anything well known. The mystery section seems more promising than the general fiction, especially for fans of hardbacks. Likewise, the non-fiction selection is good. There are a lot of great cookbooks, as well as books on house stuff, gardening, and hobbies. The biography selection is extensive. Finally, they have quite a few audio books at incredibly low prices (many were $1.25). Most of these are cassettes; a few are cds. With no way to make sure they work and no returns, it is a risk. But for the price, not a big one. All in all, worth stopping in now and again, but it does not warrant a special trip.

Cheers from San Francisco!

Since we are in San Francisco to celebrate my sister's 40th birthday, thoughts have turned to cocktails. In particular, thoughts have turned to Irish Coffees, since the fog is starting to roll in and it is turning typically chilly. While the Buena Vista Cafe is justly famous for its Irish Coffees, we are personally more fond of the version served at Hark! Cocktails on Chestnut (technically, the "Marina Lounge"). A good I.C. is all about ratio, and the glass they use ensures the ideal mix of coffee to sugar to whipped cream to whiskey. Yum!

Along with cocktails themselves, I love books about cocktails. In general, I tend to be a cocktail purist, so I stay away from most modern books about drinks. For example, it makes me bonkers to see weird, frou frou cocktails called "martinis" just because they are served in a martini glass. A "martini" is gin, a drop of vermouth, and an olive. It is only very recently that I have acknowledged the "vodka martini" because I always considered this drink to be a "vodkatini" -- a poor second cousin to a true martini.

I have turned to vintage cocktail books because I like reading the informative sections, especially the advice on how to host parties, and trying out the old drink recipes -- classics and those that have not managed to stand the test of time. These books are generally out of print, but often found in used books atores or eBay. My favorites are:

Trader Vic's Bartender Guide
Esquire's Handbook for Hosts
Patrick Duffy's The Official Mixer's Manual

Bottoms up!

Modern Library v. Radcliffe

I adopted both the Modern Library and Radcliffe Publishing lists of Top 100 novels of the 20th Century. Having finished all the books on the M.L. list, I am still working on the Radcliffe list. Both include very good books and there is a tremendous amount of overlap between the two. That said, if I had to chose which list really represented the "best" 100 novels of the 20th Century, I would pick the M.L. list for a couple of reasons. First, I think the Radcliffe list leans in general to books that are more popular (Gone with the Wind, for example), while the M.L. list includes books that are more literary. For example, the M.L. list includes An American Tragedy, which I thought was heavy sledding, but as it was a groundbreaking work, it should be on the list. Second, but along the same lines, the Radcliffe list includes a number of children's books, such as Charlotte's Wed and Winnie-the-Pooh. They are good children's books, but I would have chosen only from books for adults. Finally, while I understand that the M.L. list is often criticized for not having "enough" books by women, I think the Radcliffe list overcompensates. I really do not think the list needs three books by Tony Morrison or even three by Virginia Wolf, especially at the expense of some of my favorites from the M.L. list like A Dance to the Music of Time and The Alexandria Quartet.

Cookbook Library: A Taste of Oregon

Junior League cookbooks are a big favorite of mine, and A Taste of Oregon, the Eugene, Oregon book is one of the best. So many of the recipes, such as the delish "Breakfast Stratta" casserrole, are standbys -- especially for entertaining. Because this is usually a great source, I was extra disappointed that the "Pork Chops Florentine" recipe was such a flop. This sounded like are real winner: slow cooked pork chops on a bed of spinach, smothered in a cheesy sauce. But smothered does not come close to describing the incredible amount of goo involved. There was something way off in the ratio of sauce to food. And, of course, the sauce got so mixed into the spinach that there was no way to separate everything once it was cooked. It was an unappetizing mess. Yuck! Oh well, they can’t all be winners.

Review: Theirs Was the Kingdom

Theirs Was the Kingdom by R.F. Delderfield is one of those "family saga"/"sweeping epics" that I would have eaten up when I was in high school.  There is more interwoven historical detail than bodice ripping, but otherwise this book is right up there with John Jakes's "Kent Family Chronicals" and other books of the 1970s school of historical novels.  Meaning that the men are all strong, the women are all lusty, the hero is moral but misunderstood, the villans are evil and usually deformed.  The characters do not have much depth, but there are a lot of them, and separate plots involve each of them.

Unfortunately, while the story is interesting, the writing is a little much. This is a typical sentence (yes, one sentence):

It was only then that he remembered the fearful risks Avery was running by coming here, a man with a double murder charge hanging over him and no means, at this distance, to establish his innocence, for who would be likely to believe that a rake like Avery had shot a man in self-defence after a whore had squeezed him dry, and afterwards fled into the night in the back of one of Swann's frigates as far as Harwich, where he had bribed a Dutch skipper to carry him to the Continent.

Whew! I give it a 3/5 stars because I think it is a two-star book for adults, but would be a four-star book for younger readers. If younger readers stil read historical fiction, this would be appropriate -- it is definitely PG and the history is interesting.


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Six Random Things

Hmmmmm . . . I just got tagged by Karen Vanuska for the Six Random Things About Myself game. I am now torn between my enjoyment of making lists and my sister's admonition: "Just because it happened to you, doesn't make it interesting." But add in that I get to tag six other people, which means another list, and I see on which side this is tilting: 1. The first book review I ever wrote was of The Borrowers Aloft when I was in the first grade. 2. There are 799 books on my TBR list, according to my LibraryThing library. 3. My current ratio of attorney billing hours to reading time is approximately 4 to 1. 4. I have read books while walking outside since I was in Kindergarden. The invention of the iPod, which allows me to download audiobooks, has saved me from chronic dorkiness, twisted ankles, or worse. 5. When I was 12, I wrote a book called Sixth Grade: The Way it Really Happened, which, while it may have been derivative of Judy Bloom (my favorite at the time), would have been a blockbuster had it not blown away in a Nebraska blizzard while waiting for the school bus. 6. I am currently working on 96 book lists, according to ListsOfBests. The list I am most likely to finish is Prose Books by Jim Harrison, which I am 94%+ of the way through (with only 100 pages left of Off to the Side). The list I am least likely to finish is Outside Magazine's 26 Essential Books for the Well-Read Explorer, which I added only for Christmas present ideas for Hubby. The six book bloggers I tagged for this are: The Tip of the Iceberg Books 'n Border Collies The Lists Reading, Writing, and Retirement Leafing Through Life DaBookLady Read and Release It was hard to find six who hadn't done it yet. And maybe some of these have. Sorry to tag you twice if that's the case.

Review: The Sound and the Fury

The Sound and the Fury is much easier to understand if you realize that it cannot be understood from the get go, but only when it is complete. To borrow a line from The Big Chill, sometimes you have to let art flow over you.

The book is divided into four parts, the first three of which are told in first-person, stream of conscious narrative from the perspective of three Compson brothers: Benjy, Quentin, and Jason.  Benjy’s section is particularly difficult to follow because he is mentally retarded and does not talk, but only narrates what he hears, in no particular chronological order.  Quentin’s and Jason’s sections are progressively more comprehensible as pieces of the story develop.  The final section is told by an omniscient third-person narrator, ties the loose ends together, and brings the story to its exciting close.

The first-person accounts are made even more confusing by the multiplicity of names.  Because this is the story of a large Southern family, many family members share first names.  There are two Moreys, although the younger of the two is renamed Benjamin, the first narrator.  The two Jasons, father and son, can usually be told apart, but the two Quentins, uncle and niece, are particularly confusing when introduced in Benjy’s section because the absence of chronological consistency brings both Quentins into the story at the same time, although the niece was born after the uncle’s death.

Reading The Sound and the Fury is like watching a masterpiece being painted.  Each brushstroke brings out more of the picture until the whole, beautiful composition is revealed.

OTHER REVIEWS

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NOTES

Reading The Sound and the Fury is also particularly satisfying for compulsive "list" readers, since it shows up on so many "best of" lists, including the following:

Books by Nobel Prize winners
The Modern Library's Top 100 Novels of the 20th Century
Radcliffe's competing list of Top 100 Novels of the 20th Century
Time Magazine's All-Time Best 100 Novels (1923 to the Present)
The Well-Stocked Bookcase (Book of the Month Club)

The Internet Review of Books

Oh! I am pleased as Punch because The Internet review of Books is going to publish a review of mine. This is heady stuff for a book geek. It looks like a longer version of my review of Franklin and Lucy will be showing up in the June edition. How exciting!

Review: The Size of the World

The Size of the World by Joan Silber is less a novel than a collection of loosely interconnected short stories – sort of a literary game of tag in which a character in one story has a connection with one, sometimes more, of the characters in the next story.  This structure is gimmicky, but clever. Ultimately, the stories come full circle when the hero of the final “chapter” sells the defective airplane screws that caused the problem that brought the hero of the first “chapter” to Vietnam to solve.

Silber’s writing is graceful and stories are interesting enough to pull a reader through to the end, but the book as a whole lacks depth. Several characters make adventurous choices to live and marry in foreign lands, but the short story structure does not give Silber room to examine the cross-cultural riffs she reveals.  Analysis of the relationships is thin.

Likewise, Silber’s bigger themes are nothing new.  The idea that, while the world may be a big place, people come together by personal connections, is intriguing if not startling.  But the premise that colonialism, corporations, and the military are heartless and bad is a pretty shop-worn formula.  All in all, there is not much to The Size of the World to keep a reader thinking after closing the back cover.

OTHER REVIEWS

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Review: Franklin and Lucy

Franklin and Lucy is an intimate look into the personal life of Franklin Delano Roosevelt and the women close to him.

Joseph Persico examines the roles played by Roosevelt’s mother, wife, dearest lover, closest companion, daughter, and a cadre of others. While Persico occasionally makes assumptions based on no more than reasonable speculation, most of his conclusions are well-supported and persuasive.

The title is somewhat misleading in suggesting that the book focuses primarily on Lucy Mercer Rutherford, who became Franklin’s lover while working as Eleanor’s personal secretary during World War I, but then played only a peripheral role in his life until late in his third term as President.

Persico’s point seems to be that Lucy was Franklin’s true love. However, the same point could have been made about Missy LeHand, Franklin’s long-time secretary and best friend, who lived with him for decades. Although the timing is fuzzy, a case could be made that, had Franklin not discarded Missy when she suffered a series of mental and physical breakdowns, she, not Lucy, would have deserved top billing in the book’s title.

Just to describe this minor flaw in the book is to demonstrate its absorbing appeal. Persico keeps the tone personal rather than prurient, but the intimate details are thoroughly discussed. He shows Franklin’s domineering mother Sara using the family purse strings to direct Franklin’s life. He explores Eleanor’s complex relationship as simultaneous inspiration and aggravation, as well as describing her own personal intrigues as she led her parallel life as an international do-gooder. He considers Franklin’s lifelong appeal to women and his delight in their company, despite being crippled by polio.

Although designed to fit a niche in collection of FDR biographies, Franklin and Lucy provides enough context to provide a good introduction to the man’s life. The book is entertaining, thorough, and readable.

Review: The Golden Bowl

Only Henry James can take a beguiling idea like quasi-incestuous adultery, add an Italian prince, a billionaire art collector, and exotic foreign travel, and make a story so tedious that it is a true chore to read.

James writes in wisps of ideas, continually layering these wisps until there is a shimmery, translucent image that gives an idea of what he is trying to get at. These literary holograms are sometimes pretty, often interesting up to a point, but there is no substance to them. By the time the image emerges from the wisps, all I can think is, “So what?”

I can appreciate the talent it took to write an entire novel without saying anything directly. James definitely had a skill that he developed to the utmost. But while I admire the talent, I have no desire to make it a part of my life. I appreciate James’s talent the way I appreciate that of the artists who can paint the face of Jesus on a grain of rice. Impressive, but I’m not going to collect a gallery of rice portraits.

OTHER REVIEWS

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NOTES

This was one of the three Henry James books on the Modern Library's list of Top 100 Novels of the 20th Century.

Review: Beethoven Was One-Sixteenth Black

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Beethoven Was One-Sixteenth Black, a collection of short stories by South African Nobel Prize winner Nadine Gordimer, has its hits and misses. The misses include a story about a tapeworm from the tapeworm’s perspective; a reminiscence of a cockroach trapped in a typewriter that doesn’t rise above casual anecdote; and the self-indulgent “Dreaming of the Dead” in which Gordimer recounts a dream of having dinner with Susan Sontag and two other deceased friends.

The hits more than make up for weaknesses in the collection. Gordimer’s elegant writing raises ordinary events above the tawdry and mundane, pulling out bigger ideas and themes, including the theme of personal identity in a changing world. In the title story, for instance, the protagonist goes on a half-hearted search for black relatives possibly descended from his white, diamond-prospecting great-grandfather. Gordimer subtly makes it clear that his search is driven by more than genealogical curiosity as he searches for a family that would unify his prior anti-apartheid political efforts and his personal history.

Likewise, in “A Beneficiary,” a young woman faced with the early death of her actress mother struggles to determine which is her real identity – daughter of the famous actor who sired her, or the loving businessman who raised her knowing she was the product of his wife’s brief, illicit affair.

Gordimer is at her best writing about marriage and its challenges. Adultery and sexual history are common elements. In “Alternative Endings,” for example, Gordimer examines adulterous affairs in three stories, using a different one of the five senses as the focus of each. Unfortunately, while one of the three involves hearing and another scent, it is entirely unclear which sense was featured in the third. More confusing, especially since this trilogy ends the book, is why Gordimer didn’t write five stories so as to feature each of the five senses.

Overall, this is a worthwhile collection of stories and a good introduction to Gordimer’s sophisticated writing.

OTHER REVIEWS 

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Author of the Day: Penelope Fitzgerald

Penelope Fitzgerald (Dec. 17, 1916 to Apr. 28, 2000) was a prize-winning British poet, essayist, and biographer. She is an inspiration because she did not write her first book until she was in her 60s. She won the 1979 Booker Prize for Offshore the 1998 National Book Critics Circle Prize for The Blue Flower.

Her novels, in chronological order, follow.  Those I have read are in red.  Those on my TBR shelf are ion blue.

The Golden Child (1977)

The Bookshop (1978)

Offshore (1979)

Human Voices (1980)

At Freddie's (1982)

Innocence (1986)

The Beginning of Spring (1988)

The Gate of Angels (1990)

The Blue Flower (1995)

NOTE

Last updated on April 19, 2012.

Nobel Prize

Among my many other reading goals, I am trying to read at least one book by every winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature. So far, I have read books by the following winners: Harold Pinter J.M. Coetzee V.S. Naipaul Toni Morrison Nadine Gordimer William Golding Gabriel García Márquez Saul Bellow Samuel Beckett John Steinbeck Ernest Hemingway William Faulkner T. S. Eliot Pearl S. Buck Sinclair Lewis Thomas Mann George Bernard Shaw William Butler Yeats Rudyard Kipling Which, according to Lists of Bests means I am 18% of the way through. I just joined a great team blog called Read the Nobels that has a 2008 challenge going to read five (or six) books by Nobel winners before the end of the year.

On a Booker Roll

I recently read two Booker Prize winners, Offshore (1979) and The God of Small Things (1997), when taking a break from slogging through Henry James’s, The Ambassadors. In one of those oddly common instances of literary serendipidy, Offshore and TGST were similar in several respects — both were by women, about women, and involved atypical, insular communities. Offshore is about a group of misfits living in converted barges on the Thames river in London. TGST is about a Syrian Christian family in a small town in India. Also, both were excellent entertainment, although in different ways. Offshore was a little gem that offered a glimpse into this secret world on the river before ending without tying up loose ends. TGST addresses bigger issues, has a more complicated plot, and uses wonderful, Nabokov-like word play. Both have stuck with me.

Review: The Sea

Following the death of his wife, the widowed narrator of The Sea spends a lengthy recuperative and reflective stay at the same beach town where he vacationed as a child. The story goes back and forth between his present grief and his coming-of-age memories.

John Banville, who won the 2005 Booker Prize for this elegant novel, has a graceful way of turning a phrase and more than a few clever lines. For instance: "If there was such a thing a 'long shrift,' I was in need of some" and "He was half way to a half wit" tickled my fancy for word play.  The present-day story of the wife's death is particularly touching. The childhood story is charming, although the end did not work as well, in retrospect, as it seemed to. All in all, an entertaining read.

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Review of the Day: How Far Can You Go?

How Far Can You Go? by David Lodge is a fascinating, anthropological novel following the lives and religious development of a group of English Catholics from their days in a college church group in the 1950s, through the tumultuous years of the sexual revolution. The friends question their religious tenant and traditions as they face marriage, families, religious callings, sexual identity, and mortality. At the same time, the Catholic Church wrestled with Vatican II, the battle over contraception, internal reform efforts, and the charismatic movement. The title jokingly refers to the question the young Catholic men asked their priests about “How far can you go with a girl?” But more substantively, the book asks how far the Catholic Church can alter its rituals and adapt to modern mores and still remain the Catholic Church. Or how far individuals can abandon their religious customs and personalize their faith and still remain Catholics or even Christians. On a different level, the title refers to how far a novelist narrator can insert himself into the story and still count the book as a novel. This is an absolutely intriguing novel. It won the Costa (Whitbread) Award for best novel in 1980. Anthony Burgess included the book in his list of the best 99 novels since 1939. Catholics (whether they lived through the changes depicted or came along after), other Christians, and general readers interested in religious cultures should find it mesmerizing.

National Book Award

I just found, at my neighborhood used book store, a 1966 Modern Library edition of Goodbye, Columbus, with a near perfect dustjacket. This puts me in the mood to pursue the goal of reading all the winners of the National Book Award. It got pushed to the back burner while I finished the Modern Library's Top 100 list. But now that I am almost done with that goal, I am looking forward to a new list. I am a big Philip Roth fan, so Goodbye Columbus will be the first one I read.

Review of the Day: Crescent City

Crescent City by Belva Plain has all the makings of a great historic saga: Jewish immigrants flee the poverty and persecution of 19th Century Europe for a life of luxury in the religiously tolerant boomtown of antebellum New Orleans; families are torn apart over the slavery issue and fight on opposite sides of the Civil War; there are loveless marriages, adulterous affairs, hoop skirts, burning plantations, and even blockage runners. Unfortunately, the book is still boring. It only skims the surface of the major events of the plot and the conflicts the characters face. It lacks the emotional depth and pure entertainment of the classic Gone with the Wind. It lacks the details of the really good historic epics, like John Jakes’s Kent Family Chronicles. It lacks the smutty thrill of a good bodice ripper like that 1970s gem, The Flame and the Flower by Kathleen E. Woodiwiss. Despite being over 500 pages long, Crescent City comes up short.

Book Note: Agnes Grey

Agnes Grey by Anne Bronte is The Nanny Diaries of the Nineteenth Century.

Review of the Day: Thomas Paine

In Thomas Paine: Enlightenment, Revolution, and the Birth of Modern Nations, Craig Nelson taught me that Thomas Paine was the Forrest Gump of the Enlightenment. He bumbled along through life, usually with no money, no real job, or no home of his own. Yet he was involved in the most important events, and with the most notable figures, of the Eighteenth Century. Paine (then Pain) spent his first 37 years in England when, separated from his wife, bankrupt, and fired from his job, he decided to go to America. It was then that he precipitously met the most famous American in Europe, Benjamin Franklin, who became his lifelong friend and his immediate benefactor by providing him letters of introduction. Arriving in America in 1774 with his cache of Franklin letters, Paine was a delegate at the first Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia. He began another lifelong friendship, this time with George Washington. While struggling along as a magazine writer and editor, he wrote Common Sense, which sparked the American Revolution. Although he did not fight in the Revolution, he was often at the front lines with Washington, and his line, “These are the times that try men’s souls” was the troops’ rallying cry. Following American independence, Paine did not hold office like many of the other Founding Fathers. But he was sent to France to represent America in negotiating peace with Britain. He wrote Rights of Man, which sparked the French Revolution and was a world-wide best seller. It also earned Paine, in abstentia, a British death sentence for sedition. During the French Revolution, Paine was elected to the French National Assembly, where he was the only member to vote against beheading Louis XVI. He got himself crosswise with Robespierre and was thrown into prison, destined for the guillotine, when the tide turned against Robespierre and American diplomacy got him released. While waiting in France until it was safe to sail to America, Paine wrote The Age of Reason. He also provided military advice to Napoleon Bonaparte about how to invade Britain. He returned to America upon the invitation Thomas Jefferson. Nelson does a good job with the story of Paine’s life and adventures. His “grand theme” gets a little attenuated towards the end as he tried to tie everything together. But overall this is an entertaining overview of this omnipresent at the revolution Founding Father.

Review of the Day: The Right Stuff

The Right Stuff by Tom Wolfe is my favorite book about astronauts. Of course, it is the only book about astronauts that I will ever read, so that isn't the strongest praise. But it is perfect for a general reader like me looking for an entertaining history of America's early space program.

Wolfe definitely keeps the tale interesting. He focuses on the personal, rather than the technical and administrative, aspects of the Mercury space program and the first seven astronauts involved. He follows the seven through their early careers, mostly as test pilots, through each of their turns in a Mercury capsule.

The most remarkable part of the story is the connection Wolfe makes between fighter jet pilots and astronauts. Having grown up in the NASA age, I did not know that the Air Force had a competing rocket program (a program that managed to send pilots several miles into space and then have them actually land the aircraft back on earth) before it was scuttled in favor of NASA's moon missions.

The only drawback of the book is Wolfe's Gonzo journalism style, which much have been refreshing and bold back in 1979. Now, the hipper-than-thou tone is a little tired and can get exasperating.

Cookbook Library: Fog City Delights

Community cookbooks enthral me. Junior League cookbooks generally lead the pack in this area, but church societies, chambers of commerce, and other groups put together pretty good collections too. I like the recipes because they are usually tried and true and sure to please.

Fog City Delights is the 1987 cookbook put out by the “Letterman Auxiliary” of the Letterman Army Medical Center that used to be in the Presidio in San Francisco. It is a sentimental favorite of mine because I lived next to the Presidio, just up the hill from where the hospital used to be (it has since been torn down and replaced with the more attractive Lucas Center).


Although “Cheddary Tomato Fish Fillets” may sound dubious, it was really tasty.

2 tablespoons butter
1 pound fish fillets
1/2 teaspoon salt
dash pepper
2 tablespoons finely chopped onions
2 tablespoons minced fresh parsley
1 medium tomato, chopped
1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese

Melt butter in large skillet. Add fillets, turning to coat both sides. Season with salt and pepper. Sprinkle the onions, parsley, and tomatoes over the fillets. Cover and cook over low heat for 7 to 9 minutes. Sprinkle cheese over the top and cover. Cook 1 to 2 minutes, until the cheese melts. Serves 4.

Library Book Sale in Prineville

Every third Saturday of the month, the Crook County Library in Prineville, Oregon has a used book sale in the lobby. (Well, every third Saturday except for in July when they have the HUGE sale over Independence Day weekend.) Luckily for me, I was heading over to Bend for the weekend, so had a chance to swing through Prineville and stop at this month's sale. Not bad. The selection wasn't enormous, but there were several long table stacked three rows deep, mostly donated (not ex-library copies), mostly hardbacks, and mostly in good shape. Hardbacks were all $1 and paperbacks were 50 cents. The newer books were mostly mysteries; the older stuff was more varied. Among other gems, I picked up a copy of The Silent Spring in very good condition. It's not a book I'm all that excited about, but it is on the Modern Library's list of Top 100 Nonfiction Books of the 20th Century, so I will get around to it someday.

Review of the Day: Restless

Restless by William Boyd is one of the rare novels that is enjoyable from the opening quote to the final paragraph. The story goes back and forth between the cloak-and-dagger world of WWII British espionage and the “contemporary” (1976) relationship between a mother and her daughter.

The premise is that a proper English grandmother, tucked away in a tiny Oxfordshire village, puttering in her garden, gives her daughter a manuscript she wrote, which reveals that she had been a British spy. From there, the story of her life as an intelligence agent develops along with the daughter’s completely new understanding of the person her mother is.

While it has its exciting bits, it is not a heart-racing thriller. Instead, gets into the minds of the characters to look at what it was like to have once been a spy, then live a normal life, and what it would be like to learn that your parent had been a spy with an adventurous life no one knew anything about. Fascinating.

NOTE: The audio book version was particularly entertaining because the woman who read did remarkably well on the accents. She had to portray characters with a variety of English and American accents, as well as Irish, Scottish, French, German, Russian, Mexican, and Iranian. She did an incredible job.