Teaser Tuesday: Every Bitter Thing

"'The method of killing was the same, a single shot to the abdomen followed by a beating with a blunt object. And the bullets were all fired from the same gun.'"

-- Every Bitter Thing by Leighton Gage.



This is the fourth book in a mystery series featuring Chief Inspector Mario Silva of the Brazilian Federal Police.


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

Mailbox Monday

My mailbox overfloweth last week. Many books really did come in the mail, plus I stopped at one of my favorite library bookstores, the Booktique, when I was in Lake Oswego for a Ladies' Lunch, and I went to Powell's to get my Book Club book. So I have a very long Mailbox Monday list.

BOOKS THAT CAME IN THE MAIL

Nine Simple Patterns for Complicated Women by Mary Rechner. This adorable book came from a Portland publisher called Propeller Books. I didn't ask for it. I don't like short stories. But it has moved from my mailbox to the top of my nightstand TBR-immediately stack because it is irresistible. Not only is the cover so vintage sassy, it is also a beautifully-made book, with thick, rough-cut pages and French flaps. French flaps. That is a trend in book binding that I support wholeheartedly.



The I Hate to Cook Cookbook by Peg Bracken. Despite my ever-growing Guilt list, I asked for this because it is a super-cute 50th Anniversary edition of a 1960s classic. And Peg Bracken was an Oregon author, to boot.



The Truth About Obamacare by Sally Pipes. This is an issue on which I need some guidance!



Maps and Shadows by Krysia Jopek. Following my review of The Mermaid and the Messerschmitt, Aquila Polonica sent me two more books and a DVD about the Siege of Warsaw. This novel looks very good -- I'll read this one.



The Ice Road by Stefan Waydenfeld. This is the second book from Aquila Polonica. It is non-fiction and involves an escape from Soviet labor camps. This one definitely has Mr. Rose City Reader's name on it. I wonder if they have to eat the sled dogs?

BOOKS FROM BOOKTIQUE

Sorry, no pictures of these. I'm in a hotel room in Eugene with horrible internet and I'd rather spend the rest of the evening getting a good start on Rebecca than waiting for every picture to load. 

Brazzaville Beach by William Boyd

Parachutes & Kisses by Erica Jong (the third in the Isadora Wing series)

Perfect Happiness by Penelope Lively

The Journals of Lewis and Clark ("Edited and interpreted by Bernard DeVoto")

Rubyfruit Jungle by Rita Mae Brown (on the Erica Jong list)

The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera (on several lists, but I can't recall which ones)

The Redhunter by William F. Buckley, Jr.

BOOKS FROM POWELL'S

Lavinia by Ursula Le Guin (for Book Club)

The Choir by Joanna Trollope

Opening Sentence of the Day: Venusberg

"Lushington collected the pieces of typewritten foolscap and shook them together so that the edges were level."

-- Venusberg by Anthony Powell.

I have been tearing through books here the past week. I'm on a reading roll.

Anthony Powell is a favorite author of mine. His magnum opus, A Dance to the Music of Time, is my "desert island" book and one I look forward to re- and re-reading.

Venusberg is an earlier novel, first published in 1932, almost two decades before the first volume of Dance.  It is the story of a British journalist sent to cover the unstable situation in an unnamed Baltic state.

My copy is a particularly cool little paperback edition put out by Green Integer Books. It is 4.25" wide by 6" tall -- an interesting, compact size. 

Opening Sentence of the Day: Housekeeping vs. The Dirt

"The story so far: I have been writing a column for this magazine for the last fifteen months."

--  Housekeeping vs. the Dirt: Fourteen Months of Massively Witty Adventures in Reading Chronicled by the National Book Critics Circle Finalist for Criticism by Nick Hornby.

This is the second compilation of Nick Hornby's columns for the Believer magazine.  I got a big kick out of the first volume, The Polysyllabic Spree (reviewed here) and am enjoying this one just as much.

This is one of my choices for the Bibliophilic Books Challenge.

Opening Sentence of the Day: Every Bitter Thing

"It was Norma Palhares who first steered her new husband towards the offshore oil platforms."

-- Every Bitter Thing by Leighton Gage.

That is a catchy first sentence. I like it. It turns out not to have a lot to do with the plot, but it sets up a good opening sequence that tells the reader a great deal about the setting -- modern day Rio de Janeiro.

This is the fourth book in a mystery series featuring Chief Inspector Mario Silva of the Brazilian Federal Police.


NOTE

Book Beginnings on Fridays is a Friday fun "opening sentence" event hosted by Becky at Page Turners. Post the opening sentence of the book(s) you started this week and see what other books people have going.

Review of the Day: Saving Stanley

Saving Stanley: The Brickman Stories by Scott Nadelson is a terrific collection of eight interrelated stories about Daniel Brickman and his family. The stories move back and forth in time and focus on different family members, eventually piecing together a family history from the grandfather’s Communist youth in Leningrad, the parents’ early years of marriage, and Daniel’s adolescence, to Daniel’s own marriage.

The stories that focus on Daniel’s mother Hannah are the strongest, starting with the title piece in which she fanatically nurses the family’s old, sick cat Stanley. Making Stanley the temporary but absolute center of her life causes Hannah to reconsider her relationships with academic colleagues, her husband, and her children. The later stories, “Why Not?” and “Hannah of Troy,” fill in details of Hannah’s years as the young, sometimes overlooked, wife of a scientist.

Many of the stories deal with Daniel’s troubled relationship with his older brother Jared. The best is “With Equals Alone” in which Daniel panics about starting high school with Jared off at college and Jared, uninterested in his own pending high school graduation, spends all his time and energy preparing for a local body building contest. The strain between the brothers is palpable, typical, and humorous – at least to outsiders.

“Kosher” and “Young Radicals” are the funniest of the stories. Daniel is a young adult in each, busy rebelling against his parents’ suburban life. In “Kosher,” he gets a shady job fundraising for the Robowski Fund for the Disabled – a charity benefiting only Helen Robowski and her sole employee. In “Young Radicals,” Daniel reconnects with his grandfather with vague plans for a college thesis on early Soviet history. His plans go awry when faced with the reality of his grandfather as a Florida retiree clash with his image of a fiery Russian laborer.

One weakness in the collection is that Nadelson does not elaborate on how the brother’s got along after they grow up. Also, the adult brothers, as characters, started to conflate. They were totally different people when they were young, and they remained factually different as adults, but what went on in their heads started to look the same. In “Anything You Need,” Jared and his girlfriend are having difficulties and he ponders what she wants that he can’t provide. In “Hannah of Troy,” Daniel has pre-wedding jitters and wonders what his fiancée wants that he can’t provide. With only eight stories in the collection and only one featuring Jared as an adult, it is a shame there wasn’t a broader range.

But that minor quibble shouldn’t keep readers away. Nadelson’s writing is fresh and clear and brings the Brickman family to life. Although only 212 pages, Saving Stanley packs the wallop of a long novel.

OTHER REVIEWS

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

NOTES

Saving Stanley won the Oregon Book Award for Short Fiction and the Great Lakes Colleges Association New Writers Award. Scott Nadelson teaches creative writing at Willamette University and lives in Salem, Oregon.

Announcement and Miscellany

ANNOUNCEMENT

The August issue of the Internet Review of Books is up now, with a dozen non-fiction reviews, a half-dozen fiction reviews, two poetry reviews (including one of a collection of Dorthy Parker's poetry that is particularly interesting), and the always-entertaining Brief Review section.

BOOK RELATED MISCELLANY

I got several things in the mail this that caught my bookish fancy.

ONE

The first is a catalog from Open Letter, an publishing house I had never heard of before. Based at the University of Rochester in New York, the press specializes in "literary translations" and has a small but impressive selection of books in print.

The book that caught my eye is The Ambassador by Bragi Olafsson, translated from Icelandic. It is a novel about a poet invited to an international poetry festival in Lithuania as official representative of Iceland, only to be accused of plagiarism on the eve of his trip.  It looks great.



The catalog is a treasure trove of novels, stories, poetry and non-fiction  from Argentina, France, the Czech Republic, Poland, Catalonia, and elsewhere. This is a terrific resource and would be particularly useful when finding books for an international reading challenge.  I see from browsing the on-line catalog that you save 20% by ordering direct.

TWO

The second thing I got in the mail iss the latest calendar for workshops and events at the San Francisco Center for the Book.  It made me wish that I still lived in San Francisco! I attended several events there, including a poetry reading/letterpress exhibit with Kirsten Rian and a Mail Art workshop where we made collage postcards and submitted them for this "digital exhibit."

For anyone living in the Bay Area or visiting, I highly recommend taking part in the goings on at SFCB.

THREE

Finally, a friend of mine sent me a book swap chain letter.  The idea, as with all chain letters, is to send whatever it is to the name at the top of the list and to pass the letter on to six friends, with the idea that when your name goes to the top, you will receive multiple whatevers. 

In this case, the whatever is a paperback book and the list only has one name on it.  That is, there is one person's name on the back of the letter -- I am supposed to send her a book.  The friend who sent it to me included six of her own return address sticky labels. I stick one on the back of each of the six letters I send out. So the pyramid for this pyramid scheme is pretty squat!

I have always been a sucker for chain letters. Ever since I was a kid, I have sent pennies, recipes, stamps, socks -- anything. Well, maybe not socks.  But I am enchanted with the idea, even though I don't know that I ever got anything.  The chain always broke before my name got to the top of the list.

So, Annette in Wisconsin -- keep a loot out for your book. It's on the way!

I am curious to know what other people think of chain letters. What about book chain letters? Tempting at all? Has anyone ever successfully participated in a chain letter?

Teaser Tuesday: Saving Stanley

"I'd never expected to be held accountable for my actions as a ten-year-old, and I certainly never thought they would cost me my brother's love.  Now I took his side in any argument he had with my parents, but he didn't seem to notice."

-- from "With Equals Alone" in Saving Stanley: The Brickman Stories by Scott Nadelson.

This is a terrific collection of interrelated stories about Daniel Brickman and his family.  Here, a young Daniel struggles to be loved by his older, now in high school, brother.  There is a lot of truth in these stories.  Great reading.

 

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

Givaway Winner!

I am pleased to announce the winner of my giveaway for The Opposite Field by Jesse Katz.


Thank you to everyone who participated by signing up and/or spreading the word! And a big THANKS to Three Rivers Press who made the book available.



I used random.org to generate a winner. That lucky person is Carin at Caroline Bookbinder. Thanks for participating, Carin. Congratulations!

Mailbox Monday

Only one book came into my house last week, so my Mailbox Monday list is very short.



Every Bitter Thing by Leighton Gage.

This was so tempting, even with its creepy cover, that I started it already and am racing through it.

So many books sit on my TBR shelves for years, it is fun to break my old habits now and again. I feel so impetuous.
 
GIVEAWAY: I'll announce the winner of my giveaway later this morning! 

Review of the Day: The Idea of Perfection

There is a small irony in the fact that Kate Grenville won the Orange Prize – awarded to the “best” novel in English -- for a book that celebrates the imperfection in all things. The Idea of Perfection examines how people cope with their own imperfections and handle the imperfections in others.

The story focuses on Harley Savage, a part-time curator and textile artist who comes to Karakarook, New South Wales, to help the town starts a Pioneer and Heritage Museum. The seams in her art quilts are intentionally askew, reflecting, perhaps, her views of how people relate and life works.

Harley fancies she has a “dangerous streak,” so has walled herself off from relationships with other people, including her own children and even the stray dog that follows her home. Readers learn early on that her husband’s suicide turned her reclusive. But when the grisly details emerge, social seclusion seems like a mild reaction – it’s a wonder she wasn’t institutionalized. Grenville did not have to go quite so far to make the story work.

With other points, Grenville has a lighter touch. Douglas Cheeseman is the sympathetic anti-hero of the piece. An engineer sent to Karakarook to replace the old, Bent Bridge (there’s the imperfection idea again), Douglas bumbles through every social encounter, barely able to talk, consumed by his self doubt. He is drawn to Harley but, in the awkwardness of their meetings, is all but incapable of moving the affair forward.

Side stories amplify the theme of imperfection. Primary among these is the mesmerizing story of Felicity Porcelline and her relationship with the town’s butcher. Felicity is obsessed with perfection – keeping her house spotless, her face unmarred by wrinkle or freckle, and her interactions with the townsfolk above reproach. Things are definitely not what they seem, however, and it turns out that this seemingly perfect woman is the least perfect of all.

Felicity’s story and some of the other digressions do not mesh with the overall plot. They seemed tacked on or laid over the top. Rather than lessening the quality of the book, these misalignments underscore Grenville’s theme that perfection is impossible and imperfection should be embraced.

OTHER REVIEWS

(If you woud like your review of this book or any other of Kate Grenville's books listed here, please leave a comment with a link to your post and I will add it.)

Review of the Day: The Mermaid and the Messerschmitt

Rulka Langer was visiting her family in Poland when Germany invaded in 1939, setting off World War II. Her husband was in America, where they had been living, but she had taken their two children back to Poland to visit her mother, her brother, and other relatives. She and her children remained in Poland through the German siege of Warsaw, before finally escaping back to America in 1940.

Langer’s account of the German invasion and siege was first published in 1942. The Mermaid and the Messerschmitt has now been re-issued with fresh editing; more than a hundred new photographs, maps, and other supplemental documents; and a new Epilogue written by her son.

This is an incredible book. Subtitled “War Through a Woman’s Eyes, 1939 – 1940,” it reads like a novel, dragging the reader through the burning streets of Warsaw as German bombs drop on the city, on perilous train and cart trips through the war-scarred country-side, and through the treacherous and increasingly evil post-siege German administration. Her writing is crisp and honest – revealing her prior experience as a journalist.

Langer was not Jewish, and she left Warsaw before the Germans squeezed the city’s Jewish population into the infamous Warsaw Ghetto, so this is not a book about the Holocaust. But her depictions of events such as the arbitrary arrest of teachers and Catholic priests, and refugees transported on cattle cars, provide, in retrospect, chilling clues about what was to come.

Hers is the story of what it was like for ordinary people to live through war, to make decisions and to carry on even when her world is being blown apart. Her descriptions and explanations can seem unrealistically chipper – such as her report of bringing her children and mother back to Warsaw after deciding they were in greater danger in the country – seeming to deny the emotions that must have gone into them. But some experiences cannot hide behind a brave face, such as watching the houses on either side burn, knowing there was no water to put out the fire should it spread to their house, or racing with her children to a bomb shelter while machine guns strafed the street on which they ran.

Although the subject matter is serious, this is still an entertaining book that is thoroughly absorbing and quick to read. Langer’s memoir is a valuable historic account that deserves a wide audience.

The Mermaid and the Messerschmitt would make an excellent book club choice, especially for readers who enjoyed Suite Francaise by Irene Nemirovsky, The Diary of Anne Frank, or Sarah’s Key by Tatiana de Rosnay.

NOTES

I am pleased to scratch this one off my Guilt List. I just wish I hadn't waited so long to read it -- it was terrific!

The book is published by Aquila Polonica Publishing, “a young company specializing in publishing, in English, the Polish World War II experience – a part of World War II which is virtually unknown in the West. This amazingly heroic and tragic story of one of the Western Allies was suppressed for decades by the Communist regime that was forced upon Poland after the war, as part of its strategy for controlling that country. Only since the fall of Communism in 1989 have the true facts begun to resurface.”

Mermaid won the 2010 Benjamin Franklin Silver Award for Best First Book (non-fiction).

OTHER REVIEWS

(If you would like your review of this book, or any other book published by Aquila Polonica, listed here, please leave a comment with a link to your post and I will add it here.)

Review of the Day: Juliet, Naked

What happens when an idol turns out to be a normal, middle-aged person with plenty of ordinary problems of his own? Nick Hornby answers this question with charm and wit in Juliet, Naked, a novel about three people whose lives are turned inside out by one man’s mania for a reclusive rock star.

Duncan and Annie have been together for 15 years, putting on a brave front as a small-time academic and rinky-dink museum curator in the cultural backwater of seaside Gooleness. The dominating feature of their tepid relationship has always been Duncan’s fixation with Tucker Crowe, a late-‘70s, early-‘80s American rock star whose album Juliet is considered – at least by the 15 or so remaining, frenetic fans – to be the be all and end all of break-up albums.

When Crowe’s record company releases a CD of the demo tracks for Juliet, the “Croweologists” go wild over the first new material from their hero in the twenty-plus years since he cancelled a tour and abruptly retired. Annie revolts, setting into motion a series of romantic, almost plausible events that finally knock her and Duncan out of their rut.

As always, Hornby’s take on obsessive fans is spot on. Using Annie as the lead character brings freshness to these themes and makes this a particularly appealing Hornby choice for his female readers.

OTHER REVIEWS

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

Opening Sentence of the Day: The Two Towers

"Aragorn sped on up the hill."

-- The Two Towers by J.R.R. Tolkien.

This is Part II of The Lord of the Rings trilogy. I read The Hobbit as a child, but never the trilogy, and have been meaning to turn to it for years. I finally read the first book, The Fellowship of the Ring, last year. I hope to get this one and the final volume, The Return of the King, finished this year. 

Finishing the trilogy will let me scratch this off several lists:

• All-TIME Top 100
• The Observer's Top 100 
• Radcliffe's Top 100 

Teaser Tuesday: The Mermaid and the Messerschmitt

The long rumbling noise of crumbling walls, the tinkle of broken glass.

Mother, the room, everything disappeared in a cloud of dust . . .

-- The Mermaid and the Messerschmitt: War Through a Woman's Eyes, 1939 - 1940 by Rulka Langer (ellipses in original).

This is a really amazing book! It is the memoirs of a Polish woman who lived through the Nazi siege of Warsaw at the beginning of World War II. It reads like a novel and tells just what it was like to try to live a normal life with bombs falling and armies on the move.

 

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

 

Mailbox Monday and GIVEAWAY

Two book came into my mailbox last week, in time for Mailbox Monday. Chick Loves Lit is the host this month.

The first book is one I had my eye on and am pleased as punch to get from the Oregon State University Press:

Discovering Main Street: Travel Adventures in Small Towns of the Northwest by Foster Church.  I am lucky to live in the beautiful Pacific Northwest and I love exploring small towns.  This would be the travel book I wrote myself if I had time and talent.




The second book is one that came to me unsolicited from the publisher:

The Opposite Field by Jesse Katz.



This memoir by a Pulitzer-prize winning journalist is generating some real buzz and great reviews. It is a father's story about his relationship with his son, centered around their baseball-playing times together.

It looks like it would be very, very good.

BUT I AM GIVING MY COPY AWAY TO A GOOD BLOG HOME.  My hope is that it will go to someone who will enjoy it and REVIEW it. Not that I don't think it is a good book and would be worth reading, but my Guilt List is already long and, honestly, if it involves wheels or balls, I am just not interested.

GIVEAWAY

The contest is open until Sunday, August 15, 2010. To enter, do any or all of the following, but you must leave a comment for each one:

1. Leave a comment on this post. You must include a way to contact you (email or website address in your comment or available in your profile). If I can't find a way to contact you I will draw another winner. (1 entry)

2. Blog about this giveaway. (Posting the giveaway on your sidebar is also acceptable.) Leave a separate comment with a link to your post. (1 entry)

3. Subscribe to my rss feed, follow me on blogger, or subscribe via email (or tell me if you already are a subscriber or follower). Leave a separate comment for this. (1 entry)

4. Tweet this post on Twitter. Leave me a separate comment with your twitter user name. (1 entry)

5. Stumble this blog, digg it, technorati fave it, or link it on facebook. Leave a separate comment. (1 entry)

There are a lot of ways to enter (maximum of five entries), but you must LEAVE A SEPARATE COMMENT for each one or they will not count. I will use random.org to pick the winners from the comments.

This contest is open to entries from the U.S. and Canada only, no PO Boxes. The deadline for entry is midnight in your time zone, next Sunday, August 15, 2010. I will draw and post the winner's name on Monday, August 16, 2010.

Opening Sentence ofthe Day: Saving Stanley

"When the cat was sick and slowly dying, Hannah canceled vacation plans, dinner parties, hair appointments, a manicure."

Saving Stanley: The Brickman Stories by Scott Nadelson (Oregon Book Award winner; Great Lakes Colleges Association New Writers Award). 

I was immediately sucked into the first story in this interconnected collection of stories about the Brickman family because my own cat recently died of old age. I know just how Hannah felt! I ripped through the whole story in one sitting. It was excellent -- subtle, tense, funny, sad, and gracefully written. I can't wait to read the rest. 

This is one of the beautiful Hawthorne Books editions that make you re-think the idea of "paperback" because they are taller and skinnier than a typical trade paperback and feature "acid-free papers; sewn bindings that will not crack; heavy, laminated covers with double-scored French flaps that function as built-in bookmarks."  Hawthorne is a Portland-based, independent publisher specializing in literary fiction and narrative non-fiction. 

Review of the Day: Small Island

In Small Island, Andrea Levy examines what happened when volunteers from Jamaica came to England to fight for the British military during World War II and then stayed. She tells the story from the points of view of Queenie, the English wife of Bernard, her Jamaican tenant Gilbert, his new wife Hortense, and Bernard. The narrative moves back and forth in time from before the war to after, and from Jamaica to England to India, where Bernard was stationed.

The varying voices allowed Levy to pull in several different threads, but the central theme of the book is race relations in the 1940s in England. Until WWII, many English people in England had never seen or interacted with black people. Levy is a bit ham-fisted in her portrayal of American soldiers and their segregated ranks, but the contrast with the English is interesting. While the Americans were blatant with their discriminatory Jim Crow rules, the English prided themselves on how the British Empire supposedly led to racial tolerance.

Levy shows that this tolerance was more theory than fact. As black soldiers returned to England as black immigrants, they were treated as unwelcomed foreigners, despite being British citizens. Neighbors resent Queenie renting rooms to Gilbert and Hortense. Although Gilbert planned to go to law school, he is relegated to driving a truck. And college-educated Hortense is told that she will never be qualified to teach in London. Levy makes her point with subtly and humor as Gilbert and Hortense learn to find their way in England and in their marriage.

Levy skillfully weaves the small island theme throughout the novel. Geographically, Jamaica is a small island, but Levy makes it clear that limited ideas about culture, race, marriage, and opportunities made England just as small.

OTHER REVIEWS

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

NOTES

Small Island won both the Orange Prize and the Costa (Whitbread) Book of the Year Award. My book club read it and it was a enjoyed by all. It counts as my Orange Prize choice for the Book Award Challenge. It would also count for the Typically British Challenge if I had not already read more than my quota for that one. 

Opening Sentence of the Day: This Is Water

"There are these two young fish swimming along and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says, 'Morning, boys[, h]ow's the water?'"

-- This Is Water: Some Thoughts, Delivered on a Significant Occasion, about Living a Compassionate Life by David Foster Wallace.

When the senior partner at your law firm hands you a little book and tells you that you should read it, the only response is to smile and say, "Oh, yes. Certainly. How lovely."

Does this mean I don't have to read Infinite Jest?

BOOK BLOG HOP

I will be hopping around today because we settled a big child sex abuse case last night (after a long, long day of mediation) and I am celebrating.



The BBH question this week is whether you listen to music when you read and, if so, what songs?

I can't listen to any music with words while I read. I can have music without words playing -- in our house, this means classic, Mid-Century jazz like Ben Webster, Charlie Parker, or Dexter Gordon -- but I don't hear it. I tune out everything when I read.

Opening Sentence of the Day: Peaceful Places, New York City

"I have lived in New York City all my life, and I am convinced that it is the most vibrant, fascinating, creative, diverse, and, sometimes, frustrating place on earth."

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

I laughed when I read the acknowledgment section at the beginning of this book because the author thanked GM and Ford for loaning her cars to use to get to the places she wrote about. Having no car is such a quintessential New York thing -- I feel like I will be in good hands with this woman.

Although I have been to Manhattan several times, I have never explored the other boroughs.  We are planning a trip to New York this fall -- maybe this will be my chance to venture farther afield. And maybe this will be the book that inspires me to do so.

Review of the Day: Valley of the Dolls

Valley of the Dolls may be the most famous of all "trashy" novels, which is why I've always wanted to read it. I have never even seen the movie, so I never knew what it was about. I had a vague, misconceived notion that the book was about women (dolls) . . . who lived in a valley? Maybe in Connecticut?

How do these ideas take root?

Jacqueline Susann's novel is actually about three young women who come to New York City after World War II, looking for fame and fortune. Anne comes from a well-off but stodgy New England background, gets a job as a secretary to a high-powered attorney-for-the-stars, and exercises extremely poor judgment in her choice of men.  Neely is a 17-year-old vaudeville trouper who dreams of becoming a musical star. Jennifer is a no-talent bombshell who builds a career around her enormous boobs.

The story rips along through two decades, following the careers, love affairs, break-ups, crack-ups, and tragedies of the three until they start to lose their youth, beauty, health, and sanity.  As life gets tougher, all three eventually turn to sleeping pills (red "dolls) to get through the night and pep pills (green "dolls") to get through the day.

And there is no happy ending.

Which is why I now  wish I hadn't read it. I don't mind sordid during the story, but I like a happy -- or at least hopeful -- ending, with the bad guys getting their comeuppance and the good guys prevailing. What with the booze and pills and adultery and abortions and back stabbing and general ugliness, I just wanted a good scrubbing by the time I got to the end. 

OTHER REVIEWS

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

NOTES

I read this for the Birth Year Reading Challenge hosted by the Hotchpot Cafe. So at least I get a candle!

Teaser Tuesday: Down River

"The trailer was old, probably thirty, which is about three hundred in trailer years. It canted to the right on cinder-block legs."

-- Down River by John Hart

This is an Edgar winner, and I am really enjoying it.  I don't usually do teasers from audio books, but I failed to download one of the disks, so had to get the book book from the library to fill in -- giving me the chance to find a teaser.

James Lee Burke pretty much has a lock on moody, atmospheric Southern mysteries, so I admire an author willing to even give one a shot. That this one is very good, original, and not a Burke homage makes it definitely worth reading. Those Edgar folks picked a good one.  


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

Mailbox Monday

I enjoyed Peaceful Places, Los Angeles so much that I got my hands on a copy of Peaceful Places, New York City.



There are plans afoot for a trip to New York this fall, so I can't wait to read this and get ideas.

This is the first week of the new Mailbox Monday blog tour. This month, Chick Loves Lit is the host.

Opening Sentence of the Day: The Mermaid and the Messerschmitt

"In front of the house, under the big chestnut tree, Mother sat on a wooden bench talking to Uncle."

-- The Mermaid and the Messerschmitt: War Through a Woman's Eyes, 1939 - 1940, "Rulka Langer's extraordinary personal memoir of the opening chapter of World War II, covers the six-month period from August 1938 to February 1940 -- from the end of the last peacetime summer, through the Nazi invasion of Poland, the Siege of Warsaw and the first few months of the Nazi occupation."

This has been on my Guilt List for a long time. But it caught my attention now, because I was fascinated by the women's stories about WWII in London in Small Island by Andrea Levy, which we just read for book club. 

Also, it is a good balance to Valley of the Dolls.

Too Busy to Blog!

But there is always time to HOP!

It has been a while since I participated in the Book Blogger Hop. Jennifer has added a new "question of the week" feature since I last hopped.

This week's question is: "Who is your favorite new-to-you author so far this year?"

My answer is A. J. Cronin.  That's kind of a funny answer, since Cronin published his first novel in 1931 and his last in 1978. So he is definitely not a new author -- just new to me.  I read Three Loves this February and reviewed it here. I enjoyed it so much that I added Cronin to my list of authors whose works I plan to read in their entirety, or as close to it as I can manage.

Happy Hopping!

Teaser Tuesday: The Valley of the Dolls

"Love is companionship, having friends in common, the same interests.  Sex is the connotation you are placing on love, and let me tell you, young lady, that if and when it does exist, it dies very quickly after marriage -- or as soon as the girl learns what it's all about."

-- Valley of the Dolls by Jacqueline Susann.

Ha! 

You see the set up -- the stuffy New England mom is teaching her college-aged daughter the ways of the world. Of course, the daughter is going to head off to New York City and see if she can't prove her mom wrong.

 

I am reading this for the Birth Year Reading Challenge hosted by the Hotchpot Cafe. I've always secretly wanted to.

 

 

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

 

Mailbox Monday

I have to cheat a little on Mailbox Monday this week because no books came into my house last week -- at least not to stay. But this is the last week Marcia -- who invented Mailbox Monday and made it so much fun -- is hosting this popular weekly event, so I didn't want to miss out.  I did get three audio books from the library that will have to count. I have started two of them already -- one in the car, the other on my iPod.

Starting in August, Mailbox Monday will rotate hosts. Read the details here. I'll be hosting in January 2011 -- woo hoo!

Down River by John Hart (Edgar winner, so this counts as entertainment and a chance to scratch something off one of my lists --  I'm almost half-way through this one on my iPod.)



The Idea of Perfection by Kate Grenville (Orange winner -- another list opportunity; I am halfway through this one in the car)



The Girl Who Played with Fire by Stieg Larsson (I want to read these in order, so this one will have to sit in my iTunes library until my hold on the first one comes in)

Review of the Day: Deaf Sentence

David Lodge’s fourteenth novel, Deaf Sentence, takes up similar themes from his earlier campus novels, this time from the perspective of retired professor of linguistics, Desmond Bates, who finds himself at loss now that his job has gone the way of his hearing. The story is told through Desmond’s journal, which he has taken up as a way to sort through his conflicting feelings about his deafness and his retirement.

The academic rivalry, potential for mischief with graduate students, strained marital relations, musings on religion or its alternatives, and bookish references are all there, although mellowed some with Desmond’s years. The kinky – maybe crazy – come-ons of an American Phd. candidate are more panic-inducing than titillating for Desmond. He is filled with “late-flowering lust” for his wife, although sometimes incapable of following through. Caring for his 89-year-old father leads to general deliberations on aging and mortality. And through it all, Desmond fumbles and fiddles with his hearing aids, mis-understands conversations, and ponders the science and art of deafness, all to great comic effect.

After starting off as hearing-impaired slapstick, Deaf Sentence ends on a more somber, contemplative note. But throughout, the book is an enjoyable ramble with one of Britain’s great novelists.

OTHER REVIEWS

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

Opening Sentence of the Day: Peaceful Places, Los Angeles

"Tranquility isn't the first word that comes to mind when most of us think of life in Los Angeles, especially these days."

  -- Peaceful Places, Los Angeles by Laura Randall.

 I actually already reviewed this one (here), so my posts are switcherooed.



NOTE

Book Beginnings on Fridays is a Friday fun "opening sentence" event hosted by Becky at Page Turners. Post the opening sentence of the book(s) you started this week and see what other books people have going.

Review of the Day: Peaceful Places Los Angeles

 

In Peaceful Places, Los Angeles, Laura Randall explores “110 Tranquil Sites in the City of Angles and Neighboring Communities,” providing descriptions, photos, and useful information for those seeking serene respite in a megalopolis known for glitz and traffic.

The sites are organized alphabetically, from Amir’s Garden in Griffith Park (Hollywood) to the Zona Rosa Caffe (Pasadena), and ranked with three stars (“heavenly anytime”), two stars (“almost always sublime”), or one star (peacefulness limited to certain designated times). Randall also offers two alternate “paths” for finding the sites – by category and by geographic area (sort of like a Zagat guide to tranquility).

The sites fall into several categories: enchanting walks, historic sites, museums and galleries, parks and gardens, quiet tables, reading rooms, spiritual enclaves and others. Randall’ s descriptions are detailed and evocative. She has a breezy style that is like getting information from a well-informed friend.

This book is a treasure for Los Angeles residents looking to explore the quieter corners of their city. It is also a must-read guide for visitors who want a break from the hectic bustle of the typical trip to southern California.

NOTE

This is one of the books I got from the LibraryThing Early Reviewer program. I am not quite caught up on my Early Reviewer list, but I am working on it.

OTHER REVIEWS

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