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Vacation Reading

I suppose the tenor of vacation reading is influenced by the tenor of the vacation. At my mom's I tend to read mysteries or romances; partially because she often has a few lying around. This time it was because they were what happened to be on my kindle.

(Ruth Asawa at Crystal Bridges)

I'd never read any of Gunnar Staalesen's Varg Veum series, and I'm not quite certain what prompted me to read Where Roses Never Die, but I'll admit I enjoyed it immensely. Staalesen caught my attention with the opening sentence:

There are days in your life when you are barely present, and today was one of those."

Initially Veum seemed a bit of a cliché, the hard-boiled PI, lost in too much booze, but the character was well developed, thoughtful and engaging in his own gruff way. I love the way the plot circled back on itself like an ever-expanding web, tying seemingly disconnected and coincidental incidents into an oddly coherent plot, much the same way lies and secrets fold in on themselves and build tangled webs. The book proved to be more thoughtful, and thought provoking, than I anticipated, with a steady folding and unfolding of motivations, reactions and understandings, mostly on the part of our detective, but also on some of the other characters in the story and I will probably look up other books in the series. It is also an exploration of the way people can wrap themselves up in guilt, or grief or despair, isolating themselves from the world, but also from an understanding of the consequences of their own actions, that isolating effect being a prison of their own making, that both tortures and protects. Veum is an interesting narrator and detective in that he does not always successfully compartmentalize his investigation from his life and the unfolding web of his investigation slowly influences his own understanding of his own life and motivations. I like the way the ending reflected back on the beginning, bookending the tale, a tale that seems to begin in dissolution and ends with a promise of hope.

The choice was mine. The rest of my life was mine. All I had to do was choose."

Mom with her furry grandchildren: Tikka and Holly

Although I also had another, longer novel in progress, I was more inclined to dive into another short novel that made few demands. I was at my mom's and didn't really want to be drawn into a story from which I would resent extricating myself, so I started The Red Car by Marcy Dermansky, a book that had been on my kindle for a long time. It was a slow go at first, and I wondered what had attracted me to the novel in the first place. The prose is short and choppy, and often fairly flat of affect, but, as I was drawn more deeply into the story, I realized that the narrator is flat of affect, that she plays a passive role in her own life, letting life happen to her, not necessarily actively engaged in the act of living. She is hiding from the world, and to a great extent from herself. Through a series of circumstances, circumstances portrayed with a bit of magical realism, she begins to find herself, but only slowly. The novel definitely flirts with what is real and what is in the narrator's head, sometimes confusing the two, and often neither possibility is all that engaging. When the novel ends she is on the cusp of discovery, but has not yet walked through the door. There are moments when the language almost flirts with becoming more, but it hasn't yet transcended that choppiness. I think this is intentional on the part of the author, but I am not sure of her reasoning, am not sure if it serves a greater purpose, a comment not just on the flatness of Leah, our narrator, but of this entire world in which Leah lives. But then again, perhaps that transition out of short declarative, almost timeless and emotionless sentences is more indicative of my own yearnings than anything related to this story. I must admit that it is the language itself that has left me unsettled, more than the story, or are they intrinsically intertwined?

Chihuly in the forest

About this time I got a notice from the Knox County library that my number had come up on the waiting list for a currently popular crime novel, and so I downloaded it. That is one of the wonderful features of modern life, being able to carry a stack of books in a small device, being able to borrow a library book from one's local library anywhere in the world.

This was another book written in short, declarative sentences, but here the language made sense. The book was Michael Connelly's new novel, The Late Show and the matter-of fact, procedural language, fit the procedural nature of the story. This is a new series by Connelly, with a new police officer, Renee Ballard, who seems to me like an attempt to create a younger, female version of Harry Bosch. It was a decent procedural, and I was engaged enough in the story, but i have doubts as to whether Ballard will equal Bosch in maintaining my interest. But the book served its purpose, and as a mindless vacation read when I needed an escape from family, or as respite after a long day of driving through pouring rain, it was completely satisfying.

The big book that saw me through most of my trip was the second volume in George RR Martin's Song of Ice and Fire series, A Clash of Kings. I don't particularly have any problems with the genre, but I'm not sure that I ever would have read this if it weren't for the Game of Thrones series on TV. I've not watched Game of Thrones, not beyond an episode, but I am enjoying the book. The characters are complex and well drawn for the most part, there are some moments where I felt a few got short shrift in this second volume, and the plot is very politically sophisticated and astute. I probably like the slower pace of the books more than I would like the series, and I enjoy the ability to delve deeper into the thoughts and motivations of the characters that is offered through the pace of the book. The violence doesn't really bother me, at least not reading about it, although I do occasionally have to put the book aside, for various reasons. I'd be incredibly naïve to claim that there is anything in here that humans haven't done to each other in our not particularly pretty past (and probably not our present or future either), but I can't watch it on TV. I can read about unpleasant things, but I can't watch movies where people physically harm other people anymore. I'll probably continue reading the novels, but not quickly. The story is a part of our cultural lexicon, whether one likes it or not, the characters are strong and interesting, and Martin is a fairly astute observer of human behaviors and motivations. Although it is not of the caliber of lets say, Tolkein, and I've found no redeeming or uplifting messages or metaphors here, it is proving to be both an entertaining and often thought-provoking read.

And now comes the question of What Next? I'm currently reading a few non-fiction books, but am itching for another novel, perhaps one with a little more weight, something that will perhaps stretch me as a reader a little further. It has been years since I've tackled a Man Booker longlist, and I've already lost a month, so I doubt I will get them all read before the prize is announced, much less the shortlist, but the list seems like a good place to start.

What about you? Do you read novels? Have you tackled the longlist? Or do you prefer something that offers more of an easy escape? Do Tell.

August 12, 2017
June Books and the Pleasures of Reading

I've been thinking about the pleasures of reading. In part this is simply because I have occasionally found myself curled up with a good book, the world receding from active thought. I don't have a boat or a pond or a lazy glade in which to read, but this painting by sergeant perfectly captures the mental escape provided by a good book. (photo taken at Crystal Bridges Museum of Art)

Which reminds me that I have been remiss in maintaining book lists, partly because keeping the list is not as fun as time spent reading, but also because I still struggle with the idea of even keeping a list, even though there is some aspect of my nature that can't relax into the next novel until I've caught up with my accounting. The fact is that keeping a list has proven useful, serving to remind me of when I read a book, perhaps even that I have read a book, at least before I get through it a second time wondering why it seems so familiar (see Rules of Civility).

Of course there are good reasons not to keep a list as well, especially when one does so in order to claim bragging rights. The point is never about what you've read, except inasmuch as what you have read, if you have read it well, becomes a part of who you are. I see already that the above statement is misleading as I've just said that what you read doesn't matter and in the same sentence stated that you become what you read. That may give me pause. There are many things I've read which I sincerely hope do not define me. Lucky this is not the case with the books I read in June.

Perhaps there is a purpose in writing a book post as well in that it forces me to think about the books I've read after the fact, when they are no longer forefront in my memory and my emotions are apt to be swayed.  It also allows me to make a pretty collage. Well, at least the previous months' reading materials yielded pretty collages; June's collage is mostly brown. Did the colors of the book covers affect my thoughts on the reading? No, but it is interesting that my favorite book, Lincoln in the Bardo is blue.

Both of the two theology texts are required reading for EFM year 4. Since I will be taking EFM mentor training, and these book are on the schedule for the next cycle, I shall keep them. Of the two, Timothy Sedgewick's The Christian Moral Life is my favorite as it made me question my beliefs and think about the way I live my life in retrospect to the principles I profess to believe.   My Neighbor's Faith is fairly light reading, and I did not find it either deeply theological or thought provoking, consisting as it did of brief personal stories. However, since one of the themes of year four, besides theology, is about deepening one's faith through interfaith dialogue, the book can be enlightening and perhaps even upsetting for those who do not have friends of different faiths or have not been inclined to engage others on matters of belief. Unfortunately I will have to buy a new copy of My Neighbor's Faith as Moisés peed on it as a very pointed protest at having been forced to move, and rather than dry it out and live with the urine-scented pages, I discarded the book. I know at least one person who does not believe that there is any valid reason for interfaith dialogue and who would applaud Moisés's actions. I however disagree.

As I look at this collage, it strikes me that three of the books, Lincoln in the Bardo, Mr. and Mrs. Doctor, and Unbroken, all deal, at least in part, with how people come to terms with change and stress and trauma in their lives, with grief and strength and fortitude, with creativity and passivity and their benefits and consequences. To some extent my reading of each was informed and influenced by my readings of the others.   But only Lincoln in the Bardo remains on the list of books I will read again.

And David Foster Wallace? I'm glad I read the book; the essays were brilliant riffs, often entertaining, often far too personal, making them at times uncomfortable to read. It is not my favorite volume of his essays, yet my perspective on the author will never be the same.

August 8, 2017
Reading in the Afternoon, Thoughts on Two Books

The past few days, I have, when given the opportunity, spent a few happy hours in the afternoon or early evening in the western sunroom, the one I tend to think of as the afternoon room. It is actually lovely most of the day, although perhaps slightly less so in the earliest morning hours, when I tend to prefer the light in the eastern sunroom. Actually, I use both rooms throughout the day, depending on mood and purpose, and their presence played a not-insignificant role in my attraction to this house.

Anyway, for a long while the western sunroom, which remains somewhat devoid of furniture, was the room in which the as-yet-unpacked boxes resided. As such, although I had a chair, and my desk had initially been situated in this room before being moved upstairs, it was not a room in which I could comfortably settle and while away happy hours. The unpacked boxes stood towering over me in remonstrance. But now the boxes are gone, their contents settled around the house, the packing detritus safely sent to recycleville, and I can sit in peace. Eventually a sofa will reside where the pillows are piled haphazardly, and there might well be a table under that lamp as well, but the emptiness does not plague me. It is more a promise as yet unfulfilled.

This room has perfect light for needlework and it is here that my needlework chair resides. I can sit here, enjoying the light, listening to music or a book on tape, happily stitching. Or I can sit with an actual book in my hand, although I do miss having an ottoman, or perhaps a table situated so that I can easily jot down a note or two. Although the needlework chair is comfortable, I suspect that sunroom reading will become more regular once there is a sofa and a table or two.

Nonetheless, it is in this room that I recently finished rereading Upton Sinclair's first Lanny Budd novel, World's End. I would never state that Sinclair is a writer of the highest sort, and although there are beautiful paragraphs here and there, there are also tedious sections, contrived plots, and a lot of history. In fact there are times when the novel reads more like a history book than a novel. But this is my third reading, first in my teens, then in my 30's, and now, closing out my 50's I find I still enjoy reading this book.

The series begins when Lanny is 13 and this volume extends through the end of the first World War, when Lanny is 19. Yes, at times it is a stretch, but Sinclair has positioned his protagonist well: a young American who will grow up with the 20th century, a thoughtful, privileged American with artistic sensibilities who is connected to both conservative American power and liberal European culture, a young man who can bridge cultures and finds himself in contact with the people and forces that shaped history. Through Lanny's eyes, at this point the eyes of a sincere, thoughtful teenager, Sinclair explores the forces and human impulses that shaped 20th century history. I'll probably slowly work my way through the whole series again, as each time I read it I see more, see the story in a different light. Sinclair was a socialist, and this is evident in the telling of the story, but he has a good handle on history and the reader gets a good sense of the human context of the period. In terms of actual characters and events, Sinclair's analysis is on point more often than he is in the weeds, and I find Sinclair's ability to combine history with fiction in a mostly coherent and insightful way quite enjoyable. In fact, even thought I know far more about both early 20th century history and human nature than I did at 16, I still find the story both gripping and thought provoking. Perhaps I am too willing to escape into other worlds, perhaps I get so invested in the every day, that I need to be repeatedly distracted and reminded of the capriciousness of human nature and history, even through fiction. Perhaps more so, more personally, through fiction. So much for clearing up space in the bookcases.



When I started reading World's End I was not yet finished with my previous novel, Lincoln in the Bardo, by George Saunders, mostly because although I loved that book, it was at times incredibly intense and I just needed a good story to fall back on. I didn't quite realize (or remember) how the books would in fact reinforce each other even though they are radically different. Saunders has taken a moment in the life of Abraham Lincoln, the death of his son Willie, and created an intense and fascinating novel full of compassion. Physically the novel is set in a cemetery on the day Lincoln buried his son. But aside from the Lincoln, most of the characters in this book are not the living — the bardo being a Tibetan term for the period between death and rebirth. The voices of the "sick" (dead) overlap and crowd around the reader, reminding me mostly of the role of the chorus in Greek Tragedy. In fact this novel works very well if one reads it at least in part as if one is reading a play, letting the voices wrap over one simultaneously even though we must read them sequentially.   But again perhaps this comparison was also brought home to me because my volumes of Aeschylus are right next to my upstairs reading chair, perhaps influencing my understanding. Now I simply want to reread Aeschylus.

So, this is a novel that is several things simultaneously. It is a novel about the afterlife, about the things we hold on to, perhaps too tightly, and how they shape and limit and constrain us. It is also about Mr. Lincoln; Lincoln the man and Lincoln the President. The author alternates the voices (chorus) from the Bardo, with quotes about the death of Willie Lincoln, comments about the war, comments, both scathing and kind about Lincoln the President and Lincoln the man — quotes both from actual texts but also fictional quotes. It is about a man who is suffering, but who, through his suffering learns that his own life and his own suffering is just a microcosm of the suffering others, and that suffering cannot be avoided, cannot be avoided without causing more suffering. In this sense there is a very Buddhist subtext to this novel, a subtext of suffering and sorrow, but also the idea that much of living, that our ability to successfully navigate life depends on our ability to enter into the suffering and sorrow of others.

I think I will be thinking about Lincoln In The Bardo for a long time, and I'll probably reread it. It is a novel that strikes me as being about more than it appears to be. On the surface there is at times a flippancy, and almost carnival atmosphere, to the novel, and it can be read as such. But this is just the surface fog, a gloss that does not hide, but in fact slowly reveals greater allegorical depths, and I do think this novel shows great depth.  The pain, the humor, the grotesqueries, the carnival atmosphere, the anger and angst and fear and denial, all point to something essential about the human condition. I'm not sure it is a novel for everyone and it may seem overly pretentious and manipulative; yet I increasingly think it may be brilliant and I need to read it again, perhaps soon, then perhaps again in a few years.

In the end that is always my test. What will I think of this book when I read it again in 10 or 15 years. Don't expect anything profound, but then we never do know where our relationships are heading do we? We never know, when we open a book, whether it will be a passing fancy, or if and how the words may speak to us. This is the gift a writer brings, the gift of relationship the ability to form a relationship with the reader through words, words that connect us to our fellow humans and through these words, to further relationships with ourselves and humanity. We never know quite what will be revealed.

July 11, 2017
Connecting A Few Dots Through Reading

Disparate bits sometimes float through our lives, something we read here, an encounter there, and occasionally they bind together in unexpected ways.

Nearly a month ago I was in Chicago for a short, roughly 25-hour, jaunt. I went to my appointment, had dinner with a friend I had missed during my previous visit to Chicago, and slept for 10 hours; none of these events offered up a defining moment. And yet there was one, a brief feeling of disquiet, of unmooring, that I initially dismissed, but which has proven to have more significant repercussions, reverberating both through my understanding of myself, but also of the world around me.

As I walked through O'Hare, roughly mid-day on a Friday, I felt distinctly lost. I was not lost in any physical sense; I knew exactly where I was going, exactly how to get there. There was nothing unfamiliar in the scenario, and yet it felt unfamiliar. I had been reading a novel on the plane, and I was deeply engaged with the story and the characters. I wondered if I was simply still in that liminal space between story and reality. I also wondered if I was simply tired. I was tired. I dismissed my thoughts, got my bearings, and moved on.

A couple of weeks ago, I stumbled across this abstract:

Among young adults, we show that refugees that enter the U.S. before age 14 graduate high school and enter college at the same rate as natives. Refugees that enter as older teenagers have lower attainment with much of the difference attributable to language barriers and because many in this group are not accompanied by a parent to the U.S. Among refugees that entered the U.S. at ages 18-45, we follow respondents’ outcomes over a 20-year period in a synthetic cohort. Refugees have much lower levels of education and poorer language skills than natives and outcomes are initially poor with low employment, high welfare use and low earnings. Outcomes improve considerably as refugees age. After 6 years in the country, these refugees work at higher rates than natives but they never attain the earning levels of U.S.-born respondents. Using the NBER TAXSIM program, we estimate that refugees pay $21,000 more in taxes than they receive in benefits over their first 20 years in the U.S. ¹

The last two sentences are the ones that roil around in my brain. I can usually quote all kinds of statistics about how influx of immigrants into a community actually raises the standard of living and the job prospects of the native-born residents already in that community. It has also long been known that children under the age of 14 pick up language and social skills much more adeptly than older children and adults. But I am also aware that we are in a period of great unrest and that immigrants get more than their fair share of the attention, unfairly because the issues are really not about the immigrants, and they have not really done anything to warrant our attention or feelings of ill-will. The roots of the issues are different, but are deeply buried in places we aren't sure we want to go.  Immigrants make good scapegoats.¹

Despite this outburst, this is not really a political blog.  Yet, in my mind at least, these two things are related. They are related through the novel I was reading at the time of my trip to Chicago, Mr and Mrs. Doctor, by Julie Iromuanya, a novel I have actually been rereading as thoughts swirled around in my brain. The simple story is that the novel is about Job and Ifi, a Nigerian couple who have come to live in the United States. It is a complicated story about leaving one's culture, trying to fit into another, and never quite succeeding. It is a story based on lies, the lies the characters tell each other and the lies they tell themselves, a fiction based on fiction. And yet it is also a story about the way we all dance around the truth in order to protect ourselves and others, and the ways change and hope come in the ways one might least expect.

It is not the easiest book. At the times the plot seems to be only partially assembled, much like Job and Ifi's plans in America.  The primary characters are not particularly likeable by the standards of polite, educated, American Society, and the Americans they encounter are not, for the most part, the kind of Americans we are proud to call our own. And yet the characters are richly developed, and there is a sense that their story is told with love and empathy, an empathy that is fully available to the reader who is willing to push past initial discomforts and stereotypes.

Pulled into the story and the lives of the characters, I felt disoriented in O'Hare that day in early June. But the truth is that I am also perhaps more likely to feel that sense of disorientation, as this experience also made me realize how much I tend towards feelings of isolation in large crowds.  There are those who are agitated in large crowds, those who thrive on them, and I am sure that I am not the only person who feels increasingly cut off and out of touch in very large groups. The larger the crowd, the more isolated I feel, and I am sure that this is some variation on my basic introversion. And yet this character trait also helped me feel in microcosm, the smallest sense of what it could feel like to live in a world that is in many ways the antithesis of everything you believe to be true and right, to walk through the world, knowing where you are going and doing what you think is right, only to have the world swirl on around you in incomprehensible ways.

And how does that second quote apply? It may be obvious. Job came to this country as a college student but he flunked out of college; his entire life is built around a lie, a lie that he cannot admit, even to himself. Job is man who is, in many ways, quite simple. There is much he doesn't understand, doesn't seek to understand, and he can be oblivious to that which seems obvious to the world around him. But do not think that makes him any less complexly human. His simplicity, his confusion, and his complexity are all apparent in the opening pages of the novel, but the depth of Jobs own self deception, and the extent to which he has closed himself in on himself does not become apparent until much later. I'm not sure that he ever becomes more likeable, but the reader does become more sympathetic toward him. Job works two jobs, two jobs that barely allow him enough money to live in a slum. He works harder than the other residents of his housing unit in many ways, hence the above quote and yet in many ways they are better off than he; certainly no worse off. He, and all the Nigerians in this story, work hard, work very hard, and tell themselves stories to make their lives easier. The book revolves around Job and Ifi, although Ifi may be the more interestingly complex character. The book is their story, but it is not their story alone.

We are a nation of immigrants. In fact we are all immigrants. We are born immigrants, brought into a world of which we have no understanding. Often the world we are born into is not the world we end up in, and whether or not we adept depends on how open we are to change, whether or not we can empathize with others, whether or not we can find that part which is human, and is common to us all. Books can help with understanding in a way that sometimes one-on-one contact cannot, in that books allow us to reach outside ourselves in a safe environment, thereby opening our minds to future encounters.

This is a book about the American Dream. Or perhaps it is about the myth of the American Dream; about the myths people tell themselves about progress, about class and race, about sexism. It is about the way the world we dream about doesn't really exist, and the way, even when we struggle to escape one set of biases, we bring them with us, and encounter new walls as well, walls that may be built on our own false expectations. But it is also a story of hope, and of the knowledge that the future can be a better one, only not perhaps in the way we imagined it in our dreams.

1. http://www.nber.org/papers/w23498#fromrss

June 27, 2017
Quick Post on Thursday Morning

There was a lull in the unpacking. I was behind on several fronts and my outside life intervened, demanding that I pay attention to obligations too long abandoned.

Then, Tuesday, I experienced another fit of profound unsettledness and the shifting and opening of boxes, with the attendant piles of paper and general chaos resumed. Although it was really only a brief side-line from the main activity center, the last three boxes were unpacked on the morning room, and I was able to bring in a small table and the two extra dining chairs that don't fit around my table without the leaves. The two chairs are actually too big for the small outdoor table that currently resides in that space, but I have the table, and as the major kitchen appliances have issues and a kitchen remodel is vaguely scheduled for the next year or so, it works for now.

In fact, aside from inability to deal with unpacked things, I am rather amazed at my ability to be patient with what is not done. In the old house, "not right" was a burden, here it is just a meh. The difference seems to be that this house simply feels like home to me and the old house didn't, although it took me a long time to articulate that feeling. This house is my sanctuary and home, even unpacked and unsettled.

But back to unpacking…

My main push on Tuesday was to find the printer and start getting the office together. I'd been struggling with shelving issues in my office, (the Billy bookcases were a failure) trying to balance my need for bookshelves on a budget now with my dream of a future library. I eventually realized the two commercial kitchen-style steel wire shelving units sitting unused in the garage would fit in my office space. Even if they are too deep, at 18 inches, I already own them, and hence no additional cost is incurred. Then I realized I had another, 14" deep unit in the basement that would work upstairs, and so the unpacking of the office began.

I got the smaller unit upstairs and assembled on Tuesday, and got my printer, tv, and some books in place. The plan was to spend the rest of the week disassembling the garage units and reassembling them upstairs, but I had a couple of the contractors here for another task and they helped, working far faster and more efficiently than I could have. They even carried my desk upstairs. Much as the sunroom was lovely, it was unpractical in the late afternoon and evening, as there was too much glare on my screen. The room is great for reading, and needlework, and chatting with friends, but no so much as an office.

So most of Wednesday was spent shifting boxes of books, unpacking, sorting and shelving. I will have to buy at least two more units, and for those I will buy the 14 inch shelves, which will be worthwhile even if, at some point, should my dreams of a library become reality, they need to be replaced with wider 18" utility shelves when they move back to the basement or garage.

In the meantime there is more unpacking ahead. My plan was that I would have philosophy, religion, classics, and literature, along with a few other small categories in my office. History, biography, and science have been relegated to the basement to wait for that dream library. At the moment it appears that I may have extra space on the shelves, although it is too early to determine how much extra space, or which books will be allowed to migrate up into the land of light.

June 15, 2017
Accounting for Books

In my imagination, May, especially early in the month, during that transitional period before moving into the new house, was going to be a period filled with open expanses of time: time for engaging with books, for reading and writing, for sharing those things that moved me in one direction or another. Alas it was not to be. There was a necessary period of post-packing naps, but otherwise my time was often too full with obligation, and although there were moments of blessed solitude, freedom of time seemed illusory, always hoped for but just slightly beyond reach.

It is not that there was no time for reading, plenty of reading occurred in the first half of the month, but there was no time for reflection, and as the month went on, that reading became more insubstantial and less likely to induce frustration at my inability to write out or talk out my thoughts on what I was reading.

Haruki Murakami's Men Without Women arrived just as packing was winding down, and I was so eager to get started I plunged in at the first opportunity after closing on the old house. I was not disappointed, although I did struggle with the first story and wondered if this would be the first Murakami I did not love. But each subsequent story drew me in, and although each story was separate and completely different from its predecessors, the progression of the stories seemed to build layers of insight, creating something that was simultaneously disconnected and unified. As usual, the characters and stories were complex, quirky, and profound and I wished I had spent more time and thought with the book, wished I had been able to explore my reactions more fully. I may well be reading it again soon.

I also wish I had been able to explore the multiple levels of interconnectedness, lies, and self-delusion in Domenico Starnone's Ties, a novel that is raw, often painful, but also insightful on many levels. It is not the easiest read, primarily due to the rampant emotions, deceit, and the slow dissolution of the walls the characters have built around themselves and between themselves as the family unravels. The book begins and ends in fury and it could be easy to read on that level alone, taking sides and blaming, but there is much more to this book. The beginning reminds me of Elena Ferrante's Days of Abandonment, but Vanda remains trapped in her fury, and this book is far more complicated, examining the story from the perspectives of all the family members, weaving a complex fabric of the many ways we layer and entwine ourselves without really understanding the consequences.   I was so upset after reading it I thought I would never want to go back to it, but now wonder if perhaps I have left it unfinished, and need to return and wrest with my thoughts more deeply.

Partly due to this frustration over being able to work out my reactions to the above books, in my head and on paper, my further reading leaned more toward works suited to my transitional mind-set, insubstantial reading which was entertaining and often captivating, but which did not leave me yearning for my pen. Memoirs and personal reflections figured highly, including Betty Halbreich's I'll Drink to That, which I found charming and, at times, touching. Yes, the book is about clothes and style and the women who buy clothes, but really that was only a small part. It was the perfect book for those first days after moving out of my old house, light but not completely insubstantial. I followed this with Stephen King's On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft, which is more a memoir than a book about how to write. King is nothing if not a good storyteller, and the story of his life and how he came to be the writer he has become is entertaining and fascinating.

Then I read An Economist Gets Lunch by Tyler Cowen, which I suppose is technically not a memoir, but then I'm not really sure what it is. It is not a book about food, and yet it doesn't escape food, or Cowen's personal experiences with food, although it is not so much about preparing food. It is also a book about economics, but economics mixed with personal annectdotes, and food history, and politics and a little mishmash of this an that. The title actually describes the book well. It is a book about an economist who gets lunch, and the explorations, mental and physical that arise from two simple precepts: that one must get lunch, and that the author makes his living by thinking about things, The book is an exploration that arises from those two principles. I personally loved it, economics, history, idiosyncracies, and all, but I recognize that it is most definitely not a book for everyone and many will find it boring, tedious, and/or unfocused.

The last memoir, read just before I moved in to my hew house was Susan Hermann Loomis's On Rue Tatin, the story of finding and renovating her family's home in France, with recipes. I have enjoyed Loomis's cookbooks, and I enjoyed the story of finding her crumbling old house and making it her own. It made me yearn for my own house, which is not as old, probably not as charming, and in far better shape. In the end though, I am a person who likes stories, and I connected with this book. Loomis is very good at describing the tastes and smells of France, of exploring the sights, the interactions, the rubbing together of cultures and expectations. It was a lovely, and yes, escapist, read; a story revolving around people, time, place and the bonds that are formed.

The two more significant books that I read during this period, Tyler Cowen's The Complacent Class and Lior Lev Sercarz's The Spice Companion, will influence my thoughts for some time to come. I don't always agree with Tyler Cowen's analyes, and I don't have to agree with an author to love a book, but he has made me think, and reconsider some closely held shiboleths. The resulting insights will continue to influence my thoughts and my choices and I think the book is well worth reading.    The Spice Companion is not so much a book to cook from, although the author does offer menus for spice blends and ideas on how to use spices, but an inspiring look at spice and flavor and the way flavors work together, or against each other.  Reading the book has already had an impact on the way I cook and think about cooking even though I haven't picked it up since moving into the house and filing it on the shelf.



On a lighter note, I listened to Michael Connelly's The Lincoln Lawyer while I took my morning walks during my period of transition and, as always I enjoyed it immensely. I have not read the series in order, but that really hasn't hurt my enjoyment of the books at all. I also found Ilia Delio's Care for the Earth: A Franciscan Spirituality of the Earth to be very light reading, although I believe my EFM classmates found it more inspiring and more difficult than I did.   I would say it was clearly written, and my main objection to it was that it mostly consisted of stringing together ideas from other books, books I had already read and found more insightful. I suppose then that, in my case, the author was preaching to the choir, but it is probably a good introduction to the idea that caring for the earth is both a moral and a spiritual or religious responsibility and in helping the reader articulate a theological response to environmentalism.

I'm hoping to be more focused in June, but it may be simply wishful thinking. Either I'll pull myself together or I'll abandon book posts all together.

June 3, 2017
Catching Up: March and April Books

I didn't really read much in March and April, and much of what I did read, proved to be less than noteworthy. Never mind, having started something (monthly book posts) I'll stick with the program and subject you to the boring details. I wasn't really looking for deep reading, my mental processes already being taxed with a few outside projects as well as the rigors of packing and sorting-while-packing. This could have been part of the problem, I am drawn to things that make me reflect, and am often disappointed by shallow gloss. And yet life is full of surprises, and sometimes you never know where you'll find some detail you weren't even aware you were looking for.

Actually, it wasn't all bad. There were a couple of books I just loved, and a couple of more that I struggled with, but which won me over and proved to be silent friends, the kind that sometimes catch you by surprise when you aren't looking. I loved George RR Martin's Game of Thrones and found it to be the perfect distraction and escape, but not without thoughtful passages that also fed my own need for rumination and reflection. It had been on my list for a long time, but never read, and I impulsively started it one night when I really wanted to disappear into that kind of numbing mindlessness that television can bring. I believe that the time reading the book was well spent and although I actually spent longer with it than I would have with the first season, the book was quite enjoyable and thought provoking as well. Alas it was a long time before another book so captured my imagination and there were evenings that I did indeed fall asleep into a video-induced semi-coma.

Shortly before reading the Martin, I picked up Adam Johnson's The Orphan Master's Son, which was also excellent, and one of my favorite novels from these two months, but it was not as good of a stress reliever or escape as the former novel. In fact, it was difficult to get started with this novel, but it did win me over in the end. It is not a novel for someone who just wants to get lost in an epic tale that carries you away, and it can be difficult with its layers of meaning, truth, fable, surrealism and poignant portrayals of hope and despair and the way they shape and corrupt. But despite this, despite the pain in this novel, there is also incredible beauty and hope and I highly recommend it, just not necessarily as bedtime reading.

If these two novels were my favorites, and they were, with their somewhat overlapping themes but very different approaches, what was the sleeper, the book that won me over? Actually there were two novels, but they are linked. Both novels are by Rachel Cusk, Transit and Outline. I also have to admit that, as much as I might have loved the first two novels discussed above more while I was reading them, it is these latter two that are going to haunt my thoughts longer.

First of all, I have to admit that I had read a couple of Rachel Cusk's earlier novels, and although they were well written, they just were not quite my cup of tea. In fact I probably would not have sought out anything else by Cusk except that I happened to read something about her newest novel, Transit, that captured my attention. After placing myself on the wait-list at my local library, I decided to read the previous novel, Outline.

Outline is a slow, engaging novel that doesn't follow a typical novel form. In fact it is much like an outline where the narrator and protagonist is passive, slowly revealed through her interactions with others, with the ways others respond to her presence. Although it seems a little odd, quite a bit is actually revealed, both about the characters with whom our narrator interacts, but also about our narrator herself, and the period of transition she is going through after a divorce, simply through the situations and revelations others make in her presence and her reaction (or lack of reaction). I wish I had my notes with me from when I read the book, as there were passages I copied out and commented upon, but alas they are packed Still, despite not having a clear story-line, the story grew, and the outline of our protagonist's character grew, as if she was slowly be revealed not only to us, but to herself, through the process.

Transit is the second novel in what is meant to be a trilogy. Here, the author is still listening to others, but she is also more present in the story and in her life. She has moved to London, purchased a house in desperate need of renovation, and has taken on that project, and this has sparked something in herself, as if the physical renovation of the house is symbolic of the emotional renovation she must undergo to become more fully herself in her new life. In fact she refers to her passivity in the previous novel:

For a long time, I said, I believed that it was only through absolute passivity that you could learn to see what was really there. But my decision to create a disturbance by renovating my house had awoken a different reality, as though I had disturbed a beast sleeping in its lair. I had started to become, in effect, angry.

Our protagonist has moved from numbness, to anger, two steps in her transformative process. And the process here is told with great gentleness and subtlety. These are books that stole into my heart when I wasn't expecting it, and they will stay with me a long time. I look forward to whatever will be revealed in the next chapter, and I appreciate the slow evolution, and anticipation, as the novel itself, or series of novels takes shape, from outline, through evolution, to some future state, not yet quite known.

In conclusion, following is my actual list, in order read, perhaps an occasional comment, but for the most part not.

Elizabeth Kostova — The Swan Thieves. I actually enjoyed this a great deal, beautiful writing about art, slightly less successful as a novel.

Rachel Cusk — Outline.

Nujeen Mustafa — Nujeen: One Girl's Incredible Journey…..

Clare-Louise Bennett — Pond.

Adam Johnson — The Orphan Master's Son

George R.R. Martin — Game of Thrones

Stephen King — Mr. Mercedes

Jimin Han — A Small Revolution

Rachel Cusk — Transit

May 9, 2017
Five Things Friday

1. It seems my mind has been too fragmented to write regularly, at least here, and I accept that it may be so for some time. It is not actually a matter of discipline because I do sit and write each day; or perhaps it is a matter of forcing myself into disciplined focus. And yet, I am content to let things slip by, unremarked, without analysis. I am sure this will change in time but for now this transitional time is both a time of discovery and a time of letting life slide past, a floating perhaps, and perhaps something will come of it in time.

2. More small tulips are blooming. I love their petit blossoms, and the slowly evolving scattering of blossoms is like an extended goodbye. I don't really plan on taking any plants with me from this house to the next one. I did, with few small exceptions, take care not to plant anything too unusual, or which I would feel attached. Besides, I do feel strongly that this garden is itself meant to be here, it is not mine to take. This was simply my contribution to this space. Whether anything will last, or be changed is beyond me, but I am content.

3. I have just finished reading Pond by Claire-Louise Bennett. There were passages that were quite beautiful, and at least one small segment I found moving, but I haven't really figured out whether the book simply did not resonate with me, or perhaps it was more that I did not resonate with it. Perhaps it is simply that the fragments of my life at the moment and the fragments which made up the book were in opposition, with the book feeling far too insular. It is certainly odd that I would think that, as I am a master of insular over-thinking. But there it is. It is also possible that my own struggle with the book has had an effect on my own lack of writing, my discomfiture with the book amplifying my dissatisfaction with my own writing and therefore creating the aforementioned inability to blog. Or perhaps I am just too scattered to pay attention to such detailed, and admittedly at times profound, focus on the mundanities of the every day. As I stated, there were passages of great beauty, and Bennett does have the ability to capture and transform stream-of-thought musings into something more poetic than most of us probably manage on a daily basis.

4. Have you watched the Netflix series Chef's Table? I just recently discovered it, and have watched season one and half of season two over the last month or so. It is not something I want to watch quickly. I want to watch and savor and occasionally watch certain episodes again. Yes it is about fancy food in fancy restaurants, and although I have eaten in some of these restaurants I may never do so again, and I am content. I yearn for something simpler now, but at the same time, I find the stories moving, especially the way the chefs speak about the elements of their cuisine, the food itself, and its connection to both the earth that nourishes, and the community of people who are dining. They practice both an elevated and an elemental simplicity. Never think that simplicity is easy. Listening to these chef's speak I am reminded of how we are each connected to this earth, and how each item and each moment is connected and precious. I am reminded of the joy of cooking and why I love to cook, even in my simple and rather crude way. I am reminded of the pure gift of sharing food with other people, of the bounty of this earth. I am also reminded also of how disconnected most of us, at least those of us in Western Industrial Societies, are from the actual world we live in, the food we eat, and the cycle of life that nourishes us. The series makes me want to cook, even a simple burger, but to pay attention, and it makes me want to work in the garden, to take time to smell the dirt and notice the new leaves, and think about my place in this world. A stretch perhaps but what does art do but cause us to stretch?

5.. It is Big Ears time once again in Knoxville. I will not be attending as much this year as I have in the past couple of years, not because there is less to hear, but simply because there are too many things to do elsewhere. But I will still go, and already my heart and brain are overflowing with music. For me, the magic started last night with the Knoxville Jazz Orchestra playing with Carla Bley. From the moment I walked in, and I did miss the beginning, the music carried me away. I was reminded of the way music focus and transforms us, and ties into the essential spirit and eternal motion of life. The music is all around us every day, in the sound of the wind, even of the grass growing, but we are usually too distracted to notice. In music however, we reconnect to something elemental, an eternal prayer of sorts, that has the power to take us beyond ourselves, connect us to the universe, and even bring us back home, safely into where we most need to be.

March 24, 2017
February Books

It seems that 2017 has been the year of reading, although I read only two books the later half of February, and one of those was an extremely short, and easy read. It has struck me that although I have read more than in the recent past, my inclination to write about what I am reading, to review something and make a statement about whether it is I good or not, or even to propose an argument over why it mattered to me, seems superfluous, a waste of time. That doesn't mean I shouldn't share things that touch my life or thoughts, but in this I've been remiss. Obviously I'm still sorting out meanings and motives and directions. In fact, I seem to have entered the time of sorting, on multiple levels at that.

So here, in yet another collage that has nothing to do with the order read, are the books I read in February, perhaps accompanied by a note or a link:

Books I read and gave away:

Insurgent Mexico by John Reed

Ten Days that Shook the World by John Reed

Why Kids Lie by Paul Ekman. Started years ago and stopped because I was bored to tears. Started again just to clear out the stacks. Some good points, but still boring.

Einstein: His Life and Universe, by Walter Isaacson. Actually excellent and I enjoyed it. But I won't read it again or probably refer back to it. With two major biographies in two months, my biographical tolerances have hit the ceiling.

Joining God, Remaking Church, Changing the World by Alan Roxburgh.

A Book I Disliked:

The Wonder by Emma Donohue.

Books that are (still) on my shelves:

I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith

The Case Against Sugar by Gary Taubes

And Every Morning the Way Home Gets Longer by Fredrik Backman. Short, probably simplistic, but it captures something that reminds me of George, Stella in her wanderings through dementia, and others I've had the privilege to know.

Everything Else:

32 Yolks by Eric Ripert

Rules of Civility by Amor Towles. Although I am embarrassed, I will admit that it took me half the novel to realize that my vague feelings of familiarity with this novel were indeed because I had read it before. Enjoyable, but apparently forgettable.

The Color of Lightening by Paulette Jiles.

Lost in Translation by Nicole Mones.

March 7, 2017
Catching Up

There is a danger in juggling too many thoughts, in holding onto attention loosely. In such random jostlings and momentary fragmentations tragedies have occurred. More often, however, our failures are minimal and we are simply inconvenienced. It was through a similar misallocation of mental resources that I found myself at McKay's bookstore Monday afternoon puzzling over the cacophonous hubbub of children, young and young at heart, who yearned to be outside in the sun but instead found themselves trapped (myself included) in long lines and interminable waits. Only as I pulled out of the parking lot did I remember that it was a holiday. The prize: coming home with slim volumes by Alice Munro and Richard Yates.

As it seems that my days have been as scattered as my thoughts, an endless cycle of never-enough, and my own mental perigrinations are not likely to settle down unless I give them an outlet, you shall have just that: random mutterings in lieu of a post.

1.   I have mostly caught up on sleep. In fact I slept 12 hours Saturday, perhaps to my regret as I was groggy and unfocused most of the day, a good part of which was spent curled up between Tikka and Moises, reading 32 Yolks: From My Mothers Table to Working the Line by Eric Ripert.   The book was engagingly enough written to draw me in and it seems honest and forthright. You see in the young Eric, in his character as a young child, but also in how he deals with his experiences growing up, his stubbornness, his drive to push through pain and loneliness, his need to excel, all the qualities that will make him a top chef. The book is quite clear about what is needed to succeed in the restaurant business, what is behind the perfect meals diners expect. It was an easy read and good for a day when I was really only running on half power.

2. My state of overwhelming exhaustion may have been kicked into overdrive by attending the symphony Friday night, a decision I in no way regret as it was a truly wonderful performance and my heart soared with the music. The orchestra was led by the incredibly talented and dynamic guest conductor, Mei Ann Chen, who won the hearts of the audience with her energy, her sparkling personality, and, not least, the beauty of the music itself. The concert ended with a stunning performance of Stravinsky's Firebird Suite.   The Beethoven was pretty good too, at least on the orchestra's part, which is high praise from me as I distinctly did not like the way Beethoven was performed under the former music director. My problem with the Beethoven, the Piano Concerto #1, was actually with the pianist. Lise de la Salle is obviously very skilled, with enormous technique and a very powerful sound.   And yet there were sections where her rather outsized sense of interpretation struck a discordant note in my enjoyment of the piece. I don't actually mind hearing a familiar piece in a new way, especially when that new way of listening opens new vistas of understanding.   Perhaps I am just growing older and more set in my ways, a bit curmudgeonly concerning beloved music, or perhaps my disgruntlement was just an echo of my underlying exhaustion, but I felt that her interpretation grated, and I was often more annoyed than enlightened. Perhaps if I were again in my 20s I would hear it differently, but alas it is not to be so.

I must admit however that Lise de la Salle gave a magnificent rendition of a Schumann song as her encore. She played with a fiery intensity that captured the imagination, making me yearn to hear more. I look forward to hearing her again, perhaps to following her career, and I would happily hear her play Schumann again. Schumann, perhaps, would never be the same.

3.   I am in the midst of another round of sorting and tossing, a refinement of sorts, in both preparation for moving in a couple of months, but also for putting my current house on the market. One such small burst of activity revolved around shelving books, and removing a few tomes that no longer held interest. Two books that came down off the shelf were by John Reed, Insurgent Mexico, and Ten Days that Shook the World. I reread both. I remember how the first book, the first book I read by Reed, perhaps when I was 19, captured my imagination. I had never read anything quite like it and I was both thrilled and shocked by some of its revelations. Reading it again now, I can remember those feelings, albeit fleetingly. Read is definitely biased, but there is a humanity to his descriptions of his time with the campesinos, and he captures pathos, and stunning naiveté born out of desperation. But he skims over the flaws and abuses of his heroes deftly, while going into excruciating detail of the crimes of the people in power. He does the same in Ten Days but although the prose may be more mature here, it has also lost its humanity. The text is dry, the revolutionary zeal more blindly integrated. In Russia, Reed is consorting with the leaders of the revolution, not the common man, and there is less humanity, less questioning of the human condition, only acceptance of the rightness of the cause at hand. The latter book held my interest less than the former. It was in the bag of books that prompted that foray into McKay's mentioned in the opening paragraph. Munro will make me happier. Insurgent Mexico currently remains on the shelf, and yet its position is tenuous. As I read and reconnect with those books that are my true joys, it may yet find itself traveling onward toward a new home.

February 21, 2017