Category: Books

Yesterday afternoon I ate my lunch outside.  As I sat basking in the warmth of the sun, I read, re-read actually, an essay from Mike Madison's Blithe Tomato, a book I read at the beginning of the year.  It is a book that surprised me.  I expected the short essays to be a little more frivolous perhaps, something you read once and toss, perhaps more strident in a my-way-is-better-than-your-way fashion, or perhaps I expected the over-educated kind of one-upmanship I find characteristic of writers like Bill Bryson, writers whose prose is so smart and so clever that they can't seem to help admiring how clever they are.  The book was none of those things, at least not to my reading, and it promises to be a book I will continue to pick up and delve into occasionally, with essays that are astute, often contemplative, but also kind and forgiving of human follies as well as short and easy to read.  I love the way the essays open a door that lets my thoughts wander down their own paths.

Even though Mike Madison is a farmer and the book is marketed as containing essays about food and farming, this is not strictly true.  Yes the essays do revolve around farming, farmers markets, farmers, and people who shop at farmer's market, but their subject is not so narrowly defined. The essays are really about life and about humans with all their strengths and weaknesses, follies and foibles.  But the essays are written with compassion and humor and the author is able to turn that compassion and that humor on himself as well as upon others.  It is a book that needs to be savored slowly.  It is a fairly easy read, and the focus, for the most part is on the small, the routine, the everyday.  But small things can sometimes point us to something greater. I enjoy reading this book most when taken in small doses, as a bit of a of a pick-me-up during the day.  

When read straight through, without time to reflect and savor the best parts, the essays tend to run together and turn into something less than the whole.  I don't mean that in a bad way, I mean to say that it is a book that should be enjoyed essay by essay, allowing time for reflection, much the same way a beautiful spring day is more memorable when one stops to smell the fresh air, soak up the sunshine, pause and reflect on the goodness of life.  When we rush onward without pause, too preoccupied to celebrate the small things, we too easily become stressed and overwhelmed, and the beautiful and the good seem to fade into the background, seeming, to our inundated neural pathways, to be less than they really are and perhaps too simple to be believed.

First, a little housekeeping: A list of books read in the current year has been added to the sidebar, but I don't believe it has assumed its final form. Brief reviews will no longer be included, but I will add links to any reviews or comments as they appear.

Having spent far more tiime than is necessary deciding whether or not to post a list of books and then what or how much to post, a couple of points have become clear:

1.  I've been puttering about  with LibraryThing and Goodreads for a few years.  Both have their advantages and disadvantages, but I increasingly prefer LibraryThing as it allows me to categorize books into collections and categories, keeping track of my impossibly long list of books I might be interested in reading someday, books I own and have or have not read, books I've read and donated or sold or never owned in the first place etc.  I also find it easier to both manage and display lists of books on Library Thing, although Goodreads is better in the social aspects of reading.  Since, my working list is on LibraryThing, I don't need to keep a list here, but I like having it, and it will provide a convenient way for me to add links to books I have reviewed should I decide to review them.

2. I will still maintain my Goodreads list.

3. I will probably add a "current reading" list to the sidebar as well.

4. I have resumed the habit of my youth, namely of reading many books simultaneously depending on my mood, time, and attention on any given day.

5.   I am not really interested in the standard review format.  I am not interested in critical analysis, although, as an ex-English Major, I am well versed in that approach.  I suppose I am most interested in the ways a book fuels my thoughts or imagination, about philosophical or moral compass, about the vistas that have been opened by reading a particular book.  I suppose I have given myself permission to choose whether or not to review a book based solely on the completely personal and arbitrary criteria of what I am thinking about on a given day.  

6. I haven't yet decided whether or not to blog about books that do not end up being the subjects of posts. I will however always answer questions about any book.

Bonnie asked for a list of my top ten books from last year's list.   Of course the list is subjective, and even my own sense of what is "best" might change over time.  In the end, aside from selecting a group of favorites, I can't narrow it down to a strict order.  They jockey for position, depending on the lens through which I am viewing them.  

At any rate, for better or worse, here are the top 10 from last year.

Redeeming Love  by Francine Rivers.  This novel was recommended by one of the women in my bible study class when we were studying Hosea.  It is a romance based on the story of Hosea but it set during the California Gold Rush and I thought it would be a good piece of escapist fiction.  I found it to be more than that. The search for grace and redemption are not easy in this story (as they are not for Hosea)  but I felt the book captured all the pain and doubt and messiness that the human search for grace can entail.

The Ties that Bind by Marie Bostwick.  This is the fifth book in Marie Bostwick's cobbled quilt series, and although I enjoyed them all, with their story of the trials and tribulations and caring friendships between a group of women, this book was my favorite, probably simply because the stories of Margot and Phillipa resonated with me. 

Swimming Studies by Leanne Shapton.  Shapton swam competitively when she was younger and she is a very good writer and artist.  This book is a series of reminiscences and reflections presented as a series of vignettes interspersed with drawings and photographs.  The resulting pastiche captures a sense of a person, place and time in a way that a simple narrative could not.

Transitions by William Bridges.  Disintigration provides the fuel on which renewal can be built.  Perfect book for me to be reading this year.

The Round House by Louise Erderich. Wonderful and engrossing story about a boy dealing with some very difficult issues. Not an easy book, but the writing draws one in and creates a sense of intimacy.

The Violinist's Thumb by Sam Kean. Keen is a good writer who makes science clear and easy to understand without being patronizing.  Filled with interesting facts and tidbits of information, the chapters are discrete, enabling the reader to pick and choose, reading a bit here and there.  

The Marriage of Sense and Soul by Ken Wilber.  I would not recommend this book to anyone who does not have a philosophical bent, but I loved it and read it twice.  It was very helpful to me in clarifying my thoughts about science and spirituality in ways I hadn't previously considered.  I disagree with Wilber on some points, which feels like a bold statement to make.  But I can love a book without agreeing with everything the author has to say.

The Seamstress by Frances de Pontes Peebles.  This is a really good novel, compellingly told about two sisters in Brazil in the 1920s.  I felt the story occasionally got mired in detail.

The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga.  Brilliant novel but not a particulaly easy read. On one level it is a rather savage condemnation of the injustice of the Indian caste system and the rather unpleasant underbelly of globalization.  But it is also a story of individualism, the burning desire for freedom and to make something of onself, of greed, of the opportunities and dangers of misinformation.  Perhaps one of its greatest strengths though is that it is a serious book that doesn't take itself too seriously. 

The Night Bookmobile by Audrey Niffenegger.  Short illustrated story about the love of reading and the danger of loosing oneself too deeply in books.  Disconcerting.

Her fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffeneggar.  This is a thought-provoking novel of great intensity and detail masquerading as popular fiction. I don't think it works very well purely on the level of story and none of the characters are easy or likeable.  And yet, if one is willing to spend the time and effort to read this novel closely, it is fascinating.  Niffenegger explores the complexities of relationships and the nature of couplehood, and while doing so touches on duality, the nature of the mind,  integration, loss, internal versus external, even art versus sciene.  But then perhaps I would say that all these things are tied together in the way we see the world and the way we relate to both ourselves as individuals and in our relationships with others.

The books are finally off the floor.

The bookshelves went in the week before Christmas.   This large wall unit is in the living room and there are more shelves in a small bedroom that has now become a library/office. A significant portion of my time  during Christmas week, and up to New Years Eve, was spent shelving and cataloging books.  When this picture was taken the Baylor Bears, my great-nephew's team, were about to play in the Fiesta Bowl and I was ready to unwind and cheer them on.

There are 2000 books shelved in this house.  As I put away the books and catalogued them, I found about 50 books I am no longer interested in reading,  and they have been sold.  I also found 3 books (out of another 2000 or so) that I donated before moving that I should have kept, that I regret not having now.  I think this is pretty good.  

Of these 2000 books, I have read 1700 of them and I am interested in reading all of them again at some time in my life.  I accept that I may not reread them all, but I recognize that libraries are as much about promise, about hopes and dreams, as they are about actual accomplishments.  If I have kept a book it means that the conversation that was begun when I read the book is something I consider worth continuing.    I do expect to make headway on the "to read" list now that it has been indexed but don't expect me to limit myself.

Reading fell off a bit in 2013.  This is not surprising really.  I read 48 books, 30 of which reside in my library.  Because I like lists (and anyone who majored in medeival and renaissance literature probably likes lists), they are listed below in alphabetical order. I don't really care about the order in which they were read, and an alphabetical list is more tidy.  I can state that April – June were particularly heavy in terms of light reading.

1. Ahab's Wife, Sena Jeter Naslund.

2. Around the House and in the Garden, Dominique Browning.

3. The basic Laws of Human Stupidity, Carlo M. Cipolla.

4. Beautiful Ruins, Jess Walter.

5. Believing the Lie, Elizabeth George.

6. Between Heaven and Texas, Marie Bostwick.

7. Deep Nutrition, Catherine Shanahan.

8. Eleven Days, Leah Carpenter.

9. Empty Mansions: The Mysterious Life of Huguette Clark, Bill Dedman.

10. A Framework for Understanding Poverty, Ruby Payne.

11. Friends Forever, Danielle Steele.

12. The Ghost Map, Steven Johnson.

13. The Great Cholesterol Myth, Johnny Bowden.

14. Her Fearful Symmetry, Audrey Niffenegger.

15. Hornet Flight, Ken Follet.

16. House: A Memoir, Michael Ruhlman.

17. Intelligence Reframed, Howard Gardner.

18. The Marriage of Sense and Soul, Ken Wilber.

19. The Millionaire Mind, Thomas J. Stanley.

20. The Millionaire Next Door, Thomas J. Stanley.

21. The Minotaur, Barbara Vine.

22. Never Go Back, Lee Child.

23. The Night Bookmobile, Audrey Niffeneggar.

24. One Shot, Lee Child.

25. Redeeming Love, Francine Rivers.

26. The Round House, Louise Erdrich.

27. The Seamstress, Frances De Pontes Peebles.

28. Severe Clear, Stuart Woods.

29. Shutter Island, Dennis Lehane.

30. A Single Thread, Marie Bostwick.

31. Sweet Tooth, Ian McEwan.

32. Swimming Studies, Leanne Shapton.

33. Teaching with Poverty in Mind, Eric, Jensen.

34. Think Like a Cat, Pam Johnson-Bennett.

35. A Thread So Thin, Marie Bostwick.

36. Threading the Needle, Marie Bostwick.

37. Ties that Bind, Marie Bostwick.

38. Transitions, William Bridges.

39. Travels in Alaska, John Muir.

40. The Trouble with Physics, Lee Smollin.

41. Under the Lake, Stuart Woods.

42. Venus in Winter, Gillian Bagwell.

43. The Violinist's Thumb, Sam Kean,

44. A Wanted Man, Lee Child.

45. The Way of Transition, William Bridges.

46. White Cargo, Stuart Woods.

47. The White Tiger, Aravind Adiga.

48. Wooden Boats, Michael Ruhlman.

Usually I remember every book I read.  When I compile the list I reflect on the books, no matter how trivial.  This year however there is one book I have absolutely no recollection of having read.  The book is Eleven Days, by Leah Carpenter. I noted that I enjoyed it and wrote "beautiful novel of mothers and sons, committment, love and courage".  I know what it is about.  But I remember nothing.  Strange.  It is back on my reading list for next year.

This paragraph, from yesterday's Wall Street Journal, resonates:

"The literary classics are a haven for that part of us that broods over mortal bewilderments, over suffering and death and fleeting happiness.  They are a refuge for our secret self that wishes to contemplate the precious singularity of our physical world, that seeks out the expression of feelings too prismatic for rational articulation.  They are places of quiet, useless stillness in a world that despises any activity that is not profitable or productive."

— Lee Siegel "Who Ruined the Humanities", WSJ, July 13-14, 2013

Light fiction or non-fiction has, it seems, always been a part of my life, although not employed, as had been the case more recently, as a form of escapist or self-consoling diversion.  For many years I read light fiction at the gym, while pedalling away on an exercise bike, as a diversion, something to alleviate the boredom of the task at hand.

Recently I have been reading bicycle books again, or occasionally listening, but the purpose is the same and the requirements are similar, I am resurrecting the term, at least for my own use.  The requirements are simple:  there must be some kid of plot or narrative that keeps me moving, the writing must be light or brisk but it cannot be so beautiful that I want to stop and savour the language, nor can the information be particularly thought provoking, because I will stop and ponder, and stopping is particularly beside the point.

Several of the Cobbled Court series of novels I read recently were "bicycle books" in that I actually read them on an exercise bike.   One of the local fitness centers sent me a pass for a promotional one week membership, free of charge, in hopes that I would join and I took advantage, although I primarily just used the exercise bicycle and did a few stretches.  Considering the number of rainy days we've had, that exercise bicycle proved quite useful, and I am now considering purchasing one, or purchasing a stand for my bike, rather than joining an actual gym.  I'd still rather be outside when possible.

But back to reading:  These novels worked well on the bike, as they move quickly and are engaging.  Although there were times when I wanted to keep reading after my exercise session, I managed to put them aside, and since these particular novels were short, I knew I could finish them in the next day or two (about 2 to 2 1/2 hours reading time).  They were a good reintroduction to bicycle reading and I will probably soon build up to longer books or novels (I read James Clavell's Shogun on the bike.)

But when it is nice out I am walking.  I can't read a book when I walk, but I can listen to one and this has been a revelation to me.  Previously, although I could read on the bike, I could not read while walking on the treadmill.  This ability to read while walking on the treadmill was something I always admired about George.  He would get on the treadmill, crank up the grade until it was quite steep, put his New Yorker or Economist on the stand and start reading and walking.  I couldn't do it.  I would always stop.  I listened to music, not soul-soothing music, usually something danceable, often disco.

I listened to audiobooks, usually when I was working in the garden, knitting,  or cleaning house, in settings where I could stop and ponder if I wished.  It didn't occur to me that there might be an audiobook equivalent of a bicyle book because, well, bicycle books were something I actually read while sitting on a bicycle, and, being a fast reader, I needed a tremendous supply.

And then I moved to Knoxville and started walking outdoors, in my neighborhood.  It is a lovely neighborhood, and a safe place to walk, but I am not exactly communing with nature.  I need a distraction.  Enter the audiobook.  The pace of audiobook "reading" is slower but the requirements for listening while walking are similar to the requirements of reading while biking: there must be a narrative, the reading must flow easily.  Fiction is good, but once again, not the kind of fiction that makes we want to stop and reflect. Popular non-fiction such as current events, biography, or poplular science can also be good, as long as there is not too much hard science involved. 

Sometimes I am surprised.  Of the three books on my current reading list, only one is a bicycle book. I purchased Leah Carpenter's Eleven Days thinking it would be a bicycle book, but already it is a book that makes me pause and ponder, a book to read a leisure.  I am listening to Steven Johnson's The Ghost Map while I am walking and it is proving fascinating enough to keep me moving a little longer each day.  As to John Muir, Travel's in Alaska is beautifully written, breathtakingly beautiful in parts, but there is no real narrative, and the prose is so dense, in places almost poetic, that I can only read a few pages, sometimes only a few sentences, before I have to pause and let the beauty of what I have read settle in.  This is a book to be savoured slowly. 

For future reference, books on the list which I read as a "bicycle book" either on the bike or while walking will be marked with a B at the beginning of my brief review.  This simply indicates that it is a book that I found to be a light easy read, not necessarily that I did or did not like it, nor even that it is not worth reading more slowly.  

Let's just start off with an admission that nothing I finished in February required thought or in any way threatened to change my perceptions of the world.  In fact it is questionable whether I can even count two of the the three completed books as reading as I actually listened to them on tape.  

First, I actually read One Shot by Lee Child.   I picked it up on a whim at the grocery store, knowing it has been rereleased because of the film based on this book.  I have little to no interest in the film and even though the book I read was marketed as a film tie-in, I refuse to post a picture of that cover, filled as it is with the all too pretty face of Tom Cruise.  I have to admit that I enjoyed One Shot more than some of the newer Reacher novels I have read.  The focus on Reacher's code of honor was very strong, on his inner voice that keeps driving him to look for the things that don't fit, for not blindly accepting the easy answer and defending or avenging the innocent.  The book is also an interesting analysis of how we tend to sometimes ignore the obvious, how appearances can be deceiving, and how the human tendency to over-do, especially when one is worried about being caught out in something leads to our downfall.

I somehow never really got in the habit of listening to books on tape.  I have the capability and a backlog of books, but I always figured that I could actually read the book faster than I could listen to it being read and discounted the functionality of audiobooks.  Of course when I was a full time caregiver I couldn't be running around with headphones on becuase I would get so wrapped up in the book I was listening too that I would be completly oblivious to G calling for me.  Of course I get overinvolved with the paper variety of books as well, and can completely tune out the real world when I am lost in my reading.  Reading or listening I am happy to be able to lose myself in a story again.

I started listening to Dennis Lehane's Shutter Island as entertainment while walking around my neighborhood, the daily 3 mile walk gave me a good period in which to get involved in the book.  Little did I know when I started that walking up the hills in my neighborhood would actually make my back worse however, so the walks got shorter and shorter and I started listening to the book while I was working on my needlepoint instead.  

I have to admit that I found the story gripping.  I am also probably far less critical of a book when I am listening rather than reading.  There were sections in the middle of the book that I thoroughly enjoyed as a listening experience but which would have driven me crazy had I been actually reading the book, but I was so thoroughly wrapped up in the story that these niggling thoughts stayed far in the back of my mind.  Perhaps I am also more easily lulled by the sound of the voice and find it easier to get wrapped up in the story and suspend disbelief. I did not anticipate the ending; I knew something was amiss, but I was too engaged in the moment to try to figure out what was happening.  In the end I was left wondering how much of each of us create our own realities and how much a measure of our sanity depends on how in sync our realities are with those around us.

Next, I listened to Ken Follet's Hornet Flight.  I enjoyed listening to this also, and also got wrapped up in the story even as I thought it was rather derivative hash.  It was, at least as read, entertaining and the characterizations were probably more engaging as I heard them in my mind than they would have been had I been translating the words on the page.  I do think there is something in the human brain that loves the sound of the human voice telling stories and that told stories register differently in our minds, in a different way than do those things we actually read.  Anyway it was gripping enough, and has convinced me that I should seek out more audiobooks, especially books by those authors for whom I am not likely to sit quietly savoring the beauty of their prose.  As I want to do more needlepoint and needlework in general, books on tape might provide an interesting diversion.

cover of One Shot from goodreads.com

Cover of Shutter Island from Audible.com

Cover of Hornet Flight from audible.com

I read three books in January.  None of them were difficult so it would seem that I could have managed to write about them and get them off my desk sooner.  At the same time, they were, for the most part, non-fiction and I have a tougher time writing about non-fiction books than fiction.  It must be something about the way my brain is wired.  Facts are important and useful, but my focus is elsewhere.

The first book was The Violinist's Thumb by Sam Kean, which I found to a fascinating and entertaining read.  Kean has a great talent for making difficult subjects clear and easy to understand.  Of course the technique he uses, of combining the story of DNA with the stories of the scientists who study it and the lives of people who are affected by specific attributes of DNA, was gauranteed to attract me at least, loving stories as I do, especially as these stories illustrate ideas that challenge the way I think about the world.  I have to say that it was a worthwhile book, fast and fun, but which has made a lasting impression.

Next up was Norm Robillard's Fast Track Digestion Heartburn which was recommended to me by a friend. Since this particular friend is strictly low-carb, almost to the point of fanatacism, and she knows that I manage my own heartburn issues by managing carb levels, (but not nearly as strictly) I assumed this book would be another text recommending the complete abandonment of carbohydrates in the diet.   

I was pleased however, to learn that my assumptions were incorrect. Although Dr. Robillard does recommend a diet far lower in carbs than is common in the Standard American Diet (SAD), he does not advocate the elimination of all carbs.  In fact he acknowledges that some low carb foods can contribute to heartburn, and acknowledges that certain carbohydrates, including some varieties of rice, do not contribute to intestinal distress.  I found his arguments interesting and compelling.  

There is a lot of science in this book including a thorough discussion of the different types of sugars and carbohydrates and the process of digestion with an analysis of why some foods are more digestable than others.  There are also lots of diagrams of sugar molecules, monosaccharides and disaccharides, as well as a few more complex forms and I found this fascinating.  It was like a trip back to my freshman year in college only this time I was more interested in these little figures because I now have a practical basis for relating them to my own life.    Not being a scientist and not really having a particularly scientific way of looking at the world, perhaps my views are simplistic, although I must say that looking at these little monosaccharide drawings and noting the difference between fructose and all the other simple sugars really helped clarify the argument that fructose is not as readily absorbed by the body as other simple sugars, with all the attendant complications that may cause.  This was an Aha! moment for me simply because I know I am fructose intolerant and this has been confirmed by hydrogen breath testing.  I discovered this during the process of actually being diagnosed as celiac, although the people who ran my test felt very strongly that fructose intolerance was more common than most people realized. Anyway, this is just a roundabout way of saying that Dr. Robillard also recommends limiting high fructose fruits and foods.

For those who suffer from heartburn, or those who have family members who suffer from heartburn, I believe this is an interesting and informative book with compelling arguments.  The book only concerns itself with digestive issues however, not general health, and is therefore limited to that part of the population (not small) who suffers from indigestion, heartburn, or any of their attendant symptoms. I am personally am not inclined to take heartburn medicines, except under duress and for very short term use, as I feel they simply mask symptoms but do nothing to solve the problem, so I am biased toward dietary changes as opposed to medications to solve digestive problems.  It seems obvious to me that what we eat is the biggest contributing factor in digestive issues, and probably one of the biggest environmental factors in many other diseases of civilization. In this I agree with Dr. Robillard although my opinions are only anecdotal, based on my own exeriences.    

I must note that I I pretty much ignored the last half of the book, which is a list of recipes and menus, and a breakdown of Dr. Robillard's formula determining  the carbs, fiber, and fermentation potential of various foods.  I have worked out a diet that works for me, but this is probably a good reference work to keep around, at least for now. 

At last, after plowing through both of these books I got to a little fiction in the form of the short, but not so sweet, tale The Night Bookmobile by Audrey Niffeneggar which I found to be just wonderful if also somewhat disconcerting.  In this brief story, a young woman, Lexi, has had a fight with her boyfriend and is out walking the streets of Chicago in the wee hours of the morning when she comes across a Winnebago which, she learns, is the night bookmobile and it contains everything she has read in her lifetime. She wishes to stay forever but as dawn breaks the bookmobile closes and she is forced to leave.  She is bereft.  Lexi becomes obsessed with finding the bookmobile again, and in the process she changes her life and her career, perhaps finding a path that is more suited to her temperament. But she cannot let go of the bookmobile and her dream of inhabiting it forever. This is a very short but very rewarding look at the joys of reading, the claims books make on us, the tension between the inner life and the life of the world and the danger of losing oneself completely in books as a refuge from life.   Does this not sound likea book that would appeal to me?  The Night Bookmobile definitely is my favorite book from January.

The Violinist's Thumb, image from bn.com.

Fast Track Digestion Heartburn image from fasttrackdigestion.com.

Image of The Night Bookmobile from amazon.com

Somewhere along the path that was 2012 I stopped blogging about books read.  Primarily I had doubts as to whether it was relevant to anything at all, even to myself, but also it was just a scattered year full of changes and there were times when both reading and blogging fell by the wayside.  

Since my early summer escapist reading binge, I really have not been reading much but I did manage to read a couple of really good new novels. Make that three good novels, but only two of them could be considered new. Oddly enough they share a common thread, although was not intentional in my selection of them; it was just the way things worked out

Back in July I read The Time it Takes to Fall by Margaret Lazarus Dean after reading a profile of the author in a local paper. Truthfully, had I come at the novel from any other approach, I might have passed it by. I was rather bored with coming of age novels and the challenger disaster itself, although I can see how it may have been a seminal event for a generation younger than myself, would not necessarily have attracted me as an interesting subject. But Ms. Dean makes it work, mixing snippets of fact with the story in a way that highlights tthe personality and struggles of this girl as she makes her way from the innocent hopefullness of childhood to the more murky waters of adulthood. In the end, the author managed to use the space program and the Challenger explosion as a framework around which to build a story, an event which was simultaneously incidental in that the story was really about a girl growing up and learning her own path, and central in the way that the space program in general and the Challenger explosion in particular, provided a framework on which to build one's growing perceptions of the world outside one's own narrow sphere.

Then, last week, I got a note from the local library that The Age of Miracles by Karen Thompson Walker was finally mine to read and I plowed through it the afternoon that I picked it up from the library. Like Dean's novel, it uses a seminal event to provide the underlying structure of the story, but in this case the seminal event is not something that has actually happened but a hypothetical future event. Also, this novel is smaller in scope even though the actual event is much greater in consequence. I think this smaller tighter frame of reference makes the book easier in some ways, and it is consistently engaging.  The book is narrated, at some time in the future by Julia, who is looking back on the year she turned 11, the "year of the slowing" the year, the year the earth's diurnal cycle changed and slowed.  That she is narrating the story tells us that the world did not end, and it also tells us that the focus of the story is not really this, the slowing of the earth, but the story of Julia trying to understand who that 11 year old girl was, and how this change in everything affected who she would become.  In that sense it is not a fully realized coming of age story, but a story of someone looking back, trying to find some lost key that connects what was to what becomes. In that sense the story is slow and small in scope. It is not a story of what is happening to the earth, it is the story of what is happening to Julia. It is the story of how an 11 year old girl faces the unravelling of the world around her as if in slow motion.  It is the story of memory, told not truly from the perspective of the girl, but not truly from the perspective of her adult self either, more from the perspective of the adult self reflecting back upon her memories of that time.  I believe that the narrow focus is the strength of this novel, a reminder that although life and history can be shaped by grand events and themes that are beyond the control of the individual, it is lived in the smaller field of the immediate and the personal.

My favorite book of the three however was The Time In Between by Maria Dueñas. I loved this book.  It is a wonderful story, well told, with of course special interest for anyone who is interested in clothes and fabric and sewing.  It is  a gripping story set in a time a place and time defined by turmoil, but it is also a story of growth and finding one's own strength and purpose in life. Dueñas masterfully blends historical reality with the completely fictional story of Sira and ties it all together seamlessly in a rather gripping read. 

 It is not a coming of age story. The protagonist, Sira, is physically an adult, although her potential remains unrealized. And yet it is a story of a young woman growing and learning to take responsibility and control of her own fate.    In the beginning of the novel Sira seems to be particularly vapid, self-absorbed, shallow and uninteresting, someone whom one could easily dismiss. The young Sira makes terrible mistakes, mistakes that seem obvious to the reader, and make Sira seem oblivious and unsympathetic. One realizes, however, if one perseveres, that Sira herself, through the circumstances of her upbringing and the characters of the particular people who surround her in her youth, has just drifted through youth, unchallenged and untutored.  I ended up forgiving her her mistakes, realizing that she truly was naive in the truest sense, existing in the world but really with no cognizance of it, and her parents, although probably doing the best they are capable of, do nothing to help or guide her, sending her on her way with vague admonitions as if sense and caution are innate and not learned, assuming that docility and good behavior imply understanding, or perhaps not even recognizing that Sira herself is capable of making leaps unrecognized by her parents. Sira does learn to rely on herself.  She finds she is strong and resourceful, and eventually she learns confidence in her own strength, her own judgement, and she takes control of her life on her own terms.  Oddly enough, or really not so oddly when you think of it, others initially see her as having more control than she herself feels, and she lets them use her until she realizes that she is stronger and more competent than she has realized.  Sira eventually recognizes her own strength and realizes that she must seize control of her own fate, or forever let others control her.  

I felt the conclusion of The Time In Between was completely satisfying although in terms of the historical story it could have gone on for a while longer. But this wasn't really the story of Spain, the Civil War, and World War II; it was the story of Siri Quiroga  and the time in between the innocence of youth and the adult realization that, no matter how little we control the events of the world, we control our own role in that world. I could read it again.