Anna Karenina: Part I

I could have seen this coming. I just finished Part I of Anna Karenina today. I thought I'd have plenty of time to read because I've taken two trips and spend a lot of time in transit. It turns out that it's really hard to read a monstrous paperback when there's a squirming infant in your lap. Also, I got waylaid by The Hunger Games trilogy (review coming ... someday).

Anyway, I'm taking the discussion questions from Christine at The Happily Ever After.

1.) "All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." Do you agree or disagree with this statement?

First of all, this is Russian literature. Are there any happy families? It's chilling to juxtapose this opening sentence with the six simple words on the opposing page of my copy: "Vengeance is mine; I will repay." This cannot bode well.

I agree that there are many more ways to be dysfunctional than there are to be functional. However, different things make different people (and therefore different families) happy. I agree with Christine's assessment that Tolstoy overgeneralizes too much here. It does make for a memorable opening line, though.

2.) The story opens with the Oblonsky household in complete disarray as Dolly has discovered her husband, Prince Stepan "Stiva" Oblonsky had been having an affair with their young French governess. What are your first impressions of Stiva and Dolly? What do you think of the couple's quick reconciliation? Do you think Stiva got off the hook too easily?

Oh, Stiva. He's kind of lovably shallow. I wouldn't mind having a meal with him, but I certainly wouldn't want to be married to him. Dolly ... I had issues with how quickly she forgave him for his dalliance with the governess. I wanted to sit down with her with a nice cup of tea and give her a pep talk, tell her she was justifiably angry with him, encourage her to show some spine. (I guess it's good to be a 21st-century woman instead of a 19th-century woman.) But instead she chatted with Anna and she and Stiva experienced an inexplicably uncomplicated reconciliation. Stiva absolutely got off the hook too easily. Sure, he was genuinely remorseful, but he still had an affair. I was thoroughly puzzled by his attitude. It was like he hadn't given any thought to the consequences of pursuing the governess and so he was blindsided when the affair blew up in his face.

3.) Meanwhile, Oblonsky's childhood friend, the shy and awkward Konstantin Levin, "Kostya," arrives in Moscow from his country estate to propose to Dolly's youngest sister, Princess Katerina, "Kitty." What is your first impression of Levin and his friendship with Oblonsky?

Levin is my favorite character so far. Out of everyone we've met so far, he's the one I'd most want to be friends with myself. He seems like a genuinely good guy. He loves Kitty for who she is; he's certainly not playing with her like Vronsky. He has a complicated family life, but he's trying to mend his relationship with his estranged brother Nikolai. Oblonsky seems to approach his friendship with Levin the way he approaches everything else - casually, without recognizing the full significance of it. I do like that he appreciates Levin's love for his sister-in-law and genuinely wishes him the best.

4.) Princess Katerina is being courted by both Levin and Count Vronsky. What do you think of Kitty's decisions regarding these two men?

Kitty made the wrong decision and she knew it. She liked both Levin and Vronsky, but Vronsky was more charming and more infatuating. Plus he's a count. And her mother (who is totally Mrs. Bennett transported to Russia) was pressuring her to turn down Levin in favor of Vronsky. Levin is clearly the man to keep around for the long term. He'd make a faithful and devoted husband; Vronsky is a cad. Kitty only realizes the extent of her mistake when she sees Vronsky with Anna.

5.) What is your first impression of the title character, Anna Karenina? There is a strong magnetism between Anna Karenina and Count Vronsky from the first moment they meet. What is your first impression of these two characters?

I wanted to like Anna, and things started out well. She was nice to Vronsky's elderly mother on the train. She helped Stepan and Dolly mend their relationship. She was good with her nieces and nephews and obviously missed her little boy. But my stronger impression was her connection with Vronsky. Tolstoy writes of their encounter at the ball from Kitty's perspective, which had a lot to do with my negative reaction to it. I did feel like she swooped in and stole Vronsky from Kitty, even though he had no intention of asking her to marry him anyway. I feel sorry for Anna's husband. From the brief glimpse we got of him, he loves her but he's bland and dorky and utterly un-Jude-Law-ish. 

6.) What is your overall impression of the novel so far?

I'm enjoying it. It's interesting to read about imperial Russia right before the revolution, but I'm also interested in the characters.

Your Self-Confident Baby

Synopsis
The subtitle explains it perfectly: "How to encourage your child's natural abilities - from the very beginning"

My thoughts
I heard about this book from a friend who read it for a parenting class and described it as "liberating." I'd also recommend it - but with reservations.

Gerber was a founding director of Resources for Infant Educarers (not a typo), which I was not familiar with. Her philosophy emphasizes letting your baby do things his or her way. I do agree that kids are over-supervised and overstimulated. I needed to read this book because it helped me realize that I didn't need to be in my baby's face all the time. It's more than okay to put him on the floor with his toys. He needs to explore the world on his own. My job is to make sure he's safe, not to direct his every move. I'm intrigued by Gerber's insistence that even very small babies are capable of more than we give them credit for and do not need to be "babied."

Gerber favors simple toys and I agree with her. Her toy box is much more streamlined than mine is, but I've stayed away from things with batteries. I like colorful rattles that make fun noises and are interesting to look at and textured toys that my son can explore by grabbing and putting in his mouth.

I appreciate that Gerber explains the motives behind her recommendations and outlines what results you are likely to see not just immediately but years in the future. Because of this, it's a good book to read at any time during early childhood, not just infancy.

However, I do think kids need more limits than Gerber suggests. For example, she says you should ask your child's permission to do things like diapering and changing clothes. I think certain things are non-negotiable and it's okay to tell children what you expect and then expect them to do it. In short, only ask your child to do something if you are prepared for a negative answer; otherwise, tell them. I also had to laugh when I got to the part where she said that she doesn't approve of patting babies on the back to burp them because patting is a form of hitting. And unfortunately, her message is undermined by poor writing.

Bottom line
There are some extremely good points in this book and I've taken away some valuable tips. However, it is a smidge too hands-off for me.

Fine print
Your Self-Confident Baby, by Magda Gerber and and Allison Johnson
Genre: parenting
Photo from Goodreads
I borrowed this book from the library

Touchpoints

Synopsis
Pediatrician T. Berry Brazelton guides parents through all the major "touchpoints" of their child's first three years.

My thoughts
I'm considering buying this book. I'm also considering finding a new pediatrician. It's not that there's anything particularly wrong with my pediatrician, but she's not T. Berry Brazelton. Which I suppose is not her fault.

The book is organized exceptionally well. The first sections are arranged chronologically. Brazelton starts out by describing his meetings with parents before the baby is even born and describing the baby's (and the parents') development over the first three years. I read the four-month chapter right before my baby's four-month appointment and it was a huge help.

There are also sections devoted to common issues - behavioral problems, separation anxiety, teething. These give you a good idea of why issues crop up and what you can do about them. I like Brazelton's approach. He often goes through multiple solutions for a problem and discusses their pros and cons. His advice is balanced and non-judgmental, which is a rarity in parenting books. It's a large part of what made me trust Brazelton's advice, and I like his conversational tone. He clearly knows what he's talking about, but he doesn't talk down to the reader. His advice is gentle but firm - for example, if you notice the signs of developmental delay, it's normal to hope you are mistaken and to wish your child would improve without intervention, but it's imperative to get help as soon as possible.

Brazelton excels when it comes to describing social and emotional development, not just physical development. Brazelton stresses that toddlers use their friends to test the limits of what's socially acceptable, it's totally normal for toddlers to make each other cry, and they'll figure it out themselves. (I'm sure I'll need to reread that it a couple years for reassurance.)

Brazelton also does a good job of interpreting events from a child's perspective. When describing croup, he lists the symptoms a parent will notice and acknowledges that it is alarming for a parent to watch a child struggle to breathe. But he also describes how scary it is for the child - and how much scarier it is if the parent panics.

He also recognizes the relationship between parent and child is full of both joyous events and frustrating power struggles. He writes with sympathy for both parent and child.

Bottom line
More valuable than the parenting books I actually own.

Fine print
Touchpoints, by T. Berry Brazelton
Genre: parenting
Photo from Goodreads
I borrowed this book from the library

The Guns of August

Synopsis
An insightful account of the escalating tensions in Europe that led to the outbreak of World War I and the first fateful campaigns in the conflict.

My thoughts
Barbara Tuchman is in a class of her own. A history of the diplomatic failures that led to World War I could get bogged down in grim details and cumbersome trivialities, but Tuchman deftly navigates through the mess in less than 100 pages and then goes on to describe the battles leading up to the Marne. Her writing style is unparalleled, and she has a gift for weeding through the banalities of history and focusing on a few gems to tell a story. Tuchman obviously did a painstaking amount of research - combing through memoirs, diaries, newspapers, official reports, and other contemporary accounts - and she managed to whittle everything down into an engrossing history. This book is compulsively readable, but it's also about a very serious subject.

I never realized the extent of the sheer incompetence on all sides of the war. Europe's leading military minds considered war inevitable and they spent decades preparing for the conflict, yet when it came they were all unprepared and hampered by inflexibility. The Germans had a strict timeline and their insistence on sticking to it left them unable to improvise when unforeseen events arose. Personality conflicts between the French and British officers went so deep that they seriously undermined the war effort. Most tragic were the Russians. Tuchman is in her element describing their state of (un)preparedness:

Insofar as readiness for war was concerned, the regime was personified by its Minister for War, General Sukhomlinov, an artful, indolent, pleasure-loving, chubby little man in his sixties of whom his colleague, Foreign Minister Sazonov, said, "It was very difficult to make him work but to get him to tell the truth was well-nigh impossible." ... In 1913 he dismissed five instructors of the [Staff] College who persisted in preaching the vicious heresy of "fire tactics."

That's right, the Russian War Ministry was led by a man who didn't recognize the power of guns and cannons over bayonets.

One of the most chilling accounts in the book discusses the German Army's use of terrorism to cow the citizens of Belgium. The Germans cut through Belgium to get through France; they didn't want to do it, but it was the quickest way to get to France and then the Belgians had the gall to resist, which messed up their unforgiving timeline. In an effort to get the Belgians to behave, the Germans began trying various forms of terrorism, including burning cities and executing hostages. This did not have the intended effect; in fact, it inspired even more resistance. It's hardly the first time an invading army has resorted to terrorism, but it struck me as especially disturbing.

Bottom line
Read it, even if you have no interest in or knowledge of World War I.

Fine print
The Guns of August, by Barbara Tuchman
Genre: history
Photo from Goodreads
I borrowed this book from the library

Fifty Shades of Grey

Overview
Naive goody-goody Anastasia Steele begins her post-college life as a sex slave to a powerful business tycoon.

My thoughts
Atrocious. That about sums up the whole book. Or at least the first 92 pages, which were all I managed (and I think I deserve some sort of medal for making it that far - either that or a slap upside the head for wasting even that much time on it).

First and foremost, I hated Ana. She was whiny, spineless, and clueless. Literally everything she did made me cringe. Ana is so inept at everything (simple things, such as walking and talking) that I found it incomprehensible that anyone would find her attractive. I want a protagonist I can root for in my escapist fantasy, but Ana is too weak. I also hated Christian Grey because of his staggeringly high creep quotient. This is supposed to be erotica, but there's nothing erotic or romantic about a man who pursues and then takes advantage of a vulnerable, barely legal girl (and let's be clear - she's supposed to be what, 21? 22? But her emotional maturity is vastly lower).

Oh, the writing was awful. It's so appalling it's distracting.

Bottom line
If everyone else jumped off a bridge, would you? I figured that if everyone else was reading it, it must be good. I figured wrong.

Fine print
Fifty Shades of Grey, by E L James
Genre: erotic fiction
Photo from Goodreads
I borrowed this book from a friend

Empress Orchid

Synopsis
Orchid is picked from obscurity and lifted into the elite world of the Forbidden City as one of the Emperor's wives. She could influence a nation - but if she crosses the wrong people she could end up worse than dead.

My thoughts
Historical fiction is hard. You have to transport the reader to a different time with unfamiliar customs, and it's challenging to gracefully overcome the reader's culture shock. There's a dearth of good Asian historical fiction in English. I haaaated Shogun (the Westerner swoops in, sweeps up the girl, and saves the day with his brilliance? Blech.) I didn't care for Snow Flower and the Secret Fan (neither the writing nor the story wowed me). I did love Memoirs of a Geisha, but I was in college when I read it and I'm afraid to reread it just in case I got caught up in the love story and the book actually isn't that great.

Last year I read Anchee Min's devastating novel of the Cultural Revolution, Wild Ginger. And then I read Jung Chang's Wild Swans: Three Daughters of China, which was all the more devastating because it was true. Wild Ginger didn't have the most original story or the most compelling writing, but I was eager to read Empress Orchid. It's been on my shelf for years (it was a Richard & Judy book pick in 2006 when I was hanging around England watching things like Richard & Judy for a few months). And I hate to say it, but now that I've read it ... it failed to bring one of the most tragic periods of Chinese history to life for me, largely because it failed to translate life in the Forbidden City in a natural way, which may be an impossible task anyway.

The subject matter is thrilling. In the late nineteenth century, the Qing Dynasty was crumbling, threatened from the outside by powerful foreign adversaries and crippled on the inside by domestic infighting and corruption. A woman stepped up to take the reins of leadership. She inspired fear and suspicion among her male contemporaries. Historians placed the blame for the eventual fall of the dynasty on her shoulders. She must have been a remarkable woman. Who else could have seized power and held it for four decades? But the novel brought me no closer to understanding who she was or how she did it.

Bottom line
This is a prequel to the real drama and tragedy in Orchid's life, but I don't feel the need to pick up the next book.

Fine print
Empress Orchid, by Anchee Min
Genre: historical fiction
Photo from Goodreads
I bought this book

Katherine

Synopsis
Katherine Swynford catches the eye of John of Gaunt, the king's son. Theirs is one of the enduring romances of medieval England. Duty means they have to marry others, but they conduct a long-term affair that results in four children. They eventually do marry each other and their descendants go on to found the Tudor dynasty.

My thoughts
I'm having a lot of issues with my historical fiction lately. I'm more than halfway through this book, but I'm throwing in the towel. Like Empress Orchid, there's so much potential in this story, and Katherine Swynford is about as juicy a character as you can get in medieval Europe. But the love scenes are too sappy for me to handle.

Seton does do a good job transporting you back to medieval England. Her descriptions of the horror of the plague are so vivid that I'm terrified of it myself. I also had no idea that Geoffrey Chaucer was married to Katherine Swynford's sister, so it was fun to see him pop up every now and then (he's witty and easy-going, despite his nagging wife).

Bottom line
It's not my favorite. If I had more time I would probably finish it. Maybe I'll finish it later, but I haven't opened it in more than a month. I think it's more likely that I'll read Alison Weir's non-fiction account of Katherine's life.

Fine print
Katherine, by Anya Seton
Genre: historical fiction
Photo from Goodreads
I bought this book

The Hunger Games

Synopsis
Katniss Everdeen takes her younger sister's place in a tournament in which 24 teenagers fight to the death.

My thoughts

C.J. Cregg: "They sent me two turkeys. The more photo-friendly of the two gets a presidential pardon and a full life at a children's zoo. The runner-up gets eaten."

President Bartlett: "If the Oscars were like that, I'd watch." 

It's a funny throw-away line in one of my favorite episodes of The West Wing. But if you stop to think about it, would you watch? Especially if they were children, would you watch?

The answer is no. The premise of the book - that teenagers are chosen in an annual lottery to enter a tournament in which they will fight until only one is left alive - is so horrifying that viewing the Hunger Games is compulsory in Suzanne Collins's fictional dystopia. It's a brilliant fusion of the ancient Greek myth of Theseus with our present-day obsession with reality television. My husband commented that he didn't know what appalled him most - that he read a book about kids killing kids or that he enjoyed it. "Why did it have to be kids?" he asked. "Why couldn't they have filled the arena with people everybody hates already, like lawyers?"

Since the heart-wrenching tragedy in Newtown, violence in pop culture has been getting a lot of attention - and deservedly so. And yet I'd still strongly recommend this book, despite the fact that it is unquestionably, disturbingly, graphically violent. Other books may have higher body counts, but The Hunger Games is especially unnerving because many of the deaths are described in intimate detail. It's not like a movie or a video game where someone gets shot and falls out of the frame.

But let's face it - violence has been glorified ever since humans developed the vocabulary to do so. Homer lovingly described battle deaths in minute detail. (One passage in the Iliad vividly traces the trajectory of a spear smashing through a guy's skull, continuing on through the roof of his mouth, cutting off his tongue, and breaking his jaw. Reading it made me imagine it happening in slow motion.) Fighting and dying in battle were romanticized and idealized well into the twentieth century.

The Hunger Games also has a conscience. Katniss (who, by the way, is the ultimate heroine - smart, resourceful, and utterly badass) never kills unnecessarily. There's also a lot of introspection and reflection on what defines a person's character.

Oh - and there's a sweet PG-rated love triangle (albeit a very lopsided one). Katniss can't quite sort out how she feels about her hunting buddy Gale. And she's thrown into the arena with Peeta, a boy who showed her a small bit of kindness at a desperate time in her childhood. But since Gale disappears from the book after just a few chapters, my full allegiance went to Peeta.

One of my only complaints was the shoddy copyediting. They couldn't decide whether Katniss was from District 12 or District Twelve. It's a small thing, but it drove me nuts.

Bottom line
A compulsive read.

Fine print
The Hunger Games, by Suzanne Collins
Genre: YA fiction
Photo from Goodreads
I bought this book.

Anna Karenina Read-Along

*Gulp!*

I may be getting in way over my head here, but I do have a hurricane to ride out, a plane trip to Hawaii, and at least one drive to Michigan between now and the end of December. Christine at The Happily Ever After and Fay at Blog A Book Etc... are hosting a read-along of Anna Karenina. It's yet another of the books that's been sitting on my bookshelf for far too long. (I've hauled it to at least three different apartments. Possibly four or five.) So this might be just the thing to get me to read it. They've broken it down into manageable 100-page chunks.

Here goes!

Library Loot: October 24 - 30

Library Loot is a weekly event co-hosted by Claire from The Captive Reader and Marg from The Adventures of an Intrepid Reader that encourages bloggers to share the books they’ve checked out from the library. If you’d like to participate, just write up your post-feel free to steal the button-and link it using the Mr. Linky any time during the week. And of course check out what other participants are getting from their libraries!

Okay, I thought last time it had been an embarrassingly long time since I've posted. *Ahem.* Considering I haven't been able to finish a book that isn't made of cardboard in more than a month, I may have been a bit ambitious. This was my first trip to my new library (I moved), and there's a limit on how many times I can renew books (I may be in trouble).

Last year I read A Distant Mirror, Barbara Tuchman's survey of Europe in the 14th century. Tuchman was a fascinating historian and her dry sense of humor and genuine talent for bringing history to life make her books fun to read. So I picked up The Guns of August, which is an in-depth look at the beginning of World War I. (I'll admit, part of the draw of this time period has to do with Downton Abbey.) Tuchman's ability to describe history is unparalleled. The book opens with the funeral of Edward VII of England in 1910: "The muffled tongue of Big Ben tolled nine by the clock as the cortege left the palace, but on history's clock it was sunset, and the sun of the old world was setting in a dying blaze of splendor never to bee seen again."

One of my friends recommended Your Self-Confident Baby by Magda Gerber. A year ago I would have scoffed at this book and its self-helpy title, but I trust this friend. She recommended it because of an e-mail chain that went around our little circle of new mommies recently. It started with the question, "So ... now what? The kid is too old to sleep all the time but still too young for finger painting. What do I do with him?" We all admitted to some degree of angst over the quantity and quality of our interactions with our infants. Were we singing the right songs, introducing the right stimuli, spending enough time with them? Was it okay for us to put them on a play mat on the floor or in a swing while we read a book or surfed the web or did anything that wasn't vital to survival (eating, napping, showering, laundry, dishes, etc.)? My friend described this book as liberating. She said she's more comfortable standing back and watching her son instead of constantly interacting with him, and she's realized that it's not too early for him to start figuring things out on his own. (Interestingly, the copy I got from the library is autographed.)

Another recommendation from my mommy circle: Touchpoints by T. Berry Brazelton. I met all of my fantastic new friends through a centering group at the doctor's office while we were all still pregnant. The midwife and the nurse who led the group both talked about this book a lot. It's broken down in two different ways - by age and by issue. The first part of the book deals with what Brazelton looks for at each visit to the pediatrician, beginning with the prenatal visit (oops ... I didn't have one of those. But in my defense, my pediatrician's office told me to call back when I actually had a baby.) The second part of the book is broken down by topic, and it looks pretty comprehensive. Brazelton covers everything from bedwetting and toilet training to eating and sleeping. I'll probably read only the parts that are relevant to me right now, and I'm looking forward to seeing whether I connect with any of the information in this book.

The Age of Empire: 1875-1914

Synopsis
The third book in Eric Hobsbawm's history of what he termed the "long 19th century" after The Age of Revolution and The Age of Capitalism.

My thoughts
Sadly, I have my second DNF book of 2012. This one is actually a good book, but there's just too much going on in my life and it's not the right time for me to read it. I need something that I can read without too much thought, something I can take in small sips of 15 or 20 minutes at a time.

I picked this book because I read The Age of Extremes, Hobsbawm's history of the 20th century, for a class in college and really enjoyed Hobsbawm's approach. So this one has been on my shelf for who knows how long.

The Age of Empire covers the time period from 1870 until World War I. I found the portions dealing with the cultural pressures on society, especially women's rights, the most interesting. The sections dealing with economics were more difficult for me to concentrate on and that's what led me to put the book aside for now. But in every aspect of the book, you can see the roots of our current world - politically, socially, economically.

A few days after I put this book down, I tuned in to NPR mid-segment and heard a man describing how he came to be a Marxist in Germany in the early 1930s and then remained affiliated with the Communist Party even after the Soviets brutally crushed the Hungarian uprising in 1956. I thought it sounded like Hobsbawm's story and it turned out it was. Sadly, though, NPR was airing his obituary.

Bottom line
It's dense, but it's well written.

Fine print
The Age of Empire: 1875-1914, by Eric Hobsbawm
Genre: non-fiction, history
Photo from Goodreads
I bought this book

Top Ten Tuesday—Books That Make You Think

I'm very behind on reading. Here's why:

He doesn't do much, but simply staring at him is far more entertaining than even the best story right now.

I still want to blog, so I decided that the best way to do that is to participate in some blog linkups. This one is hosted by The Broke and the Bookish, and there are tons of participants. She posts a different top-ten topic every week. This week it's the top ten books that make you think. Without further ado, here are mine:

1. My Sister's Keeper. I read this for a book group a few years ago and it sparked one of our best discussions ever. Would you conceive a child for the express purpose of saving your sick child? Now that I'm a mom, my answer hasn't changed. I would die for my son, but I couldn't bring another child into the world to serve as a donor child; it just wouldn't be fair to that child. I pray I'll never have to make a decision like that.
2. The Bookseller of Kabul. This book made me think about the place of women in post-Taliban Afghanistan. (Khaled Hosseini's A Thousand Splendid Suns is a novel about the same topic, but The Bookseller of Kabul is all the more powerful because it is a true story.)
3. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. This is a classic coming of age story that brought the hardships of poverty home to me when I first read it as a teenager. Almost 20 years later it still affects me. Angela's Ashes does this, too.
4. Nineteen Eighty-Four. Two words: Big Brother.
5. Farewell to Manzanar. This book resonated with me because I am half Japanese. Even though none of my relatives were sent to the camps (they all lived in Hawaii), it appalled me to think that this actually happened in the recent past in this country. Land of the free, indeed.
6. Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass. As awful as the relocation camps were, they pale in comparison to the atrocities of slavery.
7. King Leopold's Ghost. Also atrocious: colonialism.
8. The Song of the Dodo. This is one of my favorite books, and its light tone belies the seriousness of its subject: the affect shrinking habitats have on endangered species.
9. The Shadow of the Wind. This one made me think in a good way: it's a very entertaining book, but you have to pay attention.
10. The Ancestor's Tale. It's fascinating to read about our evolutionary origins and the science behind discovering them.

The Sins of the Father

Synopsis
Book 2 of the Clifton Chronicles follows Harry as he serves a lengthy prison sentence for a crime he didn't commit. Meanwhile, Emma becomes convinced that Harry didn't die at sea and sets out to prove it.

My thoughts
There was a lot more action in this book than in the first installment, and that made it even more fun to read. Archer's ability to convey the action in only a few words really helps keep the pace going. This book picks up right where the first one left off. Harry and Emma's story takes center stage, but there are also significant developments for Hugo, Maisie, and Giles. (Giles certainly wins the "most improved" award.)

The one thing I complained about in the first book (multiple viewpoints) wasn't an issue here. There are still multiple narrators, but the action isn't duplicated since the characters are spread out over three different continents for most of the book.

Archer tried to end on a cliffhanger for this book, but nothing could match the first book's jaw-dropping ending. I'll stay tuned for the third book and hopefully I'll find time to read more of Archer's other books in the meantime.

Bottom line
Even better than Only Time Will Tell (the link goes to my post on that book).

Fine print
The Sins of the Father, by Jeffrey Archer
Genre: fiction
Photo from Goodreads
I borrowed this book from the library

The Mummy or Ramses the Damned

Synopsis
The immortal Ramses is awakened in the early twentieth century. He finds love but jeopardizes everything to pursue a woman who enchanted him centuries ago.

My thoughts
Romance is really at the heart of this book. The romance between Ramses and Julie was fun to read, but it wasn't convincing. He falls in love with the first woman he lays eyes on? Really? She inspires the same passion in him that Cleopatra did? Cleopatra, one of the strongest, craftiest, and most legendary figures in all of history.

What I really wanted to see was the romance between Ramses and Cleopatra. There was real drama there - she awakened him from his first sleep, he tutored her, and he fell in love with her. Then she started to assert herself and took up with that good-for-nothing Mark Antony. She broke his heart and Ramses refused to give the elixir of life to Antony at Cleopatra's request. I kept thinking that would have been way more entertaining to read about than Ramses roaming around modern England and Egypt. And then he stumbled onto a mummy who had been Cleopatra in life and resurrected her. It was a brilliant twist and that's when the story really picked up. Cleopatra was consumed with hatred for Ramses. Ramses was forced to realize that the ravages of time had not been kind to Cleopatra, and the monster running amok in Cairo was not the woman he had once loved. But now she was immortal. And he was the only one who could possibly stop her.

Bottom line
Really good. The action moves quickly and there's a lot of it. This made me an Anne Rice fan and I'll definitely read more of her books in the future.

Fine print
The Mummy or Ramses the Damned, by Anne Rice
Genre: fiction
Photo from Goodreads
I borrowed this book from the library

The Ancestor's Tale: A Pilgrimage to the Dawn of Evolution

Synopsis
Evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins formats his trek through time on Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. He starts with present-day humans and goes backward in time, meeting up with other pilgrims (other species) at the points at which our evolutionary paths diverged.

My take
This was a bear of a book, but it was worth it. It's a complex tale and it's long (688 pages). Dawkins tackles many interesting facets of evolution along his painstakingly thorough journey. The experience starts with modern-day Homo sapiens and Dawkins explores how the different races diverged before introducing us to our closest ancestors, the ergasts and the habilines. These terms were vaguely familiar to me from a bio anthro course with some crazy-haired professor I took in college, but I hadn't thought much about them since so it was interesting to read about them in a broader context. From there, he explores where we split from the rest of the primates. Et cetera, et cetera. Certain species get to tell "tales," in which Dawkins uses them to illustrate certain evolutionary points. It's quite comprehensive, and I was introduced to plenty of species I never knew existed. The chapters that deal with vertebrates are the most interesting; things get a little more tedious when you reach the invertebrates.

Dawkins kicks off his romp through millions of years of evolutionary history with two opposing quotes—one from Mark Twain ("History doesn't repeat itself, but it rhymes.") and one from Clarence Darrow ("History repeats itself; that's one of the things that's wrong with history.") I love the Twain quote in general, but it also sums up some of the major themes of the book—that different species have independently evolved independent characteristics. (Who knew that howler monkeys and humans independently evolved the ability to see color?)

Bottom line
It's definitely a thought-provoking and rewarding read, even if you don't have a passion for evolutionary biology. It's an infuriating book if you're a creationist, but it's hard to read books like this and remain skeptical about evolution.

Fine print
The Ancestor's Tale: A Pilgrimage to the Dawn of Evolution, by Richard Dawkins 
Genre: non-fiction, biology
Photo from Goodreads
I bought this book

Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage

Synopsis
The harrowing true story of Ernest Shackleton's ill-fated journey to Antarctica. 

My take
"Our mission was called a 'successful failure' in that we returned safely but never made it to the moon." That's a line from Apollo 13, and before there was Apollo 13 there was the Endurance. Both were epic journeys to inhospitable places that turned into races for survival. In the case of the Endurance, all 22 crew members amazingly survived.

Shackleton's attempt to cross the White Continent on foot was never supposed to be an easy feat, but his tale of survival is even more thrilling. The Endurance was trapped in ice before the crew could get to its landing site. Shackleton and his men lived on board, hoping for a thaw, until they were forced to abandon ship before the ice destroyed it. What followed was an incredible trek over miles of ice and and open water to try to find help. The book is pieced together from some of the crew members' diaries, and it includes everything from the dramatic escape from a ship being crushed by ice to the mundane day-to-day activities of 22 men living in close quarters with dwindling food supplies.

Shackleton himself rarely takes center stage in this account because he always remained somewhat aloof from the rest of the men. He was acutely conscious that he was their leader and that they all depended on him to make life-or-death decisions for all of them. The book paints a portrait of him as a pioneer and a skilled leader.

The book is aimed at a lay audience and it generally explains nautical terms and other technicalities well, but the only slow parts of the read were the descriptions of ships.

Bottom line
It's a thrilling adventure story, but read it either in the height of summer or in front of a roaring fire because you'll inevitably feel chilled to the bone after reading about survival in subzero temperatures.

Fine print
Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage, by Alfred Lansing 
Genre: non-fiction, history
Photo from Goodreads
I borrowed this book from the library

The Last Hurrah

Synopsis
Tammany-style politics take a bow as an old-school politician in an unnamed city makes one last run for office.

My thoughts
The book is supposedly based on James Michael Curley, a mayor/governor/representative from Boston. There are some statues of him around here somewhere, but I don't know much about him other than that he was still hanging around at the beginning of the Kennedy era (around the same time this book was written). This way of governing is long dead now, but O'Connor brings it vividly to life.

It was incredibly interesting to read this book in a presidential election year. Frank Skeffington would be considered corrupt by any standard today, but his brand of politics emphasizes the human connection between citizens and the politicians they elect - something that's entirely missing from any election today. It's a testament to O'Connor's skill as a writer that he makes you view Skeffington as a champion of the underdog instead of a corrupt politician.

There's one passage that illustrates this perfectly - with a few requests and a bit of persuasive rhetoric (read: threats), Skeffington arranges for one man's wake to be well-attended and his widow taken care of financially.

I didn't think there'd be any question about who would win the race (the hero, of course), but O'Connor manages to inject some suspense into the story. I didn't realize how invested I was in the story until I started to care about Skeffington's political fate. Skeffington is quite a character - engaging, boisterous, charming, decisive, just.

Bottom line
A must-read for anyone who's interested in politics. Probably boring as hell for anyone else. There's a movie, too.

Fine print
The Last Hurrah, by Edwin O'Connor
Genre: fiction
Photo from Goodreads
I borrowed this book from the library

Only Time Will Tell

Synopsis
A coming-of-age epic about Harry Clifton, a promising young boy of uncertain parentage. This is the first of a trilogy and ends with the beginning of World War II - and a whopper of a cliffhanger for Harry.

My thoughts
"Time will tell," my grandma always used to say. That's what drew me to this book, even though I'd never read anything by Jeffrey Archer. This family-based saga seems to be a deviation from Archer's normal repertoire of espionage thrillers, but his background in writing fast-paced, plot-driven novels works to his advantage here. I was hooked from the beginning and flew through the book. I never got bored.

My one criticism has to do with the multiple points of view. Most of the book was told from Harry's point of view, but other supporting characters get their own chapters too. The problem is that the switch from one to the other is jarring. The narration switches and all of a sudden you're reading about something that happened 20 pages ago. Most of the time it was interesting to see someone else's perspective, though.

This is a strong beginning to a promising new series. I immediately put the second book in the Clifton Chronicles and Kane and Abel, Archer's best-known thriller, on my to-read list.

Bottom line
Excellent read, especially when you're looking for something lighter.

Fine print
Only Time Will Tell, by Jeffrey Archer
Genre: fiction
Photo from Goodreads
I borrowed this book from the library

Escape Artist

Synopsis Edna Ferber, a budding reporter in small-town Wisconsin, tackles the mystery of a murdered young woman. Houdini makes a cameo.  

My thoughts It's an entertaining yarn, but not entertaining enough for me to read other Edna Ferber mysteries. There are several reasons for this, but I wasn't particularly convinced by Edna. For a very modern character in a quaint society, Edna is oddly flat and two-dimensional. I liked that Edna wanted more from life than being a homemaker, but the repeated focus on her plain looks really rubbed me the wrong way. And the strife between Edna and her mother and sister and other female characters was too shrill for me. Edna Ferber was an actual historical figure, so I was hoping for a bit more. In addition, the mystery itself is pretty ho-hum. But there is a lot that's done well here. The real triumph of the book is the excellent depiction of small-town early 20th-century America, especially the suspicion directed toward immigrants and Jewish Americans. There's also a great deal of sexism given that Edna is a young woman in a male-dominated field; unfortunately, this comes across in a very heavy-handed way. But Houdini's cameo was handled well. It could have been a distraction, but it wasn't. Houdini provided some helpful hints and then receded into the background where he belonged.

 Bottom line Skippable unless you have a great interest in Edna Ferber or Houdini.  

Fine print  
Escape Artist, by Ed Ifkovic
Genre: fiction, mystery, historical fiction
Photo from Goodreads
I borrowed this book from the library

The Worst Hard Time

Synopsis
Timothy Egan recounts the environmental, financial, and humanitarian catastrophe that was the Great American Dust Bowl of the 1930s.

My thoughts
I've read The Grapes of Wrath and learned about how the farming crisis contributed to the Great Depression, but I knew shamefully little about the Dust Bowl until I read this book. The best way to teach history is to make it personal, and Egan focuses on different communities throughout the Oklahoma/Texas/Colorado region to make this devastating story come to life. The storytelling drags at times, but Egan succeeds in painting a vivid picture of the people who stubbornly rode out the Dust Bowl despite unimaginable horrors—walls of dirt that hurtled across the Great Plains and destroyed settlers' lives and livelihoods. He does a great job conveying their despair as months turn to years without any end in sight.

Egan does a masterful job with the personal element of the story, but he also does a good job explaining the technical facets of the Dust Bowl, specifically its causes and its economic and environmental consequences. This book is as much a narrative of a tragedy as it is a cautionary tale. The Dust Bowl was wholly man-made. There were smart people who saw the folly of ripping up thousands of acres of land and trying to force it to produce healthy crops, yet the government persisted in its efforts to encourage people to settle and farm this last untamed portion of the country. Once the Dust Bowl began, the government's inaction was appalling and the rest of the country's response ranged from disinterest to downright hostility.

One small complaint: There are photos to supplement the author's story, but it drove me crazy that Egan repeatedly described other photos that don't appear anywhere in the book.

Bottom line
This a wrenching and insightful read about a chapter of history that far too many Americans know far too little about. I picked up a copy of Egan's next book, The Big Burn: Teddy Roosevelt and the Fire that Saved America, and I hope that will be similarly enlightening.

Fine print
The Worst Hard Time, by Timothy Egan
Genre: history, non-fiction
Photo from Goodreads
I borrowed this book from the library

1861: The Civil War Awakening

Synopsis
Adam Goodheart, one of the columnists who contributes to The New York Times series "Disunion," analyzes contemporary accounts of the run-up to and beginning of the Civil War.

My thoughts
Goodheart creates a fascinating portrait of the country as it slides inevitably toward civil war, laying out the causes of the war and capturing the mood of the country. It's a well-written, well-researched, and well-reasoned account, and even the detours are entertaining (there's a fun one on trends in facial hair in the nineteenth century). He relies on contemporary documents and focuses on a few carefully chosen subjects. This is the best way to immerse yourself in a distant time and Goodheart's subjects are interesting both for their individual experiences and the impact they had on the war.

One of the men he follows is a college professor, lawyer, and novice politician from Ohio—seemingly indistinguishable from hundreds of other Union supporters except that his name was James Garfield and he would go on to become the 20th president of the United States. Another is the charismatic leader of the Zouaves, an acrobatic but impractical unit in the Union army. A bonus for me: a colorful cameo by one of my friends' distant ancestors, an eccentric Texas politician. When we were growing up, my friend always joked that one of her ancestors started the Civil War ... at least I thought she was joking until I read 1861 and realized he kind of did—he bizarrely inserted himself into the action during the siege of Fort Sumter. Goodheart describes him as "[p]erhaps the feistiest Southerner of all." My friend describes him as "a nutter. We're very proud."

Bottom line
A must-read for anyone with even a passing interest in the Civil War. A must-buy for anyone with more than a passing interest.

Fine print
1861: The Civil War Awakening, by Adam Goodheart
Genre: history
Photo from Goodreads
I borrowed this book from the library

The Lost: A Search for Six of Six Million

Synopsis
Daniel Mendelsohn tries to find out what happened to his grandfather's brother and his family during the Holocaust.

My thoughts
Mendelsohn is a mesmerizing writer and he could not have found a more poignant subject than his family's personal tragedy. Mendelsohn grew up hearing stories about his grandfather's older brother Schmiel, who was a successful businessman in the Ukraine before World War II and who was killed in the Holocaust along with his wife and four daughters. Over the years, the story of how they died became garbled—did they die in a concentration camp? Or were they murdered in a massacre by members of their own town? In a quest that takes him all over the world, Mendelsohn uncovers tantalizing hints about how Schmiel and his family lived during the war—that they hid in a castle, that they joined the resistance.

There are two separate stories—Schmiel's story and Mendelsohn's journey—and both are told in the voice of a strong storyteller. Six million is an unfathomably large number, but the six members of Mendelsohn's family come alive through his research. Mendelsohn talks to people who knew Schmiel and his daughters and comes to know them as individuals with distinct personalities rather than unsmiling figures in faded family photos. As he pieces together the stories of his murdered relatives, Mendelsohn also documents his relationships with his living family members. He doesn't focus as much on these dramas, but they're familiar and help round out the story.

Bottom line
It's a long book, and it's worth every page.

Fine print
The Lost: A Search for Six of Six Million, by Daniel Mendelsohn
Genre: history, non-fiction
Photo from Goodreads
I borrowed this book from the library
I read this book in April 2011

The Intelligencer

Synopsis
In 1593, Christopher Marlowe uncovers a scandal that could be the end of Elizabeth I's ambitious counselor Robert Cecil. In the present day, Renaissance scholar/private investigator Kate Morgan is drawn into a case involving a coded manuscript that may help solve the mystery of Marlowe's murder once and for all. There's also a second case that unexpectedly involves Kate's personal life.

My thoughts
I first read this shortly after it came out in 2004 and wanted to be Kate Morgan. I've always loved mysteries and I really love historical fiction, but thrillers were totally new to me. It's an ambitious book and I remember enjoying the novelty of having a contemporary mystery intertwined with a centuries-old mystery. Both parts are entertaining, but they never quite mesh and I found the constant shifts from one to the other jarring.

On this read-through, I enjoyed the contemporary portion of the plot the most. Kate's main case involves a coded Elizabethan manuscript, a dead would-be thief, a murdered professor, and a suave businessman. It crackles with action—disguises, knifings, etc. Marlowe's interwoven story is skillfully written and also chock full of action. There's one superb twist that I didn't see coming—and it even surprised me on this second reading.

Back in the present day, Kate's second case gets relegated to the background, but it is in many ways the most interesting part of the book. It involves an intelligence officer recently sprung from an Iranian prison (and, as you might imagine, in horrifyingly bad shape). It could have been the entire plot of a book on its own and in many ways it's a shame it wasn't. It doesn't get enough attention, isn't fully developed, and isn't fully resolved by the end of the book.

There's a lot going on in this book, so there are a lot of characters to keep track of. Fortunately, they all have distinct personalities and it was easy for me to remember who was who. It's a skill I didn't fully appreciate until this weekend, which brings me to ...

I finally got around to watching Anonymous this weekend. I was really excited when I first heard about it but decided not to see it in theaters when it got panned by the critics. I have to say, the critical vitriol was totally warranted. The story spans 40 years and jumps back and forth between the two startlingly often. I struggled to keep the characters and events straight because there's just too much going on. The plot revolves around the premise that the Earl of Oxford authored all of the plays we attribute to Shakespeare and that Shakespeare himself was an illiterate actor. (I actually adored Rafe Spall's Shakespeare. He's utterly blasphemous but irresistibly, deliciously hammy.) Anonymous and The Intelligencer shared a few commonalities—Cecil makes a convenient villain and Elizabeth is anything but virginal. And Marlowe pops up long enough to threaten to expose Shakespeare as a fraud and get killed for it. But I spent a good chunk of the movie going, "wait, what?"—there's just too much crammed into it.

Bottom line
The Intelligencer: good page-turner. Anonymous: unwieldy blockbuster where things blow up simply because Roland Emmerich directed it. (Seriously, you want explosions? Adapt the mystery of Mary Queen of Scots and the murder of Lord Darnley for the big screen. Bonus points for gratuitous extraterrestrials.)

Fine print
The Intelligencer, by Leslie Silbert
Genre: mystery, historical fiction, thriller
Photo from Goodreads
I borrowed this book from the library

Gorillas in the Mist

Synopsis
Dian Fossey's account of her attempts to study and protect the gorillas of Rwanda.

My thoughts
I was inspired by this book. It takes a woman of immense strength and determination to do what Dian Fossey did. There was no blueprint for the type of research she did, so she had to make it up as she went along. In addition, she faced opposition from corrupt local conservation authorities who ignored poachers and even worked with Western zoos to capture gorillas for their exhibits.

I don't have a strong background in science, so I was relieved that Fossey wrote for a lay audience and didn't spend much time on gorilla anatomy or physical anthropology. Instead, she focused on her personal connection to the gorillas and her understanding of their social dynamics. Each group is led by a mature silverback with one or more immature males acting as backup to protect the females and young. The younger males were often the most colorfully drawn, and it was truly fun to follow them as they grew up, developed distinct personalities, and learned from their group's silverback. Their stories became most compelling when they either inherited the leadership of their group (sometimes before they were ready) or had to branch out on their own.

Fossey's commitment to the gorillas was admirable, but it was awkward to read about an American woman trying to impose her morals and standards on a culture she didn't understand. Her attitude smacked of the superiority and imperialism that was (and in many ways still is) characteristic of the way the West views Africa. But to some extent, it was necessary and she was successful in her efforts to protect the gorillas and raise awareness about them around the world.

Gorillas in the Mist was published two years before Fossey's still-unsolved murder, and her research and conservation efforts continue today. As soon as I finished the book, I went online to make a donation to the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund and was delighted to realize that some of the gorillas she'd written about almost 30 years ago not only survived but thrived.

Bottom line
A must-read if you're at all interested in wildlife and conservation.

Fine print
Gorillas in the Mist, by Dian Fossey
Genre: animal science, memoir
Photo from Goodreads
I bought this book

Mort

Synopsis
Death needs an apprentice so that he can commence with his midlife crisis without worrying that his responsibilities will be neglected. Enter Mort, a young boy who is hopeless at everything and has never been entrusted with much responsibility at all.

My thoughts
I needed something quick and fun to read after the Choirboys disappointment. This was perfect. Technically, it's the fourth book in Terry Pratchett's acclaimed Discworld series, but it's the first one I've read and I don't get the sense that it's the kind of series you need to read in any kind of order. (It's not a traditional series where you follow the same protagonists as they age/progress through life. You meet some of the same characters in every book—Death, for instance, shows up a lot, although Mort apparently does not—but they don't always stick around or play a central role in each book.)

Mort is arguably the star of the book, but Death often steals the show. Death sincerely tries to gain a better understanding of humans and why they enjoy the things they do, but he's just not capable of it. His fishing trip and his stint as a short-order cook are two of the funniest parts of the book, even though they don't contribute to the main storyline.

Terry Pratchett is a comic genius and I laughed out loud throughout the book. His sense of humor is very British—very dry with a dash of absurdity. (Think Douglas Adams but with fantasy instead of science fiction.)

Bottom line
It's a great read for anyone. I'll definitely read more.

Fine print
Mort, by Terry Pratchett 
Genre: fantasy
Photo from Goodreads
I borrowed this book from the library

LIbrary Loot—May 30–June 5

Library Loot is a weekly event co-hosted by Claire from The Captive Reader and Marg from The Adventures of an Intrepid Reader that encourages bloggers to share the books they’ve checked out from the library. If you’d like to participate, just write up your post-feel free to steal the button-and link it using the Mr. Linky any time during the week. And of course check out what other participants are getting from their libraries!

It's been an embarrassingly long time since I've participated in one of these ... in fact, I think this is my first one this year. But I had a fantastic time at the library this week!

First up: The Intelligencer. This is a reread for me. I read it when it first came out in 2005 and I remember loving it. It's a mystery/historical fiction mash-up that switches back and forth between 16th-century England and the present day. The book subscribes to the conspiracy theory that playwright Christopher Marlowe was also a spy and that he was killed in the service of the Queen instead of in an ordinary tavern brawl. ("Marlowe attacked and got his own knife in the eye. Quarrel about the bill." "The bill! Oh, vanity, vanity!" "Not the billing, the bill!") In the present day, we follow a feisty private investigator named Kate Morgan whose expertise in Elizabethan ciphers draws her into a dangerous international mystery. The two stories are intertwined, and the secrets of the past are revealed along with some surprises in the present.

I also got Anne Rice's The Mummy, or Ramses the Damned. I haven't read anything by Anne Rice and I'm still skeptical about the vampire craze, but I can get behind a story about an undead pharaoh.

And I walked out with Consumer Reports Best Buys 2012 and four issues of Consumer Reports, so that should keep me busy for the near future.

Photos from Goodreads

The Choirboys

Synopsis
The adventures and exploits of individual LAPD squads culminate in tragedy.

My thoughts
I hated this book on so many levels that I found myself doing all sorts of tedious and detested things—scrubbing the bathroom, managing my 401(k), watching entire soccer matches on ESPN2—just to avoid reading it. Eventually, I had to admit defeat, and The Choirboys earned my first (and hopefully only) did-not-finish of the year.

It's a satire; interestingly, my 2011 DNF book, Super Sad True Love Story, was also billed as a satire. Here's my thing: satire has to have a sharp, biting sense of humor. I adore The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and The Colbert Report. I thought 1984 was brilliant. And although I didn't particularly enjoy Catch–22, I appreciated the absurdity of it. The Choirboys tries to recreate Catch–22 in Los Angeles, but it only succeeds in being a not-very-entertaining rip-off.

But that's not the main reason I couldn't bring myself to finish it. The book is populated by a boatload of loutish, deeply unlikable LAPD malcontents. I knew their stories were building to some sort of climax, but each individual chapter was a morass of not-funny stories featuring pathetic men that didn't advance the story. I didn't get any sort of value or entertainment from them, and after about two-thirds of the book I couldn't take any more.

Bottom line
No.

Fine print
The Choirboys, by Joseph Wambaugh
Genre: crime, fiction, satire
Photo from Goodreads
I borrowed this book from the library     

Book Challenge: Seconds Challenge

When I started this blog late in 2011, I had every intention of signing up for every book challenge I could find in 2012. Specifically a 52 books challenge, possibly an A–Z challenge. But then life happened and I haven't had as much time for reading or blogging.

We're almost halfway through 2012, but I still haven't given up on joining a challenge and I was intrigued when I found the Seconds Challenge at A Few More (Reading) Challenges.

Basically, here's how it works: You make it a point to read a second book by an author you've read once before or the second book in a series. It could be an author or series that you enjoyed but haven't got around to reading again or it could be a second chance for an author or series that you didn't enjoy the first time but are willing to try reading again.

There are four different levels:

• Just a spoonful - Read 3 books that are 2nd in a series or the second time you’ve read the author. 
• A few more bites - Read 6 books that are 2nd in a series or the second time you’ve read the author.
• A full plate - Read 12 books that are 2nd in a series or the second time you’ve read the author.
• All you can eat - Read 20 books (or more) that are 2nd in a series or the second time you’ve read the author.

Appropriately enough for a seconds challenge, I'm going to try for the second level (6 books), but hopefully I'll be able to surpass that. This challenge appealed to me because there are so many times that I read a book and mean to pick up another book by the same author ... and then three years (or 13 years, but who's counting?) go by and I still haven't gotten around to it. It might take me a few weeks to get into this because I just started a book and have another on hold at the library, but hopefully by posting this challenge I'll be motivated to get going as soon as possible. 

A Town Like Alice

Synopsis
Englishwoman Jean Paget unexpectedly inherits a large chunk of money. She decides to use part of it to help the Malayan village where she spent the last part of World War II. Her journey gets more interesting when she discovers that an Australian POW who helped her was not killed as she thought and may still be alive.

My thoughts
The romance at the heart of this book was sweet, sappy, and almost too good to be true. Jean met Joe very briefly during the war, when she was being led on a forced march through the Malayan countryside. He stole some chickens from a cruel Japanese soldier and gave them to Jean to help feed her and the other women and children on the march. When the Japanese soldiers discovered the chickens with her, Joe took the blame and Jean thought he was killed.

Her trek to find him touchingly coincides with his journey to find her. They finally do reunite and sparks fly. But there's a not insignificant obstacle to overcome before they can live happily ever after. Joe lives in the harsh Australian outback and he's not convinced Jean will like it. She solves this on her own by using a little more of her inheritance to become a successful entrepreneur, proving that she can hold her own. I loved Jean's character. She's resourceful, sassy, and tough. She's a very modern woman in a man's world.


On the other hand, the casual racism and paternalism directed at the Asian and Australian Aboriginal characters was difficult to read. I know it's a product of the times the book was set in and written in, but it kept me from truly enjoying the book.

The book is told from the point of view of Jean's lawyer, which was less than enjoyable and made the book drag. (It's a short book, but between the irrelevant lawyer's inner thoughts and the main characters' wanderings it could have been cut in half.)


Bottom line
It's a quick read, so it's worth a look.


Fine print
A Town Like Alice, by Nevil Shute 
Genre: fiction

Photo from Goodreads
I borrowed this book from the library

Beast

Synopsis
"Beauty and the Beast" from the Beast's point of view, set in Persia.

My take
I'm a sucker for fairy tale retellings, but I was disappointed in this one. I was intrigued by the promise of seeing the Beast's point of view; unfortunately, it wasn't very interesting. Beast—or Prince Orasmyn, in his human form—is actually a good, decent guy who gets turned into a lion on a technicality. Because of this, there's obviously no need for a journey from bad guy to good guy, and the story is the worse for it.

I did like that it was set in Persia and discussed the friction between traditional Persian culture and Islam. That wasn't the main point of the book, but I did appreciate that it played even a small role.

Bottom line
Just watch Beauty and the Beast again.

Fine print
Beast, by Donna Jo Napoli
Genre: YA fiction
Photo from Goodreads
I bought this book

The Lost Symbol

Synopsis
Robert Langdon is back in another thriller, this one set in Washington, D.C. A rogue Freemason kidnaps one of Langdon's mentors and it's up to Langdon to save his friend's life.

My take
This is a real page-turner and it kept me entertained—but it's probably my least favorite of the Robert Langdon books I've read. (Angels and Demons ranks first because I read it first and found it utterly captivating. The Da Vinci Code comes in second; the premise was intriguing, it was just as fast-paced as Angels and Demons, and it kept me guessing right to the end.) The Lost Symbol tries to be bigger and better than its predecessors, but ultimately it's just too much. It's like Dan Brown knew he needed to top Langdon's other adventures but couldn't quite pull it off. And that's why I rarely let myself get drawn into series books or books that have a common protagonist—no matter how much I love the characters, the quality invariably deteriorates. (This was why I stopped reading Diana Gabaldon's Outlander series and I may not finish George R.R. Martin's Song of Ice and Fire series for the same reason.)

There were many twists and turns, but I was disappointed that I was able to figure out the villain's true identity well before the dramatic reveal. My husband and I read Angels and Demons at the same time and he figured out who the bad guy was long before I did—he even wrote a page-long analysis explaining his logic to convince me. And I didn't see the Da Vinci Code resolution coming either.

Another drawback: there was a lot of tedious long-winded explanation in this book, which is something I don't remember from Angels and Demons or The Da Vinci Code (although it's been a few years since I've read them). Angels and Demons contained both scientific and religious details, but they were woven into the overall narrative more seamlessly. Brown was less successful in doing that with The Lost Symbol. The explanations were easy to follow, but they were distracting and they took me away from the action. It was like watching a movie and having to hit pause every few minutes to have something explained.

But enough negatives—on to the positives. Brown manages to cultivate a sense of suspense despite the fact that the formula of the genre dictates that the good guys live happily ever after. And as an organization, the Freemasons make a compelling focus for Brown's trademark symbolism-driven mystery. They're just as fascinating as the Illuminati or Opus Dei. I also liked that the action was set in Washington, D.C. It's not as glamorous or as historically rich as Rome or Paris, but it makes a strong impression (much like the first National Treasure movie). Brown goes out of his way to stress that D.C. is just as worthy as the grand old European cities, but I don't quite buy it. After all, it did take him this long to focus on D.C. himself.

Finally, a modest cheer for the smart female sidekick, who for once is not a leggy brunette half Langdon's age.

Bottom line
It certainly lives up to its billing as a thriller. It's leagues above most of the rest of the genre, but it's not quite on the same level as Angels and Demons or The Da Vinci Code. Like previous Dan Brown books there's a lot of gore, so it may not be for anyone who is squeamish. And if it's ever adapted for the screen you can probably skip the book and just see the movie.

Fine print
The Lost Symbol, by Dan Brown
Genre: Thriller
Photo from Goodreads
I bought this book

Smilla's Sense of Snow

Synopsis
A young boy falls to his death and his neighbor Smilla sets out on a quest to prove he was murdered and find out why.

My take
This is not your typical whodunnit. It doesn't have a conventional ending or a conventional heroine. I liked that the ending didn't tie things up in a neat bow for me, but I'm still a little surprised I made it to the end at all. I just couldn't get into this book and I think most of the reason lies with Smilla. She's the star attraction of the book, and she's a polarizing figure you either love or hate. I didn't care for her. She possesses many traits I find admirable—self-sufficiency, inquisitiveness, pragmatism. But she was so aloof and robotic that it was hard to see her as fully human.

I also had a problem with the way the plot unfolded. I didn't follow the logic behind many of Smilla's decisions. Isaiah was afraid of heights, so it makes sense that Smilla would be suspicious about how he came to fall to his death from the top of the apartment building. But I never understood why she connected Isaiah's father's death with Isaiah's death. She turns out to be right and there wouldn't have been a story if she hadn't figured out the link between the two deaths, but the book is full of developments that I didn't quite follow.

This book did make me curious about the author, Peter Hoeg. He chose a female narrator and he also brings in elements you don't normally see in the mystery/thriller genre—for instance, the cultural clash between Denmark and Greenland and the use of math and science to solve the mystery.

Bottom line
If you can get past the flaws in characters and development, read this book on a swelteringly hot day or in front of a roaring fire because not only are the characters cold, but the locale is too—and it only gets worse the more the book goes on.

Fine print
Smilla's Sense of Snow, by Peter Hoeg 
Genre: Mystery
Photo from Goodreads
I borrowed this book from the library

Across the Nightingale Floor

Synopsis
Takeo's world is upended when his entire family is killed and his village is obliterated. He is adopted by his mysterious savior and learns he is a member of the Tribe, a family of assassins that possesses modest supernatural powers. He hones his skills and nurses dreams of revenge.

My take
I can't remember how I first heard about this book—I may have read about it when it the New York Times named it one of the notable books of the year in 2002—but I'm glad I put it on my reading list.

The story takes place in a world that's very similar—but obviously not identical—to feudal Japan. While some of the characters and events are based on real historical figures and occurrences, I didn't mind that they weren't exact copies. Lian Hearn introduced the concept of a separate race of people who can move at super speeds and make themselves invisible, so why not alter other details to suit the story?

Across the Nightingale Floor was written for a non-Japanese audience, so I was impressed at how seamlessly Hearn incorporated information about a history and culture that most readers probably wouldn't know much about. Her writing style also helps move the story along smoothly.

Takeo has a strong voice and is a well-drawn character. I felt for him and was fully invested in his part of the story. It was fun to read along as he discovered his new talents, and it was wrenching to read about the choices he faced—avenge his family, stay loyal to his adoptive father, or fully join the Tribe. His metamorphosis from country boy to mature warrior is well done. Unfortunately, the female lead, Kaede, does not fare so well. Her story is never as captivating or convincing as Takeo's. She's supposed to be a young woman who finds strength within herself much as Takeo does, but it seems forced and even a little cliched. Takeo's and Kaede's stories eventually mesh and they predictably fall in love immediately. It was sweet to read about but distracted from the larger picture. The narrative was strong—until the end, which was mostly Kaede's fault. Without giving too much away, I understand she needed revenge just like Takeo did, but the resolution to her story seemed contrived and it came at the expense of a satisfying conclusion for Takeo. Since he was the main protagonist, I felt cheated.

Bottom line
Highly enjoyable and mostly terrific. I'd recommend it, especially if you have any interest in feudal Japan. It's the first book in a series—I put the second one on my to-read list, but I didn't run out and get it, mostly because I was a little disappointed in the ending.

Fine print
Across the Nightingale Floor, by Lian Hearn
Genre: Fantasyish/historyish fiction
Photo from Goodreads
I borrowed this book from the library

One Hundred Years of Solitude

Synopsis
And they all died. Once upon a time there had been a town-wide plague of insomnia-induced memory loss, a woman who rose to heaven with her sister-in-law's precious sheets, and rains that lasted for four years, eleven months, and two days. And so it goes.


My thoughts
I had to struggle to finish this book. Every now and then, I pick out a book because it's on all the "100 Best" and "Must Read Before You Die" lists. Experiences like this make it easier for me to ignore those snobby lists. I was disappointed.

Jose Arcadio Buendia, his wife Ursula, and their merry band of followers leave their hometown and wander around in search of the ocean, where they've decided to build a new settlement. They never find the ocean, so they eventually just plop down in the middle of nowhere. The plot is pretty straightforward—it charts Jose Arcadio and Ursula's exploits and those of their descendants for almost 500 meandering pages.

I love epic family sagas, but this one didn't hold my interest. The characters all have variations of the same names, but they're easy to keep track of through their individual incestuous and/or obsessive compulsive tendencies. I never felt close to any of the characters because there's not much to relate to.

The detached writing style and the sheer ridiculousness of the characters' circumstances don't help. I know that's Gabriel Garcia Marquez's style, but I prefer Jorge Luis Borges's brand of magical realism. Garcia Marquez has this maddening habit of introducing an event or idea that seems promising and then veering off on a tangent for seventeen pages (all one dense paragraph) before finally getting to the point. By the time I finally, finally reached the end of one of these, I was usually so exhausted/exasperated that I didn't get any reward from whatever I'd just read. Yes, the writing is lyrical, but the beauty was overwhelmed by the sheer volume of prose.

Bottom line
At least I can check this one off my list of must-read classics.

Fine print
One Hundred Years of Solitude, by Gabriel Garcia Marquez 
Genre: Classic fiction
Photo from Goodreads
I borrowed this book from the library
Edited for typos