bookrblog

Caleb’s Crossing

Thursday, August 18th, 2011 | American Literature | Comments Off

This is Geraldine Brooks’ latest, I heard her talk about it on the radion the other day. The idea is really interesting – the story of the first native american guy to graduate from Harvard back in 16something or rather. The execution is a bit mills and boone and boring. You can always pick a journalist-turned-novelist, they are good at the craft but lack that spark. Anyway, this story covers Caleb “crossing” from his traditional life on Martha’s Vineyard island, to an “English” life at Harvard. The true story is incredible – this version is a bit lame. An ok read.

Left Neglected

Wednesday, April 20th, 2011 | American Literature | No Comments

This was a frustrating read; Lisa Genova’s first book, Still Alice, was very good, but this one doesn’t say anything new at all. A workaholic mum discovers there’s more to life after she gets a head injury. Yes, it’s been done before, this has the benefit of a very specific explanation of the head injury (left neglect), but it’s a drawn-out obvious metaphor. The most frustrating part was that the character has a baby and he hardly appears! My baby is with me 24/7 and is definitely not a subplot. Anyway, it was readable but should have been more tightly edited.

Free Range Kids

Sunday, March 13th, 2011 | American Literature | No Comments

. . . for dummies. Well, it doesn’t actually say that, but it should. I thought this would be a book of essays discussing topics around providing free play for kids; instead it’s a self-help manual for neurotic upper-middle-class parents who won’t let their kids go outside except in a car.  It even has boxed suggestions at the end of each chapter.

Of course, it’s written by a journalist, who has practised writing “it’s obvious but I’ll say it ten different ways anyway cause it fills the column” kind of style for many years.  Lenore Skenazy allowed her 9 yr old to ride the subway, blogged about it, and ended up getting fame and fortune – and this book deal – out of it. Let your children be free as we were in the 70s, is her cry – but the book is simplistic and worst of all, patronising. There are so many interesting ideas in the concept of child freedom, but the book focuses simply on parent paranoia. It was disappointing.

Between a Rock and a Hard Place

Tuesday, March 1st, 2011 | American Literature | No Comments

I heard an interview on ABC Classics with Aron Ralston, the young man who cut off his own arm in order to save his life after being trapped by a rockfall whilst hiking alone. He sounded like a very intelligent and very interesting man. His book is fairly well structured, fleshing out the 127 hours of his ordeal with the story of his past exploits skiing and hiking; he is an adequate writer but not brilliant and I did find some of those stories a little uninteresting. He comes across as a bit of a risk-taker who learnt a very hard lesson. Having said that, the actual story of his ordeal is fascinating and even though – or perhaps because – you knew what was coming, the tension built bit by bit until a pretty exciting finish. I wish though it had had something in the book about his vision of his son actually coming true, which was alluded to in his radio interview. A fairly good read but not as good as I had hoped.

The Balance Within

Monday, November 15th, 2010 | American Literature | No Comments

After listening to an interview with Esther M. Sternberg, I ordered this book,
which covers the interaction between physical health and emotion. It is a good
book, but not a great book. Sternberg is a scientist, an immunologist, and
while her writing is fairly well crafted, it does lack the ability to really
bring some of this quite complex science to life.

Sternberg covers the history of the link between immunology and psychology,
although I am simplifying it a fair bit; there are chapters and chapters
about hormones, neurotransmitters and other chemicals which interact within
the body. Some of these chemicals affect our mood, others affect our physical
health, causing disease. These chemicals interact, so that stress can affect
our immune system, and alternatively being sick can affect our mood. While
these things seem self-evident, they certainly weren’t to scientists who
could not “see” emotion; therefore Sternberg painstakingly traces the science
behind the reciprocity. She explains the practical side;
altering the workplace environment to improve mood can reduce
our chances of heart disease and other diseases. Therefore, prayer, yoga, meditation,
all have a real place within science and should be respected, now that science
can trace the actual chemicals working within the body.

Interesting stuff, but a better writer would have made it fascinating and the science
easier to access; would have drawn upon some of the reasons why even with this
understanding Drs are still hesitant to prescribe meditation over medication. Sternberg
is evidently a very good scientist, but just a fairly good writer; this is a fairly good
book, but there are probably better ones out there.

Rosanna of the Amish

Thursday, June 10th, 2010 | American Literature | No Comments

It’s unusual to find a book about the Amish, by the Amish – in this case, Joseph Yoder was born and raised Amish although as an adult went to college and married “outside”. This was written and published many years ago, probably the ’30s – I came across this second-hand copy in “Shakespeare & Co.” in Paris!

Joseph tells the story of his mother, who was left as a baby to be raised by an Amish woman when her Irish mother died. Rosanna lived her life among the Amish people and by telling her life, Joseph explains a lot of the customs and history of the Amish from his experience, from the beliefs to the music to the habits and some of the mysteries too. It’s a cheerful read, as Joseph despite not agreeing with every belief obviously thought they were a pretty decent bunch of people. A good story.

As I Am

Sunday, January 10th, 2010 | American Literature | No Comments

This is Patricia Neal’s autobiography, the American actress who married Roald Dahl. She really did live an eventful life; a top actress in the ’40s and ’50s, lover of Gary Cooper, married to Roald Dahl, losing her daughter to measles, her son having a brain injury due to an accident, then having a stroke herself. Really, she had so much happen to her. I was shocked at all the affairs she had with married men in her youth; and the fact that she never thought “karma” when a young woman had an affair with her husband (who ended up divorcing her). She was evidently a pretty strong woman who lost her temper a lot, knew what she wanted, and felt hard done by quite a bit too. She hated the relationship she had with her children, and yet she wasn’t around when they were young, due to her career. She was in a lot of films, won an oscar, but in the end none of that brought much joy to her. A fascinating woman, if slightly amoral, even if she did end up becoming a catholic and haunting a convent – more for what she could get than anything else. Interesting.

My Life in France

Saturday, January 9th, 2010 | American Literature | No Comments

I really enjoyed this book by Julia Child; I sought it out after the Julie & Julia film, where Julie was so dull and Julia so fascinating. Julia Child spent years in France post-war and discovered food, food, food. She also discovered the beautiful places and interesting people; she sounds like one of those people who find things are wonderful simply because of their outlook on life. This book is also about her relationship with her husband Paul, which is lovely. There is a mixture of wicked and clever alongside a sort of naiveity which is really endearing. I don’t “get” the food thing, but I do get the joy of new cultures and discoveries. It’s wonderful that she found something so concrete to enjoy in life, which lasted wherever she went.

The 19th Wife

Monday, January 4th, 2010 | American Literature | No Comments

This novel by David Evershoff was very creepy, because you know that it’s based on real cults in the USA today. The actual structure of the novel is flawed; it moves between a modern murder story and fragments of memoirs from a hundred years ago. In the modern story, a 19th wife is accused of murder, and her estranged son, a “lost boy” tries to find out what is really going on in order to help her. In the old story, it re-tells the story of Brigham-Young’s 19th wife, Ann Eliza. I can imagine a better writer managing to allow the story to flow a little more seamlessly; as it is, you begin to forget whose story you are reading. However, despite his shortcomings as a writer, this story is powerful because of the truths in it; that women are still being subjugated by religion every day, and that people prefer to ignore it rather than face it.

The Other Side of Paradise

Sunday, December 27th, 2009 | American Literature | No Comments

I reread Gatsby this year – this is F Scott Fitzgerald’s earlier novel, his first, in fact. It’s an odd novel about a rich boy who he labels “the egotist” . It’s autobiographical I suppose, as Fitzgerald also went to a “prep” school, Princeton, and the war. I don’t really know what to say about it – it’s coming of age, but where, at the end, you don’t feel that the character has changed at all. He espouses Socialism at the end whereas he had previously pushed for the aristocracy to have all the power, but it’s still all talk. However, the book isn’t really about a boy, but a time, an age, where the rich were rich and unaware, and people were hopeful about the future. Long time ago.