Home Safe

Home Safe by Elizabeth Berg
Fiction
2009 Random House
Finished on 6/27/09
Rating: 4.5/5 (Terrific!)



Product Description

In this new novel, beloved bestselling author Elizabeth Berg weaves a beautifully written and richly resonant story of a mother and daughter in emotional transit. Helen Ames—recently widowed, coping with loss and grief, unable to do the work that has always sustained her—is beginning to depend far too much on her twenty-seven-year-old daughter, Tessa, and is meddling in her life, offering unsolicited and unwelcome advice. Helen’s problems are compounded by her shocking discovery that her mild-mannered and loyal husband was apparently leading a double life. The Ameses had painstakingly saved for a happy retirement, but that money disappeared in several large withdrawals made by Helen’s husband before he died. In order to support herself and garner a measure of much needed independence, Helen takes an unusual job that ends up offering far more than she had anticipated. And then a phone call from a stranger sets Helen on a surprising path of discovery that causes both mother and daughter to reassess what they thought they knew about each other, themselves, and what really makes a home and a family.

"Maybe Freud didn't know the answer to what women want, but Elizabeth Berg certainly does," said USA Today, and that special gift of understanding shines through in this remarkable new novel. Home Safe is an exquisitely rendered story about mothers, daughters, and finding new richness in the stages of life, in one's family, and in oneself.

Hurray!! After a few disappointments, Berg (who was once my #1 favorite author) has written another winner! It's been 15 years since I first discovered Talk Before Sleep, and in spite of a few lackluster novels, I've remained a faithful reader, always hoping to find another gem. I've enjoyed reading her blog, which is full of wonderful personal stories that make me laugh and tug at my heartstrings, and am so happy she's found her writing mojo again. As I read, I kept wondering how much of Home Safe is autobiographical. I discovered the following on Berg's blog:

What's it About?

Helen Ames is a writer who has recently lost the ability to write. And her husband. And her nestegg. Now she's worried about losing her daughter. The book looks at the nature of creativity, the mother/daughter relationship, and the surprising places one can find love and meaning.

What was the inspiration?

For the first time in my life, I was having difficulty writing. My older daughter said, "Why don't you write about that?" The other inspiration was my younger daughter. I drive her crazy, but she likes me anyway.

On finding passion in what you do:

She gives her class their next assignment: Eavesdrop on a conversation; then use it to inspire a conversation between two characters you make up. Through dialogue only, give the reader an idea of how each person looks. She watches them eagerly scribble their assignment down, and becomes aware of some kind of spreading warmth inside her. At first she is alarmed, wondering what that is. But then she recognizes it. Happiness.

On writing:

When Suzie introduced Helen, she told the audience that one of the best things about books is that they are an interactive art form: that while the author may describe in some detail how a character looks, it is the reader's imagination that completes the image, making it his or her own. "That's why we so often don't like movies made from books, right?" Suzie said. "We don't like someone else's interpretation of what we see so clearly." She talked, too, about how books educate and inspire, and how they soothe souls—"like comfort food without the calories," she said. She talked about the tactile joys of reading, the feel of a page beneath one's fingers; the elegance of typeface on a page. She talked about how people complain that they don't have time to read, and reminded them that if they gave up half an hour of television a day in favor of reading, they could finish twenty-five books a year. "Books don't take time away from us," she said. "They give it back. In this age of abstraction, of multitasking, of speed for speed's sake, they reintroduce us to the elegance—and the relief!—of real, tick-tock time.

There was a time when I would buy every Elizabeth Berg novel the minute it came out in hardcover, but lately I've resigned myself to borrowing them from the library, as I did this one. I didn't want to take the risk of spending money on something I may not want to keep. But this one is defintely worth owning! If you've enjoyed Berg's earlier works (Open House, The Year of Pleasures, Ordinary Life, Never Change), I can assure you that this one won't disappoint. And doesn't it have a lovely cover?!

It will probably be another year before Berg publishes another novel. Until then, I guess I'll just have to read her blog. She really cracks me up sometimes. Maybe because I see a lot of myself in her actions. Here's a glimpse at her most recent post:

June 24, 2009

Just back from an evening walk around the neighborhood. It was about ten thousand degrees today, with about 400% humidity, and at 8pm, dogs' tongues were still hanging out far enough to be streetsweepers. People were sitting at outdoor restaurant tables drinking wine and patting their foreheads with dinner napkins. Children were listlessly standing around on the playgrounds. As I walked past houses, I was engaging in my favorite practice of looking into people's windows and I got CAUGHT, and it was very embarrassing. I was going past a place where people in a second floor condo had used fabric on their ceiling, they'd gathered it tightly together in a very beautiful and interesting and harem-ish way and I was staring and staring up at it and then all of a sudden I noticed a man in another window of the room staring back at me. His hands were on his hips and he did not appear to be smiling. Or waving. Or friendly. Well. What would you do in a situation like that? Turn and walk away? That would be the sensible thing to do. Not me. I kept staring, but I shifted my gaze just SLIGHTLY to the right, so he would possibly think I was looking at something else. The outside brickwork on his condo, perhaps. Someone who lived next to him. Or, you know, maybe an airplane. THEN I walked away.

Oh, those fireflies tonight, flitting around the gardens. I wish I were a together and technically competent person who carried a camera at all times, one that could take pictures at night, and I would have taken so many lovely photos and posted them on my website so that you too could be magically transported. But I had no camera. And also I forgot how to put photos on here, but I'm going to learn again because I have to put up a photo of my dog, Homer. People think the dog on my website with the halo over his head is Homer, but it is not, that dog is Toby, best dog in the world, who died, hence the halo, you see.

I am reading a galley of Lorrie Moore's new novel and mama mia, is it good. It is GOOD. And she makes you laugh out loud, so she gets even more points. Next up is Suite Francaise, which I STILL haven't read but now I have to because Elizabeth Strout, who wrote Olive Kitteridge told me she loved it and I love Olive Kitteridge so what can I do?

I'm thinking a fragrant, lukewarm bath is in order. Summer pajamas. Then the books. I wish I could read by fireflies, like I did as a little girl one summer night when I was nine. I loved it. The fireflies did not, I think. I let them all go the next morning and not a one of them looked back and said, "Hey, thanks for the hospitality. Loved the holes you punched in the jar lid."

Also, I wish we could have fireflies in winter. Wouldn't THAT be pretty? Those little lanterns against the snow? Someone once said to me, "Boy. You sure wish for things a lot." And I said, "SO?????" I should have said, "I wish it wouldn't bother you so much."

Yep. Women's fiction. I'm sure my husband would be bored with Berg's blog. He'd read this and think, huh?! Well, I happen to like it. She has a way of turning the ordinary into something special.

Off to find my blogging mojo. I think I left it on the plane out to Oregon. Oh, yeah. We were on vacation last week. I had a great time at our mini family reunion in Depoe Bay. Fifteen of us had good times eating lots of homemade tortillas and clam chowder (not together!), climbing to the top of Cape Kiwanda (a huge sand dune) in Pacific City, kayaking on Devil's Lake, playing hours of Mah Jong, watching the whales cruise by just off the bluff at Little Whale Cove, hiking through Silver Falls State Park (10 waterfalls!), enjoying the gorgeous Oregon Garden in Silverton, and... getting addicted to Facebook. It's been almost two weeks since I last posted here! I have three more reviews to write/post and I hope to get some photos up from the trip. Don't go away. I'll be back!

Taking Lottie Home

Taking Lottie Home by Terry Kay
Fiction
2000 William Morrow
Quit on 6/19/09
Rating: DNF





From Publishers Weekly

Set in Georgia at the beginning of the 20th century, this latest novel by the popular author of Shadow Song is an evocative, atmospheric and elegiac story of an uncommon woman and the three men she loves. Lottie Augusta Barton, "angel of the lonesome," is born in a tumbledown river house in Augusta. To escape from her troubled family, she takes to the road in 1904 with a traveling salesman. On the train, she meets Ben Phelps and Foster Lanier, baseball players just cut from the Augusta Hornets. Ben, nearly as sweet-natured as Lottie, is on his way home to a good job in a dry-goods store in his home town of Jericho. Foster, drunk and down on his luck, takes up with Lottie and they both join a traveling carnival. To Ben's surprise, when the carnival comes to Jericho, Foster's strange generosity sets Ben up as a local hero in a carny baseball game, and almost kindles romance between Ben and Lottie. Several years later, when Ben is engaged to his boss Arthur Ledford's daughter, Sally, he hears from Lottie; she and Foster married and have a son, called Little Ben, but Foster is dying and would like to see Ben again. Ben goes to Kentucky, and ends up bringing Lottie and her son to stay in his mother's house for a time, when both fall ill. The townspeople flutter around Lottie, whose radiant, serene presence draws them to her like moths to a gentle flame. A local lowlife attempts to blackmail Lottie with her carnival past, but Arthur Ledford, who's come to love Lottie, rescues her. Ben takes her home to Augusta; then he returns to Jericho, marries Sally and never sees Lottie again. Little Ben comes back, though, and in an epilogue, his daughter, the story's offscreen narrator, adds a poignant twist to the narrative. Though slow at the outset, this affecting novel glows with warmth and sincerity, and manifests Kay's customary ability to pull at the heartstrings.

Meh. I gave up after 32 pages. I knew it wasn't going to grab me, even after skimming ahead a few pages. However, I have a copy of To Dance With the White Dog in my stacks and will gave that a try instead.

Happy 4th!

(To view a prequel to this shot, click here)

I hope everyone has a fun & safe holiday. It rained on and off all day yesterday, but that didn't deter any of the neighborhood kids (big and little) from shooting off an arsenal of fireworks. Annie was not a very happy dog.

Still Life with Chickens

Still Life with Chickens: Starting Over in a House by the Sea by Catherine Goldhammer
Nonfiction - Memoir
2006 Hudson Street Press
Finished on 6/18/09
Rating: 2.5/5 (Fair)



I did not have a year in Provence or a villa under the Tuscan sun. I did not have a farm in Africa. Instead, my diminished resources dictated a move to a run-down cottage in a honky-tonk town where live bait is sold from vending machines. But as luck would have it, in a town where houses rub elbows, I came to live at the edge of a pond beside a small forest. I came to a place where a thousand dragonflies the size of small birds fly over my yard in the summer. In a town where everyone knows everything, I came to live in a place no one knows exists.

Product Description

For the millions who loved A Year by the Sea comes a memoir of a woman who awakens at midlife to find wisdom in a most unlikely place

In this lovely, unconventional, often funny memoir, we meet Catherine Goldhammer, newly separated and several tax brackets poorer, forced by circumstance to move from the affluent New England suburb of her daughter's childhood into a new, more rustic life by the sea. Against all logic, partly to please her daughter and partly for reasons not clear to her at the time, she begins this year of transition by purchasing six baby chickens-whose job, she comes to suspect, is to pull her and her daughter forward, out of one life and into another.

As she gradually transforms her new house, nine hundred feet from the sea-with its tawdry exterior but radiant soul-tile by tile, flower bed by flower bed, as she watches her precocious twelve-year-old daughter blossom into a stylish and sophisticated teenager, and as she tends to the needs of six enigmatic chickens, Catherine's life starts to slowly shift from chaos to grace. Beautifully written and ultimately inspiring, Still Life with Chickens is an unforgettable lesson in hope, in starting over, and in the transcendent wisdom that can often be found in the most unlikely of places.

My dear friend Nan wrote about this book two years ago and I was immediately intrigued. I found a lovely hardcover edition on a bargain table and quickly snatched it up, only to have it gather dust on one of my bookshelves. I'm not sure what prompted me to finally pull it from the shelf, perhaps the pretty cover art with the billowing sheets on the clothes line. Or perhaps a recent discussion over dinner with a good friend about eating locally, the benefits of organic food, and raising chickens. Plus, I'm a sucker for any book about living by the ocean.

This is the story of my foray into the salvation of one sorry house and garden and one slightly tattered soul. It is the story of a small house on a big piece of land, by a salt pond, nine hundred feet from the great Atlantic Ocean. It is the story of a time that began as failure and turned into grace for a mother and a daughter and a small, determined dog. And, in what started as a bribe and then became a love story, it is the tale of my reluctant ownership of six two-day-old chickens who came to live with us here, on Dragonfly Farm.

I have absolutely no desire to raise chickens. I'm quite content with one dog (and not so content with the dozen plus rabbits living in my back yard!). I have a good friend who has chickens and is very generous, giving me all the fresh eggs I could possible need. So I read this book more for Goldhammer's account of moving near the ocean and beginning a new life with her daughter rather than for the nuts-and-bolts of raising chickens. And therein lies my disappointment with this book. Other than a chapter or two, the majority of the book is about the chickens, not the house. What kept my interest (and made me laugh out loud) were the little tidbits about restoring the house. I do not like house "issues." I do not like watching workers make repairs or rennovate my house. I'm a worrier and I can only imagine what lies behind the walls and under the floors of this old house.

They proceeded to pull wires out of the walls. They moved the refrigerator and did something behind it. They conferred with the window guy. Either it couldn't be done, in which case they would take back the window, which was ghastly expensive, and put in one that would fit the space between the wires, or it could be done, and I would be living with chaos either way, a wall stripped down to the wood, the house filled with cold air and fog moving in off the ocean.

and

Chris and Scott were outside pulling siding off the house. I could hear Christ whistling. I found this reassuring. They didn't seem to be worried at all. Now Rick was whistling also. I returned to my bedroom. I heard drilling. I heard cursing. I heard sawing. I could no longer tell who was talking. "Beautiful," said someone, but he sounded sarcastic. The exposed wood on the inside of the house had looked good, solid, and free of rot or mold. I still didn't want to see the outside. Our life in this house was about to change. It would be like moving in again, to the house I had imagined when I bought the house it was.

Rick was pounding something through the ceiling.

"I don't know why these guys used to use this junk," he said. I hoped he didn't also say that it was rotting. I thought I might stay in my room forever, with my hands over my ears, mute and invisible. I was going to wait until they had cut the hole for the window and had seen everything there was to see. I was going to wait until the worst was over. Until there were no more problems. The plumber would come. The plasterer would come. The counter would come. The floor would go in. We would have a sink. We would have a stove. We would be able to cook, although only one of us really liked to. Then I would come out, bank account depleted.

Fear is a poor companion. It gives no rest. It had been with me for some time, and I was weary of it, but I didn't know how to rid myself of its company. "MEDITATE," I wrote at the top of my list every day, and every day I didn't. I had a hard time sitting still in the most restful of times. Now, in these times, full of stress and worry, sitting still was nigh impossible. I made some effort every day to take a couple of deep breaths and get a sense of my head actually being attached to my body. At all other times it was a free-for-all in which the tornado of my anxious thoughts won handily over my body, with its aching leg and need for rest, and spun wildly into the unknown. I would learn, eventually, that everything did work out. It would have been nice to have known in the process, while the pipe with the sock in it was still sticking through the ceiling.

At about three, when I had to leave to pick up my daughter, I walked out of my bedroom and into the kitchen to see the window guys standing there eating steaming subs, looking at the pond through a ten-by-four-foot hole. My dog sat on the floor next to them watching them eat.

About the chickens:

Some days it is hard to say just what is so attractive about chickens. They are not the cleanest of creatures. They are poor housekeepers. They are sometimes mean. They constitute a farm chore. More than other animals, in my experience, with chickens there's always something. Something wrong with the coop, the roost is too low, the ventilation inadequate. You run out of bedding. You run out of food. You run out of grit, or scratch, or sunflower seeds. They need more protein, they need more calcium, they need more grass. They get dirty, or they get worms, or mites, or fungus. Their toes fall off. Their beaks fall off. Their feet fall off. Their combs fall off. One famous chicken, Mike the Headless Chicken, lived for eighteen months without a head. He has his own Web site. Otherwise everything that can go wrong seems to. The crop impacts, the vent prolapses, the eggs go spongy. And everything, everything, wants to eat them.

Yep. No question about it. I don't need chickens. I don't want chickens. But, I wouldn't mind a house by the ocean. Even if it needs work.

To read more about raising chickens, visit Nan's posts here and here and here.

To read about Mike the Headless Chicken, go here.

In Defense of Food

In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto by Michael Pollan
Nonfiction - Cultural Studies
2008 Penguin Books
Winner of the James Beard Award
Finished on 6/11/09
Rating: 4.5/5 (Terrific!)

Eating with the fullest pleasure—pleasure, that is, that does not depend on ignorance—is perhaps the profoundest enactment of our connection with the world. In this pleasure we experience and celebrate our dependence and our gratitude, for we are living from mystery, from creatures we did not make and powers we cannot comprehend.
~ Wendell Berry

Publisher's Blurb:

Food. There's plenty of it around, and we all love to eat it. So why should anyone need to defend it?

Because in the so-called Western diet, food has been replaced by nutrients, and common sense by confusion—most of what we're consuming today is no longer the product of nature but of food science. The result is what Michael Pollan calls the American Paradox: The more we worry about nutrition, the less healthy we seem to become. With In Defense of Food, Pollan proposes a new (and very old) answer to the question of what we should eat that comes down to seven simple but liberating words: Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants. Pollan's bracing and eloquent manifesto shows us how we can start making thoughtful food choices that will enrich our lives, enlarge our sense of what it means to be healthy, and bring pleasure back to eating.

While I'm not a vegan or even a vegetarian, I have always been a bit of a health food nut. I eat lots of vegetables and fruit. Not too much red meat. Fish at least once or twice a week. I gave up margarine and squishy white bread years ago. I prefer dark chocolate and red wine over milk chocolate and sodas. Unless we've decided to watch a DVD while eating, my husband and I eat all our meals (including breakfast and lunch on the weekends) together at the dining room table. I can't remember the last time I ate in a car.

But don't get me wrong. I love Lays potato chips, Dove Bars, peanut M&Ms, and an ice cold beer as much as the next person. I love New York strip steaks medium rare and baked potatoes loaded with butter, sour cream, bacon and cheese. I love hash browns and cheeseburgers and nachos (with real cheese, not that fake orange stuff they glop all over the tortilla chips at a baseball game). I love donuts and Bunny Tracks ice cream and Hershey Bars with Almonds.

To me, it's all about moderation. I don't deny myself those insanely fattening items, but I also know that I have absolutely no will power, so I don't stock them in my house. I treat myself when I know I've been eating well for an extended period of time. This works for me and I don't feel deprived. Of course, now I'm craving everything, and tonight's meal is more along the lines of healthy rather than decadent. Sigh. So, back to the book...

I thoroughly enjoyed Pollan's journalistic style (informative without getting too bogged down in the science) and plan to read The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals, Second Nature: A Gardener's Education, A Place of My Own: The Education of an Amateur Builder, and The Botany of Desire: A Plant's-Eye View of the World. I'm also quite interested in Barbara Kingsolver's Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life, as well as Harvest for Hope: A Guide to Mindful Eating by Jane Goodall. Oh, and, Mindless Eating: Why We Eat More Than We Think by Brian Wansink.

And then, of course, there are the movies, Food, Inc. and King Corn.

So, just how much did I like this book? Well, there are 201 pages of text. I highlighted 73 pages (36% of the book). I think that's a record! And just what did I come away with after reading this book? Well, I'm so glad you asked. :)

• Eating a little meat isn’t going to kill you, though it might be better approached as a side dish than as a main. And you’re better off eating whole fresh foods rather than processed food products.
  

• If you’re concerned about your health, you should probably avoid products that make health claims. Why? Because a health claim on a food product is a strong indication it’s not really food, and food is what you want to eat.
  

• Part of what drove my grandparents’ food culture from the American table was official scientific opinion, which, beginning in the 1960s, decided that animal fat was a deadly substance.
  

• Sooner or later, everything solid we’ve been told about the links between our diet and our health seems to get blown away in the gust of the most recent study.

• Food is also about pleasure, about community, about family and spirituality, about our relationship to the natural world, and about expressing our identity.
  

• No people on earth worry more about the health consequences of their food choices than we Americans do—and no people suffer from as many diet-related health problems.
  

• All of our uncertainties about nutrition should not obscure the plain fact that the chronic diseases that now kill most of us can be traced directly to the industrialization of our food: the rise of highly processed foods and refined grains; the use of chemicals to raise plants and animals in huge monocultures; the superabundance of cheap calories of sugar and fat produced by modern agriculture; and the narrowing of the biological diversity of the human diet to a tiny handful of staple crops, notably wheat, corn, and soy.

• ...many date the current epidemic of obesity and diabetes to the late 1970s, when Americans began bingeing on carbohydrates, ostensibly as a way to avoid the evils of fat.
  

• ...the sheer abundance of food in America has bred “a vague indifference to food, manifested in a tendency to eat and run, rather than to dine and savor.”
  

• In order to eat well we need to invest more time, effort, and resources in providing for our sustenance, to dust off a word, than most of us do today. A hallmark of the Western diet is food that is fast, cheap, and easy. Americans spend less than 10 percent of their income on food; they also spend less than a half hour a day preparing meals and little more than an hour enjoying them.
  

• HOW a culture eats may have just as much of a bearing on health as WHAT a culture eats.
  

• ...the French eat very differently than we do. They seldom snack, and they eat most of their food at meals shared with other people. They eat small portions and don’t come back for seconds. And they spend considerably more time eating than we do. Taken together, these habits contribute to a food culture in which the French consume fewer calories than we do, yet manage to enjoy them far more.
  

1. Don’t eat anything your great grandmother wouldn’t recognize as food.
2. Don’t eat anything incapable of rotting.
3. Avoid food products containing ingredients that are a) unfamiliar, b) unpronounceable, c) more than five in number or that include d) high-fructose corn syrup
4. Avoid food products that make health claims. For a food to make a health claim on it’s package it must first HAVE a package, so right off the bat it’s more likely to be a processed than a whole food.
5. Shop the peripheries of the supermarket and stay out of the middle.
6. Get out of the supermarket whenever possible. When you eat from the farmers’ market, you automatically eat food that is in season, which is usually when it is most nutritious.
7. Eat mostly plants, especially leaves.
8. You are what what you eat eats too.
9. If you have the space, buy a freezer. Freezing (unlike canning) does not significantly diminish the nutritional value of produce.
10. Eat like an omnivore.
11. Eat well-grown food from healthy soils.
12. Eat wild foods when you can.
13. Be the kind of person who takes supplements. We know that people who take supplements are generally healthier than the rest of us, and we also know that, in controlled studies, most of the supplements they take don’t appear to work. Probably the supplement takers are healthier for reasons having nothing to do with the pills: They’re typically more health conscious, better educated, and more affluent. So to the extent you can, be the KIND of person who would take supplements, and then save your money.
14. Eat more like the French or the Italians or the Japanese or the Indians or the Greeks.
15. Regard nontraditional foods with skepticism. Innovation is interesting, but when it comes to something like food, it pays to approach novelties with caution.
16. Don’t look for the magic bullet in the traditional diet.
17. Have a glass of wine with dinner.
18. Pay more, eat less.
19. Eat meals.
20. Do all your eating at a table.
21. Don’t get your fuel from the same place your car does.
22. Try not to eat alone.
23. Consult your gut.
24. Eat slowly.
25. Cook and, if you can, plant a garden.

I love to cook. And my husband isn't a picky eater. Making a slow change to eat more mindfully is going to be fairly easy for us. We're not planning any major changes, but over time, I think we'd both like to move away from the processed "foods" (i.e. non-dairy creamer, Splenda, whole wheat bread with high-fructose corn syrup, etc.) We had fun at the farmer's market this past weekend and plan to return every week. We're toying with the idea of building raised beds so we can grow our own vegetables next summer, but we may decide to admit early defeat to the huge rabbit population in our backyard and rely on the local farmers to supply us with their bounty.

In Defense of Food was my book club's selection for June. We had a record turnout for the discussion (not sure if that had more to do with the book or the fact that we knew we would wind up sitting around a swimming pool on a 90+ degree evening!). In any event, almost everyone read the book and thought it was quite good. Some members felt they already knew most of what Pollan presented, yet I thought it was more a case of a light-bulb moment rather than just affirming what I already knew. A few others mentioned that they thought the book was a bit repetitive. I have to agree, although it wasn't something that bothered me as I was reading.

It's been almost three years since I read French Women Don't Get Fat. (Click on title to read my review.) I remember feeling the same enthusiasm after finishing that book as I do now. There are definite similarities between Pollan's doctrine and that espoused in Guiliano's book. I suppose a lot of it boils down to common sense.

Final thoughts?

Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.

and

Moderation in all things, including moderation.

Listen to this wonderful CBC Radio interview with Pollan here. (Scroll all the way down to the bottom of the page.)

For a list of more interviews, go here.

Maus I

Maus I: A Survivor's Tale: My Father Bleeds History by Art Spiegelman
Nonfiction - Graphic Memoir
1986 Pantheon
Winner of the 1992 Pulitzer Prize
Finished on 6/13/09
Rating: 3.5 (Good)



Publisher's Blurb:

Maus is the story of Vladek Spiegelman, a Jewish survivor of Hitler's Europe, and his son, a cartoonist who tries to come to terms with his father, his father's terrifying story, and History itself. Its form, the cartoon (the Nazis are cats, the Jews mice), succeeds perfectly in shocking us out of any lingering sense of familiarity with the events described, approaching, as it does, the unspeakable through the diminutive. It is, as the New York Times Book Review has commented, "a remarkable feat of documentary detail and novelistic vividness...an unfolding literary event."

Moving back and forth from Poland to Rego Park, New York, Maus tells two powerful stories: The first is Spiegelman's father's account of how he and his wife survived Hitler's Europe, a harrowing tale filled with countless brushes with death, improbable escapes, and the terror of confinement and betrayal. The second is the author's tortured relationship with his aging father as they try to lead a normal life of minor arguments and passing visits against a backdrop of history too large to pacify. At all levels, this is the ultimate survivor's tale--and that, too, of the children who somehow survive even the survivors.

Part I of Maus takes Spiegelman's parents to the gates of Auschwitz and him to the edge of despair. Put aside all your preconceptions. These cats and mice are not Tom and Jerry, but something quite different. This is a new kind of literature.

It's been years since I first heard about this book and I'm glad I finally got around to getting a copy to read. I've never read a graphic novel (although that's a misnomer for this work, as it's not fiction but rather a memoir), so I wasn't sure what to expect. Would the cartoons distract me? Would they minimize the horrors of the Holocaust? Surprisingly, I found I didn't spend too much time looking at the drawings and wondered if this was common or if a true graphic novel demands more attention to the artwork. And I certainly didn't think this form of narrative did anything to minimize the severity of the story. If anything, its impact might actually have been enhanced, rather than minimized, by the fact that it's such a horrible story told in a medium normally reserved for more innocent, child-like pursuits.

Maus is a deeply moving story, especially knowing it's Spiegelman's father's true history. In spite of the subject matter, I enjoyed this compelling book (as well as one can enjoy such a tragic tale) and I look forward to reading Maus II: A Survivor's Tale: And Here My Troubles Began.

Go here to listen to an excellent NPR interview with Art Spiegelman.

One Square Inch of Silence

One Square Inch of Silence: One Man's Search for Natural Silence in a Noisy World by Gordon Hempton and John Grossman
Nonfiction - Environment
2009 Free Press
Quit on 4/30/09
Rating: DNF



See how nature—trees, flowers, grass—grows in silence; see the stars, the moon and the sun—how they move in silence... We need silence to be able to touch souls.
~ Mother Teresa

Publisher's Blurb:

Having completed a coast-to-coast mission to preserve and protect natural soundscapes, Gordon Hempton proclaims that "the extinction rate for quiet places vastly exceeds the rate of species extinction." Part road trip, part cultural chronicle, One Square Inch of Silence is an eloquent celebration of nature and an ear-opening journey into Earth's vanishing sanctuaries.

Like a sound safari, One Square Inch of Silence recounts Hempton's trek across the country to capture the sounds of American landscapes and the reflections of the American people on the importance of quiet in their lives. Birdsong, melting ice, the bugling elk all achieve immortality as the author addresses questions of surprising importance, including: Why isn't natural quiet part of the ecological agenda? Culminating in the author's arrival in Washington, D.C., where he pleads his case for the preservation of natural quiet, One Square Inch of Silence is one of the most impassioned, original environmental works ever written.

I can't tell you how many times I've toyed with the idea of going back and finishing this book. I have a dozen passages marked with sticky notes and there's just something that appeals to me about Hempton's idea to research (and fight for) silence in this crazy, chaotic world of ours. Not to mention reading about someone else's road trip!

But for now, I'm going to call it quits. However, I will leave you with several of my favorite passages and blurbs. Maybe, in doing so, I might just convince myself to keep the book for a future read.

One Square Inch of Silence is more than a book; it is a place in the Hoh Rain Forest, part of Olympic National Park—arguably the quietest place in the United States. But it, too, is endangered, protected only by a policy that is neither practiced by the National Park Service itself nor supported by adequate laws. My hope is that this book will trigger a quiet awakening in all those willing to become true listeners.

and

Silence is a sound, many, many sounds. I've heard more than I can count. Silence is the moonlit song of the coyote signing the air, and the answer of its mate. It is the falling whisper of snow that will later melt with an astonishing reggae rhythm so crisp that you will want to dance to it. It is the sound of pollinating winged insects vibrating soft tunes as they defensively dart in and out of the pine boughs to temporarily escape the breeze, a mix of insect hum and pine sigh that will stick with you all day. Silence is the passing flock of chestnut-backed chickadees and red-breasted nuthatches, chirping and fluttering, reminding you of your own curiosity.

Have you heard the rain lately? America's great northwest rain forest, no surprise, is an excellent place to listen. Here's what I've heard at One Square Inch of Silence. The first of the rainy season is not wet at all. Initially, countless seeds fall from the towering trees. This is soon followed by the soft applause of fluttering maple leaves, which settle oh so quietly as a winter blanket for the seeds. But this quiet concert is merely a prelude. When the first of many great rainstorms arrives, unleashing its mighty anthem, each species of tree makes its own sound in the wind and rain. Even the largest of the raindrops may never strike the ground. Nearly 300 feet overhead, high in the forest canopy, the leaves and bark absorb much of the moisture... until this aerial sponge becomes saturated and drops re-form and descend farther... striking lower branches and cascading onto sound-absorbing moss drapes... tapping on epiphytic ferns... faintly plopping on huckleberry bushes... and whacking the hard, firm salal leaves... before finally, the drops inaudibly bend the delicate clover-like leaves of the wood sorrel and drip to leak into the ground. Heard day or night, this liquid ballet will continue for more than an hour after the actual rain ceases.

Hempton's passion:

I listen to the world—this is my job and my passion as an acoustic ecologist. I've recorded on every continent except Antarctica. My recordings are used in everything from video games and museum exhibits to nature albums, movie soundtracks, and educational products. More than 25 years of recordings in all manner of natural setting have swelled my library to 3,000 gigabytes. I've captured the flutter of butterfly wings, the thunderous booming of waterfalls, the jet-like swoosh of a bullet train, the wisp of a floating leaf, the passionate trill of a birdsong, the soft coo of a coyote pup. I'd rather listen than speak. Listening is a wordless process of receiving honest impressions.

What is One Square Inch?

One Square Inch of Silence was designated on Earth Day 2005 (April 22), when, with an audience of none, I placed a small red stone, a gift from an elder of the Quileute tribe, on a log in the Hoh Rain Forest at Olympic National Park, approximately three miles from the visitors center. With this marker in place, I hoped to protect and manage the natural soundscape in Olympic Park's backcountry wilderness. My logic is simple and not simply symbolic: If a loud noise, such as the passing of an aircraft, can affect many square miles, then a natural place, if maintained in a 1000 percent noise-free condition, will likewise affect many square miles around it. Protect that single square inch of land from noise pollution, and quiet will prevail over a much larger area of the park.

On Peace & Quiet:

Good things come from a quiet place: study, prayer, music, transformation, worship, communion. The words peace and quiet are all but synonymous, and are often spoken in the same breath. A quiet place is the think tank of the soul, the spawning ground of truth and beauty.

On the Lack of Sound of Silence:

Sadly, though, as big as it is, our planet offers fewer and fewer quiet havens. This is especially true in developed nations, where the high consumption of fossil fuels translates into noise pollution. It's come to this: there is likely no place on earth untouched by modern noise. Even far from paved roads in the Amazon rain forest you can still hear the drone of distant outboard motors on dugout canoes and from the wrist of a native guide the hourly beep of a digital watch. The question is no longer whether noise will be present, but how often it will intrude and for how long. The interval between noise encroachments (measured in minutes) is the measure of quiet these days. In my experience, a silence longer than 15 minutes is now extremely rare in the United States and long gone in Europe. Most places do not have quiet at all; instead, one or more noise sources prevail around the clock. Even in wilderness areas and our national parks, the average noise-free interval has shrunk to less than five minutes during daylight hours. By my reckoning, the rate of quiet places extinction vastly exceeds the rate of species extinction. Today there are fewer than a dozen quiet places and by that I mean places where natural silence reigns over many square miles.

Be sure to take a look at the author's website, as well as this video clip about One Square Inch of Silence.

And then maybe consider replacing your leaf blower with a rake or broom.

Shhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

Summer Solstice

It's the first day of Summer!!

Summer afternoon,
Summer afternoon...
the two most beautiful words
in the English language.
~ Henry James

Barnes & Noble (Store #2939) Bestseller!

Click on photos to enlarge

May I just say that my husband rocks?! For those of you who didn't receive the email blast (or see this post about his new release), Rod participated in our local Barnes & Noble author event with seven other authors this past Saturday. It was exciting and stressful and great fun! And, we both want to send out a huge THANK YOU to everyone who came out to support Rod on this very special day. What a thrill to see so many friends and family (some of whom we haven't seen in years!). To think we were worried nobody would show up -- halfway into the signing, I was worried we'd run out of books! And we nearly did!

But the biggest thrill of all was when I walked into work this morning and was informed that Rod's book was our store's #1 seller for the week. Yep, he beat out Jodi Picoult (My Sister's Keeper), Stephenie Meyer (Eclipse), Mark Levin (Liberty and Tyranny: A Conservative Manifesto), William Young (The Shack), and Dean Koontz (Relentless)! Whoohoo! :)

We also want to thank Hilary Sire (B&N Community Resource Manager extraordinaire) for putting on such a fantastic event. Rod says it was truly an honor to be part of such a memorable day.

Rod & Pat

Pat & Kim

Rod & Katie
(Rod's editor while freelancing for Smart Computing)

Rod, Jen, Maddie & Emily
(adoring nieces & sister-in-law)

Rod & Shirley-Mom

Sarah, Brent & Rod

Mary Kate, Josh & Rod

Rod & Dave

Daniel & Rod

Rod & Alison

Rod with Bob & Miss Linda

Rod with Barry & Lynn

Apparently, not everyone was impressed with Rod's book. We'll give her time. I'm sure she'll come around in a few years.

The Wildwater Walking Club

The Wildwater Walking Club by Claire Cook
Fiction
2009 Voice (Hyperion)
Finished on 6/1/09
Rating: 2.5/5 (Fair)





Publisher's Blurb

When Noreen takes a buyout and gets dumped by a boyfriend in one fell swoop, she finds herself with nothing but time to notice everything that's missing in her life. Tess is the teacher next door, who thought she'd be spending the summer with her college-bound daughter, but now that daughter isn't speaking to her. The Wildwater Walking Club is complete when they meet Rosie, the dutiful daughter who moved onto her parents' lavender farm after her mother died—and dragged her family with her.

As the Wildwater women walk and talk, and talk and walk, they tally their steps, share their secrets, and let life take them in some new and surprising directions. Throw in a road trip to Seattle for a lavender festival, a career coaching group filled with unemployed Boomers, a clothesline controversy that could only happen in the 'burbs, plenty of romantic twists and turns, and a quirky multigenerational cast of supporting characters, and the result is pure Claire Cook- fun, fast, and totally fabulous.

I started running for exercise when I was eleven years old. We had recently moved to Del Mar, California and I would run from our house down to the beach and back. Looking at Google Maps, I now know it was a little over three miles, round-trip. I also peeked at the Google street view of our house. Wow! It hasn't changed a bit in 36 years!

My passion for running continued for many more years. I didn't join the high school cross country team, but I did take a Beach Jogging class during my sophomore year. My husband loves to tease me about this every chance he gets! "Only in Del Mar, California can you take a Beach Jogging class or Surf P.E., yet never be required to read Shakespeare!"

After my daughter was born, I decided to get back into shape by running in 10K races and eventually worked up to longer distances, running in two half-marathons. But over the years, all those miles caused quite a lot of wear and tear on my knees and I finally had to give it up. When we moved to our current house, I started walking on the bike trail, which is located just a few blocks down the street. It's quite a popular trail, especially after work and on the weekends, but it's not too crowded mid-day. Until we got our dog, I used to walk for an hour (approx. 4 miles) five days a week. Unfortunately, Annie-dog tends to stroll at a more leisurely pace than I prefer, at least for a good workout, so my walking routine has fallen by the wayside. That is until I read Claire Cook's recent release, The Wildwater Walking Club. As I got into the story, I was inspired to turn off the computer, put on my tennis shoes, grab my iPod and hit the trail—without the dog! It felt great to get back out on the trail, walking briskly to my music, swinging my arms, smiling at all the others who were out walking, running, riding their bikes and, yes, walking their dogs. It felt so good to get my heart rate up and feel that stretch in the back of my legs. Walking Annie just doesn't cut it, I'm afraid.

I love my new workout routine, but can't say the same for Cook's latest novel. I didn't enjoy it nearly as well as Summer Blowout, never coming to care about any of the one-dimensional characters or their plights. The dialogue and certain situations didn't always ring true and the simplistic plot left me hoping for more. I really would've liked deeper conversations among the three women as they got to know each other on their walks and during their trip to the Pacific Northwest. The thoughts and feelings (and occasional bickering) they shared felt trite and superficial.

If you're looking for a light summer read, similar to Kris Radish's The Elegant Gathering of White Snows or Annie Freeman's Fabulous Traveling Funeral, this is just the book for you! If you're looking for a book that will motivate you to get up off the couch and start walking, grab a copy of this book. Don't forget to pick-up a pedometer so you can measure your steps. 10,000 steps per day is the goal. Happy reading & walking!

For more information about the 10,000 step walking program, visit this site.

Be sure to click on Cook's website to read her walking group guide, as well as an excerpt from the book.

A Month in Summary - May '09

Click on photos to enlarge to full size

Well, here we are. I have just recorded my worst month of reading ever. Perhaps a more appropriate title for this post should be "A Month in Summery!" If you read this post, you'll understand why I haven't done much in the way of getting through the towering stacks of books in my house. However, my house & garden look lovely!

So without further chatter, here are the stats.

The Sharper Your Knife, the Less You Cry by Kathleen Flinn (4/5)

The French Gardener by Santa Montefiore (DNF)

Click on the titles to read my reviews.

Favorite of the month: The Sharper Your Knife, the Less You Cry by Kathleen Flinn

Books Read 1
DNF 1
Male Authors 0
Female Authors 1
New-To-Me Authors 1
Epistolary 0
Audio 0
Fiction 0
Nonfiction 1
Historical Fiction 0
Coming-of-Age 0
Classic 0
Poetry 0
Teen 0
Children's 0
Sci-Fi 0
Fantasy 0
Horror 0
Romance 0
Humor 0
Travel 0
Memoir 1
Short Stories 0
Essays 0
Culinary 1
Mystery/Thriller 0
Re-read 0
Mine 1
Borrowed 0
ARC 0

Note: Only books completed are counted in the above totals with, of course, the exception of the DNF category.

The French Gardener

The French Gardener: A Novel by Santa Montefiore
Fiction
2009 Touchstone
Quit on 5/25/09
Rating: DNF




Publisher's Blurb:

A neglected garden. A cottage that holds a secret. A mysterious Frenchman (handsome, naturally). A family in need of some love. These elements are entwined in this heartwarming novel by the author reviewers consistently compare to Maeve Binchy and Rosamunde Pilcher.

It begins as Miranda and David Claybourne move into a country house with a once-beautiful garden. But reality turns out to be very different from their dream. Soon the latent unhappiness in the family begins to come to the surface, isolating each family member in a bubble of resentment and loneliness.

Then an enigmatic Frenchman arrives on their doorstep. With the wisdom of nature, he slowly begins to heal the past and the present. But who is he? When Miranda reads about his past in a diary she finds in the cottage by the garden, the whole family learns that a garden, like love itself, can restore the human spirit, not just season after season but generation after generation.

Wise and winsome, poignant and powerfully moving, The French Gardener is a contemporary story told with an old-fashioned sensibility steeped in the importance of family and the magical power of love.

Another gardening novel bites the dust! I love Rosamunde Pilcher, but the blurb has got it all wrong; this novel hardly comes close to her lovely writing and endearing characters. After close to a hundred pages, I decided I'd given it my best effort. Perhaps given more time, I would've come to care for the characters, but after just 40 pages, I was annoyed with Miranda (the self-absorbed mother), Gus (the bratty, cruel son), and David (the pompous cheating ass of a husband). I kept going, but finally had to call it quits. Life's too short! Time to move on.

Unintentional Bloggy Break

Yes, I'm still here! It's been over two weeks since my last post. Yikes! This is definitely the longest bloggy break I've taken without some sort of an announcement. I hope you haven't all given up on me.

I've been busy with work (back to my regular 7-2 schedule, although next week I'll be working 7-3), gardening, entertaining, and another road trip. We were in St. Louis for several days in April and hit the road again over Memorial Day weekend, taking the motorcycle and MiniCooper out to Broken Bow (located in the Nebraska Sandhills). I've been busy with all the photos I shot on both trips, posting a daily shot on my photoblog.

But what have I been reading, you ask? Nothing!! I finished one book in May. Yep, you read that right. Just one! However, remember that long to-do list I posted earlier? Well, I've accomplished quite a bit, which of course makes me very happy.

Wash the front porch and deck (which are both covered in a lovely layer of fine, yellow pollen) Did it!

Wash the cars My sweet husband took care of this for me.

Wash the windows (I'm willing to skip the ones that nobody but us looks out) Still needs to be done.

Paint the guest room and my office (This has been on my list for a few years now and every spring I say, this is the year!) Calling about this tomorrow.

Buy annuals and replacement perennials for flower beds and pots on deck. Plant them! Almost finished!

Tackle the weeding before it gets out of hand. (Too late!) Now I just need to stay on top of them.

Get the carpets cleaned. Done!

Schedule A/C tune-up before the heat & humidity arrive. Done!

Continue sorting and posting photos recently shot on a couple of trips to Missouri. On-going processing, especially now that I've added another set of photos to the mix!

Store all the winter clothing and gear that was tossed into a big pile in the basement over a month ago. Oops. Forgot all about this.

Start brushing Annie on a regular basis. She's beginning to blow her winter coat and we're back to dealing with all that beautiful dog hair. On-going chore.

Start using the Swiss exercise ball I bought over a month ago (and have only used once!). Thank goodness I decided to get that rather than a Wii Fit. I'm only out $25 if it doesn't get used as often as it should. Hmmmm. Maybe tomorrow...

Post new recipes on my food blog. It's been neglected for far too long and I really want to try this recipe. Hmmm. Maybe today?

Read more! I'm still reading the same book I started two weeks ago. It's not long or involved. I'm just too busy (or tired) to read more than a few pages every night. I'm trying! I've got a couple of books going right now, but gave up on a couple that weren't holding my interest.

Post my monthly summary for April! We're almost halfway through May, for heaven's sakes. And now it's time for May's!

So, I'm almost ready to settle down and enjoy the summer with lots of good books. And get out on the lake in my kayak. And spend some time floating in a pool. And ride my bike. Guess I really do need more hours in my day.

Oh, and did I happen to mention a particular book signing I plan to attend next weekend? My favorite biker/car-washer/editorial dude is participating in a local author event at my Barnes & Noble from 2-4 on Saturday. Should be great fun! Stay tuned for photos of that exciting event!

The Sharper Your Knife, the Less You Cry

The Sharper Your Knife, the Less You Cry: Love, Laughter, and Tears at the World's Most Famous Cooking School by Kathleen Flinn
Nonfiction - Culinary Memoir
2007 Viking
Finished on 5/16/09
Rating: 4/5 (Very Good)


Publisher's Blurb:

In 2003, Kathleen Flinn was a thirty-six-year-old American in London who felt trapped in corporate middle management—until her boss eliminated her job while she was on vacation. Ignoring her mother's advice that she find another job immediately or "never get hired anywhere ever again," Flinn cleared out her savings account and moved to Paris to pursue a dream—a diploma from the venerable Le Cordon Bleu cooking school.

But instead of being ushered into "a glamorous world of soufflés and foie gras," Flinn found herself struggling in a stew of hot-tempered chefs, competitive classmates, and her own "wretchedly inadequate" French. She trudged home traumatized by gutting fish, severing the heads off rabbits, and dropping an entire roast duck on the floor moments before having to present her plate to the presiding chef. One day she was even advised that her tronçons de colin pochés needed "a bit more salt" from the homeless man who sat near the school's entrance.

As the story moves through the various classes, the basics of French cuisine—the ingredients, cooking techniques, wine, and more than two dozen recipes—are interwoven, but not every page is spent in the kitchen. Flinn also offers her experience of the vibrant sights and sounds of the markets, shops, and avenues of Paris.

In time, Flinn triumphs in her battle with puff pastry, masters her sauces, and wins over the toughest chef. More important, though, she finds within herself the strength to pause on her life's journey to challenge a career-focused mentality and attempt a discovery of what really matters to her. She even comes to realize that the love of her life has been right in front of her the whole time.

Fans of Julie & Julia, Cooking for Mr. Latte, and Eat, Pray, Love will be amused, inspired, and richly rewarded by this vibrant tale of romance, food, Paris, and pursuing a dream.

I love memoirs and since I enjoy cooking almost as much as reading and photography, culinary memoirs are high on my list of favorites. Stephanie (from The Written Word) was kind enough to send me a copy of Flinn's book early last year. I've been trying to get to all the "gift" books I've received over the years and am glad I finally took the time to read this gem! I thoroughly enjoyed reading about Kathleen's experiences at Le Cordon Bleu. My copy is littered with sticky notes!

Inspired to do something significant with her life (after typing up a depressingly short obituary for her hometown newspaper), and reminded of her parents' creed that "Life is not a dress rehearsal," Flinn wrote the following "Statement of Motivation" for her application to Le Cordon Bleu:

I have wanted to attend Le Cordon Bleu for at least 10 years. No, that's not true. I think I've always wanted to go to Le Cordon Bleu, even before I knew that's what I wanted. I have been passionate about food and cooking since I was a little girl. Professionally, I have worked as a journalist for more than a decade. I once figured out that by age 30, I'd written a thousand stories. I've worked as a restaurant critic and a food writer, and I believe this training will give me greater understanding and perspective in that aspect of my career. It is my dream to write books about food, about cooking, about nourishing people, heart, soul and stomach....I don't know that I want to be a chef, or that I particularly want to work in the food industry when I am done with my training....I just know that going to Le Cordon Bleu is something that I have to do.

Well, I love to cook, and I love to read memoirs about cooking, but I definitely have no desire to attend a formal cooking school or work as a chef in a restaurant! It sounds extremely demanding (and at times a bit cruel) and I'm afraid I'd walk out without a diploma and absent any of the enthusiasm I might have once had for cooking.

Flinn's experience as a journalist is quite apparent. Her memoir is not only a joy to read, but quite informative. I learned a great deal about the history of Le Cordon Bleu, as well as numerous cooking techniques. And, of course, I marked several recipes to sample in the privacy of my own kitchen. Recipes such as Potage "Minestrone" à la Façon de Ma Mère, Boeuf à la Bourguignonne, Poulet Cordon Bleu, Spaghetti Bolognaise de Sharon, Pizza Grillée, Sauce Tomate aux Herbes et à l'Ail, Coq au Vin et Thym, Filet de Bar au Lait de Coco et Épices Douces, and Boeuf en Croûte Champignons avec Sauce Vin Rouge. How hard could they be? :)

On French cooking and butter:

Chef moves on to the mashed potatoes that will accompany the grilled sirloin we'll prepare in the rest of our practical. "You should add roughly half as much butter as potatoes," Anne translates as the chef churns soft just-boiled potatoes through a food mill. "Un petit peu de beurre," Chef says—"a little bit of butter"—tossing three sticks of butter in. He beats them in with a wide plastic spoon and pours in a generous dose of cream. Mike will love them, but my thighs will not.

On the reality of a professional cooking school:

With a plastic spoon, he scoops up some sauce for a taste, then cuts into my fish. "The fillet is not even, your fish is overcooked, your sauce is too thin, it needs more salt, and your parsley isn't chopped finely enough. Thank you," he looks at my name tag, "Miss Flinn." With a bored tone, he calls, "Next?"

That's it. After three hours, two fish, some three thousand calories in wine and butter, and ruined notes, I clean up, put my tiny fillets in my enormous Tupperware, and wearily head downstairs with Kim, L.P., LizKat, and Anna-Clare, the woman who works across from me.

and

Kim drops her knives on the floor. "This isn't cooking, it's like learning some complicated sport," she says wearily, tugging off her necktie.

"Why am I so flustered in the kitchen?" Anna-Clare wonders aloud. Like me, she had along dreamed of coming to Le Cordon Bleu and finally convinced her advertising agency to give her a three-month sabbatical so that she could. "It's just bizarre. In my job, I have to make presentations to marketing directors and corporate chiefs all the time, and I can do that without being nervous. I mean, I knew this would be kind of stressful, but I'm surprised at how the scrutiny of the chefs completely unsettles me."

"But you're probably not as emotionally tied to those presentations," I tell her.

I know how they both feel, especially Anna-Clare. In my own kitchen, I'm usually sipping a glass of wine while I cook. Now I'm exhausted, and it's only the second day. I look at my bloodstained apron, gray bits still clinging to parts of it. This isn't like Sabrina at all.

Audrey Hepburn would never have ended up covered in fish guts.

In addition to reading all the entertaining details about a cooking school, I enjoyed a personal challenge of my own. I attempted to translate the chefs' French before reading Flinn's translations. It's been 30 years since I sat in Monsieur Beckers' high school French class! I was very surprised to discover I could understand more than 50% of the French (and closer to 80% by the end of the book). Stupefier! ;)

I've read a few culinary memoirs (and novels) and this rates right up there with Julie and Julia, On Rue Tatin, and The School of Essential Ingredients. Definitely a keeper!

Further praise from a fellow blogger:

With the full support of her then boyfriend Mike, Kathleen embarks on a life changing experience. Not your typical “cooking school memoir” Kathleen tells the story of grueling cooking classes, looking for affordable Paris apartments, planning a wedding and mastering the art of puff pastry with wit and charm. At times laugh out loud funny (the author describing how her so-so French got her the nickname “the crazy pizza lady” from a local restaurant) to the more touching moments of her life (in particular when Mike is involved in a terrible accident), The Sharper Your Knife was a delightful look into the life of a women trying to make her way in Paris. (Stephanie, from The Written Word)

Click here to read Stephanie's interview with Kathleen Flinn.

A Month in Summary - April '09

We're already halfway into May and I'm just getting to this monthly summary. Why is it that winter drags on forever, and yet spring seems to fly by like a bat out of hell? As I mentioned in my previous post, I really could use a few more hours in my day. Since I already get up before the sun, I suppose I could try to stay up a bit later. Am I the only one who crawls into bed with a book at 8:30?!

In spite of the single Did Not Finish (brief review to follow, says she with determined optimism!), April turned out to be another good month of reading. Sandford has always been hit-or-miss, so I wasn't terribly surprised (or disappointed) that Mortal Prey wasn't as entertaining as some of his earlier works. I thoroughly enjoyed Chris Cleave's powerful novel and am tempted to go back and read his debut, Incendiary. The Hunger Games was fabulous! Everyone in my face-to-face book club loved this book and we're all anxiously awaiting the release of the sequel this fall. The Midwife is the type of memoir that is so vividly written, it stays with you long after the final page. I have a copy to give away, so if you're interested, leave a comment with your email address and I'll draw a winning name this Sunday night.

Click on the titles to read my reviews.

Mortal Prey by John Sandford (2.5/5)

Little Bee by Chris Cleave (4.5/5)

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins (4.5/5)

The Midwife: A Memoir of Birth, Joy and Hard Times by Jennifer Worth (4/5)

One Square Inch of Silence by Gordon Hempton (DNF)

Favorite of the month: The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

Books Read 4
DNF 1
Male Authors 2
Female Authors 2
New-To-Me Authors 3
Epistolary 0
Audio 0
Fiction 3
Nonfiction 1
Historical Fiction 0
Coming-of-Age 0
Classic 0
Poetry 0
Teen 1
Children's 0
Sci-Fi 1
Fantasy 0
Horror 0
Romance 0
Humor 0
Travel 0
Memoir 1
Short Stories 0
Essays 0
Culinary 0
Mystery/Thriller 1
Re-read 0
Mine 1
Borrowed 3
ARC 1

Note: Only books completed are counted in the above totals with, of course, the exception of the DNF category.

Wanted: More Time in My Day

What is it about spring that creates such a sense of urgency to get so much accomplished before summer arrives? Do you all have a To Do list like mine? You know, the kind with unrealistic optimistic goals such as:

Wash the front porch and deck (which are both covered in a lovely layer of fine, yellow pollen)

Wash the cars (see above)

Wash the windows (I'm willing to skip the ones that nobody but us looks out)

Paint the guest room and my office (This has been on my list for a few years now and every spring I say, this is the year!)

Buy annuals and replacement perennials for flower beds and pots on deck. Plant them!

Tackle the weeding before it gets out of hand. (Too late!)

Get the carpets cleaned.

Schedule A/C tune-up before the heat & humidity arrive.

Continue sorting and posting photos recently shot on a couple of trips to Missouri.

Store all the winter clothing and gear that was tossed into a big pile in the basement over a month ago.

Start brushing Annie on a regular basis. She's beginning to blow her winter coat and we're back to dealing with all that beautiful dog hair.

Start using the Swiss exercise ball I bought over a month ago (and have only used once!). Thank goodness I decided to get that rather than a Wii Fit. I'm only out $25 if it doesn't get used as often as it should.

Post new recipes on my food blog. It's been neglected for far too long and I really want to try this recipe.

Read more! I'm still reading the same book I started two weeks ago. It's not long or involved. I'm just too busy (or tired) to read more than a few pages every night.

Post my monthly summary for April! We're almost halfway through May, for heaven's sakes.

So, what exactly have I been doing for the past month or so? Well, I've been spending a lot of time playing around with my photos, posting a daily shot on my Aminus3 blog, as well as perusing my favorite photoblogs. Plus, my work schedule was tweaked a little bit after the holidays and rather than have my afternoons free, I've been getting home right about dinner time. After a long walk with Annie-dog, a glass of wine (or two), and dinner & dishes, I'm too tired to do much of anything else. Of course, you'd think since I don't have to leave for work until 10:45, I'd have plenty of time to get some of these projects accomplished, but I'm just not that productive first thing in the morning. However, I go back to my 7-2 shift next week, so I have high hopes of crossing some of these tasks off my list before autumn rolls around.

Too bad this blog post wasn't on my To Do list. It'd be nice to finally have something to cross off! :)

Congratulations!!

Time for a toast!

I am so excited! My husband's book is finally out! We received a box from the publisher, full of beautiful copies of The Annotated Sailing Alone Around the World. I couldn't be more proud of Rod. And what a great birthday present for him. Happy birthday, Sweetie. I love you!



From the back cover:

The Annotated Sailing Alone Around the World is a remarkable commentary with precision clarification of Slocum's voyage in his wooden Spray. Reading the side bars brings out a brighter picture and adds greater meaning to each page. Nothing is hidden in the print, in fact, just scanning the side bars doubles the impact of this historic circumnavigation in 1895.

The Joshua Slocum Society puts this edition of Sailing Alone Around the World at the top of their recommended reading list for this sailing season, a must for the cruising group or those at home with feet up in front of the open hearth.

- Ted Jones, The Joshua Slocum Society

I was privileged to be re-introduced to the wonder of Slocum's accomplishments when I read Rod Scher's brilliant annotated version of Sailing Alone Around the World. Rod Scher has transformed the material with information about oceanography, geography, sailing explanations, and history so that a reader is transported back to that era. He provides an authentic venue of understanding exactly what it meant to sail around the world in the late 1800s. Scher has done a remarkable job and has made Slocum's story accessible to a larger audience. This is a tale of adventure, humor and pathos that has been given life once more by Scher's deft handling of the material.

- Patricia Wood, author of Lottery

Rod Scher brings Slocum's fantastic journey of 100 years ago right into today. His critical and insightful annotations not only illuminate, but provide the reader with a lens into the character of the times of this amazing mariner.

- E. Michael Jackson, Teacher CruiseMasters Boating Instruction

The Midwife

The Midwife: A Memoir of Birth, Joy, and Hard Times by Jennifer Worth
Medical History/Memoir
2009 Penguin
Finished on 4/28/09
Rating: 4/5 (Very Good)




Product Description

An unforgettable story of the joy of motherhood, the bravery of a community, and the hope of one extraordinary woman

At the age of twenty-two, Jennifer Worth leaves her comfortable home to move into a convent and become a midwife in post war London’s East End slums. The colorful characters she meets while delivering babies all over London—from the plucky, warm-hearted nuns with whom she lives to the woman with twenty-four children who can’t speak English to the prostitutes and dockers of the city’s seedier side—illuminate a fascinating time in history. Beautifully written and utterly moving, The Midwife will touch the hearts of anyone who is, and everyone who has, a mother.

About the author

Jennifer Worth trained as a nurse at the Royal Berkshire Hospital in Reading, England. She then moved to London to train as a midwife. She later became a staff nurse at the Royal London Hospital, Whitechapel, and then ward sister at the Elizabeth Garrett Anderson Hospital in Euston. Music had always been her passion and in 1973 Jennifer left nursing in order to study music intensively. She gained the Licentiate of the London College of Music in 1974 and was awarded a fellowship ten years later. Mother of two daughters and grandmother of two; Jennifer lives in Hertfordshire with her husband Philip Worth.

I generally don't read a lot of nonfiction, but I sure do love memoirs, so I was happy to accept a review copy of The Midwife. I had a little bit of difficulty getting started, stumbling a bit through the introduction, but after that it was smooth sailing. The author has an engaging style and I was quickly transported to the streets of East London.

This is one of those books that must cause a bit of confusion for bookstore buyers and merchandisers. The subtitle indicates that it's a memoir. However, Barnes & Noble has it shelved in the medical history section. I'm not sure it's either. I think it falls more into the area of British history, as many of the anecdotes have more to do with life in London after World War II than with the art and science of delivering babies. Regardless of its classification, it's a lovely story of a young woman living amongst a group of kind-hearted nuns, learning the ropes of midwifery.

On the joy of a delivery:

I am about ready to leave. It has been a long day and night, but a profound sense of fulfilment and satisfaction lighten my step and lift my heart. Muriel and baby are both asleep as I creep out of the room. The good people downstairs offer me more tea, which again I decline as gracefully as I can, saying that breakfast will be waiting for me at Nonnatus House. I give instructions to call us if there seems to be any cause for worry, but say that I will be back again around lunch time, and again in the evening.

I entered the house in the rain and the dark. There had been a fever of excitement and anticipation, and the anxiety of a woman in labour, on the brink of bringing forth new life. I leave a calm, sleeping household, with the new soul in the midst, and step out into the morning sunlight.

I cycled through the dark deserted streets, the silent docks, past the locked gates, the empty ports. Now I cycle through bright early morning, the sun just rising over the river, the gates open or opening, men streaming through the streets, calling to each other; engines beginning to sound, the cranes to move; lorries turning in through the huge gates; the sounds of a ship as it moved. A dockyard is not really a glamorous places, but to a young girl with only three hours sleep on twenty-four hours work, after the quiet thrill of a safe delivery of a healthy baby, it is intoxicating. I don't even feel tired.

From large families (one delivery is of a woman's 25th child!) to rickets to interracial births to the horrors of the "workhouse," Worth entertains and enlightens her readers with anecdotes that help balance the story's grim poverty and hardships with stories imbued with her keen sense of humor:

A convent is essentially a female establishment. However, of necessity, the male of the species cannot be excluded entirely. Fred was the boiler-man and odd-jobber of Nonnatus House. He was typical of the Cockney of his day and age. Stunted growth, short bowed legs, powerful hairy arms, pugnacious, obstinate, resourceful; all these attributes were combined with endless chat and irrepressible good humour. His most striking characteristic was a spectacular squint. One eye was permanently directed north-east, whilst the other roved in a south-westerly direction. If you added to this the single yellow tooth jutting from his upper jaw, which he generally held over his lower lip and sucked, you would not say he was a beautiful specimen of manhood.

I noticed an occasional repetition to some of the stories, making me wonder if each chapter originated as an essay or column, later to be woven together in the form of a book. This is very minor quibble, as it really didn't distract from my enjoyment of the narrative.

The Midwife is much more than simply a memoir about a young woman's experiences in her new role as a midwife. It's a warm, engaging examination of life in a convent, life in London's post-war slums, and the friendships that grow between the nuns, midwives and mothers-to-be. If you enjoy any sort of medical narrative or historical memoirs (such as Frank McCourt's Angela's Ashes), you'll fall in love with Worth's richly evocative story. I certainly did.

Be sure to watch this wonderful video (from BookVideos.tv) of Jennifer Worth discussing her memoir. There are some marvelous black and white photographs included throughout the clip.

Thank You, Amazon Shoppers!

As most of you know, I'm an Amazon Associate. When you, my readers, click on a hyperlinked book title, cd, image of a book cover, etc. and then proceed to purchase that item, I earn a small bit of pocket change. I also earn a referral fee when someone clicks through to Amazon and places an order for something even if I haven't linked to it. Last year I earned a whopping $150. Most of the earnings average somewhere under a dollar, but occasionally, someone will order a large ticket item (all of which I can view under my earnings/order reports). For example, last year I had orders for these items:

Kindle ($39.90*)
iPod ($9.56*)
A History of Byzantine Literature ($7.08*)

Today, I discovered that someone has purchased a beautiful Canon EOS 5D Mark II 21.1MP Full Frame CMOS Digital SLR Camera (Body Only). This is not an inexpensive camera! My earnings amount to $107.56 for this single item!

I never know the identity of those who place orders through my blog, but I'd like to send out a huge thank you to the buyer of this camera. You've made my day! And, I hope you get great enjoyment out of your new camera!

*my earnings

The Hunger Games

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
Young Adult Fiction
2008 Scholastic Press
Finished on 4/15/09
Rating: 4.5/5 (Terrific!)



Product Description:

Katniss is a 16-year-old girl living with her mother and younger sister in the poorest district of Panem, the remains of what used be the United States. Long ago the districts waged war on the Capitol and were defeated. As part of the surrender terms, each district agreed to send one boy and one girl to appear in an annual televised event called, "The Hunger Games." The terrain, rules, and level of audience participation may change but one thing is constant: kill or be killed. When Kat's sister is chosen by lottery, Kat steps up to go in her place.

Wow! It's been a while since I've read such a good teen novel. While not quite as good as The Book Thief, it sure comes a lot closer than Stephenie Meyers' Twilight series. It may even be as good as the Harry Potter books.

The Hunger Games was my book club's choice for this month's discussion. We had a fantastic meeting, and yes, we all loved it. I've gotten to where I don't read any reviews or even the dust cover blurbs prior to reading a book, as I prefer to go in completely unaware of what might take place between the covers. And since this was a book club choice, I just assumed I'd give it a try without really knowing what it was about. As I began reading, I immediately wondered what I was getting into. I'd heard very good comments about the book, but wasn't aware of the premise of the "games." I had an uneasy feeling that it would be a bleak, depressing story about killing and death, but I continued on and quickly became engrossed in the characters and story. I think the author did a very good job of keeping the story interesting and suspenseful without resorting to gratuitous violence and gore. There was no lingering detailed description of the actual killings and I never felt uneasy or disturbed by the acts of violence.

On life in Panem:

When I was younger, I scared my mother to death, the things I would blurt out about District 12, about the people who rule our country, Panem, from the far-off city called the Capitol. Eventually I understood this would only lead us to more trouble. So I learned to hold my tongue and to turn my features into an indifferent mask so that no one could ever read my thoughts. Do my work quietly in school. Make only polite small talk in the public market. Discuss little more than trades in the Hob, which is the black market where I make most of my money. Even at home, where I am less pleasant, I avoid discussing tricky topics. Like the reaping, or food shortages, or the Hunger Games. Prim might begin to repeat my words and then where would we be?

On the Hunger Games:

The rules of the Hunger Games are simple. In punishment for the uprising, each of the twelve districts must provide one girl and one boy, called tributes, to participate. The twenty-four tributes will be imprisoned in a vast outdoor arena that could hold anything from a burning desert to a frozen wasteland. Over a period of several weeks, the competitors must fight to the death. The last tribute standing wins.

Taking the kids from our districts, forcing them to kill one another while we watch — this is the Capitol's way of reminding us how totally we are at their mercy. How little chance we would stand of surviving another rebellion. Whatever words they use, the real message is clear. "Look how we take your children and sacrifice them and there's nothing you can do. If you lift a finger, we will destroy every last one of you. Just as we did in District Thirteen."

To make it humiliating as well as torturous, the Capitol requires us to treat the Hunger Games as a festivity, a sporting event pitting every district against the other. The last tribute alive receives a life of ease back home, and their district will be showered with prizes, largely consisting of food. All year, the Capitol will show the winning district gifts of grain and oil and even delicacies like sugar while the rest of us battle starvation.

Fans of The Giver (Lois Lowry), Ender's Game (Orson Scott Card), Lord of the Flies (William Golding), The Most Dangerous Game (short story by Richard Connell) and, yes, the Twilight series (Stephenie Meyers) will not be disappointed. I know I'm not alone when I say I'm anxiously awaiting the release of Catching Fire, the second in the trilogy, which is due out on September 1st. Until then, I may have to check out the first in Collins' young reader series, Gregor The Overlander (Underland Chronicles).

Further praise from fellow bloggers:

What an exciting YA book! I saw this when it first came out and didn't give it a second glance when I discovered it was science fiction (I am so not a fan), but then I started seeing it getting very popular on Amazon and decided to give it another look-see. I'm so happy I did because I was always eager to learn what was going to happen next. (Joy, from Thoughts of Joy)

What more can I say about a book that received rave reviews from Stephen King, Stephenie Meyer and Rick Riordan? Suzanne Collins' The Hunger Games is the best young adult novel I've read in over a year. It's an addictive, fast-paced story with a feisty teen heroine. (Lesa, from Lesa's Book Critiques)

Go here to read Stephen King's wonderful review on The Hunger Games.

Final words: Highly addictive!!