Because in our frigid January and our surprisingly-snowy February, I pretty much did nothing but read books, I offer up the following six booknotes for your reading pleasure (and library assistance if so desired!)
The Stolen Child by Keith Donohue
About a year ago, this was the book to be reading in book-loving circles. Since my library takes at least 18 months to even get around to thinking about getting a new book (and because we don't have county libraries here, just city ones, so I can only use one library), I didn't get to read it until this winter. It was worth the wait, though---I enjoyed it. It wasn't perfect---too slowly plotted in places, so I had to read forward a bit, and then go back to piece it all together (am I the only one who does that?) Its topic is the changeling. One child is stolen by a changeling child; the stolen child takes the place of the changeling child in the fairy camp, and the changeling child takes the place of the stolen child in his or her life. That new changeling will have to wait decades or centuries before stealing another child and taking on its life.
In the book, you read both perspectives. There is the terror, hunger, and misery of the new changeling child, as well as the few comforts he finds in his new life. And there is the joy of being a child again for the old changeling, as well as his dawning realization that living a stolen life is difficult. The story bangs right up against the realities of our world---where does a group of fairy children hide itself in the midst of suburban development? It forces you to think about how the past you hardly know (through vague family folklore) affects your personality and position in the world today. But more than anything I think it questions the formation of identity---how do we become who we are? And what impact do the experiences in our own history that we have forgotten have on us now?
Lucky I liked it. On the day I was taking it back to the library,I helped my sister-in-law get her kids to school, and my little nephew kicked it out into the snow. So now I own it---hate buying damaged library books when you just know I had a late fine to pay as well!
The Memory Keeper's Daughter by Kim Edwards
I wanted to love this book. I am usually all-the-more involved in a book when its residents are experiencing something difficult. But the brand of hardship this novel creates was just too much to deal with. I think there are about three other people in America who've not read this book, so you know the basic plot line: a father delivers his own twin babies when he's caught in a snow storm, only no one knew there were two babies. The second one ends up being a girl with Down's syndrome, who is spirited away by the nurse who helped with the delivery. He tells his wife the unexpected twin died, and the book is about that lie and its repercussions in many lives.
I don't require a novel to have a happy ending in order to enjoy it. But I do think that the knowledge the characters gain from their tragedies should at least give them some solace. That is what, I think, bothered me about this book. Norah eventually gets knowledge: the solution to her unflagging feeling that her daughter was simply lost, not dead, and an understanding of why her marriage changed so drastically. Secrets are unveiled. But this knowledge doesn't really give any solace to the sorrows the characters experienced. None at all. The years are lost forever and the possibility of a mother-daughter relationship between Norah and her daughter Phoebe can't exist. Maybe what the author is trying to prove is that some tragedies can have no solace, no redeeming grace, and that is so not how I feel about any tragedy that I just couldn't love the book.
Ultimately, the question I left this book with is this one: What level is the right one to go to in our efforts to spare those we love from grief? While I didn't love the book, I do love that question, and find myself returning to it again and again. Who knows the answer for sure? Avoiding one tragedy can cause a different sort of tragedy to occur, and yet we all want to keep our families happy. This is the thought this book sparked in me.
The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster
One of my more-distant neighbors has a son named Milo. Every time I hear her say his name, I have a faint memory of a book I read a long time ago, about a boy and a car and a dog and some fairly weird creatures. But I couldn't pin it down until last December, when I was browsing on Amazon looking for books for my kids for Christmas (because a new book---or three or four---is as necessary a Christmas gift as new PJs, you know?) and I stumbled, finally, across the book, The Phantom Tollbooth.
I wouldn't recommend this book to just anyone. It's allegorical ("well, that's for every man to decide for himself," ten extra credit points if you can place that quote) and, like I said, fairly weird. Milo, the boy who is bored by everything, finds an expandable tollbooth in his bedroom one day, drives through, and finds himself in the land of Expectations. While there, he goes to jail, visits Dictionopolis, the Word Market, the Valley of Sound, Digitopolis, and other interesting places; gets lost in the doldrums, is nearly eaten by goblins, and manages to save the world.
As always when I re-read certain books I enjoyed as a child, I am surprised to recognize how much this book affects how I think even to this day. In many ways, it's meta fiction---a book about writing books. And it's full of wisdom---I think about 1/3 of my new copy is underlined and commented on. (Gems like "It's not just learning things that's important. It's learning what to do with what you learn and learning why you learn things at all that matter" strike sparks with me.) If you---or your ten-year-old-or-older child---are not afraid of weirdness leading you to wisdom, then this is a book for you!
Uglies, Pretties, and Specials, by Scott Westerfield
If I ever decide to go back to teaching, I want to be better prepared in the adolescent-lit department. So I'm reading a lot of it. This trilogy works for me because it falls squarely into one of my favorite genres, dystopian lit. A dystopia is a seemingly-perfect world where at least one individual starts to see the menace behind the perfection. (Think of Ewan McGregor's character in The Island.) In this dystopia, social perfection comes at age sixteen, when Uglies are turned into Pretties by advanced plastic surgery. Doesn't that sound like a perfect society, a place where everyone is drop-dead, model gorgeous? Especially if you're a teenager, that'd seem like heaven.
Of course, it's not. What I liked about these books is that they manage to teach, without preaching, the problems behind the ambition to be like everyone else. I think that's a compelling message in our current Brittney-esque society. An added bonus is that the books also deal with environmental issues, too. True---it's adolescent lit. The ending was a little weak. But I thoroughly enjoyed this trilogy.
This is Not Chick Lit Edited by Elizabeth Merrick
Anyone who knows me knows that I value intelligent writing. So the genre of chick lit (that really is a good explanation there) doesn't hold much appeal to me. This book contains short stories by women that are not chick lit---writing that makes you think beyond your own experiences. Do I sound snarky? The tone of the intro to this book makes my inner snark come out. Like this quote:
Chick lit's formula numbs our senses. Literature, by contrast, grants us access to countless new cultures, places, and inner lives. Where chick lit reduces the complexity of the human experience, literature increases our awareness of other perspectives and paths. Literature employs carefully crafted language to expand our reality, instead of beating us over the head with cliches that promote a narrow worldview. Chick lit shuts down our consciousness. Literature expands our imaginations.
Oh yeah. That's just the intro! Go on to read the stories and you'll find writing that makes you see from a different perspective. It does bother me that the fluffy chick lit of the world gets quite a bit of attention. It's like being offered a marshmallow when you're starving. Literature (like the stories in this book), on the other hand, is satisfying as a good steak (or a nice grilled portobello mushroom if you're the vegetarian type!)
Labyrinth by Kate Moss
(I promise...this is the last one!) I bought this book on an impulse. (I MUST stay away from the temptation that is the book aisle at Costco, I tell you. It's easy to walk away from almost anything at a regular book store, but when I find something interesting at Costco---which happens fairly often---I cannot walk away from a tempting story and a tempting price.) Usually I buy my books carefully, after reading reviews and trolling for opinions from my booky friends. I knew nothing about this one. I wouldn't put it in that literature department that Elizabeth Merrick explains up there, but I am glad I bought it.
Think Da Vinci code, only from the point-of-view of women. (I found out later that it's billed as a "woman's adventure story," which I guess it is.) It tells about the medieval Crusades in France as it tells a contemporary story of a search for the grail. So it's two stories that flip back and forth through time. There are the usual sinister characters, some driven by greed, others by religious devotion; betrayals and foolish decisions and lost precious relics. Honestly---the contemporary story felt a little formulaic. But I would still recommend it, with that caveat. It presents the grail quest in a new light---the grail itself in an unexpected way, and by the end you're dying to know how it all turns out. If you're a fan of the Da Vinci code, I'm certain you'll like this one.
Alrighty then. I did read a few other books, but these are the ones that made the biggest impression on me. Today I've continued to think I need to go to the library. But I'm thinking I should get some housework done instead. Happy reading!
At least a hundred times a day, he does something that makes me laugh. Like tonight. Kendell and I took K. and N. to Burger Supreme for dinner, a little fast-food restaurant in Provo that has THE yummiest hamburgers. When we walked in, K. looked around and said "burger." Umm, OK---he's never eaten a hamburger. How does he know A---that we're at a restaurant that sells them and B---that he would like to eat one? But I ordered him a little cheeseburger, with nothing but cheese and meat on the bun (something I learned to do during the very brief time period when Haley liked hamburgers; they're too little to know there's supposed to be lettuce and tomato and mayo and ketchup, so the eating experience is far less messy). He stood on the bench at the booth we sat in, bouncing up and down and eating his burger, holding it with both hands and saying "burger! burger! burger!" as he bounced. He ate the entire thing, plus three french fries. Maybe you had to be there to see the humor, or maybe it's just a parent thing, but it was funny. A few other things he does that make me laugh:
The funeral was held in the morning, and it was freezing; everyone was gathered around the casket with spare blankets from cars or simply dressed in shivers. As I listened to the talks---a sort of life sketch, remembrances by different family members---I couldn't help but wonder when my own funeral might come along. That sounds morbid, which isn't the direction I want to go. Death just has that affect: it makes you stop and think am I doing enough with my life? Am I developing my talents, loving my family and friends, and savoring as much as I can? This seems to be a life theme I keep bumping up against lately. That it keeps coming up is making me consciously consider my choices and my actions, seeing where I am wasting time and emotional energy.