Confessions, St. Augustine

Now that I have finished this book, I can't believe how long it took me to read it. I think, somehow, I have retained the idea that classics, especially non-fiction ones and those in translation, are difficult reads. Lies. However, let me make a few clarifications. I read a 1961 Penguin Classics edition with a translation that was accessible. If I had found another version, I may have found the going a little tougher. Also, I have been a long time at reading this book. I picked it up about a year ago, left my borrowed copy at home when I returned to St. Louis, bought a copy, read it for a bit, got distracted by the Epistles, picked it up again, got distracted by novels, finally decided I needed to finish, and devoured the last five or six books.

In his Confessions, Augustine describes his story of gradual conversion and the consequences of it. He shares his life before and after he realized the Truth of the Church, with an emphasis on the process of change. His story covers philosophy, as he seeks the meaning of concepts such as Truth and Beauty; identity, as he seeks to know God in the Trinity and himself; and morality, as he struggles with the lifestyle implications of the Christian Way.

I knew intellectually that people see Augustine as still applicable to the world today, but the modernity of his questions and struggles struck me. He follows the ways of the intellectuals of his time who have twisted the way of truth to make it easier. He prays, famously, "God grant me continence and chastity, but not yet." He longs to give his life to God, but does not go all the way, holds back. And God breaks through all his opposition, partly through the steadfast intervention of his mother.

After his conversion, Augustine begins to chronicle some of the blessing which God has bestowed upon him and to meditate on some lines of Scripture. In fact, he starts with Genesis 1:1a : "In the beginning." After writing at length he moves on to Genesis 1:1 : "In the beginning, when God created the heavens and the earth." He lost my interest for a while as he mused over abstract ideas of time and matter, mostly because he has a tendency to repeat himself seven or eight times over in the section. However, in the last book, he writes that he does not have the time, nor his readers the energy (true!) to go through the Scripture in such detail, and he addresses the six days of Creation in one fell swoop, regaining my interest.

If you are Catholic, read this book. If you are a non-Catholic type of Christian, read this book. Augustine speaks of joining the Catholic Church, but he wrote at a point in history where all our modern denominations did not exist. If you are not a Christian, I still recommend it for an interesting theological and philosophical read. It would be an excellent book for a discussion group, because it has a lot to digest.

North and South, Elizabeth Gaskell

I'm back!  And with another book on my list of very-favorites.  This one actually came to me by the way of Netflix - yes, I broke a cardinal rule and watched the movie first.  The film version was so good that I figured the book must be even better.  And it was.

Our heroine, Margaret Hale, grew up in aristocratic southern England.  Her father is a country curate, but she spent many of her formative years living with a wealthy (and very irritating, in my opinion) aunt in London.  When her cousin (also very irritating) gets married, she returns to her parents at Helstone (the parsonage), only to soon be uprooted to Milton, an industrial city in northern England.  The Hale family has a strange position in Milton social circles, which are polarized between textile factory owners and their workers.  As the novel progresses, Margaret forms relationships with individuals in both classes - not least the distinguished and well-respected master, Mr. Thornton (a tough nut to crack).  I'll leave the rest to your reading pleasure.

Elizabeth Gaskell lived at the same time as Dickens and the Bronte sisters and had close connections with each.  It's a fascinating period in history (1840s-1850s), when industrialization was transforming social and economic conventions.  North and South is not simply a romance - it is chock full of debates about gender roles, class conflict, and social justice issues, 19th century style.  It's a very intelligent, thought-provoking, thoroughly enjoyable work.  I certainly recommended it for fans of Austen, Dickens, and the Brontes.  And for romantic socialists.

To clarify: Yes, there is another book called North and South, published by John Jakes in 1982.  Yes, it is about the antebellum United States.  Yes, I have been in love with Orry Main (and perhaps George Hazard as well) since approximately the age of eight.  I have never read the book, but the 1980s miniseries is pretty wonderful.  A whole lot trashier than Victorian England, though...

Love in the Time of Cholera, Gabriel Garcia-Marquez

I read this novel on recommendation of a good friend. Unfortunately, my Spanish isn't good enough to read it in the original, but Garcia-Marquez is an amazing writer, even in translation.

The novel is a love story. It starts close to the end, with a death: the death of the husband of Fermina Daza. After the funeral, her former suitor, Florentino Ariza, comes back to declare his love again -- after waiting over fifty years. Garcia-Marquez then shifts back to when they first met and follows the two characters through their lives.

I love Garcia-Marquez and enjoy just reading his words. His prose is engaging, and, while some of his characters are over the top, they fit into his story very well. Other characters are nuanced enough to be real. However, the plot (a man whiling away the years in love affair while waiting for the husband of his "true love" to die) did not sit well with me, and I was not a fan of the ending.

That being said, I can tell why the friend recommended it to me. And I would pass on the recommendation to anyone looking for read by a good writer.

A Tale of Two Cities, Charles Dickens

I have read the beginning and the end of this book several times before, but have never made it all the way through. Until now. In case you don't know, the novel follows the story of the French Revolution through the lens of Dr. Manette, who is released from the Bastille at the beginning of the novel; Lucie, his daughter; and her eventual husband, the French aristocrat, Charles Darnay. Dickens also spends a good deal of time in France, among the peasants, who are simultaneously oppressed and bloodthirsty.

I found Dickens's narration of history very hard to get through, both because it is dense and wordy and because I am not much of a history person. I wanted to take a pen and slice out a third of the words he used. Especially when he went on about kings and aristocrats and massacres and politics. Again, though, that is in part due to my interests. On the other hand, I fell in love with his good-hearted scoundrel character (a tendency of mine), and, in general, enjoyed the plot lines and the way Dickens wove them together. Mostly though, I just feel better read for having actually worked my way through the entire novel at last.

And You Are Christ's: The Charism of Virginity and the Celibate Life, Thomas Dubay, S.M.

I borrowed this book from a friend who is reading it as prep for a retreat. The sub-title really tells it all. Fr. Dubay writes about people who dedicate their lives to Christ as celibates. He explains it in terms of love, self-gift, and prayer, and contrasts this approach to ideas of freedom for service. He offers the idea that virginity for Christ is a radical, rich, and loving. The virgin remains single because she is completely given to God, totally in love with Him, and can't imagine anyone else as the focus of her life. He of course goes into detail and pulls on Scripture and the saints, but that is the long and short.

I enjoyed the book, but I think that's mostly because of where I am in life right now. It's an accessible read and insightful, however, if you are interested in the topic.

Gregor the Overlander, Suzanne Collins

Okay, so I have a new favourite fifth grade boy fantasy series obsession.  (I know, you're shocked.)

If you are one of those people who believes that there must be a colony of gargantuan rats and cockroaches living under the streets of New York City, consider yourself vindicated. When Gregor's baby sister crawls into an air vent in the basement of their apartment building, he follows her down a long dark chute and into the Underland.  Fortunately, they are found by the friendly giant cockroaches and not the evil rats.  The cockroaches bring them to the city of the Underland humans.  There Gregor learns that his father who disappeared two years earlier fell down the same chute and ended up prisoner of the rats and that Gregor himself may be the warrior hero mentioned in an ancient Underland prophecy.  Together with the snobby young queen and her insufferable cousin, two loyal bats, two kind cockroaches, and the snarky, bitter traitor rat Ripred (my personal favourite character!), Gregor sets off on a quest to save the Underland human race from destruction. 

The book is dark but awesome and ultimately has a pacifist message, which is interesting for a fantasy questing book.  I'm so excited to read the rest of the series!

Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy

In case you are wondering if I've fallen off the planet for the past month... No, I have not. I've been working my way through one thousand pages of Anna Karenina. I expected it to be difficult, but I found it much less dense than expected, very engaging, and maybe a new favorite. Apparently I had the "wrong" translation; I found the translation very accessible, but apparently the best one has purple flowers on the front cover.

The novel opens with an glimpse in the house of Stepan Oblonsky and his wife, Dolly, the morning after she has discovered that he was having an affair. These two characters serve to connect the other main couples: Oblonsky's sister, Anna Karenina, and Alexey Vronsky, who is not her husband; and Dolly's sister, Kitty Scherbatsky, and her suitor, Konstantin Levin. These four are the "main" characters, but the novel sweeps through a diverse cast of Russian nobility of the late 1800s.

The novel encompasses at least as many themes as characters, but both themes and characters kept me turning page after page, as Anna reacts to Vronsky as he seduces her; as Anna interacts with her husband as Vronsky seduces her; as Anna raises her son as Vronsky seduces her. They kept me turning pages as Kitty and Levin's relationship grows and blossoms. Passion and love, fidelity and honesty, personal and social responsibility, faith and religion all have their respective places in this novel, along with vast social commentaries on Russian noble and agricultural life at the time.

Two years ago, I wouldn't have made it through the entire novel, but I would have missed out. I highly recommend Anna Karenina to anyone who loves reading... in spite of my sub-par post to describe it.

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, Mark Haddon

Seven minutes after midnight, Christopher John Francis Boone found a dead dog outside of Mrs. Shears' house.  Someone had stabbed the animal with a garden fork.  Since Christopher's teacher had encouraged him to write a story, he decides to write a murder mystery about the death of the dog.  Christopher's book documents his own investigations into the dog’s death; he could never write about something that didn’t actually happen.  Despite his father’s command that he “stay out of other people’s business,” he sets out to detect who killed the dog—and ends up uncovering a host of family secrets in the process. 

Christopher has autism.  The entire novel is told in his voice, in a stream of consciousness style which gradually reveals the details of his life to the reader.  The book examines the challenges that Christopher faces because of his disability, the tensions in his family and relationships, and also the beauty of his world and his unique and brilliant perspective on life.  This is all captured in the framework of Christopher's murder mystery. 

Mark Haddon, who has worked with children on the autism spectrum, crafts the story masterfully, drawing the reader in immediately and keeping him or her captivated for every page.  Although stream of consciousness can often be a challenge for authors to write well, Haddon articulates the style perfectly.  Christopher's voice is believable and clear, and his experiences range from humorous to heartbreaking.  The book is not long, which is good, because once you start reading, you will not be able to put it down!
      

Father Joe: The Man Who Saved My Soul, Tony Hendra

At the age of fourteen, Tony Hendra was caught having an affair with a married woman.  It was after this event that he decided he wanted to become a Benedictine monk.  Decades later, looking back on a successful career which includes stage appearances with Cambridge Footlights (from which Monty Python got its start), writing credits with National Lampoon, and films such as This Is Spinal Tap, the British comedian recounts his spiritual history and honors the life of the most influential friend in his life: Father Joe. 

From his first meeting with Father Joe in the Benedictine abbey, Hendra knew the priest would have a significant impact on his life.  Although Hendra eventually moved away from a monastic vocation--and even from the Catholic Church--his spiritual advisor remained a rock in his life, helping him through the challenges of marriage, divorce, miscarriage, and substance abuse, as well as sharing the joys of his family and his love of writing.  The comedian's memoir recounts his colorful life with the wit that is characteristic of his writing and pays tribute to the man he holds responsible for securing his salvation.

Candid and inspirational, Hendra’s spiritual narrative articulates the joys and pains which all people experience with profound and humorous eloquence.  It is a fun read that allows the reader see the world through the writer's eyes.         

The Assassin's Gallery, David L. Robbins

No moon shines over the dark waters of the Newburyport coast as a Persian assassin slithers ashore.  Her mission: to kill Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the 32nd president of the United States.  Only Professor Mikhal Lammeck, expert in assassin psychology, has a chance of tracking the elusive Judith and eliminating her before she reaches her target. 

Lammeck has spent years teaching the theory of assassin psychology.  Now, called back into the field against his will, he finds that he is in way over his head.  As the distance between him and his quarry narrows, Lammeck finds himself entering the assassin's mind, and is awed at her ability.  No longer motivated by the desire to help his country, the professor find himself drawn forward by the allure and enigma of his brilliant adversary. 

Robbins' novel is not simply an action-packed thriller.  His revisionist history is filled to bursting with historical detail, set against the complex backdrop of the 1940s social climate.  Industry, war, racism, and sexism writhe in the background, complicating an already intriguing plot.  Robbins also devotes considerable energy to developing the character of his assassin, lest she be seen as a “faceless” enemy.  Along with Lammeck, the reader comes to understand the motivations and history of the assassin, the challenges she faces, the depth of her resolve, and the reason that she is determined to succeed in her objective, against all odds.  

More literary than most thrillers, The Assassin’s Gallery is a great read for anyone who enjoys a good historical fiction novel and a story of action-packed suspense.   

Oryx and Crake, Margaret Atwood

As far as Snowman knows, he is the last human left on the earth.  The blazing sun—hotter now that the atmosphere has thinned—burns his skin, even in the shade of the tree in which he lives.  His only companions are the human-like Children of Crake, a tribe of genetic experiments of whom Snowman was made guardian, before the known world came to an end. 

Unlike the Children of Crake, who survive by consuming raw vegetation, Snowman must forage for more nourishing food.  He braves a dangerous trail, crawling with vicious Pigoons, to find supplies in the ruins of a nearby city.  Haunted on his journey by the memories of the brilliant, cunning Crake, his enigmatic lover Oryx, and Jimmy, the unremarkable boy who Snowman used to be, Snowman relives the series of seemingly inconsequential events that led to the destruction of his world.  Slowly, the true cause of the apocalypse is revealed.  

Oryx and Crake has particularly strong resonances with modern American society in a framework which is more action-filled than some of Margaret Atwood's other works.  The book is both exciting and thought-provoking--forcing readers to speculate on the future of genetic engineering, cyber-stalking, global warming, and biochemical warfare.  As in most post-apocalyptic tales, Snowman’s story is intense and tragic.  It isn't a light read, but it is an engaging one.  This book is hard to put down! 

Northanger Abbey, Jane Austen

I seem to be making my way through Jane Austen's works this year!  I began this book with few expectations other than a typical Jane Austen read, but it turned out to be a little different.  Northanger Abbey is Jane Austin's satirical take on Ann Radcliffe-style Gothic novels.  I found the novel's romantic conflict halfhearted; instead Austen focused on building suspenseful imaginings in the mind of her protagonist, Catherine Morland.  At seventeen, Catherine is sensible but very naive, and learns the hard way that some acquaintances are superficial and deceitful while others are generous and genuine.  And she learns that frank realities are sometimes worse than dark, romantic imaginings.

An enjoyable read.  It could almost qualify as a coming of age novel of sorts, regency England style.  I would perhaps recommend this book for a younger reader who's not quite ready to tackle the dark and more complex themes of works like Sense and Sensibility and Persuasion.

Looking for Alaska, John Green

This book is painful. I don't want to tell you the painful part, because it will ruin a lot of the book, but I do want to forewarn you, that it's not a light happy read.

But if you want an idea of the author's sense of humor, check this out.

The book is designed for high school boys, so there is a certain amount of immature humor. But the characters are believable and the themes dig deep. The story is divided into before and after. Pudge, a nerdy kid with no friends, transfers to a boarding school where he meets Takumi, the Colonel, and Alaska, a remarkable, enigmatic, impulsive--and did I mention gorgeous--girl, who is unfortunately devoted to her long-distance boyfriend. Between smoking breaks and epic pranks, Pudge falls in love with Alaska, or at least the idea of Alaska. He also develops strong friendships which he discovers will survive a senseless tragedy.

I recommend it mostly if you find teenage boy humor entertaining (or want insight into a teenage boy's brain) because otherwise I fear you will find it tedious. But it is a fantastic and thought-provoking book.

The Love That Satisfies, Christopher West

About a year ago, a friend sent me an e-mail asking if I would buy some books to donate to the 'Greatness' (W&M's Theology of the Body group) library.  I ended up purchasing two, and checked this one out of the "library" in January.  It's been my lunchtime reading for the last week - so the book has acquired some field dust and slight apple and raspberry jelly stains, but I'll be taking it back to the 'Greatness' collection when I'm down at W&M for homecoming.

The whole concept of Theology of the Body was foreign to me until college, and as I explained in my last entry (The Jewler's Shop), I'm not the best at understanding theology.  However, Christopher West does a great job of spelling out some really complex ideas about God's love and human love (the subtitle of the book is "reflections on eros and agape").  If I got one thing out of this book, it really made me think.  We are called to live to an ideal, such that our relationships mirror Christ's devotion to the Church.  But the reality is (I'm a very realistic thinker), we fail a whole lot.  It matters most that we keep trying, that we never lose sight of the beautiful, big picture of what God has in store for us.  Our earthly lives are at best a shadow of a heavenly future, and as we seek union with another, we must never forget that union with God is what we seek, in our heart of hearts.

The Small Rain, Madeline L'Engle

Of course I loved this novel. Madeline L'Engle wrote it. I have read most of her novels and I've yet to find one that I don't like. This particular novel tells the story of a girl growing up. L'Engle tends to write coming-of-age stories, and all of them are similar, yet each of them is unique. Katherine Forrester is only 8 or 9 at the beginning, and the story takes up about 10 years of her life. She is the daughter of musicians and is a pianist herself. Her story covers her broken but beautiful family life, her time at school, and her experiences with all kinds of love.

This story was a quick read, fun and tragic by turns. I especially enjoyed the ending, because L'Engle tends not to tidy up too much at the end of novels. I can't think of much to say about it, other than that I highly enjoyed it and have checked out the next novel in which the main character appears.

The Jewler's Shop, Karol Wojtyla

This book came as a recommendation (and a gift) from a good friend on my last birthday.  The Jewler's Shop is a monologue-driven play written by Pope John Paul II back when he was a bishop in Poland.  Its subject is marriage: the three acts present to us three couples, each reflecting on their relationship from different angles and perspectives.  One couple looks at the past and present of their (positive) relationship as they prepare for marriage; the next portrays a couple whose love has faded over the years.  The final act brings the two together, as the (uncertain) children of the marriages from Acts I and II prepare for their wedding.  I found myself reflecting on so many things as I read this.  I am not an aficionado of poetry or theology, or metaphysics for that matter - so I feel like a lot of the words flew over my head.  But the message - I think I got that part, at least a little.

Sometimes human existence seems too short for love.  At other times it is, however, the other way around: human love seems too short in relation to existence - or rather, too trivial.  At any rate, every person has at his disposal an existence and a Love.  The problem is: How to build a sensible structure from it?

At the heart of marriage, as of any relationship, is first complete devotion to God, and a commitment love another, but also to share a deep friendship throughout life.  Marriage is the bedrock of a family, of society; this commitment ensures stability through the roughest days as during the sweetest moments.  It is so much greater, so much grander - and so much more difficult -  than today's society will allow.  And I am always thankful for a reminder, in the midst of a scary, mistrustful world.

The Columbian Exchange, Alfred Crosby

I lied.  In lieu of a much-anticipated Jane Austen novel, I decided to go for another early-Americas pick, The Columbian Exchange: Biological and Cultural Consequences of 1492.  Motivated by the large font and lengthy endnotes, I decided to follow my previous selection (1491) with a work about the world after Columbus.  It was a quick read, and I enjoyed spending a week of lunch breaks pouring over tales of epidemic disease and wild pigs.

Crosby originally wrote this book in 1973, so most of the statistics are from the 1940s-60s.  The Cold War is still hot; China isn't yet a big player in politics or economics; the total world population is still under four billion.  All the same, the book lays out a good basic overview of primarily biological interchange between the Americas and the rest of the world since 1492.  Diseases like smallpox and syphilis ravaged populations.  Wild pigs, cattle, and horses roamed the Caribbean islands and American plains.  Potatoes, corn, and manioc, from east to west, became some of the most basic staples of the Old World diet.  A little dry, but there's enough subtle humor to keep you going if you're motivated.

As much as I've enjoyed my journey through the contact-era Americas, it's time for a change of pace.  Next stop: theology.

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, Robert M. Pirsig

I really wasn't sure what I expected from this book when I started, but I know it was not what I got between the covers.

Pirsig tells the story of a journey he took with his son across the country on his motorcycle. At first, he lets the reader think the book is about the journey and a few thoughts he has about "classic" (logical) versus "romantic" (aesthetic) ways of confronting the world. Slowly, however, the reader learns that the story actually chronicles his own past, before he was hospitalized for mental instability. But he doesn't care about his past insanity as much as he cares about his past work in philosophy. Part autobiography, part intro to philosophy, and part philosophical treatise, this book heads out in so many directions, a lesser writer and a lesser thinker would have lost track of his trains of thought, and his readers would have watched them collide.

Instead, he manages to tell the story of the journey, to tell the story of his past, and to introduce the reader to an entirely new system of thought within on coherent masterpiece. I didn't agree with all his philosophy, and I didn't understand all of his philosophy (two problems that, for me, tend to be related), but I enjoyed his book. If you're up for a book that makes you think and keeps you entertained, pick up this book. It is a definite commitment, however; it took me two or three times as long as the other books I've read lately, because it requires pauses to process information and is not a book you can read when tired.

King Lear, William Shakespeare

Spoiler Alert: Everybody dies.

Believe it or not, there is a shocking amount of good English major lit out there that I just haven't read. I am remedying this defect, and King Lear is part of my solution.

It is a Shakespearean tragedy, so I came in knowing that pretty much everyone dies. Because it is about a father and his three daughters, most of the characters are related, which makes the disregard and cruelty with which they treat each other even more poignant. I enjoyed the twists that it took to get from the beginning to the point where everyone dies, even if the original premise made the story a little unbelievable. The entire conflict hinges on King Lear's making his three daughters give public speeches about their love for him and his youngest daughter's refusal, despite her deep love for him. Being a tragedy, it goes downhill from there. Being Shakespeare, there are a lot of disguises and tricks thrown into the story, plus a few good storms and failed suicide attempts.

My favorite character was the Fool, who offered an alternately nonsensical and wise counterpoints to the suffering throughout the play, following Lear in his exile. And of course, I loved the language of the play. That's why I read Shakespeare.

Wuthering Heights, Emily Bronte

Yes, I am fairly certain that most, if not all, of my fellow-bloggers have read this novel, and I hope a good chunk of my readership as well. I am also fairly certain that almost everyone who reads this novel develops a strong opinion of it, and I might be risking my often-in-jeopardy literary neck by offering my own view. But here goes.

First, in case you haven't read it, Wuthering Heights picks up the age-old question of nature-versus-nurture in the form of several very twisted love stories. The action centers around Heathcliff, a foundling child of mixed race, who enters the Earnshaw household. The older sibling, Hindley Earnshaw, hates him; Catherine, the younger, loves him. However, for various reasons, she chooses not to marry him, but the pretty-boy Edgar Linton instead. From there, the novel spirals into Heathcliff's elaborate machinations of vengeance.

I'm not sure what Bronte was thinking when she wrote the novel, but the narrative point of view is unusual, to say the least. A complete outsider (Lockwood) narrates the novel, but the housekeeper tells him the story that really constitutes the plot. However, she did not witness every event in the story, so she gives Lockwood long monologues from other characters... It is story veiled in story veiled in story and presents the dilemma of the unreliable narrator ad absurdum.

I don't like stories told through third-party narrators. I don't like stories where I don't identify with, like, or respect any of the characters. I don't like stories about hatred or vengeance. And if I picked some adjectives to describe the novel, they would be dark, twisted, annoying, and boring. So, logically, I should really hate Wuthering Heights. Yet, I don't. I enjoyed it the first time I read it, four years ago, and I enjoyed it this time, and I have no idea why.

1491, Charles Mann

Yes, I'm still here!  I am absolutely astounded by how quickly my fellow-bloggers read books.  But after a month of reading (and traveling cross country to Colorado), I finally have a new one for you -  1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus.  A professor assigned a chapter from this book during the spring semester and I liked it so much that I decided to buy it.

Unlike many historians and archaeologists, Mann is able to pull together a succinct synthesis of American civilizations pre-Columbus, focusing on the ways people modified their environments to shape the world early colonists later experienced.  Perhaps it sounds a little dry, but Mann is an excellent writer and takes you along on his adventures to the Amazon, the Mexican countryside, and New England.  I was impressed with how well he tackled some complex archaeology, and drew comparisons between so many diverse groups of native peoples in the Americas.

I certainly recommend this book for anyone interested in early American history, archaeology, Native American studies, or environmental studies.  It's easy to read, but does take a while to tackle the whole thing if you're an unfortunately slow reader like me.

And with that, I'm defecting to another Jane Austen before I tackle any more archaeology or history.

On Writing, Stephen King

My little sister loaned me this book, and I am very upset about having to give it back. Stephen King abandoned horror fiction for the length of one book to write about writing. His detour resulted in an accessible, fun-to-read book that covers a variety of topics. The book is part autobiography, part grammar and stylistic lesson, part rant on pet-peeves, and part advice to aspiring writers.

Having read it, I am disappointed that King writes in a genre that I don't enjoy, because I enjoyed his writing and wanted to read more than this short book. He didn't give any advice that I haven't heard, but he wrote it in a way that I liked to hear. If you write fiction, you should read this book; it is inspiring, entertaining, and helpful, a pretty good combination of traits.

The True Meaning of Smekday, Adam Rex

After the Boovish invasion of Earth, Gratuity Tucci has learned a lot about human nature. For instance:

"--Most folks will steal if they can get away with it.
--Most people want to break other people's things and roll cars over, but won't unless their planets are invaded by aliens, or their basketball team wins the finals.
--About one in a hundred people resent having to wear clothes all the time.
--Alien invasions make people stick flags on everything. Not just American flags, either. The Jolly Roger made a real comeback around this time."

This book is brilliant and hilarious. It is framed as an essay for school: What is the true meaning of Smekday?--the day formerly known as Christmas, the day that the Boov arrived to colonize Earth, and the day the Boov left one year later. The winning essay will be put in a time capsule that will be opened in 100 years. In her three attempts at writing the essay, Gratuity reveals the story to the reader in a not quite chronological way, which makes it incredibly engaging. I loved the way the author structured this book. He is also an artist, so there are some amazing illustrations, and interjected comic pages drawn by the Boov who can't write in English.

Thematically, it is largely a comment on Manifest Destiny and the treatment of Native Americans. It deals with issues of race and prejudice through the blunt, sarcastic, witty voice of 11 yr. old Gratuity. And the plot itself was amazingly conceived.

In an attempt to reach the human reservation in Florida by car, Gratuity and her cat, Pig, meet up with a Boov criminal, who has taken as his Earth name J.Lo. (Favorite line in the book: "It was a long message, and in pretty good English, but with that same pitched whine that J.Lo had. J.Lo the Boov, not J.Lo the singer/actress/perfume.") Together they travel across the country searching for Gratuity's mom, who was abducted toward the beginning of the invasion. Then Gratuity, J.Lo, and Pig join forces with a gang of boys who have been hiding under Disney World to drive the Gorg (another set of invading aliens--much more evil than the Boov) out of Earth. I won't ruin the ending for you.

One of the best things about this book is that even though the narrator is a girl, boys love it too. It's pretty gender-neutral in its style, and the sense of humor really appeals to boys. It's on a 5th/6th grade reading level, but we did it with a book group that included 3rd/4th graders and everyone loved it. Highly recommend it!

The Lovely Bones, Alice Sebold

My first adult book of the summer! Look at me go!

Because of the movie, you probably know that this is a book about a young girl who is raped and murdered by a serial killer. The story is told by the girl's ghost as she watches her family and friends deal with the tragedy of her death.

It wasn't quite what I expected. I thought more of the book would be devoted to tracking down her killer and bringing him to justice. But it was much more subtle and complicated than that. It's an upsetting story, but having Susie's ghost as narrator (yes, her name is Susie, and spelled the same way I spell it, which--not gonna lie--kept jarring me as I read it) lends a sort of peace to the story that it wouldn't have had being told by the father or the detective. The reader knows from the start what happened, so the pressure for justice and the need for the characters to learn the killer's identity isn't quite the same as it would be if we needed that information as well. Also, while Susie is dead to the characters, she is very much alive to the reader, an active participant in the story.

Incidentally, having now finished the book, I love what Alice Sebold does with the title. I can't think of many serial killer book that have so perfectly incorporated and thematic titles. And maybe that's what impressed me the most about this book: it's not just another serial killer book. The driving force behind it is much more complex than the surface murder mystery.

The ending is one of those perfect endings that is not what the reader expects, maybe not what the reader wants, but (after having read it) obviously the only possible way the story could have ended. An inevitable surprise.

Good book. I recommend it if you haven't already read it.

Thursday Next Series, Jasper Fforde

I decided to wait and post about this series in one entry. Fforde wrote four books about his "literary detective" heroine, Thursday Next: The Eyre Affair, Lost in a Good Book, The Well of Lost Plots, and Something Rotten. They are set in England in a world that might-have-been, if Winston Churchill had not carried England through the Second World War.

Thursday, a Special Operations agent of the Literary Detectives, spends most of her days searching out forged Miltons and keeping Marlovites (those who think Marlowe penned Shakespeare's plays) from rioting. Then an operative from a high unit of Special Operations comes to seek her help. Acheron Hades, the archnemesis of the world as his name might imply, is plotting evil things, and Thursday can recognize him since he once was her professor. As events unroll, Hades and Thursday discover a way to travel into books, a feat Hades uses to blackmail the world when he threatens harm to Jane Eyre and Thursday uses to pursue Hades.

And that's just the first book. In subsequent books, Thursday battles more of the Hades clan (their names are Cocytus, Phlegethon, Lethe, Styx, and Aornis) and goes head-to-head with her country's personal evil corporation. She ends up living inside Book World, a complex fictional society where characters live and new stories are created. Ultimately, she has to save the real world from threats of its own and characters from the Book World.

Fforde creates an alternate England that provides a hilarious, witty, and sometimes scathing critique of the modern world. He throws in time travel, re-engineered extinct species, and full contact croquet just for the fun of it, and his novels are fun. However, I found his long sojourn to Book World very tedious. He creates a detailed set of rules and mores for his fictional world that fall flat after reading the parts that take place in the modern world. They tested the bounds of belief and were not always internally consistent. And, frankly, I ultimately did not care about the complexities of Book World. I wanted Next to get on with her life in the real world.

Still, I think this series (or at least the first one) is a must-read for any English nerd. How can you turn down a novel with Shakespeare vending machines?

Nation, Terry Pratchett

This book is wonderfully deep. It's for teens--middle and high school. I'd say older readers, except that this 6th grader in our book group seemed to understand it and enjoy it as much or more than the older readers. I could tell you what the book is about, but it's one of those books that you can know what it's "about" without knowing what it's about. . .

The basic plot is that some sort of plague has wiped out most of England's population (it's set in a sort of parallel universe of the Victorian period. At the same time, a giant tidal wave has destroyed a particular island nation. Only one boy (Mao) has survived, because he was off on an island undergoing his test to become a man. He has left his boy soul on the island, so he arrives back at the Nation, not a boy, not a man, with no soul, to bury the dead bodies of everyone he has ever known. The wave also wrecks a ship carrying the new heir to the throne (although she doesn't know she's the heir, since she doesn't know that the 139 people ahead of her in the line of succession have died of plague). Ermintrude (who decides to change her name to Daphne) is the only survivor on the ship; she meets Mao and together they try to fathom the tragedy and rebuild their lives, as more survivors begin to arrive on the island.

The book is about identity, cultural heritage, language, racial prejudice, religion, friendship, love, and grief. And underlying all of it is Terry Pratchett's quirky sense of humor--especially poignant in this dark context. Definitely worth reading.

The Mysterious Benedict Society, Trenton Lee Stewart

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I won't say that it's the most brilliant bit of literature ever written, but then again it is for 3rd-5th graders. The characters are fantastic, and the book is full of puzzles for the characters (and reader) to problem solve.

Reynie Muldoon is an orphan incredibly gifted at solving puzzles and logic games. Kate Wetherall is an orphan who is incredibly resourceful with the items she carries around in her beloved bucket; she can create almost anything. Sticky Washington can read at lightning speed and remembers everything he has ever read, heard, or seen. And Constance Contraire. . .well, Constance is stubborn. And for reasons that will not become clear until the very end of the book, Mr. Benedict insists that she is far more brilliant than the other children realize.

Mr. Benedict gathers this group of brilliant children together to form a team of secret agents who will infiltrate an institution for gifted children that is a front for a madman's plot for world domination. Although the implications of the madman's plot are quite dark, the brain teasers vibrant characters keep the tone of the book light. I would not hesitate to recommend it to children. And to anyone who was once a nerdy child! It's a fun, suspenseful, exciting read!

Thanks for the recommendation, Tex :-)

Eleven Birthdays, Wendy Mass

We're doing this book in upper elementary book group this week. I enjoyed it. Not my favorite book in the world, but it was cute and engaging.

The story is that an enchantment has been placed on these two kids who happen to have been born on the same day. As long as they stay friends, everything's fine. In order to ensure that they stay friends, the enchantress arranges it so that they celebrate their birthdays together every year. But one year, they have a huge falling out (the boy is a jerkface and says mean things about the girl in order to seem cool in front of his friends) and so the next year--on their eleventh birthday, time changes for the two of them and they keep repeating the same day over and over again. Very Groundhog Day. And so they learn important things about themselves, each other, friendship, etc., etc., and in the end they're friends again (sorry to spoil the ending, but you had to see it coming).

It's a decent book. It's told from the girl's perspective, though, so boys won't be too keen on it.

The Shack, William P. Young

I absolutely loved this book! It's a story of a father whose daughter is kidnapped during a family camping trip. That is only the beginning however. As one might assume, he falls into a depression that he can't seem to find a way out of. He is invited back to the scene of it all-the moment when he learned that his daughter was dead. He is invited back to look at it through different eyes. Because waiting for him at the shack...is God.

This book is spiritual, but I loved it for its different approach to talking about the mysteries of God-its ecumenical approach if you will. Young encourages his reader to see God in a different way. It is a Christian approach to faith, but it is all-encompassing at the same moment.

It's not a book to "pound through." I often stopped to try to fully wrap my head around what was written. The most interenting part of the book is that it is a true story-true to the person it happened to. It's a great book to read for personal growth, as well as a great bok to read if you're looking for something more spiritual, and not a theology of some sort.

I hope you like it!

Paper Towns, John Green

This is a book for high school boys. And it is excellent.

The main character, Quentin, lives next door to Margo Roth Spiegleman--the girl of everyone's dreams. One night, near the end of their senior year of high school, Margo shows up at his bedroom window dressed like a ninja and takes him on an adventure around the town to exact revenge on her cheating boyfriend and various other offenders. The next morning, Margo has disappeared, and Quentin begins a quest to find her. Along the way, he discovers the real "Margo" behind the super-human image that he and the rest of the school has attached to her. He discovers her human fears and insecurities, and her human flaws. He also discovers a new confidence in himself along the way.

Because it is written for and from the perspective of 17 year old boys, there is a certain amount of discussion of masturbation and of body parts that isn't necessarily appealing to someone who is not of that gender and age group. But the story itself is deep and moving. I really enjoyed reading it, and its implications are still on my mind, which I find to be the sign of a good book.

Oh, and I should mention: the entire quest to find Margo (and "Margo") is paralleled by Whitman's "Song of Myself." Quentin discovered a copy of Leaves of Grass in Margo's bedroom that she had highlighted and written in, and he tries to use the poetry as a way to discover how she thinks and where she might have decided to go when she ran away. It ends up allowing him to better understand himself, the world, what it means to be free, etc. John Green handled it in such a way that the discussion of literature wouldn't be repulsive to his teenage boy readers; but anyone who reads the book finds himself engaged in the poetry and understanding it on the level that Green wants him to. It was very well done, I think.

The Boy Who Loved Anne Frank, Ellen Feldman

Following the theme of Beth's most recent post, I recently finished a novel relating to Nazi Germany.

The story is told from the perspective of Peter van Pels, the young boy who hid with the Frank family during World War II. Anne wrote in her diary that Peter told her that if he got out alive, he would reinvent himself entirely. Though Peter actually died in Mauthausen, in this novel, Feldman explores the possibility that he did survive. What if Peter, having been separated from Otto Frank at the concentration camp, lived the three additional days until the camp was liberated by allied forces? What if, alone in the world, he emigrated to the United States, where bearing an "American" surname he was able to shed off all traces of his Jewishness and his life before? What would've happened to him when Otto released Anne's diary to the world?

Though I can't say that The Diary of Anne Frank was one of my favorites as a child, it certainly had an impact on me, and the premise of this book was enough to draw me in. I wasn't too terribly impressed with it as a whole, but there are some sections which are so poignant that they more than made up for the rough patches. It raises some interesting questions -- Was the Nazi persecution one felt by all Jews, or just those who actually lived through it? By essentially "canonizing" Anne Frank, are we in a sense doing her a disservice? Do we fail to understand that, at age 13, Anne's view, though genuine, may not necessarily have been accurate? (There's a great part of the novel that deals with the "stealing bread" incident in Anne's diary). How long should we keep something on the forefront of our consciousness? How long are we even capable of doing so?

This novel isn't really a tear-jerker (you learn early on in the novel that Peter finds success and even happiness in America), but it's also not really an uplifting story either. I do find that it's genuine though. And when you're dealing with something as awful, as ugly, as the horrors of Nazism, I think that that's perhaps the best we can ask for.

The Book Thief, Markus Zusak

I should maybe leave this book to Susan, because she recommended it to me. However, I just finished it and have quickly added it to my favorite books.

The Book Thief tells the story of Liesel Meminger, a young girl living with foster parents in Nazi Germany. She cannot read at the beginning of the book, but slowly falls in love with words through the people closest to her. And these people offer different revelations about life, death, morality, obligation, love, and what it means to be human -- against the backdrop of one of the most inhumane times in history.

Zusak chose Death as his narrator, a character who has the dubious privilege of seeing much of Europe during the time of the book. This narrator places Liesel's story in a horrific historical context. At the same time, he keeps the story focused on, and revolving around, Liesel. Zusak's richness of metaphor and unique use of language fit both his narrator and his main character very well. Death is a straightforward narrator with an outside-of-human perspective on his subject matter.

Despite this understatement, the story loses nothing of the horrors of the time. Somehow, Zusak keeps a childlike tone to his narration, so that people like me, who are chased off by too dark subject matter, still enjoy it. The story made me cry without depressing me. It offered no false hope, but did not crush characters or readers. It is brilliant.

Other than that, all I have to say is, you should read it.

Persuasion, Jane Austen

"Upon my word, Miss Anne Elliot, you have the most extraordinary taste!  Everything that revolts other people, low company, paltry rooms, foul air, disgusting association, are inviting to you."

As I read these lines, I knew I had found a literary companion in Anne Elliot.  A sensible twenty-something among the vain, silly, proud, and rank-obsessed, Anne seems almost too perfect to be palatable.  Yet her faults - timidity, relying on the opinions of others, thinking perhaps too much about duty - do indeed make her human (though still enviable in my opinion).  Believable characters are key in a novel with a lot of talk and very little action.  Persuasion was engaging and funny - especially if you are used to Jane Austen's irony and sarcasm.  It was a fast read for me, and I certainly recommend it - if you have patience for a book of conversations.

As a bit of an introduction to my literary tastes, I float between 18th-20th century literature, history and historiography, anthropology and archaeology, Annie Dillard or Elizabeth Gilbert-style nonfiction, historical fiction, religion and faith, and the occasional just-for-fun read.  Hopefully I'll have some good reviews to come.

"She was feeling, though not saying, that after being long in the country, nothing could be so good for her as a little quiet cheerfulness."

The Looking Glass Wars, Frank Beddor

OH MY GOSH! Cannot remember the last time I was that caught up in a book. Could not put it down.

The plot goes along with Alice in Wonderland--the story being that "Alice" is based on the stories told by Alyss Heart, the rightful queen of Wonderland who was exiled at age 7 when her evil Aunt Redd killed her parents and stole the throne. Alyss must return to Wonderland with the help of her friends Hatter Madigan the milliner assassin and her childhood love Dodge Anders, who I am now not so secretly in love with. . . . The book has elements of 1984, and an incredibly imaginative re-interpretation of Wonderland. One of my new favorite books!

Helena, Evelyn Waugh

Once again, I chose a book based on recommendation. I opened it in the library to see if I could figure out the basic plot line (I don't like to jump into a book unless I know this) and sat on the floor reading the first five or ten pages. Needless to say, that recommended it to me.

Helena tells the story of St. Helena from a half-fictional, half-historical perspective. St. Helena is the mother of Constantine, the Roman emperor who legalized Christianity. She is famous for being pious, establishing churches, and supposedly discovering the true Cross. Not much is known about her background or her relationship with Constantius, the father of Constantine.

Waugh takes liberty in creating a vivid young Helena on the British Isles who falls in love with the adventures she hopes to find as the wife of Constantius. I felt like I knew Helena through her early marriage, the birth of her son, and even up through her divorce. Then, abruptly, the tone shifts. Waugh steps away from Helena. I spent most of the novel anticipating the story of her conversion because she spends so much of the novel seeking. Waugh simply slipped in her conversion as a side note, rather than a major part of the story. I never quite got over that, even though he brought the narration back into her character for a while.

Waugh also has a habit of slipping occasionally from the concrete into heavily abstract language that, quite frankly, lost my attention. Other than these few passages, however, I enjoyed his writing. Like the first five or ten pages, the novel read smoothly and kept me reading. I just had to see it as a novel about a girl from Britain who marries a great Roman and gives birth to a greater one, not as the story of a saint that I expected.

Dave Barry for Fifth Graders

I just finished two books by Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson.

The first was Peter and the Sword of Mercy (Book 4 in the Peter and the Starcatchers series). I have mixed feelings about it, because it radically changed the series. Books 1-3 are prequels to Peter Pan (the story of how Neverland came to be, and the adventures of Peter and 11 yr old Molly--the future Mary Darling). At the end of book 3, you can see how everything is set up for the story of Peter Pan to occur a couple decades in the future, when Wendy tells the stories that her mother has told her of Peter Pan and George Darling refuses to remember the adventures of his childhood. But book 4 sort of crosses the boundary from prequel to fan fiction, because it takes place 20 years in the future, and introduces Wendy and Peter in a drastically different way than Barrie's Peter Pan. It was certainly fun to read, and a great adventure, but no longer seems like Peter Pan could come after it :-/

The second book I read was Science Fair: a story of mystery, dancer, international suspense, and a very nervous frog.... This book was just hilarious. Very politically incorrect, but hilarious. The plot is amazing: international terrorists from Krpshtskan infiltrate the school science fair and are defeated by a boy, a frog, and a giant mentos in a 50 gallons of coke. And interwoven is the story of D. Arthur Vaderian, a star wars buff who is attempting to steal paraphernalia from the main character's nerdy parents. Yes, there is a lightsaber battle.

Both of these books are 5th/6th grade reading level. I highly recommend the Peter and the Starcatchers series to everyone, although again--it could have ended with book 3. I wonder if there are plans for a book 5 that will somehow round it out.

The Peacemaker, Ken Sande

Subtitled A Biblical Guide to Resolving Personal Conflict, this is a non-fiction self-helpish book that delves into interpersonal relationships and outlines some biblical guidelines for resolving conflict.

I should start by saying that this is not the type of book I usually read. In fact, if I had not been required to read this book for a summer fellowship, I can pretty much guarantee I would never have cracked the cover. However, I've never been the type of student who doesn't do the reading (hence the reason I suffered through several Mark Twain books in high school), so I decided to make a go of it. Just under 300 pages long, it's a fairly fast read.

I was pleasantly surprised. Early in the book, there's a diagram entitled The Slippery Slope of Conflict. It's a half circle the lays out the "peace-faking" responses (suicide, flight, denial), "peace-making" ones (overlook, reconciliation, negotiation, mediation, arbitration, accountability), and "attack responses" (assault, litigation, murder). As a disclaimer, I'm the law student -- litigation is pretty much what keeps my profession in business. So I'll admit to being a tad wary. However, Sande does a great job throughout of distinguishing between circumstances in which litigation is appropriate (and, indeed, may be necessary) and cases where people simply jump the gun (it's amazing what idiotic things people will sue over!).

Additionally, Sande lays out an orderly and consistent approach to examining your own behavior. For my fellow Catholics out there, think of it as an examination of conscience with a twist of pop-psychology. Though at times he gets a little preachy, overall the balance of religious verse with a general analysis of conflict resolution is well-maintained.

My one big criticism is that Sande doesn't venture very far outside of Scripture. His examples work very well if the conflict is between two Christians (especially if they go to the same church), but I don't believe that he adequately addressed how Christians can take advantage of secular institutions, especially if the party with whom they are in disagreement is not a Christian.

So overall, I can't really say that I'd recommend this book. However, if you're looking for some guidance in resolving conflict in your life, this is definitely a good resource. Sande makes a good point when he notes that our society is quick to place people in adversarial relations. The problem with that posture is that it makes us very inward-oriented, when really we should be working in communion with those around us.

This will probably be the only book of this type that I'll review here. But since I had to read it, I figured I'd pass along the title -- maybe it'll come in handy for you someday.

Snow White and Rose Red, Patricia C. Wrede

As I was searching the children's section for Briar Rose, I stumbled upon a few books I had not read by Patricia C. Wrede. Wrede writes fun young adult books, full of magic, confusion, and spunky heroines. Being in the mood for fun and not too much thought, I picked up another book in the Fairy Tale series of Briar Rose, Snow White and Red Rose.

Snow White and Red Rose is not the same fairy tale as Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. So I didn't actually know the fairy tale of the book. Wrede interspersed bits of the fairy tale with her story, so that I read it slowly throughout the novel, but I think part of the joy of the story was lost on me.

The novel is set in Elizabethan England, in a world that combines traditional idea of Faerie with a historical fear of witchcraft. Two girls and their mother get inadvertently involved in a vortex of human wizardry and Faerie drama. Wrede uses rather Shakespearean language (this is the only place I've read "an" to mean "if" outside of the Bard), which jarred with her accessible prose at first. Once I got past it, I enjoyed the novel, from an "I want something simple and engrossing to take my mind off the housing hunt" perspective.

The Evidential Power of Beauty: Science and Theology Meet, Thomas Dubay, S. M.

My parents gave me this book as a present because I'm fascinated by the overlap between science and God/religion/theology. I had to wait until the summer to have time to enjoy it, and overall I found it an interesting book.

The book had a lot more philosophy and theology and less science than I had expected. The first third of the book discusses the concept of beauty. The second third finally got into the science and discussed the beauty of creation and scientific marvels, ranging from the very huge to the very small. The author also discussed the idea of design in the universe and the anthropic principle. The final third of the book focused on the beauty of God.

I found the first part of the book a bit slow, which probably stems mostly from my limited patience for philosophy, although it did raise some interesting thoughts. I greatly enjoyed the second and third sections, which made me more appreciative of the world and caused me to pause and think about the beauty surrounding us.

My only remaining criticism of the book is that it was a bit repetitive. Some of the quotes and ideas were repeated often enough that I thought I was rereading sections. However, I enjoyed this book overall and would recommend it.

Briar Rose, Jane Yolen

On recommendation from a roommate and fellow Vincentian volunteer.

This book brings together the stories of the Holocaust and Sleeping Beauty, one of my favorite fairy tales. I mostly liked the fairy tale as a child because I had a Sleeping Beauty book with the most beautiful illustrations. I sped through Jane Yolen's Briar Rose in one evening, from 4pm to 10pm, despite the fact that I had assumed it would keep me reading for a few days.

Despite the fact that it is in the Fairy Tale series, a series of books by different authors meant to bring fairy tales to life in the modern world. It is the story of a girl on a quest for her own history and her grandmother's identity, an identity which Yolen reveals through the story of Sleeping Beauty. Any Holocaust story is bound to be tragic, and this novel is no exception. Yet it keeps from being oppressive. I'm fairly certain that I've read excerpts from it somewhere, because portions of it were so familiar that I already knew the names of places and events, but I know I hadn't seen some of the plotlines before.

The library housed it with Juvenile Fiction, where it probably fits best, but it doesn't need to be a children's book. Which, after all, is part of the goal of the Fairy Tale series.

An Explanation

This isn't where I regularly blog. However, it occurred to me as I was placing the lasted additions on the "Books I've Read" list at the bottom of my bog, that such a list is fairly useless. Its original purpose was to keep tabs on the books I could check off my "Book List" on Facebook -- a helpful compilation created by my friends for my literary benefit.

However, I never intended that list to be a show-off list of what I've read. I wanted to keep tabs on what I've read and share good books with others. Problem : I wouldn't recommend everything I've read. Solution : This blog.

I will post a few brief thoughts on books when I finish them. Each entry will be a title and author; I'll try to make labels based on genre. I've asked other people to contribute to make the thoughts and opinions more diverse and to get some book recommendations of my own. You can follow me in my reading career, or visit if you are looking for a good book. Unless you don't trust my taste in books...