Seeing Voices: A Journey into the World of the Deaf

#742
Title: Seeing Voices: A Journey into the World of the Deaf
Author: Oliver Sacks
Publisher: HarperCollins

Year: 1990/1989
208 pages
Audiobook.

I enjoyed this, as I enjoy all Sacks, and it's not his best. It's light on neurology. Given its 1989 publication, it's quite out of date. It predates baby sign language and both behind-the-ear speech processors and fully implantable cochlear implants. In addition (and since I read it as an audiobook, I can't easily double-check this), Sacks makes two errors of a sort I don't usually see from him. First, he treats Kaspar Hauser is a viable example of late language attainment. I believe that by the time he was writing, it was reasonably well-agreed that Hauser was a fraud. Second, he seems to believe that the "dumb" of "deaf and dumb" refers to intellect, when a cursory look at etymology shows that this is incorrect. "Dumb" means "silent" in this context ("dumbwaiter," "struck dumb").

Sacks provides an interesting history of education for the deaf (or lack thereof), the development of sign, and the cultural and political struggles around sign. I found the third section, on the 1988 student protests at Gallaudet University, most interesting, probably because I remember it well. 

The Exiled Queen (Seven Realms, #2)

#741
Title: The Exiled Queen (Seven Realms, #2)
Author: Cindy Williams Chima
Publisher: Hyperion
Year: 2010
586 pages

A gift from my nephew.

Chima better hits her stride in this second volume. The reference to a staff in the amulet that annoyed me in the first book here appears in an as-yet-explained old illustration, mentioned as foreshadowing (p. 431). Despite the existence of herbal birth control and some heavy smooching, Raisa apparently will remain a virgin until she's old enough for US standards. Pleasantly, same-sex partnerships exist and don't excite much commentary, though we're told that elsewhere in the Seven Realms they might. Yes, Han is a bad boy and Raisa is a kick-ass girl, but refreshingly, Han keeps trying not to be bad and Raisa can only sometimes kick ass. Their parallel need to assume new identities and behaviors in ultimate service to their beliefs about what's best for the kingdom is amusing.

Both main and secondary characters are sufficiently complex that they sometimes act in surprising ways that aren't out of character. They are sometimes stupid in their actions (as, Raisa sending a letter) and lack of critical thinking (as, Han's inability to instantly grasp what HRMAW probably stands for), but this is true of many teens as depicted in young adult novels.

On the down side, there are plenty of Harry Potter-esque references (such as "Abelard's army" and white-haired evil wizards).

On a personal note, this is the second book I've read this year with a mysterious character named Crow (the first being Murakami's Kafka on the Shore).

Born Standing Up: A Comic's Life

#740
Title: Born Standing Up: A Comic's Life
Author: Steve Martin
Publisher: Scribner
Year: 2007
240 pages
Audiobook.

Enjoyable enough and a quick read, Steve Martin's memoir of his life to date in comedy includes events and examples that some of us remember, but touches only lightly on his romantic relationships. More than you'd expect about his relationship with his parents, however. 

A Case of Exploding Mangoes

#739
Title: A Case of Exploding Mangoes
Author: Mohammed Hanif
Publisher: Knopf
Year:2008
320 pages
Audiobook.

I thought this might give me a kick back toward Charlie Wilson's War. Hanif uses a fictional first-person narrator to explore the presumed conspiracy that took down Pakistan's General Zia-ul-Haq. Hanif's answer: Pretty much everyone wanted him dead, including an ill-fated crow. I listened to the book, so I may have missed it, but was the case of mangoes indeed implicated as well? The novel generally retains a slightly distanced, slightly humorous tone, and sustained my engagement with the characters throughout.

Singing Away the Hunger: The Autobiography of an African Woman

#738
Title: Singing Away the Hunger: The Autobiography of an African Woman
Authors: Mpho M'Atsepo Nthunya & K. Limakatso Kendal
Publisher:  Indiana University Press
Year: 1996/1997
Country: Lesotho
187 pages


A volume of short autobiographical stories by a Basotho woman, aided by a US woman (who explains her involvement and her concerns about colonial/exploitative practices). These stories, loosely but not entirely chronologically presented, detail a complex, difficult life in a country changing over to self-rule. If I were training medical volunteers for Lesotho, I'd have them read this as a way to understand how people might be making health care, education, and economic decisions on the basis of beliefs and practical realities very different from those of the professionals.

The Unit

#737
Title: The Unit
Author: Ninni Holmqvist
Publisher: Other Press
Year: 2006/2009
272 pages
Ebook.


Aspects of the general conceit match Ishiguro's Never Let Me Go, with an occasional dash of Schusterman's Unwind or Logan's Run thrown in. An important difference, however, is the protagonist's matter-of-fact acceptance of her fate, which inclines the tone more toward Ishiguro. The story around the edges was the more interesting piece for me--the staff of the Unit who clearly are troubled by their ethical scruples and lean toward disobedience. More exploration of their dilemmas (especially when the residents are so compliant) might have made this a 5-star novel.

As a woman of somewhere around 50, I found the notion that my utility to society might be complete laughable; on the other hand, as a person in a partnership not legally acknowledged by my nation, the idea that some kinds of relationships count while others don't cuts close to home. I agree with some other reviewers that [highlight for spoiler] it makes no sense that you'd waste organs by conducting medical experiments on the residents.

Reading Lolita in Tehran

#736
Title: Reading Lolita in Tehran
Author: Azar Nafisi
Publisher: Random House
Year: 2003
 356 pages


"It is only now, when I try to gather up the morsels of those days, that I discover how little, if ever, we talked about our personal lives--about love and marriage and how it felt to have children, or not to. It seemed as if, apart from literature, the political had devoured us, eliminating the personal or private." (p. 237) When I reached this statement about 2/3 in, I thought, yes, and that's why I just can't get into this memoir, despite repeated efforts over the last year.

I empathize with Nafisi (as a secular subject high school teacher in a religious school, I once had to buy or hand-expurgate 11 copies of One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich to keep my job) and, while I don't find her comments on literature very interesting, I'm at least in agreement with the idea that novels are a refuge in difficult times, or that they may illuminate sociopolitical contexts other than those in which they were written.

I think my inability to engage deeply with Nafisi is due in part to the lack of emotional detail; there's a reasonable amount of telling of emotion, but not much showing of it. Nafisi as narrator seems distant, somewhat authoritarian, and sometimes reactive in ways that seem guaranteed to get her sacked, beaten, or executed. These outbursts don't always make sense to me, though I can add my own speculation that she is keeping a tight lid on her feelings, or erupts when she can't stand it anymore, or is culturally less disclosive than an American would be. However, that's just my exegesis, and Nafisi comes off as more histrionic than repressed (that is, as if her emotions are shallow rather than that she's forcing them down). Again, that's not what she says, but it is what I take from what I actually experience as a reader. Despite being much more cued by words than images, I found Persepolis more immediate and moving.

I could now get into a long discussion of fiction vs. memoir and the intentionalist fallacy, but instead I'm just going to reitterate that for whatever reason, I never got to a point where this felt like a pleasure. That's an observation, not an indictment. I'm glad to have read it, but it was a long, hard road.

The Psychopath Test: A Journey Through the Madness Industry

#735
Title: The Psychopath Test: A Journey Through the Madness Industry
Author: Jon Ronson
Publisher: Riverhead
Year: 2011
288 pages
Audiobook.

At a certain point I stopped taking notes on problems and inaccurate statements. Instead of a formal critique, I'll just say that this has the depth of a magazine article, with all the problems of superficiality and inxorrect information inherent in that genre. If you're not familiar with psychiatric diagnosis, how US psychiatric/psychological treatment works, or the criteria for civil commitment now vs. during Rosenhan's era almost 40 years ago, check Ronson's assertions before believing they're factual. As a narrative, it doesn't hang together very well and its conclusion appears to be "don't think you can diagnose people without adequate training," which I or any therapist could have told you when Ronson tries to diagnose himself with the DSM, if not before.

The Planets

#734
Title: The Planets
Author: Dava Sobel
Publisher: Viking
Year: 2005
270 pages
Audiobook.

A lot of people love her prose style, but I didn't enjoy it. Some authors can blend personal reflections with non-fiction; I didn't think Sobel pulled it off. This would be a good introduction to the solar system for someone who isn't very familiar with it. In the absence of enjoyable writing, there wasn't a lot to it for me. For a more informative look at a planet (more or less) and recent astronomical history close to home, try Brown's How I Killed Pluto and Why It Had It Coming.

Gulliver's Travels

#733
Title: Gulliver's Travels
Author: Jonathan Swift
Publisher: Audible
Year: 1726/2010
~318 pages
Audiobook.

Read by David Hyde Pierce. A good satire of both the travel writing genre and Swift's political milieu. Each of the adventures has its very funny aspects. It's clear why the journey to Lilliput is the most popular: It's a tight story with well-chosen "factual" details to support its claim to be non-fiction, plus a great deal of amusing scatology. 

The Birds of Costa Rica: A Field Guide

#732
Title: The Birds of Costa Rica: A Field Guide
Author: Richard Garrigues
Illustrator: Robert Green
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Year: 2007
Country: Costa Rica
408 pages

Costa Rica.

Yes, I read all of it. I'm like that with some field guides. This one features somewhat larger illustrations than many. Our Costa Rican birding guide isn't taken with the color register (he blamed the printing process), but in many cases, I found it more accurate than the other guidebook I was using. The illustration of the keel-billed toucan, for example, was much more true to life.

The intention of this handbook is to omit information unneccesary for identification, and this it does, while bolding field marks and behavioral information that assists differentiation. I found it easy to use in the field.

Open Road's Best of Panama: Your Passport to the Perfect Trip!

#731
Title: Open Road's Best of Panama: Your Passport to the Perfect Trip!
Author: Bruce C. Morris
Publisher: Open Road
Year: 2008
248 pages

For a book whose big sell is that it only has what you need, it's amazingly, astonishingly repetitive. I'm not just talking about repeated information, but word for word, cut-and-paste repetitions, sometimes 3 or 4 times through the volume. I'd have rather bought a smaller book without repetition, or this length book with more information.

Holy Cow! An Indian Adventure

#730
Title: Holy Cow! An Indian Adventure
Author: Sarah Macdonald
Publisher: Bantam
Year: 2002/2004
298 pages
Audiobook.

I enjoyed this more than I first thought I would, but less than I'd expect. I liked it precisely because it <i>wasn't</i> fun girl adventures in India. The author conveyed her fear and the harrowing nature of many of her experiences, which is useful for my teaching. What I liked less well was what seemed like a superficial tour of available religons. I assume that this was the great idea that sold the book, but I'd have liked more depth, whether or not this premise was real or constructed. 

The Filter Bubble

#729
Title: The Filter Bubble
Author: Eli Pariser
Publisher: Penguin
Year: 2011
304 pages
Audiobook.

If anyone has told you recently that the information you want is in "the second link that comes up for X on Google," but it's not, you already know the first part of what Pariser is going to tell you. Much of this book addresses aspects of the issues of filtering, which means monitoring, and how our online behavior and data may be used not only to tailor what we see, but to commodetize us. Pariser does a good job of demonstrating that a filtered web does not flatten access to information, but compartmentalizes it. At the same time, he represents the necessity of some filtering, given the crush of data. If you read hard science fiction you'll find this confirmatory; if you tend to be naive about what you post on Facebook, it may usefully increase your paranoia.

The Sense of an Ending

#728
Title: The Sense of an Ending
Author: Julian Barnes
Publisher: Vintage
Year: 2004
144 pages
Audiobook.

What I like here is how Barnes sneaks in changes of genre within the fictional confessional memoir. I enjoyed attending to the structure of the novel. Less enjoyable was the story aspect, which was not terrifically interesting to me, perhaps because I didn't find any of the characters sympathetic.

The Demon King (Seven Realms, #1)

#727
Title: The Demon King (Seven Realms, #1)
Author: Cinda Williams Chima
Publisher: Hyperion
Year: 2010
528 pages

I almost stopped reading early on because the writing was so awkward. Example:
Using a stick, he lifted the amulet by its chain. It dangled, spinning hypnotically in the sunlight, a green translucent stone cunningly carved into a snarl of serpents with ruby eyes. The staff was topped with a brilliant round-cut diamond larger than he'd ever seen, and the snake's eyes were blood red rubies (18-19).
Well, which is it? A stone? A stone topped with a diamond? A stone topped with a diamond plus inset rubies? Isn't "ruby eyes" pretty much the same as eyes that are "blood red rubies"? Are there many serpents, or one snake? And what is this "staff" of which you speak? This is all made worse by the cover illustration, which shows one snake with a ruby eye, no translucency to the green stone, no diamond, no staff, and a metal setting. Fortunately, it picked up after that, though there are certainly tracts that cry out for basic editing.

The first volume introduces the protagonists and sets them on their courses. There are some enjoyable reveals (both in the story's frame and historical) and believable villains. This might turn out to be a quest narrative, but since Han acquires a pretty good Magic Thingie by page 18, the journey may be one of discovery rather than acquisition.

A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius

#726
Title: A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius
Author: Dave Eggers
Publisher: Vintage
Year: 2000/2001
530 pages
Audiobook + paperback.

Eggers captures the manic/anxious response to complex grief in a mostly-memoir that is evocative of the Snowden episodes of Catch-22 mashed together with the last chapter of Ulysses. I found it unreadable on the page, but almost unbearable (in a good way) as an audiobook, capably read by Dion Graham in a naturalistic and exhausting manner. I wasn't put off by the titring meta-self-scrutiny, though it tired me and I'm glad I read other work by Eggers first or I might not have done so. Bonus: I learned (from Wikipedia, not this book) that Dave and Toph write the delightful Dr. and Mr. Doris Haggis-on-Whey books, notably Your Disgusting Head.

In the Land of Invented Languages: Esperanto Rock Stars, Klingon Poets, Loglan Lovers, and The Mad Dreamers Who Tried to Build A Perfect Language

#725
Title: In the Land of Invented Languages: Esperanto Rock Stars, Klingon Poets, Loglan Lovers, and The Mad Dreamers Who Tried to Build A Perfect Language
Author: Arika Okrent
Publisher: Spiegel & Grau
Year: 2009/2010
342 pages

 As a college student I'd have given it 5 stars and learned Klingon. Now I just enjoyed it. Okrent begins with a tense writing style that makes me want to reassure her that anybody who picks this up is a nerd and will only find the sometimes arch tone offputting. We all know who we are and why we're reading it, so just relax.

Okrent presents a good range of artificial languages created by dissimilar means and to different ends. It's a nice overview and introduction, suitable for lay readers but with amusements here and there for people with a background in linguistics.

Star Trek [2009 Movie Tie-in]

#724
Title: Star Trek [2009 Movie Tie-in]
Author: Alan Dean Foster
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Year: 2009
274 pages
Audiobook.

Why yes, it is still my pleasure to read Star Trek novels. Sorry, ladies, I'm already taken.

Foster has always been a more-than-serviceable translator of Star Trek to novel. What I enjoyed about this movie and novel was the story frame, which asserts the inevitability of the Star Trek TOS timeline. George Kirk, a victim of this timeline, may not see it this way, but from the perspective of  the Trekker, important aspects of canon triumph over Nero's attempt to suppress it. That Spock is the witness to this bifurcation and rejoining is a nice echo of his status as a man between worlds and identities.

The novel follows the movie reasonably closely, occasionally providing a glimpse of material that was probably edited or compressed. Without the diversion the movie's bright palette and fast action, the parallels between protagonists' life stories (for example, the losses experienced by Nero, Spock, and Kirk) are more evident. Better with the movie, but could hold its own as a book.

The Motorcycle Diaries: Notes on a Latin American Journey

#723
Title: The Motorcycle Diaries: Notes on a Latin American Journey [Notas de Viaje]
Author: Ernesto Che Guevara
Publisher: Ocean Press
Year: 1992/2003
175 pages
Audiobook.

This makes me feel old, but in a good way. I don't want to be carousing about drunk on stolen wine, ill, with no money, pitching off my broke-down motorcycle over and over, misrepresenting my credentials and trying to score with cute women. I mean, it sounds good on paper, but I've made different choices with my life.

What is interesting here is Che's discourse on class and opportunity. Otherwise, it's a mildly interesting travelogue by a guy.

Goliath (Leviathan, #3)

#722
Title: Goliath (Leviathan, #3)
Author: Scott Westerfeld
Publisher: Simon Pulse
Year: 2011
543 pages

A reasonably satisfying conclusion to the trilogy. While some plot points are attended to, there's a level of detail that isn't entirely resolved. For example, that the perspicacious lorises make connections and inferences before the humans do is an idea just left dangling. Still, a pleasing series with strong male and female teen protagonists. As in the previous two volumes, lovely illustrations.

Confession of a Buddhist Atheist

#721
Title: Confession of a Buddhist Atheist
Author: Stephen Batchelor
Publisher: Random House
Year: 2010
302 pages

Batchelor's autobiography, which greatly enriches my reading of Buddhism without Beliefs: A Contemporary Guide to Awakening. Here and there he goes on at more length than seems necessary, but overall this was well-written and very absorbing. 

The Magician's Assistant

#720
Title: The Magician's Assistant
Author: Ann Patchett
Publisher: Harcourt
Year: 1997
368 pages
Audiobook.

This may be my last Patchett. The plots are quite similar in terms of odd coincidences, too-tidy wrap-ups of too many strands, and emotions at the conclusion that I don't believe. This one would have been okay enough as a quick read except that I'd just read another Patchett so while I couldn't guess the plot, I could guess the structure. Plus, I don't buy the ending.

Three Cups of Deceit: How Greg Mortenson, Humanitarian Hero, Lost His Way

#719
Title: Three Cups of Deceit: How Greg Mortenson, Humanitarian Hero, Lost His Way
Author: Jon Krakauer
Publisher: Knopf
Year: 2011
96 pages

 A useful companion to Mortenson's book, and perhaps one that raises the caution: People with a passion for humanitarian work aren't necessarily the best administrators, and certainly aren't the best accountants. That Mortenson is annoying to work with should be obvious to anyone who's read him, but isn't an indictment of his practices. However, Krakauer documents a number of problems that suggest we really need to attend to infrastructure and fiscal transparency in our non-profits and NGOs, as well as conduct adequate needs assessments and outcome evaluation.

What I Hate: From A to Z

 #718
Title: What I Hate: From A to Z
Author: Roz Chast
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Year: 2011
64 pages

Not Chast's best. She's usually hilarious; this inspired a smile or two but had no real zing.

Unwind (Unwind Trilogy #1)

#717
Title: Unwind (Unwind Trilogy #1)
Author: Neal Shusterman
Publisher: Simon & Schuster 
Year: 2007
335 pages
Audiobook.

A nicely tense dystopian YA novel, first in a series. The story is enjoyable enough to make up for the somewhat expository and clunky present-tense writing. The basic premise provides an interesting distorted reflection of Ishiguro's Never Let Me Go: Abortion is illegal, but adolescents can be "unwound" for spare parts. Logan's Run comes to mind as well. The variety of uses and abuses to which this policy may be put are sometimes shown, sometimes told. The three main characters are engaging and differ sufficiently from each other, and some of the minor characters become more sympathetic over time. I found Lev the most interesting character, and the interpretation of tithing an engaging idea. I don't believe that there would be Jewish tithes, however--Jewish philosophy argues against it, as well as Jewish beliefs and practices around death. Whether it's more plausible for the other religions mentioned is a question I'll leave to others more cultually proficient in those traditions.

Update: I think it's only fair to add the questions that arose as I reflected on the book last night. I'll spoiler tag them by putting them in white lettering. Highlight to see:
1. Why would a rebellion humanize and personalize the unwinds' situation? It might bring it to the public's attention, but time and again, studies of group behavior show that appealing at the individual level ("Mom! Don't you love me?") personalizes, while groups are perceived as scary or deindividuated mobs.
2. Why would a rebellion in a holding facility lead to changes in the law that favor the rioters? Blowing stuff up is more likely to lead to more stringent arrangements.

3. Roland is unwound when he is because he has a rare blood type, AB-. I'm not sure how Rh factors into it, but AB is the universal recipient. Though it's a rare type, it's not necessary to have it on hand for AB recipients, at least AB+. Further, Connor receives Roland's transplanted arm. So Connor is also AB-? Since this is true of only 0.6% of the US population, that's too much of a coincidence.

4. I'm willing to live with the conceit that one's consciousness pervades one's organs, but what about blood? Plasma? Lymph? The ending, though poignant, ruptures my suspension of disbelief with a) its wish fulfillment, and b) the implication that indeed, the unwinds are still alive--and even conscious!--as transplanted organs, which kind of kills the idea that unwinding is murder and substantiates the rationale for it.

Still, a good book, but not a 5-star experience.

When a Crocodile Eats the Sun

#716
Title: When a Crocodile Eats the Sun
Author: Peter Godwin
Publisher: Picador
Year: 2005/2007
416 pages
Audiobook.

Godwin's memoir of growing up in Zimbabwe is a good companion piece to Fuller's Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight: An African Childhood; like Fuller's autobiography, Godwin's works best in the childhood segments. Godwin captures changing attitudes and moods over time and shows the sociopolitical changes in his country across his lifetime. The writing is descriptive but not flowery, and the dialogue flows naturally. 

Darke (Septimus Heap #6)

#715
Title: Darke (Septimus Heap #6)
Author:  Angie Sage
Publisher: Katherine Tegen Books
Year: 2011
641 pages

One of the better books in this series, with plenty of action, a good level of anxiety, and teen self-preocccupation and angst. Some leveling occurs--Silas does something well, Simon attempts to mend his ways, and Septimus makes some errors. Enough multi-book story arcs are resolved for a good sense of closure, while others remain tantalizingly open for the 7th book including, perhaps, Princess Jenna's relationship to the Port Witch Coven. 

Blue Nights

#714
Title: Blue Nights
Author: Joan Didion
Publisher: Knopf
Year: 2011 
208 pages

While The Year of Magical Thinking was easy to become absorbed in, and was an excellent evocation of grief, Blue Nights is a better-structured book. In part, this is because Didion is always so meticulous about language and the sequencing of scenes. Here, that very carefulness is subject to scrutiny. If The Year of Magical Thinking is about grief, Blue Nights may be about the defenses against grief, about ways of narrating, remembering, and depicting that subsume the emotional chaos of the experience. The Year of Magical Thinking was cathartic to read. Blue Nights may be about the agony of not making peace with overwhelming grief except by engaging with it only as a cognitive experience. Didion ruminates on her own mortality, draws parallels and identifies chasms between herself and her daughter, and demonstrates ways in which a telling cannot contain the subtleties of the experience, and may deflect the teller and listener. She uses the representation of privilege within the memoir to provide the reader with an experience to mirror hers of trying to understand her relationship with Quintana. If this sounds technical, it is, but Didion manages to convey her dilemma eloquently and without bogging down. It's a remarkable book and I recommend it highly.

The Medicine Cabinet of Curiosities: An Unconventional Compendium of Health Facts and Oddities, from Asthmatic Mice to Plants that Can Kill

#713
Title: The Medicine Cabinet of Curiosities: An Unconventional Compendium of Health Facts and Oddities, from Asthmatic Mice to Plants that Can Kill
Author: Nick Bakalar
Publisher: Times Books
Year: 2009
240 pages

There was nothing wrong with this, and I mean the 2 stars in my Goodreads review in the Goodreads sense of "it was ok." However, it seemed more desultory than its brevity could accommodate and still seem complete, even in the "a little of this, a little of that" style.

I didn't learn much that I didn't already know, so I may be the wrong audience. Probably people who don't work in in medical/allied health professions would find it a more engaging and gripping reading experience. The information presented about which I have professional knowledge was generally correct, and in some cases I could identify the source material without checking the notes. 

Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex

#712
Title: Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex
Author: Mary Roach
Publisher: W. W. Norton
Year: 2008
319 pages

Roach is an entertaining writer, and I especially admire a book on sex that has a footnote on presidential running mates. In Bonk, she's more hands-on than you'd expect, sometimes astonishingly so. She's sort of the George Plimpton of sexology.

I'd have given the book 4 stars were it not for the last chapter. There, she seems to breezily excuse Masters and Johnson's instructions for conversion therapy (same-sex to other-sex orientation) without much acknowledgement of how cruel this practice was (and is), or even an adequate exploration of its lack of efficacy. The chapter could have ended the book with a cautionary tale about how professional or cultural ideas about healthy sexuality don't always match the data. Instead, there's a blip about homosexuality and its mis-treatment, the end. I expect better of Roach and her editors. 

Paradise Lost

#711
Title: Paradise Lost
Author: John Milton
Publisher: Blackstone Audio
Year: 1667/1984
276 pages
Audiobook.

A good reader (Frederick Davidson) on this edition. The blank verse resonates and emphasizes without overpowering, and he does a good job with both rhymes and enjambment. This exegesis of Genesis relies fairly heavily on the Greek and Roman pantheons for symbolism and plot points. It's interesting to see how much more psychological this is than that other stalwart of Christian allegory, The Pilgrim's Progress.There is also more imagery, more shown than told, and more theological argument in the manner that we will later see in de Sade's The 120 Days of Sodom. Eve is weak-willed, while Adam is just a darned nice guy. They feed and angel lunch and hear its expositions. 

Ship Breaker

#710
Title: Ship Breaker
Author: Paolo Bacigalupi
Publisher: Little, Brown
Year: 2010
336 pages
Audiobook.

Middle- to young adult novel with a pretty straightforward plot, post-apocalyptic but not as dystopian as The Windup Girl. The worldbuilding is pretty good, though the language is less rich (and less grim) than in his adult works. I try hard to picture the half-men as Daniel Lee's Manimals, but usually fail and imagine something like McGruff the Crime Dog. 

Bright-sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America

#709
Title: Bright-sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America
Author: Barbara Ehrenreich
Publisher: Renaissance Press
Year: 2009
256 pages
Audiobook.

Overbroad strokes and a sour attitude no matter what render this one of Ehrenreich's worse showings. In her contempt for the positive psychology movement, she sloppily confounds a varity of professional and pop practices, and seems to ignore the vast world of cognitive psychotherapy, which is nothing if not tediously data-rich. Ehrenreich (and to be fair, some of those she derides) seems to think the goal of cognitive or positive intervention is to live longer. It's not. What some studies do show is not gains in longevity, but a better self-reported quality of life. Ehrenreich might see this as a way to coax people to go gently into that good night, but that isn't how I've experienced it as a therapist or informed consumer. She chooses really outlandish, stupid examples without identifying them as extreme, and she ignores the huge history of stupid practices in the name of religion, vilifying psychology as if it did not derive from and in many ways reflect the field of philosophy.

I can identify with her indignation expressed in the breast cancer chapter, and found her discussion of Calvanism interesting. The others are often distorted and bitter rather than funny.

Ehrenreich's Marxism is best when she sticks to her critique of capitalism, rather than, as in Nickel And Dimed: On (Not) Getting by in America, when she devolves to snapping at white women for, she reports, having more pubic hair in their bathrooms. Bright Sided may be my last Ehrenreich.

The Curse of the Giant Tortoise: Tragedies, Crimes, and Mysteries in the Galapagos Islands (6th Ed.)

#708
Title: The Curse of the Giant Tortoise: Tragedies, Crimes, and Mysteries in the Galapagos Islands (6th Ed.)
Author: Octavio Latorre
Publisher: National Cultural Fund
Year: 1997
Country: Ecuador
243 pages

Ecuador.

A poorly-organized, poorly-translated hidtory of Galapagos. It often crosses into incoherence and doesn't seem to have a point other than to describe a series of disasters that, for a reader without other references and resources, are here rendered unintelligible.

[Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH]

#707
[Title: Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH]
Author: Robert C. O'Brien
Publisher: Aladdin Books
Year: 1971/1986
240 pages

BEFORE:
The serendipitous and simultaneous purchase of Rat Girl: A Memoir and Rat Island: Predators in Paradise and the World's Greatest Wildlife Rescue at the National Discount Rituals to Mark the Death of Borders was neither unremarked (by others) nor uncelebrated (alas, by me alone). I realized that I had other rat books at home, enough for a thematic rat shelf. Zinsser's Rats, Lice, and History: Being a Study in Biography, Which, After Twelve Preliminary Chapters Indispensable for the Preparation of the Lay Reader, Deals With the Life History of Typhus Fever, Sullivan's Rats: Observations on the History and Habitat of the City's Most Unwanted Inhabitants, and Guthrie's Even the Rat Was White: A Historical View of Psychology (Allyn & Bacon Classics Edition), Second Edition would be nicely complemented by Hersh and Stolzenburg. I am the type of person who rearranges some of the shelves to see if you are paying attention: Less Than Zero to Ten Thousand Light-Years From Home. The Sound and the Fury, The Red and the Black, The Cook and the Carpenter. Organization by spectrum. Spines depicting faces. I'm like the Kliban cartoon captioned "Just give Alice some pencils and she will stay busy for hours."

In the night I bolted up in a cold sweat. It was actually a hot sweat, but the room was cold. I cried out, but using my inside inside voice, "What about Mrs. Frisby?!" I had read Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH, twice. Surely I had a copy. Where else would I have read it? Not at a friend's house. Let's face it, my friends have kids who move right from Heather Has Two Mommies to Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal. They eschew the Frisbys and The Borrowers and Caddie Woodlawn. I, too, had skipped directly from Little House in the Big Woods to Gods, Graves and Scholars: The Story of Archaeology and History Begins at Sumer: Thirty-Nine "Firsts" in Recorded History. In fact, I lost points on an IQ test in high school when I answered the question "Who is the god or goddess of dreams?" with "Geshtinana, the divine poetess and dream interpreter." Apparently when your guidance counselor answers "In which mythology?" with "Any," she doesn't mean Sumerian. I'd have known the correct answer if those Percy Jackson books had been published, but they were decades in the future. The point is, I skipped most children's and middle readers' books, returning to them only as an adult.

I have a hard time with library books, too. There's something about a library book that makes me want to eat it rather than read it. I don't like the time pressure. Sometimes a book needs to deliquesce on my shelf for 3 or 4 years before it is sufficiently ripe. So where had the copy of Mrs. Frisby I mostly undoubtedly had had gone to?

I don't know, and I don't care. I picked up a used copy for $2 today. I will re-read it soon. At that time, my review will follow this exposition. My rat shelf is sufficient until I acquire a copy of Doctor Rat, which I began but never finished when I was 15 and worked at a library.

AFTER:
As a child, I was troubled by the lack of verisimilitude in Stuart Little. It wasn't the invisible car that bothered me, but the idea that a human could give birth to a mouse and even notice. I was aware, even as a tot, on account of my mad reading skillz, that baby mice were born in littlers, not singly, and that a litter of mousie pups would fit in a spoon. I merely mention this to demonstrate that I am a discerning reader who can suspend my disbelief when warranted. I was willing to believe that good commie rats can form an anarcho-syndicalist collective and live off the land, while bad capitalist rats get zapped by their own electricity. Or at least, that is how I read the moral. 

State of Wonder

#706
Title: State of Wonder
Author: Ann Patchett
Publisher: HarperCollins
Year: 2011
353 pages
Audiobook.

 A somewhat silly premise and conclusion, though that's okay for this light fare. I don't buy for a minute that she'd leave Easter. Another 20 pages of agonized decision-making could have rescued this. and served the novel's need for Marina to have learned something about herself, her own choices, and moral relativism in order to moderate her contempt for Mr. Fox.

The Shadow of the Wind

#705
Title: The Shadow of the Wind
Author: Carlos Ruiz Zafón
Publisher: Penguin
Year: 2005
500 pages

Grand themes of destiny, conflation/collapse, and perfect coincidences are engagingly drawn in broad strokes, similar to but grander than Q & A (Slumdog Millionaire). Occasional slips into magical realism weren't necessary and bugged me. Some parts fit together better than others; at best, it was like seeing something sucked into a whirlpool, disintegrated, and miraculously emerging in a different form. The burned man's identity was obvious early on. Oddly, I was simultaneously reading The English Patient, with its own burned man whose identity was important and concealed. 

The Pilgrim's Progress from This World to That Which is to Come, Delivered under the Similitude of a Dream

#704
Title: The Pilgrim's Progress from This World to That Which is to Come, Delivered under the Similitude of a Dream
Author: John Bunyan
Publisher: Blackstone Audio
Year: 1666/2000
325 pages
Audiobook.

This is not a review of the religious sentiments expressed in this early allegorical novel.

The allegory itself was heavy-handed, perhaps because the art of fiction was still young. There is much in the way of deus ex machina, miracles and the like, while the plot is not much developed. It falls somewhere between Jaynes's "[the] god told me to do it" structure described in The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind and Forster's description of a plot (rather than a picaresque series of "and then... and then..." events).

Part 1 is far more engaging. Part 2 ("oh, yeah, women can be saved, too") seemed repetitious.

Emotionally, it was similar to reading the Left Behind series in that I have a hard time viscerally understanding why faith trumps acts. That, I suppose, demonstrates that I was raised in a very different spiritual and philosophical milieu. 

The English Patient

#703
Title: The English Patient
Author: Michael Ondaatje
Publisher: Vintage
Year: 1992
302 pages
Audiobook.

The first of two books featuring a burned man with a mysterious, plot-twisting identity I happened to read simultaneously in some weird kismet-y thing.

I never saw the film, and this was so much better than anyone led me to believe that I must now a) re-evaluate everything I've ever been told; and b) read everything by Ondaatje that I haven't already.

The complaints I'd heard were that "it's boring" and "nothing happens," neither of which were my experience of it. I did think the parallelism, symbolism, and complementary aspects of characters and actions were pretty obvious and overblown, but I didn't find that this detracted from my enjoyment. I kept thinking, "If they made a film of this, I'll bet they'd...," so I suppose I'll have to see if they did.

The Story of Sushi: An Unlikely Saga of Raw Fish and Rice

#702
Title: The Story of Sushi: An Unlikely Saga of Raw Fish and Rice
Author: Trevor Corson
Publisher: Harper Perennial
Year: 2007
256 pages
Audiobook

This is two intertwined narratives, one interesting, one not. The uninteresting narrative is an account of a sushi training academy that doesn’t ring true for two reasons: First, the focal character, Kate, does nothing right until she is fairly advanced in her program. For someone who wants to work in sushi preparation, she and her classmates know less about sushi than I do as a casual consumer of Japanese food. Second, the knowledge deficits of Kate and company too neatly serve the structure of the book, providing the hook on which the interesting exposition hangs. Though the book identifies a website where one can see photos of these people, the audio version doesn't explain the author's relationship to them. Who are they to him? Did he follow them for three months? Reconstruct from interviews? Make up a tale based on some other source?

The part of the book that works well is the informational/descriptive sections, though early on I almost stopped listening when the author referred to ATP in the cells as "power pellets." This is a mystifying description and weirdly oversimplified given that he frequently references osmotic processes, amino acids, and the like. Perhaps the author was advised that the book would draw more readers if he associated the explanations about dashi, eels, and Japanese food preservation with a human story. This might work, but not if I don’t believe in this particular set of characters.

I did read this as an audiobook so it’s hard to check my recollection, but I come away with the impression that Kate is tolerated in the class because she is cute and wears tight clothes. Perhaps the real barrier to being a female sushi chef is that the profession, judging by this narrative at least, requires a great deal of oogling female patron’s breasts. 

#701
Title: Some Girls: My Life in a Harem
Author: Jillian Lauren
Publisher: Plume
Year: 2011
352 pages
Audiobook


The title is a misnomer—the author spent several months in a contemporary harem, but not her life. This is not a memoir about social justice or women’s rights, so although the author mentions the Asian women who may not have the option to leave, it is only in passing and without analysis.

Lauren is definitely a handful, and though her parents are not portrayed as stellar, neither does she seem particularly easy to have a relationship with. This is her self-report, but there was not enough emotional depth for me to tell whether the tone is intended to be matter of fact, proud, repentant, or something else. I experienced two commingling impressions throughout this fairly psychologically superficial book: First, that there were even more drugs involved than the narrative names; and second, that fairly early on, the author saw herself as writing a contemporary version of The Happy Hooker. Although there is a fair amount of detail, the “plot” of the story isn’t very compelling.

Kosher Chinese: Living, Teaching, and Eating with China's Other Billion

#700
Title: Kosher Chinese: Living, Teaching, and Eating with China's Other Billion
Author: Michael Levy
Publisher: Holt
Year: 2011
256 pages

Another in the Tales of the Peace Corps/Tales of China categories, though a reasonable rendering of both. More like River Town than Iron and Silk, Levy's memoir manages to be both entertaining and educational. Like Hessler, Levy captures the absurdity and at times the horror of living in an unfamiliar culture. Unlike Salzman, he describes what he's doing in the classroom ands his relationships with his students. The Chinese fascination with Judaism allows Levy certain outs of the "I'm not an American, I'm a Jew" variety. These are often useful when he needs to distance himself from inaccurate assertions about US culture. The statements about Jews are also often stereotypical or incorrect, but they are more admiring than vitriolic.

Levy wrestles with questions of identity and how to balance Peace Corps ideals with his own beliefs and practices. In this regard he does a better job than many, and I'd have wished for even more. Though not stylistically the best of the Returned Peace Corps authors, his writing is straightforward and flows without awkwardness. This and his self-reflection make this memoir better than some others for teaching international studies/field work preparatory classes.

The Magician King (The Magicians #2)

#699
Title: The Magician King (The Magicians #2)
Author: Lev Grossman
Publisher: Viking
Year: 2011
400 pages
Audiobook

Highlight entry to see spoiler text.

It's better than The Magicians, but still disappointing. The high point is Julia's back story; the rest doesn't hang together very well. Grossman seems to have decided that he's writing amusing fantasy rather than a parody of fantasy, which at least clarifies his genre. There is nominally more sense of Quentin, though there is still much more telling than showing. I can live with this, but what I can't live with is the arbitrariness of the action. Characters appear and disappear with little coment. Perhaps some will return in a third book, but wouldn't their absence be commented on more by the main characters? Janet is nothing, absent from most of the narrative; I don't think it spoils the story overmuch to say that Jollyby is killed very early, but his death is never explained; Penny is now, for unknown reasons, sort of an okay guy. The action of the novel recalls Angelica Button and The Dragon King’s Trundle Bed from The Simpsons (season 18, episode 8), from magic of the quality of Headmaster Greystach's "Moustache powers! Activate!" and story progression startlingly similar to Angelica's exposition, "I somehow escaped from the hourglass!" And the climax: Really? All those Maxwell's demon-type gods are going to be thwarted by turning some keys in locks? How? And why do the keys also unlock keyholes in the air? And why is everyone hurtling around between worlds? And how are the two gods encountered (rapey fox and succor-mamma) related to the cosmic electron-plumbers looking for who tapped the cosmic magic sump? Oh--and ending courtesy of The Truman Show, more or less.

The Best of It: New and Selected Poems

#698
Title: The Best of It: New and Selected Poems
Author: Kay Ryan
Publisher: Grove/Atlantic
Year: 2011
288 pages

At their best, Ryan's poems are gem-like, with astounding observations that give a brilliant little flash as you examine them: Oh! At worst, they are doggerel, sing-songly little nothings with no point beyond description (in the manner of giraffe...carafe, though that isn't actually one of her rhymes). This collection includes both and allows a longitudinal look at how Ryan has streamlined and improved her work over time. Her rhymes are less clangy; her abstractions less pronouncements than observations; her descriptions more emblematic or symbolic. This is a very good volume for seeing both ends of her capacity as a poet.

The Son of Neptune (Heroes of Olympus #2)

#697
Title: The Son of Neptune (Heroes of Olympus #2)
Author: Rick Riordan
Publisher: Disney/Hyperion
Year: 2011
513 pages

Yes, it's a little repetitive in some ways, in part because of the previous Percy Jackson series, in part because it's the meanwhile, on the other coast at the other demigod camp story that parallels The Lost Hero. Like Jason of that narrative, Percy has had his memory erased in order that Juno may manipulate events to try to save the world from Gaea. This volume seemed more self-conscious to me, with joking cultural references (such as Amazons who work at Amazon) that were slightly entertaining. I acknowledge that if I were 12, I might have found them hilarious. This read like a bridging volume to get the heroes from point A to B, setting the scene for the third book.

Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland and The Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides

#696
Title: Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland and The Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides
Author: Samuel Johnson & James Boswell
Publisher: Audible
Year: 1775 (original)
~160 pages
Audiobook

Read as an audiobook. Audible (the edition I listened to) claims it's unabridged and it clearly is abridged. They've intercut Boswell and Johnson's narratives and included what I'd estimate from the length of the recording as perha;ps 160 pages. The 2-memoir set tends to run 300-something to 400-something in print editions.

I like Boswell less the more I read of his sycophantic fawning on Johnson. As to the journals themselves, I enjoyed both men's descriptions and explanations of daily live, scenery, and history. I'd have liked to hear more about whiskey, this being my greatest preoccupation with Scotland, but perhaps this topic is better represented in the version that's actually unabridged.

Rat Girl: a Memoir

#695
Title: Rat Girl: A Memoir
Author: Kristin Hersh
Publisher: Penguin
Year: 2010
336 pages

A smart, engaging memoir that includes bipolar disorder, music, and much more. Smart writing and choice of details make this a literary memoir of greater interest than many reports of mental illness. Plus it's by Kristin Hersh of Throwing Muses. Plus it's fun to revisit all those Rhode Island and Boston venues and think about what I was doing there while Kristin was doing what she was doing.