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.

The Bagel: A Cultural History

#694
Title: The Bagel: A Cultural History
Author: Maria Balinska
Publisher: Yale University Press
Year: 2008
288 pages
Audiobook

Despite some mispronunciations by the reader, this is an engaging history of the bagel, though it's really a history of the bagel, Jews in Poland and elsewhere in Eastern Europe, and the Jews and labor unions in the US. Really, there isn't a lot to say about the bagel itself, but the bagel as an organizing strategy for a social history works well.

In Papua New Guinea

#693
Title: In Papua New Guinea
Author: Christina Dodwell
Publisher: Picador
Year: 1983/1985
Country: Papua New Guinea
256 pages

Like Rita Golden Gelman,  the author of Tales of a Female Nomad, Christina Dodwell is some combination of adventurous, naive, lucky, and skillful. This narrative of her two years in Papua New Guinea provide evidence for all of these interpretations. I enjoyed Dodwell's descriptions and musings and have a much better on-the-ground sense of the country than I often have after reading travel memoirs. On the other hand, I was more consistently alarmed than usual. It might have helped to have a better sense of Dodwell's thoughts and emotions, but this is the least revealed aspect of the book.

The Man Who Ate Everything

#692
Title: The Man Who Ate Everything
Author: Jeffrey Steingarten
Publisher: Vintage
Year: 1987/1988
528 pages

Steingarten's essays on food, more or less, from Vogue.

Steingarten has a great ear for detail and makes many clever asides. He's funny when you agree with him, annoying when you don't. He has strong opinions about food, nutrition, and diets, often expressed in extremes, sometimes inaccurate (e.g., the man can assert all he wants that lactose intolerance doesn't include cheese, but he's never had to sprint with me to the bathroom after a nice Quiche Lorraine consumed sans Lactaid). The tone is usually genial, at least some of his over the top assertions are clearly tongue in cheek, and one admires his willingness to devote himself utterly to a recipe or process for weeks at a time.

I admit to skimming some of his recipes, since I know I'll never make them and I'm not that interested in, say, the perfect apple pie.

Sho's Apple Pie
Remove one frozen pie crust from the package. Fill with thinly sliced apples. sprinkle with cinnamon and a little lemon juice. Cover the edges with foil if you like, but I hate crust, so I just break it off before eating. Bake at around 350F until the apples are cooked through and the crust is brown.

There, that was much easier than Steingarten's 10 page (I kid you not) apple pie recipe, which may be delicious but perhaps not in proportion to the effort required.

Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain

#691
Title: Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain
Author: Oliver Sacks
Publisher: Knopf
Year: 2007
381 pages
Audiobook

Perhaps my favorite Sacks so far, because of the sustained focus on one topic but from a variety of perspectives. (I note that the first Sacks I ever read was Migraine, another single-topic book.) The first several chapters used case studies only as illustration for broader neurological points. I found them more interesting than most of the later, extended case studies, though the chapter on Williams syndrome had me leaping up for  Adams and Victor's Principles of Neurology, Ninth Edition. Yes, that's my idea of a good time. Either you're happy you're not married to me or you wish you were. There's very little in between.

Quantum of Solace: The Complete James Bond Short Stories

#690
Title: Quantum of Solace: The Complete James Bond Short Stories
Author: Ian Fleming
Publisher: Penguin
Year: 2008
304 pages
Audiobook

A little pulp adventure genre cotton candy rendered even fluffier by the brevity of the pieces. While the literary Bond is a more interior fellow than his film avatar, there's still not a lot going on here. The stories aren't that salacious, though some make reference to more provocative literature, such as a novel Bond reads, the cover of which features a woman bound to a bed. It's always hilarious to see how movies diverge from the story; here, the short story "Octopussy" bears no resemblance to the film of that name, though there is a Fabergé egg elsewhere in the collection. 

Traditional Medicine of the Marshall Islands: The Women, the Plants, the Treatments

#689
Title: Traditional Medicine of the Marshall Islands: The Women, the Plants, the Treatments
Author: Irene J. Taafaki, Maria Kabua Fowler, & Randolph R. Thaman
Publisher: IPS Publications, University of the South Pacific
Year: 2006
Country: Marshall Islands
300 pages

Marshall Islands.

This is a surprisingly enjoyable and fascinating compendium centered on medicinal plants (though pumice and a couple of animal bits make brief cameos. The main portion of the book presents the plants with a color photo, genus and species, local name, and medicinal uses as described by one to several local practitioners. Other sections provide some focused history and explain how the data were collected. It's interesting to try to determine the mechanism of action of each specimen and preparation. Some can clearly be understood biochemically, some are symbolic, and some seem obscure and driven by the system of taboo rather than what westerners would think of as empirical outcomes. For the right reader, an engrossing volume published, like many, at ISP Publications at University of the South Pacific.