A Photographic Guide to the Birds of the West Indies

#561
Title: A Photographic Guide to the Birds of the West Indies
Author: G. Michael Flieg & Allan Sander
Publisher: New Holland
Year: 2000
144 pages

The New Holland series of bird identification guides is uneven, but this is the best I've read so far. The photos are clear and the selection is good for common birds of the region. What distinguishes this volume is the descriptions of birds' feeding habits and other behaviors that allow for better identification. On a recent trip to the Caribbean, I was able to identify firm or con54 species, including the very weird brown trembler, using this comparatively small field guide.

My Mongolian World: From Onon Bridge to Cambridge

#560
Title: My Mongolian World: From Onon Bridge to Cambridge
Author: Urgunge Onon
Publisher: Global Oriental
Year: 2006
162 pages

Onon, a Genghis Khan scholar, here recounts his childhood and early adulthood. He lovingly evokes rural Mongolian  scenes, interwoven with folktales recounted by the people around him. Read with Weatherford's Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, particularly the chapters on Genghis Khan's childhood and environs.

Eifelheim

#559
Title: Eifelheim
Author: Michael Flynn
Publisher: Tor
Year: 2009
512 pages

Quantum physics, first contact with bug-like aliens, Jesuits, and the Black Death--what's not to like? Sure,  the interweaving of the contemporary and historical strands is uneven at times, and I believe in the reality of the medieval characters and aliens more than the modern-day scholars, but at its best this is the science fiction structural version of Brooks's People of the Book, though frequently more hilarious. Read with any book on the plague, or Willis's Doomsday Book for science fictiony plague goodness, or with Blish's A Case of Conscience (or Miller's A Canticle for Leibowitz, or Russell's The Sparrow) for further reflections on the spiritual nature and moral status of aliens.

English: A Novel

#558
Title: English: A Novel
Author: Wang Gang
Translators: Jane Weizhen Pan & Martin Merz
Publisher: Viking
Year: 2009
320 pages

This Chinese novel is presented as the narrator's coming of age story in rural Xinjiang during the Cultural Revolution. While political events intrude frequently, they shape the emotional tone of the story, not in the protagonist's response to policies and dictates, but in the fear, brutality, and betrayal that pervade most of the relationships. Though the narrator is more sympathetic than Mishima's, I was nevertheless reminded at times of the flat, calculating, cool affect of the children in The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea. Here, though, the adults as well as the children are alienated, though they are more prone to outbursts of rage and despair. Love Liu sees English, and its symbol, his teacher's English dictionary, as a way out, though this abstraction ultimately fails him. Read with Hessler's River Town: Two Years on the Yangtze for an outsider's experience of teaching English in a nearby region of China or with pretty much any Yukio Mishima for cross-cultural resonance.

Cats on Quilts

#557
Title: Cats on Quilts
Author: Sandi Fox
Publisher: Abrams
Year: 2000
128 pages

Though this looks like a cute little coffee table book, and it is, it's also a surprisingly informative overview of, well, cats, as depicted on historical quilts. A number of time periods and quilt styles are represented and the text is useful and informative.

Where Am I Wearing: A Global Tour to the Countries, Factories, and People That Make Our Clothes

#556
Title: Where Am I Wearing: A Global Tour to the Countries, Factories, and People That Make Our Clothes
Author: Kelsey Timmerman
Publisher: Wiley
Year: 2008
272 pages

A quick, informal introduction to issues of globalization and economic considerations for people just beginning to think about the topic, through the mechanism of the author's attempting to see where his clothes were manufactured. It's fine as an introductory exploration such as might be appropriate for an undergraduate class. If you're looking for a lot of background or analysis, though, this will not satisfy you.

A Week at the Airport: A Heathrow Diary

#555
Title: A Week at the Airport: A Heathrow Diary
Author: Alain de Botton
Photographer: Richard Baker
Publisher: Vintage
Year: 2010
112 pages

I agree with readers who found this to be lighter than they had hoped, and also with those who found it sufficiently absorbing. De Botton provides a nicely phrased but ultimately superficial pensée on his week spent in or adjacent to Heathrow. The idea of this project is a good one, though not de Botton's--he was a recipient of the opportunity. There's nothing to dislike about the narrative, and the photos provide a additional medium that is wonderfully atmospheric.

My dirty secret is that I love airports. I regularly kill up to 12 hours at international airports. If I were to be a writer in residence at an airport (and let's be frank: Many of us have spent many days trapped in a single airport), I'd have explored aspects unexamined by de Botton, such as sleeping in the airport (not at the adjacent hotel)--at a gate, in the women's room, behind an unused counter, in a car in the parking garage--, riding a baggage cart on the tarmac, eating foods I never eat,  watching rest room traffic, or determining the feasibility of visiting the other terminals, for example. I'd want to evaluate the art, see what long-term menu variety can be constructed at the shops and restaurants, try on clothes, or see how good a haircut and massage I could get. The man is in Heathrow, where I'd assuredly sample as much Scotch as God and nature permitted, perhaps purchased by strategically flying in to Terminal 5 from a trans-border point of origin so I could stock up at the World Duty Free Arrivals Store. If I were lucky they'd have my favorite, Glenmorangie Cellar 13, a 10-year-old special bottling that until recently was only available at duty free and was not exported, and to which I am extremely partial. To sip a wee dram at Heathrow, perhaps accompanied by a "luxury chocolate" from The Chocolate Box while perusing a copy of Jackson's beautifully illustrated Whiskey (acquired at WH Smith) would be a deep and quiet pleasure with no plane to catch or security queues to endure.