Fallen by Karin Slaughter

Posted on June 24, 2011 by pagesofjulia

Police corruption, gang violence, family ties and a nascent romance entangled in this breathless, emotional ride through Atlanta’s underbelly.

Karin Slaughter’s latest work of suspense has all the elements her readers have come to expect: likable, well-developed characters; an array of strong women; fast-paced action; and surprising plot twists. This story of family relationships, with its underlying threads of romance, violence and taut suspense, will satisfy fans of Lisa Gardner or Lisa Scottoline as well as Slaughter’s own.

When Georgia Bureau of Investigations Special Agent Faith Mitchell arrives at her mother’s house to pick up her daughter, Emma, there’s blood on the door, and the baby’s been hidden in the shed. Retired Atlanta police captain Evelyn Mitchell is missing, but her house is not empty; Faith goes in with guns blazing, and the blood flows.

The clock ticks in the search for Evelyn as the case is further complicated by shifting suspicions and questioned loyalties. We share Faith’s concern for her family and her need to be involved, despite a clear lack of professional detachment. Her partner, Will Trent, aches to help her, but his past investigation of her mother’s unit compromises their relationship. Sara Linton, a local doctor with ties to law enforcement, struggles to balance her role in the case with a budding personal relationship with Will. Meanwhile, Amanda Wagner, Will’s boss and Evelyn’s best friend, might be playing both sides of the fence.

Slaughter weaves intense and unrelenting suspense while compelling readers to care about the very real and human characters involved, whose backgrounds and conflicting loyalties we sympathize with even as we see their flaws.

This review originally ran in the June 24, 2011 issue of Shelf Awareness for Readers. To subscribe, click here, and you’ll receive two issues per week of book reviews and other bookish fun!

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guest review: Fire Season by Philip Connors, from Pops

Posted on June 23, 2011 by pagesofjulia

Today we’re visiting my father again, who’s traveling this summer. I put the screws on to compel him to buy a copy of Fire Season for himself to read on the road because I loved it so much (see here). I promised to buy it off him if he regretted the purchase; and I may, anyway, because I want to own a copy. Actually, though, I don’t know if it’s for sale. He did like it. I’m compiling some of his thoughts via email to share with you; they’re mostly in response to my original post (see link above) but I thought his slightly different perspective was worth sharing. Here’s Pops.

I finished Fire Season yesterday while I was camping in the finest of the rain forest valleys in Olympic NP, the Hoh river. I found it as exceptional as you said. The timing was impeccable; e.g. I was reading his passages about the magical meditative element of long walks… (or, I would say, endurance activities – you could read Bill McKibben’s Long Distance for a bit of the same; I found it wonderful, and you should know who McKibben is anyway for his potential to be one of the great environmental soothsayers of our time) …and it helped me decide a plan for my Monday walk: a full 10 hour day of wandering up and down the valley in rain and mist marveling at the magical forest – when I wasn’t daydreaming. I loved how he wove in stories of Kerouac, Edward Abbey, Chief Victorio, Alice the dog, Aldo Leopold, Cormac McCarthy, Gary Snyder (new to me) – and others. And we certainly learn about wildfires. Thanks for the tip.

So glad you liked it!! [And, incidentally, what safety precautions are you taking on 10-hour walks? Do you call Mom to let her know you’re going off on such things, and then call in when you return?]

And have you made the connection with current events? – with a massive fire burning for weeks now in eastern Arizona (the western borders of Fire Season) and today all around the Carlsbad Caverns area in NM (within the eastern horizon view of Fire Season).

Maybe not specifically those fires; but West Texas has been ravaged for months and it made my reading of the book a touch more personal. This spring race series, we raced two races in a row only to hear that the race course saw a wildfire start as we were leaving. (We promise we didn’t start these fires.) One was in Arksansas, one in central Texas. And we have a friend/teammate who tried to race in Ft. Davis, but the event was canceled due to one of the bigger fires we’ve seen; it swept across a considerable part of the state we’re used to driving and riding through. Close to home.

Did you also make the connection that we all went camping in the Gila Wilderness twice when you were 3 and 4 yrs old? (and that, because we had been there before you were born)

No, of course I don’t remember that, but very cool!

I really endorse what you said about his eclectic voice, and the many priceless vignettes he blends into his story. (I really wish I had read it with a highlighter!)

I also found him to be an endless stream of contradictions (perhaps we all are?) – he could be a sedentary slug for hours/days on end, but was also often driven to minimalist walks & overnights (an evening walk from a summit inevitably involves a serious down & UP!); he obviously functioned well in cities & bars, as well as wilderness; he became well versed in much wilderness language, yet succumbed to the elementary, pitiful, dreadful trap of the young fawn.

I cried over the fawn.

And, re: your comment about the contradictions. I am reminded of David Guterson’s The Other as well as Jon Krakauer’s Into the Wild (the first, fiction, the latter non) – both books about young men going into the wilderness, thinking they wanted to get away from it all, but also strangely and paradoxically clinging to certain odd elements of society. As the protagonists of both books came to unpleasant ends, I think perhaps Connors has found the perfectly balanced way to do it! In fact, I think I mentioned balance in my initial review. The writing in his book is balanced; and his interactions with his world are balanced. His saintly wife helps him be balanced. I daresay we all aspire to a lifestyle like this; I know I do, and I think, Pops, that you do. But then, you’re closer than most of us right now!

Based on your and my reactions, I’m guessing that readers will appreciate many different aspects of this book. You particularly noted the lessons about wildfire & forest policy, which I knew much of already. I loved the many references and new details about Kerouac, Snyder and the various personalities of the Beat generation who so influenced my 60s & 70s, and subsequent characters like Edward Abbey and Dave Foreman.

You barely mention Alice! I thought she was an elusive minor character, disappearing for times but playing a key role at many turns. Moments were familiar to Barley’s world; like her unilateral retreat to accompany Martha home from the lookout summit, and her personality change from city to wilds. Most poignant – Alice evoked my most secret lonely moments, far up a mountain trail without Barley’s companion spirit, spunk and relentless energy. “Alice is the only living being I know who will take a forty-mile walk in the woods without any need of cajoling, planning, or consulting a calendar.”

My apologies to Alice; you’re entirely right… she was a special creature and character, and a neat side-story proving (yet again) that dogs are our best friends and offer relationships unlike what we humans can offer one another. Here, I’ll treat our readers to a picture:

Hops (brown) & Ritchey (short white hair) who live with Husband and I, and my parents' Barley (scruffy white hair)

Finally: “…the movements of my limbs help my mind move too, out of its loops and grooves and onto a plane of equipoise… If I weren’t a walker I suppose I would be a television addict, a dope fiend, a social butterfly.”

Because I had to look it up, I’ll share. Equipoise: an equal distribution of weight; even balance; equilibrium.

Thank you for your musings, Pops. I hope we’re (still) encouraging folks to find this book! I think I’m ready to call this my best read of 2011 to date.

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Clara and Mr. Tiffany by Susan Vreeland

Posted on June 22, 2011 by pagesofjulia

I was attracted by the idea of this book when it came out in January, and I’ve just now gotten around to it. I’m really enjoying reading books pre-publication for Shelf Awareness, but it’s also nice to sneak one in every once in a while that’s NOT a thriller/suspense/murder-mystery. For that matter, I have some classics to read for the Classics Challenge, and I’ve been talking about Don Quixote…

But at any rate. Recently, on a whim, I picked up Clara and Mr. Tiffany, and it immediately grabbed me with its lovely writing, evocative of the artistic beauty the book revolves around. Clara, the narrator, works for a living in the 1890’s, and before the action of the book begins, has already had to choose between marriage (even… love?) and her passion for her work. Clara Driscoll, a real historical figure, was the artist behind much of the stained glass and the legendary lamps for which the Tiffany name is so famous. Vreeland has fictionalized her story for us here. Clara also has quite a bit in common with another historical figure I read about recently: Annie Londonderry took her extraordinary ride during the same years in which this book begins. It gave me a nice little thrill to recognize the historical setting, especially because the two female characters have so much in common. Reading these two books back-to-back allowed me to immerse myself even more in the times, and I’m tempted to head right into The Devil in the White City next. We’ll see.

I want to share a beautiful excerpt with you to illustrate the writing style.

…I carefully wrapped in a hand towel the one thing I had that no one could wrench from me – the kaleidoscope, his engagement gift to me. Bits of richly colored glass in a chamber served as his sweet acknowledgement that I’d had to give up my joyous work with just such glass in order to marry him. At the slightest turn of the maple-wood tube, the design collapsed with a tiny rattle of falling objects, and in a burst of an instant, nothing was the same.

Vreeland’s writing is quietly lovely and melodic; it expertly creates both a mood and a pacing to match the world in which Clara lives and works, and also evokes the colors, art, and beauty that involve her so deeply. Clara is an artist, first and foremost; she wants to design, to create, to replicate nature (she loves flowers, insects, the sea, leaves) and uplift the human spirit. As a woman at the turn of the century, though, she faces a number of challenges as a working woman, as a single woman, and as a craftswoman intent on earning a living, knowing she deserves one. She’s tormented by the frustrations of being unrecognized by Tiffany and by the world, as Tiffany (the man, and the company) receive accolades for her work. But she’s also tormented by guilt for what she thinks of as her narcissism – in that she desires credit at all.

Clara is a well-developed character. We see her progress, for example, as a feminist. She doesn’t set out with any high-minded ideals, but rather develops them as the world fails to treat her fairly. Clara heads up the Women’s Department at Tiffany, and her “girls” are described in varying detail; some of them become very real and sympathetic characters, and many of them serve to portray the experiences of immigrant workers in New York during this time. When their department comes under attack from the unionized male employees, Clara organizes the women to march into work together through a picket line – not striking, since the union doesn’t recognize them, but vilified all the same. This part of the story serves to underline that not all feminist demonstrators began as idealists or radicals, but rather that “regular” women were forced to stick up for themselves or die quietly. I appreciated that point.

Over the course of the book (spanning 1892-1908), she has a series of relationships: we meet her freshly widowed, she is courted by several men, and has a number of very close friendships. I found her heartfelt friendships, with men and with women, to be very touching. She struggles with love, with the idea that she’ll never find a satisfying romantic relationship with a man; with finding respect and fulfillment at work; with creating ideal art and beauty and being recognized for it. The story is of art, and of a time and a place, of love, and of women’s rights and a changing world. But mostly, it’s Clara’s story.

This was a beautiful book. The art and music bleed through the pages:

The sparrows of Irving Place were preening too, and gossiping pianissimo, and hopping about with an air of importance. Distant medleys of the city blended into a pleasant humming, punctuated at intervals by the Third Avenue elevated rumbling in a crescendo, grinding its brakes shrilly for the Eighteenth Street station, expelling its pfft of steam, then starting up again and fading away in a diminuendo.

I liked the historical aspects, too. As I like my hist-fict authors to do, Vreeland includes a note at the closing to explain where she took liberties. It does seem fairly clear that Clara Driscoll created many or nearly all of the leaded-glass lamps Tiffany got credit for; she did have two marriages; and a number of the figures in the novel did at least exist, with a few verifiable details. But much of the novel is purely fiction.

This was a really beautiful book, enjoyable to read, with a comforting, quiet rhythm and characters I cared about. It was a joy, and I recommend it.

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Towards Zero by Agatha Christie (audio)

Posted on June 19, 2011 by pagesofjulia

After my disappointment with going outside my known tastes, I have switched back to a tried-and-true. I’m sure somebody out there doesn’t like Agatha Christie, but they have yet to tell me to my face.

I had never heard of Towards Zero, and it involves neither Hercule Poirot nor Miss Marple. But it did have one of the most important Christie trademarks: a twisty-turny puzzle-plot that begs for the reader to try solving the crime before the end of the book. I, at least, am generally incorrect several times over because the plots of her books tend to double back on themselves so often.

This novel opens with a meeting of lawyerly minds (which you can see, incidentally, here), in which the title is explained. Most murder stories (and criminal trials), we are told, begin with the murder, when in fact the relevant story begins much, much earlier, and culminates in the murder as the result of all the previous action. Then we switch to the story at hand. In which…

Nevile Strange and his new wife, Kay, decide to visit Nevile’s mother-figure, Lady Tressilian, not at their usual time of year, but at the same time that Nevile’s first wife Audrey will be visiting. This, predictably, results in a number of uncomfortable, awkward, embarrassing moments and some conflict. (I found it interesting to observe the manners of the day which required referring to both women as “Mrs. Strange.”) Kay is rather bleatingly jealous and unsympathetic; Audrey is long-suffering and stoic but seems forgiving; Nevile is wont to refer to Audrey as “his wife” and ignore Kay, which of course irritates her still more. They make an interesting household, along with Audrey’s longtime admirer, Thomas Royde, just returned from overseas to pursue her; Lady Tressilian’s companion Mary Aldin; and visitor Ted Latimer, Kay’s childhood friend and admirer (parallel to Audrey’s Thomas, although rather opposite in temperament). So. All these folks in a classy country home together trying to be polite and play nice and dance around the love quadrangles, and then a murder takes place, and it’s one of those that could only have been committed by someone from within the household. Very Agatha Christie.

Love Suchet's Poirot.

Missing was Hercule Poirot’s biting wit, though. [Aside. Here is where I admit that I’ve never read Miss Marple! Only Hercule Poirot! Also, I grew up with Poirot on television as played by David Suchet and can’t hear or see him in any other way, for better or for worse. But didn’t he make a wonderful Poirot?] There wasn’t really much humor in this story, which is a Christie-staple in my mind, so that was odd; but it was very, very enjoyable without it, so no foul.

Into this closed household comes the vacationing Superintendent Battle and his nephew, the local Inspector Leach, to solve the crime. There are red herrings by the bucketful, and false leads, and I thought I knew whodunit SO many times, but Christie is a tricky one. The final scenes involve the Superintendent talking through the crime with the lot of them and eliciting a confession – also Christie trademarks. Finally, a little surprise romance which I did not entirely see coming topped off this charming, delightful, delicious little tale.

I love Agatha Christie. There’s a reason she’s hailed as a master (and Wikipedia claims she’s the all-time bestselling writer of books). I haven’t read anywhere near a majority of her works, but what I’ve read is always entertaining and clever and usually funny, too. Recommend.

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the Guardian’s list: 100 greatest non-fiction books

Posted on June 16, 2011 by pagesofjulia

More lists! Great fun! I found this list of the 100 greatest nonfiction-books according to the Guardian, thanks to Shelf Awareness, who had this to say in yesterday’s daily email newsletter:

Let the debate begin: The 100 greatest nonfiction books of all time were chosen by the Guardian’s book desk writers, who observed: “The list we’ve come up with rewards readability alongside originality, heaps praise on perfect prose and rounds it all off with a dash of cultural significance. It’s clearly a mug’s game to make any kind of claim for definitiveness but, whatever you make of our list and its (doubtless many) omissions and imperfections, there’s no question that it features a whole heap of truly great books.”

I was immediately interested, of course. Don’t we all love lists? The usual game is how-many-have-I-read, and I didn’t do all that well. It’s interesting to see what they chose, though, and to think about what I maybe *should* have read, or should read. I haven’t reproduced the entire list here – you can go read it at the above list, and you should! But I have reproduced some of the entries, recategorized. (Blurbs following titles are the Guardian’s, not mine.)

Books Already on my TBR shelf:
The Autobiography of Alice B Toklas by Gertrude Stein (1933)
Stein’s groundbreaking biography, written in the guise of an autobiography, of her lover
-has been on my list for years; actually just brought home a copy a few weeks ago
Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee by Dee Brown (1970)
A moving account of the treatment of Native Americans by the US government
-has always been on my shelf. still haven’t gotten around to it
Dispatches by Michael Herr (1977)
A vivid account of Herr’s experiences of the Vietnam war
-not on my shelf, but I’ve seen it on my parents’ shelves all my life
A Vindication of the Rights of Woman by Mary Wollstonecraft (1792)
Wollstonecraft argues that women should be afforded an education in order that they might contribute to society
The Souls of Black Folk by WEB DuBois (1903)
A series of essays makes the case for equality in the American south

Books I have read:
Silent Spring by Rachel Carson (1962)
This account of the effects of pesticides on the environment launched the environmental movement in the US
– read as a kid, maybe grade school
The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test by Tom Wolfe (1968)
The man in the white suit follows Ken Kesey and his band of Merry Pranksters as they drive across the US in a haze of LSD
-one of my all-time favorites
The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank (1947)
Published by her father after the war, this account of the family’s hidden life helped to shape the post-war narrative of the Holocaust
-of course. this is a staple. everyone has read this. right?

Read as part of my undergrad education in political science
Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave by Frederick Douglass (1845)
This vivid first person account was one of the first times the voice of the slave was heard in mainstream society
On Liberty by John Stuart Mill (1859)
Mill argues that “the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilised community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others”
The Prince by Niccolò Machiavelli (1532)
Machiavelli injects realism into the study of power, arguing that rulers should be prepared to abandon virtue to defend stability
-my prof thought I’d be a JS Mill fan; but I reacted with far greater fascination (if not far greater sympathy) to Machiavelli. Go figure.
Leviathan by Thomas Hobbes (1651)
Hobbes makes the case for absolute power, to prevent life from being “nasty, brutish and short”
The Rights of Man by Thomas Paine (1791)
A hugely influential defence of the French revolution, which points out the illegitimacy of governments that do not defend the rights of citizens
Manufacturing Consent by Noam Chomsky and Edward Herman (1988)
Chomsky argues that corporate media present a distorted picture of the world, so as to maximise their profits

I also noted The Journalist and the Murderer by Janet Malcolm (1990): An examination of the moral dilemmas at the heart of the journalist’s trade. Not specifically on my TBR list, but Janet Malcolm in general is; maybe I should move this one up the list. My TBR reads from her, already, are The Silent Woman: Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes and (I already have my copy of this one) Two Lives: Gertrude and Alice.

I also just wanted to note the range of dates covered by this list: pretty wide! From
The Art of War by Sun Tzu (c500 BC)
A study of warfare that stresses the importance of positioning and the ability to react to changing circumstances
to
Here Comes Everybody by Clay Shirky (2008)
A vibrant first history of the ongoing social media revolution

Something else I really appreciated about the Guardian’s list is that they have invited debate. No list will ever be final or uncontroversial, as we know! I’m not going to be so ambitious as to start my own list of 100 nonfiction books; I’m overwhelmed enough by my own list of 100, which is of course still incomplete. (Hey, my life is incomplete. As are all of ours.) But I’m sure it is and will be a fascinating debate. Are there any you think really shouldn’t be on this list? And I’m sure there are lots that we could think of that should be… Just looking back at my aforementioned list of 100 for nonfiction, I find quite a few. Here comes more list-making: I’ve reproduced them for you here, with a few words about each. I’m not sure they all belong on the all-time list, for various reasons…

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot: I think this is an awfully important book. The only argument for is exclusion is its recent publication. I always wonder if a book’s importance will last the test of time. Although in this case I’m rather sure it will, I wouldn’t be against a sort of mandatory waiting period, if you follow.

My Stroke of Insight by Jill Bolte Taylor: This one might be extra important to me personally, because of the insight it allowed me into my own recovery from a brain injury. Maybe not so universally applicable; but still, I’d say, worth consideration.

Pretty Good for a Girl by Leslie Heywood: The author’s story of being a young female athlete and battling the problems common to that demographic, including eating & exercise disorders and an unhealthy relationship with an older coach. Another important book. Although it sounds like a niche subject, I think the issues are large ones: the struggles of being female in a male world.

Ten Points by Bill Strickland: Okay, this is a little more niche; it’s a cycling book. But really, it’s the author’s story about being a bike racer, struggling to win, as metaphor for trying to overcome the abuse he was victim to as a child, and trying to not repeat the cycle.

The Autobiography of Malcolm X as told to Alex Haley: How is this not one of the greatest and most important nonfiction books of all time? Really.

The Immortal Class: Bike Messengers and the Cult of Human Power by Travis Hugh Culley: Totally niche. Artistic little vignettes of life as a bike messenger in Chicago, enchanting to me as a (now former) bike messenger.

Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America by Barbara Ehrenreich: I recognize that the political leaning of this one may make it less universally appealing, but I thought there were some important points made. I fear its acceptance is harmed by the author’s obvious slant, which is a shame because I think her conclusions are true regardless of politics.

The Courage of Their Convictions: Sixteen Americans Who Fought Their Way to the Supreme Court by Peter Irons: I read this in college and found it instructive. It is, as the title says, 16 stories about regular people making history. A very readable way to learn judicial history.

Desert Solitaire by Edward Abbey: Nature, solitude, beauty. Poetic.

Travels with Charley by John Steinbeck: Steinbeck’s travels in Americana with his dog. Maybe a bit too concentrated on US culture for the Guardian’s list? But there are others on their list that focus on certain countries or cultures.

Dethroning the King by Julie Macintosh: Again, a recent publication, so there’s that. But wow – an international tale of business, culture, hubris, and beer. C’mon.

Fire Season by Philip Connors: 2011 publication. However! This might be my favorite book of 2011 so far, and it tells so many important and poignant stories of history, public policy, nature, beauty, solitude, relationships… and does it so beautifully. I’m still raving about this book.

Okay, well. I don’t have any major arguments with the Guardian’s list, but I do submit Malcolm X’s Autobiography, and really Henrietta Lacks as well. What do YOU think they left off?

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did not finish: The Rocky Road to Romance by Janet Evanovich (audio)

Posted on June 15, 2011 by pagesofjulia

To be fair, I barely even started this audiobook. I was trying to expand my horizons a little bit. I’ve never read anything by Janet Evanovich! –shocking, to many readers of genre pop fiction, as she’s one of the bestselling romance/mystery crossover authors out there. She’s also one of the big names here in my little library. But then again, not so shocking when you consider I’m not a reader of romance, really. I am a huge fan of mystery novels, but hers are known to be cozy, funny, romantic/sexy mysteries, which isn’t my style. But, so. I wanted to broaden my reading world and thought I’d pick up one of hers, just to know what I’m missing.

I’ll give JE the benefit of the doubt and assume I picked the wrong one. To be fair, this is a romance – not mystery – title, and not one of her more popular, just judging from circular numbers in my library.

I didn’t even make it through one cd. What I did get was the beginning of the sparks flying between Daisy – cute, hard-working, quirky – and Steve, boss at one of her several jobs and obligatorily hunky, mysterious, and distant. The dialog and general writing was just so stilted, and the characters so pat, that I couldn’t take it. I was eye-rolling so hard I couldn’t watch the road, which was a hazard, so I hit eject. The narrator, C.J. Critt, didn’t help matters any, but I don’t think I should blame her necessarily; she was playing along with the book.

I’m being completely honest about the fact that I couldn’t stand this audiobook. But note the qualifications: not my genre or my style; and not Evanovich’s star character (that would be Stephanie Plum, of the numbered series starting with One for the Money).

I think I’m still determined to give JE a try, but will aim for a Stephanie Plum mystery next time for sure. (Thanks to my mother, with whom I mostly share reading tastes, and who enjoyed One for the Money although not outrageously much.) This one made me grit my teeth.

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Around the World on Two Wheels: Annie Londonderry’s Extraordinary Ride by Peter Zheutlin

Posted on June 13, 2011 by pagesofjulia

I ate up the story of Annie Cohen Kopchovsky, better known as Annie Londonderry, like the tale of adventure it is. As I said earlier, this story combines sports marketing, women doing outrageous things, bicycles, travel, and history. Nowhere to go wrong there, unless in writing badly or boringly – which Zheutlin thankfully does not.

Annie was a working-class young mother of three living in the tenements of Boston in the 1890’s, when she decided, out of the blue, to take on the challenge of riding a bicycle around the world in under 15 months. She had never ridden a bicycle before, and her decision to set off on this journey is rather mysterious. The origins of the idea are rather unclear: she claimed that two wealthy Boston businessmen had made a wager that a women couldn’t do such a thing (following the around-the-world ride just recently accomplished by a man), and that they were offering a substantial purse upon her successful completion, but it does not appear that there were any such businessmen or any such wager. At any rate, Annie acquired a hefty women’s bicycle, a new name (the Londonderry Lithia Spring Water Company became her first sponsor), and set off.

Annie doesn’t appear to have planned very well. She set off first for New York, from Boston, then Chicago, then back to New York, then across the ocean to France. If your knowledge of geography suggests that this is not the most efficient route for circumnavigating the globe, you are correct.

In Chicago, Annie abandoned the attire that was appropriate at the time for ladies: high collars, long sleeves, full skirts with copious undergarments and petticoats and corsets and… lots of things I’m not familiar with. She first went to bloomers or split skirts, and eventually (I believe on her second visit to New York) gave up on even the bloomers and went to a “men’s riding suit”, meaning pants that more or less fit her – ack, shocking! She also picked up (in Chicago) a “diamond-frame” men’s bicycle – meaning, with a horizontal top tube, making skirts impractical or impossible. Her bike lost some 20lbs in this transition, and her wardrobe change lost a lot of weight, too.

The most fascinating parts of Annie’s story are the inconsistencies, erm, not to say lies she told throughout. She changed the terms of the wager repeatedly; she gave a plethora of personal biographies to different newspapers, ever-changing and not once (at least not that is documented) telling the truth. She never mentioned, for example, that she was a married mother of three; this would have made her leaving home unacceptable in her society. Annie told outrageous stories of violence, adventure, and near-death experiences during her journey, many or most of which appear to be false. And most egregiously, perhaps, she did not ride a bicycle for the majority of her trip at all. She rode, as stated above, around the northeast United States, and then across France, and from there took trains and ships almost exclusively (with a series of short, recreational or social rides for exhibition or touring purposes) from France to the Far East. She then shipped to San Francisco, where the riding began in earnest again; she rode south to El Paso and back up to Chicago, Boston, and New York, most likely with some miles by rail interspersed, but overwhelmingly by bike.

Annie claims to have won the wager, making it back to Boston under the 15-month deadline, and to have secured the $10,000 purse; but who paid it? Never mind the details, she would have told us. Although she didn’t ride anywhere near all the miles, she did a lot of riding, and appears to have finished in awfully good shape, even for a man of her time (and goodness knows, unheard of for a woman). She was a colorful character, and while not above criticism, what she did do was a remarkable accomplishment. If she cheated and rode “only” 10,000 miles, I would still give her a high-five and my respect. By today’s standards it’s easy to disparage the ethics of her, um, liberties with the truth, and the journalistic ethics of the many papers who covered her story credulously (and her own later career in sensationalist journalism). But Zheutlin does a fine job of setting the stage for the reader, reminding us that these were the journalist standards of the times.

Interspersed into this story of Annie’s wild ride and her telling of tall tales, Zheutlin gives us snippets of the history of the women’s suffrage movement, the history of the bicycle in American culture, and the revolution in women’s clothing reform that was deeply intertwined with bicycle riding (I wasn’t aware of the close relationship there). I found the author’s Afterword, in which he discusses his research process and his relationship with Annie’s memory (she is his great-grandaunt, although he only learned of her existence after her death), especially moving and interesting, and I wish this aspect would have played into the body of the book. As I’ve said of several nonfiction books I’ve read before, I enjoy the author’s voice, and her/his experience in research and writing. To me, this is part of the story, and leaving it out can be a disservice, leaving the story incomplete, or at worst, even dishonest. I don’t accuse Zheutlin of dishonesty of course; I’m just saying his role in Annie’s story being told is an important chapter, in my opinion.

I really enjoyed this story for its crossover elements into so many chapters of history: women’s rights and clothing standards, bicycles, travel, journalistic trends, even tidbits of various world cultures. I also appreciated Annie as an outlandish and wild woman, cyclist, and teller of tales. And I took pleasure in Zheutlin’s quiet comments on his research processes. If you’re a stickler for honesty, don’t expect to find Annie entirely likeable; but I think you’ll still be impressed by her story, and learn a few little-known details of our history as women, cyclists, and Americans. Check it out.

Thanks again, Fil!

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Eyes Wide Open by Andrew Gross

Posted on June 12, 2011 by pagesofjulia

Eyes Wide Open promises to be something of a psychological thriller, and there are definitely aspects of mental-illness-as-character (which I think of as one possible iteration of the psychological thriller, although not the only one). The story is narrated by Jay, a successful surgeon and family man, called from New York out to California to help his big brother out of trouble, again. Intermittently, we hear the voice of Charlie’s son, Evan, whose death by apparent suicide opens the book.

Charlie’s past as a troubled youth includes a brief stint living on a commune with a cult of sorts. Apparently the murders committed by this cult group several decades ago aren’t done haunting Charlie’s life, and now Jay’s, too.

I tried to be open-minded about this book. The plot was fairly mediocre; the cult group and the murders of housefuls of Hollywood beautifuls were so clearly rip-offs of the Charles Manson story that I kept waiting for the name-drop, but it never came. This left me confused; is Gross trying to pretend that this isn’t a rip-off of Manson? The suspense was there, at least. I kept turning pages; I did finish the book. Not having abandoned it is some small mark of favor, I guess. But the plot fell a little short for me. We open with a tender moment between Jay and his wife, intended (I think) to show us what a strong marriage he has and what a fine family man he is; but this isn’t really upheld by the rest of the story. Charlie and his wife, Gabby, are on the one hand mentally ill and down-trodden to the point of helplessness; but on the other hand, they’re awfully coherent and articulate on the subject of their helplessness, which rings a little false. Worst of all, the story peters out late, and the intended terrifying cliffhanger of an ending fell well short for me.

But my worst beef with this book was the writing. I’m trying not to be cruel, but I’m really not sure when I last saw writing this painfully bad. Now, I need to say, I read a galley copy, which comes with all the disclaimers about not quoting from it and it still being edited further before publication – and good thing, because this is the most poorly-edited galley I’ve ever come across. BUT! Unless they’re going to rewrite as well as edit, I’m afraid the published version will still draw criticisms.

Gross has trouble painting pictures with his words. He just states things, failing to follow the “show, don’t tell” maxim. Now, I understand there’s a place for brevity, for dismissing floweriness or long passages of description. I’m a fan of Hemingway and Connelly, neither of whom, I think, get accused of long-winded explication. But I still want an author to evoke settings and emotions with words, rather than take my emotional participation in the story for granted. For example… I have to paraphrase from memory, plus this is a galley, so take it with a grain of salt, but there was something like “…he cried. She cried too.” Are you kidding me? You couldn’t think of any more evocative verb, and you had two opportunities? Just “cried, and cried”? You’re trying to wrench my heart with this?

I realize I’m coming down a bit harshly against this book and I feel a little badly (especially having just written another negative review of Gone with a Handsomer Men). But this was my honest reaction. Sigh. Here’s hoping I pull something enjoyable on the next roll of the dice.

Suspense? Fine. Plot? Meh. Writing? Distractingly bad. Go ahead, pick it up to pass your time if you don’t expect much and just want a gritty story for a beach read. But don’t say I didn’t warn you.

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Gone with a Handsomer Man by Michael Lee West

Posted on June 11, 2011 by pagesofjulia

Gone with a Handsomer Man was definitely outside of my normal range of reading tastes, but I was intrigued. The product description sounded cute:

Teeny Templeton believes that her life is finally on track. She’s getting married, she’s baking her own wedding cake, and she’s leaving her troubled past behind. And then? She finds her fiance playing naked badminton with a couple of gorgeous, skanky chicks.

Needless to say, the wedding is off. Adding insult to injury, her fiance slaps a restraining order on her. When he’s found dead a few days later, all fingers point to Teeny.

Her only hope is through an old boyfriend-turned-lawyer, the guy who broke her heart a decade ago. But dredging up the past brings more than skeletons out of the closet, and Teeny doesn’t know who she can trust. With evidence mounting and the heat turning up, Teeny must also figure out where to live, how to support herself, how to clear her name, and how to protect her heart.

So. Troubled young woman falsely accused of murder, plus hunky lawyer man, along with (you don’t really get this from the product description, but it’s full-on, I promise) a heavy Southern angle. Cozy mystery with romance, a Southern accent, and an emphasis on cooking and baking, too. Like I said, not my usual style of mystery – I go for the dark and gritty ones more than the cozies – but I was a bit tickled by the Southern thing and I thought, what the heck. Put a little diversity in my reading.

For most of the book I was entertained, if not engrossed. Teeny is, indeed, a cute character with a good dose of Southern charm to her. She’s native to Georgia (grew up on a peach farm), but relocated to Charleston, South Carolina to be with Bing, the murdered fiance. She loves to cook, and bake; dreaming up fanciful recipes, as well as actually cooking, is how she and her female family members have always dealt with stress or for that matter, emotion of any kind. She’s a guilt-wracked Baptist, too, which I guess adds flavor, although it felt a bit remote from my Southern experience. Coop, the lawyer/ex-boyfriend, is indeed hunky.

But for me, the attractions ended there. Teeny is a bit too wishy-washy, timid, and hand-wringing for my tastes; I was exasperated with a series of poor decisions she made, and she thus fell a bit short of being a sympathetic character, or even a complex or multi-faceted or very human one. Coop was worse: hunky does NOT compensate for one-dimensional and bumbling. But the worst part was a series of completely unexplained turn-arounds. Red hates Teeny! Now Red is giving Teeny brotherly pecks and good advice! Teeny hates the house! Teeny loves the house! And what’s up with her sudden and unprecedented sympathy and nostalgia for the odious Bing, late in the book? Any attempts at “plot” are thwarted by loose ends flopping about, and characters and events flip-flopping with no semblance of explanation or reason. I guess if you can’t find a plausible way to explain a change of heart you just… don’t? The heart just changes?

I wanted to like this book, and certain aspects of the Southern frame were sweet and gratifying. My frustrations didn’t really kick in til the final pages, I guess because I trusted West to tie up the aforementioned loose ends, and I didn’t realize until late in the game that she had no intention of doing so. (Yes, she. Michael Lee West is a woman. It took me a minute, too.) But when I finished the book, Husband can tell you I stalked off in a tiff that I’d wasted precious reading time on this unsatisfying cream puff of a book.

On the other hand, there are recipes included at the end, if you like that sort of thing.

Good job, product-description-writer. You got me. Perhaps you should have written the book, too.

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Thank You, Jeeves by P.G. Wodehouse (audio)

Posted on June 9, 2011 by pagesofjulia

What a charming little venture into the British peerage. This may be a first for me, but I think the audio format actually improved this experience! (I actually have Right Ho, Jeeves at home in paperback, so I can compare then. Although the voice may already be established in my head… we may never know.)

Sir Pelham Grenville Wodehouse was an extremely prolific British humorist; he wrote plays, poems, short stories, novels, and more (I’m getting this mostly from Wikipedia, FYI, along with a general sense I’ve had of him). The stories in his Jeeves series are among his best-known, and I, not knowing much about him, decided to start there.

Thank You, Jeeves is just silliness, but of the most enjoyable sort.

Bertram Wooster (Bertie), our narrator, retires to the country when London society ostracizes his playing of the banjolele, and for the same reason he loses his valet, Jeeves, who can’t stand the playing of the banjolele any more than London can. Jeeves enters the employment of Bertie’s old friend Chuffy, who also houses Bertie in a cottage on his country estate. American millionaire Stoker shows up to discuss business dealings, along with his daughter Pauline, formerly engaged to Bertie, soon engaged to Chuffy. A rather Shakespearean case of mistaken identities, love triangles, and well-meaning bumblings ensues. (Like so often in Shakespeare, a good dose of Telling Everyone The Truth In A Forthright Manner would have solved everything early on, but then there wouldn’t have been a funny book.) Also in Shakespearean fashion, the servant Jeeves is a sharper tack than his employers. Eventually the talented, intelligent, well-read, scheming, and discreet Jeeves solves everyone’s problems up neatly, reuniting several estranged couples, keeping everyone out of jail, and even returning Bertie to London where he belongs, and himself to Bertie’s employ. But not before I get to enjoy all sorts of hilarity and irony, in the events of the book but most especially in the dialog. I think this Wodehouse is a master of goofy dialog, and this narrator Jonathan Cecil performed it admirably. Husband did not follow the action at all but greatly enjoyed hearing the characters exclaim over Lord Whatwhatly (I don’t know how this is spelled as I was listening, not reading, but it is funny-sounding).

I will definitely search out more Wodehouse; he is deserving of his fine reputation as a humorist. This was funny and lighthearted and easy to “read.” I recommend.

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