Category: Books

The Season of Lists

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Some of us make lists all year long:  to-do lists, grocery lists, shopping lists, and the like.  I am an inveterate list maker, always have been.  As was my mother so I suppose I inherited this tendency as did at least one of my sisters.  It’s satisfying to create a list and then check off items as they are completed.  And if one is debating an important decision, such as a job offer, making a list of pros and cons can be helpful in weighing the options.  

But the month of December represents the epitome of lists.  ‘Tis the season.  Ten best-of-the-year lists of movies, books, and music CDs populate newspapers and social media.  Daily book critics write columns about their favorite books, while the Wall St. Journal solicits short statements about the books they liked from celebrities, politicians, actors, and authors. And that behemoth Amazon supplements its best books of the month in various categories with its own best books of 2018.  While these lists reflect the tenor of the times, they are also a retail tool, designed to generate sales.  As an avid reader and in a spirit of competition with myself, I pore over several book lists—looking in part for any overlap between them, but even more to see which of the year’s best titles, I might have already read!

Lisa Halliday’s novel, Asymmetry,which I read and blogged about, is on both the New York Times Book Review’sand the Wall St. Journal’s lists as is David Blight’s biography, Frederick Douglass.  The novel, Washington Black by Esi Edugyan, appears on both the WSJ list and the Washington Post’s, perhaps an indication that I should add it to my personal to-be-read list.  I was  pleased to see that Westover’s bracing memoir, Educated, made it onto the NYT list and was also Amazon’s #1 pick of its top twenty books of 2018.    On the WSJ list, the other title I’ve recently read is biographer Claire Tomalin’s memoir, A Life of My Own.  

And just in case, you don’t end up with enough new reading material, there are the notable book lists; the New York Times named 100 notable books. while the Washington Post published its 50 Notable Works of Fiction in 2018 along with a companion list of notable nonfiction.  

I also checked to see if my favorite west coast newspaper, the San Francisco Chronicle, had a 2018 list, but it appears that it won’t be published for another week or so.  Likewise, the Los Angeles Times.

As December winds down, I’ll be thinking about my favorite or best book of the year and looking ahead to what I’ll be reading in 2019.  What was your best book of 2018?  I’d love to include your choices in my first blog of the new year.

Here are several of the 10 Best Books of the Year lists for 2018.  I included the WSJ titles since they have a very robust paywall.

New York Times Book Review

Washington Post

Wall Street Journal

Asymmetry by Lisa Halliday 

Churchill: Walking with Destiny by Andrew Roberts 

Cloudbursts by Thomas McGuane 

The Consciousness Instinct by Michael Gazzaniga 

Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom by David W. Blight 

Godsend by John Wray 

Lamentfrom Epirus by Christopher C. King 

A Life of My Own by Claire Tomalin 

Patriot Number One by Lauren Hilgers 

Season of the Shadow by Léonora Miano 

Tidy Tidbits: Books & More

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RECENT READING

VEGAS SHOWGIRL

All the Beautiful Girls by Elizabeth J. Church    

This is Church’s second novel, and while I enjoyed it a lot, I think The Atomic Weight of Love is better. It is the story of Lily Decker aka Ruby Wilde, from Kansas, who becomes a Las Vegas showgirl in the 1960’s.  Lily’s parents died, and she has been taken in by a strict aunt and an uncle who abuses her.  Desperate to escape and desiring only to dance, she heads west and begins a tortuous physical and mental journey to stardom, addiction, and ultimately, happiness.  Church graphically conveys the demands of working in a casino and the unreality of that “glamorous” world.  She brings in real world events and shows how the political changes of the 60’s impacted women.  Lily is a likable character, and her male friend The Aviator, an enigma and almost too good to be true. The novel would have benefited from being tightened up, but it remains a compelling story. (~JWFarrington)

POLITICAL FARE

Fear:  Trump in the White House  by Bob Woodward

It took me several months to read this account of the early days of the Trump administration, mostly because I dipped into and out of it, and partly because Woodward is no stylist.  Much of what’s here in how that man deals with people and situations has been reported.  What Woodward provides is the fine structure with the lengths to which his staff, aides and even Cabinet secretaries went to prevent him from disastrous mistakes.  Recommended for political junkies with strong stomachs.  (~JWFarrington)

Becoming by Michelle Obama  

For a complete change of pace from Woodward, Mrs. Obama’s memoir is refreshing for its overall upbeat tone, its intimacy, and its extreme candor.  I had the pleasure of meeting her and briefly chatting one-on-one when the Obama campaign did an event in San Francisco at our museum; she was incredibly warm, gracious, and real.

What is probably most compelling in the book is her account of her upbringing in a loving family stretched for resources and her gritty determination, as a black girl and then woman, to excel and to prove herself—over and over again.  The story of her relationship and then marriage to Barack is replete with tenderness and admiration mixed in with her occasional frustration with his completely different (from hers) approach to life.  She comes through as a generous and caring friend and an individual of substance who resolutely found her voice as First Lady.  My only criticism is that at a few points, it could have been more tightly edited.  Highly recommended!  (~JWFarrington)

BIG SCREEN

Boy Erased

This is not a perfect film, but it is one well worth seeing.  Based on a memoir of the same name by Garrard Conley, published in 2016, it recounts a young man’s experience in an anti-gay conversion therapy program.  Jared (as expertly portrayed by Lucas Hedges) is a product of Arkansas and the son of a car salesman and preacher, when he is sent to a conversion program by his parents.  How he and others are treated, verbal abuse mixed in with a tainted take on Christian love, is chilling and unsettling to say the least.

Russell Crowe as Jared’s father, Nicole Kidman as his mother, and Joel Edgerton, head of the facility and the film’s screenwriter and director, are all excellent and believable.  The beginning of the film is sketchy on how Jared ended up being sent away—only later are some details fleshed out.  I also found some of the Southern accents so thick that I didn’t catch every word.  Nonetheless, I recommend it.  (~JWFarrington)

 

Note:  Header photo, Florida sunrise, by JWFarrington.  Other images from the Internet.

Tidy Tidbits: Memoirs and Movies

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READING MEMOIRS

 As my regular readers know, I am fond of reading memoirs.  I am also fascinated by the dynamics within a marriage and intrigued by the nuances and tensions within romantic relationships in general.  Here are two new memoirs touching on these and other issues.

The Victorian and the Romantic:  A Memoir, a Love Story, and a Friendship across Time by Nell Stevens.

I included the full subtitle here because this little book is so much more than a memoir.  It’s an enchanting, frustrating, and somewhat curious account of this young academic’s struggle to find her place in the world and to fulfill what she views as her rightful female destiny.

Nell is in love with Max, an aspiring American writer, and employs all sorts of economies and part-time projects to fund trips from her home in London to his in Boston.  She even signs up for several research studies, including a sleep one that requires her to spend 14 days in a lab and be awake for 40 hours.  At the same time that she’s angling to visit Max, she’s grappling with the topic for her Ph.D. dissertation.   Eventually she settles on Elizabeth Gaskell and the several months Gaskell spent in Rome socializing with a group of noted writers and artists.

Elizabeth Gaskell (tattonpark.org.uk)

Although I occasionally had too much of Nell’s troubles, I found the sections on Gaskell in Rome and her relationship with Charles Eliot Norton delightful and creatively imagined.  As Stevens makes clear in her short introductory note, her memoir is based on true events, but is not truly accurate; so, reader, take heed and apply salt as seems appropriate!  One result is that I now want to read or re-read one or more of Gaskell’s novels.  (~JWFarrington)

 

Strange Paradise:  Portrait of a Marriage by Grace Schulman

What goes on inside a marriage is always something of a mystery to those outside it, no matter how close they are to the couple.  Poet Schulman came of age before careers for women and multiple roles as professor, wife and also mother were widely accepted.  She felt that her own mother had been compromised in her aspirations and her abilities in her marriage, and she, Grace, feared a loss of independence and freedom for herself.  Nonetheless, she and Jerry Schulman, a medical doctor and virology researcher, wed in 1959 and were mostly together for more than 50 years.  This is her account of their continuing love despite some years living apart and his long decline due to illness.  But it’s also about her friendships with other poets and writers and her years as poetry editor for The Nation and coordinator of literary programming at the 92nd Street Y.  As she writes, “the phrase, ‘happy marriage’ is a term of opposites, like ‘friendly fire’ or ‘famous poet.’  My marriage has been a feast of contradiction.”  Informed by her poetic sensibility, her book is both bracing and poignant.  (~JWFarrington)

 

WATCHING FILMS

In this new age of content available on iPads, smartphones and other screens, we rented these two films online and watched them on our own large screen TV.  Cheaper than the price of one movie ticket, and you can make your own popcorn!

(Image from imbd.com)

Three Identical Strangers   

How would you feel if you arrived at college for the first time and lots of students were greeting you warmly as if they knew you and then called you by another name?  For Bobby, this is a strange and unnerving experience, as he discovers he has not one, but two other brothers.  All three were adopted and each was raised by parents of a different socio-economic class.  What is the role played by heredity versus environment in one’s development, the old nature vs. nurture question, and why were these three boys separated at birth?  A film that starts out joyful unfolds to a more serious and somber set of issues.  A bit repetitive at points, but well worth seeing.

The Children Act

The Children Act by Ian McEwen is probably my favorite of his novels that I’ve read.  I was predisposed to like the film and, with Emma Thompson, a favorite actor, and Stanley Tucci, in the lead roles, how could it go wrong?  It’s a superb film and, with McEwen’s screenplay, the equal of the novel.  Judge Fiona Maye handles cases relating to children’s welfare.  She and husband Jack have hit a bad patch in their marriage which comes to a crisis just as Fi gets a difficult case involving a 17-year old young man.  He’s a Jehovah’s Witness, who needs a blood transfusion to treat his leukemia, but his parents are refusing it.  How this case plays out and its impact on Fiona and those around her is the crux of the film.  Thompson is wonderful in the role with the right combination of judicial dedication and exactitude mostly masking her inner feelings.  Definitely an Oscar-worthy performance!

Note:  Header image of Emma Thompson in The Children Act is from an article in the South China Morning Post.

The Literary Life

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TIMELY FILM—The Wife
I read Meg Wolitzer’s novel of the same name, but I think the film version of The Wife is better. Glenn Close gives a stellar performance as Joan Castleman, the dutiful, somewhat subservient wife of literary rockstar and new Nobelist, Joe Castleman. With just the slightest change in expression, Close portrays a whole range of suppressed emotions from anger to frustration, boredom, and puzzlement. Only once does she really erupt into a violent outburst and that is quickly transformed into the actions of a caring spouse.

As the couple proceeds through arriving in Stockholm and all the press and trappings leading up to the actual Nobel ceremony, it is clear that all is not hunky-dory in the marriage nor in their relationship with writer son David. Through flashbacks we see undergrad Joan, who has talent as a writer, and her mentor professor Joe and then the early years of their marriage. In Joan’s beginnings as a writer lies the crux of this too timely film. Also very well played is aspiring biographer Nathaniel who is like a pesky fly that keeps returning. Well worth seeing!

READING—THE LITERARY LIFE
A Life of My Own by Claire Tomalin
Before reading her memoir, I knew of Claire Tomalin primarily as a biographer as I’ve read hers of both Jane Austen and Thomas Hardy. Before she discovered her calling as a chronicler of other’s lives, Tomalin had a successful career as first a reader of manuscripts, a writer of book reviews, and then most significantly, as a literary editor at a number of notable publications including the Sunday Times.  

British by birth, her mother was a musician and composer and her father held posts with the United Nations and other NGOs. As a child, she was exposed to good literature, theater, and opera and in her youth and adulthood became acquainted with many of the literary luminaries of the time.  In short, her intellectual life was rich in culture.

Her personal life, however, had its challenges, particularly during the riotous 1960’s. Her first husband, Nick, was charismatic and an accomplished reporter, journalist and TV broadcaster, but also unreliable and regularly unfaithful.  Her youngest son was born with spina bifida and one of her daughters suffered from severe depression.  Left a widow with young children in the 70’s, she initially cobbled together a series of part-time jobs and kept on going with determination.

While Tomalin shares some thoughts about these tragic events, she is not the most revealing of memoirists. Her book at times reads like a diary of all the meetings, assignments, conferences, and lunches she took part in with a host of boldface names. Perhaps because I am interested in what goes into the business of book publishing and reviewing and the journals associated with it, I found these details mostly fascinating and, consequently, the book held my attention. Others might find this aspect tedious.

Nonetheless, Tomalin succeeds in portraying what it took for a woman of her generation (born in 1933) to carve out a rewarding career and, ultimately, to craft a happy second marriage. She is generous toward her friends, both old and new, and seldom spiteful. For another view, see the excellent one in the August 23 issue of the Wall St. Journal. (~JWFarrington)

OF LIBRARIES AND BOOKS
While visiting my Chapel Hill sister, we stopped by her local library, Chatham Community Library. What was interesting to me is that it is a hybrid library, a combination academic library for the community college and a library for the general public. It’s a new building and a very attractive one! I chuckled at some of the end-of-the-stacks posters and thought that the faux fireplaces were a nice touch.

 

We also paid a visit to one of our favorite bookstores in North Carolina and that’s McIntyre’s at Fearrington Village. As usual, I succumbed to a book for myself as well as a few for my granddaughters. Tired of browsing, the Chief Penguin and my brother-in-law made themselves comfortable on the bench outside.

Note:  All photos ©JWFarrington (some rights reserved).  Header photo is the interior of the Chatham Community Library.