Tag: books

Booknote: Summer Reading

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For some of us, summertime is an excuse to read something light or more frivolous than we usually would.  For others, it’s an opportunity to devote time to delving into a serious tome, perhaps one that’s been languishing on the shelf.  I view it as a chance to do both—indulge in lighter fare and stretch my brain with something more challenging, usually a nonfiction title.  When I was working fulltime, Maine was my time for extended reading.  Now I have more available time, but I still see Maine as a gift for long spans of reading, whole mornings or whole afternoons.

Before leaving home, I load up my Kindle with new books, pack a few paper books in my luggage, and, don’t tell my spouse, even mail myself a box of assorted novels and nonfiction to await my arrival.  On the day we arrive at our rental house, a priority is to assemble all the books I’ve brought or mailed and put them in stacks on the living room end table with another stack in the bedroom.  There’s something very appealing about having all those choices laid out from which I can choose what to read next!

Here are some titles I’m considering.  More to come in a future post.

Flying Shoes by Lisa Howoth.  A first novel about an unsolved murder in Mississippi in 1996.

Lovers at the Chameleon Club, Paris, 1932 by Francine Prose.  A novel about a lesbian and cross dresser that seems appropriate reading given today’s ongoing conversation about gender and gender roles.  On the “2014 100 Notable Books” list from the New York Times Book Review.

Mrs. Lincoln’s Rival by Jennifer Chiaverini.  Chiaverini has written several historical novels set in the time of the Civil War as well as a series of books about quilters.  Lighter fare and this will be my first of hers..

Muse by Jonathan Galassi.  A new short novel about the world of publishing.

Ashley’s War by Gayle Tzemach Lemmon.  Nonfiction account of women on the battlefield in Afghanistan in 2010.

The Secretary by Kim Ghattas.  Published a couple of years ago, this is a reporter’s account of traveling with Hillary Clinton when she was Secretary of State.   Timely given her candidacy.

WHAT I’VE READ RECENTLY

What is it like to work in the White House?  The Residence by Kate Andersen Brower is a quick read  based on interviews with butlers, seamstresses, housemaids, valets, and other White House staff from FDR and Truman to the present.  For the most part, the closer you get to the present day, the more restrained the staff are in their comments about the President and First Family, but you still get an intriguing glimpse of that enclosed world.  Each family has its own distinct personality and its own preferences and some families were definitely friendlier to the staff.

 

“Book Happy”

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As a child, I was entranced by my grandfather’s study.  Grandpa and Grandma lived on a quiet leafy street in a big brown house that always smelled warm and cozy and I felt embraced by it the moment I entered.  The study was a very small room.  There were bookcases on every wall and the desk was overflowing with papers and more books.  There were even stacks of books on the floor.  Other than the public library, it was more books in one place than I’d ever seen.

There was just enough room to turn around in and pivot to look at the shelves.  I was allowed to go in and just look which I did.  I couldn’t have been more than eight at the time and was already an avid reader.  These were books mostly about literature (Grandpa being a professor at the university) and while I wasn’t ready to read them, I liked gazing at the spines and pulling out an occasional volume here and there to inspect it.  The room smelled of paper and ink—slightly dusty—and I would spend long moments just contemplating the scene.  As I grew older, I spent more time here and would even read a few pages or an introduction.  Struck by all these books which Grandpa obviously cherished, I dubbed him “book happy.”

When I was a teenager, my grandparents moved to a split level house on the other side of their town.  With its new house fresh paint smell, it was spacious and modern and slightly standoffish, but Grandpa’s study on the ground floor was expansive—two to three times the size of the old one.  Here too there were bookcases lining the walls, a large desk, and the ever present stacks of books and papers on every surface, floor included.  This room was lighter and brighter than his old study, and I passed the time here as well, always welcomed into his lair by my grandfather.

Today, I have my own small study—not as many bookcases as Grandpa had, but still a wall of shelves including the New York edition of the works of Henry James, given to me by him and one of my treasures.  I do own a Kindle Paperwhite and I do appreciate the convenience of having many books on it when I travel, but there is a sameness to books read on a device. They all look alike.  At heart, I’m a lover of paper books and an acquisitive one at that.  I gave away hundreds of books before moving, but will continue to buy books going forward.  I like the feel of a book, that tactile experience, and I derive visual pleasure from the design and color of book jackets and the variety of fonts on the page.  I think it’s fair to say I’m “book happy” too.

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Movie of the Week:  I can’t recall if I ever walked out of a movie before, but this week I did. Given all the press “Birdman” was getting, we decided we should go see it.  Even beforehand, I didn’t particularly care for the premise.  I suffered through not quite an hour before I suggested we leave. Fortunately, my husband was in agreement.  I didn’t like any of the characters, thought the language was overly vulgar, and found the narrow corridors of the film’s setting dull and tedious.  I couldn’t take a second hour.  A woman I overheard the week before said she found the movie “weird,” but she didn’t say “don’t go to it.”  Anyway, not a winner for me.

Booknote: My Favorite Books of 2014

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Some years ago, I started keeping a list of most of the books I read each year just for myself with some occasional comments.  I received a slew of new books for Christmas and near the end of the year purchased a few so I have an even higher stack than usual awaiting me.  You would think that being retired, I would be doing more reading, but so far, travel and getting settled in have intervened.  One of my 2015 goals is to set aside more time each day to read and to work my way through some of these literary riches.  At this stage of life, I’ve both given myself permission and forgiven myself for not finishing every book I start. There are just too many good books–and more being published– to spend time on one that doesn’t engage me.  I will give most works 50-75 pages before bailing out.

Back to my 2014 list.  Here are my top favorites for the year.  I purposely left off any books I have already blogged about.  In no particular order, they are as follows:

NONFICTION

Being Mortal by Atul Gawande.  Surgeon Gawande is one of my favorite writers and I always read his pieces in the New Yorker where he is a staff writer.  Since we all have or have had parents and aspire to old age ourselves, this book is a must-read.  Using case histories and even his own family as examples, Gawande delineates how we often do not act in an individual’s best interests at the end of life.

Soldier Girls by Helen Thorpe.  Three young women, socio-economically disadvantaged, joined the National Guard partly as a way to increase their income and assuming their tour of duty would all take place stateside.  Instead they were assigned to Afghanistan and one also served in Iraq.  Gripping, painful and informative about the horrors and the boredom of life in a war zone.

House in the Sky by Amanda Lindhouts.  I heard Ms. Lindhouts speak at the Aspen Ideas Festival last summer and then got her book.  It is a chilling story of her kidnapping and imprisonment in Somalia, but even more it speaks to her incredible force of spirit and tenacity to endure and ultimately survive such brutal treatment.

FICTION

Quiet Dell by Jayne Anne Phillips.  Based on an actual murder, this novel includes the crime, but focuses more on the press and the surrounding story.  Beautifully written and more accessible than her earlier, also very good novel, Lark and Termite.

Nora Webster by Colm Toibin.  I’m a big fan of Toibin’s work and loved Brooklyn.  This novel traces a young Irish widow’s trajectory of grief and its impact on her children who seem oddly neglected.

Life After Life by Kate Atkinson.  A tour de force of creativity.  Events occur and then are re-wound to  different endings and then re-wound again in this novel set in the early 20th century.  How might our lives been different or this one life?

The Impossible Lives of Greta Wells by Andrew Sean Greer.  More straightfoward time travel from 1981 to 1918 and 1941 exploring the role of women in times of crisis–or at least the experience of one woman, Greta. She is an engaging character. A fitting successor to Greer’s The Story of a Marriage which has its own twists.

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Here’s to happy reading in 2015!