Book-Book (Read It)

Book Review: Mister Pip by Lloyd Jones

This is an odd but compelling little book about an eccentric old man, Mr. Watts, who reads Great Expectations to a group of Pacific Island children whose lives have been shattered by civil war.  The book is narrated by a young teen-aged girl, Matilda, who is so entranced by the character of Pip that it makes her mother jealous. When combatants (we are never told precisely who these fighters are; the two sides are called simply “redskins” and “rambos”) arrive on the island,  they demand to meet this mysterious Mister Pip and do not believe that the villagers cannot produce him.

 Jones’s prose is simple and beautiful.  The voice of Matilda is lyrical, but not precious.  Her mother, Dolores, is a marvelous character.  My only reservation is that the violence late in the book creates a tone that contrast so starkly with the book’s overall tone that it did not work for me.  Doubtless Jones intended to shock his reader out of their dreams, but to me it seemed over the top.

Book Review: An Incomplete Revenge by Jacqueline Winspear

I dipped into this popular mystery series set in 1930s England “because it was there,” and found it enjoyable. Maisie Dobbs is a psychologist-detective and a former World War I nurse. This book, smack in the middle of the series, is set during the hops picking season in rural Kent. Maisie is investigating a series of mysterious thefts and fires and senses that the villagers, always happy to blame the incidents on Gypsies, know more than they let on. Maisie is an interesting character, the mystery here is neat and tidy, but the real appeal for me was the rich setting, and especially the chance to learn more about the customs and beliefs of English Gypsies.

Dickens was not paid by the word!

In honor of Charles Dickens's 200th birthday next month, can we stop spreading the myth that he was paid by the word?  He wasn't, period. Readers often offer up this myth because they think it gives them a legitimate excuse to dislike Dickens's books.  It's also a subtle slam on those of us who love his work, suggesting that we have been conned by someone with mercenary motives.

As far as wordiness, Dickens's style was in line with nineteenth century literature generally, although because he was a self-consciously popular writer, he probably had a higher quotient of bombast and sentimentality than some others. You either forgive him the bombast or you don't.  I do.

Let me repeat: Dickens was not paid by the word.  He wrote his novels in serialized format and he was paid by installment.  I suppose one could try to argue that he drew out his stories unnecessarily for the sake of the check, but I'd like to see the evidence for that.  If he was just tossing words around to the detriment of the story, he would not have been as popular as he was.  19th century readers who treated him like a rock star didn't complain about his wordiness.

If you don't like Dickens, just own that opinion.  Don't try to justify it with an urban legend.

Book Review: Death in the City of Light: The Serial Killer of Nazi-Occupied Paris by David King

This is the true story of Marcel Petiot, a Paris doctor who allegedly murdered untold numbers of people and stole their money and belongings under the guise of helping them escape occupied France. Besides detailing the investigation and trial, it provides a detailed picture of Paris during the Occupation: a chaotic and corrupt dance of mobsters, collaborators and Gestapo agents.

The book is being marketed as an Erik Larson read-alike, but I found it nowhere near as compelling as the Larson books I've read.  Mr. King's research is admirable, but perhaps too much of that research found its way into the final draft, and the overall tone of the book is very dry. I don't want to say that the book wasn't quite lurid enough.  Let's just say that Mr. King doesn't have Larson's skill at shaping a narrative.

Book Review: The Paris Wife by Paula McLain

If you enjoyed Woody Allen's movie Midnight in Paris, you might complement it with this fictionalized account of Ernest Hemingway's first wife, set in the Paris of the 1920s.  After innocent Hadley Richardson meets and marries the young aspiring writer, the pair move to Paris and become involved in the bohemian life, hobnobbing with cutting-edge artists as well as with hard-drinking rich people.  Theirs is the "good marriage" in a atmosphere of musical-chair relationships, but as Ernest's career takes off, the marriage suffers.

I really enjoyed this one. Hadley's voice sounds authentic, a smart and profoundly straight-laced person trying to cope with a cynical and hard-edged world. She contrasts herself with "modern" feminist women who are independent and are not content with being wives and mothers. But for whatever reason, I was not exasperated by her, nor did I hate Hemingway. The book makes both of them sympathetic.

Book Review: Before I Go to Sleep by S J Watson

This mind-bending thriller is narrated by Christine, a middle-aged woman who lost her short-term memory in her twenties following a brutal attack.  Every morning, she wakes up in a strange house, next to a strange man, and looks into the mirror shocked to see a middle-aged version of herself, and every morning the strange man has to explain that she is married and that she has suffered an injury.  Unbeknownst to the husband, a doctor is encouraging her to keep a journal, phoning her every day to tell her where it is hidden, and that journal is the device that allows the book to have a coherent narrative.  Through the journal, Christine comes to believe that her husband doesn't always tell her the truth about her past. Why is he lying, if indeed he is? Can she trust her doctor?  Can she trust her own narrative? 

Watson, a male writer, does a great job in voicing a female character, and the empathy one feels for Christine puts a little meat on the suspense-tale bones.  I gobbled it up and enjoyed the gobbling, although I will say that <SPOILER>I disagree with those who found the ending a shocker, since I had it figured out about halfway through the book.</SPOILER>

My 2011 Reading Roundup

Favorite reads: (because I can never pick just one!)

The Widower's Tale by Julia Glass - Wonderful characters.
The Imperfectionists by Tom Rachmann - Again, wonderful characters.
The Borrower by Rebecca Makkai -  A great little kid and an appealing, tart authorial voice.
The Passage by Justin Cronin - Great story with suspense and heart.
Major Pettigrew's Last Stand by Helen Simonson - Lovely, sweet, dear, charming love story.
Mr. Peanut by Adam Ross - Intriguing construction.  Not sweet or charming!

Worst book:

The Secret of Crickley Hall by James Herbert. This so-called horror novel is embarrassingly bad, just wincingly awful.  It reads like a first-time self-published author, although Herbert is a veteran and has written decent ghost stories in the past.

Most disappointing: The School of Night by Louis Bayard.  I've enjoyed each of his historical suspense books until this one, set partially in contemporary times, which seemed dumbed-down for the masses.

What I learned: It is worthwhile to revisit classics that you hated as a youngster. I'm so glad I steeled myself to re-reading Of Human Bondage, because this "boring" book has jumped into my Top Ten Books Ever.  On the other hand, I hate Henry James as much as I ever did, and that was good to learn, too.

Total books read: 52, which is a lot for me.

Genre breakdown:

Classic - 13
Fantasy - 1
Historical Fiction - 2
Horror - 4
Humorous - 1
Mainstream/Literary Fiction - 19
Mystery - 6
Nonfiction - 3
Suspense - 3

Book Review: The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen

Okay, so I'm the last person on the planet to read The Corrections. The next time I do my "dysfunctional family" book display for the holiday season, this one is going front and center!  It is similar in tone and structure to Freedom, but perhaps a bit more arch and much more darkly humorous.  A third of the way through, I was put off by the whiff of "look at me!" in the prose and by what I detected as Franzen's judgmental attitude toward his characters - never a good strategy for an artist - but as I read on, either the writing changed or I changed, and I grew to like the book a great deal.  As in Freedom, Franzen presents his characters' personal difficulties on an expansive canvas of 21st century American life. The three Lambert children mess up their lives in interesting ways.  Their mother Enid aggressively ignores the calamities surrounding her and tries to promote a Hallmark vision of family that she surely knows is false.  The patriarch Alfred has stored up a lifetime of big mistakes and big sacrifices, but is felled not by the forces within his character, but by the undiscerning hand of fate in the form of disease.

I'm still digesting the book, but, in the mood to be audacious, I'll say that The Corrections has the clear-eyed social dissection of Middlemarch, mixed with the occasional low-brow comedy and heart-breaking pathos of Dickens.  So all in all, a pretty good read.

Book Review: The Submission by Amy Waldman

Amy Waldman's debut novel about a Muslim architect whose design is chosen for New York's 9-11 memorial is tailor-made for book discussion groups, but it's more subtle than a didactic "issue" novel. In brief, the (blind) selection of a Muslim's design causes a political and cultural firestorm, and while some of the players are predictable, others are presented with interesting complexity.  The politicians and journalists are mostly odious, and provide some of the black comic relief.  The architect, Mo Kahn, is secular, apolitical, ambitious and depending on your view, either principled or stubborn.  His counterpoint is Claire Burwell, a 9-11 widow on the memorial jury, whose early defense of Kahn and his design falters when the media trumpets an Islamist conspiracy theory pretty much out of wholecloth.

With a good balance of sociological observation and close depiction of characters' emotions, it's an involving story with an important theme. It's making my best of 2011 list, for sure.

Book Review: The Tiger's Wife by Téa Obreht

Obreht's debut novel is set in a Balkan country during "the war" - take your pick as to which war.  The narrator, Natalie, while on a humanitarian mission to inoculate children, finds out that her beloved grandfather has died and wants to discover the circumstances.  She recalls the stories he told her about his childhood, interlaced with village folklore and seemingly endless civil strife.  There are two  stories at the heart of the book. One is about a tiger who escapes a zoo during World War II and is befriended by a deaf-mute who is viciously abused by her husband. The other is about the Deathless Man, a friend, if you can call him that, of the grandfather, who cannot die himself but can predict the death of others.

This is one of the most beautifully written books I've read in ages, with achingly gorgeous language and a piercingly vivid sense of place, although the reader is (quite deliberately?) never told precisely where we are.  The different stories are riveting in themselves, but I had trouble making them cohere.  The author seems to have made a conscious choice not to explain to the reader.  That is fine, because I dislike explanation, but this kind of nonlinear narrative structure makes it hard for my aging brain to remember stuff, so at times of the novel where there was a factual revelation, it wasn't always for me revelatory.  I think this novel needs a re-read, and it can easily stand up to one, because it is beautiful, and full of story.