Review of “Me Before You” by Jojo Moyes

I laughed and cried. I felt hope and despair and elation and fear. At times I wanted to put the book in the freezer. [This analogy comes from the "Friends" episode in which Rachel offers to put Little Women in the freezer for Joey, who wants to stop something from happening and/or reading that it did!] I felt ALL THE FEELINGS.

What I especially loved is that when the 26-year-old heroine, Louisa (“Lou”) feels angry or sad or horrified or haunted or betrayed or happy or shy or awkward or ecstatic – whatever her state of mind, we were absolutely made to feel it also. I believe that talent by the author for conveying emotions and for making us feel them too, is what gives this book so much power.

Per email discussions with Sandy, who also loved this book, we both feel special mention is warranted commending the author for the way she handles disability issues in the book. Lou works as a caregiver for Will Traynor, a 35-year-old C5-6 quadriplegic, who, before his accident, lived an intense and active life as the head of a company specializing in “crushing people in business deals.” His idea of a vacation was pushing himself to his physical limits. Now, his physical limits are crushing him.

As an ever-present background in the book, the author provides a striking picture of what quadriplegics have to endure, not only in terms of the overwhelming physical and mental effects of profound injuries, and not only because of the awkward reactions of abled people who are uncomfortable in their presence, but even with respect to the difficulties of trying to navigate in a world designed for the able-bodied. She takes us through the heartbreak, frustration, humiliation, and fury, as well as the occasional triumphs and moments when Will is treated as a man instead of someone [or thing] repulsive or offensive or a bother or a reminder of our vulnerability and mortality that we don’t want to have. Moyes captures all of this beautifully and with exceptional compassion. If it aids in changing readers understanding of and response to paralyzing conditions, this alone would justify the book.

I don’t want to say too much more about what this story is about, because it might be spoilery. It’s a love story, with two unlikely partners, and it is full of humor and joy and sorrow and ALL THE THINGS.

It’s about life and grabbing it by the horns and living it as fully as one can. It’s about the right to choose what you want out of life, and what gives you that freedom or takes it away. It’s a comedy of manners or lack thereof. More specifically, I’ll insert a brief more descriptive but possibly spoilery sentence here, comparing it to other books, which you can mouse over if you like.

Imagine a British-accented mash-up of Silver Linings Playbook and The Fault In Our Stars and the movie Pretty Woman and Erich Segal’s Love Story.

I’ve got just one piece of dialogue for you, to give you an idea of why these characters are so irresistible. In this scene, Lou is upset, and her sister Treena goes to her bedroom:

There was a knock on the door.

I blew my nose. ‘Piss off, Katrina.’

‘I’m sorry.’

I stared at the door.

Her voice was muffled, as if her lips were close up to the keyhole. ‘I’ve got wine. Look, let me in, for God’s sake, or Mum will hear me. I’ve got two Bob the Builder mugs stuck up my sweater, and you know how she gets about us drinking upstairs.’

I climbed off the bed and opened the door.”

Evaluation: I loved this book. Highly recommended!

Rating: 5/5

Published in the United States by Viking Penguin, a member of the Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 2012

Kid Konnection – Review of “Desmond and the Very Mean Word” by Archbishop Desmond Tutu and Douglas Carlton Abrams

This is a wonderful book! I cried at the end of course. I found it absorbing and definitely don’t think it’s just for kids!

Archbishop Desmond Tutu, the famed South African social rights activist and retired Anglican bishop, tells the true story of an experience he had when he was a young boy, when he got called a very mean word by another child. He was so hurt, and wanted to get even.

Father Trevor, his childhood hero and mentor, helped him through that rough patch, by talking to him about how he could feel better about himself and about others.

Father Trevor went on to become Archbishop Huddleston, one of the most important members of the South African anti-apartheid movement, and Desmond Tutu not only became an Anglican archbishop, but was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1984. He named his first son Trevor.

Abdul Minty, Father Trevor Huddleston, Archbishop Desmond Tutu and Adelaide Tambo at the Nelson Mandela Freedom March, England, July 1988.

Evaluation: This book not only suggests how to deal with cruelty from others, but shows that even great men, even future Nobel Laureates, at one time struggled with being hurt by other kids, and with learning the best way to deal with it. Young Desmond had a strong desire to get revenge, but Father Trevor showed him there was actually a better way to get free of the hurt he felt.

A. G. Ford adds to the impact of the story with his vivid and realistic oil paintings.

Highly recommended for all ages!

Rating: 5/5

Published by Candlewick Press, 2012

For more multicultural picture books, check out all the resources at The Birthday Party Pledge, a new website dedicated to promoting gifts of multicultural books to the children in our lives.

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For more reviews of books for children and teens, go to Booking Mama’s feature, Kid Konnection, posted on Saturdays. If you’d like to participate in Kid Konnection and share a post about anything related to children’s books (picture, middle grade, or young adult) from the past week, leave a comment as well as a link on her site.

Review of “A Question of Identity” by Susan Hill

This is the seventh in the Simon Serrailler mystery series, quirky because Simon, who is Chief Superintendent in the British town of Lafferton, rarely makes an appearance in the books. Rather, these stories take a detailed and intimate look at the lives of those around Serrailler, whether his family members or those he is investigating.

In this novel, Serrailler is investigating a serial killer who targets elderly women. But we learn much more about the women and their daily lives and their families and friends than we do about Serrailler’s case.

Also, like previous books, the central character is actually Simon’s widowed sister Cat, and her struggles to raise her three children, the eldest of whom, Sam, has taken to bullying. Who is he, she wonders? Who, indeed, is anyone in this reverie about identity and how we define who we are.

Cat is losing her job because of budget cuts, and she must figure out who she now is without her career to define her. Similarly, Simon’s love interest, Rachel, is in a very precarious position that requires her to come to terms with her self-image. Cat and Simon’s stepmother has to deal with the changes in who her husband has become, and who she must be in response. And most critically, the killer has decided that the only way to achieve a sense of identity is to go on committing murders.

As the story winds up, we learn who the killer is, but not why the killer engaged in such bizarre rituals, or chose those particular victims. Nor is there any resolution to the identity crises facing the other characters. One assumes they will be taken further in the next installment. After all, one doesn’t read Susan Hill for the mysteries, but rather the ongoing psychological analyses she performs on her characters.

Evaluation: This book is even more unusual than the previous ones in that a whole slew of plot threads are left unresolved. This series is not for those who want a fast-paced carnival ride with well-hidden criminals and life-threatening close calls. Rather, these books call for a big cozy chair, afghan, roaring fire, and glass of Laphroaig, Simon Serallier’s warmer-upper of choice.

Rating: 3/5

Published in the United States by The Overlook Press, 2012

Simon Serrailler Crime Novels in Order:

The Various Haunts of Men
The Pure in Heart
The Risk of Darkness
The Vows of Silence
The Shadows in the Street
The Betrayal of Trust
A Question of Identity

Review of “The Swerve: How the World Became Modern” by Stephen Greenblatt

Note: This review is by my husband Jim.

Many scholars of history or art consider the Renaissance to be a relatively short period of time (roughly the 15th and 16th centuries) when educated Europeans experienced a substantial and sudden change (a “swerve”) from a deeply religious weltanschauung to one more secular or scientific. In The Swerve, Stephen Greenblatt, the John Cogan University Professor of the Humanities at Harvard, writes eloquently about Western Europe as it underwent that change of worldview. He begins with describing the (largely religious) preconceptions generally held prior to the swerve. He detours through the history of book collecting, papermaking, medieval libraries, the importance of penmanship before the invention of the movable type printing press, and the sociology of monasteries and the monastic movement. [This may sound dry, but it contains much interesting information, such as the extreme value of writing material and the fact that monastic scribes used a mixture of milk, cheese, and lime as “whiteout” for mistakes.]

The central figure of the book is Poggio Bracciolini, a secretary to the first Pope John XXIII. In 1417, Poggio unearthed in a German monastery a copy of “De Rerum Natura” (“On the Nature of Things”) by Lucretius, a 7,000-line epic poem which had been lost for more than a thousand years. Lucretius, born in 99 BCE, was not the most original of thinkers, but he wrote in beautiful Latin, and he rearticulated the theory of atomism first posited by Leucippus and Democritus and further developed by Epicurus. As Greenblatt tells it, Poggio’s rediscovery of Lucretius introduced to 15th century Europe the concept of that all things were composed of combinations of eternal, indestructible atoms moving about in the “void.”

Lucretius circa 55 B.C.

The Roman Catholic Church at first thought atomism was a dangerous concept because it was thought to contradict (or at least make less tenable) the concept of transubstantiation, which had been so painfully analyzed and articulated by Thomas Aquinas. Borrowing from a distinction made by Aristotle, Aquinas argued that the host consecrated at mass maintained only the “accidents” of bread, while its “substance” underwent a change into the body of Christ. The Church officially adopted Aquinas’s concept at the Council of Trent (1545-1563). But atomism absolutely denied the distinction between “substance” and “accidents,” and thus threatened Aquinas’s intellectual edifice. If the host were merely a specific arrangement of atoms, just how could it be turned into the body of Christ, which had been an entirely different arrangement of different atoms?

De Rerum Natura

“De Rerum Natura” also contradicted another seminal church theologian, Augustine of Hippo, whose view of man’s status in the world dominated medieval perceptions. Augustine had emphasized man’s “fallen” nature. He wrote that the road to salvation required men to overcome their natural desires, to refrain from seeking pleasure (especially the sexual kind), and to perform nearly constant penance. On the other hand, Lucretius, picking up from Epicurus, taught that there was no afterlife and that happiness could be obtained only by seeking pleasure. [It should be noted that Epicurus was not a total hedonist or debaucher—his notion of pleasure was a modest (one might say “sensible” or “temperate”) one, something like Aristotle’s search for eudemonia.] Lucretius wrote that humans can and should conquer their fears, accept the fact that they and all things they encounter are transitory, and embrace the beauty and pleasure of the world.

Roman marble bust of Epicurus, 341 BC – 270 BC

Greenblatt contends that right about the time Poggio returned to Italy from Germany with his copy of “De Rerum Naturum,” Western Europe underwent what Lucretius called a “clinamen” [the word is derived from the Latin clīnāre, to incline] or swerve —an unexpected, unpredictable movement.” He avers:

Something happened in the Renaissance, something that surged up against the constraints that centuries had constructed around curiosity, desire, individuality, sustained attention to the material world, [and] the claims of the body. The cultural shift is notoriously difficult to define, and its significance has been fiercely contested….[I]t helps to account for the intellectual daring of Copernicus and Vesalius, Giordano Bruno and William Harvey, Hobbes and Spinoza.”

Discussion: It should be noted that many experts take issue with Greenblatt’s contentions. They decry his depiction of the Middle Ages (at least after the 12th century) as overwhelmingly dark, ignorant, and superstitious. His portrayal may be vivid and fascinating, but closer to caricature than fact.

From Britannica – A French scholar works on a manuscript in a monastery, in a painting from about 1480. During the Middle Ages, monasteries and cathedrals were the guardians of classical learning, and many had large libraries.

More critically, Greenblatt’s suggestion that Poggio’s discovery led to the Renaissance is anathema to some thoughtful historians. While Greenblatt makes some modest disclaimers about one poem causing an entire movement, he gives mixed signals in that regard. He writes, for example:

A short, genial, cannily alert man in his late thirties reached out one day, took a very old manuscript off a library shelf, saw with excitement what he had discovered, and ordered that it be copied. That was all; but it was enough.”

And certainly the subtitle of the book, “How the World Became Modern”, lays bare his mind set. The publishers’ blurb, for which we probably should not blame Greenblatt, goes even further:

The copying and translation of this ancient book, the greatest discovery of the greatest book hunter of his age, fueled the Renaissance, inspiring artists such as Botticelli and thinkers such as Giordano Bruno; shaped the thought of Galileo and Freud, Darwin and Einstein, and had revolutionary influence on writers like Montaigne and Shakespeare, and even Thomas Jefferson.”

Engraving of Poggio Bracciolini – prime mover, or one of many?

That encomium clearly jumps the shark. All those great thinkers were influenced by many movements and thinkers besides Lucretius. It could even be argued that Greenblatt saw the impress of others, such as Cicero, and somewhat arbitrarily (or at least unjustifiably in terms of the evidence) attributed them to Lucretius. Many historians, for example, have credited the onset of the Renaissance to the discovery of Cicero’s letters by Petrarch in the 14th Century.

Marcus Tullius Cicero, 106 BC to 43 BC

Cicero’s writings on Greek philosophical systems not only profoundly affected European ideas in the early Middle Ages, but are said to have inspired Lucretius! In fact, Petrarch is considered by many to be the “father of the Renaissance” by stimulating much of the humanist philosophy that characterized it. The list goes on: in the mid-16th Century, the works of Sextus on skepticism were translated into Latin, and these ideas too were said to have profoundly modified the course of religious thought in the late Renaissance.

Italian scholar Francesco Petrarch 1304-1374 takes the prize for headgear…

The point is that many factors went into the gradual efflorescence that characterized the Renaissance and inspired later thinkers. Greenblatt’s reliance on the shoulders of just one giant isn’t warranted.

Evaluation: When I first encountered this book, I thought the author had overemphasized the importance of the discovery of “De Rurum Natura,” merely using it as an excuse to write a book about the Renaissance. I still think he overstates his case, but a second reading showed that his thesis was somewhat more nuanced and measured. Greenblatt doesn’t contend that the discovery of Lucretius caused the Renaissance, but he does say, “This particular ancient book, suddenly returning to view, made a difference.” With that, I can agree. The book is well-written and replete with interesting philosophical analyses. If it inspires readers to read more about medieval history and philosophy, so much the better.

Rating: 3/5

Published by W. W. Norton & Company, 2011

Note: This book received the 2011 National Book Award, the 2011 James Russell Lowell Prize, and the 2012 Pulitzer Prize for nonfiction.

Review of “Criminal” by Karin Slaughter

This story, part of the Will Trend/Sara Linton series of crime novels, begins in 1974 Atlanta, and alternates between that time period and the present. In this way, we get a more in-depth portrait of some of the older characters in the series, and we also get the bonus of finding out what happens to characters in the future, something most crime novels don’t have the luxury of conveying.

Someone is abducting and murdering prostitutes in 1974, and as the present day story begins, a dead girl is found exhibiting the same horrific signs of torture that characterized the killings some thirty years earlier. For some reason, although the Georgia FBI is called in, Deputy Director Amanda Wagner won’t allow her agent Will Trent to be on the case.

On the one hand, this enables Will to spend more time developing his new relationship with Dr. Sara Linton, but on the other, he is puzzled as to why Amanda is shutting him out.

As we go back and forth to 1974, when Amanda was first starting out in the police force, we gradually understand her connection to this case, and why she is determined that Will not get involved.

Discussion: Karin Slaughter just keeps getting better and better. This book had me both laughing and crying, neither of which I have ever done while reading one of Slaughter’s gritty mysteries.

Ordinarily, crime novels that feature abuse of women make me run the other way. But Slaughter is an exception to the rule. One, her aim seems not to be sensationalism but rather to expose the myriad ways in which a sense of anger and impotence in men can, and does, get taken out on women. She manages to elicit understanding, sympathy, compassion, and even outrage.

Second, her writing is just so darn good – not because the prose is poetic, but because she knows how to construct a good crime story.

And third, her characters, whether flawed but well-meaning, or damaged and evil, are drawn in an interesting and well-rounded way. (One exception may be the recent evolution of Sara Linton, the heroine of two of Slaughter’s series, who is starting to be a little too perfect.)

This book is even more noteworthy because it required a great deal of research by the author on Atlanta in the Seventies, and her hard work shows. Slaughter creates a fascinating picture of what it was like back then for such groups as women, blacks, police, prostitutes. She observes in an afterward that as crazy as her portrait may seem, it is borne out by testimonials, studies, and news articles.

The sequences in the Seventies are riveting. You emerge with nothing but admiration for the pioneering women cops who had as much to fear from their fellow male officers as the criminals on the streets. [Slaughter was greatly aided in this part by a year-long study conducted of female police officers in Atlanta in 1975.] Read about what they endured and weep. And cheer. And fall absolutely in love with these women who, having imbibed the prejudice and racism of their time and place, at first seem totally unlikable. As they learn, they change and grow, and inescapably, so does the reader’s affection for them.

Some memorable episodes: the first time one of the women gets a credit card; an encounter between two of the women cops and an Jewish woman who is talking about hot flashes during “the change” and their thinking it must be something Jewish women get; the disdain of the female cops for prostitutes evolving into this:

Those girls… They aren’t very different from us, are they? Someone along the way decided that they don’t matter. And that made it true.”

And then there is the moment Amanda and Evelyn walked into the squad room for the morning briefing after doing something none of the males had been able to do….

Evaluation: I can’t say enough good about Karin Slaughter. This book actually can be read as a standalone, but really, why not start at the beginning? You won’t be sorry!

Rating: 4/5

Published by Delacorte Press, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., 2012

Note: The Will Trent series in order so far:

Triptych (2006)
Fractured (2008)
Undone (2009)
Broken (2010)
Fallen (2011)
Snatched (a novella) (2012)
Criminal (2012)

Kid Konnection – Review of “Romeo Blue” by Phoebe Stone

This is a delightful book with such an adorable protagonist that you soon forget she is only 12 (albeit, like many tweens, going on 21). Although it apparently continues a story that began with The Romeo and Juliet Code, I had not read that book and had no trouble following this one. I regret not starting with it though, since I loved this one so much!

The setting is 1942 in Bottlebay, Maine, a fictitious place that sounds a bit like Biddeford Pool. There, the U.S. Government put up an observation tower during World War II to patrol Maine waters for German submarines. Citizens on Main’s coast also had to keep their windows blackened, observe strict curfews, and were exhorted to keep vigilant. And in fact, on April 23, 1945, a U. S. Navy sub-chaser was torpedoed by a German U-boat just three miles off of Cape Elizabeth. Even before that, others had been sunk, and two German spies had even come ashore in Frenchman’s Bay. Fortunately, they turned out to be venal and stupid, and ended up giving themselves away. (You can read about them here).

The SS Port Nicholson, sunk off the coast of Cape Cod by a German U-boat in June 1942.

In the book, Flissy (Felicity) Bathburn is living with family members in Bottlebay a year or so after her parents dropped her off there from Great Britain so they could continue their undercover work in Europe. Flissy has not only not heard from “Winnie and Danny” as she calls her parents, but she just found out that her “Uncle” Gideon, with whom she now lives in Maine, is actually her father: after Flissy was born, Winnie fell in love with Gideon’s brother Danny. Flissy never knew Danny wasn’t her real father. Gideon and Danny’s mother, “The Gram,” hates Winnie for how she disrupted the family, but loves having Flissy with her. The big cozy and historic house is also home to The Gram’s daughter Miami, and Gideon’s almost-adopted son Derek.

Derek is a year older than Flissy, and Flissy has a huge crush on him. They are also good friends, but Flissy adores him:

He seemed a bit moody today, but I rather liked moody. It could be quite dashing when hovering over someone like Derek. I would have followed Derek to the edge of the world, if he had wanted me to. And then perhaps we would have had to hold hands because it must be quite windy at the edge of the world.”

But Flissy’s life is filled with a lot more than preteen angst. So much is going that causes her to feel all mixed up. Derek is trying to find his real father, and keeping it a secret from Gideon and The Gram. Flissy thinks Gideon and The Gram are, like Winnie and Danny, also involved in spying. Aunt Miami is in love with the mailman, and the mailman may be drafted soon. And somehow, the theme of butterflies keeps recurring in a suspicious manner. Of particular significance is the Mazarine Blue, a primarily European butterfly, the male of which, Flissy avers, is also known as the Romeo blue.

Mazarine (or Romeo) Blue Butterfly

As time goes on and the war heats up, so does the tension, since the war brings big changes to all of their lives. Moreover, Flissy is leaving her childhood behind her, and the ways in which she grows are so heartwarming and lovely!

Evaluation: This story does not sugarcoat what happens in war, but as it takes place in the U.S., it isn’t as harrowing as it might have been if set overseas. It’s a great way for kids to get a feel about how a war fought by adults could also have an impact on their own lives, even in the relatively isolated United States.

Flissy is such a winning character that I would love to see the author do a whole series of books on her that take us with her on her journey through life, sort of like Anne of Green Gables, of whom she reminds me a lot!

Rating: 4.5/5

Published by Arthur A. Levine Books, an imprint of Scholastic, 2013

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For more reviews of books for children and teens, go to Booking Mama’s feature, Kid Konnection, posted on Saturdays. If you’d like to participate in Kid Konnection and share a post about anything related to children’s books (picture, middle grade, or young adult) from the past week, leave a comment as well as a link on her site.

Review of “Emperors of the Ice: A True Story of Disaster and Survival in the Antarctic, 1910-1913” by Richard Farr

Note: This review is by my husband Jim.

By the beginning of the 20th Century, there was only one place left to explore on the surface of the Earth, and that was “the great white blank at the bottom of the map”: Antarctica. And so several expeditions began “the race” to reach South Pole.

In 1909, Ernest Shackleton famously came within 100 miles of the Pole. In June 1910, Roald Amundsen led a Norwegian group to Antarctica. At about the same time, Robert Falcon Scott led a British expedition. This book tells the story of Scott’s expedition, which had numerous scientific goals (marine biology, geology, glaciation, the atmosphere, the magnetic field, parasitology, and bird evolution) in addition to reaching the Pole.

Amundsen reached the Pole and returned to become an internationally renowned hero. Scott probably reached the Pole, but died returning to his base camp, frozen in the Antarctic wastes. Most of his men survived, but none of the survivors had been with the group of five men that made the fearsome trek from the base camp across the Antarctic continent to the Pole.

Antarctic landscape

Apsley Cherry-Garrard (called “Cherry”) was a young Englishman of a noble family who joined Scott’s expedition. His only qualifications for the trip were that he was rich, well-connected, and very hardy. Cherry survived the trip and went on to write The Worst Journey in the World, a book that Richard Farr (the author) calls “the best volume of exploration literature ever written.” In fact, The Emperors of the Ice is really not much more than Farr’s retelling of Cherry-Garrard’s story. But what a story it is!

Except for the introduction, Farr’s book reads as if it were written by Cherry; it is “narrated” in Cherry’s voice. Farr explains, “’My’ Cherry writes what I believe he would have written had he been able to put certain obsessions aside…and consider all evidence and all sources from the viewpoint of our own time.” The result is very readable.

A portrait of of Apsley Cherry-Garrard after returning from his attempt to find the missing Captain Scott, January 1912

The “Emperors” of the title are penguins, Emperor penguins to be precise, the largest and in many ways the most exotic of the penguins. They were of special interest to biologists because they were thought to be prime candidates for the “missing link” between dinosaurs and birds, but the link could not be proven without being able to examine live penguin eggs to see how the embryos developed. The problem was that the Emperors all lay their eggs at the same time and incubate them during the Antarctic winter in a remote valley safe from predators. The incubation area is far enough south that the sun does not shine there for four months, the wind blows fiercely, and the temperature (not wind chill) can reach -70°F.

A penguin on the ice pack. One of expedition photographer Herbert Ponting’s famous Antarctic images, taken in 1910

Cherry’s Worst Journey was one of the scientific side trips, this one to find live emperor penguin eggs. The little 135-mile jaunt took him and two other men five weeks in the dark of winter pulling heavy sledges through abrasive snow. Between +15° and -25°, snow actually melts under the runners of sleds, allowing them to slide easily. At colder temperatures, snow forms hard grains that do not melt under the runners, making it have a consistency like sand.

The temperature on their trip reached -77°F one night. The wind ripped their tent to tatters, and the men slept in their sleeping bags under the snow because it was warmer than the air. It was still cold enough that Cherry’s sleeping bag trapped about 30 pounds of frozen breath! Against all odds, Cherry and his two companions survived and returned with the precious eggs. The ultimate irony was that the eggs did not add much to the world’s knowledge of penguin embryology, nor did they supply the “missing link.”

Two of the expedition geologists, Frank Debenham and T. Griffith Taylor

The book contains many tidbits of Antarctic lore: One reason Amundsen survived was that he relied entirely on dogs rather than ponies to pull his sledges. Scott tried to use ponies, but they just ended up as meals for the explorers. Scott also tried to use motorized sledges, but they broke down in the cold weather. The roundtrip walk to the pole from the edge of the continent is more than 1800 miles. Moreover, the explorers had to climb the 10,000-foot Polar Plateau. It’s no wonder they didn’t survive.

Evaluation: This is a rip-roaring good story, especially for those who like to read about how people survive (or don’t) in extreme conditions.

Rating: 4/5

Note: In addition to good writing, the book contains quite a few photographs, drawings, and helpful maps. You can also see more images and learn more about the expedition from the University of Cambridge’s Scott Polar Research Institute website, here.

Published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2008

TLC Book Tour Review of “A Constellation of Vital Phenomena” by Anthony Marra

Note: This book is reviewed as part of TLC Tours.

This is a book that is both wonderful and terrible, all at once. I agree with the critics that it is a masterpiece of writing, but taking this plunge into a fictional representation of the real-life hell of war-torn Chechnya is far from a happy experience.

The story begins in 2004 the morning after the Russian military (“The Feds”) have “disappeared” a villager named Dokka, orphaning his 8-year-old daughter Havaa. A neighbor and friend, the less-than-competent village doctor named Akhmed, comes to find her, and takes her to the local hospital to see if the (only) doctor there, Sonja, will take Havaa into her care. He has to act surreptitiously to avoid the other neighbor, Ramzan, whom he suspects of having informed on Dokka. Even Ramzan’s father, Khassan, avoids Ramzan, although they live in the same house.

As the story unfolds, we learn more about these damaged individuals trying to survive in a land in which one wrong step can detonate a land mine or – perhaps worse yet – call you to the attention of hostile authorities. The Feds are in the business of killing not only suspected insurgents but any relatives of those under suspicion, in order to deter further disobedience to the Russian hegemony. Sonja’s patients are broken in so many ways by man or machine that she is astoundingly grateful when Havaa arrives with intact limbs and an unbroken spirit. Still, Sonja has no time or energy (physically or emotionally) to take care of Havaa, especially while she is still mourning the absence (unexplained, like so many of the absences) of her sister Natasha.

The story occasionally flashes back to 1994 to fill in how these characters came to be who and what they are. Some of the answers can be found in “The Landfill,” a notorious torture camp that most of them have familiarity with for one reason or another. As we segue back to 2004, we learn more about the confluence of events that brought these characters together, and the dangers they face in trying to survive another day. And in fact, some will, and some won’t.

Where in the world is Chechnya?

Discussion: This book tackles several thorny issues, torture being among them. Always my focus when I hear or read about torture is not as much on the recipient of this ghastly process but on the practitioners. What kind of people can do this to others? What does it mean that they can? What exactly does it take to cause people to see other people not as human beings but as objects to be used or abused? And once they have crossed this line, can they ever return?

The author does an excellent job of illuminating the thought processes of the victims: those who are forced to balance the desire to remain loyal and to be the sort of people they think they are, with the reality of instruments that gouge and amputate and sear and create incredible amounts of agony. You think you will hold out, but you don’t really know the point at which fear and pain can break down any bravery, convictions, and love for others that you hold.

There is not so much insight on what makes a person a torturer. But the perpetrators and abusers in this book are not the focus of the story. And maybe there is no clear answer at any rate.

The book is also very much about the notion of family and what actually constitutes it. What are the “rules” of love and allegiance? Or are there any?

We also get a hard look at the central role memory plays in our lives: as much as any explosive in the ground, it too constitutes a minefield for these survivors: its sheer intensity and resulting tyranny over people; the way it changes our perceptions and informs our actions and reactions; how difficult it can sometimes be, especially after traumatic experiences, to move past it and get on with life.

And perhaps most centrally, there is the question of what happens to humanity in the midst of conflict. At one point Akhmed asks, “Is common decency too much to ask?” It is in fact the overriding question of this novel, and one that I think each reader may answer differently.

Evaluation: This book is very impressive. It is not only well-crafted – balancing blood and tears with love and humor and hope, but rich in its ability to make the reader think about the issues presented, and allowing us to imagine lives that, hopefully, are very foreign to the majority of readers. This story – especially the poignancy of Sonja’s evolution and the description of the transcendent, tear-producing last encounter between two friends, will haunt me for a long time. It would make an excellent choice for book clubs.

Rating: 4.5/5

Published by Hogarth, a trademark of the Random House Group, Limited, 2013

To view Marra’s other TLC tour stops, click here.

Source: A big ‘thank you’ to TLC Book Tours for asking me to be a part of this tour and to the publisher for providing me with a review copy of the book.

Review of “Animal Wise” by Virginia Morell

I wish this book could be assigned reading for everyone! Not only is it absolutely wonderful with never a dull moment, but it is full of fascinating and important information about the ways in which animals have been proven to be sentient, intelligent, and emotional beings, having self-awareness, fears, pains, ties to family, and a love of fun and play. They also sneak, connive, strategize, and combine with others to achieve goals. Given our common genetic and evolutionary heritage, we should realize that they have a lot to teach us about our own behaviors, just as we should not find it so strange that our own behaviors can provide clues about theirs.

Some examples of the great developments in animal research you will learn:

How scientists figured out that bowerbirds have an artistic sense of perspective;

How they know if animals recognize themselves in mirrors;

The vocabularies of a certain breed of dogs and how they can even pick out objects after seeing two-dimensional pictures of them on paper!

Fish sing to communicate! We just can’t hear them without special instruments.

Rats giggle, and love to be tickled; they also feel pain, and other emotions that make them questionable research subjects.

Why elephant poaching makes a worse impact than even just the killing;

And how PTSD can make young elephants grow up to be delinquents.

I could go on and on. This is a book I listened to in the car, and I was grateful for Bluetooth so I could call Jim (hands free) every five minutes and say “WAIT till you hear THIS!” He is listening to it now (although one wonders why he needs to after all my phone calls, ha ha).

The narrator, Kirsten Potter, is terrific. She did her homework on pronunciations, and added just the right inflections and voice changes for different scientists profiled in the book.

Evaluation: Don’t miss this book!

Rating: 5/5

Published unabridged on 9 compact discs by Random House Audio, a division of Random House, Inc., 2013

Kid Konnection – Review of “The Boy Who Was Raised by Librarians” by Carla Morris

If your child does not yet know the wonders that can be found in the local public library, this book will erase all doubts! It’s the story of a boy named Melvin, who spends a great deal of time in the library as he grows up. Through the years, no matter what he comes up with, the librarians are there to answer his questions, applaud his efforts, and help broaden his horizons.

As the book ends, Melvin is off in college, but writing letters to his librarian friends to keep them up to date about what he is reading and what he is learning. Back home, a little boy named Sterling comes to the library…..

The pictures by Brad Sneed help convey a sense of fun.

Evaluation: How can you not like a love letter to librarians? The episodes are fun too, with Melvin’s curiousity constantly getting into trouble, and the librarians turning these would-be-disasters into learning experiences. Every library should have a team on board like this one!

Rating: 3.5/5

Published by Peachtree Publishers, 2007

For more reviews of books for children and teens, go to Booking Mama’s feature, Kid Konnection, posted on Saturdays. If you’d like to participate in Kid Konnection and share a post about anything related to children’s books (picture, middle grade, or young adult) from the past week, leave a comment as well as a link on her site.