Catching Fire is the “sequel” to The Hunger Games, although it’s really more of a continuation. I wouldn’t have wanted to read the second book without having read the first. But having read the first, I had to read the second, and having finished that one now too, I share the same anticipation of most of the YA world for the third one, yet to be published.

This supposed trilogy [can the author really stop at three after all the hoopla (read: income) surrounding these books?] centers on Katniss Everdeen, a young girl now age 17 in book two, who lives in constant fear that the evil government of Panem will hurt the ones she loves to punish her for inciting resistance throughout the country.

Panem is a dystopic descendant of the United States, divided into twelve districts and ruled with an iron glove. The government tries to inflame internecine conflict among the districts in the age-old strategy of keeping subjects divided in order to maintain control over them. But Katniss, unbeknownst even to herself, changes everything, and threatens to bring the hegemony of the Capitol to an end.

Katniss is idealistic, naïve, loving, brave, loyal, and apparently quite attractive, although to the author’s credit, she dwells on the character of Katniss much more than on her appearance. There are two young men in love with her, and each seems too good to be true, but let’s face it, who cares?

There’s lots of kissing in this book, but nothing more physically, and not even any bad language! Okay, there are brutal murders, but no one curses while committing them!

Evaluation: This is a must read for those who have read The Hunger Games, but it might be a bit confusing if you haven’t. I would agree with the reviews asserting that this book is not quite as good as the first, but it isn’t relevant: after you finish the first book, you are too sucked in not to want to read the second book!

Rating: 4/5

FTC Disclaimer: I won this book along with a pin and a t-shirt but the t-shirt is too small for me so it doesn’t count!

Note to readers: This review is part of my ongoing series, “Probable Last Person in the Universe to Have Read This Book.”

I’m telling you, these books are just so clever and funny, you forget that you, a grown person who likes to think of herself in a literarily snobby manner, are really having a great time with a book series about vampires. Plus, the author adds redeeming value by her continuous thread highlighting and satirizing prejudice against groups which have not gained total acceptance.

Book 2 of the Sookie Stackhouse vampire romance-mystery series does not disappoint. More “supes” (supernatural beings) are added, but once you accept the premise of vampires, it doesn’t seem to matter anymore. (…yet one more affirmation of the efficacy of Kierkegaard’s “leap of faith.”)

Sookie Stackhouse is a saucy and sassy 25-year-old barmaid in Bon Temps, Louisiana, working at Merlotte’s bar by day and dating Bill the Vampire by night. She also is telepathic, and once the vampires in the area catch on to this, they encourage Bill and Sookie to start up a “detective agency” of sorts so they can find out which humans are betraying them.

Because the Japanese perfected synthetic blood drinks, vampires have been able to come out of the closet and live in the “mainstream” of society (at least, during the evening hours) since they no longer need to feed on humans to survive. But there is still a lot of prejudice against vampires, and hate crimes are becoming a problem. In fact, “the fastest growing cult in America” is the Fellowship of the Sun. Its members are convinced that vampires are an abomination to God, and aim to kill all they can, along with any sympathetic humans. The vampires don’t want to exacerbate the situation by killing enemies indiscriminately. Thus, the need for Sookie’s telepathic skills.

Living Dead in Dallas is action-packed and has not a few moments of sex, but like the first book, the sex is rather tastefully depicted.

I particularly like this one passage that would be so poignant if there were such a thing as vampires. After both vampires and humans have a brush with death, the air is electric with erotic energy. Sookie observes:

…let’s face it, brushes with death have that effect. You want to reaffirm the fact that you’re alive. Though vampires actually aren’t, it seems they are no more immune to that syndrome than humans…”

Evaluation: Ack, I know I should feel shame: a bodice-ripper with vampires and shape-shifters and throbbing body parts… but I loved it anyway! Please don’t tell anyone….

Rating: 4/5

I can’t believe this book for young adults is as good as everyone said! Not that I don’t trust my fellow bloggers, but the premise seemed so grim that I couldn’t imagine making silk out of such a sow’s ear. I’m happy to declare I was so wrong.

Sixteen-year-old Katniss Everdeen lost her father when she was 11. She lives in the poor coal-mining District 12 of Panem, a country that once was the United States, and residents of her district often die of starvation. When her father died, Katniss took to the woods to hunt food for her mother and little sister Prim.

Every year Panem holds a lottery to select two candidates from each of the twelve districts to fight to the death in “The Hunger Games.” (This is punishment that the twelve districts must endure for an uprising in which the thirteenth district was obliterated. The twelve must never be allowed to forget.) When Prim is selected, Katniss volunteers to take her place. Her male counterpart is Peeta, a boy who apparently has been in love with her all his life. But according to the rules of The Hunger Games, there can only be one winner out of the twenty-four; the rest must die.

Sounds depressing, doesn’t it? Noir-y? Violent? It’s a little of those things, but mostly it is surprisingly original, gripping, and memorable. And it’s a love story! The characters are almost uniformly likeable without being cardboard, and the fantastical elements are not too absurd or unbelievable. Well, maybe the last-featured of the mutations, or muttations [sic] as they are called. Otherwise, I am pleased to say there is no shark-jumping in this book.

Evaluation: This book is terrific. If you are one of the few people in the universe who have not yet read this, I think you should find out what all the buzz is about; you won’t be disappointed.

Rating: 4.5/5

FTC Disclaimer: I bought this book at Target in an attempt to sneak it into our “sundries” budget so my husband would not see that I bought yet another book.

Note to readers: This review is part of my ongoing series, “Probable Last Person in the Universe to Have Read This Book.”

This gorgeous pop-up book is guaranteed to thrill you even if you don’t have the slightest belief in Seraphim, Cherubim, Principalities, or any of the rest of the nine angelic orders.

According to St. Thomas of Aquinas in Summa Theologica, angels are intellectual creatures of pure spirit, i.e., they are completely incorporeal. Nevertheless, he concedes that from time to time they assume bodies just to perform some specific service for God.

This book highlights the visual representations of these incorporeal beings and tells something of the history of how they came to look the way they do in art and literature.

It is important to understand that, at least according to St. Thomas of Aquinas, an angel is not a dead human; angels are as different from humans as animals are from us. They are endowed with a power and intellect not proper to man. Thus the angels are not humans, and humans can never become angels. So how do we know what they might look like? Why do we depict them with wings, for example? Fischer tackles these questions and more in the surprisingly comprehensive written material.

The book is divided into three sections: Messengers, A Hierarchy of Angels, and Secular Angels. Next to the large central pop-up section on each page, small booklets to either side give explanations for what you are seeing, drawn from cultures and religions around the world.

But you don’t even need to read a thing to enjoy this book. I could sit and turn the pages for hours, just to partake in the pop-up confections. And you definitely don’t need to believe in angels. You just need an appreciation of art, culture, and design, and the magical wonder of elaborate pop-ups.

In the review by Kathy, a.k.a. Bermudaonion, you can see a quick one-minute video with more gorgeous pictures from this book.

Evaluation: If you need a lovely present to give someone for Christmas this year, I don’t think you can go wrong with this book! You might want to protect it from your resident wild things, however, whether human or beast.

Rating: 4/5

Thanks to Anna of Hachette Press for providing this gorgeous review copy.

In general, I am wont to make scathing deprecations of vampire books. Historically, I have preferred to think of myself as sticking to a program of self-improvement suggested to me so many years ago by Benjamin Franklin’s Autobiography. But really, sometimes one just wants to have fun.

Michelle of Gallysmith insists that one place to go for fun is the Sookie Stackhouse mystery series, and by George, I believe she’s correct!

Dead Until Dark is the first book of this mystery series that features Sookie Stackhouse, a saucy, telepathic blonde, blue-eyed, 25-year-old barmaid from northern Louisiana who falls for a vampire named Bill. Bill is tall, dead, and handsome; preternaturally strong and correspondingly unhumanly gentle; and filled with a longing for love that has been building for centuries.

The author of the Sookie Stackhouse books (adapted by HBO into the series “True Blood”) has a delightful sense of humor and an impish imagination. She portrays vampires as having a social status analogous to gays: vampires can now be “out of the coffin” (read: closet); there is controversy over how they got to be that way; there are politically correct ways to refer to them; there are hangers-on called “fang-bangers” (read: fag-hags); and there is some vicious prejudice against them and occasional hate crimes. Yet this sometimes serious approach is both tempered and augmented by the author’s sense of humor.

Sookie’s telepathy also adds to the fun, especially since vampires’ minds are closed to her – which is part of Bill’s appeal. As Sookie says:

…sex, for me, is a disaster. Can you imagine knowing everything yor sex partner is thinking? Right. Along the order of ‘Gosh, look at that mole…her butt is a little big…wish she’d move to the right a little…why doesn’t she take the hint and…?’ You get the idea. It’s chilling to the emotions, believe me.”

By the way, yes, there are sex scenes, but they mange to be romantic and titillating [sic] without any off-putting language or anatomical detail. And yes: apparently having sex with a vampire is all that it’s cracked up to be!

Best vignette:

The first time Sookie brings Bill home to meet her grandmother (with whom she has lived ever since her parents died when she was almost seven), she tells Bill: “Gran says to please eat before you come.”

Worst revelation about myself:

Ugh: Clearly I’m in that demographic that has long transitioned from the passionate excitement of romantic pursuits and crazed hormonal longings to the mundane quotidianness of settled life. (read: “whose turn is it to wait for the cable guy?” and “don’t forget the trash!”) I’m just ripe for the picking for this kind of book, in which I can thrill to the “Remembrance of Things Past.” How embarrassing. Sigh.

Evaluation: A bodice ripper with blood, and loads of fun.

Rating: 4/5

Congratulations to the winners!

J. T. Oldfield wins Never Let Me Go – Kazuo Ishiguro – paperback.
Trisha (Electic Eccentric) wins Testimony – Anita Shreve – paperback.
Janel wins Feather Man – Rhyll McMaster – paperack.
Megan (Write Meg) wins The Gargoyle – Andrew Davidson – paperback ARC.

I will be sending emails to all of the winners.

I signed up for the Kristin Lavransdatter Readalong, sponsored by Richard of Caravana de Recuerdos and Emily from Evening All Afternoon.

As Emily pointed out, “we’ll be reading the Tina Nunnally translation, which won the PEN/Book-of-the-Month-Club Translation Prize in 2001 and apparently restored a number of the more experimental passages, which had been excised from the original English translation. It’s available from Penguin in both omnibus and three individual editions.”

Participants are to post their reviews of each section around the end of the month, and we will compare notes. The schedule is as follows:

October: The Wreath (pages 1-291)

November: The Wife (pages 295-697)

December: The Cross (pages 703-1124)

My Personal Plan of Action

I finished all three volumes at once. I didn’t want to have to waste a lot of time floundering around in Vol. III figuring out, e.g., which Sigurd was which. I also thought that having an idea of the entirety of the book would give me a better perspective by which to evaluate each volume. I read Volume I in both translations but decided to stick with the Nunnally. (See my post on the translations here.) I also read Dooms Day Book by Connie Willis to serve as a comparison at the end. So I will have four posts on this book. In the third post, for Volume III, I will examine some additional elements of the plot as part of my overall impressions.

Plot Summary of Volume I

First published in 1927, this is Book I of a trilogy that follows the fictional life of Kristin Lavransdatter in 14th Century Norway. This is a culture that is manifestly Catholic, but still deeply wedded to pagan beliefs. It is the Church, however, that structures social and cultural life: times of the year are marked by Holy Days, church days, and church rites and rituals. Sins can be prayed away or even bartered away through a trade of money and/or land. (Thus the Church is able to accumulate wealth.) It is understood that holy men can bring God’s word, but they are still men and therefore sin cannot be expected to be foreign to them. And even after three centuries, most of the Catholic ritual is still in Latin rather than Norwegian and therefore unintelligible to all but the most privileged classes; they pick up the slack by sticking with what they know, which is the superstitious customs and cures to ward off sickness and evil and to explain the mysteries of the universe.

The book begins when Kristin is seven, and recounts the close relationship she has with her father Lavrans. Her mother, Ragnfrid is moody and withdrawn. Kristin is definitely a daddy’s girl, and remains so her whole life. She has no living brothers, and two sisters. Her best friend is a neighbor boy, Arne Gyrdson, who grows up to love her. When she was fifteen, however, her father betrothed her to Simon Darre, who was considered to be a felicitous match. Kristin failed to be impressed with Simon, and begged to go to a convent for a year to get peace of mind.

While at the convent, rather than encountering serenity, Kristin encounters Erlend Nikulausson, a handsome man who gets her heart racing. After several assignations, they give themselves to each other in body and soul, saying to each other “May God forsake me if I ever take any other…into my arms, for as long as I live on this earth.” They cannot marry yet, however. Kristin has to break off the betrothal to Simon, and Erlend has to free himself of his own entanglements, including an old paramour by whom he had two children.

Many try to discourage Kristin from her attachment to Erlend, but she remembered words she had heard as a child (ironically, from Erlend’s aunt): “…good days [are] granted to sensible people, but the grandest of days are enjoyed by those who dare to act unwisely.”

They’re finally able to marry, and in the drunken aftermath of the celebration, Lavrans and Ragnfrid, now married some twenty-seven years, and struck by witnessing the love and lust shown by Kristin and Erlen, review their own feelings for one another.

Discussion

Undset was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1928 for this trilogy (along with other work), which focuses on the lives of women. She was considered to be a trailblazer in her emphasis on the erotic needs of women, and on the sexual perils they faced as well. (Women could scarce go out unaccompanied in the Middle Ages, lest they be raped.) The Bridal Wreath is a good book, but it doesn’t actually end. It just sort of comes to the end of a chapter. I have no idea why it would be sold separately from the other two installments although it is the only one of the three volumes that might be able to stand alone.

Each of the three volumes does have a different emphasis however, and represents a different phase in Kristin’s life. I would compare this volume to “Fiddler on the Roof” (which was based on Sholem Aleichem’s Tevye and his Daughters). That story concerns an impoverished Jewish community in the Pale of Settlement in Russia, which follows the time-old practice of arranged marriages according to class and dowry. Tevye, the hero and father, has three daughters to get bethrothed. But each one does him the enormously complicated disservice of falling in love. And each time, Tevye must somehow reconcile his faith in tradition and his disapproval of the husband with his love for his daughters.

He dissembles to protect his wife, although it is he who needs the protection. In the final scene, he comes to see the appeal of love, and wonders if his wife loves him. This could have been the dialog between Lavrans and Ragnfrid:

(Tevye)
“Golde I’m asking you a question…”

Do you love me?

(Golde)
You’re a fool

(Tevye)
“I know…”

But do you love me?

(Golde)
Do I love you?
For twenty-five years I’ve washed your clothes
Cooked your meals, cleaned your house
Given you children, milked the cow
After twenty-five years, why talk about love right now?

(Tevye)
Golde, The first time I met you
Was on our wedding day
I was scared

(Golde)
I was shy

(Tevye)
I was nervous

(Golde)
So was I

(Tevye)
But my father and my mother
Said we’d learn to love each other
And now I’m asking, Golde
Do you love me?

(Golde)
I’m your wife

(Tevye)
“I know…”
But do you love me?

(Golde)
Do I love him?
For twenty-five years I’ve lived with him
Fought him, starved with him
Twenty-five years my bed is his
If that’s not love, what is?

(Tevye)
Then you love me?

(Golde)
I suppose I do

(Tevye)
And I suppose I love you too

(Both)
It doesn’t change a thing
But even so
After twenty-five years
It’s nice to know

Evaluation

I’ve finished the entire trilogy now, so I can say that I think Volume I is the weakest of the three. But in part this is because Undset is setting up the background of daily life on a Norwegian farm and introducing us to many of the characters and family lineages. She does tend to go on and on about matters like the amber waves of grain, whereas I think modern readers might get a little impatient over that.

Also, for most of the beginning of the book (i.e., Volume I), Kristin is still a child, and her life isn’t that interesting yet. Moreover, Undset alludes to quite a few “mysteries” in this volume, perhaps to induce us to keep reading, but that are rather annoying until you find out what they are all about in Volume II. (Examples include: why Ragnfrid is so moody and given to running outside and crying from time to time; how she knows Fru Aaschild, a local witchy-woman; and what the problem is with the relationship between Lavrans and Ragnfrid.)

The book gets better in Volume II, and even more so in Volume III.

Volume I favorite passage

Erlend put his arm around Kristin, and now she felt arm and secure – at his side was the only place she would ever feel safe and protected again. … Without knowing it, Kristin was gathering up from all he said every little thing that might make him more attractive and dear to her, and that would lessen his blame in all she knew about him that was not good.”

On the one hand, this is a delightful, clever, funny book that will entertain any child who loves silly jokes, action heroes, satire, and books about nerds versus popular kids in school. I laughed aloud more than once, and I loved the many positive messages.

The NERDS are a group of fifth graders made up of actual “nerds” whose “weaknesses” have been bionically enhanced to give them special powers. The government made them into special agents after determining that kids would make the best spies because (1) they are small, and often overlooked and underestimated by adults, and (2) they are more techno-savvy than adults. Thus NERDS (National Espionage, Rescue, and Defense Society) was born.

The current crew includes Duncan “Gluestick” Dewey (he can stick to walls), Ruby “Pufferfish” Peet (her allergies can help her detect danger and dishonesty), Heathcliff “Choppers” Hodges (his buckteeth allow him to control minds), Julio “Flinch” Escala (his hyperactivity gives him super speed and strength) and Matilda “Wheezer” Chois (her inhalers enable her to fly and blast enemies). They are joined by the formerly popular Jackson “Braceface” Jones, who was rejected by his friends after getting braces.

Together, they sneak out of school to fight the evil Dr. Felix Jigsaw. Dr. Jigsaw is aided by Mindy (“Hyena”) Beauchamp, and it is the depiction of The Hyena that gets my hackles up. This is how the author describes her:

For a professional killer with ice in her veins, the Hyena was pretty cute. She had platinum blonde hair and bright green eyes, long eyelashes, and a nose like a button. When she was seven years old, her mother decided to capitalize on her daughter’s stunning good looks … and plunged her daughter into the world of professional child beauty pageants.”

Here’s my problem. The author has made his nerd group multicultural (although the male hero is a stereotypical blond, “handsome” football playing jock). He has filled his book with positive messages about the ultimate value of kids who tend to be considered nerds in school:

…we know that what the popular kids have to offer the world is so tiny and unimportant compared to what the nerds will do. The dorks, dweebs, goobers, and spazzes that you picked on are the ones who will grow up to discover the vaccines, write the great novels, push the boundaries of science and technology, and invest things that make people healthier and happier. Nerds change the world.”

And yet the author slips in numerous references to what makes someone beautiful (or handsome), and they are not multicultural images. (Nor, for that matter, are they images of kids who wear braces, glasses, or have medical conditions.) I think many teens want to be attractive; they’ll worry about curing diseases when they’re older – far, far in the future. In particular, Buckley’s book doesn’t help the young girls of color with their self-image who read this book, nor does he help abate the slew of subliminal messages that affect young white people.

Consider the new movie by Chris Rock, “Good Hair,” in which he explores the history of race relations in America as symbolized by images of black women and attitudes toward their hair. He says he decided to investigate the issue after his young daughter said to him, “Daddy, why don’t I have good hair?”

How are little girls of color supposed to love themselves, when every cultural image from the overt to the subtle tells them they are not the same as what is defined as attractive? How are they supposed to grow up to be self-actualizing, confident women who value themselves?

This is a very fun book that is “reluctant reader friendly” as The Happy Nappy Bookseller says in her review. But how long must we reinforce the notion, as bell hooks laments, that “the femininity most sought after, most adored, [is] that perceived to be the exclusive property of white womanhood?” If we don’t start with kids, changing what is taught through the words and images used in books, movies, videos, and ads, how will these notions of beauty ever evolve?

Evaluation: If it weren’t for its images of “beautiful” and “handsome” I would be telling you I absolutely adored this book. But I can’t get past the deleterious stereotyping. So what do you think, readers: should this book be recommended or not?

Rating: 4/5

In my most recent giveaway, I told you that last year, I had been delighted to discover Randolph, the mystery-solving black labrador that writes his own books and even has his own blog. This year, Randolph has come out with a new book, and in order to celebrate, his human dependent, J.F. Englert, is sponsoring giveaways of the first two books, with three winners for each!

Last week, I reprinted my review of the first book and then held a giveaway that’s still open! This week, I’m reprinting my review of the second book and then, if you like what you read, you can enter the giveaway for it. And now, without further ado:

Review of A Dog Among Diplomats

A Dog Among Diplomats is the second in the new “Bull Moose Dog Run Mystery Series” by J.F. Englert. These are delightful mysteries told from the point of view of a very proper, educated (self-taught from training newspapers) dog. Randolph is sentient, but more educated (in his own opinion) than other dogs.

This black Labrador retriever and his master Harry are suffering from the disappearance of Imogen, Harry’s girlfriend and Randolph’s original owner. Harry doesn’t realize Randolph is sentient, and Randolph himself doesn’t quite understand the phenomenon, but certainly wants to keep it a secret. “Only recently,” Randolph confides, “had I watched a National Geographic team on television sedate a harbor seal for ‘its own good’ and attach a camera to its head.’” Nevertheless, there are some moments when he just has to communicate with Harry. In the first book, he used Harry’s Alpha-Bits. In the second book, Harry believes he has developed a wheat allergy, and so rids the house of little letters that can be pushed into place by a canine nose. The intrepid Randolph has no choice but to go online, set himself up with an email account, and try (not always successfully) to bypass all the book sales (sometimes with accompanying free tote bag!) and send messages to Harry.

The reason for urgency is yet another murder that, as in the first novel, is somehow tied to the missing Imogen. In order to get to the bottom of things, Randolph finds he must ignore the rich smells of food and analyze the more complex scents of human emotions. In the process of helping to solve the crime, Randolph has a number of adventures: riding about town on the back of a Vespa; mingling at the U.N. among diplomats; falling ill (he felt “a bit eleven o’clockish, as Pooh Bear might say”); foiling some other murder attempts; and saving Harry’s life. All in a day’s work for this lover of liver sausage, crème-filled donuts, belly rubs, and James Joyce.

Englert takes a little time to hit his stride again in this second book; some of Randolph’s adventures are a bit over the top; and one of the characters even drops out from the plot! All the same it’s light and silly and endearing and fun. I look forward to reading more about the likeable Harry and Randolph.

******************************

To enter this contest to win one of three copies of A Dog Among Diplomats, do any of the following:

1. Leave a comment on this post about a pet you have had or that had you. You must include an email address in your comments. If I can’t find a way to contact you I will draw another winner. (1 entry)

2. Blog about this giveaway. (Posting the giveaway on your sidebar is also acceptable.) Leave a separate comment with a link to your post. (1 entry)

3. Subscribe to my rss feed, and/or follow me on Google Reader (current subscribers are eligible too). Leave a separate comment for this. (1 entry)

4. Subscribe to Randolph’s blog, and/or follow him on Google Reader (current subscribers are eligible too). Leave a separate comment for this. (1 entry)

5. Tweet this post on Twitter. Leave me a separate comment with your twitter user name. (TWO ENTRIES)

There are a lot of ways to enter, but you must LEAVE A SEPARATE COMMENT for each one or they will not count. I will be using random.org to pick THREE WINNERS from the comments.

This contest is open to entries from the U.S. only. (Immigration doesn’t let dogs fill out customs forms. It is perhaps unfairly assumed that they are not too sharp after sniffing all those drugs.) The deadline for entry is midnight, November 17. I will draw and post the winners’ names on November 18th.

Note: There’s also still time to enter the giveaway for the first book, A Dog About Town!

Julie, the inimitable Booking Mama, is hosting the Shelf Discovery Challenge which sounds like a lot of fun.

This challenge is named for the book Shelf Discovery: The Teen Classics We Never Stopped Reading by Lizzie Skurnick, which features books and authors that defined the youth of so many bloggers – books like Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret, The Good Earth, and Jacob Have I Loved.

Personally, I missed that aspect of childhood – I read mostly biographies, Nancy Drew books, and The Farmer’s Almanac. So I am interested in this challenge to become familiar with the books which played such a big role in so many people’s lives!

I haven’t selected my six books yet because I’m waiting for our periodic library sale in November. They usually have a nice array of dog-eared YA classics, and it will be fun to pick some out. If you want to join in this challenge, please stop over at Julie’s blog and sign up. She’ll be adding little incentives for those who join like periodic mini-challenges.

This excellent and informative book offers a unique look at the war in Iraq from the often-neglected perspective of its effects on Iraqi women. It will inspire and infuriate you, but most of all, it will teach you things you will not read in treatments of the war by men.

Reporter Christina Asquith, who has written about women’s rights in Afghanistan, Oman, and Jordan, spent five years getting to know the women whose lives she chronicles in this book, which begins with the American invasion of Iraq. Zia and Nunu, young girls aged 21 and 19 at the time of the invasion, lived with their liberal parents in Baghdad. Manal Omar was an observant Muslim American woman in her late twenties who came to Iraq after the invasion to help establish women’s rights. Heather Coyne, an examiner in the White House’s Office of Management and Budget with a degree in Arabic from the Defense Language Institute, joined the army to be a part of the Iraqi liberation.

The author recounts in detail the mishandling of the invasion by the Americans: appointments were based on political loyalty to the Bush Administration rather than competence, experience, or facility with Arabic; emphasis was placed on establishing an immediate democracy without any consideration to groundwork or more pressing needs (Americans seemed oblivious to the fact that Iraqis were more concerned with safety, schools, medical care, and which form of Islam would be hegemonic rather than with forming “democratic” organizations); troop levels were too low to ensure order among the simmering tribal and religious rivalries that had been held in check by Saddam; and many hired contractors were low-lives who needed to get out of the U.S.: they often built shoddy facilities knowing there was no rule of law to stop them, and they threw their weight around in an offensive manner with respect to the locals in general and woman in particular.

The repercussions of the war on women have been horrific. Much of it can be attributed to the breakdown of authority and subsequent sectarian violence between Shia and Sunni sects and the Islamic fundamentalists within those sects. Women had been used to a measure of freedom under Saddam. Now, those who went out without head scarves, who wore blue jeans, who studied at the university, or worst of all, who got jobs with the Americans, were considered fair game for rapes, kidnappings, beheadings, and vengeance on the rest of their families. Women became afraid to leave their homes. Programs for women emphasized teaching them democracy and getting them jobs. But it was more important to the women that their husbands have jobs first. Lynne Cheney, wife of the Vice-President, headed up an organization to help women in Iraq, but it would not even meet with any women who were considered left wing or critical of the United States. This practice omitted a great many women who were talented organizers and also sensitive to the needs of Iraqis.

A few women, like Manal and Heather, and some others who were reported on by Asquith but who were killed, lobbied extensively for just a small portion of financial support and security for centers for women, especially centers that could be safe havens from violence. The male-dominated American establishment for the most part left the women to sink or swim. In the case of the very few gains, they claimed credit for them even though they had left the women on their own.

Asquith laments that much of the Iraqi-on-Iraqi violence that targets women goes unreported in the American media. This not only has allowed the practice to continue without an international outcry, but also allowed the Bush Administration officials to interpret the situation for women in a very positive light, which just wasn’t justified.

By the book’s end in 2009, Zia (who once only narrowly escaped being beheaded in Iraq) has managed to survive largely intact by emigrating to the U.S.; Nunu almost had a nervous breakdown and considered suicide; Manal was almost killed; and Heather suffered from Post-Traumatic Stress Disease.

Evaluation: There are so many things I would want to report from this book (just ask my husband, who had to listen to my rants while I was reading it!), but in the interest of brevity, I will just say: if you are a woman, and you plan to read only one book on the lives of women under Islam fundamentalism, or if you want to see war from a whole new perspective than the usual one delivered by male (generally white, western) authors, this is an excellent choice. I should also add, this is not by any means an anti-American screed, nor is it an indictment of the Muslim religion. Rather, it seeks to point out abuses that can happen when lawlessness and politics govern a country, and emphasizes that in situations of war, women are often the first victims.

Rating: 4.5/5

Note: The author’s website contains more information and suggestions for ways to help the women of Iraq.

This week’s theme is animal behavior, as you can see from Monday’s review of A Dog About Town and the accompanying giveaway.

The feature today is a review of Love At Goon Park by Deborah Blum, who won a Pulitzer Prize in 1992 for her writing and reporting on primate experiments and ethics. In this 2002 book, she undertakes a history of the primate research by University of Wisconsin scientist Harry Harlow’s team, famous for the “cloth monkey” studies that established the importance of a mother’s love.

The author points out that infant care was very different at the beginning of the 20th Century. The influential and respected psychologist John B. Watson “led a professional crusade against the evils of affection.” Too much mother love would warp a child, he taught. Doting parents would endow their children with “weaknesses, reserves, fears, cautions and inferiorities.”

Harry Harlow set out to prove otherwise. In order to do so, however, he had to understand the total nature of love, including its withdrawal. In this respect, many of his studies are today seen as cruel and unjustified. Blum maintains that not only were many studies by others much crueler, but that, before Harlow’s studies, we “didn’t fully believe” that caring was so important to a child.

What Harlow did, in the 1950’s, was to separate infant monkeys from their mothers only hours after birth. He then divided the monkeys into two groups: both were to be fed and “raised” by a machine, but in half, the machine was just a wire monkey, and in half the wire monkey was covered with a soft terry cloth and given a face. The results were dramatic. The monkeys with the wire mothers grew up to be psychologically damaged and even physically sickly, whereas those raised by the cloth mothers were healthier in every respect.

Cloth Mom versus Wire Mom

More controversially, Harlow’s experiments didn’t stop there. He divided monkey groups by toys versus no toys, or administered random shocks, or put monkeys in isolation, and devised other experiments in order fully to understand the parameters of love and to overwhelm his detractors (of whom there were many).

Harry Harlow

Blum ends her engaging book with the plea:

Let us remember the best of Harry’s contributions as well as the worst. Let us not slip backwards, ever, into believing that we are not necessary to each other’s health and happiness. You don’t have to like the way Harry found his answers. Almost no one could admire every choice he made. But neither should we pretend that he did anything less than arrive at some fundamental truth. Our challenge is not to squander it.”

Evaluation: This is a very readable and informative history about recent theories of childcare, and also of the development of primate studies.

Rating: 4/5

The theme this week is animal behavior, as you can see from Monday’s review of “A Dog About Town” and the accompanying giveaway (access them both here).

The latest Chronicle Review (dated October 23, 2009) also highlights animal behavior as a growing interdisciplinary concern, although in truth, ethology has been gaining respect for years, from the groundbreaking studies of Harry Harlow to the naturalist emphasis of Nobel Laureate Nikko Tinbergen to the popular studies of Jane van Lawick-Goodall and Dian Fosse that won so many hearts and minds.

Why the appeal? In part, it is because the ecological future of mankind can no longer be assured by maintaining a division between living creatures. And in part, there is so much insight to be gained into human behavior by examining similar behavior in animals without the obfuscation of language.

Animal behavioralists have been busy beating down the barriers of difference between us and other species. For example, the four necessary determinants of culture (according to Talcott Parsons) have all been demonstrated in animal groups: viz: (1) symbolic systems; (2) transmission of symbols over generations; (3) a normative order organizing the life of the population; and (4) that normative order functioning as the focus of exclusive attachment and reward-expectation.

As biologists Pierce and Bekoff argue in the article “Moral in Tooth and Claw” in The Chronicle:

…animals have social lives rich beyond our imagining, and that cooperation and caring have shaped the course of evolution every bit as much as competition and ruthlessness have. Individuals form intricate networks and have a large repertoire of behavior patterns that help them get along with one another and maintain close and generally peaceful relationships.”

The current issue of The Chronicle is full of academic references, but there are plenty of wonderful books outside of academia that can give you information on animal behavior.

Two more recent examples are Alex and Me by Irene Pepperberg (see my review here) and Wesley the Owl, by Stacey O’Brien (see my review here). You may know a bit already about the intelligence of parrots, but you will be amazed and delighted to read about the loving, loyal barn owl Wesley, in one of the best books I read in 2008.

And since Christmas is coming upon us with remarkable speed, you may as well know that you can get a plush Wesley the Owl to go along with the book, here.

Last year, I was delighted to discover Randolph, the mystery-solving black labrador that writes his own books and even has his own blog. This year, Randolph has come out with a new book, and in order to celebrate, his human dependent, J.F. Englert, is sponsoring two giveaways on my blog, with three winners for each!

This week, I’m reprinting my review of the first book and then, if you like what you read, you can enter the giveaway for it. Next week, I’ll do the same with the second book, so be sure to come back! And now, without further ado:

Review of A Dog About Town

“A Dog About Town” is a delightful mystery told from the point of view of a very proper, educated (self-taught from training newspapers) dog. As Randolph explains, “You see, I am a dog – not a scoundrel, a cad, a rascal – no, not a dog in that sense, but an actual dog, Canis familiaris.”

This black Labrador retriever and his master Harry are suffering from the disappearance of Imogen, Harry’s girlfriend and Randolph’s original owner. Harry doesn’t realize Randolph is sentient, and Randolph himself doesn’t quite understand the phenomenon, but quietly nurtures his love of Dante and Auden in stolen moments when Harry is asleep or not at home.

When a murder occurs, Randolph finds himself in the thick of things, since his ability to analyze scents far outstrips that of humans. As Randolph observes when entering the house of a suspicious person,

The smells carried a cast of characters and bore a kaleidoscopic range of human emotion: excitement and joy; despair and hate; the bitterness of death and the hope of birth. And this was just in the entranceway.”

In desperation, Randolph nudges Harry along in the investigation by nosing Alpha-bits cereal pieces into clues for him to read. Harry never seems to catch on, thinking Randolph is guided by the “spirit world.” This is all to the good as far as Randolph is concerned, since he doesn’t relish being sold or promoted as a freak.

This enjoyable romp through the concerns and occupations of a dog who loves philosophy, Chinese food, and rolling in dead animals will leave you looking forward to more of the same. Fortunately for the reader, another mystery, “A Dog Among Diplomats,” follows on the heels of this one.

J. F. Englert and his dog, R. Englert

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To enter this contest to win one of three copies of A Dog About Town, do any of the following:

1. Leave a comment on this post about a pet you have had or that had you, or a person who seems to you like a pet. You must include an email address in your comments. If I can’t find a way to contact you I will draw another winner. (1 entry)

2. Blog about this giveaway. (Posting the giveaway on your sidebar is also acceptable.) Leave a separate comment with a link to your post. (1 entry)

3. Subscribe to my rss feed, and/or follow me on Google Reader (current subscribers are eligible too). Leave a separate comment for this. (1 entry)

4. Subscribe to Randolph’s blog, and/or follow him on Google Reader (current subscribers are eligible too). Leave a separate comment for this. (1 entry)

5. Tweet this post on Twitter. Leave me a separate comment with your twitter user name. (1 entry)

There are a lot of ways to enter (maximum of five entries), but you must LEAVE A SEPARATE COMMENT for each one or they will not count. I will be using random.org to pick THREE WINNERS from the comments.

This contest is open to entries from the U.S. only. (I don’t believe that Immigration allows dogs to fill out customs forms.) The deadline for entry is midnight, November 10. I will draw and post the winners’ names on November 11th.

Note: Don’t forget to come back next week to enter the giveaway for the second book in this mystery series!

Note: My husband and I collaborated on this review, and are in rare agreement on all of its points, including liking the book in spite of its problems.

This second volume in the The War Chronicles series (Volume One covered “From Chariots to Flintlocks”) would make a nice Christmas present for students or adults, at least if some revisions are made.

This large book contains short sections on wars throughout the world from the French Revolution in 1783 to the Iran-Iraq War of 1988. For each conflict, the following elements are included:

In our own collection, we have approximately 150 books on wars, many of them covering the most minute aspects of very complicated issues. So we were pleased to discover that overall Cummins does a good job of referencing complexity in his introductory summaries. He also peaks your interest to do more reading, while satisfying the need to know the basics of the battles.

Alas, the book seems to have been rushed into print. There are some significant factual errors that mar the value of the book. Take just the section on World War I. In the introduction to that section, the author states that “Austria-Hungary wanted to quash Baltic nationalism…” Unfortunately, the word should be Balkan, not Baltic: two very different regions!

The Balkans

The Baltic Area

In the same section, in describing how General Moltke of Germany vitiated the war strategy known as the Schlieffen Plan, Cummins maintains that Moltke “fatally weakened the thrust by depleting the armies sweeping through Belgium to strengthen Germany’s western defense position.” Moltke did indeed fatally weaken the Schlieffen Plan’s thrust, but it was in order to strengthen the eastern position, not the western.

Further, Cummins cites zeppelins as having “top speeds of more than 100 miles … an hour” but in fact the zeppelins’ top speed was closer to 100-130 kilometers an hour (or 62 to 81 miles per hour).

Besides problems with facts, we also have some criticisms of the emphases of the book.

Cummins has a lot of wars to cover. But devoting only thirty pages or so each to World War I and II seems to us to evince a lack in a sense of proportion.

The section on World War I devotes a whole page (valuable real estate in this book!) to Lawrence of Arabia, who is famous largely because of the movie that was based upon Lawrence’s fantastical report, The Seven Pillars of Wisdom, not on reality. Yet there is no print devoted to the Battle of Gallipoli, with its half a million casualties, and its profound repercussions. In Turkey, the battle is perceived as a defining moment in the history of the Turkish people and the Ottoman Empire. In Australia and New Zealand, the campaign was the first major battle undertaken by a joint military formation, the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC), and is often considered to mark the birth of national consciousness in both of these countries. And in Britain, the loss not only extended the war but knocked Churchill out of the war cabinet, a fairly momentous occurrence.

Map Showing Gallipoli's Important Strategic Position

The section on World War II is superficial and Americo-centric. Indeed many histories of the war written in the West tend to give short shrift to the role of the Eastern front, but this account falls further short than most. For example, D-Day is listed as the turning point of the War, when in fact Stalingrad, two years earlier (July 1942-February 1943), was far more crucial. The battle was the bloodiest in the history of warfare, with combined casualties estimated at nearly two million. By the time the Americans landed in Normandy it was clear the Russians would win.

The Battle of Kursk in the East (July – August, 1943), also critical, is not mentioned. Kursk was the largest tank battle of all time. It was the last strategic offensive the Germans were able to mount in the East. The resulting decisive Soviet victory gave the Red Army the strategic initiative for the rest of the war. While Americans like to read about the battles in which they fought, a history of the war should be more balanced and accurate.

Soviet T-34 tanks with infantry at Kursk

The account of World War II also lists George S. Patton as a principal commander but there is not one mention of George C. Marshall, the U.S. Army Chief of Staff. Once noted as the “organizer of victory” by Winston Churchill for his leadership of the Allied victory in World War II, Marshall also served as the chief military adviser to President Franklin D. Roosevelt. (After the war, as Secretary of State, his name was given to the Marshall Plan, for which he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1953.)

And then there is Vietnam. It is a conflict perhaps too close for comfort for Cummins, who avers that “After North Vietnamese patrol boats clashed with a U.S. intelligence-gathering destroyer in the Gulf of Tonkin in August 1964, Johnson secured the approval of Congress to send U.S. combat troops to South Vietnam and begin bombing North Vietnam.” Historians have since concluded openly, at least four years before this book’s publication, that National Security Agency information on the attacks was exaggerated and in part falsified in order to persuade Congress to authorize broad military action in Vietnam. (The findings were intially published in 2002 but not made public until 2005, out of fear that they “might prompt uncomfortable comparisons with the flawed intelligence used to justify the war in Iraq,” according to the New York Times.) Again, historical accuracy, not politics, should be Cummins’ first priority.

Evaluation: In spite of the errors and lack of proportion in covering the World Wars, we still like this book – or the idea of this book, at any rate! Properly edited and vetted for facts, this book has potential as a welcome reference source for students, and a satisfying soupçon of war essentials for adults.

Rating: 3/5