The Society of Timid Souls or How to be Brave by Polly Morland

Polly Moreland takes readers on a journey exploring bravery.  She calls us Timid Souls, and we are welcome with her as she travels England and the US and other parts of the world interviewing and discussing bravery with brave people.  She did not try stunts--like doing brave things herself (thank you!).  Instead she examined courage and bravery from many many angles: approaching death, facing war, facing animals, acting courageously in sudden spontaneous life threatening situations, leaving war, and even criminality.  And the ultimate in bravery--taking stands on moral issues. Civil rights leaders?  Non-violent protesters? 

She writes the book from the prospective of a non-brave person trying to understand what it means to be courageous.  Some of the interesting questions she considers are: Can you be brave if you have no fear?  Can the 9/11 hijackers be considered brave?  What about animals?  Can our pets be brave? Performers? She interviews dying men, men who ran away from war, people who stand up to criminals, matadors, the parents of a women who died fighting a fire, and a man who marched with Martin Luther King. 

Her discussion of the subject was compelling, fun to read, and it had a small light hearted touch which hinged on the whole idea of a timid soul society.  We all are rather timid souls, in search of lessons on how to be brave as the group that gave the book its title were called. Some classical musicians around 1942 formed a society for timid souls whose sole mission was to overcome stage fright.  So we, like they, are part of this quest. We go along and investagte this phenomenmon with her. 

It was slow going at times, but thoroughly enjoyable.  Lots of stories to ponder and ideas about courage.  If the topic interests you, it is worth having a look at.  Due out this summer.  I have this early erview copy if you want to borrow it.

Her by Christina Parravani

My latest memoir read and early review installment is the captivating tale of Christa Parravani, one half of a set of identical twins.

Her book tells the narrative of two girls who go through life together and when one of them dies tragically, the other is left to discover what it means to be alone. I have never understood so thoroughly what being a twin must be like, and I found that the parts of the narrative that discuss the power of identity and the ties of love specifically between twins to be the most interesting part of this memoir.  I felt real pain for Christa as she attempted to navigate life without her other half.

Reader's should be warned that there is a horrifying rape scene in the early chapters of the book, that was written by the rape survivor, Cara, the twin who died (by drug overdose).  The author of this memoir included several excerpts from the deceased twin's journals to illustrate many points of their lives together.  Among those excerpts is the description of the rape that led Cara to the circumstances of her eventual death.  I loved the extra point of view of the twin's lives together.  Cara had a captivating voice as well and it is a tragedy that her life ended early.

This book is scheduled to be released in March.  I am thrilled to have an early copy and will certainly be glad to lend it to anyone with interest.  This story is sad, beautiful and worthwhile reading. The message, corny as it sounds, rang clear and true:  Love always wins over death.

Adventures of a One Breasted Woman by Susan Cummings

This was my latest Early Review.  Fifteen chapters of interrelated essays about coping in the aftermath of breast cancer.  The author reminds me of many of the women in my writing circle who write exclusively on one subject and have many personal points of view and interesting side angles to a single topic.

I was worried it would be a rehash of all the events leading up to and during her ordeal, but it was as described in the title: reclaiming her moxie after cancer.

Some of the chapters were more interesting and better written then others, but overall it was satisfying, and Susan Cummings does write some lovely prose.  I specifically liked the chapter on faith which deals with signs and symbols and feelings that some otherworldly presence is looking out for her (or are they?) and a great chapter on a specific friendship in four parts, which had a bittersweet ending.

Overall I began to feel sorry for  Susan because the sadnesses in her life (not even related to cancer) seemed to build up and build up, but she saved her good news for last and the memoir had a satisfying, upbeat ending.  A small coda at the end had her planning for her own funeral and death which seemed slightly macabre, but it was interesting food for thought.

I am lending this book to a few one breasted friends I know, but I am sure it is available on Amazon and will definitely save it for anyone who would like to read it.

January First

Wow!  Captivating story of a father whose small child exhibits symptoms and is eventually diagnosed as schizophrenic.  Michael Schofield takes us through about three years in the life of his family as they grapple with his severely disturbed daughter and all the ups and downs of caring for someone you love who causes you so much pain. 

I could not put this story down. I turned the pages to find out if they ever felt relief, if they ever got a correct diagnosis, or if they adjusted her medication so that she could be calm and stop hearing voices.  I turned pages to make sure Michael and his wife stayed married and if their son Bodhi survived the onslaught of sister malice.

It was a raw energetic work, and yes, it was written too soon.  The girl in the story January "Jani" Schofield is probably not even 10 years old yet, so I know there is a lot more to this story and I do think given time, a different story might be written.  But in this instance, the recentness of the story, works.  There is a real immediacy that makes my pulse quicken.  This tale needed to be told.  January is one of the youngest children to be diagnosed as schizophrenic.  It does not normally present in children so young.

The author has produced a blog so that interested readers can follow along with  the progress his daughter makes and how is family is coping.  

This is a stunning, gut wrenching, draining story of a father's struggle to maintain his own sanity, keep his family safe and try to do right by his little girl.  I can't recommend it enough.  It was out in print on August 7th so you can probably find it on-line or at your local bookseller.  I am glad to lend mine as well.

All gone: a memoir with refreshments

There is a scene somewhere in the middle of this book that I can't quite shake.  The author is a teenager-frustrated with math homework, and stands up and makes a gesture at the skies as if to say, "I give up."  The author's father mistakenly thinks his daughter is going to hit him and punches her in the face.  She retreats to her room and her mother comes in and demands that she go apologize, "your father thought you were going to hit him first," she says.

I recount the scene because it is shocking and because it illustrates a bit about what was off about this memoir.  All Gone, a memoir ostensibly about Alex Witchel's mother's descent into depression and dementia, had this strange undercurrent of a story about her relationship with her father that was only hinted at and seemed the true story of this memoir.

Ms Witchel clearly loves her mother beyond all measure and is devastated to watch her formerly strong, independent, educated mother fall into mental disarray.  It is a very true story to which many of us can relate.  Her writing is clear and unadorned and when she finally settles down to tell the story, during the last half of the book, it comes through quite sadly and clearly.

But up until then the book seemed to be all over the place, a bit about childhood, a bit about nana, a bit about how she got to be a writer, some food writing,  and little stories and anecdotes about her horrible relationship with her father.

It felt not quite ready to be written.  This is a complaint I have made frequently about memoirs, and I think this is a perfect example.  At the time of this writing it appears that her mother and her father are still alive. The story feels like it is still in full swing to me and not over yet. It also explains why she may not have explored as much about her relationship with her father as she should have.  The missing stories about him could fill another chapter or two.

The author is a food writer by trade and includes food memories and recipes throughout which I always love. I am definitely going to try her potato latkes.

I recommend this book if you have a parent going through end of life issues related to dementia or if you love food memories and recipes wound up in the narrative. It is an early review book and I would be glad to share it with anyone who asks.

Brooklyn Zoo by Darcy Lockman

This is the second ER book I have been asked to review written about a NYC mental hospital.  I think I rolled my eyes a bit when I got it in the mail.  This one took place in a less toni hospital in Brooklyn that was over taxed, under staffed, and generally scruffy.  The writer, a psychology intern, tries to make sense of her year of experiences: the good, the bad and the ugly.

Darcy Lockman seems largely unlikable to me. Her peers apparently agree as she shares the horrifying moment when her supervisor tells her that while she is an adequate therapist, no one particularly likes her.  That section of the book endeared me to her.   Can you imagine, building up a sort of hatred for a memoirist, wondering why she got into this field of work because she clearly has disdain for everyone and everything and then having her confess that everyone feels the same way?  I kind of loved that angle.  You are redeemable Darcy Lockwood.  Really!

Ms Lockwood profiles many encounters with patients, the ups and down of working in the most notorious mental hospital in NYC, the supervisory struggles she has, the definite conflict between psychologists and psychiatrists (Guess which group of people looks down their noses at the other?), and the often backwards approaches to therapy many well meaning professionals take when the setting is less then ideal.

I both loved and hated this book.  It did get a little dull at times, but she did have some interesting observations and insights into psychology and mental hospitals.  Her own story was the most compelling and had sort of a sweet ending. The year she learned to love and now loves to learn from.  I recommend this if you are at all interested in a career in therapy or the ins and outs of a mental health professional.  It is more personal that the first one I reviewed.

I'd love to loan it to anyone.

Mirror Mirror by Stephanie Hart

Early review of memoirs and stories about just an average woman coming of age in the 50's and 60's.  Ms Hart's writing is lovely and sweet.  Short bursts of observation about leaving home at 7 to attend boarding school when her parents divorced, her mother's alternating rage and undying love, her late life love, and her life in NYC.  These short stories and memories remind me why I love to write and also show me that really everyone has a story to tell.  All of us.  And it is within our power to tell it.

The book is divided into 4 parts and the first three parts are the memoirs. The last part is the most interesting for a writer to read.  She had memories of parents and grandparents and great grandparents that have been told to her as stories.  She has taken these stories and imagined them: place, street, people, smells and feelings and painted them into true tales. This writing and this ability to recreate what has been a part of family lore is especially exciting to read and think about.  Some of the stories in this last part seem a little disjointed. The flow is disrupted now and then, but overall, I loved the exercise and the writing.  They are smart and truly felt.

I don't think this book will get a lot of attention, but would be writer's should take note.  Write it! I would also be happy to lend it to anyone who wants to take a look.

Uncompromised by Nada Prouty

Uncompromised: The Rise and Fall and Redemption of an Arab American Patriot in the CIA is Nada Prouty's very personal story of her young life in war-torn Lebanon and her immigration to the US to begin a new life for herself.  The rise of her life as a CIA agent is the first 225 pages of the book and the fall is the last 50. The redemption takes place only on the last ten or twenty pages.   As of press time she is still waiting to have her US citizenship returned.

One can't help but love Nada and cheer for her as she begins to make her way out of her despicable home life and also find her footing and career in a very male industry.  Nada's story will be fascinating to many as she writes of catching terrorists in foreign lands, interviewing suspects, and being on the forefront of most major investigations in the middle east over the past 10 years.  

But the ugly underbelly to her interesting life is the fact that simply because she is a nationalized American citizen of Arab descent she becomes a suspect in this post 9-11 world.  She was stripped of her citizenship, forced to deplete her savings on lawyers to defend herself, and forced to plead guilty to a crime she committed (and she did commit a crime) in which the statute of limitations had run out, and she fully confessed when she was first hired by the FBI. Nada is not innocent but she certainly did not deserve the treatment she got from the government and the country she sought to protect.

I loved this book and recommend it to you if you are interested in the war on terror and one woman's unique story of her love for America and how it was used against her.  At times it felt like she was working too hard to convince me she was innocent, but then again, she has a lot riding on her ability to do just that.  

This was an early review book and I would love to lend it  to anyone interested.

Situations Matter by Sam Sommers

Sam Sommers, Psychology Professor from Tufts University, has written an interesting book about context that compares to books written by journalist Malcolm Gladwell.  If you liked Blink and The Tipping Point, you would enjoy Sommers' analysis of the importance of paying attention to the situational elements of life which can deeply affect how we understand ourselves, our relationships and our community.

Sommers' readable book combines personal anecdotes from his teaching life and family, stories from popular culture, and current psychological studies to illustrate interesting concepts about day to day problems.  My favorite chapter was called "You're not the person you thought you were" and discusses how our own self-perceptions are shaped daily--perhaps hourly--by the context in which we find ourselves.  He critiques the idea of the authentic self because the self we wish to be within our family might be different that the self we want to be at work and so on.  The self is ever a work in progress, and no self-help book on earth tries to explain that to us.

He does a good chapter on gender which I also enjoyed, but found it overlapped with some reading I had done on current gender trends by Peggy Orenstein in Cinderella ate my Daughter. The chapter on race described a lot of training I had many years ago when I worked as a student affairs administrator.  Those ideas were re-treads for me, but my own unique context might be different from another reader's. I loved the chapter on finding a mate and falling in love.  I also loved the chapter on why often many people witnessing a crime or distressing event fail to act.  We really aren't bad people.  Perhaps lazy, but not malicious.  He ends with several emails and anecdotes from former students who have taken his ideas and theories and used them in the wider world.  All the information felt really useful and practical for understanding common situations.

Much of his storytelling and thinking seemed to me, fresh and original.  I read several chapters of this book aloud to my husband as we drove to various destinations on the Thanksgiving holiday.  The stories and ideas prompted thoughtful conversation with one of the most interesting people I know.  (Wanted you to know my own context for enjoying this book.)  I highly recommend Situations Matter and would love to lend this early review to anyone who is interested.

Soul to Soul by Deborah Masel

The writer tells us in the first few sentences that her book is a sad one: a woman's story as she accepts diagnosis and struggles with stage 4 metatastic breast cancer and wends her way through and often unkind and mixed-up health care system (Australian).  She requests that we not stop reading even though the journey is a hard one to bear, and it was this simple introduction which lured me in and kept me with it.  I felt that I had been chosen to bear witness to the depths of suffering of the human soul.

The memoir was most interesting early in the book when she is clearly ill and waiting for the doctor's diagnosis.  Her busy life barely lets her rest and it is hard for her to change gears and accept that she must stop and be sick for awhile.  Also in the early chapters of the book she goes back through her life and recounts various adventures she had as a young student and a young wife.  She recounts recent tales of being in Israel during the recent Lebanon war.  I found her method of storytelling, going back and forth and introducing us to her rich and varied life, interesting.  It kept me turning the pages.

The constant turning back to tell a story of and earlier version of herself made me hang in limbo about the Cancer story...so it unfolded painfully, but slowly.

It lost a little steam in the last half when it was simply chapter after chapter of pain and suffering.  She had some epiphanies about accepting death and her journey with the Torah (she was an avid Torah scholar and teacher) always presented divine revelation, but the reading was not as compelling.  I felt that the recent chapters were too close to her.  Like she just had that treatment last month and was just now writing about it.  A writer always needs distance between herself and her subject. But then, it was sad to realize, that Deborah might not have much time to reflect.

The story ends with a craniotomy to remove some tumors from her brain and as far as I know Deborah is still alive in Australia teaching Torah and enjoying her family and her precious life.

I would recommend this to anyone who is struggling with life or death issues or who wants to read about the ups and downs of the medical establishment.

Please ask me if you would like to borrow my copy. This was an early review.

The Pursuit of Happiness

"I don't know many happy people.  What are they like?"  ~Meg Tilly as Chloe in The Big Chill

There is an interesting branch of social psychology that studies happiness and what makes people happy.  Is it true that money can't by happiness?  Children make us happy? Marriage makes us happy?  Religion?  I have been to several presentations on the origins and truth about what makes people happy.  I find them infinitely fascinating as the topic of who is happy and why they are happy seems to come up frequently in my life.  I am reminded that even our own Declaration of Independence bases itself squarely on the side of the pursuit of happiness. 

This new book, The Happiness Equation: The Surprising Economics of our Most Valuable Asset by Nick Powdthavee, studies happiness now from an economic standpoint.  The author is an economist by training and attempts to translate economic studies on happiness from economics journals to studies and stories that the rest of us can use and follow.  Most of it asks and answers interesting economic questions about the pursuit of happiness. 

In general, much of it reads like an economics primer and would be interesting if you followed economics news and had a head for the vagaries of the study of the economy.  I was a C student in economics, and it often made my head swim, so I was perhaps not the best early reviewer for this book.  Parts that piqued my interest most of all were the discussions on the happiness factor of parenthood (really none of us is very happy) and the fact that perhaps we have an overblown sense of the right to be happy.  Some people prefer to pursue a more interesting life rather than a pleasurable one.  The books asks, who makes us think that we have to be happy? 

I was also pleasantly interested in the discussion about the ability of a government to coerce their people into doing things that will make them happy through the right kind of policies and legislation and marketing.  Have you ever heard of libertarian paternalism?--now there's an oxymoron.  And of course no book on the study of happiness would be complete without a look at the famous country of Bhutan whose monarch actually put into place the idea of GDH-Gross Domestic Happiness.  Who cares about the product when what you really want is to make the people happy.  Really?

I close this post with the fond memory of one of my favorite Peanuts cartoons.  Charlie Brown and Linus are discussing the meaning of life.  Linus says, I think we were put on this earth to make others happy.  To which Charlie Brown turns to the skies, raises his fist and yells, "Someone is not doing their job!"

Following Josh by David Norman

As a twenty something traveler I always dreamed of doing what Dave Norman and his friend Josh do:  travel the world via the Trans-Siberian railroad.  Dave flies to Seoul, Korea where he meets up with Josh and together they form a roving fraternity duo heading their way through China, Mongolia, Russia and Eastern Europe to the tune of booze and bad moods.

I have read a lot of very good travel memoirs.  Most of them are extremely well written and full of witty observations and self-deprecating humor.  I love a wry take on the theme of a stranger in a strange land.   Dave Norman does not seem to understand the genre, rather he seems to have published his travel journal and included every whimsical thought and internal monologue that he had while trekking across the North Hemisphere.  Each page was full of half thoughts and slang terms and fevered experiences and elipses.  This book could have used a good editor. From the absense of any acknowledgements in the final pages (which I always love to read) I have to believe he forgot to run this by anyone.

This is why, strange to say, that in the parting pages of this book, when Dave Norman promises his next book will be about part two of this grand tour with another friend named Jake, I actually felt a little interested in it.  Was it true that I stuck with the writer long enough, through enough eye rolling, angst ridden travel that I actually want to see how this turns out?  Perhaps.

Also,  once I waded between the awkward prose, I did enjoy seeing parts of the world to which sadly, I will probably not venture.  My rugged, youth hostel, strange meat eating days are long past me. So Dave Norman, if you read this, I am one of those Saints who would sit with you at dinner and hear your whole travel story from first to last and ask you about all the crazy adventures you had and admonish you for having a perpetual bad mood all the way around the world.

This was an early review book and if anyone wants to journey on the Transiberian railroad please let me know and I will send it along.

Falling for Me by Anna David

I have written before about what I term the stunt memoir.   The author, usually an already well established writer, comes up with some sort of stunt to try for a year, and then writes about it.  I have read memoirs about giving up electricity, not buying things, not buying things from China, and making amends with all the people you have alienated.  All these stunts generally take one year.  After reading so many of them they start to feel really contrived.  All you need is an agent to pitch it to, a publisher, and a great book advance and voila, paperback memoir and a big book tour.  None of them has given me terribly great insights.

Enter a variation on the theme: established contemporary writer reads a long forgotten tome by some famous person and lives a life in response that work and writes about it. The best example of this is Julie and Julia about the woman who blogs her way to fame by cooking all of the dishes in Mastering the Art of French Cooking by Julia Child, also made into a movie starring Amy Adams and Meryl Streep.

Falling for Me falls under this catagory as Anna David comes across a copy of Sex and the Single Girl by Helen Gurley Brown written in 1962.  Ms. Brown is an early feminist who talks about having a career and attracting men. She posits the idea that you don't have to be dowdy to be powerful.  It is okay to be sexy and wear make-up and be a modern woman.

Anna David is thiry something and sadly single and decides she will follow Gurley Brown's advice for-- guess what?--one year and see where that takes her.  Perhaps a bit of the 1960's Cosmo editor's advice is all she needs to perk up her languishing love life.  Ms David takes up new hobbies, redecorates her apartment, makes herself very available to dating all kinds of men through on-line sites, speed dating, volunteering and going to the beach.  She redoes her wardrobe and her voice and in the last chapter spends a lovely summer in Spain.

She does fall in love, but in the end she falls in love with herself, and the last chapter is really the best written and most interesting as she details how she really has become a whole person because of her ability to re-do herself.  The rest of the work feels a little tired and worn out, and she somes across as really pretty shallow.  Most of the men she meets never pass her sexy meter or looks meter, so even though she vows to give more men a try, it really felt pretty low brow.  The cover you see here on my blog is different from the one on my advanced copy.  This cover actually makes it seem a lot more fun than it really was.  Though I love the ending and the realization that one can love oneself, I also think that in many ways it felt like one 300 page singles ad.

Unfinished Business by Lee Kravitz

A few years ago I did an early review on a memoir very similar to this one.  Do-over was the author's take on 10 separate incidents in his life that he did poorly, and in the memoir he did his best to recreate the scene and do it all over.  I found the narrative to be entertaining because it was a childhood memoir combined with a stunt memoir.  It worked on both levels for me.

Unfinished Business follows a year in the life of Lee Kravitz, a work-a-holic editor who finds himself without a job.   While he is trying to get his life together, he makes a list of 10 things that he should have done that he never did and sets about to right a bunch of (mostly social) wrongs from his past.

The book started off with a bang.  The voice held my interest, the story seemed enough different from Do over, and I began reading quickly.   Now that I am finally finished after two weeks, my honest reaction is that it was a very good effort, but it felt like it would have better filled 10 short essays for Sojourners magazine rather than one long memoir.  Mr. Kravitz would introduce the piece of unfinished business, describe how he finished it, and then was philosophically about it for 20 pages.  In a nutshell, taking care of all his unfinished business:  writing a condolence card, eulogizing his grandmother, paying an old debt, finding a long lost friend, changed him for the better.

The two chapters I found most interesting were the first, where he sets out to find a favorite and long lost aunt who has been locked away in an institution for many years and the second to last where he uses his reporters research skills to corroborate a family story that involved Eliot Ness and bootleggers in his hometown of Cleveland.

This paperback version of the book comes complete with your own guide to unfinished business.  How do you right some of the wrongs that you committed when you were young? Seems cheaper than therapy.

Winged Obsession

Parts of this journalistic account of  a Fish and Game undercover agent's exploits in the the world of insect smuggling are interesting but many parts are just down right dull.

Yoshi Kojima is an eccentric man who makes his living (and a pretty substantial one at that) dealing in endangered butterflies and insects.  Agent Ed Newcomer is out to bring him down.  Understanding the butterfly and insect trading world and the life of an undercover agent in the most unappreciated division  of law enforcement held my attention.  I think anyone would enjoy the general set up to the problems and the day to day life of the agent and also the nefarious world of illegal bug trading.

Once the writer got to the daily and weekly machinations of the sting (which was easily half of the 300 page book) I lost complete interest.  I had very hard time focusing on which butterflies were which, who told which lies, when agent Newcomer was supposed to call and Skype his prey and all the petty comings and goings of the the agent and the butterfly dealer.

The author, Jessica Speart, wrote this book without mention of herself at all.  It was totally third person with no over arching voice of the narrator, how she got all her information and how she could tell the story so thoroughly from a third person perspective.  The last chapter ended that voice and introduced us to a first person view of the author and how she went to get an interview with Kojima after he was released from prison and sent home to Japan.  I found this an odd chapter and while in some ways it was the most interesting, it was also the most misleading.

The author is worried the Kojima will not talk to her, so she lies to him about being interested in his shop and she basically goes undercover and asks him all kinds of questions about the agent and about the illegal butterfly trade.  Huh?  Undercover journalist as well?

So while this was not my favorite Early Review book,  and I personally did not enjoy it, someone may like the stories of butterfly smuggling and undercover work.  Please let me know if you would like to borrow it.

Blogs become Books

These days many of my early review selections are books by bloggers.  Someone starts a blog about a particlar topic, in this case diet and nutrition, and attracts a lot of followers and uses that poplarity to launch a book of the same name.  I am impressed.  This method of getting yourself published seems to level the playing field a bit and give me hope that its not just literary writers who get to have a piece of the publishing pie. 

To be fair, there was a lot of useful advice in this book regarding how to approach dieting and weight loss with the many temptations that bombard us day after day.  I also came across many good recipes that I will try:  pumpkin muffins and tomato zuchini fritatta to name just two.  So if you are looking for good low fat, high health recipes to try this is a good source (as her blog probably is too).

The only drawback to this book is that Ms Haupert's writing is not very interesting or engaging, and I had a hard time geting through each chapter.  I am not sure it was possible to make it more lively.  She spent a lot of time explaining her schedule each day and her calorie counts.  Some people might find this fascinating, but I found it dry.  (I am also a tad over weight so maybe she does have something!)

I do want to give her credit for inventing a life for herself that is interesting and varied and sings to exactly what she wants to do.  This I envy and admire.  I guess that is another good reason to read this book:  she gives good advice on living a creative life and breaking the mold from the standard 8-5 drudgery. 

I can offer this book to anyone who would like it.

The Boy in the Moon by Ian Brown

A sweet, sad and ultimately very thought provoking memoir written by the father of a severely disabled boy.  Walker Brown has a genetic mutation resulting in a syndrome that only about 100 people on the planet have.  Walker cannot speak, does not eat food and is fed through a G tube, wears diapers and must wear protective gear as he constantly hits himself and beats his head into the wall.  He is very small for his age and cannot communicate through any discernible means.

Ian, his wife Johanna, and the older sister Hayley spend 13 years caring for Walker round the clock until the parents finally find a suitable group home for him.  Ian then embarks on a journey to discover what, if anything, his son's life means to him, to the community and to humanity.  Surely there must be some answer as to what his life means?

The author travels around Canada and the US meeting other families with children that have this syndrome. He travels to California to meet the geneticists who first confirmed this condition and understand how a mutation on a gene can occur to create the condition.  He goes to France to meet advocates for the disabled, philosophers of disability studies, and to visit communities of severely disabled.   He looks at his own heart and mind and reactions to people like Walker and he takes a cursory look at how the severely disabled have been treated in the Western world throughout history.

I was fascinated by the picture he painted of his life, his marriage and his unending love for his son.  He thoroughly examines all the ethics at work in studying genes that produce disabled humans, the ethics of how we treat the least of all in our care and the philosophies behind how to treat these children.  It was all wonderfully enlightening.  A fascinating look at people who we don't like looking at or even being around.

I am humbled by the questions Mr. Brown raises and by his own love for a child who most of society will always see as lesser. I really understood the love he described for his son, and his own interest and passion for helping and understanding the disabled helped me understand a bit more about being a parent.

If you are interested in my copy of this book please let me know and I will pass it along.

On writing to writers

I frequently track down authors of books that I enjoy reading and email them and let them know what I enjoyed. Often my emails will ask follow up questions of the author, things I wish I knew but weren't included in the book. I have been doing this for years, even before the advent of email. I did not really know how to find a writer then, so I sent a letter to the author's publisher, figuring someone at the publishing company would know how to reach the author. I did not hear back from too many writer's in the era of snail mail. (I did get a nice letter from Gloria Steinem once. Very cool.)  Email responses are a different ball game. I would guess I hear back from 90% of the people I write.

Once a Muslim writer I complimented, wrote me and asked me if I would invite him to my Unitarian Church while he was on book tour, (I did even though I was on spring break and could not go myself.),   I get put on writer's mailing lists, get my questions answered and feel like I learn something new every time.  My biggest disappointment was Malcolm Gladwell, whose writing I adore.  He wrote me back after about 6 months and then just thanked me.  He did not answer my questions or even address anything I said.  Just, "Thanks for writing."

Last month when reading an early review book called Sometimes I feel Like a Nut by Jill Kargman, I was confronted with the need to write the author.  She wrote about a character in a TV series that she did not like and I had just finished a memoir by the very actress who played that character.  The actress's memoir reminded me a lot of Jill (both funny women) and it seemed uncanny that Jill would write about the actress at about the same moment that I was reading her memoir.  So I wrote Jill (we are on a first name basis now, best buds.) and mentioned this book and this actress and suggested she might like it.

Jill wrote me back within a few hours and thanked me and was amazed that I had her book already.  (I surmise that the publisher is trying to get her more of a midwestern following and thus we early reviewers from the heartland got first dibs on her funny funny book.)

Kudos to Ms. Kargman for writing me back quickly and maybe even taking the time to pick up the book that I recommended.  I have a secret fantasy now that the actress and Jill will become BFF's based on my reading suggestions.  They will reminisce that their friendship got started by this weirdo from Indiana who send them emails.  They won't remember my name though but they will laugh every time.

Check out this funny funny book.

The Hunchback of Neiman Marcus: Coming in April 2011

This truly unique collection of poems is arranged to form an interesting, bittersweet and really fun novel.  I had not read anything quite like this before (okay Canterbury tales and the ancient Greeks).  When I first opened it, I was surprised: the description never mentioned poetry.  It was an early reviewer book that I bid on and sad to say I probably would not have bid on it if I knew it was all poetry.

Hunchback read very quickly.  In about 400 pages there were about 200 prose poems with a smattering of meter and rhyme--and even a picture poem or two. They were generally sad, funny and thoughtful looks at a 50 year old woman's mid-life crisis which included a daughter leaving home, a mother in the hospital and a marriage that was alternately on the rocks and the best marriage in the world.  There were some real points of tension and sadness that built up even through the prolonged use of poetry.  I could hardly believe poems could produce this heightened state of interest in the characters.

The author, Sonya Sones, is better known for her young adult novels.  In fact, it appears as though they might be constructing a marketing campaign for young adults with this book so perhaps they hope the book to have a crossover audience.  I think this is a fun little book and you will enjoy it especially if you are interested in seeing what poetry can do for a narrative.  This was a clever way to play with words.

I found myself reading each poem and asking myself if it could stand alone as a poem.  If you saw it reprinted in the New Yorker by itself would you enjoy it as a poem or would you miss everything since it is really part of a longer narrative?  I decided that most of them could.  I leave you with one of my favorites:

I AM TIRED OF BEING A POET

Worn out by this business
of always having to see things
with "fresh new eyes."

Just once I'd like to sit by the fire
without trying to figure out how to describe it
in a way that no one else ever has before.

I'm tired of meter, tired of form,
tired of rhyme, tired of off-rhyme,
tired of repetition, tired of metaphors--

Those wild...somethings
that never fail to fly south for the winter j
ust when I need them the most.

I am rife with,
no...overrun with,
no...bursting with

the boredom,
the monotony,
the tedium

of constantly
having to look up words
in my thesaurus.

I'm fed up with allusion,
alienated by allegory,
allergic to alliteration.

But I am especially tired of similes--
those sneaky figures of speech
that ceaselessly elude me,

just as
they're eluding me
right now

on this cloudy morning
that's like...
a cloudy morning.

I've had it up to here
with trying to invent another original way
to say "I'm really sad."

I'm not as melancholy as the song
of the mateless mockingbird,
 I'm just plain miserable--

miserable
and sick and tired
of being a poet.

Being Grateful for a New Year

I received the book 365 Thank Yous: The Year a Simple Act of Daily Gratitude Changed My Life by John Kralik  just a week or so after Thanksgiving.  In this year in which I have been counting my blessings daily, it seemed a very apt and profound memoir.  Mr. Kralik writes a very earnest account of his life which was sinking to new lows every day:  two marriages gone, rocky relationships with his kids, girlfriend left him, failing business and a pending lawsuit.  In the midst of his despair one New Years day he makes a commitment to be grateful for what he has and resolves to write a thank you note (a real hand written note put in and envelope with a stamp and an address) to someone every day.  Thus 2008 unfolds for Kralik as a drama of turning your life around by the simple act of of being thankful.  


I loved some of the simple observations he made.  For example, when Kralik traveled he took the time to learn people's names so he could thank them later.  He observed that he couldn't change the behavior of his clients who did not pay their bills but he could thank the ones who did and be grateful.  Even though it is an easy lesson, I am still amazed by what a hard time most of us have learning it.   It took Kralik the physical act of writing a note every day to help him remember all that is good in his life. 


There is nothing earth shattering here, and all the lessons are applicable to all of us. It should inspire people to consider their many blessings even in the bleak midwinter.   What do you have to be thankful for and how can you show that during this year?  Maybe we could all write about about how gratefulness  can turn our lives around. 


Happy 2011 to my readers near and far. I'll look forward to hearing about your next 365 days of blessings.  Keep in touch.