My favorite book from January

My plan to read slim books in the month of January so as to start off the year by making a good dent in my "to read" list backfired to a certain extent, as I didn't find that many books that I'll remember or that had a great impact on me.  My favorite book from this past month was Larry Watson's Montana 1948, a short but great read that reminded me both of Ivan Doig and Richard Ford's writing. Told from the perspective of David Hayden, a boy coming of age in fictional Bentrock, Montana, the book explores themes of loyalty - to one's values, one's family, and one's job, and how these can create conflict within a nuclear family and a town.  I'm officially a Larry Watson fan now!

Not Under Forty

Willa Cather's collection of essays, Not Under Forty, starts off with a caveat that the essays would likely not appeal to those "under forty."  Nonetheless, I took a stab at it. Enjoyable and interesting of course, but not as wonderful for me as Cather's fiction. There was one quote that resonated with me:

"The unique charm of Mrs. Fields' house was not that it was a place where one could hear about the past, but that it was a place where the past lived on - where it was protected and cherished, had sanctuary from the noisy push of the present."

This last sentiment captures why I love Willa Cather so much, because when I read her work, it is indeed a sanctuary for me, as her writing hearkens back to an earlier time stripped away of distracting modernities, and instead focuses on the essence of relationships with oneself, others, and the landscapes that define us.  

Words on War

I recently read Tobias Wolff's memoir In Pharoah's Army as well as Phil Klay's collection of short stories, Redeployment.  It's fascinating to read these books within the same few weeks, as they both illustrate the effects of war and have many commonalities.  Wolff writes of his decision to enter the army, his experience in Vietnam, his relationship with his father, and his adjustment to life as a civilian.  Klay writes about Iraq and Afghanistan, and his stories focus on both being in the thick of daily life in a war zone, as well as what people's lives are like after returning from war.  Both Klay's debut and Wolff's memoir are very well written and engaging, and provide a great deal of insight into the intimate challenges faced by soldiers.  Recommended!

To Russia We Go

Published in 1948, A Russian Journal, by John Steinbeck, is his account of spending just over a month traveling in Russia at the beginning of the Cold War.  Steinbeck traveled with war photographer Robert Capa.  As Steinbeck explains in the book, his goal was to write about the lives of every day Russians, not to take a political or ideological stance, and ultimately has a very good experience there and enjoys his time with the generous and friendly Russian people he and Capa meet along the way.  In doing so, he reports about the various Russian cities and towns he visits, the food he eats, people's clothes and customs, and his experiencing traveling in planes, jeeps, etc. throughout the country.  The book captures Steinbeck's signature ability to write clearly to the heart of the matter, with no shortage of humor as well.  While this wasn't my favorite Steinbeck, it is an interesting one.  Some of my favorite passages:

"At last the plane took off, and as it did, a man sitting next to me opened his suitcase, cut off half a pound of raw bacon which was melting in the heat, and sat chewing it, the grease running down his chin.  He was a nice man, with merry eyes, and he offered me a piece, but I didn't feel like it at that moment."

"It was equipped with blades that were scissors, blades that were files, awls, saws, can-openers, beer-openers, corkscrews, tools for removing stones from a horse's foot, a blade for eating and a blade for murder, a screw driver and a chisel.  You could mend a watch with it, or repair the Panama Canal.  It was the most wonderful pocketknife anyone has ever seen, and we had it nearly two months, and the only thing we ever did with it was to cut sausages. But it must be admitted that the knife cut sausages very well."

"Our driver was, as usual, wonderful, an ex-cavalry man, and he had, of all things, a jeep.  The jeep does not bring out the best in anyone, and in a cavalry man it brings out the cowboy....He drove like a mad man, he was afraid of no one.  Again and again, in traffic, outraged drivers forced him to the curb, and there would be an exchange of violent Georgian language, and our man would smile and drive off.  He won all engagements.  We loved him."

Irish Anguish

I've wanted to read John McGahern's The Barracks for quite some time now - glad I finally got around to it.   The story centers around the life of Elizabeth Reegan, a woman who has lived a varied life but ends up back in the Irish village in which she grew up.  Married to her husband, a widower and a police officer who hates his job and wishes to be his own boss someday, she tends the home and takes care of his three children.  It's a bleak tale in which Ms. Reegan must fight for her life against breast cancer, and addresses the futility and fleeting freedoms of life.  This is an insular, unsparing book, and beautifully written.  Some compelling passages:

"He brought a wonderful ease with him sometimes into the house, the black hands of the clock would take wings."

"She was shackled, a thieving animal held at last in this one field."

"There never had been even any real discussion, not to speak of understanding, and while each of them alone was nothing there might be no knowing what both of them might find together." 

"Always easy to love something or somebody when you know you don't have to endure them anymore, when the goodbyes are being waved, and you can have your dream and choice of them instead of their solid, individual and demanding presence."

A Tightly Woven Tale

I have no recollection of how Larry Watson's Let Him Go ended up on my "to read" list (possibly an IndieBound next list suggestion?!) but I'm glad it did.  It's the kind of book you'll want to read quickly, as it immediately draws you in to the action the characters, and their intent.  It's spare and atmospheric writing, reminding me in ways of Kent Haruf and Peter Heller's The Painter.  And I feel that I've read this kind of plot before, but I just can't remember in what book (family members attempting to rescue kids and bring them out of harm's way, etc.). 

The story centers around Margaret and George Blackledge, who set out on a journey to find and protect their grandson, who, after their own son's death, is being raised by their daughter-in-law and her boyfriend, Ronnie Weboy.  The Blackledges know something is amiss with the Weboy family and despite their age, have a determination and pluckiness that propel them to possibly put themselves in harm's way to make sure their grandson grows up in a safe environment.  Set amidst the backdrop of small town North Dakota and Montana, this is a book you'll want to read in just a few sittings, and then put more of Larry Watson's books on hold at the library.  At least, that's what I'm going to do!

Favorite Bookstores of 2014

Here were my favorites that I visited this year:

1.  Front Street Books:  Alpine, TX
-  A pleasant bookstore with a well curated and bountiful selection of regional books, as well as new and used books on all topics.  Very helpful manager. I can't wait to go back!

2.  Parnassus Books:  Nashville, TN
- I have heard much about this bookstore in interviews with owner (and famous author) Ann Patchett on NPR.  Though in a strip mall of all places, this was a classy, modern establishment with friendly and well informed staff with hand picked recommendations at the ready.  

3.  Book Fellers:  Fort Davis, TX
- Such a charming, unpretentious, small used bookstore in small-town Fort Davis.  Very friendly owners, old time jazz music playing, used and collectible Texas books, and lots of general used books for only $2/book!  I found a copy of Jane Jacob's The Economy of Cities, and also, The Enneagram Made Easy.  Delightful, unexpected find!

4.  Mrs. Dalloway's:  Berkeley, CA
- One of my favorites - so many hand written reviews (my mark of a good bookstore), very cute, also conveniently located right next door to The Elmwood Cafe which makes the best hot chocolate in town!

5.  Walden Pond Books:  Oakland, CA
- This is the closest one to me, so close I can even walk there from my apartment, and I consider this my "local bookstore."   It has both new and used, and the floors make a good creaky sound as you walk on them.  I've been impressed by how busy this bookstore has been lately (though I prefer it less crowded).  Makes me happy to know there are still lots of book lovers out there.  They are always happy to special order titles for me. 

Cather: The Young Adventurer

Before Willa Cather became a famous author she was a teacher in Pittsburgh, and when she was only twenty-eight years old (in 1902), she traveled to England and France to the first time.  Having grown up in pastoral Nebraska, some of the countryside she saw resonated with her own life, whereas the cities and the level of poverty within them was something she had never experienced before.  Collected in Willa Cather in Europe:  Her Own Story of the First Journey are fourteen travel articles that Cather wrote for a newspaper in Lincoln, Nebraska.  The articles contain her first impressions of the places she visited.  Even in this early writing of hers, some of the key themes of her later writing are captured, perhaps the most compelling of which is her keen interest and curiosity of the lives of the poor and working class, as opposed to high society.  My favorite quotes:

In Liverpool:  "Hats have never at all been one of the vexing problems of my life, but, indifferent as I am, these render me speechless.  I should think a well-taught and tasteful American milliner would go mad in England, and eventually hang herself with bolts of green and scarlet ribbon - the favorite colour combination in Liverpool."

In Barbizon:  "The village at first sight looks like any other little forest town; the home of hard-working folk, desperately poor, but never so greedy or so dead of soul that they will not take time to train the peach tree against the wall until it spreads like a hardy vine, and to mass beautiful flowers of very hue in their little gardens."  

"There is something worth thinking about in these brown, merry old women, who have brought up fourteen children and can outstrip their own sons and grandsons in the harvest field, lay down their rake and write a traveler directions as to how he can reach the next town in a hand as neat as a bookkeeper's."

In Avignon:  "As we carried no bologna with us, we were naturally interested in the dining-room on the afternoon of our arrival."

In Marseilles and Hyeres:  "What more of life could one wring out of twenty-four hours, if you please  At noon the wet olives of Arles; at nightfall a chorus of gay sailors, made up to the life, and the rattle of stage thunder, much blue lightening, and a great tossing of blue water; at dawn a sunrise over feathery date palms, with the sea at one's feet and a porcelain sky above.  What more could one ask for, even in the country of Monte Cristo?"

In Lavandou:  "I am sure I do not know why a wretched little fishing village with nothing but green pines and blue sea and a sky of porcelain, should mean more than a dozen places I have wanted to see all my life."

Army Wives' Lives

No Man's War:  Irreverent Confessions of an Infantry Wife is the debut book by Angela Ricketts, who has been part of the army culture for her whole life, first as an army brat as she calls herself, and then by way of marrying her husband, whom she met when he was an infantry lieutenant.  I learned of this book because of Terry Gross' interview with Ricketts on Fresh Air.  It struck me that the topic was something I know nothing about, as I don't know anyone in my life who is connected to the military in any way.  I was intrigued enough by the interview to read the book of which the main themes seemed to be the relationships (i.e. camaraderie, competitiveness, and hierarchy) among army wives, being without ones' partner for long stretches and the toll it can take on one's marriage and well being (Ricketts describes having a heart attack), raising children with your partner gone for long stretches, etc.  Ricketts describes the "buoyancy" of army wives as a key characteristic and common thread among highly divergent personalities. 

You've Got Mail (from Capote)

I recently read Too Brief a Treat, the letters of Truman Capote.  While I didn't enjoy this collection merely as much as Willa Cather's short stories, they were still entertaining and of course provided some insight into one of my favorite authors.  Capote addressed his friends with pet names, often contained gossip, and usually involved his asking his friends to keep writing him wherever he was (Italy, Switzerland, New York, Kansas, etc.).  Some of my favorite quotes are as follows. The last quote was in reference to William Goyen, a Texan writer most famous for The House of Breath (which I recently reviewed on this blog).  Capote was an early supporter of Goyen, but when Goyen wrote some less than flattering words about one of Capote's works, he was no longer a fiercely appreciated friend, but a foe to which Capote said good riddance.  He fiercely adored his friends and abhorred his enemies, never one to be moderate in his opinions!

"Currently am waging war against two little girls down the road.  They are driving me out of my mind.  Why do children always think that I am a child too?  I'd like to crack their little heads together."

"Not, I must say, that you've been dazzling correspondents, any of you:  many's the night I've trudged down to the post-office, then trudged back empty-handed - thinking, a fine lot they are, whirling from one gay event to another, never giving a thought to poor Truman:  far off there on a windswept hill with nothing but the sound of the sea to cheer him up.  Oh chilluns, it do get mighty powerful lonesome here."

"What a psychopath."

Reading Roundup: The Best Books of 2014

Here's my list of the best books I read in 2014 (out of a total of what I think will be 89, still have a few days to go!):

1. The Selected Letters of Willa Cather
2. Love and Terror on the Howling Plains of Nowhere - Poe Ballantine
3. My Brilliant Friend - Elena Ferrante
4. The Goldfinch - Donna Tartt
5. The Sound of Things Falling - Juan Gabriel Vasquez
6. The Dogs Bark - Truman Capote
7. The Night in Question - Tobias Wolff
8. The Wind - Dorothy Scarborough
9. The Descendants - Kaui Hart Hemmings
10. The People in the Trees - Hanya Yanagihara
Honorable mentions: 
A River Runs Through It and Other Stories - Norman Maclean, One Foot in Eden - Ron Rash, First Comes Love - Marion Winik, The Sheltering Sky - Paul Bowles, In a Narrow Grave - Larry McMurtry, In the Place of Justice - Wilbert Rideau, The One-Room Schoolhouse - Jim Heynen
Most looking forward to reading in 2015:
1. Dorothy Day, Selected Writings
2. Faces in the Crowd - Valeria Luiselli
3. The Barracks - John McGahern
4. The Death and Life of Great American Cities - Jane Jacobs
5. The Story of a New Name - Elena Ferrante
6. My Struggle - Karl Ove Knausgaard
7. The World and the Parish - Willa Cather
8. Two Serious Ladies - Jane Bowles
9. Working Days: The Journals of the Grapes of Wrath - Steinbeck
10. Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind - Suzuki
And as many of the other 80+ books on my "to read" list as possible!

The Wild West, Two Ways

I recently read two books back to back that prominently feature the American West, in two very different ways.  The first was Molly Gloss' Falling From Horses, which is a straightforward and really touching story that follows the lives of two young people setting out to California to try to carve out a life for themselves in Hollywood - one as a screen writer and the other as a horse rider in Western movies.  The year is 1938, and Lily Shaw and ranch hand Bud Frazer meet on the bus as they travel to Los Angeles for the first time, and ultimately become life long friends.  We learn about Bud's difficult past regarding his sister and his family, and about his coming of age in Hollywood.  It was the first book I read by Gloss, and I plan to try another one.  The writing style reminded me in a way of Kent Haruf.  

The second book was John Williams' Butcher's Crossing.  Set in the 1870s, the book tells the story of young Will Andrews, who drops out of Harvard and heads West to explore his own "wildness" and learn more of the natural world.  He finds himself in Butcher's Crossing, Kansas, where he decides to put together an outfit of four men who will travel on a buffalo hunt.  The book perfectly captures the restlessness and sense of adventure of men in those times.  The men encounter difficulties along the way, and ultimately end up snowed in, in a valley in the Colorado Rockies for the winter, as they were so caught up with the greed and excitement of killing buffalo that they lost track of time.  

Both of these books caught me off guard - they were well written, captivating, and just plain old fashioned great story telling.  Both are recommended!

A Breath of Fresh Texas Air

William Goyen's The House of Breath (published in 1950, and Goyen's first work) was recently listed as a recommended book in Texas Monthly magazine, of which I am a subscriber. I also finally figured out how to use "LINK +" with the Oakland Public Library system, so was able to get this book on loan from another library system.  It was a book like none I have ever read before - the narrative structure and writing style is wholly unique to Goyen.  It is poetic and evocative, and brims with memories of small town life in Charity, Texas.  The style reminded me a bit of Faulkner and a bit of Garcia Marquez.   These days I'm more drawn to realistic fiction, so I didn't love the unconventional style but I appreciated some of the beautiful phrases in the book.  Here are some of my favorite passages (with spelling as it appears in the book):

"Everything then, working with and upon everything - with accompanying resistance and damage and error but turning out something changed, finished, prepared to receive something more, to take in and take on something more:  pain, wisdom, love.  This great, mysterious chemistry going on - praise it."

"Aunty just got up from her chair on the gallery and said in at the front door, "Seven years bad luck little feist," for the broken mirror.  (Oh, she had it, seven and more.)"

"I'd lie there in my bed and want to die, and think - is this what parents have to come to, a creepin at night through room and room with a shotgun after the ghosts of their children who've gone away and left them lonely and sleepless and chokin in the night?"

"O what's the meanin of it all?  There must be some meanin somewhere - it cain't all be just this rabblement and helter-skelter."

"We ought to see it that we make good memry for ourselves, like a slow and perfect stitchin, as we go along, and embroidry a good and lovely memry out of all the tread we one day have to set, alone, and unravel, stitch by stitch."

"You didn't want to flicker around East Texas, you wanted to blaze in the world, to sparkle, to shine, to glisten in the great evil world."

In the Place of Justice

Wilbert Rideau's In the Place of Justice:  A Story of Punishment and Deliverance, is a memoir of Rideau's forty four years spent in the Louisiana State Penitentiary (Angola prison).  Rideau killed a woman at the age of nineteen in a bank robbery attempt and was sentenced to death, a sentence that was eventually changed to life imprisonment.  Many years later, his murder conviction was changed to manslaughter, after it was determined he had not been given a fair trial because of racial discrimination.  While at Angola, he became the editor of the prison magazine, The Angolite.  Under his editorship, Rideau won many awards for journalism, and The Angolite was nominated multiple times for the National Magazine Award under his leadership.  Rideau even became an NPR correspondent from Angola.  He was the first African American editor of prison magazine in the U.S. This unflinching, honest account of Rideau's life explores issues of race, power, and the concept of redemption.  Very interesting and thought provoking - highly recommended.

A Poe to Know

For many years now, I've had the opportunity to read Poe Ballantine's work in The Sun magazine, a publication known for its raw, honest, gut wrenching writing.  I recently read Ballantine's Fear and Terror on the Howling Plains of Nowhere, and Things I Like About America, and I very highly recommend both of them. Both of them capture Ballantine's humor, grit, resolve, and fabulous writing, as he writes of his life as a drifter with blue collar jobs, to his eventually getting married and settling down in Chadron, Nebraska, with his wife and son.  I've never met him (though I would love to go to a reading of his someday!), but I feel like I know Ballantine very well after these two books.  He's that great, "undiscovered" writer that you haven't heard of, but beware - he's going to get big someday.  In fact, Cheryl Strayed (of Wild and tiny beautiful things), wrote the intro to Fear and Terror on the Howling Plains of Nowhere, and really sums it up best when she says, "Wow.  Yes.  Jesus. Poe."  His books probably aren't available at your local library, but why not support a local independent press, and purchase some of Poe's books?  You won't regret it!

On the Road with McMurtry

I'm a huge fan of Larry McMurtry's non-fiction, even more so than his fiction.  I'm thinking of his memoir Books, and his essays on Texas, In a Narrow Grave.  Here are some of my favorite quotes from his book, Roads:

"It may be that the Midwest produces a distinct kind of disappointment, which, in some, becomes murderous resentment.  I think this disappointment has to do with glamour - or rather, with the lack of it."

"What would America, much less ldaho, be without waitresses named Kitty?"

Roads reminded me somewhat of Steinbeck's Travels with Charley: In Search of America, except that admittedly, without a Charley (or other side kick), it wasn't quite as entertaining.  However, I wrote down some of the routes that McMurtry recommends (highway 2, highway 83), and I can't wait to drive them someday!

The Book of Unknown Americans

Cristina Henriquez's The Book of Unknown Americans weaves together the interlocking stories of a group of Latino immigrants living in the same run down apartment complex in Delaware.  Through the eyes of these characters, we come to feel what it would be like, for example, to be dropped off in a less than idyllic setting (with thoughts of the "American Dream" quickly pushed aside), with hardly any possessions and no knowledge of English.  The book centers around the story of Alma and Arturo Rivera, who come to the United States seeking medical help for their impaired daughter who had an accident in Mexico.  Despite Arturo's efforts at work and Alma's efforts to protect her daughter and create a feeling of home, there are no simple answers or quick fixes, and in fact, some of these characters face even more tragedy in the U.S. than they did at home.  Henriquez doesn't sugar coat the lives of her characters, and in avoiding doing so, she brings the reader face to face with the realities of many "Unknown Americans," in all of their heartbreaks and struggles.

Kaui Hart Hemmings - master of hilarity and heartbreak

Hemmings' The Descendants finds the perfect balance between hilarity and heartbreak, and she does it again in The Possibilities. The novel follows Sarah St. John's grieving the loss of her 22 year old son, Cully, who died in an avalanche near Breckenridge, CO. Hemmings takes us into the inner workings of Sarah as she comes to grips with this devastation in her life, as she navigates her relationship with her own father, Cully's father who comes back into her life, and a young woman who holds a secret that links her to Cully and therefore to Sarah.  Set over the course of just a few days, this novel explores the messiness and beauty of familial ties and love.  Hemmings is a brilliant talent - I recommend starting with The Descendants, as I think this is her stronger of the two!

A Mouthful of Murakami

Murakami is one of those rare authors with a cult following, and I've read all of his works and wait in anticipation of his next book (I hear there is a new one coming not too long from now)!  I was thrilled to go to the library to pick up Murakami's new book, Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage.  The novel tells the story of Tsukuru and his group of friends in high school, all who have a color in his last name except for him.  Feeling the most colorless and bland of the bunch (similar to other Murakami protagonists), Tsukuru goes off to college to study engineering and while there, learns that his friends want nothing to do with him anymore and cut him off completely.  Tsukuru, now 36, is hoping to form a serious relationship with a girl he has recently met, but she encourages him to find out why his friends cut him off as this seems to be preventing Tuskuru from forming a deep, trusting relationship with her.  Tsukuru decides to meet up with his friends to discover why they cut him off years ago.  This is classic Murakami - impossible to put down but I couldn't really tell you why.  On the one hand, Murakami often pays attention to very small seemingly bland details (we hear all about characters daily rituals and ablutions), but also writes in somewhat of a dreamlike manner.  All in all, I love Murakami's writing.  This wasn't my absolute favorite of his, but it was interesting and engaging.   

Two Great First Novels

Ron Rash is one of my favorite contemporary Southern writers.  His novel Serena and his short stories Burning Bright, are very memorable and readable.  One Foot in Eden, Rash's first novel, is an atmospheric tale of love, loyalty, and family ties that takes place in rural Appalachia in the 1950s.  It was totally riveting - couldn't put it down!  Billy and Amy Holcombe, a young married couple, try to get pregnant, but after failing to do so, Amy makes a decision that yields her a son, Isaac, but ultimately costs her more than she could have imagined.  

Tobias Wolff is one of those authors where each of his works must be savored, as he is spare in words and not as prolific as some of his contemporaries.  His first novel, The Barracks Thief, explores the relationships between three young paratroopers before being sent off to the Vietnam War.  While narrow in breadth and short in length, Wolff shows off his ability to create flawed characters that we root for and with whom we sympathize.

I highly recommend Rash and Wolff!