Recently Read Books: Ones That Don't Get An Amazing Rating From Me (I'm probably missing something, but it's how I feel!)

1. Island of the World by Michael O’Brien

Beautifully written and deeply moving, this book traces the life story of a boy born in the Balkan mountains. Throughout his life, Josip Lasta endures multiple cycles of suffering from the cyclical violence that ravages his country. While describing his experiences, the story focuses on his inner life; the journey of his soul and its repeated resurrections from the inner deaths wrought by suffering. I have only heard raving reviews of this book, but I must say that I can’t give it five stars. I was wishing it would go ahead and end; over 800 pages of this cycle of suffering and healing began to seem a little far-fetched to me.  Moreover, about halfway into the book the tone changes, and Josip seems more of a ghost with a mechanical soul that chooses forgiveness again and again. The ghostly, soul-less feel is totally merited; I would become a ghost with a mechanical soul after the things Josip endured by page 400. However, that’s where Josip’s renewal, soul-resurrection (if you will), and baffling choice to forgive and give love almost seem mechanical. It feels like it is coming from a person who has already died, because he has already lost everything that matters. I think if O’Brien would have shortened the story, it would have meant more to me. But who knows? You’ll probably love it!

2. My Antonia by Willa Cather

I finally finished Cather’s most famous work and I must say---I really didn’t like it! I felt like it was an endless, pointless rambling. I have to chuckle though; I’m sure that is what others may feel when they read Cather’s book Death Comes for the Archbishop, which I count as one of the most poignant, beautifully written, subtly meaningful books I’ve ever read. So I feel a little guilty about disliking My Antonia---perhaps I’m missing something grand!

3. A Land Remembered by Patrick Smith

This is another book that garnered rave reviews, won awards, and was highly recommended to me, but it didn’t meet with my grandiose expectations. It was an interesting read however, and it helped me appreciate Florida’s history and look on the land around me in a new light. I don’t think I had quite understood how much of a wilderness this place was even after the Civil War! This book traces the lives and struggles of three generations in the McIvey family, whose patriarch moved to the scrub-bush in Florida in the 1850’s. The accounts of wilderness survival, cattle drives, and friendships with the Seminoles fascinated me because the names of these remote outposts are well known to me---but now they are anything but remote! While I won’t be raving about this book like others do, it did give me a great appreciation for the Florida Crackers’ and their toughness, as well as a sadness for the plight of the Seminoles and for the destruction of the Florida landscape.

Recently Read Books: The Ones I Loved, In Order

1. My Reading Life by Pat Conroy

I loved, loved this book. Conroy is an amazing writer, and this memoir is unique because his entire life was marinated, steeped, soaked in great books. I listened to this book as I was driving across three states, and I was constantly wishing I could take out a pen and write down the books he talked about and the authors he loved. His personal anecdotes are truly moving and memorable, particularly the stories about his two greatest mentors—his mother and his high-school English teacher---and yet these stories come wrapped up in the books that shaped his consciousness and turned him into a writer. This book is beautiful, beautiful---but I’d recommend listening Conroy read it himself on CD to get the full effect of its magic.

2. The Mom Factor by Dr. Henry Cloud and Dr. John Townsend

These guys are great counselors.  Highly recommended for lending perspective and practical advice on relating to your mother as an adult.

3. All the Shah’s Men:  An American Coup and the Roots of Middle East Terror by Stephen Kinzer

This was one of the most fascinating historical accounts I’d ever read; talk about learning something new! I was clueless regarding America’s involvement in Iran over 25 years before the hostage crisis of 1979. This book was so eye-opening, showing how oil, British intransigence, Iranian nationalism, Cold-War politics and a few strong opinions created a U.S.-backed coup that overthrew Iran’s leader Mossadegh, and installed Mohammad Reza Shah. The coup and its aftermath helped to plant the seeds of anger which came to full fury in 1979. This book provides details and background that help when trying to understand even a sliver of the complicated backstory that precedes foreign policy crises.

4. The Maytrees by Annie Dillard

This story of a couple and their inner musings on the nature of love is winsome, unique, and baffling. I love Dillard’s writing style.  I loved parts of this story, hated parts of this story, and am still baffled by other parts of this story. I would love to read this book in a discussion club!

5. The Water is Wide: A Memoir by Pat Conroy

This is the warm story of Conroy’s rewarding, enlightening, and infuriating year as a fumbling, brand-new teacher on an isolated island off the coast of South Carolina. With little else but a desire to make a difference, Conroy encountered a whole new world as his students were completely isolated from the outside, and his education superiors still harbored racist attitudes and agendas. This is a beautiful little account of one teacher’s attempt to connect his students to real life and treat them as persons of value.

Meditation on Memory

Echoes of early childhood ripple through my veins.

My uncle, his mannerisms so like my father’s

Triggers memories of his mother, my grandmother

Her voice, her stories, her tiny Florida cottage.

Blue river-waves slapping the bleached pilings

Of a dock ruined by a hurricane

In the pelicans skimming the water

I see the reflection of a photo

This dark haired little girl

Posing on a Miami dock, 1986,

Pelicans all around.

Sailboats docked in the marina,

Masts thrust heavenward

Transport me to Matheson Hammock,

My father’s great love of the sea and sails,

“Coming about” in our sailboat, scrambling to our tasks

My two brothers and I,

Our clumsy fingers fumbling the ropes, my father shouting,

We four lowering our heads for the boom.

My babysitting gig, this toddler named Noah—

He shares the name of the tow-headed brother

I raised on my hip

Before the sisters arrived.

It was another world.

These lizards, they’re everywhere—

I had forgotten.

Toddler Noah gives them heck and

I remember my brother Paul

The boy who caught lizards with his hands.

It was another world, a lifetime ago.

Those days when our family lived in their city of birth

When my experience of the other 49 states

Was limited to the plastic map above our dinner table,

That place where we ate meals together and played long guessing games.

The days before the bus, the boondocks, adventure, trauma

Moves upon moves, the cloistered life

The stories that fascinate and shock

The journey to normalcy

But not---

Because in my veins runs a passion for the unconventional.

These memories rush back from the days

When China was just a place in my favorite storybook,

Before I thirsted after Europe

Before I stomped through deep, brilliant Cambodian mud

Or lost my way among darkened Saigon streets

Or gripped a bamboo raft with my bare toes

As it whisked down a Thai river.

I have traveled so far

From these early moments

Those opening chapters.

And yet, the book turns back

The pages open---

Musty, forgotten, familiar

When I return—

A stranger.

Recently Read Books: An Episode of Sparrows

An Episode of Sparrows by Rumer Godden

This book was a sweet story, written in “old story style.” A bit like The Secret Garden, and yet, quite different. The story mainly focuses on three children (“sparrows”) who live in poor circumstances, on the same street, in post-war London. The little girl is overcome with a passionate desire to plant her own garden, but since she is poor, even “good garden earth” (dirt!) is very hard to come by. Planting and cultivating the garden brings two of the children together as friends, and the third one sometimes tags along when they dig up dirt under cover of darkness. The featured adults in the story are also folks with deep desires, and this tale illustrates the truth that no-one’s deep longing should be sniffed at. To quote from the story: “You are making a mountain out of a molehill,” said Angela. Olivia was suddenly inspired to answer, “A molehill can be a mountain to a sparrow.”

Recently Read Books: Pilgrim's Inn

Pilgrim’s Inn by Elizabeth Goudge

This book was a fun read; the story centers not only around a family but around a place, a beautiful, old inn-turned-home-then-turned-inn-again. The inn was made for pilgrims, religious travelers. Once it is revived, the folks who pass through are not religious travelers, but they are broken souls needing healing. And somehow, they find it in this place.

Recently Read Books: Plainsong

Plainsong by Kent Haruf

This book was unusual. The story was unusual. The way it was written was unusual. The lack of quotation marks was unusual. It was a plain story, but with an underlying sweetness.

The setting, a little no-account town in Colorado. The characters: Two pre-teen brothers who deliver newspapers. Their father, a high school teacher who is unwilling to let a lazy student pass his class. Their mother, who suffers from depression and leaves home. A pregnant high school girl who needs a place to live. And the three connectors in the story: two bachelor brothers who farm, and the middle-aged high school secretary named Maggie. While I didn’t like everything about this book, I did enjoy its focus: these are real, unremarkable, everyday, plain folk. They are plodding along. They might remind you of someone in your town who is struggling. They are real people. They need kindness. And among them, there are some real good-hearted ones who see under people’s plainness and treat them as though they matter.

Recently Read Books: Jewel

Jewel by Brett Lott

I was not so keen on Lott’s other book, “A Song I Knew By Heart,” but “Jewel” was truly a masterpiece. With great skill, perception, and gentleness, Lott weaves a beautiful story of a mother and her special-needs child. Somehow, he creates this story with such a sense of authenticity, writing such a deep, personal saga, that the reader walks with this mother, with this family, in grappling with the mystery of how this gift of a special-needs child changes, challenges, and transforms every part of their lives. This book helps those of us who have not experienced this gift to gain a small glimpse into the hearts of those who have. Masterful.

Recently Read Books: Postcards from Tomorrow Square

Postcards from Tomorrow Square by James Fallows

Although most of these “postcards”, or short essays, were written about the China of 2008, this book is not outdated because the author mainly discusses trends that he observes in the Middle Kingdom. The trends he discusses have not disappeared, and he helps to shed light on some murky stereotypes Americans have of challenges facing China (domestically) and the US (internationally) as it responds to China’s rise. This book was encouraging, as Fallows peels back blanket statements and hysteria and addresses both sides of the issues, often using his personal encounters/interviews with the Chinese to offer a more balanced perspective on the China question. A very enjoyable read.

Recently Read Books: China Court: The Hours of a Country House

China Court by Rumer Godden

I loved this book because of the way that the complex story of a family was told through present moments and snatches of past memories. Every family’s history is rather like a patchwork quilt; you can never get all of the shining memories or shameful regrets in one telling. To understand the inner feelings of members in one’s family tree, one must actually “get into their brains”, which, of course, is quite impossible. We only remember what we saw and felt; we cannot know what sorrows or hopes hid under the coats or aprons of those distant uncles or crotchety aunts. But, remarkably, these people do shape us and influence the events of our own lives. This is what comes through this story, told through the patches of memories or the inner musings of nearly all of the characters mentioned. The chapters are divided into “hours”, that is, the prayer-hours of an old prayer-book that also features in the story. The story of the generations in this family is closely tied to their family home, a place called “China Court.” Whimsical, lyrical, and charming, it’s a rare look at the story of a family from the inside.