Homo Deus by Yuval Noah Harari (2015)

This was on more than one recommended reading lists, including Bill Gates' summer reading. Very depressing. On one hand, this author did a great job of summarizing the world, but his predictions of the future made me glad that I am getting on in years and will not live to see most of this, or be getting old enough to not care.

Since I listened to this, I didn't have the physical book to go back through to point out the things that I especially liked. And now that I got my hands on the physical book, I don't have the time to do this book justice, so just a few points.

• Harari starts out by pointing out that we have conquered the three major problems humanity faced over the centuries, millennia, in my mind portrayed by the three riders in Aleksandrs Grins' and probably many other books - famine, plague and war. Yes people are still starving, there are still epidemics, and we are still fighting each other, but at a much smaller scale, and we have solutions for most of these. The problem more often than not is political, human created, and it will not be solved by praying or sacrificing to any god.
• There was a section that I thought nicely addressed why there should no longer be a need to pray to any form of god. He seemed to dismiss all religions, but never did address the need for something spiritual that most of us feel.
• The scary part was that he sees the developments in science, especially biology and study of genes, leading to the development of super humans, eliminating genetic diseases, extending life. I am sorry, but I have never understood the search for the fountain of youth or living to be over 100. More power to those that do live long, but haven't you read Robert Heinlein? Why would you want to live that long?
• He talks of human-animal relations, moving from hunting in the wild to domestication of animals - to the abuse, often, today. I think he spent a lot of time on this, but have already forgotten the details. I am definitely not one of those super-humans. 
• "Sapiens rule the world because we alone can cooperate flexible in large numbers."
• One of my favorite stories about the power of the written word was that when Jews were trying to flee France as the Nazis came in, a Portuguese consul kept issuing visas to Jews, though the government had forbidden it. He issued thousands of visas in a number of days, thus being responsible for the largest rescue operation by a single individual. Though he lost his job and the Portuguese were reluctant to admit these refugees, the power of the piece of paper was such that they were all accepted.
• He explains how the Europeans divided up Africa, knowing very little about the continent and making some grave errors in the process that affects the continent to this day.
• He had a strange take on humanism. I don't remember his whole argument, but I remember it feeling very negative. The book has photos explaining it in simple statements like:
• The voter knows best. (politics)
• The customer is always right. (economics)
• Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. (questioning art)
• If it feels good - do it! (ethics)
• Think for yourself! (education)
• There is a lot about technology and it felt like the worst SF movies depicting the robots taking over the world coming to fruition.

In looking over the actual book. I realize it probably deserves a rereading already, but I have other things that need my attention.

The Man Who Fell From the Sky by Margaret Coel (2015)

One more of my out West books picked up a Wall Drug. Not bad, but seemed to take me forever to get through this. Margaret Coel is a historian who is considered an expert on Arapaho Indians of Colorado and Wyoming. Her mysteries feature Father John and Arapaho lawyer Vicky as mystery solvers. 

Robert Walking Bear's death in a lake may have been an accident, but since he was looking for Butch Cassidy's treasure, there are some doubts. This mystery is based on the true fact that Butch Cassidy did have friends in the area and that he did have a relationship with Mary Boyd, half white and half Indian, and that she did have a daughter. As far as Coel knows, no one ever did find Cassidy's treasure. I did appreciate a window into the current world of the Native Americans living in the state where my cousin resides.

When I'm Gone by Emily Bleeker (2016)

This is the first book I've read through Amazon Prime. I don't have a Kindle and have not gotten into reading online. I remember when Stephen King (not an author I would choose to read) came out with the first online only book that he was distributing chapter by chapter. I started reading that just to see what it was like, but I must have lost interest, as I only read 3 or 4 chapters. This was before Kindle and no one could decide on a platform to use. Anyway, this was just simple reading on my laptop. OK, but not great.

The story started out similar to P.S. I Love You, where a person gets letters from their loved one after they have died. At first it seemed like it was just going to help Luke get through those difficult first months, first year, raising three kids on his own. Natalie's letters kept appearing on his doorstep. He was encouraged to accept help from his neighbor, then a young girl was suggested as a babysitter, but this was a much more complex story with secrets being revealed over time. I guess it turned out to be a pretty good story in the end.

I always take a look at what other people have said about a book on Amazon or GoodReads - more down to earth than official reviews. One comment struck me that this book made her think about writing down things about her own life for her kids and grandkids - answers to questions they may not think to ask until it is too late. Good idea.

Forced Underground: Homosexuals in Soviet Latvia by Rita Raduša (2014)

I was looking to see if there is anything written about LGBT in Latvia and found this - suggested by a friend. Originally published in Latvian as Pagrīdes citādība, I was able to find the translated version through interlibrary loan. It is a series of 12 stories based on interviews by the author about the life of gays, lesbians and one transgender person in Soviet Latvia. Most of the stories had to be anonymized, and one asked that her story not be told, as there were still too many details that could identify her.

If life for LGBT folks was/is hard in the States, it was harder still in Soviet times, where there was no acknowledgement of sex, never mind homosexual sex. Most of the people in these stories grew up not being able to define how they were feeling. Many came across Jānis Zālītis' In the Name of Love, one of the few texts on sexuality, where homosexuality was at least acknowledged, but recommended curing it. And then trying to find others like you.

I will have to find a way to purchase a copy from Latvia. It would be interesting to compile a bibliography of LGBTQ writings from Latvia or about Latvians. There are only 6 institutions in the US with this book, and the copy that I got through interlibrary loan was gifted to the library by an alum from Latvia.

Beartown by Fredrik Backman (2017)

Currently one of my favorite authors. He just seems to get people, especially those for whom life isn't easy. The main character in this book is Beartown - the whole town with it's love of hockey, it's hopes for a winning team, it's frustrations with loss of jobs, struggling families - even those that are well off are struggling with something. I have to admit that for a while things looked bleak, the need to win became so great, that people forgot the difference between right and wrong, but I knew Backman wouldn't leave it like that. He showed us such a wide range of characters, each with its own struggles, but in the end good won (mostly) over evil. (This right/wrong vs good/evil is Backman's concept, not mine, but I really liked it.)

When a book that begins with: "Late one evening toward the end of March, a teenager picked up a double-barreled shotgun, walked into the forest, put the gun to someone else's forehead, and pulled the trigger." you start imagining a myriad of ills, slights, offenses that teens might encounter. Throughout the book I kept trying to figure out who was going to shoot whom.

I knew he was a Scandinavian author, just didn't realize he was Swedish until I just looked it up. His story is so universal, that it could be in the U.S. One family moved to Canada for a while, but that could have been from the U.S. There was just one mention of Swedish nationals, and the a few mentions of krona. I had to look up how much 5,000 kr. was worth ($600) to figure out the extent of that one gift/bribe. Since I listened to the book and didn't see the names in print, my ears made them sound like familiar one. Only by looking at the text I realized they were mostly unfamiliar.

-Maya lives with her parents Peter Anderson, the general manager of Beartown Ice Hockey, and Kira, a lawyer and Leo, her little brother. 
-Ana is Maya's best friend and seems to sleep at Maya's way too much.
-Amat lives with his mom Fatima, who cleans at the rink. (I like the words she wrote down for her son, a variataion from Mother Theresa: "If you are honest, people may deceive you. Be honest anyway. If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfishness. Be kind anyway. All the good you do today will be forgotten by others tomorrow. Do good anyway. What you create, others can destroy, Create anyway. Because in the end, it is between you and God. It was never between you and anyone else anyway." And he had written: "They say Im to little to play. Become good player any way!" And he practices every morning before school to become one.
-Zach is Amat's best friend
-Kevin's parent built him a rink in the back yard when they couldn't find him one winter when he was little - because he was out on the lake practicing shots. His parents are well off but too busy to watch him play, though he is the star of the junior team.
-Benji is Kevin's best friend with some older sisters, one works as a bartender. 
-Bobo is a huge player on the junior team, who helps his father in the auto shop and his mom work in the hospital.
-Sune is the long time coach of the A-Team, though board members want him out.
-David is the coach of the junior team about to play the game of the decade and expecting to take Sune's place.
-Jeanette is a teacher having to deal with the energetic hockey players in her class.
-Ramona runs the local bar and is the town's psychologist. She hasn't stepped more than a few feet outside her bar since her husband died.

Anyway, you get the point. A town, even a small town, is made up of a lot of people, each with a role, job, relationships, problems, and when a whole town's future is threatened, it is interesting who comes through and does the right thing. Just realized this book fits into the recent #MeToo conversation.

The Light of Paris by Eleanor Brown (2016)

I am still enjoying books about Paris. This is the story of two women. The first is Margie or Margaret in 1924, who goes to Europe to accompany a younger cousin, but who is left alone in Paris, decides to stay against her parents wishes, and finds she loves it. She gets a job at the America Library. I sent a friend there to do research while he was living in Paris for a few months, as it had books that he needed - in English. I now found out how it was started - from books sent over to France during WWI for American soldiers. Margaret meets a French painter Sebastian, but even at the beginning of the book we know she somehow is forced to come home and live out the life her parents had planned for her in high society. We learn of her through her diaries that are discovered by her granddaughter.

Margie's granddaughter is Madeline, who has a loveless marriage in Chicago in 1999. She comes to spend some time with her mother in Magnolia, Georgia and finds her grandmother's diaries. She finds so many similarities. Both of them are not typical beauties and lack the delicateness and grace of others in their society. They feel they have to marry the men chosen form them by their parents. (I never understood how Madeline still felt that way in 1999.) Madeline wanted to be an artist and spent her high school and college years painting, but when she married, her husband wanted everything neat and she gave it up. But in Magnolia she find new and old friends who make her more comfortable than she has felt in years. While reading her grandmother's diaries, she has to make decisions about her own life.

How to Handle a Cowboy by Joanne Kennedy (2014)

Picked this up in Wall Drug, South Dakota on the way home from Wyoming. Was just looking for some light reading with a Wyoming/Western theme and this fit the bill with hunk on the cover. Yes it was a typical romance, but I did like Sierra Dunn and her devotion to the boys in the group home she was setting up in a small town in Wyoming. Another lost friend, Riley, lands on her doorstep. Ridge is a rodeo cowboy, whose career is over due to a major injury. He is looking for ways to fill the rest of his life. Training horses is one part of it, but he wants to do more and offers to volunteer working with the group home boys, to pay back a bit of what was given to him. Here he meets Sierra and we have the attraction, but reasons on both sides not to engage. I did like the small town Wyoming details, the way they watch out for each other, the things that are important to them in this wide open country. I also liked the fact that the two main characters weren't isolated, but part of a past with connections to other people; Ridge has his brothers and the townspeople.

Thrice the Brinded Cat Hath Mew'd by Alan Bradley (2016)

I hadn't listened to a Flavia de Luce novel for a while, so I thought I would try one again. She does grate on my nerves, but is one spunky and brilliant twelve year old. I have skipped a few of the books in the series and a part of me wants to go back and see why she was sent to Canada and how she fared there, and I'd like to see how she continues growing up, so maybe I will go for some more. Maybe it is the voice of the reader, though it is perfect for Miss know-it-all Flavia, that makes it even more annoying.

For half this book, Flavia is gallivanting about on her bike Gladys - in the winter, often not sufficiently dressed, or taking trains into London. She is asked to deliver a message to Roger Sambridge, a carver, but she find him hanging dead from the back of his bedroom door. She records the details of the scene before she reports it and then goes about following up on all those that may be connected in some way. She finds first editions of Oliver Inchbald's famous children's books, and one inscribed to a girl Flavia knows named Carla - who has a terrible singing voice, but mentions an adventurous deceased aunt Louise Congreve. Of course she figures it all out and passes her deductions to Inspector Hewitt. I never was sure how much he had figured out himself.

In her personal life, Flavia has just returned from Canada, but doesn't like her sisters, so she avoids them. Her father is ill in the hospital with pneumonia, which concerns her greatly, but she somehow never gets around to visiting him over the course of the book. I understand being so concerned that you want to avoid an unpleasant situation, but to be told he shouldn't have visitors would have never stopped anyone like Flavia. Her best friend seems to be the butler Dogger. With her mother gone, at least there is Mrs. M. looking out for her - to the extent she allows herself to be looked after.

The Unquiet Dead (2015) by Ausma Zehanat Khan

Suggested by my audio book store owner, this was a combination mystery and historical novel, a bit like Daniel Silva does with Israeli history. I was not prepared for the intensity of it, and it was about a part of the world - Europe even, where I was unaware of another atrocity, though I lived through it. This time it was about the slaughter of Muslims in Bosnia in the early 1990's.

The story is in current day Toronto - for a while it sounded like the places in Canada were further north, but then I realized that Etobicoke and Scarborough were just suburbs of TO - I have friends living in both. What I did not know was that there are bluffs along Lake Ontario. In my youth I walked along Scarborough beaches, but never came across the bluffs. Will have to remember to check them out when I next visit TO.

Back to the story - Christopher Drayton fell off the bluffs and it appears that this was just an accident, so police are not investigating. But Esa Khattak is asked to look into it, as he works with cases involving ethnic minorities, and he asks Rachel Getty to help him. There is an interesting dynamic between the two of them, and she seems like a few other women investigators I have read about, who have an unhappy family life, not much of a social life, so work becomes very important to them. She has a brother that left home seven years ago that she has been trying to locate. Rachel is definitely my favorite character in the book.

There are quite a few colorful characters in this story - Nate, an old friend of Esa's who lives in Drayton's neighborhood, but something seems to be off between Nate and Esa. Then there is Drayton's fiance Mel - a big bosomed money grubber, who doesn't much care for her two girls, except when their loving dad wants to spend time with them. There is a museum opening in the neighborhood commemorating Andalusia, a hisotrically rich part of southern Spain, which is being developed by a librarian named Mink. The girls like to help out there, and Drayton and other neighbors have been interested in supporting the museum with donations. A couple of gardeners keep the gardens blooming. There is some question about Drayton's identity and pulls us into flashback of the horrors of the literal slaughter of the Muslims by Serbs in Srebrenica and other Bosnian towns.

I have to say I was intrigued by the author's first name Ausma. I was wondering if she was a Latvian who married a Muslim. Most biographies of her were very brief, but then in an interview I realized that she definitely did not have a Latvian background. Just a coincidence with names. I will have to check out her other books.

House of Spies by Daniel Silva (2017)

I know, I just finished another of his books, but I had a long trip to cover, and Silva and his character Gabriel Allon always hold my interest. This is the latest and right on target with today's events. 

I was wondering how Allon, who is now the head of the Israeli intelligence, is going to provide me with an action packed tale while sitting behind a desk. Spoiler alert - he does not just sit behind a desk. He wants to get Saladin - who has been masterminding a lot of the ISIS terrorist attacks in Europe. There seems to be a connection with Jean-Luc Martel, a successful French businessman and his beautiful art gallery owning companion Olivia Watson. (Got to get that art in there.) So Allon brings back the female spy from the Black Widow and friend to pose as a wealthy couple to get close to Martel; and Christopher Keller is back from the English Spy. Even though he is from England, looks like there will always be connections between the Israeli and British intelligence. We again find ourselves traveling around the continent between Israel (just as a home base for Allon), London, Saint-Tropez in the south of France, Casablanca and other parts of Morocco. We have another set of bad guys in Morocco dealing with hashish that is sent in to Europe through Libya and provides funds to ISIS. 

Allon is fascinating to me, as he kills a bad guy and then jumps into a waiting car, and hugs his wonderful wife Kiara. He regrets not seeing his recently born twins awake, as he is always out saving the world. It will be interesting to see if he can find the balance between work and fatherhood. (I just read Silva's biography and he too has twins.)

In the author's notes Silva explains that he finished the book on March 17 of this year - depicting two terrorist actions in London, and on March 22, a terrorist actually did run people over near Westminster Bridge. All the activities in Morocco involving hashish distribution in Europe is also based on fact.

Not as Crazy as I Seem by George Harrar (2003)

Just thought I would pick up a random young adult book. This was the story of Devon, who has OCD. We get the story from his viewpoint - relations in school, at home, with the therapist. In his amusing narrative we see how differently the world can be perceived.

Dark Matter By Blake Crouch (2016)

An interesting premise. At every decision point in our lives we split off into parallel universes, to that there are hundreds, even thousands of universes with us in them living out our lives differently. Do I believe in parallel universes? Not really, though I understand that there are some physics principles and astronomical phenomena that claim this is possible and plenty of science fiction stories play off on this.

We have Jason Dessen, a brilliant quantum physicist, who got married to Daniella, an artist, had a son Charley, and now teaches physics at a Chicago college. He gets kidnapped one night and wakes up in a lab where everyone is thrilled to see him, but he doesn't recognize anyone. He escapes, goes to his house, but it is completely different and then finds that he is not married to Daniella, who lives elsewhere as a successful artist. If he is a bright physicist, I'm not sure why it takes him so long to figure out he is in a parallel universe, but...

With the help of a technician at the lab, Jason goes hopping through universes - some incredible horrible, to find HIS Daniella and Charley.

I do like the idea that our lives are made up of thousands of decesions - some small, but some making a huge impact on our lives. What if I had chosen to go to a different university, or not walked into Stache & Little Brothers where I met Bobby that started my Logan, OH phase of life. Or lost my nerve and not gone to visit Paul, who opened the world of TORI to me. Or not see that article in Laiks that had me calling Valdis and led to moving to Kalamazoo, becoming a librarian and so much more. So yes, I could have led a lot of different lives.

But when we get lots of Jasons appearing in the same world, it just got very weird. Kept wondering if we are following the "real" Jason, but it all worked out - sorta. They did leave quite a mess for someone to sort out.

Comfort Food by Kate Jacobs (2008)

I was looking for a "comfort food" type book to balance the thrillers and heavy historical novels I have been reading. This was OK.

Gus Simpson has a show Cooking with Gusto on a New York food network. She lives in Rye and tapes her shows in her own kitchen. She has two grown daughters that she hovers over too much. She lost her husband when the girls were little and has worked hard. Ratings have been slipping, so the network owner insists she do a live show with a young Spanish cook - Carmen Vega. They do not get along, but the tension between them makes for a good show.

There is a cast of characters that I actually did like. Hannah the recluse neighbor that comes over every morning to be fed and befriended by Gus. Troy, the man who has started a company to put fresh fruit vending machines in schools, airports and elsewhere, who still pines for one of Gus' daughters. Oliver, a former successful investment banker, who gave it up to cook and has been assigned to Gus' team. Or Pryia, a fan of Gus' show, who gets to meet her. I enjoyed the retreat they were all forced to attend for team building. I guess I found plenty to like. Not great, but OK.

Shadow Land by Elizabeth Kostova (2017)

Kostova is one of the authors I always pick up when I see a new book and she didn't disappoint. I do have to say there was a bit of a pall over my lovely weekend up north, as I kept listening to this once again heavy story. You would think I am done with World War II and the Soviet aftermath, but now I got a new perspective - from Bulgaria.

Turns out Kostova herself went to Bulgaria and fell in love, so she has always wanted to write a book wholly located in the country. I would like to think that given a map of Europe with country outlines, I could identify Bulgaria, but without country lines - nope - until now. Between Greece and Romania with a coastline along the Black Sea.

Alexandra Boyd has done nothing special after graduating from college, so after a few years of shelving books in a library (couldn't she move up to more interesting jobs in the library?) she decides to spend a year teaching English in Bulgaria and arrives a bit early to explore the country before she starts working. The taxi from the airport leaves her off at a hotel instead of her hostel. She helps an older couple and a younger man get all their things into a taxi, but then realizes that one of their bags has stayed with her. She spends the rest of the book returning the bag that contains a box of ashes of Stoyan Lazarov.

The taxi driver Bobby (Asparuh) helps her out, brings her to the police as she requests, then follows clues criss-crossing Bulgaria to find the family of Stoyan Lazarov. The adventure takes her to Velin  Monastery(couldn't find it, maybe meant to be Rila), Bovech (maybe be Lovech), major city Plovdiv, Gorno in the mountains, Burgas on the sea.  She meets Bobby's aunt Pavlina, Lazarov's wife's sister Irina, Lazarov's wife Vera, their son Nevan, friend Milen Radev, his daughter and various other characters. 

As we meet these people, slowly the story of Stoyan Lazarov is revealed - a brilliant violinist, who studied in Vienna, but came back as the war was starting, met Vera, courted her, married her, but was taken away to a labor camp. These are the stories I have heard before, but this one just wrenches the heart even more than usual. How does one stay sane to endure the incredible hardships? Lazarov had his music and stayed sane by playing through all the pieces he knew. I have thought about how well I could endure something like this - I think I would lose it. What would I think about? Books? I've forgotten more than I remember. Songs? I've stopped singing them.

Born a Crime by Trevor Noah (2016)

Subtitle: Stories From a South African Childhood.

I like Trevor Noah. Though he is not Jon Stewart, he has held his own on The Daily Show and his outsider's perspective on our politics feels fresh. So it was with pleasure that I listened to Noah read his autobiographical book. His childhood growing up in Soweto was hard. The fact that he had a white father made his birth a crime, and though he did meet with occasionally with his father, he wasn't around. Later his mother married Abel, who was abusive. We get to see a post apartheid world, where things are not easy. I somehow had missed that there are so many languages spoken in South Africa, that it becomes another barrier. Poverty, racism, classism, the various neighborhoods. I did not know South Africans were given real names and then European names. Trevor uses mostly the European names, and it does not look like he had a South African name himself. One of the strangest stories he told was about a great street dancer named Hitler, which did not go over very well in a Jewish school. It was interesting to see from their perspective, that Hitler was just a name, with no inferences. Trevor was lucky his mother provided him with books and good schooling to get him out of the poverty cycle, though he spent some time after high school dealing in pilfered music. His mother was very religious and trusted God and Jesus. There is a story of a miracle at the end of the book that I like to think was the result of her strong belief. We know it all ends well and though he mentions his career as a comedian, he doesn't tell us how he got there. I am sure that will be material for another book. His sense of humor got me through the hard parts of his book.

Radiant Child by Javaka Steptoe (2016)

Subtitle: The story of young artist Jean-Michel Basquiat.

Got to keep up with those Caldecott books. This is the story of an artist in New York (OK, so he grew up in Brooklyn with a Puerto Rican mother and father from Haiti. I've definitely seen his work, but knew nothing about this artist who drew as a child, moved into graffiti and then became a successful, well know artist with a message against capitalism, colonialism and those with power in the late 1970's and 1980's.

Steptoe, the author/illustrator of this book has created interesting pieces of art on every page. The illustrations are painted on boards, which give them a rugged authentic look. He has recreated Basquiat's work through his own interpretation. He even recreated Picasso's Guernica, which must have been fun. Steptoe tells a story for children, but then in the back there is some more biographical information. Since I love historical fiction, especially art history fiction, I enjoyed this book.

The Chemist by Stephenie Meyer (2016)

This is the same Stephenie Meyer of Twilight fame. The cover caught my eye and I liked the idea of the hero of a thriller being a woman, not just a side-kick. Alex or whatever her name is on her fake ID is on the run. She was a brilliant med student and chemist, who had been working in a top secret federal lab on compounds that affect the nervous system. She called herself the Chemist, one character later called her Poison Lady and Oleander/Ollie for a poisonous plant.  (I thought it was a flower of sorts from memories of the book White Oleander, but turns out it is a shrub.) 

Her mentor/lab partner gets killed and she barely avoids the same fate, so is on the run. She sets up elaborate chemical protections before going to sleep with a gas mask in a bathtub every night. She moves around a lot and tries to leave no trace. She goes to libraries to read up on how to stay safe - from non-fiction, but also thriller novels. I did feel a twinge when she cut out the tattle-tape from a few library books.

She gets an email from her old boss apologizing for trying to kill her on a number of occasions, but that they really need her skills. Some deadly virus is about to be let loose and only she will be able to get the information out of the perpetrator. She knows this could be a trap, which it is.

Her target is Michael, a seemingly mild-mannered teacher who coaches volleyball and works with Habitat for Humanity in Mexico, but that there he has hooked up with evil doers. Strangely he falls for Alex as soon as he set eyes on her - before stuff gets weird. 

Michael's brother Kevin swoops in like Batman and has stashes of weapons and disguises which Alex likes to call his bat caves. The unusual trio run, hide and fight around the country, trying to figure out who has it in for them. They are joined by Val, a sometime girlfriend of Kevin's, who has parleyed her beauty into a lucrative business. She comes in handy with her make-up skills. Then there are the dogs. Kevin raises and trains amazing protective dogs - Einstein , Lola, and others. They are great companions, fiercely loyal, intelligent, and save the human lives more than once.

I have stated before that I don't like torture and there were two scenes I could have done without, but the rest was good. My only quibble with the book is in the happily ever after ending. Would Alex be happy in the fairly mundane role we see her in the epilogue? She is a brilliant scientist. Does she still get to use her talents?

Britt-Marie Was Here by Fredrik Backham (2016)

Another heart-warming book by Backman. I no longer know the diagnoses of his characters, and I have to be patient in the beginning as his main characters' personalities and stories emerge. We see Britt-Marie in the unemployment office looking for a job, though she has not worked outside the home for decades. Rubbing the finger where a ring once sat explains why. Surprisingly she gets sent to Borg to take care of their rec center, which the town has forgotten to close. The town is dying with only a pizza joint/corner store/post office still operating. Britt-Marie's one skill and obsession is cleaning and organizing, so she sets off doing just that. In the process she encounters a band of kids who like to play football (soccer), a couple of older women who drink too much, the local policeman who has taken every crafts course available and more town folk. Of course she ends up helping out the kids, the town and finding herself - in the most unusual ways. Though this is set in Denmark, it could be any town that has run into hard times. There are so many wonderful details, like the unemployment worker, who at times is driven crazy by Britt-Marie's calls, but who also find hope in these encounters. I always feel so good about humanity after Backman's books.

1984 by George Orwell (1949)

Seems like everyone is rereading this classic in this current baffling political climate. Fake news and alternative facts fit in perfectly into Orwell's world. Winston Smith works in the Ministry of Truth, altering facts in past publication when those in power declare white is black, or when someone is arrested and killed, every mention of them is erased.

I couldn't help but try to think this through logically - so if they had to rewrite an article in a newspaper and it gets reprinted in some central location, what happens to all the other copies that were distributed elsewhere throughout the land. The other thought I had was that Orwell couldn't even imagine how easy it would be to dumb down the general public. Back in 1984 we still had newspapers, but now they are dying out and how many people read them anyway. People get their information from media (like the telescreen in the book) selectively - what they want to hear and we see now how easy it is to plant fake news.

Big Brother is Watching You! This definitely reminds me of all the surveillance done by the Soviets. One whole floor of a multi-story hotel in Riga was devoted to it. I always wondered how much staffing was needed to watch/listen to guests in all the rooms. Or to open all the mail, especially that coming or going outside fo the USSR. So again, I am wondering how they wired the whole world with surveillance - even out in the woods, and who did all the watching. I still think there are remote parts of the world they could not watch. But then again, think of now, we are all being followed through our electronic devices and online presence and surveillance cams are all over. 

I liked the appendix exploring newsspeak, the minimized language. Another phenomenon we are seeing today. I hope cool heads and intellect and reason prevail, but we have seen the destruction of intellectuals in authoritarian regimes before, and it could happen again.

I dislike reading about torture. I was freaked out in childhood when I read how Soviets tortured school kids in Latvia. I know it really happened then and happens now, but I am deeply opposed to it and hate it in books and movies. In 1984 it was awful to see Winston broken. Just like I never saw the Soviet purpose of deporting people, especially the young and old, and not providing citizens - the working class - with the basic necessities. This is coming up in Follet's Edge of Eternity. I've just started it, but one character already said: "How can we solve the problems (under Communism) if we can't even discuss them."

(Since I was listening to audio and did not have a cover image, I had to choose from the many that have been created for this book. This one looked familiar. I think this is what the book looked like when I first read it in the 1970's.)

Stars Above by Marissa Meyer (2016)

It seems that Marissa Meyer had left too many quetsions unanswered, so here we have six stories from the Lunar Chronicles about the origins of the main characters and the happily ever after ending. How did Scarlett come to live with her grandmother and how did grandma Michele get involved in taking care of Cinder while she grew up in a suspension module? We see Cinder's fate before she moved to New Beijing, how Iko came to be Cinder's good friend, the scene at the market where Prince Kai brings his android to be fixed by Lynn Cinder - but this time from his point of view. I don't know how much it would make sense for someone who hasn't read the other full novels. For instance, you know that Cinder is standing on one foot the whole time, as she is talking to the prince. He notices something, but doesn't realize what. Then there is the story of how Wolf was transformed into the part wolf being. And how Winter and Jason go back to early childhood, as their fathers were guards together, and Jason always protected Winter. What a rogue young Thorne was, and how Cress got commandeered to spy on Earth from space. Of course, the lovely ending with them all gathering for Scarlett and Wolf's wedding, but we get to hear how they have all fared in the couple of years since the end of the last book. Enjoyed it.

The Lover by Marguerite Duras (1984)

Translated from French by Barbara Bray (1985)
Read this as it was one of the books on a list recommended by Roxanne Gay - a keynote speaker at a library conference in Baltimore this spring.

It's been a long time since I've read something like this. I would call it stream of consciousness. Why do I have a need for chapters, places where I can draw my breath? This whole book consisted of  vignette's (not the right word), usually a paragraph, no more than a page and a half in length in a small format book. The girl is 15 and a half, lives in Saigon with her mother and brother in a boarding school, goes to a French high school, dreams of being a writer. On the ferry she meets a Chinese man in a big black limousine. They become lovers, but his family would not hear of him marrying her. She eventually moves to Paris and has a life. With plenty of jumps into the past and future. Turns out this is autobiographical.

I don't regret reading it, but can't say I got a lot out of it. Maybe I am just too used to the typical plot driven book, though this too had a story too, and beautiful writing.

Island of Glass by Nora Roberts (2016)

Had to finish the last of the Guardians Trilogy. Though this series seems to find more of a balance between the six characters - they do function and evolve as a team, but then each book is focused on one of the couples. This time it was Doyle and Riley's turn. He is the immortal, who has suffered for centuries, as those he loves or becomes close to, die; and she is the archaeologist, scholar, adventuress, who also happens to turn into a wolf three nights a month. Of course they are suited for each other, it just took a bit longer for them to discover this than their companions Bran & Sasha and Anika & Sawyer.

They have returned to Bran's home in Ireland to try to figure out where to look for the third star - the Ice Star. Turns out he has built his home on the ruins of where Doyle's family home once stood. Once they find the star, they have to find the Island of Glass and return all three starts to the goddesses.The magic is a bit hokey, the fight scenes not too engaging, and I figured out what Doyle and Anika would get as rewards from the goddesses, but it was a fun story anyway. I like the daily interactions better than the main events, and the subplot of the three guys getting their ladies rings. I have wondered what has happened to the old gods of yore, as has Neil Gaimon in some of his books, so there is a satisfaction to hear a fairy tale of devotion to a quest with superheroes of sorts.

Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys (2011)

Ruta Sepetys is a Lithuanian-American who is writing novels about our Baltic history. This is very like our own Ruta U.'s Dear God, I Wanted to Live. The story is very similar, how a family that has committed no crimes is dragged out of their house in the middle of the night - men separated out and sent to prison camps, women and children put into cattle cars and then sent off to Siberia. The Latvian version by Ruta U. is actually written by someone who experienced it herself, being deported at age 14. In this story the girl Lina is 15 and written by someone who has researched these deportations. Lina travels with her mother and younger brother. They spend a month and a half in the cattle car getting to their first labor camp, where they live in a hut with a Russian woman while they work, but then they are taken to another place north of the Arctic Circle, where they are expected to build their own shelter - a yurt, and of course many do not survive the winter. Stalin is responsible for the deaths of an estimated 20 million people. This is less known than Hitler's atrocities, so these kinds of books are important. It looks like this has been made into a film, but I can't find any references to it being out yet. I believe it is called Ashes in the Snow. With all the other shades of gray books and movies out there, the original title might not work. 

A minor detail is the maps in front of the book. I always like books with maps that show me where the action is taking place. This map is very familiar to me, as have taught excerpts from Dear God, I Wanted to Live at the Latvian school for years, and one of our activities is to follow their trip on a map of the Soviet Union, so the path of these deportees was very similar. I find it interesting, that at the end of Between Shades of Gray, when Lina has spent two of her twelve years of imprisonment, her thoughts are focused on survival, on wanting to live, as in the title of our Latvian book.

Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese (2009)

This book was suggested by a friend years ago, and I finally got around to reading/listening to it. The book is interesting on various planes - and I understand the attraction for her to all the medical descriptions, as my friend is a vet.

I understand Verghese is an Ethiopian-born medical doctor, so much of the story takes place in Ethiopia, a place that holds interest for me, as I work with a journal and conference on African development that focuses a lot on Ethiopia. It helped me visualize Addis Ababa and understand the various political upheavals the country has endured.

Actually, few of the characters were Ethiopians. Stone of the title is a British surgeon from India. Sister Mary, Hema, and Gosh are Indian expat doctors and nurses. Even of the "locals" some are Eritreans - and I had to look up the Ethiopian-Eritrean conflict, finding out that Eritrea broke off in 1993. Ethiopia itself has an interesting and unenviable history. It was interesting to hear about medical education in India and Ethiopia and then how those that land in the U.S. have difficulty getting into the major hospitals, but work in those treating the poor populations of Americans. All of these doctors in the story were highly dedicated to their work, their patients, and some even managed to come up with medical breakthroughs.

All of this interesting information was couched in an engrossing story of a set of twin brothers born in an Addis Ababa hospital. Unfortunately their mother does not survive and father disappears, so they are brought up by Hema and Ghosh, two other doctors at the hospital. The story is told by Marion, one of the twins - as he reconstructs his birth parents story, remembers his own childhood and puberty (very touching), how he started helping Ghosh at the hospital and realized he too wanted to be a doctor. His twin Shiva was brilliant, but not one to follow narrow guidelines, so he ends up helping Hema in her work with obstetrics without going to med school. The brothers are incredibly close, but different and life does separate them. 

This was a beautiful story of human compassion and endurance, of family ties, even if not by blood, and opened my heart and eyes to one more part of the world.

My Not so Perfect Life by Sophie Kinsella (2017)

I do like these Sophie Kinsella books. Katie is a young woman from Somerset,the countryside in England, but wants to have a career in branding, a form of marketing, and live in London. She gets a job in a company as a junior researcher. Her boss is the brilliant, but scatterbrained Demeter. Katie is given a boring job and she tries to figure out office politics. She lives in a tiny apartment with two others, has a long commute, but keeps posting lovely photos of London an supposedly her perfect life in London. Then she meets Alex at work and has fun with him trying out various toys from China and hanging out a bit, but because of some errors, the company isn't doing well and she gets laid off.

Back in Somerset her father and stepmother want to start a glamping business on their farm, and Katie ends up helping them. (I had heard of glamping, but this gave me more of an insight.) Of course Katie is great at marketing and the business takes off, but then Demeter shows up.

Anyway, good story of  young girl finding herself with the internal dialog Kinsella is so good at. Katie starts out thinking others have these perfect lives and in the end realizes that everyone has bright and shiny spots in their lives and crap reality too.

Apprentice in Death by J.D. Robb (2016)

There is no way I will keep up with all of Nora Roberts' books as JD Robb or otherwise, but every once in a while I want to dip in to see how Eve Dallas, Lt. of the NYPD and her rich tech savvy husband Roarke are doing. This was a gripping one as people were being picked off by a skilled long range sniper. = Roarke was able to quickly develop a program to pick certain buildings that could fit the criteria for being the nests, or places from which the sniper shot and thus ID the killer. But killer wasn't alone - it was a young apprentice, being guided by a damaged, but skillful mentor.

I guess the theme is nature or nurture. Was this young person born with something innately off, that they could kill for sport, for revenge against the world? Could the mentor have guided the child in a different direction? I like that Eve's work world is always interspersed with some personal, real life events. She is dreading going to her best friend Mavis' daughter's first birthday. But in the end she has bagged the killers and reluctantly attends this party with all those little crawlers she does not understand. But Eve starts watching them and realizing they are fascinating too, that a lot is going on in those little heads. I wonder if this is a step toward her having one of her own.

The story is typical Eve Dallas story, with great police work, lots of teamwork, crafty interviewing, tech solutions, exhaustion, scrapes and bruises on Eve, support from Roarke (keep wondering when he runs all his businesses, but he is superman). I really like that Eve is no nonsense and when Roarke wants to give her a new command central office in their home, he has to give her an extreme girly version that he knows she will hate, before giving her more mellow options from which she can really choose something. I observe that Nora Roberts gets off on describing clothing - crazy clothing from the future (this book is set in 2061). Eve dresses very simply, but you see her reacting against Peabody's colorful coats and clothes and ragging on others too. I guess it also lightens the mood between murders and the heaviness of murder investigations. I also saw a bit of a potential school shooting theme.

The Hidden Life of Trees by Peter Wohlleben (2015)

Translation from German 2016. I had heard of this book and it was on our popular reading shelf. The whole concept was interesting, but not interesting enough to finish the whole book, though I skimmed the rest of the chapters.

I really did not know that trees can communicate with each other, warn each other about predators, help each other by providing nutrients to the weak, and that the massive root structures are responsible for a lot of this. I know I have heard of huge fungi growing underground, and the fungi have an important role in forests, but the roots! I just feel I am constantly fighting with the roots of the many trees on my property, when I try to work on a flower bed - often a solid mass of roots. One of the biggest questions I had while reading this was - how in the world did they measure all this and get the data, as trees function much more slowly than we do - and more slowly than the Ents in Lord of the Rings. Another question I had, and which might have been answered in one of the chapters I did not read - What happens to the roots and fungi when a forest is cleared? Do they just rot away? I assume for a while they provide fertile soil for crops, but then with erosion and decay, it probably is much less so.

I Am Pilgrim by Terry Hayes (2013)

Bought this on the suggestion of a friend for "light" reading as we hung out together in a bookstore. What a roller coaster ride of a thriller! Started it in print, misplaced it, listened to it, and the end couldn't wait, so finished it in print.

While I was reading this, I kept thinking that most of us have a life full of adventures and major life events, but they are not usually told all at once unless one is writing a biography, but it seems that we hear the life story of Scott Murdoch in this one book. Of course his life story is exponentially more exciting than ours. When I was done with the book, I realized the author had threaded every past experience from Scott into the solution or resolution of this story. There seemed to be no loose threads at the end. I liked that the story of how he had learned to sail from his father comes into play at the end. Maybe the art collection could have been played out more, but it did have a resolution of sorts.

The narrator is Scott or Pilgrim or one of many names he used over the years as a special secret agent of the U.S. We meet him at a crime scene in New York, where he has been asked to consult by the NYPD's Ben Bradley. This seemingly unconnected perfect crime, based on a book about crime investigation written by Scott under the name of Jude Garrett, does connect with future events. Here are some of the stories we get:

• Perfect murder in NYC post 911
• Scott's childhood Harvard education and recruitment, early career
• A mole in Moscow
• Greek drug dealing family acting as money men for Moscow
• Child visiting an almost forgotten Nazi concentration camp and an image of a woman and her children walking to their death leaves a never to be forgotten impression
• Words of wisdom from a monk in Thailand
• Retiring and living in Paris to write book
• Ben Bradley in 911
• Ben Bradley discovering Jude Garrett's identity
• Crazy operation in Bodrum Turkey years ago
• Wild parties in the ruins of a city partially underwater
• Investigating the death of a rich American in Bodrum
• Cumali, the female cop in Bodrum and her cute son

And those are just some of the stories from our hero's life. We get as many from the "bad guy", Zakaria al-Nassouri, but called Saracen throughout the book, a name that means "Arab" and in an older form "nomad." So of course our story is about the great hatred that some Arabs have towards the West, especially the United States. The Saracen's fate is sealed by the beheading of his father in Saudi Arabia. He turns to a very conservative mosque, goes to fight in Afghanistan, changes identities and becomes a doctor and hatches a most awful weapon to destroy America. He is as intuitive and intelligent as Scott and it is fascinating to see his evolution, the factors that contribute to his hatred, the chaos of the Middle East where he can lose himself, the brilliance of his plans. I did like the fact that this book took us to many countries around the globe.

It is strange, maybe even inappropriate, to be reading this book about Middle Eastern terrorist enemies in a time when we are trying to keep calm after our administration spews such inappropriate things against immigrants and non-Americans. I know that most Muslims and Arabs just want peace in the world. But with the lack of respect shown by our leadership, I am afraid that more will become fearful and that fear can turn to hate. I do not know how to combat those groups that teach hatred towards others, other than to stand up for the rights of our immigrants (as were my parents), international students, refugees and welcome them, as they have all helped make our country a better place.

Evening Class by Maeve Binchy (1998)

I seem to like Maeve Binchy's colorful tapestries of humanity. She finds a way to bring together a group of disparate people, each dealing with their own issues, and somehow they help each other heal and live fuller lives. This one started a bit slow with Aidan Dunne, a Latin teacher, expecting to become the headmaster, but Tony O'Brien gets the job instead. Aidan just could not understand how this good looking, but not very involved teacher, should get it. Aidan wants to teach a class in Italian to the community, but that only becomes a reality when Signora shows up with her passion for Italy that she can share with others, but she has a mysterious past. The class fills up with bank clerk Bill, his fiancee Lizzie, rich woman Connie, sulky Lou, young and a bit slow Kathy. Each chapter is from the point of view of one of the characters - Aidan, Signora, Bill, Kathy, Lou, Connie, Laddy, Fiona, Viaggio. I read this months ago, so the details have been forgotten already, but I enjoy being in Binchy's Irish world.

2016 in Review

It has been a busy year for me, but I also did quite a bit of traveling, so I did get to listen to plenty of books. I was not good at keeping up with my blog this year, so there will be some I will try to add after this, and some I will just have missed.

Seems like many of my favorite authors had come out with books recently so I read Ann Patchett’s Commonwealth, Elizabeth Gilbert’s Big Magic, Annie Proulx’s Barkskins, Isabel Allende’s Japanese Lover, Tracy Chevalier’s At the Edge of the Orchard, and Geraldine Brooks’ The Secret Chord.

I seemed to inadvertently hit a World War Two theme this year, starting with Ken Follet’s massive Winter of the World, which I followed by Hannah’s Nightingale, that seemed to fill in gaps or continue in depth the story of French resistance, which I also glimpsed in All the Light We Cannot See last year. The Aviator’s Wife about Charles Lindbergh’s wife took us through WWII also, when they were very unpopular. One of the Massie Dobbs book also covered this era and Philip Dick took me to an alternate history where Germany and Japan had won the war in The Man in the High Castle.

I discovered two new mystery series that I really loved. Kelly Greenwood’s Phryne Fisher series set in Australia in the 1920’s is a delight and quite addictive. Every one is based on some historical fact. I think I’ve now read everything they have at the audio store, I may need to get the rest in print. The other was Louise Penney’s Gamache series. He is the chief inspector of murders for Quebec, but he keeps being diverted to this small town of Three Pines. These are slow, lazy stories where we get to know the people involved. I continued to read Baldacci and Silva.

I decided on giving up on the too dark and evil mysteries by some of the Scandinavians, but Fredrik Backman came out with another heartwarming tale of humanity in My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry.

I did try to do some classic reading, my oldest books was Thomas Hardy’s Far from the Madding Crowd (1874)– wow has how language changed. I remember reading the Scarlet Pimpernel as a Reader’s Digest Condensed book as a child and always felt good that I got references to it, but it was time to reread this 1905 book in its entirety. I read PD Wodehouse’s The Mating Season, as I had never read any of the Jeeves stories. And the Philip Dick book was from 1962 – not ancient history, but still not contemporary.

I got around to some non fiction too, my favorite being Gilbert’s Big Magic on creativity, but Michael Kinsley’s Old Age: A Beginner's Guide was valuable too.

Twelve Days of Christmas by Debbie Macomber (2016)

Just a quick Christmas read. Julia has a grumpy neighbor and needs a subject to write about in a blog that would gather followers as she vies for a job. She decides to try to overwhelm Cain with kindnessa - and is surprised by the results. (Read in December)

Kubla Khan by Kathleen Krull (2010)

Subtitle: The Emperor of Everything. Illustrated by Robert Byrd. 

I don't know why, but I am fascinated by Genghis Khan, Kubla Khan, the Terracotta Army, Silk Road and the like. I still know too little about this part of the world and those times, but children's books sometimes can inform without getting too complex. Though a picture book, there was plenty of text and I put another snippet of history into my personal RAM. Kubla Khan lived in the 13th century and ruled over most of Asia and beyond. Marco Polo wrote about him, which in turn inspired Columbus. 

Last Stop on Market Street by Matt De la Pena (2015)

Illustrated by Christian Robinson. A Caldecott Honor book about grandma taking her grandson by bus to the last stop on Market Street to help out in a soup kitchen. Touching.

Black Widow by Daniel Silva (2016)

Silva continues to draw me in. This time Gabriel Allon plays less of a role, but instead he sends a woman to infiltrate a terrorist group after an ISIS bombing kills a friend, who once helped Allon out by lending a rare painting. The mysterious leader they are targeting is called Saladin, after a 12th century Muslim warrior. (This name is also used in I am Pilgrim, a book I am reading now.) Natalie Mizrahi pretends to be a black widow - someone who has lost her husband/boyfriend in the recent violence and is ready to give up her own life for the cause. She is Jewish, but knows Arabic and is trained by Allon's people to think like a terrorist and is taken in for training in a terrorist camp. Natalie is a doctor and ends up saving the life of Saladin- her training won't let her do otherwise. The whole experience is quite harrowing and leads to Washington DC. I hope she becomes a regular operative as Allon takes over the helm of Israeli intelligence. (Read in 2016)

Heartless by Marissa Meyer (2016)

Marissa Meyer does it again. This time she takes on Alice in Wonderland and gives us the back story to the mean Queen of Hearts. After finishing Heartless, I went back to reread the parts of the original book about the queen and watched the Disney movie. I realized that Meyer had included much of that story - including the short, ineffectual king, Mad Hatter and his tea party and all the characters around the table. She had the croquet game with groundhog balls and flamingo clubs. I could imagine the cards hitting the ground as I had the image in my head from the movie.

Turns out Catherine was really a sweet girl from a rich family whose dream was to open a bakery, as she loves to bake, but her parents want her to marry the king. (Didn't the Queen of Hearts yell something about tarts?) A joker shows up, who captures her heart, but it all goes wrong, when Peter the Pumpkin Eater, from the nursery rhyme, shows up with his wife. Jabberwocky makes an appearance - I had to look up the reference, it was a nonsense poem by Lewis Carroll in a sequel to Alice. We see that there are other worlds - like the world of Chess that has a White Queen and a Red Queen that are constantly at war. All in all, quite entertaining.

My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry by Fredrik Backman (2015)

Another delightful book from Backman, author of A Man Called Ove. This too builds slowly and then magically blooms into a heartwarming story of humanity.

Elsa is a 7 year old girl, who loves books and comics and is very bright, though she doesn't have friends. Her parents are divorced, her mother is busy with her career, so spends a lot of time with her grandmother. Grandma was a doctor saving lives around the world, is still constantly up for adventures and tells Elsa fairy tales - often based on real people. When grandma dies, she leaves Elsa a puzzle - envelopes she has to hand out to different people - but one at a time, so she gets to know them, and finds out how they were tied to grandma. Plus grandma has asked them all to watch over her. We rarely know the secrets of the individuals around us, what is behind the slick or weird exteriors. When you find out, their appearance and actions make sense. This was just a very feel-good book.

I'm Not a Terrorist but I've Played One on TV by Maz Jobrani (2015)

An Iraqi student gave me this very funny and spot-on book by comedian Maz Jobrani. He was born in Iran, but grew up in America, so very American. In one sense his is the typical immigrant story of parents expecting their children to become lawyers and dealing with them when he decides to take a different path to happiness and success. But it is different because he is a Middle Easterner and all the stereotyping that goes along with that. As the title indicates, he has been asked to wear turbans and play terrorists, which he now refuses to do. He has dealt with profiling - and his own fear of being profiled. I was glad to hear him share his thoughts around 911 and the precarious state for all Middle Easterners after that. He has married a woman from India to add to the wonderful melting pot of America.

Maz is funny. He has taken really heavy topics and covered them in a humorous, easy-to read and digest way. I broke out in laughter on more than one occasion. What surprised me was that he has performed in the Middle East and is a great hit there. I would expect that he would have to find the balance between being funny and offensive there, but obviously, he has found the right tone and they love him, bootleg DVDs of his performances and even kings have come to see him. Humor is tricky, and I have to say that there are a lot of comedians and types of humor I don't like, but I would actually like to go see him perform. Looks like he is in Chicago in March. Maybe...