Are Men Necessary? by Maureen Dowd (2005)

Maureen Dowd is one of my favorite opinion columnists, along with Barbara Erehnreich, and the recently deceased Molly Ivins. I've been reading this book for a few months, as it really isn't a story, but a series of essays on gender issues. Many of her facts are quite disconcerting - the huge increase in plastic surgery in the last few years, the way the younger women seem to be going backwards on many women's rights issues. Fascinating compilation of current cultural indicators, but not in an academic sense. This kind of book cries out for footnotes and a bibliography, but it is not that kind of an academic book.

Gold Coast by Nelson DeMille (1990)

I don't remember why this book was recommended to me and, for a while, I thought that the 25 hours of listening time would never be over, but I have to say, the book grew on me. When I finished it, I went back to the introduction to again hear how DeMille was inspired by The Great Gatsby, and described his idea as "Godfather meets Great Gatsby on the Gold Coast". I have to admit, that even though I grew up in the New York City area, I had never heard of the Gold Coast - the northern shore of Long Island, where the richest of the rich used to have their mansions. DeMille himself grew up on Long Island and remembers the great construction boom, which I was aware of, as many Latvian immigrants found jobs building up Long Island in the 50's and 60's.

The story is narrated by John Whitman Sutter, a blue blood lawyer, who has married Susan Stanhope Sutter, who grew up in one of the now deserted mansions. I was interested in the history of this Gold Coast, how the rich settled out here, and how taxes and the Great Depression made these mansions impossible to maintain, so they were often deserted, bulldozed, or sold to institutions. I had a hard time listening to the idle lifestyle of the rich. John is a lawyer, and at least does some work, but still has time for long lunches at the club, and takes off weeks or months to spend in a summer home sailing. Susan rides her horse every day, does some gardening, socializing, and belongs to the Gazebo Club. I guess I need to understand that there are people that live that way, but it was a frustrating read. All people have their demons, and John Sutter's seemed to arise out of boredom, maybe some discontent of this laid back lifestyle. In the first line of the book, John meets Frank Bellarosa, the biggest Mafia don remaining in New York, who has just moved into the estate next door - Alhambra. As a straight laced lawyer, John is repelled by this man and wants nothing to do with him, but Bellarosa is engaging and definitely not boring. Susan too was drawn to this man, as was I. John keeps repeating how this man is dangerous and manipulating, but gets drawn into Bellarosa's life anyway, and watches his own crumble. I am naive in many ways and want to believe the best in people, so I was drawn to Bellarosa's humor, ties to his community, the way he bought goodies for his wife, or planted tomato and other edible plants. I was totally intrigued by the descriptions of Little Italy and the Italian immigrant community, finding some parallels with Latvians. We never had a place like Little Italy, where all could "come home." My aunt married a Sicilian, and I was vaguely aware that he had close ties with his Italian buddies and went to his club to play cards.

For a long time I thought John's problems were outgrowths of his own discontent, but slowly realized that most of them were created by Bellarosa. Since I have never read anything by DeMille, I didn't know he is a writer of thrillers, but there was a simmering thriller underneath. This is not his typical work and it was not reviewed well, but as people started reading it, it became popular among readers, and is sometimes used as a companion to The Great Gatsby in college courses.

Smoke in Mirrors by Jayne Ann Krentz (2002)

This was recommended on some library list because the main character is a librarian. Yea! A good mystery with various twists and turns. The romances all came together a bit too patly, but hey, this was just for fun. Leonora's friend Meredith dies, and Thomas Walker comes looking for her, thinking she knows about some big money Meredith scammed out of an alumni endowment fund. Thomas' brother Deke is convinced his wife was murdered a year ago, and maybe Meredith too. The alumni house is the Mirror House, as it has a collection of antique mirrors, and a library to support that collection, that Leonora comes up to catalog online. I liked the setting in the foggy sounds of the state of Washington. There are various references to academe - getting tenure and the sort, enough to make it feel comfortable. I liked Thomas with his dog Wrench - the guy is into tools, and my favorite passage is when he dresses down Leonora's ex - the academic.

Your Oasis on Flame Lake by Lorna Landvik (1997)

I picked this book up becuase I really enjoyed her Angry Housewives Eating Bon Bons. I had a harder time getting into this book, but found it depicted family connections and disconnections pretty well. The story is told by various members of two families - Devera and Dick with daughter Darcy and BiDi and Sergio. Devera and BiDi are best friends from high school, and all the adults seem to be going through a mid-life crises. BiDi seems pretty shallow with ther focus on looks and totally not understanding her daughter Franny, who plays on the hockey team. Sergio really loves BiDi and is very supportive of Franny, though she is not his daughter. Devera is looking for something and ends up having an affair. Dick works on his dream of having a neighborhood nightclub in his basement. He enjoys singing and his daughter Darcy loves to MC and tell jokes. She also becomes a good friend to Franny. Her older sister goes through usual teenage angst, though Franny has the hardest time. I was amazed at the goodness of these two men, and this turned into a feel-good novel for me, even BiDi redeamed herself at the end.

Nature Girl by Carl Hiaasen (2006)

I saw this reviewed in a few places, so I listened to this mostly funny book set in the Everglades. It has a wide range of characters that somehow end up connected. My favorite was Sammy Tigertail, a half-seminole who is trying to get away from it all and figure out who he really is, except that these attractive, very talkative women keep offering to be his hostage. I found this very funny. More poignant is a boy, whose parents are divorced, and who would like to see them back together again, but doesn't want to be hurt again by their fighting and splitting. His mother, Honey Santana, is the "nature girl" who takes revenge on Boyd Shreve, a phone salesman, who is such a slimy and stupid guy, that I actually had a hard time listening to the sections about him. Honey cons Boyd into coming to Florida, and takes him and his girlfriend out on a kayak trip around the islands in the Everglades. All sorts of other people end out there and for a while it is like a Midsummer Night's Dream with people looking for each other, except a couple of them have guns with them. I guess it all was pretty entertaining.

Firework Maker's Daughter by Philip Pullman (1999)

I somehow was expecting a bit more from the author of the Goldan Compass trilogy, but since this was a very short - 2CD - listen, I guess it had a few interesting ideas. A girl lives with her father, who makes fireworks and teaches her to make them. Her best friend is responsible for a white elephant, who at times gets covered with graffiti and advertisements. She goes on a quest, etc., etc. Maybe I've just been spoiled by some excellent, innovative writing for young adults, so this just felt formulaic to me, but would probably just be fine for young readers.

Looks like I have to amend this. Turns out, this is probably full of Asian folklore that I did not even realize. The white elephant in the story was given to people the ruler did not like, and they were responsible for feeding it and taking care of it until they went broke - so it was an unwanted gift, that you wanted to give away. This is the actual background to "white elephant" gifts of today.

Sampinjona deriba by Laima Muktupavela (2002)

The Mushroom Covenant is a novel about Latvians going to Ireland to work. At the time the novel was written, I believe there were about 10,000 Latvians in Ireland. The number is currently more like 30,000. Muktupavela went to Ireland herself and worked, to see what it was like. She has a background in history and journalism, so she was very observant, but this is not her story, it is a woman with nothing to lose in Latvia. It is just strange to read about my own people being treated like migrant workers - which they are, though they are educated, cultured, etc., but without the knowledge of English, they appear ignorant to many of the Irish. The interactions between the Latvians living and working together are disturbingly distant. The mushrooms in the title refer to the mushrooms our main characters are picking seven days a week. Sometimes they get paid, sometimes they don't. There are good employers and not so good employers. Muktupavela looks at the various motivations of workers to go to Ireland, and what they do with the money they earn. I think this wave of migration is ripe for all sorts of research.

Alvas kliedziens by Gundega Repse (2002)

I wasn't going to list Latvian books in this blog, but I felt I had to list two that I read during Christmas break. The title of this translates as The Tin Scream - a sound made by tin when bent. I am looking for current Latvian fiction to use in teaching about life in Latvia under Soviets and in the era of new independence. I understand that Repse has based this book on her actual diaries from the time she was eleven to sixteen. Much of it reflects normal childhood ups and downs, but her story is full of small details that differ from our childhoods in the U.S. As she gets older, she has a harder time conforming to what is expected of a good soviet student, and with troubles at home, she starts acting out, which is interpreted as mental illness and she is drugged and eventually hospitalized. The normal childhood story gets quite intense. The book would have to be excerpted very selectively, but it has some important scenes like when some students decide to attend church on Christmas eve, and as they come out of the church, a teacher is writing down their names and they are later called in for interrogations. (Definitely more than just a plain discussion.) I don't think our children understand what it was like under the Soviets.

The Prophet of Yonwood by Jeanne DuPrau (2006)

A prequel to our much enjoyed books The City of Ember and The People of Sparks. Though interesting in and of itself, it left my son and me unsatisfied as a third book to this provocative series.

Imperium by Robert Harris (2006)

I picked this up because I really like Harris' Pompeii. This was about the historical figure Cicero (106-43 BC), an orator, statesman, political theorist, lawyer and philosopher of Ancient Rome, as nicely summarized by Wikipedia. This historical novel actually gave me more than I ever wanted to know about Cicero, but since it was an audio book, I sat through it and actually was glad I did. The novel is narrated by Cicero's slave, who acts as his secretary and scribe, a man who invented shorthand, to capture almost every word Cicero said. I asked our rare books librarian how did all this text from Cicero survive the ages, as I haven't really heard of vast Roman tablet collections. She explained that the important stuff was transcribed over the ages and these transcriptions have survived.

I enjoyed the detailed descriptions of Roman life, and was fascinated by the political process. Much of our democratic process was developed way back then. Though oratory is still very important in our political process - think campaign speeches and state of the ___ addresses, but I am glad we have gotten away from speeches that last hours. (I remember suffering through some very lengthy speeches on Latvian independence days. Wonder if anyone has collected and analyzed those speeches over the years.)