54. The Remains of the Day

The Remains of the Day - Kazou Ishiguro

I enjoy Ishiguro's novels a little. I never thought they were fantastic, but they never suck. This one goes right along with the others. No big thrill, but it was not horrible either.

This book took a long time to read. I started and then stopped probably five times. It was good enough to know I wanted to finish, but not good enough to delay beginning something else. This last few weeks I made it a goal to finish a number of "those" books. :-)

39. Pirate Latitudes

Pirate Latitudes - Michael Crichton

How many of Michael Crichton's book have a I read? I can't remember. I do know that they were intensely detailed and very high-tech.

Then I saw this one. Pirates? 1665? Port Royal, Jamaica? How in the world would Crichton pull off his story-telling style? If he was not describing the details of DNA manipulation and nano-bots he was writing some super technical medical stuff. This was totally different.

Crichton pulled it off. This is a great swashbuckler of a pirate novel. It was a bit cliche, but was still a ton of fun and very detailed with information about technology of the day.

The story was predictable. Most pirate stories are. Good guys are also bad guys. Depending which side you are on is whether you call it privateering or piracy.

There were many sea battles. There was much drinking of rum and debauchery of all kinds. There was the obligatory battles with cannibals that shoot poison darts, a giant squid they called Kraken, a hurricane to beat all hurricanes, overcoming insurmountable odds while facing an enemy who shows no mercy, etc etc.

It was a good fun story that I am surprised Crichton was able to pull off and still write in his own style. Enjoyable and fun.

12. Raditzer

Raditzer - Peter Mathiessen

This was an interesting novel about a few navy recruits in the Pacific during World War II. They are stationed in Hawaii and none are on sea-duty. They all have goofy jobs doing things like landry detail or working in the mess hall. Nothing glamorous. Nothing important. Definately nothing in a combat role. There is a war going on, but this book is not so much about that war as it is about the relationships between the men.

Raditzer is one of those guys who has been alone all his life and has no sense of worth. He compensates for this by being a jerk. He latches onto one or two others and then uses situations to cause strife between them and others. He has no idea what friendship is and definately will never fit in with a military unit where camaraderie and trust are needed.

Needless to say, Raditzer gets a blanket party. He is lucky that is all he got. He was going to be tossed into the ocean by some combat hardened veterans, but his "friend" managed to keep that from happening.

I spent 21 years in the military. I met two or three guys that I remember that reminded me a little of Raditzer. They just didn't seem to fit. They were always on the fringe never quite trusted to be one of the guys who would have your back. They seemed to try and get along and then would do or say something that would destroy all the headway they had made. None of those guys was anywhere near as bad as the Raditzer character in this novel.

11. The Reader

The Reader - Bernhard Schlink

Interesting. I disliked the first part of the book. I really liked the middle. I think the ending was pretty darned good. How is that for a summation?

The beginning: Michael Berg is a fifteen year old German boy during WWII. He meets a woman named Hannah Scmidts who is about thirty years old and works as a conducter on a trolley. He is infatuated with her. They end up being lovers. He reads books to her every day. One day she is just gone. Moved away and Michael has no idea where or why.

Years later: WWII is over. The youth of Germany now condemn the actions of their Nazi parents. Michael is doing a project for college and must attend a trial where some people are on trial that worked at a concentration camp. One of the people is hannah Scmidts. Hannah refuses to defend herself on numerous occasions and is sentenced to life in prison. Michael realizes that the reason Hannah took the fall is that she is illiterate and is more ashamed of that than being convicted.

While Hannah is in prison Michael reads book onto cassette tapes and sends them to Hannah. Never a note or anything. Just the books. Over time Hannah learns to read and write using Michael's tapes and the books from the prison library.

Hannah is freed after serving 18 years. Michael is the only person ever to contact Hannah so the warden asks him to help her in the trasnition. He does. The night before she is released she hangs herself.

Thee is much more to the book as far as interpersonal relationships and the effects people had on each others lives. Twice I was taken by surprise. Once when it was revealed that Hannah was illiterate and all the implications that had on why things happened the way they had in the past as she covered her illiteracy. The other was that Hannah kills herself. It was abrupt and unexpected.

I enjoyed the book. Not at first of course. It was like listening to a kid tell a story about Stiffler's mom. Once Hannah left and the physical relationship ended it was much more interesting. Interesting enough for me to recommend it to you? Nah. Probably not.

95. True Grit

True Grit - Charles Portis

This was an outstanding book with some fascinating characters.

Mattie is a 14 year old girl who's father is killed in Fort Smith, Arkansas and the killer flees into the frontier lands that would later become Oklahoma. She hires a US Marshal, Rooster Cogburn, to hunt the killer down and bring him to justice. A Texas Ranger also gets involved in the hunt because he has been chasing the same man for the murder of a Texas State Senator.

The character or Mattie was awesome. She was a spunky strong-willed girl who would do whatever it takes to get what she needs. She is a shrewd bargainer and haggler. That would all pay off for her later in life as she becomes a well-to-do bank owner.

I chose to read this book now because the remake of the old John Wayne movie based on this book is coming out soon. I want to see that movie. I remember liking the John Wayne version very much. I loved his portrayal of Rooster Cogburn. I wanted to read this book before seeing the new movie because I have a feeling they are going to ruin it. The movie trailers look very violent and dark to me. I am hoping they didn't do the typical Hollywood action adventure tricks to this story.

One thing I am expecting concerns Mattie. Nowhere in this book is there any sexual content. The closest it comes is when she meets LeBoeuf. He says to her something like "I would steal a kiss, but you are very young, and sick, and kind of ugly also." So, there is no sex...but I am willing to bet that somewhere in the new movie one of the bad guys will have have tendencies towards pedophelia and rape. he will be stopped, of course, but I expect something along those lines...and it is not in the book at all.

I recommend this one. I was pleasantly surprized. I will be keeping it on the shelf.

There were a few things that struck me as I was reading that I wish to post here, and then there are some old words that I had to look up.

The first is something that Mattie said while watching prisoners being taken to jail by some Marshals: "You must pay for everything in this world one way or another. There is nothing free except the Grace of God. You can not earn that or deserve it."

And then there was this one where Rooster was telling Mattie how he decided to accept that the North won the Civil War... "I've swallowed the puppy." I have no idea what that means.

SAT WORDS:

SANGUINARY AMBUSCADE: An attack from a concealed position with much bloodshed.

PETTIFOGGING: Bickering or quibbling over unimportant matters. To carry on a shifty law business.

PROBITY: Integrity and uprightness, honesty.

FETTLE: A state or condition of being.

BEEVES: beef

DEPREDATIONS: The act of preying upon or plundering, robbery, ravage

60. Things Fall Apart

Things Fall Apart - Chinua Achebe

Here is one of those book sitting on the shelf because I should have read it in school, long long ago. I never did. It has been waiting for me to "catch up". I chose to read it at this time because I was looking for something written by a foreign writer and I had put it on my list of books to be read this year. It killed two birds with one stone and gave me a sense of getting something done other than just reading a book.


This book has been reviewed and analyzed a thousand times. I don't need to cover all that again. I will say that it impressed me with its ability to portray the conflict when two societies come together. One dominates the other and it causes a lot of strife. Just being different does not make one wrong.

Something else that struck me was the character Okonkwo. He was a strong man who dealt with all of life’s problems from the position of never showing weakness and himself winning all battles. This outlook on life broke up many of his relationships with friends and family. It may have gained him respect, but that respect was short-lived. The broken relationships with people he should have cared about lasted forever. I felt sorry for him.

I think the best part of reading this book had nothing to do with the writing. I was reading it at work and asked a friend how to pronounce the author's first name. This co-worker is an immigrant from Ghana. He saw the book and got a huge smile. He said it took him back 25 years to his high school days. He was relating lots of stories about his experiences growing up in Ghana. Those were awesome.

Then he asked why I was reading this book. I told him it was one of the books that are suggested all high school students read, but I never did. I am making up for lost time. He was surprised to hear that American high school students read African authors. He did not even know anyone had heard of Achebe in America. He was pleased. I was pleased. That is much better than fighting and then hanging myself from a tree.

57. The Sky Unwashed

The Sky Unwashed - Irene Zabytko

This book was outstanding. It is the story of a Ukrainian widow, Marusia Petrenko and her family. They lived in the small village of Starylis near Chernobyl. The story is about their lives and the effects of the nuclear power plant disaster on the family and the lives of their friends.

Marusia lives in a small home in an agricultural village. Her son, Yurko, daughter-in-law, Zosia, and two grandchildren live in the same home. They live a simple life. She is a retired widow. Yurko and Zosia both work at the power plant. Yorko is at work the night of the explosion and does not come home for three days afterward.

The first part of the book is pre-disaster. It is meant to give you a feel for their way of life and to get to know the characters and the other townsfolk. The author did a fantastic job with this aspect of the book. Building the characters was done excellently.

The book does not dwell on the actual disaster at all. It does not take you to the plant and describe the problems there other than a brief moment when Zosia tried to go to work and turned back. The disaster is not what the story is meant to be about. It is about the effects of that catastrophe on the lives of these people.

Descriptions of the way the air changed, the taste and smell, were outstanding. They knew something was wrong days before they were told about the problem. The evacuation of the village and the time spent as refugees was heartwrenching. The problems this family encountered and the changes to all of them made me feel for them in ways I rarely have for any charachter in a book.

I want to write about the things that happened to these people, but I won't. I do not want to ruin the book for other readers. I recommend you read it when and if you find a copy.

Was this an exciting, edge of the seat kind of book? No. Was it full of surprises and unexpected plot? No. Did I learn more about the Chernobyl disaster? No. So, why recommend it? This story was about people and the effect on them and thier way of life when something beyond their control changed the world. That story was awesome.

I lived in a village much like Starylis is described. I lived thier for a month while adopting our daughter. The town was called Sakhnovshchina. The people led simple lives and it was centered around agriculture. This story took place in 1986 and the years following. My visit was in 2006. Twenty years later, but much of the way of life what was written about was still happening. The people were happy, but it was a hard life. I envied them in some ways. That experience changed my perspective. This book brought back many of those memories and for that I am thankful.

34. Darkness At Noon

Darkness at Noon - Arthur Koestler

This book is definitely not for everyone. It is very political. It is very psychological. It is very philosophical. It is unlike any book I have read in the past.


From the opening line the narration is gloomy and dark. What could be cheerful about a man who has spent his life supporting a revolution which has now turned against him? The very first line in the book sets the tone for the entire 216 pages. "THE CELL DOOR SLAMMED BEHIND RUBASHOV." It was written all in caps for some reason that I failed to grasp.

The entire story is actually the interrogation and trial of a man named Rubashov. He has spent his life promoting and loving the post revolutionary political system of Communist Russia. I do not specifically recall them saying it was Russia or communist, but that is quite obviously the scenario. They even have a leader who is definitely Stalin, but he is never named and is only called “Number 1” throughout the book.

The story almost entirely takes place in the prison cell and interrogation rooms where Rubashov discusses his beliefs and convictions as he works through his current dilemma and how it fits in with his past.

The book is full of political theory, ideology, and what should be considered socially moral. Rubashov is forced to use his own beliefs against himself. He has spent his life making logical arguments concerning the greater good of society outweighing the needs of an individual. He is lead to come to the “logical” conclusion that he should confess to numerous crimes for which he is not-guilty in order for the Party to maintain it’s prominence.

Though it is never plainly stated that we are discussing Marxism or socialism, it is that type of society being described. Rubashov had lead the revolution in order to free the people in order to pursue a utopian society and has conflicts within himself about whether that society being lead by a dictator that forcefully suppresses any opposition is acceptable. Do the “ends justify the means”? Is the ultimate socialist goal worth accepting a brutal totalitarian leader?

I think the most fascinating part of this book is near the end. After Rubashov confesses and the trial is over he is waiting in his cell. He is waiting for his own execution. He has spent his time in this cell contemplating his life and occasionally having “conversations” with is neighbors using the “tap” system of communication. When he is in his cell at this point he taps a single word. He taps this on a wall where he knows he has no neighbor. The one word is “I”. He types “I” twice. That is all.

Why is this so interesting to me? Rubashov has spent his entire life promoting the Party. He has said the individual is insignificant compared to society. Yet, when it came to the end what was important. Was it a realization that the individual is all he really has? Something along those lines anyway. I just found it interesting that he tapped that word.

SAT Word Alert:
SCROFULOUS: morally degenerate; corrupt

AGUE: a fit of fever or shivering or shaking chills, accompanied by malaise, pains in the bones and joints, etc.; chill.

PERFIDY: deliberate breach of faith or trust; faithlessness; treachery

QUIXOTISM: An idea or act that is caught up in the romance of noble deeds and the pursuit of unreachable goals; idealistic without regard to practicality.

I enjoyed this book, but it took me a while to finish it. I guess life happened. Spring came and I went outside. The yard looks better. The vegetable garden is planted. The chickens are happy. We went on vacation to the beach for a few days. All that stuff happened and I did not read. Whatever. It isn’t like I broke the law or anything. I just took a while to finish this book. Why would I even think that it matters? Maybe I am crazy. 

33. Austerlitz

Austerlitz - W. G. Sebald

This is an interesting story written in a very unique style. It was originally published in German in 2001.

The narrator throughout the book relates the story of Jacques Austerlitz, an architectural historian he meets at a train station in Antwerp, Belgium. They first meet in the 1960's. The story unfolds through a series of meetings over the following four decades at which Austerlitz reveals a bit more of the story to the narrator, who in turn tells us.

The story is about Jacques, who until he was 15 years old thought he was Dafyyd Elias, the son of a Calvinist preacher living in Wales. At fifteen his parents have both died and his school tells him his real name is Jacques Austerlitz, but they no nothing more.

This school has a history teacher who is a Napoleon buff and one day is relating the story of his battle at Austerlitz. Jacques then has a direction to begin his search for where he is from and who he really is.

Over the following decades the two fellows meet at railway stations, libraries, museums and numerous other historical places in Germany, England, Paris and Prague. Jacques relays his findings as he discovers he was sent to Wales on a Kindertransport from Prague before the Nazis took over the city. He then went to Prague where he searched archives for people with his name in hopes of finding a trail to follow. He ends up discovering a woman who knew him as a child and was close friends with his mother and father.

He finds out they were never married and went separate directions during the war. His mother was taken to a Jewish Ghetto community in Germany. His father went to Paris.

He follows these leads and eventually finds that his mother died in a concentration camp during the holocaust and that his father left Paris after the war headed to the Pyrennes mountains. Nobody knows where is has gone from there and he is never found.

The story itself is good. The reason I liked this book so much was the way it was written. It is probably the most descriptive book I have ever read. While reading, I kept thinking this author was painting with words. It was that clear a picture that I got as he described a room or a building or a bird or a woman's hat or a seemingly endless array of details. Normally this type of descriptiveness just annoys me. It is just wordy and unnecessary. Sebald makes it beautiful somehow and not dull or repetitive. I kept thinking about Walden while reading this book. Thoreau was very descriptive. Sometimes too descriptive. Sebald reminded me of that level of writing without being annoying.

This is an amazing book well worth the read.

19. Memoirs of a Geisha

Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden

This was another foray into the audio books. I worked the last three days and then had to drive half way across South Carolina today. Needless to say, the book was listened to for hours on end.

I liked it. I really hated Hatsumomo and her manipulative and cruel ways.

I liked Mameha very much. She was what a big sister should be like, though later it was revealed that she did not do this on her own. It was a request from the Chairman. I did get the feeling that Mameha didn't mind taking care of her little sister, so it was still all good.

I can't say that I was thrilled with the whole book. It was kind of like reading a chic book, but it was better than that. It was good, but it was not thrilling. The insights into the Japanese culture, especially one prior to World War II, were very interesting and I enjoyed that a lot.

73. All Quiet on the Western Front

All Quiet On The Western Front - Erich Maria Remarque

I read it. It took forever because I was busier than I have ever been in my life this last five weeks or so.

So busy in fact that I don't even feel like blogging about this book.

It was very good. War sucks.

59. S.

S. : A Novel About the Balkans - Slavenka Drakulic

This is a very interesting novel about events that took place during the war in Bosnia. It has nothing to do with Americans or American involvement. This book is written to expose the mass rape and torture of women by occupying forces.

I work with a man that is from Bosnia. He and his family were refugees and came to America. They are Muslim, and were the target of the genocide taking place at the time. He has told me stories of when he was in Sarajevo trying to escape with his family. Those stories of having no food or water while seeing the city was surrounded by tanks in the hills will always stay with me. He witnessed many horrifying events. I will never forget him or his stories about that time.

He is the reason I picked up this book. Slavenka Drakulic picked up where my friends stories left off. He would not have the first hand knowledge of what happened to women after they were taken away from the villages and put into camps. Drakulic wrote about that aspect of the war.

The story was just graphic enough to give you a thorough sense of the humiliation these people underwent. The purpose of what was happening to them was not about the pleasure for the men or to hurt the women. It was entirely about humiliating them and killing their souls. The Muslim women would be shunned for being raped. They would no longer be welcome in their own society. Public humiliation and mass rape made it clear to all who had been raped and who had not. I can only hope that the Muslim community in Bosnia has not shunned these women as Milosevic's army expected.

The characters in the book do not have names. They are called by either a title or by an initial. S. K. N. H. The Captain. Soldier. etc etc. No names for anyone. I think this is done to emphasize how the women become something other than the person whom they used to be. Once a captive, Jane Smith the school teacher from everytown USA would just be J. Why? Because she is not free. She owns nothing. She controls nothing. She can not control even her own body. She would become the property of, well, not even a person or a government. She would be the property of all the men who wish to do their bidding. Perhaps she lives. Perhaps she dies. It makes no difference because there are plenty of other "playthings" to choose from next time. It is very very sad.

One interesting aspect of this book was that S. got pregnant. She spent a lot of time reflecting on whether to give the child up for adoption or to raise it herself. For her whole pregnancy she looked at the life growing within her as a parasite or a tumor. Once the child was born she did not want anything to do with him...and at this time there was a lot of insight to her thought process.

Was it better for this boy to be raised by an adoptive family and have no idea who he was or how he was conceived? Was it better to raise him herself and make up a story about a father despite not knowing which one of many men it could have been? Was it better to raise him and tell him the truth about the rape and how she hated him while he was inside her?

There was no good solution to this problem. Lying to the child would probably make things seem better, but cause problems for him in other ways. To tell the truth might cause him to hate people he otherwise would not have...and I believe this is what influenced her decision. If he hated the Serbian people then perhaps he would seek revenge.

This book is very sad and made me angry at points. It is about war. It is about the evil things people can do to other people. I think all groups of people are capable of doing these things. Even here in America, where we like to pretend we are so noble. I think if there was an enemy right here doing some stuff to us we did not like that we would do evil things right back to them. I do not think our government would set up a situation like in Bosnia. I do think that the citizens would do many things beyond the control of our government. Maybe not to the extent of this book, but it could get pretty ugly real fast.

I am rambling now. Bed time. :-)

52. The Things They Carried

The Things They Carried - Tim O'Brien

This was a fascinating book to read and is probably the best writing I have ever read concerning the Vietnam War. Yes, the subject matter is the war, and therefore it can be quite disturbing at times, but that is not what the guts of this book is about.

This is written to inform the reader about how the war affected the author and his friends. What were they thinking? What were they feeling? Why did they react the way they did in given situations? What were the reasons for the soldiers having problems in life afterward?

It gets into the head of the soldier in a way I have never experienced. It shows how the defense mechanisms in a man's mind that are used for survival can be seen as making them hard, uncaring, and without feeling. The people who are not in the same position could never understand what happened in that war. They could not feel the depth of fear and confusion and how life becomes a moment to moment survival on a physical, psychological and emotional level.

Writing this blog is difficult. I can't describe the writing without giving examples of why I liked it so much. I don't want to give examples because it will detract from the future readers experience. That is a good word for it. I did not READ this book. I EXPERIENCED this book.

It is an amazing book. I loved it. I recommend it to all.
Mike, it will be in the mail soon. It is definitely worth the time to read.

51. Chernobyl

Chernobyl - Frederik Pohl

This novel took a real world event and fictionalized it. Is fictionalized a word?

I have read a lot about what happened at Chernobyl. This book kept the facts straight for the most part. Things like the dates, the timeline, the causes, the reactions, all seemed to be on par with what actually happened in those days that grabbed the worlds attention.

That was all key to the story, but it was not the story. This book was about the people. Granted, they were fictional people, but what they were doing was actually done by real living breathing human beings.

The main characters in this book are the deputy director of the power plant and his family, an engineer who works with the water systems in the plant and his family, a few power plant operators, a fireman, an army private, and the Government of the USSR.

We follow all these characters as the disaster unfolds. Some turn out to be heroes. Some end up being chumps. Some live. Some die. We get to know their families, their motivations for doing what they do, and their shortcomings. They end up seeming like they could be real people.

Aftasia Smin was one of my favorite characters. She was an 86 year old woman, born in 1900. She was a hero of the first world war. She was a wounded combat veteran, and a generally feisty old lady with power and respect even all those years later. She told stories of the Stalin days a few times. On one occasion there was a side trip she took some relatives on to the Babi Yar site in Kiev. This is a location where the Nazis murdered 100,000 Ukrainian Jews (and others) during WWII. There was a lengthy speech given by her that explained the history of the place. This has nothing to do with the Chernobyl story, but I am glad it was there. It seems that Babi Yar gets overlooked when looking at atrocities around the globe. This brought it to my attention again, and then I can blog about it and bring it to yours. It happened.

While reading this book I constantly thought of Elena Filitova and the documentary films she has made in the restricted zone. She has visited the Chernobyl power plant, the town of Pripyat. Visit this website for more info. Thanks for sending it to me so many years ago Mike. http://www.kiddofspeed.com/ Make sure you check out the link called Elena Revisits Chernobyl and watch the Ghost Town video.

The Chernobyl power plant, reactor number 4.The town of Pripyat, Ukraine. It has been abandoned since 1986.

46. One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich

One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich - Alexander SolzhenitsynОдин день Ивана Денисовича

This has become one of my favorite books. It was a fascinating story and very well written. I understood and empathized with the characters. I could feel the frustrations and sadness within their souls. It made me want to reach out to them, despite their being fictional characters from a half century ago. Silly me.

The story is set in a Soviet prison camp (Gulag) in the 1950's. Ivan Denisovich Shukov is serving a 10 year sentence for being a German spy, which is a confession made to avoid his own execution. There are many men serving the same types of sentences.

This story is set in the Stalin era. The abuses of the Soviet people at that time were numerous. For one, the Ukrainian Holodomyr of the 1930's, is something I have learned quite a bit about.

This book is quite dramatic and is a testament to the abuses and repression perpetrated on the Soviet people by Stalin. This being the case, it is amazing that it was ever published within the Soviet Union. Why did that occur? Kruschev was in power at the time. He personally approved the publication of this story because he wanted to show the evils of the Stalin regime. He wanted the people to back his new government leaders (the politburo, etc). So, Kruschev allowed this story to be published in "Novy Mir" (New World), a Soviet literary magazine known to be progressive. The book includes a forward written by the editor of Novy Mir that warns the readers of the political volatility and the nature of what they were about to read. To us Americans, the story would be no big deal. To the Soviets, this type of story was unheard of.

The entire story takes place in one average day Ivan Denisovich spends in a prison camp somewhere in Siberia. This day is exactly like any other. There is nothing special on this day. That is what is so moving about the story. This exact same thing happens every day for ten years. There is nothing special. Just doing time and trying to survive each day as best you can.

The last few paragraphs of this book summed up the simplicity that takes over life when one is just trying to survive. I would imagine this is what it would be like to hope you can keep hope alive within your life.

"Shukov went to sleep fully content. He'd had many strokes of luck that day: they hadn't put him in the cells; they hadn't sent his squad to the settlement; he'd swiped a bowl of kasha at dinner; the squad leader had fixed the rates well; he'd built a wall and enjoyed doing it; he'd smuggled that bit of hacksaw blade through; he'd earned favor from Tsezar that evening; he'd bought that tobacco. And he hadn't fallen ill. He'd got over it.
A day without a dark cloud. Almost a happy day.
There were three thousand six hundred and fifty-three days like that in his stretch. From the first clang of the rail to the last clang of the rail.
Three thousand six hundred and fifty-three days.
The three extra days were for leap years."

Almost a HAPPY day? That is how far down the hole these men are. I felt sorrow for their daily plight and I truly felt like rejoicing at the smallest of "victories" during Ivan's day.

Read it!

38. A Farewell To Arms

A Farewell To Arms - Ernest Hemingway

This is supposed to be "The best American novel to emerge out of World War I". My sister-in-law says she loved this book. It is written by Hemingway. This is the same guy who wrote "The Sun Also Rises", "For Whom The Bell Tolls", and "The Old Man and the Sea". (None of which have I read) I had high expectations for this book.

I was let down. Was it because I expected more? Was it because the book just was not that good? I am not really sure, but probably the former.

My observations...Frederic Henry and Catherine Barkley are quite irritating when they are together. "Do you love me?" "Yes, I love you." Do you really love me?" "Yes, I really love you." "Are you sure I am not unlovable?" "I love you just like you are." "Are you sure?"..... oh just shut the hell up! This type of interaction drove me crazy.

What I think was really going on is that Frederic and Catherine wanted to be in love so badly that they made themselves believe they were in love, but really had no idea. They secluded themselves and convinced themselves they loved each other, and then acted according to what they thought people in love should act like.

I worked through this book.

I enjoyed the parts where Frederic was "retreating" from the front and then escaping/deserting to get back to Catherine. That was pretty interesting.

The descriptions of the places, the scenery, the mountains, the lakes, the train, etc, were very good. The people on the other hand, not so much for me.

Oh...and these guys (the male characters) and really just a bunch of womanizing drunkards. They were constantly drinking.

Does it really rain that much in Italy?

Read it if you want. It is Hemingway. I will try "The Sun Also Rises", but my expectations will not be as great the next time.

Moving on now.... :-)

15. One Thousand White Women

One Thousand White Women, The Journals of May Dodd - Jim Fergus

I took a while to read this book because life happened. It had nothing to do with the book. I really enjoyed reading it.

The story is formed mostly through a series of journal entries. The protagonist is a white woman from Chicago. She has volunteered to take part in a two year government program where white women are to become brides to Cheyenne Indians, live with the Cheyennes, and to have mixed race babies. Does that sound far fetched and stupid? It sounded pretty darned stupid to me.

Then I found that the way it was all stitched together made the story believable. Not probable, but believable anyway.

I have no idea whether this is true or not, but the author's note at the beginning of the book says the inspiration for the novel was from an actual historical event. He says that "in 1854 at a peace conference at Fort Laramie, a prominent Northern Cheyenne chief requested of the US Army authorities the gift of one thousand white women as brides for his young warriors. Because theirs is a matrilineal society in which all children born belong to the mother's tribe, this seemed to the Cheyennes to be the perfect means of assimilation into the white man's world."

The author took liberties with and greatly expanded upon that incident. I can imagine the laughter from the Army at the time. No way in hell would that be allowed to happen.

Well...it does happen in the book. May Dodd is one of the brides. Her story is fascinating. The descriptions of the "savage" way of life is quite revealing. Yes, they repeatedly call the Indians savages. It is not a politically correct book. That is on purpose.

I found this book to be very interesting. The interactions between the different brides, the brides and the warriors, the brides and the squaws, the Army and the Cheyenne people, all very interesting. The relationships between Catholics, Protestants and others were interesting.

Some of the characters were a real pisser. The Kelly twins and their Irish accent and street wise ways. Gretchen, a large and very strong Swiss woman with another heavy accent who marries a lazy and fearful guy who she "controls" in some humorous ways. Euphemia, a black "white" woman who is an escaped slave and is an amazing story in her progression to becoming a warrior herself. There were more than a dozen different characters that were well developed and I got a sense of who they really were.

I very much enjoyed this book. Some of the subject matter, the events of the book, are pretty unsettling (war, raids, racism, sexism, etc) but the book was a lot of fun to read.

I think the thing I liked the most about the book were the descriptions of the land, the wildlife, the places. I could see it. I could smell it. I could imagine it. It made me long for it...and made me wonder if that was the place Chris McCandless was seeking. I imagine it was.

12. The Jungle

The Jungle by Upton Sinclair

This book is categorized as political and historical fiction. There are good reasons why.

The book is credited with being a catalyst for real change. It is very rare when a work of fiction creates a real-world problem to be corrected. Published in 1906 and revealing the "wage slavery" and corruption within the meat packing industry, this book literally caused an uproar in America. This book put the disgusting practices of the industry in a public form and people reacted. Sales of American meat took a nosedive following publication. People were scared of eating diseased meat. The meat packing industry ended up lobbying the federal government to help them show the world that the meat was safe. This lobby and the public outcry are why President Theodore Roosevelt initiated an investigation that led to the passage of the Meat Inspection Act and the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906 (which later became the FDA).

"I aimed at the publics heart, and by accident I hit it in the stomach."

The quote above is what Mr. Sinclair says about the reaction to his book. Why did he say this? Upton Sinclair was an outspoken Socialist Journalist. He was a muckraker extraordinaire. He had an agenda and he pushed that agenda all of his life (into the 1960's). His point in writing this book was not to fix the meat packing industry. His point was to show the ungodly working and living conditions of the people. His goal was to have the workers organize and promote a Socialist agenda. The public reaction didn't really care about that at all. They cared deeply about the meat on their own tables being safe. I think the quote is very appropriate.

The story itself is about a Lithuanian immigrant family that comes to Chicago in pursuit of the American dream. The story is a never ending stream of misery and misfortune. Try as they might, these poor people keep falling down again and again. The system is designed to make them feel like they have a chance. Just enough of a chance to try. To try very hard. The problem is that they really never have a chance from the very start. It is made for them to perpetually lose.

From the very beginning I felt bad for these people. Time after time I would think, yes, that is the direction you should take...do that...and they would. Time after time there was something that happened and caused them to be even worse than they were before. There were times when I physically had a tear in my eye. (Damn you Upton Sinclair!)

So, life sucks repeatedly, until Jurgis (the main character) is exposed to and joins the Socialist party. Well, isn't that just amazing how nothing goes bad from that point. Life is wonderful and everything just happens to fall in place. Yeah, right. The last 80 pages or so of the book is really a very ling dissertation about the strengths of Socialism. Amazingly, while reading it I thought it sounded really good. What a wonderful idea. Yes, that makes sense. But, I know it is missing parts that are really needed for the system to work.

Mr. Sinclair wrote this whole misery and agony novel in order to show the reasons why Socialism was a better option. He exposed more than just bad business policy in the meat packing industry. He showed the real truth about how the businesses, governments, big company trusts (oil, railroad, coal, etc) colluded to hold men down, and much more. The American people got pissed about dirty meat, acted on that, and then chose to mostly ignore the rest.

The book was a good read. Sometimes, I felt like I was reading a very long article in a newspaper. That makes sense because Sincalir was a journalist for the now defunct Socialist paper Appeal to Reason. It went into very graphic detail throughout the entire book. It was descriptive enough to give me a mental image of everything described.

My only problem with the book (besides the conclusion dragging on and on about the benefits of Socialism) was all the Lithuanian names (Jurgis, Ona, Elzbieta, Marija, Jokubus, Jadvyaga, Tamoszius, etc etc). They were difficult to follow because they were unfamiliar. It took a while to get them all straight. Other than that it was a damned good book and I am glad I read it.

PS...I am not going to argue the pros and cons of Socialism in this blog.

8. Property

Property by Valerie Martin

This is yet another used book store find. This one I took off the shelf because of the cover photo. When I read the description on the back cover I thought I had never read anything like that, so why not give it a try. On the front cover was a blurb that said "This fresh, unsentimental look at what slave owning does to (and for) one's interior life must be a first." This book was about the effects of owning slaves, not being a slave.

The book's back cover description said "Valerie Martin's Property delivers an eerily mesmerizing inquiry into slavery's venomous effects on the owner and the owned. The year is 1828, the setting a Louisiana sugar plantation where Manon Gaudet- pretty, bitterly intelligent, and monstrously self-absorbed- seethes under the dominion of her boorish husband. In particular she resents his relationship with her slave Sarah, who is both his victim and his mistress" It sounded interesting, and it was written by a female author, so I took it home.

It is an easy read. Manon is the narrator. She is miserable in her life. There is nothing she likes. Everyone and everything has faults, except her deceased father, he is help up as the standard for everyone else. That is until she realizes he was like all the rest. She is completely absorbed in herself and her own world. Everything is about what is good for her, what she wants, and what she likes. She hates her husband. She hates her slaves. She hates the other farmers. She wishes more than once that her husband would die...and then there is a slave uprising.

Then there is the empathetic look at this book. Manon is a woman in the early 1800s. She has no rights. She is completely dependent upon a man she hardly knew when they were married. She has no safety net. She is stuck and scared and worried all the time. She sees the debt mounting at the plantation and knows her husband has indebted them to bankruptcy. Would anyone be "self-absorbed" when their thoughts are always about self-preservation? Probably.

This book has lots of fun things. Stuff like cholera, yellow fever, hangings, beheadings, murder, manipulation, rape, bounty hunters, bastard mulatto children, etc.

Word Alert:

vetiver: the long, fibrous, aromatic roots of an East Indian grass, Vetiveria zizanioides, used for making hangings and screens and yielding an oil used in perfumery.

epistolary: contained in or carried on by letters: an epistolary friendship.

manumission: To free from slavery or bondage; emancipate.

This was a very quick read. The book is 193 pages and it flows easily. It gives a little insight into what life may have been like in New Orleans and the surrounding area in 1828, thought I believe if it was like that all the time the people would have moved away. That is one more reason to think that Manon is just a very negative person.

Slaughterhouse-Five - Kurt Vonnegut - Dec 08

Hmmm...is this another science fiction novel that I say I like but I also say I don't like science fiction novels? Maybe I do like science fiction novels.

Anyway, this one I read very quickly. Why? Because I wanted to know what happened next. I have always felt that if I wanted to know what happened next then the story must be good. This one was very good and had me hooked from the beginning.

Time travel from World War II POW camps in Dresden to small towns in upstate New York to the people in the zoo on the planet Tralfamadore. All of these things happening not in turn, but simultaneously.... very interesting.

Everything that ever did or ever will happen is happening all at once and all the time and always will be and... ummm.... my brain hurts.